Mark eased forward. “Hey Dar.”
“Hey.” Dar responded amiably. “This our new security chief?” She delivered a smile to Carlos, whose head was roughly even with her own, and extended a hand. “Hi, I'm Dar.”
The big man blushed a little, but took her hand. “Hi.” He said. “I've heard a lot about you.”
“I bet.” Dar gave Mark a droll look. “Welcome. Glad you decided to give us a try.”
Mayte came over. “Kerry, I have some messages for you. I left them on your desk.” She said. “Welcome back.” She added to Dar. “My mama also has a package for you, and some notes.”
“Thanks.” Dar pulled Kerry a little closer. “We just want to get a picture with everyone and the new sign.” She pointed at the second level, where the workmen were climbing down off the ladder after finishing with the bolts.
“Oh! That is so nice.” Mayte's eyes lit up.
They cleared the ladder away and Kerry retrieved her camera from the SUV, taking a few pictures of it, before everyone had come down from the office and gathered in front of the entrance. “Okay, now.. “ She glanced at the workers. “Could I impose on you guys to take a picture of us with this beautiful new sign?”
'Sure.” One of them came over and took the camera. “Just press that to focus, and then to take the picture?” He asked. “My son's got one of these. He really likes it.”
“Yep.” Kerry crossed over to where the group was and paused long enough to pick up Mocha, turning and coming up next to Dar who put her arm back over her shoulders. “Everyone ready?”
The workman smiled, and focused, and then it was over and everyone was swirling around again, this time coming up and asking Dar about her meeting.
Kerry took a step back and gave Mocha a hug, walking over to reclaim her camera. “You guys did a great job.” She said. “It looks really good.”
The man nodded. “He's a good carver.” He said. “Said he'd be by later to check the install, and pick up the fee.” He scratched Mocha's ears. “Glad he got a commission. Been a while. People don't want to pay for stuff like this in these times.”
Kerry nodded. “It's tough.” She said. “I was really glad they referred him to us.”
The man glanced around, then back at her. “I heard you had some trouble with some of those guys, that hang around in the streets round here. That' true?”
Kerry wondered if it wasn't just a little more small town like than she was strictly comfortable with. “Yes.” She said, briefly. “But I really think it was more of a miscommunication than anything.”
The man nodded. “Be careful with them guys. You seem like nice ladies, and we heard they like to hassle women.”
Kerry sighed. “I sure hope they don't.” She said. “But thanks for the warning.”
The man lifted his hand in farewell, then shouldered his tool kit and picked up his end of the ladder, he and his partner moving off down the street together.
Kerry went back to the crowd who was now sorting themselves out to re-enter the building through the front door. Dar was waiting for her and they walked back in together, and headed up the steps to their offices. “Did you get any lunch?” She asked, as they reached the top of the stairs.
“They fed us on the plane.” Dar remarked.
“Take that as a no, then. We probably have some of those pastelitos left.” Kerry bumped her with her hip.
“I've got some kit kats left in my backpack.” Dar bumped her right back. “We can trade.”
The sun was setting as they gathered in the conference room, Dar and Kerry, Mark and Carlos, Maria and Mayte. Dar had a copy of the newspaper article and she put it on the table as they all sat down. “Okay, so.” She folded her hands. “We seem to have acquired some additional notoriety over the past day.”
Mayte was taking notes. “It is a very nice picture.” She said, diplomatically.
“Well, a lot of people think so, because four of those five messages you left me were from people who'd seen it, and who want to come in and talk to us.” Kerry said. “So we have a couple issues here. One, we've become very visible very quickly.”
Carlos was nodding. “People might see you as a way to get in on the government.”
“Exactly.” Dar said. “That kind of influence is in a business sense, priceless.”
“But Dar.. you always had those hooks.” Mark said. “I mean, they came after you the last time, remember? Like, right out of the blue.”
“That's true. I'm not worried about that part of it. My links to the military are what they are. I can't change that.” Dar said. “But we need to think hard about how we're going to secure ourselves because other people might want to find out what we're doing for them.”
“Cams.” Mark said, then looked pointedly at their new security man.
Carlos pulled out a folder from where it had sat on his lap, and opened it. He was dressed in neatly pressed cargo pants and a blue pullover sweater that had a faint look of the military about it. “I think we should use these.” He pushed a data sheet over. “They're expensive, but they're PTZ, IR, night scope, and 10X zoom.”
Dar pulled the sheet over and studied it. “IP?”
He nodded. “The last place I was at, they did the wired and wireless, so if someone got some smart idea to cut the cable it would go over the radio.”
“Good.” Kerry agreed. “That's nice.”
Maria folded her hands. “If you tell me the places you want these things, I will have the electrical man make the connections for them.”
Dar's eyes twinkled, as Carlos passed a diagram over to her. “Thanks, Maria.”
Mark grinned. “Good job, buddy.” He complimented Carlos, who grinned back.
“I like that.” Dar said, passing the page off to Kerry. “Get them and get them installed. I'll write a program that takes the input from them and parse alerts.”
Kerry eyed her. “We do have programmers, hon.”
The pale blue eyes pinned her with ferocious intent. “When it comes to the safety of the people here and especially you, I want absolute perfection.”
“Got it.” Kerry muffled a smile.
“Anyway, I'd like to get the cams in before next week ends if we can. Kerry and I will be out of town this weekend, I'd like to start on the program after we get back from New Orleans.”
“Business there, boss?” Mark asked.
“Valentines Day.” Dar responded without missing a beat. Her eyes twinkled a little at his blush. “Back at the old place, Ker and I were pretty low key. This isn't ILS. We own this joint for better or worse, so I don't' see any point in not being open.” She glanced at Carlos. “If you have an issue with that, speak up now.”
Carlos shook his head, undisturbed. “I”m fine with it. Mark told me.”
“Okay, so.” Dar cleared her throat. “Cameras. Now we've also got to secure the data. I can write the encryption into the database schema, but what about the physical side?” She looked over at Mark. “I don't want people to be able to load up external hard drives, or thumb drives, and walk out of here.”
Mark nodded and cleared his throat. “I got a schematic to protect the server room.” He pulled out his own page and pushed it over to Dar. “And it's gonna be a pain in the ass, but we're going to certify all the local storage, and not allow any transfer to any device that ain't coded in.”
Dar studied the page, and grunted in approval.
“The big data store, here?” He pointed at one of the racks. “We should only allow remote access to. Work in a virtual session, with sandboxing. No local transfer at all.”