It had started with a spell of tunnel vision, the edges of her sight becoming a whirling, sparkling blurriness. The pain had started at the base of her skull and was working upward, the throbbing so bad it was making her stomach upset. The Marketing VP’s voice wasn’t helping. Eleanor had an unfortunate nasal voice, and Dar felt herself losing her concentration, wanting nothing more than to curl up in a dark place and tune the world out.
But she couldn’t. There was too much to do, so she grimly sucked down more water, calculating whether she could risk downing another four or five ibuprofen. “Looks good, Eleanor. We can work out the bandwidth, but I’d write in the overhead for additional T3s into those contracts.”
The woman scribbled a note, nodding. “Yes, we can do that.”
The phone rang, and Dar punched the speakerphone button. “Yes?”
“Dar, we’ve got a problem.” Mark’s voice was irritated. “T and T
requested Internet access for some of their senior techs, and they’ve got an open TCP/IP stack on their boxes. I can proxy them, but there’s a chance someone can get into them from that damn intranet they support and hit us from the inside.”
“Fine. No,” Dar uttered, resting her head on her hand. “Tell T and T
nothing doing.”
“I did,” Mark replied. “But Alai’s complaining up and down the place and chewing my ass.”
Dar took a breath and released it. “Tell him I said no,” she answered evenly. “Tell him if he has a problem with that, he can call me directly and I’ll tell his little, punky, unintelligible ass no.”
Momentary silence. “Okay,” Mark answered slowly, drawing out the word.
“And you can tell him from me, if he’s so stupid he can’t understand a simple concept like network security, we can find him a new position painting stripes outside in the parking lot of the Bank of New Zealand,” Dar continued, her voice deepening into a growl.
Longer silence. “I think I’ll let you tell him that,” the MIS chief finally replied with a hesitant chuckle. “I don’t want to deprive you of the pleasure.”
The throbbing got worse, and Dar suspected she was near throwing up, the very thought of which made her head hurt even more. “Thanks.” She hung up, then looked at Eleanor “Are we done?”
The woman blinked at her. “You all right, Dar?” she politely inquired.
“Not that you usually aren’t in a foul mood, but this seems a bit much, even for you.”
Blue eyes pinned her mercilessly. “Are we done?” Dar repeated testily.
The woman stood and shook her head. “Yes. Have a nice…weekend, Dar.” She paused. “Or whatever.” She walked out, closing the door behind her 116 Melissa Good with an unnecessary force and gave Maria a look. “She’s got a bug up her ass today, doesn’t she?” Her eyes fell on Kerry, who had just entered the office and was now standing near the secretary’s desk. “Oh, sorry, honey, you’re still kinda new, aren’t you? Haven’t gotten sick of her yet? My god, you’ve lasted six times as long as the others. You must be some kind of saint.”
Kerry gazed at her. “I like my job, and my boss,” she replied mildly. As the woman just shook her head and walked out, Kerry turned her attention back to Maria. “She has been pretty upset all day; is something up?”
Maria shrugged. “I tell you…something is wrong, but she won’t say.”
The secretary lowered her voice. “I worry. She got a call from the doctor today, early this morning. She’s been so quiet since.” She nudged Kerry. “You better go in, she was asking where you were.”
“Okay.” Kerry sighed, then picked up her offering of coffee and gently tapped on the door, pushing it open as she heard the low response. She entered to find Dar seated behind her desk, her arms resting on its surface.
“Hey, you looking for me?” As she moved closer, she noticed the pale tinge to her boss’s normally tanned skin and she set the coffee down, peering at the taller woman in concern.
“Yeah. “ Dar exhaled. “Um…those contracts, the ones Duks wanted reviewed. Did you take them? I can’t seem to find them.” She rested her head on one hand, her eyes closing briefly. “Thought I had them in the bin there.”
“Dar?” Kerry circled behind the desk and knelt at her side, putting a hand on her arm. “Hey, are you okay?”
Dar’s brows creased. “Yeah, I’ve just got a lousy headache,” she admitted. “It’s driving me nuts.”
“You look terrible.” Kerry leaned closer. “Why don’t you lie down on the couch?”
“Just…” The older woman drew herself up, taking a long breath. “I’m all right. I need to find those contracts, I told Duks I’d get them back to him this afternoon.”
Kerry studied her for a moment. “I was reviewing them, but I thought I brought them back. Let me check my office. I’ll see if I can find them.”
Dar nodded and let her head rest on one hand again. “Good enough.”
Kerry walked toward the small door which led to the back corridor between their offices, then stopped and turned, taking her courage in both hands and returning to the desk. “Dar?”
Blue eyes glanced up at her in minor annoyance. “What?”
Kerry perched on the edge of the polished wood. “Um…listen, why don’t you go home?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Kerry,” Dar said testily. “There’s noth…” She clamped her jaw down tight, as her stomach threatened to rebel and closed her eyes. “Damn it.”
“Dar?” Kerry’s voice took on a cajoling softness. “Come on, let me take you home, okay? You can lie down. I know you’ll feel better.”
“I can’t.” Dar protested wearily. “There’s too much to do.”
“I’ll do it. Come on, I’ll drop you off, then I’ll come back here and finish stuff up,” Kerry coaxed. “Hey, it’s Friday afternoon. You can get out of here a few hours early, can’t you?”
Tropical Storm 117
Dar stared at her. The sea green eyes warmed and gentled as the blonde woman regarded her, and suddenly Dar just wanted to give in. “Well…”
“C’mon, you’re white as a sheet.” Kerry gave her a worried frown. “Dar, please, I don’t want anything to happen to you. I’d have to run screaming from the building if it did.”
That, at least, made her smile just a little. “All right.” She surrendered, leaning back in her chair and letting her head rest against the cool leather. She kept her eyes closed, listening to Kerry shutting down her computer, and the faint jingle as she captured Dar’s car keys from the top drawer. “Teach me to hire a debating champion, huh?”
“Come on,” Kerry urged quietly. “Let’s get out of here.”
“Yeah, all right.” Dar pushed herself to her feet, then shouldered her laptop and followed as Kerry lead the way across the room and opened the door. She gave Maria a look as the secretary glanced up, startled. “Maria, I’m, um…”
Kerry held up the car keys behind Dar’s back and exchanged worried looks with Maria.
“You’re…offsite at a meeting,” Maria said quietly. “Emergency calls only, ay?” Dar nodded. “That’ll do.”
Their exit was quiet. Kerry was amazed they managed to escape the building without Dar being stopped a half dozen times, but it seemed they picked the right time—everyone else was either in afternoon meetings or still at lunch. She walked with Dar across the lot, wincing herself at the lurid, bright sunlight that seemed all the odder in contrast to the thunderheads building above them. “Looks like it’s going to rain.”