"Think you scared them off yesterday?"
"Maybe." Dar said. "Dad's inside. Mom go back to the boat?"
Kerry nodded. "Guess we should go inside and be sociable, now that you woke me up and all." She nudged Dar affectionately. "I need to go put some water on my face. I could go right back to sleep."
"C'mon." Dar stood, lifting her up at the same time. "That's a cute apron. I like the pocket."
Kerry looked down at herself. "Ah." She studied the position of the single, centered pouch, featuring a saucy looking gopher. "I wonder why, Gopher Dar?"
Dar pushed the sliding door open and entered the cool of the condo where her father had taken over the loveseat with Chino in adoring attention. "Look who I found outside."
Andrew looked up. "Hi there, kumquat." He greeted Kerry. "Spiffy looking battle wound you got there." He got up and came over to meet them, peering curiously at Kerry's face. "How in this earth did a feller kick you in there with all that stuff you put on your head?"
"Just bad timing." Kerry released her partner. "The toe of his boot caught me right in the gap here." She touched the front of her face. "It happened so fast, all I knew was one minute I was turning, the next I was on the mat. Boom."
"Wall." Andy turned her face to the light a little. "Ain't a patch on what Dardar there used to get. Should be all fixed up in no time." He patted her cheek gently.
"That's what I hear." Kerry grinned, ducking past him and heading for the downstairs bedroom. "Be right back."
Andrew settled back down on the couch, and Dar took a seat across from him on the larger one. "Been a hell of a week." Dar said, with a grimace. "How's it going on your end of things?"
"Wall now." Andrew spread both long arms out across the leather surface, and extended his legs, crossing them at the ankles. "Ah do believe I have been of some use to you ladies during this here week."
"Yeah?" Dar half grinned.
Kerry poked her head out of the bedroom. "Yeah?"
"Yeap." Andy looked pleased with himself. "Soon as you come on out here, kumquat, I'll tell all about it."
Hmm. Kerry patted her face dry. Maybe it'd been a better day than even she realized.
HALF AN HOUR later, the fish were in the oven, Ceci had returned with a bucket of vegetables and dip to snack on. They were all enjoying a beer as the few lines of sunset peeking between the condos painted the beach outside a coral pink.
Dar was sprawled in one corner of the couch with Kerry next to her. One of Kerry's legs was slung over hers, and she was happy to sit there and listen to the conversation as she slowly sipped at her drink.
It was times like this when she understood the measure of change she'd experienced in the last few years. Aside from having a partner, someone to share her everyday life with, she'd also regained a family that had been lost to her.
It was almost as though she were a completely different person sometimes. Not inside, because Dar knew she herself hadn't changed any, but outside, where other people saw her. Instead of being a loner, mysterious and threatening, she had become someone who even her coworkers treated as one of the corporate family now.
As though falling in love had made her much more understandable to them.
This was odd because it had made her much less understandable to herself sometimes. Dar gazed quietly at the tan thigh covering hers, half smiling as she slid her fingers over Kerry's skin and savored its warmth.
Kerry flexed her leg in response, rubbing the inside her heel against Dar's calf, while she kept on talking, explaining what she'd been doing on the ship.
"So, we finally got everyone to agree to what we wanted to do and give us space." Kerry said. "But I tell you, it wasn't easy."
"Naw." Andrew shook his head. "Nobody likes to give up a nickel's worth of space on board one of them there things, kumquat. Every squinch is worth the earth," he said. "Though them folks should count their blessings. Worst I saw in there was five bodies bunking up together and them's with their own bathroom."
"Oo." Ceci chewed on a celery stick. "Luxury." She poked Andrew in the ribs. "More than six inches of drawer space and I bet they don't hot bunk."
Kerry paused, looking at them. Then she turned and looked Dar questioningly.
"Remind me to take you on a tour of an aircraft carrier next time we're near one." Dar told her.
"O...kay." Kerry amiably returned her attention to her in-laws. "So you're saying they've got it pretty good, compared to what sailors in the service have, right?"
