Winds of Change Book Two Read online

  Winds of Change Book Two

  Copyright © 2015 by Melissa Good

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Other Titles from Melissa Good

  Other Yellow Rose Books

  About the Author

  Visit Us On Line

  ALSO BY MELISSA GOOD

  Dar and Kerry Series

  Tropical Storm

  Hurricane Watch

  Eye of the Storm

  Red Sky At Morning

  Thicker Than Water

  Terrors of the High Seas

  Tropical Convergence

  Stormy Waters

  Storm Surge: Book One

  Storm Surge: Book Two

  Winds of Change: Book One

  Other Titles

  Partners: Book One

  Partners: Book Two

  Winds of Change Book Two

  by

  Melissa Good

  Yellow Rose Books

  by Regal Crest

  Texas

  Copyright © 2015 by Melissa Good

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. The characters, incidents and dialogue herein are fictional and any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Print ISBN 978-1-61929-232-1

  eBook ISBN 978-1-61929-231-4

  Cover design by Acorn Graphics

  Published by:

  Regal Crest Enterprises, LLC

  229 Sheridan Loop

  Belton, TX 76513

  Find us on the World Wide Web at http://www.regalcrest.biz

  Published in the United States of America

  Chapter One

  KERRY LEANED BACK in the deck chair and put her feet up on the aft well wall of the boat, idly watching the sun sliding toward the sea as they traveled along. Chino was curled up in a ball on her bed nearby, and Mocha had just given up watching the spray and was snuggling up next to her.

  It was later than they’d planned, and Dar had the gerbils scrambling, trying to get them down to the cabin before it got dark. If she tipped her head back the other way, she saw Dar’s back as she sat at the console, hands on the throttles and bare feet curled around the captain’s chair’s footrest.

  Was Dar ready for some coffee? Kerry felt like she was, so she got up and went into the cabin, holding the door open as Mocha noticed her leaving and bolted after her. “Want to help me get your other mommy coffee, little man?”

  “Yap!” Mocha seemed amazed at everything. He skittered across the boat’s deck, barking at the moving sunbeams, astonished when the surface under him rocked suddenly as Dar moved across a wake. He looked at her with wide eyes.

  Kerry started laughing. “What’s it like to be so brand new, huh?” She went behind the counter in the galley and got some coffee working. “Everything’s just so cool.”

  Mocha came behind the counter and sniffed everything, including her feet, with earnest thoroughness. He sat down and looked up at her, his tiny tongue hanging out.

  Kerry reached down and picked him up, cradling him in her arms. “Oh, you’re so cute.” She scratched him behind his ears and examined his brown paws with their inky black pads.

  A big shadow crossed over the boat and she glanced outside, seeing them moving past the bridge that linked the mainland to the start of the Keys. “Ah, we’re crossing into the gulf.” She put Mocha down. “I need to get some coffee upstairs, kiddo. Don’t start chewing anything.”

  Mocha bounced off and found a Chino sized Nylabone that he pounced on and claimed with a paw, applying his baby teeth to the partially chewed surface.

  “Good boy.” Kerry filled the thermos with sugar, milk and coffee and capped it, then shook it vigorously to mix the ingredients. Then she hung the container around her neck by its strap, and went to the door, slipping out and then climbing up the ladder.

  Dar was just putting her sunglasses on, since they were heading into the westering sun, and she turned around as Kerry arrived, her face creasing into a grin. “Hey, beautiful.”

  “Flattery will get you hot coffee every time.” Kerry slid into the chair next to her and uncapped the thermos. “Almost there.”

  “Almost there,” Dar repeated, taking the cup and sipping on it. “That was nice, today.”

  “It was.” Kerry took a mouthful of coffee directly from the thermos. “I enjoyed just hanging out with all those folks and talking like we were just regular people.” She pondered the horizon. “I lost count of the people who came up to me and told me how sad they were to see us go.”

  “Me too.” Dar adjusted the throttle a little. “But the new guys may make a go of it. Different outlook. Might not be all bad.”

  “You said you knew the guy taking your place?” Kerry asked. “Higgs? I think I read about him in one of the industry papers. Seemed like he was pretty well regarded.”

  “Met him at a conference last summer,” Dar said. “Reminded me a little of Bob. Very status conscious, spent a lot of time talking about his Mercedes Benz.”

  “Nice.” Kerry sighed. “What did those people do to deserve that?”

  “The other one, who’s taking your position, Mark sent me a brief on him,” Dar said. “David Willerson. He’s from the oil industry. Was the CIO of some drilling company who’s got family ties to Higgs.”

  Kerry sighed again. “I don’t care what happens to the company. I do care about what happens to some of those people. Especially the ones we managed.”

  “Mm.”

  “On the other hand, maybe rearranging everything we did there will keep them too busy to care about what we’re doing,” Kerry said. “And I hope they have some kind of success, Dar, because I’d like all those people there to keep getting paychecks.”

  “Because we can’t harbor all of them,” Dar said, pragmatically. “I have to tell you, though, Mark said whatever it was that pushed him to come talk to us that night we left was pure karma. He’s so damn happy.”

