Stormy Waters: Book 10 in The Dar & Kerry Series Read online

  The woman smiled at her. "Absolutely. No problem. Having four ships in here in the summer is a big windfall for the port. We'd be glad to do anything we can to make it good for you."

  "Except pre-assign the piers," Kerry said wryly.

  "Well..."

  "It's okay." Kerry started for the front doors. "We'll manage it somehow."

  She bid Agnes goodbye and crossed behind the Agnes' truck toward the small parking lot in front of the pier. Her Lexus sat there in the heat looking very blue and lonely. She slid behind the wheel with a grimace as the hot leather hit the back of her legs. "Ugh."

  She started the engine and got the air going, then leaned back and pulled out her PDA. She opened a new message and tapped out a directive, then paused, tapping the stylus on the edge of the device as she thought about what she was doing.

  It wasn't really a risk, per se. It was an expense. The question was, should she incur the expense, and accept the cost in order to ensure she had the environment she needed to do the job? Kerry nibbled her lip, counting the days they had left.

  Well, she had leverage with Bellsouth. With a slight nod, she sent the message. She put down the PDA then shifting the car into reverse, backed out and drove carefully out of the parking lot

  She checked her watch again, then opened her cell phone and hit the speed dial. "Hey, sweetie."

  "Hey." Dar's voice sounded relaxed. "Just got out of my meeting with Mariana."

  "Aha. How'd it go?" Kerry asked, making the turn onto Biscayne.

  "I don't think Telegenics' lawyer likes me."

  Kerry chuckled low in her throat. "There's a shocker. Listen, before you tell me more, I'm heading to the Bread Factory. You want a sandwich?"

  "Mm, chicken curry," Dar responded instantly. "And that spicy soup if they've got it."

  "Okay. Now, what did the lawyer say?? Kerry navigated carefully through the traffic. ?Are they really serious about pressing charges??

  "Not anymore."

  "Ah, that's good."

  "I basically told them since it was off company property, and off company hours, it wasn't a company problem."

  Kerry blinked. "Um..."

  "And if they wanted to pursue it on a personal basis, I'd welcome a suit that explained why his clients were trying to entice my partner out to convince her what a scumbag I was."

  "Ugh." Kerry winced. "Hon, I don't think that's exactly what they were up to."

  "Doesn't matter. It was enough to scare him off. Besides, that was the subject matter that made our battling burritos dump the chili bowl, so..." Dar chuckled a little. "Anyway, one less thing to worry about, but listen..."

  Uh oh. "Yeah?"

  "Maria just told me that Mayte told her that you got an invitation from Quest to a kick off reception at the port this Saturday."

  "Just me?" Kerry pulled into the small strip mall that held one of their favorite sandwich shops.

  "You and a guest."

  "You and me, then." Kerry sat back. "Okay, so here we go again. Can I hope, maybe, that Telegenics will send someone else to do the bid now that it's on?" She got out of the car and headed for the restaurant. "I've just scoped out the port, Dar. It's going to be a pain in the ass working here."

  "Uh huh. I figured."

  "I'm dropping lines into all four possible spots we could be. I'll just cancel the ones we don't need," Kerry said, holding her breath a little as she waited for her boss's reaction. Dar hated wasting provisioning and she knew it.

  "Hmm."

  "Two chicken curry on croissants, provolone, nothing else, two spicy soups, one coffee." Kerry told the attendant, still listening to the pensive silence on the other end of the cell. "Hon, I had to. I couldn't risk not having it, and they won't tell us where they're putting the damn things until the last minute."

  Dar sighed into the phone. "Yeah. I know. I just--"

  "Hate wasting the money." Kerry handed over some cash. "I know."

  Dar clucked her tongue a few times. "But you know what? This is your project," she finally said. "So go for it. I've got hacker bees flying around my head like gnats, so that's what I'm going to concentrate on."

  Kerry felt uncertain all of a sudden. "Okay," she said slowly. "Are you sure you don't want to..."

