Thicker Than Water - DK5

by Melissa Good

  Kerry turned, leaned on the armrest, and peered out of the small window. “Hm. Mostly police, no fire rescue, could be anything. Maybe a hijack attempt?” She watched over her shoulder.

  “Drugs. See the dogs?”

  “Ah, we must be home.” Kerry smiled. “This is the only airport I’ve ever seen that on a regular basis.”

  “Mm,” Dar acknowledged. “Guess we’ll read about it in tomorrow’s Herald.”

  “Okay.” Kerry settled back as the plane turned to enter its 190 Melissa Good assigned gate area. “But you have to read me the comics first.”

  She grinned as Dar gave her a look. They’d developed what was, to Kerry, a charming habit of diving through the morning paper for the cartoons, finding Dilbert first, of course, then sharing the others, and their respective horoscopes. That was after their run and shared shower, while the coffee was brewing for the drive to work.

  Work. Kerry gazed pensively at the overhead. Would that schedule be changing? From what Dar said, it probably would.

  But… She glanced at Dar. They’d figure out something. In the meantime, they’d get a cup of coffee, shed their jackets, and watch the palm trees wave as they drove home.

  Kerry sighed happily. She was so looking forward to that. She fairly ached for the normality of it. The plane bumped to a halt, she released her seat belt, and stood up alongside Dar who ducked to clear the overhead. “Sometimes it pays to be short.”

  “I agree.” Ceci chuckled from behind her as they watched Andrew move into the aisle to avoid cracking his head. “And no offense to your home state, Kerry, but I’m glad I’m no longer in it.”

  Kerry snorted. “Like I wasn’t counting the minutes?” She took a deep breath as the cabin door opened and a gust of moderately warm, moderately moist air blew in, tinged with aviation fuel but welcome nonetheless. She shouldered her laptop, edged out in front of Dar, and gave the flight attendant a smile as she exited the plane onto the jetway.

  “Ah. Air conditioning in December. I must be home,” Dar remarked as they walked up the sloping path. Already, they could hear the clamor of the airport loudspeaker, a combination of English and Spanish that matched the conversations going on around them.

  “Oh yeah,” Kerry agreed as they walked out of the gate and into the flow of terminal traffic. “I remember my very first experience getting off a plane here. I walked ten feet, put my bag down, stared, and wondered what in the world I’d gotten myself into.”

  It had been more than culture shock, that was for sure. It had been an exotic, intimidating new world. Now, it was just home, and she welcomed the bustling activity and the riot of color that surrounded them. “You up for a café con leche? It’ll take them twenty minutes to bring the car up anyway. You did valet it, right?”

  “You bet your…” Dar’s eyes wandered. “Yes, I did.” She grinned, mindful of her father’s inquisitive presence. “You parked or what, Dad?”

  “Ah am about to go get me that truck,” Andrew said. “Fig-Thicker Than Water 191

  gered we’d talk to you two later on.” He gave Dar a pat on the back and accepted a hug from Kerry, then ambled off with a wav-ing Ceci in tow.

  “Bye.” Kerry waggled her fingers back. “They’re so cute.”

  Dar arched a brow at her. “I’ll go turn in my valet ticket. Did you say something about coffee a minute ago?” She bumped Kerry towards the coffee bar with her hip. “Get me a cheese pastalito, too.”

  Mm. Kerry obediently trotted over to the coffee bar and leaned against its polished surface as the attendant came over.

  “Dos café con leche, dos queso pastilitos, por favor.”

  The boy grinned at her. “Si, Senorita.” He turned towards the espresso machine. Kerry slid onto the stool and idly watched him, enjoying the sharp, distinctive scent of the brewing coffee as she listened to the conversations around her. Football and soccer mostly, with a spattering of stock market, and one very excited discussion about deep sea fishing. She turned around as her coffee and pastries were delivered, paid for them, and received another smile from the server as she left a tip.

  She picked up her goodies, shouldered her bag, and headed for the automatic doors leading outside.

  Dar was leaning against a support pole, her sunglasses now firmly settled on the bridge of her nose.