  Kerry smiled.

  “He said he’d been wanting to make a change, to go in a different direction, but it was hard to take the risk. This forced him to.” Dar fell silent and put the thermos cup to her lips.

  Kerry waited a bit, but there seemed to be nothing more forthcoming. “Hit home a little?” she asked.

  Dar shrugged. “Not really. Because we’d already made that choice, Ker. I keep losing sight of the fact that before they fired us, we quit.” She laid on a turn to the left, a lazy arc that would bring them around the end of Key Largo and into Blackwater Sound.

  The water here was flat and calm, typical of the Gulf side. The water was alive with boats though, crisscrossing through the shallows, many coming back from days out fishing.

  That never caught Dar’s interest. Going under the water always seemed preferable. Spending her time watching the fish and seeing the coral structures was far more enticing than sitting on the boat waiting for a bite.

  “Want to do a night dive?” Dar asked. “Just off the dock? I’ll turn the big lights on and we’ll see if we can find your earrings.”

  Kerry grinned, her face reddening a little. “Sure. I still feel like an absolute idiot for having them
in that pocket,” she said. “I’d love to go on a little treasure hunt with you.”

  Speaking of lights, Dar turned on the boat’s, though the sun was not quite near the horizon just yet. She checked the channel markers and aimed a course down the center of them, lifting a hand and waving at a sailboat turning off and going in toward shore.

  “Is that Marvin?” Kerry asked. “I owe him a half gallon of milk.”

  “Since when do we ever get milk in half gallons?” Dar inquired.

  “We don’t. It’s all he had.” Kerry patted her on the back. “Let me go downstairs before our puppy decides to chew a hole in the fiberglass.” She filled up Dar’s cup from the thermos, kissed her on the lips and then retreated down the steps to attend to the frantic yelps that were coming from the boat’s cabin.

  Dar smiled, looking ahead to the horizon where she could already see the spit of land that held their cabin and the dock she was aiming the Dixieland Yankee toward. She took another sip of the coffee, convincing herself she could taste the love Kerry put into the making of it.

  She could, right?

  “Dar?” She cocked her head as the boat’s intercom crackled, and Kerry’s voice echoed softly through it. “Yep?”

  “Did you know this new gizmo has a piece of software that lets me control the systems in the cabin?” Kerry said. “I just turned on the aircon and the lights.”

  Dar shaded her eyes, and chuckled. “Yep, you sure did.” She saw the dock halons popping on. “That’s pretty cool. I forgot to do that from the condo.”

  “Heh.” Kerry clicked off.

  The sunset spilled across the hull as she slowed for the approach to the cabin, the bow coming down in the water as she cut power. The dock itself was just big enough for the Dixie, and she maneuvered carefully past it, putting the engines into reverse to bring them to dead slow, then letting the mild current carry them back against the wooden pylons.

  For a moment she let herself imagine a life where she piloted a boat for a living instead of what she actually did.

  No high tech, no conference calls, no miles of wires to worry about. Just day after day of laying down float plans, and keeping the boat in good condition

  It was enticing, but she knew enough about herself to know that it would be interesting only for a little while, and then she’d wish she was doing something more challenging. There were only so many routes, so many soundings, so many people to take out fishing, or diving or just sightseeing.

  Dar smiled, as she heard Kerry come out on deck, already reaching for the lines. Just a daydream. But it was a nice daydream, and since she was lucky enough to own a boat that required a little skill to drive, she got to indulge in it from time to time when docking the yacht in places like this. She put the engines into drive and held the boat against the dock while Kerry walked along the side wall and tied them up to the standing posts.

  Easier than floor based cleats. “We tied?”

  “Yep.” Kerry came back to the rear of the boat and then went to the door, opening it to let Mocha and Chino out. Chino immediately recognized a favorite place and leaped out onto the dock and trotted toward the cabin.

  Mocha was too short to follow, and he stood up and scrabbled at the fiberglass, hopping a little bit until Kerry picked him up and stepped shoreward with him. “Take it easy, Mocha.” She put him down and watched him ramble off the wooden pier, starting a through sniff fest of the sandy backyard.

  Kerry followed him, pulling the keys to the cabin from her pocket as she joined Chino on the porch. She unlocked the door and pushed it open. “G’wan, madam.”

  The cabin was already a comfortable temperature, and the lights were on. “Second home sweet home.” Kerry entered their bedroom and took a deep breath of the scent of clean linen. “Want to grab a sandwich before we go diving, hon?”

  Dar was busy in the kitchen. “Sure. Just giving the mooch pooches some grub.”

  Kerry took a swimsuit from one of the drawers and traded her shorts and shirt for it, then added a light dive coat that went to her knees.

  It was terrycloth lined with a water resistant exterior, a good compliment to a night dive in chilly weather. She walked back out and found Dar watching the dogs hoover up their kibble with an indulgent smile. “I have some pita pockets. You up for a couple of gyros?”