Andrew shrugged one shoulder. "Get used to anything." He commented.
"Yes." Ceci interpreted. "The first time Andy took me to see where he lived on a ship; I nearly took a header overboard. Twelve stories up. Horrific."
"Wasn't that bad."
"Oh, yes it was. Nobody was more relieved than I was when you got your officer's promotion."
"Was it that bad?" Kerry whispered to her partner.
Dar pondered the question, as she watched her parents playfully arguing across from her. "To be honest," she whispered back, "it was the one single thing I knew would keep me out of ship duty."
"Really?"
Dar nodded. "A rack is a six inch foam mattress, with a space underneath to store your stuff. It's got a curtain across it so you can sleep in the daytime, and they're stacked three atop each other."
Kerry's eyes widened.
"Hot bunking is two or three guys sharing the same bunk in turn."
Kerry's eyes nearly came out of her head.
"Hey, beats a foxhole." Dar grinned slightly. "And the food's a lot better."
"Brr." Kerry shuddered. "Well, to hear those guys talk, you'd think I was trying to take away their Christmas presents. But we worked it out."
"Yeap." Andrew nodded. "Heard them hollerin' about the same thing over on the boat I'm at. Don't think they worked out the same deal you did...they were still hollerin' this morning."
"Heh." Kerry smirked a little.
"Them women running that thing don't know much about getting folks to cooperate." The big ex-SEAL continued. "All they do is run to and back making a lot of noise." He folded his arms over his chest. "Ah do not like them."
Dar sighed inwardly. She hadn't expected her father to like them, and it made her wonder how, once upon a time, she had.
Youthful dementia?
"They're not too fond of us," Kerry said. "I thought Michelle was going to chuck up a kidney when she had to call and ask me for that circuit." She leaned back against Dar. "Thanks for sending those pricing lists over by the way."
Dar wrapped her arm around Kerry's waist and rested her chin against her partner's shoulder. "We know for sure they're paying more than we are." She agreed.
Andrew shifted and took a swig of his beer before he answered. "Wall now, something funny's going on there," he said. "Either them women are just nuttier than a squirrel, or I don't know what. They put that damn order in six times, and not one body there can figure out why."
Dar cocked her head in confusion. "Huh?"
Kerry's eyes narrowed. "Six times?"
"Yeap."
"Must be some kind of mistake," Dar said. "How did you know? You got six copies of the invoice?"
Her father nodded. "We figured first it was one big truckload of that stuff you all use, but I was sorting the pages, and they just kept..." He made a rotating gesture with one hand. "Didn't make much sense."
"Oh no." Kerry said. "It makes perfect sense."
Everyone looked at her. Dar blew gently in her ear. "It does?"
Kerry turned her head and her eyes almost crossed. She blinked. "I got a call today from our infrastructure supplier. Seems that all the stuff we need suddenly went out of stock."
Dar's eyebrows hiked right up.
"Do tell?" Andy murmured. "Wall then."
"Hmph." Ceci felt she understood enough of the conversation to contribute at least a token noise of disgusted agreement. She had no idea really of what was being discussed, but the expressions on bot
h Kerry's and Dar's faces clued her into the fact that neither was happy.
"So you think--" Dar paused.
"Do you seriously think it was coincidence?" Kerry replied.
"No." Dar shook her head. "So what's the plan?"
Kerry felt that little tingle inside whenever she had to put her business skills out on display for Dar's perusal. She was good and she knew it, but she also knew Dar was more than good and no matter how long she worked with her, she never got over that little internal squiggle. "I had Mark call them, and tell them either they coughed up our order, or we'd switch vendors company wide."
Dar's eyes widened a little, more white showing around the deep blue centers.
Andrew whistled.
"My." Ceci murmured. "For some reason I'm getting the feeling that meant more to them than me threatening the same thing to Publix."
Dar cleared her throat. "And?"
"They caved. It's on the way." Kerry replied matter-of-factly. She exhaled in satisfaction. "And now that I know who paid those little buggers off, I almost wish they hadn't."