  “Rats. I forgot.” Kerry handed Dar the bag and dug inside her briefcase pocket for her own glasses, a nifty wraparound pair Dar had gotten her not long before. She put her bag between her feet as she straightened and accepted the cup of steaming liquid from Dar. “Thank you, ma’am.”

  “Ma’am?” Dar laughed and took a sip.

  Kerry leaned against her and sucked happily at her drink, enjoying the rich, sweet flavor. The air was cool and equally sweet, and she felt a sense of pure, animal well-being as she watched the confusion of traffic trying to get to the curbside. Soon enough, she spotted Dar’s Lexus making its way toward them, and she actually almost felt like hugging it. “Want me to drive?

  Give your arm a break?”

  Dar’s face went still for a moment, then she exhaled. “Okay.”

  She accepted her keys from the valet and put her bag in the back seat before Kerry took them from her fingers and circled the car.

  They settled into the leather seats and Kerry took a moment to adjust the driver’s seat forward.

  “I should keep a booster seat in here for you,” Dar remarked dryly.

  “Hah hah.” Kerry put the big SUV in gear and edged cautiously into the traffic stream. “How about next time you just put 192 Melissa Good me in your lap?”

  “Mm.” Dar chuckled softly, sparing a moment to imagine driving with her arms wrapped around Kerry. “Yeah, okay…Hey, pull over.”

  “Hedonist.”

  “It was your idea!”

  Kerry dodged a speeding Mercedes and settled down to the relatively short drive home. “Hey, Dar?”

  Dar had her head tipped back and her eyes closed. “Yeeess?”

  Kerry thought a moment of how to phrase her question, then she just shrugged. “Is this really it, at work?”

  Dar was quiet, then she shrugged. “Yeah.”

  “No reprieves? No time off for good behavior?”

  A soft chuckle rose from the passenger’s seat. “Hon, I’ve never behaved good in my entire tenure there. Trust me, if I had to come up with a reason to leave, you were the best reason on Earth.” She reached carefully behind her with her good arm and tugged her briefcase over and onto her lap. “Want to help me write my resignation letter later?”

  Kerry sighed. “Dar, it’s not funny.”

  “I know, I know. I j...” Dar reached inside her briefcase, and her fingers touched a thick sheaf of paper she didn’t remember putting inside. She looked into the case. “What the heck is that?”

  “What?”

  Dar removed the papers and stared at them in utter disbelief.

  “Dar?”

  Dar looked at her. “Did you put this in here?”

  Hearing the tension in Dar’s voice, Kerry pulled the car over.

  “Me? Of course not. What is it? The only thing I put in your case this morning was your laptop, because you asked me to.”

  Dar thumbed the sheaf, the soft rustle of paper sounding loud in the car. “It’s the data I gave your father.”

  “What?” Kerry put the car in park, half turned, and reached for the stack. “How…Wait, are you sure? Maybe it’s a copy you put in there, Dar. You had one.”

  “I’m sure.” Dar turned the first sheet over. “I printed this one on recycled; it was my check copy. The other one’s on water-mark.”

  Kerry stared at the words on the back of the page—someone’s recipe for pot roast. That seemed so odd and so incongruous, she almost wondered if her father might have scribbled it down for the cooks to try at home. The world seemed strange around her.

  She braced her elbow on the armrest between them and rested her head on one hand. “I don’t get it.”

>   “Me, neither.” Dar pulled out her cell and hit a speed dial Thicker Than Water 193

  button. She waited until it was answered, then cleared her throat.

  “Hi, Alastair? It’s Dar.”

  “Ah! Oh…uh, Dar, listen, can I call you right back?” Alastair sounded surprised to hear from her. “I’m, ah—”

  “I don’t care if you’re on the john,” Dar said bluntly. “I just wanted you to know I have the papers.”

  There was dead silence, then a splutter. “How did you know where…? Did you get that GPS thing working for cell phones?”

  Dar merely waited.

  “If you did, why the hell didn’t you say so? You know how much money we could make w—” Alastair fell silent. “Holy Jesus, did you say you had the papers?”

  “Yes.”

  Through the phone connection Dar could hear a ball game playing softly somewhere in the far background, but little else.

  “Alastair?”

  His sigh was audible. “Dar, I’m not sure it matters now.”

