by Melissa Good
Kerry smiled. "That's the point, I think. I want to be touched by the places we go to, not just by a nice vacation. I think that'll happen in Scotland." She turned her head to look at Dar. "I'd like to see Antarctica, and maybe the Sahara desert."
"How about climbing Everest?"
Kerry's brow twitched. "Ahhhh--no." She grinned briefly. "That idea doesn't thrill me. I don't mind working for my fun but that's way too much work, hon."
"Phew." Dar chuckled. "For me too. I'd like to see the Mayan ruins in Central America though." She paused, thoughtfully. "It's hard for me to think about going somewhere for a month. There are so many places I'd like to go."
Kerry rolled over and swam back. "You know what the truth is,Paladar?" She went nose to nose with her partner, stretching her hands out and bracing them on either side of Dar's head. "Just going with you anywhere for a month is something I very badly want to do."
Dar released the wall and settled her arms around Kerry instead. "Me too. We need to do this," she added, in a softer tone. "I wonder how many of those people in those towers were telling themselves someday I'll do that."
Kerry remained still and quiet, listening.
"Someday I'll see that." Dar went on. "Someday. Bob wanted to buy a sailboat someday, he told me."
"No more somedays." Kerry let her forehead rest against Dar's. "We so easily could have been in harm's way in this, Dar. I want to savor every minute living my life with you from now on."
Dar kissed her. "Scotland it is." She promised. "That's going to be a blast. Maybe I'll get a suit of armor there to match that old sword I've got"
"Maybe we'll try haggis." Kerry suggested.
"Maybe we won't." Dar smiled anyway, and then paused. "Or what the hell. If Alastair can try sushi, I can try oatmeal in sheep innards." She kissed Kerry again, and then she nipped her nose and surged forward, taking them both underwater.
"Bwwflhh--" Kerry spluttered, as they surfaced. "Dar!"
"Tag." Dar pinched her in a sensitive spot. "You're it."
"Yowch!" Kerry yelped, grabbing for her partner who was no longer there. "You pissant!"
Dar took off, diving under the water to escape, barely eluding Kerry's outstretched fingers. "Slowpoke!"
"Oh, I don't think so, madam." Kerry plunged after her. "This ain't no forty foot piece of ocean." She dove under the water and swam after her elusive tormentor, reaching for skin or any bit of bathing suit.
The moon slid behind the clouds overhead, wisely hiding its eyes.
"I'VE GOT WATER in my ears thanks to you." Kerry hopped on one foot, as they waited for the elevator to deposit them on their floor. "That was fun though."
"It was." Dar felt very pleasantly tired after two hours of water horseplay. She put a hand on Kerry's back to steady her, as the elevator slowed to a halt and the doors opened. "We're here."
Cheers echoed through the hall as they exited, and they could see the doors to the lounge still open. "Sounds like a good game," Kerry said, as she removed the room key from the pocket of her robe. "Glade everyone's enjoying it. They needed a mind break."
"Yeah." Dar agreed. "Tomorrow's probably going to be rough. I'm glad Alastair thought of it." She glanced down the hall. "Speaking of."
Alastair had just come out of the lounge, and was heading toward his room. He saw them and paused, then continued past his door and approached them instead. "Well, what have you two been up to?"
"Really want to know?" Dar asked, folding her arms over her terrycloth-covered chest and leaning against the wall.
He paused and considered. "Am I going to have to speak to the hotel manager tomorrow because of it?" he asked cautiously.
"Probably not." Kerry ran her fingers through her wet hair somewhat self-consciously. "We were swimming in the pool."
"Ah." Alastair nodded. "That sounds pretty innocuous." He leaned against the wall himself. "Game's about done. I'm going to let all these kids finish the night out. I'm bushed." He stifled a yawn. "Good bunch there."
"Glad they had a chance to relax," Dar said. "I think tomorrow is going to be a little different."
Alastair eyed her shrewdly. "Even with our challenges?"
Dar shrugged. "Who the hell knows? Maybe we'll get lucky." She straightened up and started for their hotel room door. "Anyway, good night, Alastair. See you in the morning."
