Tropical Convergence (42 page)

A dry chuckle. "If you were the other client, how would you want me to answer that?" Kerry said, as she started down the steps toward the fountain bedecked luncheon restaurant.

Quest was briefly silent. "Well."

"It's not all about getting new business, Mr. Quest," Kerry added, in a mild tone. "If you don't retain your existing customers and help them grow, it's just a shell game."

He looked at her hard. "Are you inferring something, Ms. Stuart?"

Kerry's brows contracted. "Excuse me?"

"Never mind." He glanced around. "I expect you to be competitive. I don't want to be handed an expensive bag of tricks, from anyone here. I have to cut the best deal for my company possible."

"We'll give you the best deal we're capable of," Kerry said. "But we may give you what you need, not what you want."

Quest snorted. "They said you were arrogant. That's why I'm surprised Ms. Robert's isn't here. She's got that down pat."

Kerry felt a growl start deep in her throat. She cleared it just before it became audible. "Dar put time in on the design for your account. Now she's left it in my hands. We're both comfortable with that, I'm sorry if you aren't."

Slightly taken aback, Quest drew in a breath and edged slightly away from her. "Ms. Stuart..."

Kerry pointed suddenly at the reporter. "I thought you said you wanted to keep this quiet, Mr. Quest. How does that impact your plans?"

Quest fell pensively silent. "It was unexpected," he admitted finally, as they reached the bottom of the steps. "But it's all that geek talk. No one I care about will see it or give a damn." He shrugged. "So if you want to spend all your time pissing on each other, Ms. Stuart, and giving them ratings--go for it. I've got more important things to do."

Kerry watched him walk off, glad of the few moments quiet respite before they joined the others. "Know what?" she remarked to her silent companion.

"What?" Mark made a vague clucking noise.

"You know that look Dar gets, the one where she sort of squints, and you think she's going to bite someone?"

"Oh, yeah."

"I'm so understanding that look right now."

Mark sighed. "Man, you guys do this all the time? I don't think I could handle that. These guys suck."

Kerry patted him on the back and had to silently, if ruefully, agree as they reached the group and joined the rest of the nattily suited men and women in sitting down at two large, round tables. "You know what Dar would do?" she whispered behind her hand as they took chairs next to each other.

"Cheeseburger, fries and a shake," Mark whispered back. "Somewhere else."

Kerry took her napkin and popped it open, laying it across her lap with an easy grace as she reviewed the menu card placed on her plate. "Yeah." She exhaled, finding herself directly across from Shari, who took pleasure in smiling fiercely at her. "Or she'd order a pizza." She found herself smiling for a different reason. "Delivered to the table. But we can't, so let's just make the best of it." She lifted her glass and sipped some cold water from it.

It was going to be a very, very long day.

DAR EMERGED INTO the sunlight once again, after her sixty-second subway ride had drawn itself out to twenty minutes. She had, however, apparently made a friend, since Scuzzy showed no signs of continuing on her way as they exited the subway station together.

Subway station? Dar glanced behind her at one of the many stairwells burping people up out of the ground. More like a nightmare from some science fiction writer's imagination.

The heat had gotten a little worse, or maybe she'd just gotten used to the cooler confines of the underground world.

"So, like, Dar. Where ya goin?" Scuzzy interrupted her thoughts. "Just coming down to see the Square?"

"No. Here." Dar pulled the brochure out of her pocket and displayed it, turning slightly as she tried to orient herself in the busy street. Buildings rose on all sides, and the roads seemed to run together from all directions.

What the hell?

After a moment of blinking, she realized why the place looked so damn familiar. She'd never been here before that she could remember, and now she took a moment to just stand and look around.

Times Square. Dar cocked her head to one side, realizing she'd always considered the place to be more of a stage set than a real city street. Her gaze shifted.

Streets.

She turned her head to look the other way.

Whatever.

The marquees raced across the building fronts just like they did on television, and Dar tilted her head back to look up at the post she'd seen the ball drop from on countless New Years Eves. Then she chuckled and returned her attention to finding her way to the Hudson river.

"You like, into that stuff?" Scuzzy had kept right up with her. "Like, guns?" She handed back the brochure.

