“No luck, eh, sailor boy?” Ceci stepped lightly over her husband’s outstretched legs and settled down on the bench at his side.

“Naw.” Andrew shook his head. “Stubborn old fool.” He turned his head slightly. “You sure Dardar’s okay?”

“Why don’t you call her?” Ceci held out the cell phone. “Make you feel better.”

Andrew examined the electronic device, then handed it back. “Got me a better idea.” He stood, and held a hand out. “Let’s go see for ourselves.”

Ceci allowed herself to be hauled to her feet, and they started down the dock. They were halfway back when the rain caught them, sweeping across the way with a scent of ozone and damp, warm wood.

“HEY.” KERRY SAT on the edge of Dar’s desk. “Why don’t you let me get you another shot of those pills, huh?” She could see the pale tinge to Dar’s normally tan skin.

“No.” Dar shifted her arm in its sling to try and ease the ache.

“They put me out, and I don’t want to risk that before Gerry calls us back.” The pain had gotten worse as the medication wore off, though, and now she had bursts of sharp agony moving up her shoulder and into her neck.

“Okay.” Kerry tried another tack. “I’m going to make some herbal tea, want some?”

Dar thought about that, then nodded. “Yeah. Do we have that peachy kind?”


220 Melissa Good

“It’s apricot and honey,” Kerry told her. “And yes, we do.”

“I’d like that.” Dar smiled. “I guess I can go lay down on the couch for a while, huh? I’m sure Gerry’s going to be a few minutes.”

“Sounds like a great idea to me.” Kerry got up, waiting for Dar to join her, then tucked a hand inside her elbow and walked with her to the living room. She got Dar settled back into her comfortable nest of pillows and fleece, and then she headed off toward the kitchen.

“Hey, Chino.” She greeted the Labrador, who had followed her.

“You want some tea, too?” The blonde head cocked curiously at her.

“No, probably not, huh?” Kerry put some hot water up, then pulled a bowl from the cabinet and raided the crisper, pulling out some fruit and washing it. Cherries, which were a favorite of Dar’s, and grapes, apples and peaches, and the bananas that were her own favorite. Then she removed a thick, sweet banana nutbread from the refrigerator, and sliced off a few slices, spreading a coating of cream cheese on them before setting them on a plate next to the fruit. “There.” She pulled a bottle of Advil from the cabinet and set it down, idly spinning it as she waited for the water to heat.

Dar tilted her head back and regarded the popcorn ceiling. Her findings had surprised Gerry; she knew that from the shock in his voice.

She also knew he would react quickly, and that troops were probably already heading for the base—military police and Marines, more than likely.

It bothered her, though, to simply release control of the situation.

Kerry was right. She knew they’d botch it. She knew they’d miss out on catching all the bastards who were involved, and maybe only get the obvious ones. And people like Jeff Ainsbright, who, even if he wasn’t involved, would be taken down because he damn well should have known what was going on in his own command.

Dar sighed, remembering the long afternoons she’d spent as a youngster running wild with Chuckie and the other kids in the housing area’s grassy spaces as their fathers huddled over barbecues in the front yard. If she tried, she could close her eyes and hear the football games playing in the background.

A warm touch on her arm made her jerk, and she opened her eyes.

“Sorry. I was just thinking.” The scent of apricot drifted over from the tray Kerry was setting on the coffee table.

Kerry took her partner’s hand in her own and chafed the fingers.

“Dar, if you’re tired, go ahead and go to sleep. I’ll wake you up as soon as the phone rings.”

“Hmm.” Dar shook her head. “I slept half the day, Ker.” She shifted her head on the pillow, then pulled herself up a little. “Did you wrap that brick up?”

Kerry nodded, then handed Dar her cup. “Wrapped it up, taped it up, put it in a box, and put it up on top of the cabinet so Chino can’t get at it.” The Labrador, hearing her name, came snuffling over looking for Red Sky At Morning 221

goodies. “Stuff gives me the creeps just looking at it.”

Dar took a sip of the tea. “You never experimented?”

“No.” Kerry shook her head. “I stuck to beer, thanks, and that got me in more than enough trouble.” She paused in the middle of handing over a piece of bread and looked up at Dar. “Did you?”

A pained sigh gave her the answer. “Once,” Dar admitted. “Not the hard stuff. A bunch of us got hold of some wild weed growing back south of the base and decided to have a party.”

Kerry finished handing over the nutbread. “And?” she asked curiously.

“I was sick as a dog for three days.” Dar nibbled her treat.

“Throwing up, seeing spots, couldn’t keep anything down until my mother finally got me to the doctor’s and he got some intravenous Dramamine into me.”

“Oh.” Kerry bit her inner lip. “I thought you couldn’t take that.”

“That’s when we found that out.” Dar grimaced. “Next time someone asked me if I wanted a joint, I slugged them.” She took a bigger bite. “Mm...I really like this.”

“I know.” Kerry seated herself on the floor, leaning back against the couch and exhaling. “Me, too.” She handed over a handful of cherries. “I was only really tempted when I was in college,” she said.

“Everyone did it. All those late nights and stress...I had a couple of friends who had a source for just about everything. They were always telling me what they had and asking if I wanted any.”

Dar watched her profile and the motion of her jaw muscles as she chewed. “We had that a lot in college, too.”

“Mm.” Kerry exhaled. “I remember one night, I had this paper due in my writing class and a systems design due on the same day. I’d had a full schedule of classes that day, and I was totally wiped out. Just exhausted. Even double espressos weren’t doing a thing for me.”

“Mm,” Dar murmured encouragingly.