"Bye." Alastair waggled his fingers and turned to head back to his own room.
Kerry opened the door and held it for Dar to enter, and then followed her inside. The room was dimly lit, and she caught the scent of chocolate wafting in the space, along with something a little spicier. "Did you send a telepathic message to room service again?"
Dar was by the desk, investigating the tray resting there. "Sorry to disappoint you, babe. I used the phone by the pool while you were doing that last set of laps. Hot chocolate, Thai chicken soup, and baked Brie with some crackers and fruit. Sound all right to you?"
Kerry detoured to the desk and liberated a grape from the bowl, popping it into her mouth and biting down. It was juicy and sweet, ands gave her partner a one armed hug for it. "Yum," she agreed. "I'm going to go change out of my suit."
"Me too." Dar untied her robe and eased it off. "Last thing I need is to catch a damn cold at this point." She draped the robe over a chair and wandered into the bathroom.
Kerry stole another grape and followed suit, shivering a little as the draft from the air conditioner hit her damp skin. "Dar, could you--thanks." She caught the towel coming at her face one handed, and then she got undressed and rubbed herself dry.
Dar came around behind her and draped a shirt over her shoulder, then kissed the back of her bare neck, making her shiver for a completely different reason. "Thanks." Kerry ruffled her hair into some sort of dryness.
"For the shirt?"
"That too." She put the cotton garment on, and ran her fingers through her hair to straighten it. "You know, that really was a great idea to go to the pool. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I really miss our gym time."
Dar paused and peered over her shoulder, one eyebrow lightly raised.
"When we're there, we focus on something other than whatever problems we're dealing with that day." Kerry clarified. "You get out of that mind space."
"Ahhh."
"You know what it is? I'm not physically tired." Kerry sat down and pulled over one of the bowls of soup. "My brain is exhausted." She took a spoonful of the spicy broth. "It's like those people downstairs at the bar. You can't keep watching those pictures."
Dar sat down opposite her picking up her cup of hot chocolate and sipping from it as she considered what Kerry had said. It was an odd feeling. In her, unlike Kerry, it manifested in a sense of intolerant impatience that made it difficult for her to concentrate on what she was doing.
The swim break had been a relief. Being silly and chasing Kerry around the pool had let her buzzing brain relax and now that they were back in the room, she was content to concentrate on what was on the tray and leave worrying about work until tomorrow.
She pulled her soup over and fished out a chunk of chicken. It tasted of coconut and lime and both she and Kerry were quiet as the chewed. The silence was comfortable though. Dar put some of the Brie on a cracker and put it on Kerry's plate, then assembled one for herself taking a bite as Kerry reciprocated by putting a handful of grapes in front of her.
She looked up, and their eyes met. Kerry's expression eased into one of tired affection, and she reached out with her free hand capturing Dar's fingers and simply clasping them.
The warmth of it made her smile. The sweetness of the moment made her focus intently on it, savoring the strength of Kerry's fingers curled around hers, and the spicy scent of the soup and the knowledge that there were hours and hours left before the sun would rise and bring another day.
Time to hoard every moment of it.
Chapter Thirteen
A FLARE OF brilliant light and a crash brought Dar awake with a painful suddenness. T
he echoes of the sound ringing in her ears as she instinctively reached for Kerry just as another flash lit the room followed instantly by a window rattling boom.
Without really thinking, Dar bundled her nearly startled witless partner in the sheets and rolled off the bed, landing them both on the floor on the side away from the window.
"Hey!" Kerry yelped. "What the hell is going on?"
Dar frantically tried to untangle herself from the sheets as her brain finally woke up and placed the sound, and the lights, and the rumble into a familiar context. Then she stopped, and slumped to the floor, her head thunking against the carpet as she let out a groan. "Son of a bitch."
Thunder rumbled again, and Kerry struggled up onto one elbow, raking the hair from her eyes as she peered around. "Thunderstorm?"
"Thunderstorm," Dar confirmed, as she listened to rain pelt the window. "Sorry about that."
