Stormy Waters: Book 10 in The Dar & Kerry Series (8 page)

"Hi." Tally gave Dar a brief smile. "Um, Kerry...listen, you really, really, really got the stripes mad about this room here." He indicated the space. "It's the Purser's office."

Kerry perched on the corner of one sad old desk. "And?"

"Ah." Dar scratched her jaw. "Pursers kind of run everything, Ker."

Tally turned on Dar with a grateful look. "You've been on ships?"

"Not this kind." Dar managed a half grin. "But yeah, enough to know the politics." She got up and put her hands on her hips. "But the problem is Kerry's right. We'll need about this much space for the system your owner wants."

Tally looked just aghast. "But the old system just fit under Drucilla's desk there." He pointed. "Honest!"

"Okay, let me give you some idea here." Kerry stood up. "First, we're going to put in two big switches about like this." She spread her arms out to either side, then raised one and lowered the other. "And like this."

Obviously lost, Tally merely nodded.

"And then, two racks of computer equipment about twice the width of a refrigerator and about that tall." Kerry added. "And that doesn't even include all the space for cables."

Tally sighed and sat on the desk. "I don't know what we're going to do. They won't give up this space; I'll tell you that right now. They've been talking for a month about how it's going to be redone." He looked around in a worried sort of way. "It's the biggest office on the ship."

Kerry paused in mid-step and peered around her. Then she looked at Dar.

"Okay." Dar said. "Then we'll give you the space this stuff's going to need, and your people can tell us where they want us to put it. We can't shrink any of it. It's just the size it is." She walked to the wall, glancing back to see another figure in the doorway. She took a marker from her pocket and drew an X. "The racks are from here." She made another mark. "To here. That's for the servers. Then the network core is here." She drew a large box on the wall. "To here."

"Why do we need all that?" The newcomer asked.

"Oh, hi Drucilla." Tally said.

"Your boss wants it." Dar told her. "Add this for consoles and monitoring stations. And you get this much space." With a flourish, she drew on the rest of the back wall, and then took six big steps into the center of the room. "Out to here."

"That's ridiculous." Drucilla came into the room. "We don't need all that! We work just fine with what we have, that NCR register system and my machine." She pointed at the drawing. "We don't have room for all that! What's it for, anyway?"

"Point of sale. Email. Computers for everyone. Interactive television, IP phones, and internet." Kerry ticked off things on her fingers.

"On here? You surely are joking."

"Nope." Dar went over to Kerry and leaned her arm on the smaller woman's shoulder. "I'm not. We've been asked by your company to put that," she indicated the wall, "in here. Now, if you don't want to give up this space, you need to get together and decide where you want to put our stuff."

"Oh, my god." The woman put her hand on her head. "This is insanity. I have to go." She turned and left.

Kerry and Dar exchanged glances, and then they both looked at Tally.

"Internet?" Tally's eyebrows quirked up. "Really?"

"Now, here's a guy with the right priorities." Kerry chuckled. "C'mon, Dar. Let me show you the rest of it."

Dar stepped carefully over a piece of rotted, rolled up carpet as she followed them out, suspecting the rest of the tour was only going to roll rapidly downhill.

"SO THAT'S IT." Kerry stood on the very back deck of the boat alone with Dar after their tour. It was dark now, and the less than soothing cantaloupe colored lights of the pier lit everything around them and washed the stars almost clean out of the sky. "What do you think?"

Dar cautiously tested the railing before she leaned against it. "I think it's going to be a Mongolian cluster fuck." She replied, crossing her arms. "No matter how we do it there isn't enough space." She ticked off a finger. "Enough cableways..." She ticked another finger. "Or enough patience in my body to deal with all these frustrated sea dogs who make my father look liberal."

"Hmm? Kerry joined her at the rail and looked over. The salt water lapped gently at the rusting metal, making little swirling sucking noises as it curled around a jagged edge. "So. What are you saying that we don't do it?"

Dar exhaled heavily.