Dar stopped and looked at her.

"Hey!" The woman held up both hands. "It's cool! No problem! I'm into that show
Gunsmoke
too, you like that show? It's great!"

"No." Dar figured out what direction to go in and started walking. "My father was in the Navy." She checked the street numbers, and started down one with some confidence. She was mildly surprised when Scuzzy chose to join her, shambling down the sidewalk at her side. She gave the woman a speculative look.

"I figured I'd make sure you got there okay," Scuzzy explained. "Then I'm goin back to get the bus."

Dar stopped walking, forcing the girl to stop as well or else plow into her. She took off her sunglasses and looked her persistent companion up and down, then repeated the exercise on herself. She finally returned her stare to Scuzzy's face, and lifted both eyebrows meaningfully. "Thanks," she drawled. "But I'll get there okay."

Scuzzy studied her for a minute. "You tryin to tell me something?"

With a faint sigh, Dar returned her sunglasses to their perch on her nose and started walking again, shaking her head. A breeze picked up, puffing fitfully between the buildings and bringing the unmistakable scent of water to her. She glanced at the storefronts she was passing, intrigued by the variety of clubs whose identity changed at almost every stride. "Something for everyone, huh?" she remarked, passing a jazz club next to something she imagined catered to the Goth crowd.

"You say something?" Scuzzy peered at her. "Hey, you ever been here to the city?"

"Yeah, I've been here," Dar finally relented, edging over slightly so the woman could walk next to her and not plow into the trees planted incongruously in the center of the sidewalk. "I'm not really fond of it."

"Miami's kinda different, huh?"

Dar looked around her with a wry chuckle. "Like night and day. I wouldn't trade 'em for a million."

"No, huh?" The woman looked around. "Well, y'know, this used to be a really tough neighborhood." She said. "Times Square, man, you didn't want to come down around here. But they fixed it up pretty nice now."

Dar peered at the theatre they were passing, realizing she'd heard its name half her life and never realized where the hell it was. "Bad neighborhood, huh?" she asked with interest.

"Oh, yeah, Absolutely." Scuzzy nodded. "Hookers lined up tits to ass back there, yeah?"

"Yeah?"

"Absolutely!"

It was hard to picture all those people in mink coats coming to see shows stepping around bums and drug dealers. Dar put the idea away for later study, and ducked to one side as a man walking a Dalmatian hurried by. Or maybe it was a Dalmatian walking the man, as the dog seemed far more relaxed than his owner. "You been here when it was?" she asked Scuzzy. "When it was a bad place?"

Scuzzy seemed delighted Dar was warming up to her. "Oh, sure." She made a dismissive gesture. "Me and my bro, we used to come down here all the time back then, cause we'd take the bus out to DC to visit my old man."

"Ah," Dar murmured. "Must have been scary."

"Nah. Just different." Scuzzy peered behind her in the direction of Times Square. "Lotta people usta live over there, y'know? Not no more. I dunno where they went now. The Park, maybe. You gotta have money to live over there now." Her nose wrinkled a bit. "Ritzy."

Dar was struck with an unexpected parallel. "Yeah," she agreed. "That happened down on South Beach, too."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. It used to be retirement hotels for all these older people. Twenty bucks a week, something like that," Dar said. "Then they put all the money in there and now I think twenty bucks maybe gets you parking for the night. Maybe." Maybe. "Sucks sometimes," Dar admitted. "You pay thirty bucks for a coke and a damn hot dog."

"That's right!" Scuzzy agreed heartily. "You got that right, yeah?" She kicked a rock which rattled ahead of them and rambled through the wrought iron steps that lead down into someone's basement. "So where did them old people go?"

Dar slowed, her head tipping to one side a little as she thought. "I don't know," she finally responded. "But I remember what it felt like when we lived on the Navy base, and they were talking about closing it." A ghost of a memory floated into focus for her. "They wanted to sell the place to build a supermarket."

"Oh, that's cold." Scuzzy patted her on the back. "So you lived with all those navy guys huh? That must have been cool."

