bottle of powerful painkillers. “If all that fails, call me.”

Kerry chuckled around her mouthful and took a swallow of the tea to wash it down. “Thank you, Doctor Dar.” She didn’t really expect either tea or candy to work, and she’d already taken a handful of painkillers, but the thought of Dar in here, meticulously arranging her action plan and writing her notes, brought a smile to Kerry’s face and allowed her to forget her misery for a short while.

A very short while.

Her intercom buzzed. “Ms. Kerry? They are waiting for you in the conference,” Mayte’s soft voice floated into the air.

Kerry sighed and unwrapped another chocolate. “I’ll be right there, Mayte.”

“DAR?”

“YES?”

“COMMANDER Albert is here to see you,” María replied quietly.

“Send him in.” Dar finished signing the last of a stack of requests and closed the folder, tossing it in her out bin and putting the top back onto her fountain pen. Kerry had given her the elegant teakwood instrument, and she played with it for a minute, admiring the fine grain before she set it down and folded her hands.

María opened the door and stood back, allowing her guest to enter.

In walked a tall, muscular man in his mid thirties, every crease in his uniform razor sharp and precise. Dar had about ten or fifteen seconds as he crossed the room to decide how to play her side of the encounter and decided, as she stood and took the offered hand, to let the commander make the first move. “Commander. Thank you for coming down here.”

“That would be up, ma’am,” the man answered crisply. “I did as I was ordered to do.”

Oh boy. Dar resumed her seat. “Please, sit down.” She waited for her guest to comply. “I understand you’re going to be the Navy’s liaison officer for this new project, and I wanted to have a word with you before we got started.”

“Ma’am, I don’t know what you’ve been told, but in my opinion, this project is a waste of both our times,” Commander Albert stated flatly. “I’d just as soon it stopped right here, to save us all the hassle.”

“Commander, that’s not your decision to make,” Dar replied mildly. “Nor is it mine, for that matter. The government, for its own reasons, has decided to contract us to do this, and if you want it stopped, you’re going to have to appeal up your chain of command to do it.”

“With all due respect, ma’am, we do not need a civilian efficiency expert coming in and telling us how to run the Navy.”

“With all due respect, Commander, that’s not what your government hired,” Dar said. “I’m a systems analyst. I couldn’t give a 50 Melissa Good crap how you run the Navy. What they asked me to do is analyze your systems and controls structures and recommend technological enhancements.”

“Our systems work just fine.” Albert’s jaw twitched.

Dar sat back. “Then it’ll be a very short project, won’t it?” She felt almost a sense of amusement as she studied the sharp profile. “Listen, Commander, you’re making three assumptions that are going to get you into trouble, so you might want to just reverse your course right now.”

“Excuse me, ma’am?” he replied stiffly.

“One, you’re assuming I don’t know an obstructionist when I meet one. Two, you’re assuming I need your cooperation to do this little job; and three, you’re assuming I’m a stranger to the Navy.” Dar stood up. “I’ll meet you out at the base Friday morning. I think we’ve wasted enough of each other’s time today.”

Commander Albert stood and gave her a short nod. “Ma’am.” He turned and walked to the door, opening it and slipping through without ever looking back at her.

Dar sat back down and shook her head. “Gerry, I’m going to get you for this.” She pulled out her Palm Pilot and scribbled a few notes on it, adding her new contact’s name. She looked up as her intercom buzzed again. “Yes?”

“Dar.” Kerry’s voice, though calm, held a distinct edge to it. “I think we need some high-level situational administration here.”

Ah. My ass-kicking skills are in demand. “Be right there,” she told Kerry. “Take five.” She released the intercom and stood, circling her desk and heading for the door. “Definitely not a good day.”

KERRY RESTED HER weight on her elbows and cradled the mug in her hands, slowly sipping from it. Across the table, Clarice Keown, a strikingly attractive black woman, was arguing with Mitchell Grafberg, a member of the Midwest team that had been responsible for administering the account over which they were currently fighting.

God. Kerry counted the seconds. She hadn’t seen this much finger-pointing since the last time someone had knocked over the water cooler and shorted out the Xerox machine. It wasn’t that she didn’t know what the problem was—she did. In fact, all of them knew it. The account had been botched from day one, and the bandwidth designed for it was simply not enough. Adding to it would be at ILS’s expense and would take far too much time, and no one wanted to be responsible for making that decision.

Well, actually, Kerry had already made it. The point was, no one wanted to be the reason she’d had to. She’d been a little surprised at Clarice, who was sharp, and funny, and whom she liked, because the regional director was the main roadblock. She flatly refused to accept that her team had goofed and was simply going around in circles with Red Sky At Morning 51

arguments, trying to justify the bill Dar was surely going to slap right onto her desk.

The outer door opened and closed, and the room was suddenly full of Dar Roberts, who swooped down on the table and circled it like a huge hunting hawk before settling neatly at Kerry’s side. Her entrance stopped the argument in its tracks, and now everyone’s attention was focused on Dar’s sleek form.

Dar gave them all a level, serious glare before turning and cocking her head at Kerry. “Well?”

“There was a significant underbudgeting of resources for the account,” Kerry stated. “That miscalculation allowed the bid to undercut the other offers, and it was awarded based on false data.”

The bridge of Dar’s nose wrinkled expressively.

“I’ve just had to order two additional T3 pipes and six new routers to make up the shortfall,” Kerry went on. “Which we won’t be able to bill back for. I’m looking at additional leveraging with other accounts in the area.”