“Jane came over and saw how trashed I was. She offered me a handful of amphetamines and a shot of coke and told me it would get me through the two assignments, no problem.” Kerry took another bite thoughtfully. “I took the drugs from her.”

Dar bit into a cherry and skillfully separated the fruit from its pit.

“And?” She echoed Kerry’s earlier question.

“I came pretty close to taking them,” Kerry admitted honestly.

“And would you believe, it was my father that kept me from it?”

Dar’s eyes opened very wide. “Your father?”

Kerry laughed softly. “He had this speech he used to do about people needing crutches. You know, Dar, that old thing about liberal programs being a crutch for the poor that kept them from really going out and making a living?”

“That’s such a crock of shit,” Dar stated.

“Not the point. It reminded me that I’d chosen to take this double 222 Melissa Good major, and if I couldn’t handle it, I shouldn’t use an illegal substance as a crutch. Either do it, or don’t do it, but don’t fake it,” Kerry replied. “I wanted to do it on my own, so I could look back and say, yeah, I did that. No one helped me.”

“Hmm.” Dar depitted another cherry and took another bite of her banana nutbread. “Yeah, I see your point,” she admitted. “So, what did you do?”

Kerry thought back to that long night, with its aching struggle she’d spent alone. “I worked through it. I wrote the systems design first, because you need brain cells to do that, and the creative writing paper...” Now a smile crossed her face. “Dar, do you know I still don’t know what I put in that paper? It got me a B, but I have no idea what I wrote.”

Dar chuckled. “Whatever works.” She looked hopefully at the plate. “Any more of that bread?”

Kerry turned her head and eyed her. “What’s it worth to you?”

Dar poked out her lower lip.

“Ah. So you think that’s all it takes to get me to give up this really great tasting nut bread?” Kerry inquired.

Dar gave her a sad look.

“You’re such a brat.” Kerry handed it over. She peeled a banana and settled back as Chino put her chin down on her thigh hopefully.

“Oh no, madam. Last time we gave you fruit, you got sick, remember?”

The phone rang, and Kerry shot a look back at Dar, then she picked up the portable receiver and answered it. “Hello?”

“Ah...yes, is Dar there?”

“Yes, General. Just a minute.” Kerry handed the phone back and half turned, resting her chin on the couch as she listened.

Dar took a breath before she pressed the phone to her ear. “Gerry?”

There was a soft knock at the door. Kerry frowned, then scrambled to her feet and trotted over to it, peeking through the eyehole. “Uh-oh.”

She hesitated, then realized she really had no choice and opened the door. “Hi.”

“Howdy there, kumquat,” Andrew drawled. “Y’all going to let us inside there?”

Oh boy. Kerry slipped outside instead, closing the door behind her.

DAR GAVE THE condo door a curious look as she listened to the voice on the other end of the line. “Gerry, we’re not equipped for that.”

Dar closed her eyes against the throbbing she could feel growing in her neck. “I have security teams that can protect data, sure, but this is a damn Navy base.”

“I’m aware of that, Dar.” Gerry’s voice was uncharacteristically serious. “The trouble is, we can’t shake a team loose to go down there for at least forty-eight hours.”


Red Sky At Morning 223

By then, it would be too late. “Damn.”

“John Taylor from the JAG office is on a plane headed your way,”

General Easton stated. “He’ll handle the official part, but if there’s any way your people could protect the evidence—”

“Gerry, people could get hurt,” Dar said. “This isn’t the kind of thing we get involved in. Corporate double-dealing, yeah, but smuggling? I’m responsible for these people, and for their safety.” She paused. “And I don’t know how many bastards are implicated.”

Injudiciously, she shifted, and stifled a gasp. “Shit.”

“Dar?” Gerry spoke quickly. “Are you all right?”

Dar bit her inner lip for a long moment, then exhaled as the sharp pain receded. “Yeah, I’m fine. I just twisted something.”

“Well, listen, my friend, I’ll find some other way of doing this,”

General Easton replied. “If nothing else, we’ll just round up the lot of them and start shaking.”

The unfairness of that, Dar acknowledged, was exactly what she’d been afraid of. “Hang on a minute, Gerry.” She put the phone down and let her head drop back on the pillow, thinking hard about her options.

Was it dangerous?

Be honest, Dar. Sure it is. Look what happened to you last night, and Chuck was a friend of yours. Dar rubbed her forehead. This was a military base, full of sailors and Marines, an unknown number of whom could be involved in criminal activity and react with violence.

But...

If she didn’t help, innocent people could and probably would get blamed, and the criminals would probably get away. Dar mulled that over. Question was, how could she help Gerry, help the base, protect the innocent, and keep her people safe at the same time? “Jesus, Paladar,” she murmured to herself. “What the hell do you think you are?”

Finally, she picked up the phone again. “Gerry?”

“What’s that? Oh, still here, Dar.”

“Let me see what I can do.” Dar heard herself say the words, and wondered how she was going to back them up. “Maybe I can get a small volunteer team inside.” Then an idea occurred to her. “With an escort.”

There was a momentary pause. “Dar, do me a favor, eh? Don’t take chances. I want to see your whole family this Christmas. Been waiting for that for a long while now.”

Dar evaded the question. “See if you can contact that JAG staffer, send him over to my office. We’ll get things moving here. Talk to you later, Gerry.” She disconnected and put the phone down on her belly, considering what to do next.

IT WAS A crowded doorstep. Kerry stood effectively blocking the entrance, despite her relatively small size. “Dar’s on the phone,” she 224 Melissa Good explained. “It’s business.”

“Uh-huh.” Andrew crossed his arms. “Not like we’d know one word in six she was using.” He eyed Kerry curiously. “Something bothering you, kumquat?”