  Dar shrugged. “Well, for what it’s worth, I have them. Anyway, talk to you later.”

  More silence preceded his quiet, “I’ll call you, Dar.”

  Alastair’s voice was now very serious. “Stay close.”

  Dar closed her phone and looked at Kerry. “Let’s go home.”

  Kerry was staring steadily at her. “It’s too late, isn’t it?”

  “Eh.” Dar picked up her hand and kissed the knuckles. “I don’t care. C’mon. Let’s go. I want you, a soft bed, a warm glass of milk, and a bowl of pitted cherries.”

  Kerry smiled wistfully at her. “In that order?”

  “Any order I can get them in.”

  Kerry gave in and put the car back into drive, then checked her rearview mirror and pulled into the traffic lane.

  After a mile or so of companionable silence, she cleared her throat. “I keep forgetting to ask you, and you did mention it twice, so it’s not your fault. What was the deal you set up with the Navy in exchange for that information?”

  Dar opened her eyes, and she regarded the fawn header on the Lexus. “Ah. That’s right. I guess I never did lay that out for you, did I?”

  Kerry glanced at her, then back at the road. “Well, I mean, it doesn’t have to be right now, but I was curious—”

  “No, now’s as good a time as any,” Dar remarked. “I should have just told you earlier.” Her expression turned pensive. “I agreed to destroy the information and forget what I’d seen, in return for the Navy outsourcing all of their IS to us.”

  Kerry almost hit the car in front of her. She hurriedly applied her brakes, then turned her head and stared at Dar in utter disbe-194 Melissa Good lief. “You what?” A horn honked, and she hastily pulled the Lexus over to the curb again and parked it.

  “What?”

  Pale blue eyes regarded her warily. “That was my price, if they wanted me to shut up. So they did. Gerry got them to agree to the outsourcing deal.” She watched Kerry’s face carefully, wondering what she was thinking.

  Kerry covered her eyes with one hand. “You blackmailed the US government?”

  Did I? Dar rubbed her chin. “Yeah, I guess I did.”

  Green eyes peeked out from between slim fingers. “Paladar Katherine Roberts, what am I going to do with you?”

  Dar smiled wistfully. “I don’t know. It was nicer having you think I just chucked it all because I wouldn’t leave you,” she reflected in a quiet voice. “Just a moment of altruistic heroism I didn’t actually have.”

  Kerry studied Dar for a moment, then cupped her cheek with one hand but didn’t say anything. They looked at each other for a moment, then Kerry put the Lexus in gear and resumed driving.

  Concentrating on the traffic gave her a chance to think about what Dar had told her and how she felt about it.

  Was she mad at Dar for not telling her? Kerry nibbled the inside of her lip. Yeah, a little. It meant a huge workload for her, and dozens of things would have had to be taken into account.

  But, on the other hand—given what had been going on at home at the time—had she really wanted to deal with that, too?

  No, Kerry admitted. She’d have had no desire whatsoever to add to the stress load she’d been suffering under. So, Dar had probably done her a favor in keeping the arrangement quiet until now. She did wonder, though, about what Dar had said about how she felt.

  A quick glance showed her a somber profile. Dar thinks I’m disappointed, Kerry realized. Am I?

  It had been flattering, of course—for her to realize Dar had just chucked everything to be at her side. But…but it had also hurt to know she had caused Dar to relinquish something she knew was so important to her partner: honor, her integrity. Regardless of what ILS had gotten out of the deal, it didn’t change the fact that Dar had traded off doing what she knew was the right thing, just to be the rock Kerry had so desperately needed right then.

  That was some tradeoff. Kerry felt humbled by it. “Thanks. But the company gaining doesn’t matter, because you’d have done it anyway.”

  Dar’s lips curved into a reluctant smile. “So much for my reputation.”

  Thicker Than Water 195

  Kerry chuckled softly. “I warned you, didn’t I?”

  “You did.” Dar closed her eyes and remembered that moment, there on that airplane coming back from Orlando which she’d almost wished wouldn’t land. “Ker?”

  “Mm?”

  “Thanks.”

  KERRY STEERED THE big SUV down the slight ramp into their parking area and pulled into the spot with Dar’s name on it.

