Tropical Convergence (40 page)

"Uh...yeah, we're set," Meyer agreed. "Is there...can we do anything until he gets here? Run some...um...tests, or..."

Dar shook her head. "No." She battled the urge to ignore the room and chat with Kerry instead, finding it disturbingly difficult to keep her concentration on the clients in front of her. "Just tell everyone to relax, that you know it's slower than molasses, but that it's being worked on." She stood up and slipped her PDA into her pocket. "And now, gentlemen, I'm going to make arrangements for the rest of my responsibilities while I'm working on this little problem of yours. I'll see you first thing in the morning."

They hastily scrambled to their feet and started yammering thanks and goodbyes as she strode across the room, heading for the door and the dubious freedom of the Manhattan streets.

Outside, she was hit with a blast of hot air, and all the sounds of a busy city that jarred on her sensitive ears. She ducked between two buildings to escape the worst of the sun and opened her PDA, leaning against the brick building as she started to write. Finishing, she hit send, and then looked around her. "So." She unbuttoned the collar button on her shirt. "What in the hell do you do on a summer day in New York?"

With a sigh, she stepped out onto the sidewalk and began hunting for the proper spot to find a cab. "Guess I'll be finding out." She fixed an oncoming yellow victim with a direct stare, making eye contact with the driver and pulling him over to the curb apparently by the force of her own will. "Shit," she sighed, opening the back door. "Now I won't find out what she did for two whole damn days."

Damn it. The secret nipped at the corners of her conscience as she tried to puzzle out what her partner could have done that she didn't want to tell Dar about over the phone.

Shaved her head maybe? Dar frowned. No, she'd just gotten a haircut.

Maybe she dyed her hair a different color. "Hm." Dar put her PDA away and watched the city roll by. "How bad could that be?"

DAR REVIEWED HER options once she'd changed out of her suit into a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. There was, she had to grudgingly admit, a lot of things to do in New York, but most of them didn't really appeal to her.

Of course, she could stay in her hotel room and catch up on email. She gave her laptop a dour look, leaning over to check the screen. It was dark with new lines, some of them with red exclamation points next to them.

Dar read the first two, then impatiently shoved the laptop away, deciding to postpone the task until later. The sender's idea of urgent didn't jive with hers, and she had other things she needed to be doing. With a grunt, she got up from the bed and went to the small table, grabbing up one of the magazines there and dropping into the chair by the window.

Faintly, the sound of the city came through the glass. Dar turned her head and peered down at the street, but after a brief moment, she lost interest and went back to deciding what to do.

She flipped through the hotel guide restlessly, passing up coach rides in Central Park she'd have jumped at if Kerry was there, and the miles of shopping available to those into that kind of thing. Fancy stores whose advertisements probably cost more than the average family made in a month. Dar's nostrils twitched as she reflected on the fact that despite all her resources, her tastes really hadn't altered to high priced snootiness all that much.

Diamond bracelets? Well...

Dar occasionally enjoyed shopping, but usually only when she and Kerry were out for the day getting stuff they needed, and also mixing it up with lunch, or a trip to the computer store, or something they both found interesting.

They liked a lot of the same things. Dar always found that comforting. At first she'd wondered if Kerry was pretending to like things just because she wanted to make them seem more compatible, but after a while she realized they really did like the same stuff and in the cases when they didn't, she'd learned to read Kerry's facial expressions so accurately she knew in a single twitch of a muscle in her cheek what she was thinking.

That was so nice. Dar exhaled, and went back to her search for amusement. Maybe she could get Kerry a diamond bracelet. Would she like that?

She frowned, imagining Kerry's reaction. Her partner liked pretty things, but she often seemed unimpressed by expensive ones. In fact, the more inconsequential the gift Dar gave her, the more Kerry seemed to cherish it.

Hm.

She needed to do a little shopping for herself, but what she really wanted was some kind of...ah... Dar spread the magazine open and gazed at the advertisement, a quarter page near the back. It featured the picture of an aircraft carrier, and a grin spread across Dar's face as she read the details. "The Intrepid Sea-Air-Space Museum. Yeah. Now that's more my style."