Dar digested the information briefly, and then smiled. "Nice." She gave Kerry a squeeze. "But what did you have in mind if they said no?" Threats aside, specing brand new gear they had no experience with in that time frame wasn't a realistic solution and she knew Kerry knew that.
"Oh, I was going to throw you at them." Kerry assured her. "I was just seeing what they were made of, and it turned out to be Swiss cheese." She patted Dar's muscular leg. "So it turned out okay, but now--now that makes sense, Dar. Don't you think? That has to be why they did it."
"Unless it's a mistake." Ceci commented mildly. "Someone hit the fax key too many times."
There was a brief moment of relative silence. "That could be." Dar said slowly. "But given what Kerry said about the vendor's reaction, I'd have to say it's not a mistake. If it was, they'd have just called and corrected it. I'm sure when they got the purchase order six times, someone said something."
"Well..." Kerry rolled her eyes.
"True enough, Dardar," Andy said. "Someone surely did say something, but someone was told to mind their own business."
So Dar felt angry, but more comfortable with this bit of business behind the backstabbing. The cellular transmitter was beyond Shari, but this kind of bullshit certainly wasn't. "Better keep an eye on that shipment." She warned Kerry.
"Ah surely will." Andy replied, with a half grin. "Since them fellers picked me to be in charge of that there part."
"Heh." Kerry picked up Dar's hand and kissed the knuckles, then got up and headed for the kitchen. "A tisket a tasket two bitches in a basket..." She warbled as she disappeared.
Dar chuckled and shook her head. "Damn, this just gets screwier and screwier." She sighed. "You having fun there, Dad?"
Her mother laughed.
Andrew gave a dignified sniff. "Ah do like to think ah am providing a useful service," he said. "And it surely is a good thing to know that general civilians are a damn sight dumber than most of the people I done worked with in blue and white suits."
They all laughed, and Dar relaxed into the couch again, letting the tensions of the day seep from her. Things were looking up she decided. She'd had a good interview, Kerry had handled a sticky problem with panache, and her father was having a kicking good time making trouble for her adversaries.
Life was good.
"Hey, Dar?" Kerry called from the kitchen. "Can I get a hand with all this?"
Life was very good. Dar launched herself off the couch and headed for the scent of baking fish and cookies. Things were working out nicely all around.
She only hoped it kept on going that way.
"MORNING MAYTE!" Kerry felt in a more than usual cheerful mood, and it showed as she sauntered across her outer office. "Did I miss any disasters yesterday?"
Mayte looked up in surprise. "No, not that they told me about," she replied. "Are you feeling better today?"
Kerry stopped at her inner door and looked back at her assistant. "Other than looking like an outclassed prizefighter, I feel great." She indicated her eye, which still sported a distinct bruise. "But Dar says I have to start wearing a helmet in practice from now on."
Mayte laughed. "Like a football one?"
"Exactly." Kerry agreed. "Dar's mom and dad were over last night, and they were goofing around with me, trying to figure out how to build one so I won't just keel right over with it on." She chuckled. "They're so funny. Mom kept trying to convince me to switch to Tai Chi."
"They are very nice people."
"Very." Kerry said. "And it's so funny, because they're a blast to hang out with. I could never imagine ever being that comfortable with any of my family. Drinking beer with my father? Good lord." She gave her head a little shake. "Anyway, so it was quiet here?"
"Si." Mayte nodded.
"Figured it was, if Dar went out for lunch." Kerry turned to enter her office. "Can you schedule me a project meeting for ten? I want to make sure we're all on track."
"Sure."
Kerry turned. "And if anyone wants to meet with me tomorrow, it has to be early. I'm taking off a little early to go down south."
Mayte cocked her head slightly in question.
"I need some time out at the cabin." Kerry grinned. "So nothing past 3 p.m., okay?"
"I will make sure." Mayte scribbled a note on her pad, and turned to her email as Kerry disappeared into her office. After a moment, she looked up, with a wryly impish expression, as she heard a delighted laugh coming from behind the door.