Kerry sat up cautiously untangling her legs from her partner's.Aside from the bursts of lightning, it was dark inside the room and a glance at the clock confirmed her suspicions that it was far from dawn.
She groaned, and settled back down on her side, pillowing her head on Dar's stomach. She could hear Dar's heartbeat slowing and she closed her eyes, willing her own to stop racing. She thought she might have been dreaming, though she couldn't really remember anything.
She had that odd sense of disassociation that usually meant she had been though. Not a bad one--probably one of those hazy, weird dreams she sometimes had where she was running around in a forest chasing rabbits.
No idea what that was all about but Kerry greatly preferred them to the darker ones that made her wake shaking or in tears.
Bleah.
She felt Dar's fingers slide through her hair and scratch gently across her scalp. "Well, that sure wasn't the way I like to wake up."
"Me either," Dar agreed mournfully. "I don't know what in the hell I was thinking."
"You were thinking there was a bomb going off outside and we needed to be out of the way which we are. But now that it's just Mother Nature scaring the crap out of us, we can probably get back up where it's more comfortable, huh?"
"Yeah." Dar pushed herself up into a sitting position, as Kerry did the same. They got to their knees and stood up. Kerry crawled back into bed while her partner pulled the covers back up off the floor and settled them over her. "I see my PDA flashing. Let me see what's up since I know that's not you."
"Not me." Kerry agreed, snuggling back into a comfortable position and wrapping one arm around her pillow. She watched Dar walk over to the dresser and pick up the flashing device, her body outlined in flashes of silver from the window.
Mm. "What's up?" Kerry asked.
Dar brought the PDA back over to the bed and sat down on it, handing it over to her partner before she got under the covers and reclaimed her pillow. "Hurricane Gabrielle, crossing Florida."
"Great." Kerry thumbed through the message. "Glad we're not in Disney World. I forgot all about the damn storm. It won't come up here,will it?"
"With our luck?" Dar put her arm around Kerry and snuggled up to her. "Probably be a category five with a tidal wave." She exhaled."Damn. Now I've got a headache from waking up like that."
Kerry studied the PDA. "Hon, you got another message here. I think it's from our network vendor buddy." She passed the PDA over her shoulder.
"Read it to me." Dar nuzzled the back of Kerry's neck. "I'm sure it's bad news anyway."
Kerry cleared her throat. "Dar--I'm in Bethesda at Lockheed Martin. I had a five-hour meeting with the folks here, and once they got past asking me not if I was crazy, but how crazy was I, not to mention how crazy you were, we got to talking. "
"Sounds like fun." Dar mumbled.
"It gets better." Kerry promised. "Sort of." She scrolled down.
"Everyone agrees there's no way to develop an optics that'll handle the specifications of multimode over that distance."
Dar lifted her head. "That's better?" she asked, her voice rising.
"Put a sock in it, Roberts. Let me finish." Kerry chided her. "Here we go. But when I told them what the stakes were, they called in a couple of specialists who agreed to see what they could come up with."
"Peh." Dar put her head back down. "In two years we'll hear of some military application for an optic that can go ten miles on multi-mode."
"One of these guys," Kerry went on, undeterred, "is the guy who figured out how to make the Hubble work after they sent it up with a bad shaped mirror."
"Peh."
"Anyway, I'll know more in the morning. I'm gonna go get some coffee and find a chaise lounge somewhere. Hope you all are doing good up there." Kerry finished and half turned, putting her hand on Dar's hip. "Honey, at least he's trying. It's 4:00 a.m., and he's at some think tank working to get help for us."
"I know." Dar relented. "I'm just in a bad mood. My head hurts and I feel like a moron for pulling us both out of the bed. And I was having a nightmare."
Kerry set the PDA aside and turned over, facing her partner. She gently pushed the unruly hair from Dar's eyes and stroked her cheek. "Want some Advil?"
Dar's expression shifted and she produced a mild grin. "Got everything I want right here in bed with me."
Aw. Kerry was charmed both by the sentiment and the almost shy look in her partner's eyes. "You know what? I just remembered. I was dreaming about you when you woke me up."
"Me?"