She checked the address. It was on the Hudson River, near midtown, not all that far from her. Walking was an option. Taxies were also an option. Dar considered carefully. Hm. But so was the subway. She drummed her fingers on the magazine, remembering her last sojourn underground.

Chicago, where they'd gotten stuck in the dark under the river. She'd practically run out of the station at the other end, nearly getting herself and Kerry into a lot of trouble.

The clenching in her guts made her angry. "God damn it, not that too." She made her decision and got up, adding her wallet to her back pocket and sticking the room key in there as well. "Maybe I'll ride that damned thing until they throw me off."

Grabbing her sunglasses, Dar marched out of the room and closed the door behind her, heading for the elevator with a grim, determined look on her face.

Dar waited for the elevator to open on the bottom floor of the Hyatt, and then she crossed the lobby and exited the hotel's ornate and stately front door.

Outside, the heat slammed into her, but lacking her wool suit, Dar now shrugged it off as she would have back home. She slipped her sunglasses on and directed her attention to the building adjacent to her hotel. "Grand Central Station. Bet I can catch something there." She headed for the building, trotting up the steps and entering the wide, ornate doors.

Inside, she stopped, drawing to one side and blinking as she took in the vast, cavernous chamber that spread to all sides around her. The scale was immense, but more than that, there was an indefinable sense of history here that even Dar picked up on.

It was also beautiful. "Huh." Dar slowly walked forward, and started down the steps into the main hall. The ceiling curved overhead, painted in a deep blue, and featured the signs of the zodiac. The stone walls seemed freshly scrubbed, their construction solid and imposing.

Slowly, she made her way downstairs, looking around at the status boards listing trains leaving for points outside the city. People walked all around her, intent on getting to their destinations and she was forced to restrict her gawking lest she be bowled over by aggressively marching city residents.

Her PDA went off. Dar stepped to one side and pulled it out of her pocket, glancing down at the screen.

What's the word in Spanish for fornicating pig?

Dar looked around in reflex, clearing her throat before she removed the stylus and considered her answer.
As opposed to a pig that's just standing there eating?

A man glanced at her as he hurried by, making eye contact as he looked over his sunglasses. Dar gave him a brief smile, then returned her attention to the PDA as it chirped.

Yes.

With a sigh, Dar shook her head.
Hope you aren't getting into that much trouble, sweetheart. Fornicando puerco, but I'm hoping you're not putting that on a Powerpoint slide.

She only had a moment to wait for the answer.

Oh, yeah. A hundred memorable quotations from the inimitable Dar Roberts, annotated. It's gonna be great!

Dar laughed in pure reflex.
Troublemaker.

Just venting a little of my frustration with some help from my one and only. The fornicando puerco is finally done. My turn. Later. Love you.

Love you too.
Dar leaned against the stair railing and smiled, letting her eyes linger over the words before she sent them and tucked the machine away.

A small kiosk caught her eye and she dodged through the crowd, arriving at the souvenir stand without getting run over. The stand had an old photograph of the station, in black and white, with a striking series of sunbeams pouring through the upper windows.

Kerry would most certainly appreciate it. "I'll take one of these." She selected a poster tube and handed over the money for it to the dour, unlit cigar chomping man behind the desk.

"Sure ya don't want it in a nice frame, lady? Got a great bargain here on this one." He indicated an ornate, gilded monstrosity.

"No thanks," Dar politely refused. "I've got to carry it on the plane. This is easier."

"Whatever. Later. G'bye." The man turned to another customer, leaving Dar standing there with her poster in her hand slightly taken aback by the gruff attitude.

Collecting herself, Dar edged against one of the walls and peered around, finally spotting the entrance to the subway. She approached it, pausing a moment before she started down the steps.

The walls were all bright and cheery, but for every second she was on the stairs, Dar was aware of the fact that she was moving further and further under the ground. Her throat went dry, and she swallowed in reflex as she reached the first platform, and was faced with a number of posted signs laying out the different routes.