Dar grunted.

Kerry correctly interpreted this to mean she’d done the right thing, but the cost was giving Dar a hive.

“So you needed me here to do what?” Dar asked. “Seems like you’ve got a handle on the disaster without me sticking my nose in.”

“There was a breakdown in processes,” Kerry reminded her. “And, unfortunately, I can’t fix the breakdown because we can’t seem to come to an agreement over where, exactly, the gap is.”

“Oh.” Dar nodded, then reviewed the table. “I get it. No one wants the blame, is that it?”

Clarice leaned forward. “Dar, it’s not anything to do with blame, okay? I still think it was a valid bid. The customer didn’t tell us enough for us to know different.”

“Bullshit,” Dar snapped back. “The customer doesn’t know his ass from a hole in the wall. That’s why they hired us. It’s our job to make sure we know what their business is, Clarice, and if we don’t know enough to ask the right questions, then we end up in situations like this.” She slammed her hand on the table, and everyone jumped.

Except Kerry. She’d felt the shift in the body next to her, and figured it would either be a table slap or a jump to the feet. Since Dar’s thigh didn’t move, she chose the slap and was expecting it.

“Kerry’s going to save your ass, and I agree with her decision, but somewhere down the line, she’s got to stand up and explain why Ops’s budget is in a deficit because we had to take on the expense of your screw-up,” Dar went on. “So you’d better figure out where your hole is and close it, or I will.”

Everyone was quiet for a minute. Clarice finally exhaled. “All right.

We’ll take care of it.”

“Good. Because if it happens again, I’m not going to worry about 52 Melissa Good whose fault it was, I’ll just fire all of you,” Dar snapped back, her voice low and electric, then building to an impressive volume that almost made Kerry wince. “Is that clearly understood?”

In the silence that followed, Kerry could clearly hear the air conditioner cycling on and off.

Clarice broke the stillness. “Understood.”

“Good.” Dar’s manner shifted abruptly to calm cordiality. “There’s a Midwest regional sales meeting going on down on ten. You might want to stop in there. I know Jose wanted to talk to you.” She cleared her throat, then absently picked up Kerry’s cup and took a sip of her tea.

Kerry was careful not to react. She kept a bland, interested look on her face and studied her pen. “I think we might even be able to push up the due date on those extra T3s. The local up there owes me a favor.”

“Good,” Dar said again, putting the cup down and standing up.

“Ladies and gentlemen.” She gave them a nod and strode out, leaving a Dar-sized awkwardness behind her.

“All right. Now that we’ve got that cleared up,” Kerry pushed back from the table and stood, “anything else we need to clarify?” She was met with silence. “Great. I’ve got a conference call I’m due on in ten minutes. I’ll keep you advised on the status of those circuits.” She gathered up her papers and tucked them under an arm, then picked up her cup and made her way to the door, pushing her way through it and letting it close behind her.

DAR HEARD THE steps catching up to her in the hallway, and she debated making a sharp right turn into the restroom. Then Clarice called her name and she regretfully abandoned the thought and stopped, turning and giving the black woman an inquiring look.

“Got a few minutes?”

Patience, Dar. Take a deep breath and imagine Kerry teaching you to crochet. “Sure,” Dar replied, then fell silent, putting the burden of the conversation back on Clarice.

“Somewhere more private than the central lobby?” There was a note of nervous amusement in Clarice’s voice. “Your office, maybe?”

“C’mon.” Dar turned and led the way along the hall, pulling the door to her outer office open and holding it as Clarice passed in front of her. María looked up as they entered, and her gaze slipped past Clarice’s shoulder and met Dar’s in wry amusement. The poor secretary had found herself in a most awkward position, having had to field the love-struck woman’s inquires into Dar’s personal tastes and preferences, and had retreated into a bland, Cuban incomprehension on many occasions.

“That is how I knew about you and Kerrisita,” María had told her once. “I did not have to tell her anything, Dar. When I saw her first time fixing you the Red Sky At Morning 53

coffee, the right way? I knew.”

Dar considered that as she followed Clarice into her inner office, realizing that should have signaled to her the difference between Kerry and all her former interests. Kerry alone hadn’t fenced around with her, done the dance, played the game. She’d walked in and simply claimed Dar, lock, stock and barrel, as though she’d had some inalienable right to do so.

Hmm. Dar set her interesting revelation aside as she sat down behind her desk and crossed her arms on it. “All right, what can I do for you?”

“So, how are you, Dar?” Clarice asked, seating herself cautiously.

“Never been better,” Dar replied with complete honestly. “What do you want?”

“Haven’t changed, huh? Straight to the point.” Clarice cleared her throat. “Well, you remember my mom?”

“Mm.” Dar nodded. Clarice’s mother lived in Coral Gables, and she’d always thought the two were close.

“She’s getting on, and the doctor doesn’t want her living alone anymore. She wants me to come back here and live with her. So I was wondering if there was anything in the company available for me.” She paused. “Here.”

Oh. Something simple for a change. Dar sat back and propped a knee up against the edge of her desk, looking up at the ceiling as she brought to mind a list of openings in operations in the area. Her peripheral vision told her Clarice was watching her with a look that mixed curiosity and something else. “There might be one or two things, but I’ll have to check with Kerry,” Dar replied. “It’s her ballpark, unless you want to change divisions. When are you looking at making the move?”

Clarice exhaled, obviously relieved. “As soon as I can. Listen, I’m sorry about this whole mess-up, Dar.” She got the words out in a rush.