  "I'm sure." Dar sounded confident. "Kerry, my being involved is only going to make it tough on you, we both know it. In fact, why not take Mark to the reception?"

  "Mark?"

  "I'm the problem," Dar said.

  Kerry frowned. "Can we talk about this later? I need to think about it."

  A bit of silence. "Okay," Dar said. "Sure."

  "It's not that I don't think you're right..." Kerry said in a rush. "I just...I want to talk to you about it."

  "You don't want to take Mark?" Dar hazarded a guess. "If you want, I'll go with you, Ker. I was just trying to make things a little smoother."

  "I know." Kerry relaxed a little. "It surprised me, that's all."

  "Okay. See you in a bit?"

  "Be right there," Kerry nodded, "just getting the sandwiches. See you in a few minutes." She folded the phone and tucked it into her belt, and tried to reassemble her thoughts while waiting for her order.

  Dar was right. She knew that. The core of their problem with Telegenics was the personal issue Shari had with Dar. But now, it might even be more than that given what had happened last week. Would Dar's stepping out really solve anything? Or just make it worse? Kerry gazed off into the distance, facing her own insecurity with a grimace. The truth was she didn?t want to face Shari and Michelle alone, and the reasons had nothing to do with business. She wanted Dar there, antagonist or not. Despite her big ideas before she?d gone to New York about how she was protecting Dar from having to be involved, despite her confidence.

  Damn.

  "Here's your order, ma'am." The boy behind the counter handed her the bag courteously. "Have a nice day."

  "Thanks." Kerry took the bag and headed out the door. "For the thought, anyway."

  Damn, damn damn.

  DAR EDGED PAST the rows of switches, ignoring the apprehensive looks of the on duty techs in the Ops center. She dropped into a seat in the back row at the master console that wasn't generally manned and keyed up some views. She wrapped her hands together and rested her chin against them as she studied the results.

  "Ma'am?" One of the techs got up and faced her. "Can we do something for you?"

  "No." Dar gave him a baleful look. "Just siddown and leave me alone."

  He did so quickly, burying his nose in the console without a backward glance.

  As though she could feel Kerry's wry look on her, Dar sighed. "Listen up, all of you."

  Four heads turned timidly toward her.

  "I'm not trying to be rude, okay? I'm just working on something, and I know this place better than any of you. So don't worry about it."

  The techs relaxed. "Yes, ma'am," the one who'd approached her said. "We know that...we just wanted to help you if we could."

  "Thanks. Now siddown, and leave me alone."

  This time the man grinned a little. "Yes ma'am." He went back to his reports, and the rest of the techs did as well, but the atmosphere was definitely a little lighter.

  Dar shook her head and went back to her own display. She called up the network topology, and studied it intently. The main part of the attack had hit them in specific places. Not their external websites, those were bypassed entirely. This had hit them in their tier one interfaces, where the big circuits connected them both to the Internet and their global network.

  That meant, Dar reasoned, someone had some pretty solid information on their infrastructure. She didn't like the idea, but knew it was almost impossible to prevent some information from leaking out. After all, the Telcos were big companies with lots of people making generic wages who could be paid to punch up their provider account and read off circuits and patch points.

  So...

  If she was going to design a global threat solution, where would she
put it? At the network core? Dar's finger traced a few lines. No, because if the threat got that far, she was screwed. Her fingertip stopped over the exterior access ports. No, it would have to go between their infrastructure, and the outside circuits, and that meant a secure appliance.

  However, she couldn't put a bottleneck in the network. That would negate all the hard work she'd done over the last few years to remove the damn things. That meant that anything she put in place had to be able to analyze all the data traffic, and yet, not impede its performance.

  It was a huge puzzle. Dar gave the diagram a fond grin. She loved puzzles. If she could solve this one, not only would she be in a position to solidify their network offering, she'd also be off the hook for being the idiot who'd made them a target the size of Antarctica.

  She pulled out her PDA and tapped a new message addressing it to their hardware provider. She scribbled a note and sent it off, her mind running over the possible approaches she could take on the thing's programming.