Dar stopped in front of a subway map, using the excuse of studying it to allow her heartbeat to settle. She could still see the steps up from where she was, and there was sufficient space around her. "Okay." She exhaled, focusing on the maze of colored lines in front of her. After a moment, her brow creased. "Jesus," she muttered. "I've seen spider webs less complicated than this."

The thought of a taxi suddenly became extremely appealing. Dar glanced over her head at the steel infrastructure, wincing a little as some train nearby rattled past and a gust of cold air blew against her. "What in the hell am I doing?"

Seeing if you have any guts at all left? Her inner voice mocked her.

With a scowl, she turned and walked to one of the token machines, studying it for a minute before she inserted a few bills and retrieved a square of cardboard for her troubles. She looked at it, and then her expression brightened. "Hey. I can prove to Kerry I did this."

Looking around to find her route, Dar started off down a passageway, sidestepping a man playing a flute and two women selling bags of... "Hm." She paused and purchased a bag of churros, taking one out to nibble on as she explored further into the maze.

Her selected route was the Times Square shuttle, since that appeared to let out reasonably close to the Intrepid museum, and more importantly, wasn't that far underground. Dar found the correct platform relatively easily, and leaned against the metal support, waiting for the train to arrive.

Okay, so far, so good. Dar glanced around her, and then she walked down the platform to where a small set of steps seemed to lead downward. She peeked down them, spotting more signs leading to more platforms, leading to different trains, which seemed to run in every direction at many different levels.

The complexity and seeming randomness unexpectedly intrigued her. It was almost as though some kids had taken six or seven of their individual train sets and threw them all together, pouring glue on top and hoping for the best.

Dar turned and surveyed the station she was standing on, taking in the tile mosaics, and the patchwork grid of the ceiling beams that crossed and re-crossed each other. The steel members seemed old, almost ancient, though the station tiles appeared new, and the facility was well kept.

Hm.

The train arrived, in a clatter of wheels and a blast of musky air.

Dar waited until the occupants had exited, and most of the people waiting to enter got in. Then she stepped onto the train, appreciating the chill of the air conditioning as she selected a seat on one side, near the back and settled into it.

The train was about half full. Dar studied her subway map, giving the doors an impatient look every few seconds when they obstinately refused to close. As the train sat there, a few late-comers jumped on. One of them, a tall bronze skinned girl in black denim and leather took the seat next to Dar.

They studied each other for a minute. Then the girl lifted one of her leather boot encased feet and put it on her opposite knee. "Yo," she addressed Dar pleasantly. "You ain't from here, huh?"

Dar's eyebrows cocked slightly. Behind her sunglasses, she glanced down at herself, comparing her appearance to the appearance of the rest of the train's occupants.

Hm. Apparently New Yorkers in downtown Manhattan didn't dress like refugees from a Jimmy Buffet concert. "No," she allowed briefly.

"Yeah." The girl folded her arms over her chest. "That's what I figured. Cause us New Yorkers don't go round half naked like that, y'know?"

Since the train wasn't moving, Dar decided conversation wouldn't hurt, and it would keep her mind off the butterflies in her stomach. "Why not?" she asked. "It's a hundred degrees outside."

"Just cause we don't," the girl responded readily. "I mean, you dress like that, you just asking for guys to come out, and be all like, touching you, and all that jazz. You know?"

Dar tilted her head and let her sunglasses drop down on her nose slightly, making actual eye contact with the women. "No, I don't," she drawled, hearing the touch of molasses enter her tone.

"Yo. You got some really cool eyes. I like that color," the woman complimented her. "They real?"

Dar blinked, her brows arching up. Then she realized what the woman meant. "Yeah." She pushed her sunglasses back up and leaned back. "What's with the train?" She changed the subject to one she figured the woman would know better than she did.

"This?" The woman pointed up over her head. "Oh, I don't know. They do that sometimes. Just make 'em stop, bam. Like that."