Dar shut down the diesels and leaned against the console, weighing the conflict of aiding their business goals at the expense of asking her father to be a part of something not quite...
Would he consider it dishonorable? Or just good strategy?
"Dar? You coming down from there or should I bring coffee up?"
Dar shut down the console and pocketed the keys, then started for the ladder still pondering the question.
KERRY SETTLED INTO her seat glad of the very early morning quiet of the office on a rainy Monday morning. She had a meeting scheduled in an hour with Mark and the technical team for the bid, and she intended on using the time before then to square away the project and tie up a few loose ends.
"Hey, Mayte?" She pressed her intercom. "You there?"
"Yes! I am."
"Did we get the circuit completion on the pier?" Kerry asked. "I don't have anything here on it."
"I will check." Mayte promised. "They were saying on Friday that it would be done."
"Okay, thanks." Kerry set that problem aside. She pulled over a folder with requisitions for the project, and reviewed them. "Yikes! Is this just for the setup team?" She sighed, leafing through the pages. Money to establish an office at the pier and get that up and running, and provisioning for the gear to equip the office. "Damn, IT is expensive." She shook her head and signed the pages, closed the folder and tossed it into her out bin.
"Kerry?" Mayte's voice crackled in.
"Yeesss?" Kerry answered.
Her assistant laughed softly. "You sound so funny when you do that."
"Do I sound like Dar?" Kerry's eyes twinkled.
"A little." Mayte admitted. "Only not so big."
Kerry's eyebrow lifted.
"The circuits have come complete." Mayte went on. "The Bellsouth man says it is terminated in the local office on Brickell. He needs to know from you which to patch here."
"Tell him the Pier 10 one." Kerry replied. "But hold on to the other ones. I might be able to rent them." She hummed softly in satisfaction. "Okay, we're good to go." She typed a message to Mark then took a sip of her morning tea.
The door opened and Mayte slipped inside coming over to her desk with a folder in her hands. "Good morning."
"Morning!" Kerry pointed at her outbox. "Can you make sure that gets down to purchasing? We're gonna need it." She glanced at her assistant. "That's a pretty shirt. I like it."
Mayte blushed visibly. "Mama got it for me this weekend." She fingered the silk shyly. "I think she was trying to make it up to me for getting me in so much trouble when you went to New York." She hesitated. "Kerry, you were talking last week about going diving. Do you like that a lot?"
Kerry leaned back in her chair. "Absolutely," she said. "In fact, Dar and I went on a night dive on Friday night. It was wonderful. I saw a moray eel."
Mayte nodded seriously. "I think I would like to try that. Do you know where I could find out about it?"
"Sure. Matter of fact, you can borrow my study materials to see if you like it. Remind me and I'll bring them in tomorrow." Kerry promised. "It's a great sport...ah, did you tell your parents you wanted to do this?"
"No." Mayte grinned a little. "I did not think they would like it. Mama is always worried the sharks will eat you and La Jefa when you go." She confided. "Have you seen a shark?"
"Sure." Kerry said. "But it was in a tank at Disney World. Does that count?" She grinned at her assistant's look of bewilderment. "Anyway, I'll bring the stuff in and you can read it. Really, it's a lot of fun."
"Thank you. I will tell Mama afterwards. Yes?"
"You learn fast." Kerry winked. "Hey, maybe you can come out diving with us if you decide you like it. I think your mama trusts us to take care of you."
Mayte's eyes lit up. "I think so too!" She blurted. "Thank you!" Her gaze dropped to the folder in her hands. "This came for you." She held it out. "I am sorry I am taking up your time."
Kerry took the folder, and watched in some bemusement as Mayte trotted for the door and escaped into the outer office. "Huh." She put the folder down and opened it. "What got into her, I wonder?"
"You."
Kerry nearly jumped out of her seat before she recognized the voice. "Jesus, Dar." She looked over at the inner door. "You scared the poo out of me." Her brow creased. "What do you mean me?"
Her partner strolled over and took a seat on the edge of Kerry's desk. "You haven't noticed yet she has a crush on you?"
"Oh, she does not." Kerry scoffed. "Get out of here. She's a nice kid, and she loves working here. What, because she's interested in diving, you think she's got a crush on me?"
The corners of Dar's eyes creased as a little grin appeared. "Okay, don't say I didn't warn you. Did those lines come in?"
"Yes." Kerry nodded. "I was going to send Mark and a team there to get the office set up and facilities working. Did you want to go look at the ship?"
Dar got up and went to the window looking out as she pressed her fingertips against the glass. "No." She did a few vertical pushups. "I've got something I'm working on in ops. Maybe I'll go over tonight, after the crowds take off."
"Okay."
"I just talked to Alastair."
Kerry half turned to face her partner. "And?"
"The contracts this contract is tied into will either make or break the quarter, he thinks."
Nothing like a little pressure. "Okay, but the quarter just started."
"New business is down forty percent on the month." Dar kept doing her pushups. "Alastair said people are waiting to see what happens with this one. It's too public."
"What do you mean, too public? Kerry lifted a hand. "You mean the filming people? They aren't done yet!"
"People know," Dar said, "about us and Telegenics. It's all over the tech press."
"So we have to win it." Kerry exhaled. "No options."
"Something like that." Dar nodded. "I've got to go to ops." She pushed away from the window. "Tell Mark I'm sure Telegenics and everyone else is going to be crawling over our people at the pier. Pick the right people to go down there. I don't want a leak inside."
"All right." Kerry watched the door close behind her. "I'll do that." She added softly.
Things were getting serious. She figured it was only going to get uglier as they went along, and at the end? What if they just couldn't put in a competitive bid? Would Dar agree to a money losing contract to secure the more lucrative one behind it?
Kerry picked up her pen and chewed the end of it, thoughtfully.
"OKAY." Kerry removed her sunglasses as she entered the port building, looking around and spotting one of their security people near the back door. "Hey, John."
"Ms. Stuart." The man hurried over. "Glad you're here. There are some people over in the office causing a problem. The pier folks brought them over."
Kerry sighed and stuck her glasses into the pocket of the red camp shirt she'd put on for her visit to the port. "Lead on." She gestured toward the back. The building was a lot noisier than it had been on her previous visit, and she could hear the sounds of various power tools going as the infrastructure staff put together their temporary office.
They walked through the entryway and into the back hall. Kerry spotted Michelle Graver's distinctive figure in the doorway to their office along with her camera people, and she only just prevented herself from audibly growling. "What's going on here?" She asked instead, putting a sharp note into her voice.
Michelle turned, along with the cameraman, and the port agent.
The port agent had the grace to look apologetic, but Michelle certainly didn't.
"We're just documenting the first of many instances of ILS's attempt to sabotage everyone else's efforts." Michelle said bluntly. "In this case, by taking all the spare pairs into the port and preventing us from putting a circuit in." She advanced aggressively on Kerry, pointing her finger at her. "Didn't think we'd find out?"