  She turned off the ignition and rested her arms against the wheel, looking out at the townhouse as Dar started to open the passenger side door.

  “Glad we’re home.” Dar sighed. “Feels like it’s been a month.”

  Home. Kerry took in the lines of the front porch, the Mediter-ranean stucco of it now warmly familiar to her. She got out of the car and stepped between it and her own, the shiny dark blue reflecting her image as she lightly kicked the parking bumper with her own name stenciled neatly on it.

  With a quiet smile, she followed Dar up the steps and stood by as her partner keyed in the lock code and unlocked the door.

  She remembered the first time she’d stood in just this place, waiting on just that same thing, but this time she tucked her fingers into the back of Dar’s waistband and kissed her on the middle of her back as they shuffled inside.

  Chino galloped towards them, whining in delight, and Colleen appeared from the kitchen, wiping her hands as she called out a greeting.

  Home. Kerry rested her head against Dar’s back as Chino jumped up to greet the taller woman. “Hey, Col,” she returned, as a wave of exhaustion threatened to swamp her. “We’re home.”

  “And a big welcome to it,” Colleen said. “Glad to see you guys. How was the flight?”

  “Wasn’t awake for a minute of it.” Kerry tossed her jacket on the back of the couch. “I’m just glad it’s over.” She knelt to pet Chino. “Hey, Cheebles. You glad we’re back?”

  The Labrador licked her face all over and managed to get fur over every square inch of Kerry that she touched. Kerry loved it all and sat on the floor and gathered the delighted dog into her arms.

  Home.

  “Coffee, Ker?”

  “Absolutely.” Kerry exhaled happily. “Absolutely.”

  196 Melissa Good EYES CLOSED, DAR mentally traced the path her briefcase had taken that day. She’d had it in the green room, taken it with her on the way to the airport, locked it in the car while she was in Dairy Queen. It had gone through x-ray, then been put in the overhead bin for the flight. Taken out again when they landed, it had sat in the back of the car all the way home.

  So…when the hell had someone put the papers in it? Dar went over the steps one more time. The only two places that were even remote possibilities were at the Stuart house and in the car while they were getting ice cream, taking into account
that someone would have had to get the rental opened and then locked it up again. No one had known they were going for ice cream, so that left the house.

  Who had put it there? Cynthia? Kerry’s sibs? None of them would have known the importance. Ah well. She exhaled. Probably doesn’t matter now anyway. At least in her own mind, she had them back and some squid wasn’t running around with them in Washington.

  Dar stifled a yawn and relaxed on the leather sofa in their living room. It was, aside from the low buzz of voices in the kitchen, blessedly quiet in the condo, and Dar dropped her head against the plushy stuffed arm of the sofa, welcoming the rich scent of the leather and the warmth of the long stripe of sunlight that was coming in the front window and painting a golden swath across her body.

  She could, she acknowledged dutifully, go into her study and find out what was in her mailbox waiting to pounce on her. She could—Dar wriggled into a more comfortable position and closed her eyes—but she wasn’t going to. Tomorrow would come soon enough, and if there was anything of a truly disastrous nature, she’d have been paged before now, right? Hm. She pulled her cell phone out and made sure it was on. Nope; no pages, no calls. Good.

  A cold nose investigated her arm, and she opened her eyes.

  “Hey, Chino. Did you give up on getting cookies from mommy Kerry?”

  Sad brown eyes regarded her, then Chino climbed up onto the wide couch, settled down with a grunt, and licked all of Dar’s exposed skin within her reach.

  “Aw.” Dar stroked the Labrador’s soft, thick fur. “I missed you too, baby.” She quickly looked around to make sure no one had heard her, then ruffled the dog’s ears. “You’re such a sweetie, aren’t you?”

  Chino put her muzzle down on Dar’s chest and exhaled happily.

  Dar exhaled too. It was over. Damn, she was glad it was over.

  Thicker Than Water 197

  Now they could settle down and get on with their life together and concentrate on happier things. Like Christmas, for instance.

  Dar wiggled her toes in mild glee as she considered the boxes she had hidden in the crawl space. Presents for Kerry, of course, and Chino, but also for her parents, something she hadn’t done for many years, and for the assorted friends Kerry had invited over for the Christmas party.