"Mm hm." Kerry traced one of Dar's eyebrows with a fingertip. "We were celebrating something in some cabin somewhere. I have no idea what. But you gave me this really pretty carved wooden bird, and we were laughing like crazy about it."
"What was so funny about it?" Dar asked. "Did it have two heads or something?"
"I don't know." Kerry put her head down on the pillow. "There was a fire in the fireplace, and I could smell the trees outside, but I don't know where we were or why that bird was so funny," she admitted."You have such a beautiful laugh."
Dar's brow wrinkled a little. "No I don't."
"In my dream you did." Kerry disagreed. "And you really do.love your laugh."
Dar stretched and relaxed against the bed. "Trying to make me feel better?"
"Working?"
Dar's brief grin altered into a true smile. "The thunder was worth it." She tucked her arm under her pillow and let her body relax, hoping her now buzzing brain would settle down and let her get a few more hours sleep.
She felt Kerry's hand touch her cheek and with no further words,the gentle stroking against her skin spoke as loudly as her partner ever could.
What a gift. Dar closed her eyes, feeling the faintest of stings. How many people had woken together last Tuesday, had a little pillow talk, gotten up, gone to work and then hours later found themselves forever sundered from this gift they probably hadn't thought twice about when they'd left the house.
"Dar?" Kerry's touch became firmer against her cheek and there was a rustle of bedclothes as she shifted and brought a comforting body of warmth into the sudden chill around her. "Hey."
Dar opened her eyes. "Sorry." She didn't bother to dissemble. "Just freaking out a little."
"About the fiber?" Kerry sounded confused, and a touch distressed.
"No."
Kerry eased over and put her arms around Dar. "Did I do something?"
"No." Dar returned the embrace. "It just hit me." She paused, as her throat tightened. "All those people who had people they loved never come home that day."
Kerry's breath caught. She swallowed audibly.
"Could have been any of us," Dar whispered. "What a crappy world this is sometimes."
"Sometimes," Kerry finally replied, her voice rough. "Do you know how glad I was it was you who told me what was going on? That we were on the phone no matter if you were thousands of miles away? "
"Wish you'd have been there with me," Dar said. "I was so damn scared something would happen to you before I got back."
Kerry buried her face into Dar's
neck feeling a shiver go down her spine. "Likewise. I don't know what I would have done if anything had." Tears welled up that had been trapped inside her for days. "Oh my god, Dar."
Dar returned the hug. "Longest few days of my life." She drew in a shaky breath. "Damn, I can't wait to go home. I want out of this." She couldn't quite stifle a sniffle.
"So do I," Kerry whispered. "It's been making me crazy."
They were both quiet for a moment. Then they both exhaled at almost the same time. "Wow." Dar cleared her throat. "Sorry this got so lousy."
Kerry shook her head a trifle. "I'm not. I'm glad I said that to you. I've been wanting to before we let this all pass. We've been up to our eyeballs since it happened and I've got all this stuff bottled up making my guts ache."
Dar slid her hand up along the back of Kerry's neck kneading the muscles there with gentle fingers. She felt the warmth as Kerry exhaled against her skin, and blinked her eyes to clear the tears from them.
She didn't cry often. Dar suspected the stress wasn't doing her any favors and she could feel the shivers rippling through Kerry's body."Let's table it for a few hours." She pulled the covers over both of them. "We'll be okay."
Kerry relaxed against her. "When I'm right here, I'm always okay. Hope I find out why that bird was so damned funny." She closed her eyes and kissed Dar on the collarbone. "Love you."
That made Dar smile again, finally. "Love you too." She tuned out the muted sound of the air conditioning and the far off grind of elevator machinery letting the darkness and the rhythm of Kerry's breathing lull her back into sleep.
Maybe, she mused, it was a cuckoo bird.
"NOT A GOOD morning." Dar followed Alastair into the conference room that already had a half dozen people in it.
Angry looking people. Dar gathered up the gruffest of her attitudes and put them in place before she took a seat at the end of the table, while her boss circled and went to the center. She put her forearms on the mahogany surface clasping her hands together.