"Dar, nothing says everything we do has to be easy." Kerry poked her gently. "It's a challenge. Isn't that what you told me sometime forever ago?"

"Yeah, I know." Dar grimaced wryly. "C'mon. Let's go home."

Kerry followed her as Dar led the way around the back of the ship toward the gangway. It was dark on the exterior with only a few of the windows lit from within here on the upper decks.

A cruise ship moved past in the channel and the ship rocked slightly in its wake. The creaks and groans from the old structure were not in any way comforting, and Kerry wondered in her heart if Dar wasn't really right after all.

Was there a point to all this? Could Quest really be meaning to take these old hulks and put them back in service with modern customers that are used to every sophistication?

Kerry turned her head and regarded the passing modern cruise liner. It was all glass and shiny metal, as far from their poor, rusting hull as could be. Four or five decks taller, and half again the width of the ship she was on, the differences were so striking she had to wonder in truth what the hell they were thinking.

She shook her head a little as they walked off the ship giving the guard a nod as they traded the gentle motion of the ship for the stillness of the concrete walkway. "I don't know." Kerry pointed at the cracks she'd noticed on the way in. "I think that ship's in better shape than this pier."

Dar inspected the cracks, then walked to the railing and jumped up and down several times experimentally.

"Dar!" Kerry squawked.

Dar chuckled, and moved on. "Relax," she said. "There's rebar all in there. It's not going..." Dar paused, and went to the rail again, leaning against it as she watched the pier below. "Ah."

Kerry went to her side and peered past her shoulder. "Oh ho." She recognized Shari's form pacing on the concrete outside their ship. "Should we say something?"

"Nu uh." Dar drew back into the shadows of the walkway and pulled Kerry with her. They stood in silence as their nemesis strolled along the side of the ship examining it.

"Dar?" Kerry whispered.

"Mm?" Dar put an arm around her, resting her cheek against Kerry's head.

"Does the fact I want to shove her in front of Majesty of the Seas over there mean I'm going to hell?" Kerry wondered. "What's she up to, just checking the boat out?"

"Ship," Dar said. "Yeah, not much else she can do from down there. Hatch is closed." She pointed at the hull. "Maybe she's seeing what we got versus what they got?"

As if to confirm it, Shari reached the end of the pier, then she turned and wandered back, apparently losing interest in the vessel. Dar and Kerry turned and walked along even with her unseen in the shadows until Shari passed the end of the ship and they were at the end of the walkway.

Shari stopped and looked back, putting her hands on her hips before shaking her head and continuing on down the pier toward the ship Telegenics had been assigned. By freak chance, it was in the slip right behind theirs, and Dar wondered suddenly if they hadn't been spotted on the aft deck while they were talking.

But why would Shari bother to come out on the docks for that? Dar dismissed the idea, and steered Kerry back through the doors toward the escalator. It still wasn't working so they plodded down it in amiable silence, their footsteps alerting the guard stationed at the office below.

"Hello?" The guard came out into the area at the end of the escalator, one hand on his hip.

"Just us." Dar waved a hand at him. "Roberts and Stuart causing trouble as usual."

The man's hand dropped and he smiled, returning the wave. "Oh, hi ma'am's," he said, obviously relieved. "Sorry, forgot you were up there." He waited for them to get down to his level. "I've had some of the crew out there try to get in, trying to get free phone calls, I guess."

Kerry patted the guard on the shoulder as she walked past. "Hang in there," she said. "We'll get something a little better set up for you guys soon. This is pretty Antarctic."

The man went back to his metal folding chair and sat down picking up his book and opening it. "No problem, ma'am. We'll survive."

Dar and Kerry walked through the outer room toward the front doors the silence of the big building broken only by their footsteps and the air conditioning units cycling on. "This is a pretty grungy place to have people go on a luxurious cruise ship, huh?" Kerry commented.

"Eh. No worse than most of the airport." Dar shrugged, pushing open the outer door and holding it for Kerry to pass through.