  It was exciting thinking about something brand new. Designing the network had been fun too, but she really hadn't created anything that hadn't already been there. She just designed the best possible one she could. This was something quite different.

  "Ms. Roberts?"

  The voice brought her out of her musing with a start. "Yes?" She glanced up sharply at the console tech.

  "Sorry ma'am." The man gave her an apologetic grin. "But you're being looked for." He pointed at the door.

  Dar looked up to find Kerry in the doorway, holding a bag and grinning impishly. With a slightly sheepish look, she got up and circled the consoles heading for her partner. "Ah...thanks." She joined Kerry at the door. "I'll be back."

  As she left, she sent one last look back at the master console grinned and let the door close.

  Yeah. She'd be back.

  KERRY PEERED AT her reflection in the mirror as she inserted a jade earring in one ear. The color not only matched her eyes it complimented the sea green dress she was wearing. She stepped back to assess the combination with a satisfied grunt.

  "Something wrong?" Dar appeared at her shoulder, glancing curiously at her.

  "No...except that this is the second time this week we had to get gussied up, and it's not nearly as much fun as the first time."

  "Eh." Dar shrugged one shoulder. "The way I figure it, we'll go for a little while, and then bow out. Nothing says we have to spend all night there."

  Kerry inserted her other earring nodding a little in agreement. Her stomach had a few butterflies anyway, since it was going to be the first time she'd seen Michelle and Shari since she'd...well, since she'd blown them off.

  No other way to say it, really.

  Blown them off and triggered a food attack on them by her staff. Kerry almost chuckled. "Okay. Then we can come back here. How about a swim in the pool when we get back? I bet we'll be all sweaty just from the drive up and back."

  "Good for me." Dar finished putting her necklace on. "Do I need to bring my boxing gloves? Or you think they'll be civilized?"

  Kerry indulged herself in a moment's fantasy of Dar in her black silk sheath, clobbering their Telegenics competitors with the cute red boxing gloves she used for class. "Heh."

  "Was that yes, or no?"

  "That was me wishing they'd be uncivilized," Kerry admitted. "Ah well. Let's get going. Want me to drive?"

  "Sure."

  Kerry walked into the living room, shadowboxing as she walked. "Boom...boom...boom..." She paused as they reached the front door and cocked her head to one side. "Wouldn't it be cool if we had the motorcycle up here? I'd love to pull up on that."

  Dar stopped. She leaned on the door and looked Kerry up and down. "Hon, think about that a minute and how you have to ride a bike," she said. "If you think I'm giving all of downtown Miami a view like that, you're nuts."

  Kerry looked puzzled, then glanced down at herself. A snort emerged. "Oh," she muttered. "Yeah. I see your point."

  Dar opened the door and gestured toward the outside. "Exhibitionists first."

  "Nyahh."

  PIER 12 APPEARED somberly festive as they walked up the flight of stairs into the port facility. Dar handed the white gloved receptionist their invitations and waited to be checked off whatever list the woman had, then gave her a brief nod as they were allowed past.

  A glance at the banners told her that Quest wasn't quite the expansive host he'd presented himself to be. It was clear that the cost of the party was being borne by the Port which tied in with what Kerry had told her about them being glad of the business in an off time.

  They rode the escalator up to the second level where there were tables filled with various edible items. A bar anchored each end of the room and both were busy with well-dressed schmoozers taking advantage of the free alcohol.

  Dar spotted Michelle and Shari at the far table and steered Kerry toward the closest table, reasoning there was no sense in getting into a fistfight before even getting a beer out of it.

  Quest approached them just as they reached the bar looking quite pleased with himself. "Good evening, ladies." He greeted them cordially. "Glad you could make it."

  "Thanks. It was a nice thing for you to do." Kerry replied. "I realize we're all competing, but the goal of the project is to give you a solution you can use and that we can implement," she said. "And besides, we're all adults, right?"

  Dar handed her a cold beer.

  "Exactly." Quest agreed. "I'm very glad you have decided to take that view." He turned slightly and ordered a drink from the bar, then leaned on it and looked back at them. "Especially since one of our applicants has chosen to capture this process on film." He indicated behind them.

