them for some months because, as Dar pointed out, it had no back up facilities and the giant UPS systems in the building had previously failed twice.

This close to Christmas, having a major center that cleared credit card purchases down was a bad, bad thing. “Power’s down again?” she asked softly, smoothing the thick ointment over the point of Dar’s shoulder and massaging the muscles just under the skin.

“Yeah,” Dar said. “Stupid bastards. I’m going to have that damn Dick Stark’s nuts for lunch.”

“Ew.” Kerry made a face, then held it for a different reason.

“Dar, this is really bruised.” She very gently touched the soft skin just above Dar’s left breast.

“I know. It hurts like hell,” Dar said. “Yeah, okay, you got a pen?” She spoke into the phone, focusing her attention away from the very concerned green eyes studying her. “All right. Have you started getting screaming phone calls from the banks yet?”

Kerry pulled Dar’s shirt back over her and covered her injured arm, then she stood and walked to the small desk, picking up her laptop case along the way. She could, she knew, legitimately take the phone from Dar and do what Dar was doing—it was her job, after all, and if she hadn’t been so dumb as to turn off her phone, she’d have gotten the call, not her boss. But she also knew that this one was going to come down to a screamfest, because if the weather in Chicago was half as bad as it was here, getting a repair crew out to fix the UPS wasn’t going to take her kind of finesse. It was going to take raw, brute, sheer bitch, and when it came to that, Kerry would be the first to admit she was a rank amateur compared to her lover. She’d let Dar get things rolling, and spend her time getting hooked up to the system to see what she could do about shifting processing remotely.

“Don’t give me that.” Dar’s voice rose into a familiar bark.

“Get his ass on the phone right now or he’ll be paying penalties on this for the next twenty years!”

Hm. Kerry regarded the figure in the bed. Then she went around the other side of the four poster with her laptop, squirmed into place next to Dar, and let her machine rest on her knees. A soft knock on the door made her look up. “Yes?”

The door opened and Angie poked her head in. “Hey.”

Kerry motioned with her head. “C’mon in.”

Angie walked quietly across the floor and took a seat next to the bed. “What are you guys doing?” she whispered as Dar’s voice lifted again.

“Tell that son of a bitch I’m going to send FedEx to pick up his testicles if he doesn’t get on this phone!”


122 Melissa Good Angie’s eyes widened.

“Easy, DR,” Kerry said in a soothing voice. She achieved her cellular connection and logged into the network. Alerts popped up on her screen like rabid weasels. “All right, all right, I get the picture; shut up already.” She slapped a few keys and looked up at Angie. “We’re running the world.”

Angie’s brow creased. “Right here, from the green bedroom?”

She watched Kerry type, her eyes flicking over the screen with a startling intensity. This was new. She’d never really seen Kerry do whatever it was that she did, and she listened in shocked consternation as Dar said things to people in terms Angie hadn’t even heard in gangster movies. It was sort of interesting, even though she hadn’t any idea what either of them was talking about.

“Look…” Dar shifted in aggravation, sat up, and reached over to move the phone from one ear to the other. It was a bad mistake, and she froze in mid-motion, stifling a yelp and biting her tongue as something that felt like a hot coal pressed against the nerves in her shoulder.

“Dar!” Kerry shoved the laptop off her legs, swiveled, and grabbed Dar and eased her back down onto the pillows. Dar’s face had gone pale, and she watched the blue eyes blink rapidly, faint twitches of pain making their way across her face. “Easy.”

Kerry grabbed the cell phone out of her hand and put it to her ear. “Hello? Who is this?” She waited for an answer. “That’s nice.

Listen to me. My name is Kerrison Stuart. I know more people in Congress than you have brain cells. If you don’t want six government agencies coming down on your doorstep on Monday morning, you’ll do whatever it is Ms. Roberts was asking you to do and not say one word.” She paused. “Do you understand me?” The sound of panic came through clearly. “Good. If you need me to get the snow removal people to clear your path, just say so.” She paused for his reply. “No? Good. We’ll be waiting for that repair-man. Good bye.” She slammed the phone shut and threw it across the room, where it bounced off the wall. “Jesus!”

She turned to see Angie staring at her, both hands covering her mouth. “What?” Then she shifted her eyes to where Dar was lying peacefully, her hands folded over her stomach, regarding her with a look of mixed amusement and pride. “What?” Her frustration surfaced. “You need a doctor!”