It was very dark outside and they both paused as several shadowy figures near the edge of the building stirred and looked their way as they came out. There were trees next to the pier doors, and the area apparently appealed to the homeless who were camped beneath them.

Kerry's heartbeat picked up slightly, but the men merely turned back around and continued their conversation not interested in them at all. She felt a little irritated at herself for the assumption of bad intent and acknowledged she had a way to go to erase her upbringing.

It was odd, those little unconscious biases that poked up from time to time. She liked to think of herself as a fair minded person, but she'd found that sometimes she just hadn't had the right experiences to be able to take away things picked up from so many years of living in the family environment she had.

It bothered her. She'd realized when she'd worked with the girls at the church that their lives were, to a large extent, alien to hers and she wondered just how much in touch with them she'd really been.

"Ker?"

Dar's voice startled her. Kerry looked quickly up to find the scattered moonlight reflecting off Dar's pale eyes. "Yeees?"

"You got quiet."

"Just thinking." Kerry sighed. "Long day."

Dar stuck her hands in her pockets. "Well, I offered not to come down here," she said. "Only made it longer, and I doubt I helped your plan any."

All thoughts of equality and WASP sensibilities flew out of Kerry's head. She took hold of her partner's arm and stopped pulling Dar to a halt as well. "Why do you keep saying stuff like that? Don't you want to be a part of this?"

They were only a few feet from their cars, Dar having parked right next to her in the now empty lot. It didn't seem to be a good place for a discussion, but going anywhere meant they'd have to separate, and Kerry really wanted to hear the answer to her question before they parted. "Dar?"

Dar twitched a half shrug that ended in her lifting her free hand and letting it fall. "Honestly? No."

Kerry exhaled, caught a bit by surprise. She thought a moment on the answer, and then decided maybe she wasn't surprised after all. "Because of how tough the job on the ship is going to be?'

"No." Dar turned and went over to Kerry's car, leaning against it and crossing her legs at the ankles. "I just don't want any part of Telegenics." She studied the tarmac, most of it cracked and weed ridden.

Kerry joined her, leaning on the car right next to her, their shoulders brushing. "Oh." She murmured. "I thought you were kinda past that."

Dar shrugged.

Kerry really couldn't think of much to say after that. She kicked herself a little for not spotting Dar's reluctance before and realized maybe she'd been deliberately ignoring those not so subtle hints.

Finally, she sighed again. "Guess we'd better go home." She pulled her keys out and chirped the door to her car open. "Anyway, thanks for coming out and giving me your insights. They really did help."

Dar remained leaning against Kerry's car, watching under half lowered eyelids as Kerry eased past.

Since the cars were parked next to each other it meant Kerry had to pick her way carefully, placing her feet down between Dar's extended ones. She brushed her lightly and put a hand on her stomach for balance as she scooted by.

Dar reached out and captured the hand holding it. She waited for Kerry to turn and face her, then blinked in surprise when she simply leaned against her, patting her side in silence. "I'm becoming a chickenshit," she murmured. "Sorry, Ker."

"It's all right." Kerry said, listening to the stuttering heartbeat under her ear. "Let's go home, and we can talk about it. I'm tired of the sauna, and my piggies hurt." She gave Dar a quick hug, and pushed back, glad to see a faint grin in all the shadows crossing her partner's face. "Race you?"

"You're on." Dar unlocked her car, and they parted to head out toward home.

THERE WERE DISTINCT advantages to working from home. Kerry leaned back in her chair and put her feet on her desk, propping her keyboard on her lap at a comfortable angle. Wasn't something she could do at work, at least not during business hours and she appreciated the difference as she peered at her screen and continued typing.

"How's the line working?" Dar entered with her laptop. She took a seat on the small couch across from Kerry's desk and opened it. "I messed with it this morning." Chino ambled in after her and curled up on the carpet near Kerry's desk.

Kerry looked up. "Great. It's a heck of a lot faster since you put DSL in. I thought you had squirmies over the security with it though."