"CLEAR MY SCHEDULE." Dar paused just in front of Maria's desk. "I'm going to be in the closet all day."
Maria paused in mid type and looked up at her boss. "Como?" She peered at Dar with interest. "I did not think you were one to be in a closet Dar."
For a moment, Dar simply stared at her, and then she broke in to a grin, and let out a burst of laughter. "Oh, hell, you got that right Maria." She chuckled. "I never even knew what the term meant until after I left college and picked up a gay magazine in an airport somewhere."
Maria also chuckled. "You have always been right in the front of everything about how you are. It is a nice thing. I do not like people who make themselves different in their face from what is real."
Dar considered that for a minute, and then she nodded. "I don't like those kinds of people either. I think that's one of the things I always appreciated the most about you."
The older woman's eyes lit up.
Dar smiled, and turned to head for her office, opening her door and entering before Maria could really collect herself to answer. She walked over to her desk and set her laptop case down, then sat down in her chair and let her hands rest on her thighs.
She was in a very good mood for once. They'd had a wonderful time last night, and this morning she'd woken early, lying quietly before dawn thinking of her security project while she held Kerry in her arms. Somewhere in all that, whether from the peace or the simple pleasure, she'd suddenly had a breakthrough in the design.
A piece had fallen into place that she'd been missing, and now she had a new direction to go in the intricate programming latticework she was painstakingly putting together.
With a pleased chuckle, she took out her laptop and opened it, spurning her desktop since she knew she had to take the fledgling program down to the closet to test it out. She rubbed her hands together and waited for the machine to boot, and then she tilted back in her chair and set the laptop on her lap.
After another moment, she put her booted feet up on her desk and relaxed, glad beyond measure that she'd found yet another excuse to wear jeans in the office. She flexed her fingers, and started typing, humming slightly under her breath as the lines of code seemed to flow effortlessly.
"I LOVE IT." Kerry circled the new addition to her office, a weighted boxing dummy in the front corner where a big empty spot had been previously. Originally a work group desk had been there, but Kerry had it removed when she decided meetings would
be held in meeting rooms and she hadn't really found anything to replace it with.
Hanging around its neck was a pair of boxing gloves that she took off and slid on her hands. The figure had a bland, wide-eyed face and a business suited body. She jabbed at it playfully, socking it in the nose and making it rock back and forth. "God, I just love it."
The door opened and Mayte poked her head in. "Did you say something?"
Kerry turned and held up her gloved fists. "This is spectacular."
She pronounced. "Who did it? I know it wasn't Dar...she can't keep a secret from me for beans anymore."
Her assistant blushed. "It was me." Mayte confessed. "Mama said for you to get chocolate, but I think this will be more useful, no?"
Kerry boxed at her with both hands, jiving a little with her body at the same time. "Mayte, you rock. I absolutely love this." She pointed a fist at the younger woman. "But I'm absolutely positive I'm not going to let you pay for it. I know what these cost."
"You do?" Mayte made a wry face.
"Almost got one for Dar." Kerry winked at her. "So either you cough up the receipt, or I'll just start stuffing bills in your purse until you scream for mercy."
Mayte appeared exquisitely pleased, but she shyly shook her head anyway. "Please, Kerry, you have done so much for me. It is a gift to me to be able to do something for you in return."
Kerry planted her fists on her hips, or at least as nearly as she could wearing boxing gloves. "Mayte..."
"Please?" Mayte begged. "It really was not so much. My uncle is the boxing instructor for our YMCA. He helped me to get it."
"Hmm..." Kerry produced a mock scowl, then relented, and let a chuckle escape instead. "Oh, all right." She moved forward. "C'mere."
Mayte entered the office and shut the door, walking over to Kerry and smiling as she was enveloped in a hug. "It is better than chocolate, right?"
"Well, chocolate is pretty good." Kerry gave her a last hug and stepped back. "But this lasts longer, and it can be just as much fun." She tapped her gloves together. "You want to try it?"
Mayte indicated her chest with her thumb. "Me?"
Stormy Waters: Book 10 in The Dar & Kerry Series Page 17