“Kerry,” Dar laid a hand on her thigh, “would you take it easy?”

“No.” Kerry scowled. “Dar, I’m really worried about your arm, and I…” She winced and rubbed her temples. “Shit.” The pounding at her temples increased and made her stomach churn.

She sucked in her breath at a wave of lightheadedness and was Thicker Than Water 123

aware of Dar’s sudden grip on her. “Damn it.”

Angie leaned forward. “Ker, are you okay?”

Kerry exhaled, trying to release the anger that had boiled up unexpectedly. She took a few deep breaths and the dizziness faded, along with the tension along her brow line. “Yeah.” She cleared her throat a little. “I’m fine...just aggravated.”

Dar rubbed the inside of her wrist. “You sure?”

Kerry looked at her, seeing the honest concern in her eyes.

“Yeah. I’m just worried about you, and frustrated.” She considered for a moment. “And overreacting, I think.” She gave Dar a wry look. “Sorry.”

“S’kay.” Dar gently squeezed her leg. “You’ve got a point, I do need to get this looked at. But we’re not going anywhere in this weather, and unless an orthopedic surgeon is on your guest list, it’s going to have to wait until we get home.”

Kerry frowned.

Angie cleared her throat. “If you don’t mind me asking, what exactly happened?”

Dar and Kerry exchanged glances. “It’s complicated,” Kerry finally replied, as the tension that had gripped her slowly ebbed.

She pulled her laptop back onto her lap and stared at it. “What was I doing?”

“Finding alernative routes for the western and southern datastreams,” Dar replied. “Try Atlanta and Kansas City. They should be able to handle the additional traffic. I think I put in big enough pipes there.”

“Yeah,” Kerry murmured, taking a deep breath and releasing it.

“Er…I meant to Dar’s arm,” Angie said delicately. “Not that what you’re doing isn’t interesting, but I’m seriously clueless when it comes to computers.”

Dar watched Kerry work for a moment. “I…um…” Explaining the entire Naval base issue was just too much for her at the moment. “I got hit in the shoulder with a baseball bat.”

“Oh,” Angie murmured. “Wow, that must have hurt.”

“Yeah, it did.”

“And then she made it worse by picking me up the other night,” Kerry muttered, her eyes focused on her laptop screen. “So there’s a certain amount of personal guilt going on here.” She smacked a few more keys. “God damn it.”

Angie exchanged glances with Dar. “Know what I think?”

“What?” Kerry asked testily.

“I think you need a nap.” Angie got up and tossed a pillow at her sister. “And you need to chill out.” She left the room and closed the green hued door behind her.


124 Melissa Good DAR’S EYES CLOSED as she lay quietly waiting for a call back on her cell phone. It was dim and silent in the room, the snow was still falling outside, and Kerry was curled up on her side with her head pillowed on Dar’s stomach, fast asleep.

Dar curled her fingers around a lock of Kerry’s hair, and wondered if Kerry was half as worried about her as she was about Kerry. She could almost sense the fractures in Kerry’s usually sturdy psyche and she only hoped the growing and renewed warmth with her nuclear family helped to heal them. Or else she’d take Kerry home and surround her with as much love and support as it took to do the job.

They’d gotten some of the problem resolved, as much as they could without fixing the broken equipment, and Dar had finally coaxed Kerry into taking one of the pills she carried around for stress headaches. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, the dos-age that merely relaxed Dar had knocked her shorter, lighter partner out like a light.

Dar’s cell vibrated softly, and she lifted it up. “Yeah? “ she murmured into the receiver.

“Dar, it’s Mark.” The MIS manager sounded upset. “Listen, we’ve got a real problem.”

One of Dar’s eyebrows lifted wryly. “Another one?”

“Some guy from the government’s here. He’s got a court order or something that says I have to give him the core dump you took from the Navy base.”

Dar’s other eyebrow lifted. “Really? Let me talk to him.”

She could almost see the smug look on the man’s face, and the carefully not smug look on Mark’s when he handed the phone over. “Who is this?” she drawled softly.

"My name is John Bradley,” a voice answered. “I represent the Military Appropriations Committee, Ms. Roberts. I assure you, this is all in order. Please have your staff here give me the information I require.”

“They don’t have it,” Dar told him, enjoying the moment of stunned silence.

“Ms. Roberts, this is not a joke. I have a court order.”