"Eh." Dar had focused on her own machine. "I tested it. It's all right, as much as any remote connection is." She replied. "And the surfing's a hell of a lot faster."

"That's for sure." Kerry watched Dar work for a moment, and then spared another thought wondering why she'd given up her comfortable sprawl on the couch downstairs for the smaller confines of Kerry's office. She really didn't think the need to ask about the circuit prompted it, since Dar seemed content now to sit quietly pecking at her keyboard.

Just wanted to be close?
Kerry found herself smiling at the thought, since she'd been regretting the fact that her own laptop hadn't contained her needed files so she could move down into the living room.

They'd had a light dinner, and then gone to the gym together but the subject of Dar's working on her project hadn't come up even once since they'd gotten home. There was something left to be said about it, though and Kerry suspected that those words were behind this instinctive drive they both seemed to have to be in the same place at the same time so when the words came out, they'd be there to hear them.

Until then, though, she was happy just to continue working; typing out an initial assessment of the ship project for the team meeting she'd scheduled the next day while Dar persisted in her programming project. They worked together in a comfortable silence, broken only by the rattle of keystrokes and Chino's dreaming whines.

"Know what I wish?" Kerry asked idly, as she waited for the deck plans of the ship to insert into her document.

"Uh?" Dar grunted in question.

"Wish we were at the cabin. I feel like a midnight salt water swim."

Dar paused and looked up. "Hmm." She shifted the laptop a little.

"We could go in the pool." She offered. "Not as romantic, but there's no seaweed and sand either."

Kerry tapped the enter key and continued typing. "Eeeeehhh...it's not really private enough for what I had in mind." She heard Dar's keystrokes stop, and she waited a second before she looked over at her to find sharply raised eyebrows and a slight grin facing her. "Don't you give me that look. It's your fault. You turned me into a hedonist."

Dar pointed a thumb at her own chest, and widened her eyes.

Kerry stuck her tongue out.

They both went back to working, but the faint grin remained on Dar's lips as she typed. After a few minutes, she paused again. "Know what I wish?"

"Does it involve hot fudge?" Kerry murmured, erasing a sentence and drumming her fingers on her keyboard as she pondered a replacement.

"Heheh." Dar snickered softly. "Save that thought for later. No. What I was wishing for was that we could go back about three weeks and start over again."

Ah. Kerry wiggled her big toe. "Before Orlando?"

"Yeah."

Kerry added a paragraph, and then paused again. "What do you think you would have done different?" She asked. "I mean, about the show or dealing with them or..." She kept her voice casual and her eyes on the screen, not wanting to stifle any revelations.

Dar was a little funny that way. If she said something, and you came back with 'what did you mean by that?', she often stopped her train of thought and switched to something completely different. It was almost like on a personal level, she didn't deal with being challenged while she was trying to communicate something

Dar shifted her position, wiggling her shoulders into a more comfortable spot on the couch. "Keep my mouth shut a lot more, for starters." She scrolled her touchpad with one finger and put her other hand behind her neck, stretching the muscles out with a grimace. "Handled the two of them better, maybe."

"Ah." Kerry ran the spell checker on her document. "I don't know, honey. I don't think most of that was us. They came into this whole thing gunning dirty."

"Mm. Well, I don't think it's going to get any better," she replied. "One of the reasons I don't want to be involved."

Kerry thought about it as she watched the spell check end. She scrolled up for another view of the report, scanning it lightly with her eyes. "Maybe you're right," she finally said. "Why don't we just table it for a while, let me get the whole process started, then you can see what you think."

They both continued in silence for a little while. Dar reached down and scratched Chino's belly, then at last tipped her head back and raised her eyes from the screen. "What I think is...that sounds a hell of a lot like what I said to you when you didn't want to be the Vice President of Operations."

Kerry looked over her shoulder and batted her eyelashes.

Dar smiled and shook her head.

"Dar, don't worry about it." Kerry said. "We'll just work it out."