"Yeah, it was." Dar shrugged the memories off. "So where are you going on a bus today, Scuzzy?" she asked, as they reached the end of the street and were faced with a four lane road separating them from the piers. To one side, Dar could see the distinctive shape of the Intrepid, and found a smile forming.

"No place," Scuzzy shrugged. "Just get me a ticket and ride somewhere and back. I got laid off last week."

Dar found herself snagged by one of the fits of recklessness that occasionally happened to her. "What do you do?" she asked, turning and leaning against a light pole. "That you got laid off for?"

Taken slightly aback, her erstwhile companion made a nervous motion with her hands. "Oh, you know, just office stuff. I was putting in traffic tickets, callin people. Anything they want me to do, but they got cut sos they had to let me off."

"You worked for the police?" Dar clarified.

"Yeah, kinda." Scuzzy seemed abashed. "So like, that's why I don't like people getting into trouble, you know?" She cleared her throat. "So whadda you do, Dar from Miami? Like what you get paid for?"

"I work with computers." Dar removed her PDA from her pocket and opened the flap. She selected a square of white cardboard, then flipped it over and fished her pen out and scribbled on the back of it for a moment.

"Yeah?" Scuzzy perked right up. "Oh, man, you lucked out. I love computers. I got me a internet mail thing at the library last month and I love going to check that out."

Dar reviewed what she'd written, then held the card up, reverse side forward for Scuzzy to see. "Go there." She indicated the address on the back. "When you get there, give the guard at the desk this." She reversed the card, the ILS logo flashing briefly in the sunlight. "Tell them I said to hire you." She handed the card over.

Scuzzy looked at the card, then looked at Dar. "For real?" she asked, after a long moment. "Like, no shit? If I give them this thing, they're not gonna throw my ass out and call the cops? That's like, Rockefeller Center!"

Dar chuckled. "No." She spent a brief instant of deliciously evil anticipation on just how much twitching she'd cause the company's staid Manhattan office. "They'll take care of you."

Scuzzy looked down at the card again, and turned it over. "Chief Information Officer." She lifted her eyes to Dar's face. "You get good money for that?"

"Yeah," Dar nodded. "But you'll do all right too."

"Yeah?" Now a touch of incredulity entered Scuzzy's tone. "You know somethin? I woke up today and I knew somethin' cool was gonna happen to me." She carefully tucked the card away in the pocket of her shirt and stuck her hand out. "This is all right."

Dar took it and gave it a shake. "See ya." She released Scuzzy's hand and turned as the light changed and gave her the opportunity to cross over to the pier.

"See yah," Scuzzy repeated, waiting until the tall figure had disappeared from sight into the pier's square frontage. "Ain't that a kick in the ass?" She removed the card and looked at it. "I'm gonna go get me a job, so screw you, momma, saying not to talk to nobody on the subway!"

Turning, she sauntered back down the street, heading back toward Times Square.

DAR STOPPED BEFORE she went through the gates into the museum, taking a moment to enjoy the breeze off the water, and the sense that she'd emerged from the close confines of the city at least for a while. She found a bench and sat down on it, retrieving her PDA and opening it up.

To her surprise, a message she hadn't caught was waiting. She tapped on it.

Have I ever told you just how much I love you?

Dar blinked a few times, then rubbed the back of her hand over her eyes impatiently.
Matter of fact, you have. But I never get tired of hearing it.

She could almost hear the sigh in Kerry's words when she responded.

I'm sitting at a table across from Shari and Michelle, suffering through an endive salad with the prospect of chicken breast over rice pilaf before me.

Ugh. Dar extended her legs into the sun and crossed them.
Well, I'm sitting near the Hudson River, and I just sent a vagabond over to the local office to get a job.

(laugh) You call me a troublemaker?

Dar smiled in reflex.
Hey, I rode on the subway to get here.

You did? No fair! I wasn't there to go with you!

The lump in her throat was getting to her. Dar shifted on her bench, then rolled her stylus in her fingers before she answered.
No one was here to see me chicken out!

But you didn't.

True. Yeah, specially since the damn thing got stuck three times with me on it. They don't like me
. Dar allowed.
Well, I'm going in to see the Intrepid, then maybe I'll find one of those hot dog stands and get sick to my stomach.