  Kerry turned her head to see a cameraman and an assistant over in the far corner. "Why did you let them?" She turned back to Quest. "I thought you wanted this to be low key."

  The man shrugged. "Once it was out, it was out. No point in hiding it anymore. This way, we get some good press for free. What can I tell you?"

  Practical. Dar silently agreed. "Look at it this way, Ker. One day you'll end up watching yourself on the Discovery channel."

  "Travel Channel." Quest corrected her succinctly. "They've already signed the deal. My people weren't that thrilled, but they never put a restriction in the contract so we're stuck with it."

  Dar studied him. "Be a lot of pressure for Telegenics to win the bid then," she remarked casually. "Otherwise, makes for bad TV, doesn't it? No happy ending for the little guy."

  "Doesn't it?" Quest tipped his drink toward her then walked off in the direction of the camera crew.

  Kerry strolled away from the bar with Dar at her heels. They both stopped in a relatively empty spot reviewing the room together. "Hmm," Kerry said. "Why does this whole thing just get slimier and slimier every time we turn around?"

  "The smell of mildew is in the air. Let's go see what they've got over there." She nudged Kerry toward the canapé table. Halfway there, she realized they'd been spotted by Michelle and Shari, but she just kept walking one hand coming to rest on Kerry's back as they reached the line. "Ker?"

  "I see them." Kerry observed the choices. "Oh, look, hon...lots of little potential weapons. I bet those stuffed potato puffs would sting."

  "Contain yourself, Jesse James." Dar handed her a plate. "Maybe it'll be civil."

  "Maybe our dog will learn to fly."

  Dar offered her plate up to the uniformed attendant and watched as he placed several canapés on it. Her peripheral vision picked up their adversaries approaching and she took a moment to sort out her possible responses before she turned and made eye contact with them. "Evening." She decided on a gracious nod.

  Kerry's shoulders squared visibly before she looked up. She merely returned the stares evenly, allowing Dar to do the communicating for the both of them.

  "Evening." Michelle responded, taking a breath to continue. But after a second, her jaw closed and she merely picked up a plate and continued down the line.
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  Shari glared at both of them. Dar lowered her head slightly and subtly altered her posture as an icy edge came into her eyes.

  The camera man from the filming crew closed in focusing on them tightly, and with a twitch of her lip, Shari also turned and went down the line, cutting in front of them and grabbing a plate of her own.

  Kerry smiled pleasantly at the cameraman. "Hi."

  "Hi," the man returned her greeting cheerfully. "So, what do you think about the party?"

  "It's been just charming so far." Kerry said. "Hope it stays that way." She added just loud enough for her voice to carry.

  Neither of their adversaries turned, but both backs stiffened.

  The man moved off to follow Shari and Michelle followed by another man who was talking into a recorder.

  Kerry removed a generic puffy something from Dar's plate and popped it into her mouth chewing with thoughtful vehemence. After a second, she stopped chewing, and, with a weird expression on her face, hastily washed her food down with a swallow of her beer. "What was that?"

  "The establishment of primate dominance as a vestige of our biological lineage," Dar replied succinctly. "Or did you mean the spicy mushrooms and anchovies? Thanks for trying it for me, by the way."

  Kerry digested both pieces of information. She took another swallow of beer to get the last of the taste from her mouth. "Ook, ook."

  "Me Jane, you Jane, you know how it is." Dar sounded more than amused. "Let's go talk to those guys from Cangen. I think that second one in the corduroy trousers used to work for us."

  "Cords in summer?" Kerry muttered, as she followed her partner across the tile floor. "Bet he didn't work for us long."

  JUST HER LUCK, it would be the bathroom again. Kerry found herself face-to-face with Michelle as she stepped up to the sink and leaned forward to wash her hands. The red haired woman was dressed in a caramel colored cocktail dress that did not flatter her at all. "Hi."

  "Hi." Michelle responded. "I've got to hand it to you, Kerry. You surprised me."