Chino woke up and flipped over, sneezing. She got up and went to Kerry's side, standing up on her hind legs and giving Kerry a sloppy kiss on the cheek.

"Thank you, sweetie." Kerry took hold of her muzzle and kissed her on the head. "I love getting kissies from you almost as much as I love getting kissies from your mommy Dar."

A moment later, she found herself encircled by Dar's arms. Teeth closed gently on her earlobe. She could feel the intensity of the emotion behind the squeeze that nearly stopped her breathing.

"Damn, I love you." Dar whispered.

Kerry reached up and cupped her partner's face, pulling her forward a little and kissing her on the lips. She then pressed her cheek against Dar's and exhaled, a low sound of contentment sounding deep in her throat. "Damn, I love you."

"Know what I think?" Dar reached over and pulled the wireless keyboard out of Kerry's hands, setting it on the desk. "I think work's over. Want to join me and a glass of champagne in the hot tub?"

Kerry abandoned her machine without a second's thought. She swung her legs off the desk and stood up, hooking her fingers inside the waistband of Dar's shorts and following her as she walked out of the office and started down the steps. Chino bustled past them reaching the bottom landing and whirling around in a circle as she waited for them to catch up.

As they reached the dog, however, the phone rang. Dar glanced at the clock on the entertainment center, and her brows lifted. "Who the hell's calling here now?"

"Only one way to find out." Kerry went over to the side table and picked up the cordless phone, keying the answer button and putting it to her ear. "Hello?"

"Hey, sis." Angela, Kerry's sister, replied. "Busy?"

Dar had cocked her head to listen. Now she gave Kerry a pat on the butt and pointed toward her own bedroom, mimicking stripping out of her clothing as she walked past.

"A little. What's up?" Kerry gave her partner thumbs up, and then dropped into the couch. "How are you? How's the munchkin?"

Angie cleared her throat. "Munchkin and I are fine," she said, and then hesitated. "But we're kinda looking for a new place to live."

Kerry blinked. "Huh?"

"Richard found out about Brian." Angie said. "He filed for divorce."

"He's divorcing you?" Kerry sat straight up, her voice rising. "No shit. Really?"

Dar kept one ear on the conversation in the living room as she changed out of her t-shirt and shorts. She was halfway glad Kerry's family had conveniently provided a distraction, to chase the subject they'd both been dancing around, out of the way for a while.

It would be easier, she thought, if she knew what the hell her problem really was. As Kerry had hinted, she'd thought she was past the bullshit. Kerry thought she was past the bullshit. So why was she doing everything in her power to avoid having to deal with the ship project?

Dar glowered at her reflection in the mirror. Stormy blue eyes were reflected back at her, and she scowled, feeling a mixture of frustration and impatience with herself. Could she really just toss the project off on Kerry's shoulders, knowing how important it was, and how much Alastair was counting on her?

On the other hand, could she really justify not trusting Kerry to handle it? Dar sighed. "Fuck." She addressed herself. "I think you need a head enema."

"Yeesh." Kerry interrupted her self-chastisement. "Poor Angie!" She entered the bedroom and halted as Dar turned, her expression altering to one of sultry interest. "Hmm. Maybe I should convince her to try something other than guys for a little while."

Dar put one hand on her hip. "Oh, I'm sure that'd be a popular suggestion. Especially for Brian," she said. "What happened?"

Kerry pulled her t-shirt off. "Angie thought she'd blown him off about Andy's blood tests, but I guess he got suspicious. He had DNA tests done without her knowing."

Dar snorted. "Nice!" She slipped behind Kerry and undid her bra, giving her a scratch between her tanned shoulder blades. "So she's going back home?"

"No." Kerry folded her bra and set it on the counter next to her already folded t-shirt. "Oh, my mother offered, sure, but Angie, she wants to get out on her own."

"With Brian?"

Kerry didn't answer for a moment, and then she turned and faced Dar. "She's not sure."

Dar cocked her head in question.