  “Yum,” Dar said. “I’ll go get the gear ready.”

  Kerry flipped on the music system and went to the fridge, removing two carefully packed bags of shaved lamb from the freezer. She tossed them in the microwave and punched defrost. Then she got a container of chopped tomatoes along with a can of fried onions and a bottle of ranch dressing. “Sort of gyros, anyway.”

  “Yap!”

  She looked down to find Mocha attentively at her feet, with Chino sitting behind him, her tail sweeping over the tile floor. “Excuse me?

  Your other mother just fed you.”

  “Growf,” Chino responded, sniffing the air as the lamb defrosted.

  Kerry chuckled, taking the lamb out and opening the bags into the pan, already hot with a little oil. She quickly warmed the meat, then assembled the pocket sandwiches with their personalized substitutions, putting the fried onions in instead of chopped fresh ones, and drizzling the definitely un-Greek dressing over it. “Sorry kids. No gyros for you.”

  She went to the fridge and got two bottles of root beer, putting them in her coat pockets before she picked up the sandwiches and headed for the door, both dogs trotting after her.

  It was now twilight and the dock was lit up. The Dixie’s white hull gleamed and reflected into the water. Dar sat on the side of the boat, her phone to her ear. As Kerry got closer she heard a wary tone in Dar’s voice.

  “That’s the general idea, yes,” Dar said. “The idea is to build intelligence into the filters so you can let the processors do the heavy lifting and deliver possible vectors to your analysts.”

  Kerry handed over a sandwich and sat down on the gear locker on the pier, gaining an instantly attentive pair of soulful eyed watchers. She took a bite of her gyro and took a piece of the lamb out, offering it to Chino.

  “Right, I get that, but it’s a fire hose,” Dar said. “There’s such a thing as too much data. You need to find a way to channel it so you’re not looking at every byte.”

  Kerry thought it was probably the government. She wiggled out a tiny piece of the lamb and handed it over to Mocha, who was standing up with his front paws on her knee. She knew Dar sent over a rough top level plan several days back, but having her get a call on a Saturday about it was surprising.

  “Right.” Dar paused, then nodded. “That’s what I...yes.” She took a bite and chewed as she listened, then hastily swallowed. “I’m due up to see Gerry Easton on Wednesday. I can stop by.” She listened again. “Exactly. You got it. Bring them in and we can white board the whole thing.”

  Kerry heard relief in Dar’s low tones and if she turned, she knew she’d see that tall body relaxing. Sure enough there came the soft thumps of Dar’s heels idly hitting the side of the boat.

  “Okay, then, see you on Wednesday afternoon,” Dar said. “Thanks for reviewing the plan and getting back to me.” She closed the phone and took a big bite of her gyro. “Yum.” She hopped off the side of the boat and took a seat beside Kerry. “Looks like I get to deal with both our government clients next week.”

  “So I heard.” Kerry contentedly munched. “I have four potential new clients scheduled for that day or I’d come with you.” She took a sip of her root beer. “By the time you get back we might not need that contract if they give you a hard time.”

  Dar gave Mocha some of her lamb. “Did I tell you recently you rock my world?”

  Kerry put her head against Dar’s shoulder and grinned.

  “These are really good.” Dar indicated her pocket. “I love those fried onions.”

  “I know,” Kerry said. “Okay, let me get these guys inside while we go diving. We’ll end up chasing them around in the water the w
hole time otherwise.” She stood up and displayed a bit of remaining sandwich. “C’mon, kids, first one back to the cabin gets a treat.”

  Dar dusted her fingers off and went back to the equipment storage locker that was built onto the dock along with the housing for the air compressor to fill the tanks. She removed two of the tanks and checked their pressure then jumped on board the boat to go and get into her swimsuit.

  By the time she finished and came back out, Kerry was there, checking her mask. She joined her and they geared up in companionable silence, pulling on full wetsuits and in Kerry’s case, a hood.

  “Polar bear.” Dar settled the back of the hood under her suit, and zipped it up. “For someone from the frozen north you sure put on a lot of rubber.”

  “Pfft.” Kerry stretched her arms out to settle the neoprene. “I haven’t spent half my life in the ocean, Dardar.” She sat down and got her arms into her BCD, clipping everything up and fastening her camera in its case to one of the D rings. “Especially not in the middle of winter.”

  Dar stood up in her minimalist rig and tightened the straps, then picked up her fins and walked to the end of the pier, regarding the water. She reached over and flipped the underwater lights on the structure, then held on with one hand and put her fins on with the other. “Let me go check things out first.”

  “Yes, grandma.” Kerry smiled, though, and continued to rub no fog on her mask.

  Dar inserted her regulator, put her hand over that and her mask, and stepped off the dock, landing in the water with a healthy splash.

  The depth off the end was about fifteen feet. Dar went down about half of that before she leveled out and relaxed, floating in mid water as she adjusted the fit of the gear and tightened everything down. The lights outlined the rough coral formations just off shore. Startled and bewildered fish were flitting around, not expecting the return of the sun quite so soon.