A shrug. "She said she doesn't want it to be a case of he needs to take care of her now. She wants to do it on her own." Kerry put her hands on Dar's waist, rubbing her thumbs on the soft skin there. "Maybe I started a family trend. In any case, she was asking what the housing prices were like down here."

"Ah."

Kerry eased forward and brushed her lips over the curve of Dar's breast. She felt Dar's fingertips run up and down her back and it encouraged her to move closer, fitting her bare body to Dar's and reveling in the sensual jolt it gave her. "Y'know, water sounded good..."

"There's water in that bed." Dar suggested, kissing her neck.

"Just what I was thinking." Kerry gladly gave up the idea of the hot tub, and started exploring Dar's skin instead. "Mm...maybe I should tell Angie..."

"Shh." Dar bumped her toward the bed. "If we start telling the heteros, they'll all want to be gay." She tumbled with Kerry into the center of the bed, as they both chuckled.

"HEY, COL." Kerry carried her teacup into the break room and set it down. "What's up?" She asked, waiting her turn at the hot water spigot.

"Same old, same old." Her friend replied, with a grin. "Hey, any chance of you making it out to the beach this coming weekend? We've got a 'cue planned."

Kerry dunked her teabag up and down a few times. "Hmm. Let me get back to you on that. Maybe. Hey listen, are there any units open in the complex?"

"Mine?" Colleen asked. "Two, I think. Why?"

Kerry poured a little milk into her tea and put the bottle back in the refrigerator. "Might need one on short notice." She explained. "You going back to your office? I'll fill you in."

Colleen picked up her coffee mug and followed Kerry out into the hallway. She caught up with her friend a few steps down. "So, what's up?"

"My sister," Kerry said. "Following my very bad example. C'mon inside and I'll tell you all about it." She entered her office, toasting the newly arrived Mayte with her cup. "Morning!"

"Morning, Kerry." Mayte smiled at her, as she went to her desk and slid behind it.

Colleen trailed after Kerry as they both entered the inner office, and Kerry shut the door before going to her own desk and taking a seat. "I get this call last night." She said. "My family's hit the Enquirer again."

"Oh no." Colleen sat down across from her. "Now what? Is your nephew an alien?"

"Worse." Kerry sipped her tea. "A bastard and his father found out about it." She watched Colleen's eyes widen in amazement. "Did I forget to tell you my sister had an affair with my ex-boyfriend?"

"Jesu." Colleen covered her face with one hand.

"Hmm. Thought for sure I told you that one. Anyway, Richard found out and he's suing Angie for divorce. She was hinting about places down here so I figured..."

"I get the picture." Colleen held her hand up, palm out. "Let me talk to the landlord and see what he's got open. I know there's a one bedroom, but I'm thinking for her a two would be better, right? How's she going to survive? I thought you told me she's a housewife."

Kerry sighed, leaning back in her chair. "She is. She can do some light office work, though, and she's not stupid. She knows how to use a PC, do some bookkeeping, that sort of thing."

Colleen made a face.

"I know." Kerry acknowledged the grimace. "Honestly, Col, she'd be better off going back to Mom's house, but I'm not really the one to tell her that, you know?"

"Mm." She nodded. "I know. Is she cut out for Miami?"

"Was I?"

"You didn't have a kid, and no skills." Colleen said with blunt honesty. "Not that I'm knocking her looking for something new, eh? It's just that I think she doesn't realize you got where you are because you earned it."

Kerry looked around at her office, hand-picked and hand-decorated by Dar, filled with knick-knacks and cute, yet mute, symbols of their partnership. A brief grin crossed her face as she sipped again at her tea. "True." She acknowledged. "But I think what she wants is to make it on her own before she lets Brian come back into her life and it reverts to stodgy traditionalism."

A soft knock came at the door. "Yes?" Kerry raised her voice.

The door opened and Mayte stuck her head in. "Kerry, the conference room is booked for your meeting at nine, but Mr. Mark says to tell you he is running a little late. Something about a wipe-up."