Habitats (an Ell Donsaii story #7) (25 page)

Chapter Eight

Ell’s AI, Allan said, “You have a call from Mr. Kinrais.”

“OK.” Ell put on her Raquel accent, “Hey Shan! What’s up?”

“I’m hoping to take my best girl out to dinner tonight? You up for that?”

“Sure! Well… wait. How many girls’ve you got that you have to designate me as your ‘best’ girl?”

“Aw shucks, you’re so far ahead of the pack that I
don’t actually recall ever knowing any other girls!”

“Good answer, where are we going?”

“Spanky’s. See you there at 7?”

“Sounds good.”

Ell stepped into Spanky’s
, and when stopped by the hostess, pointed to Shan sitting along the side wall. When she dropped into the chair she saw he already had a Coke for her, “Sorry I’m late.”

“Three minutes, Ms. Blandon, I’m so disappointed.” Shan grinned slyly at her.

“You just keep busting my chops Mr. Kinrais, I might have to demote you to ‘worst’ boyfriend.”

Shan put his hands up in a fending motion, “No, no, not that!”

Ell leaned forward, “So what’s the occasion?”

Shan leaned back
, a dismayed look on his face, “What? I can’t just take my girl out to dinner?”

“Nope,” she grinned, “broke ass students don’t do that unless they are
either in hot pursuit, or celebrating something. Since you’ve already overtaken, I assume you must be celebrating.”

Looking chagrined, he said, “You’re right, I
am
pan>
celebrating something.”

Ell raised her eyebrows, “What?!”

Shan leaned forward and whispered conspiratorially, “I am no longer a ‘broke ass student.’” He put his hand on his heart, “I, Madam, am now a junior member of the Math faculty at the University of North Carolina.”

With a squeak, Ell leaped to her feet, and, once he stood too, threw her arms around Shan. “Congratulations!” she whispered in his ear
; then gave him a long kiss.

As they sat down again, Shan thought to himself that his getting a job
really didn’t seem like much compared to the amazing things she’d achieved as Ell Donsaii. The fact that, despite this, she could be so happy and proud for him was both weird and wonderful.

Shan
leaned back, “Guess who was on the big sports feed over the bar while I was waiting for you?”

Suspiciously she said, “Who?”

“That Ell Donsaii girl.”

“You’re not about to ruin our date talking about another woman are you?”

“No, no; she was just a run in to another interview with Michael Fentis.”

Ell raised her eyebrows, “And what did the redoubtable Mr. Fentis have to say?”

“Well first they ran a clip of Donsaii reacting to Fentis saying that gymnastics wasn’t a sport and Donsaii had just ‘gotten lucky.’”

Ell nodded.

“And she just agreed she’d been lucky, then ‘begged to differ’ on whether gymnastics was a sport. Very ladylike, I must say.”

“
And what did Fentis have to say?”

“That he was glad to see that she understood how incredibly lucky she’d been. But then Donsaii’s interviewer asked her about the video showing she ran faster than Fentis and told her that Fentis said there had been a mistake interpreting the video. Fentis just went off
about that! The video analysis had been wrong, it was easier to run in the gym, the distance was short, and
no one
would
ever
break his hundred meter speed.” Shan paused and raised an eyebrow.

Ell raised both of hers, “Well, he’s probably right.”

Shan grinned, “That’s what Donsaii said, to quote, “He’s probably right don’t you think? It just doesn’t seem reasonable that a girl could have outrun him. He is the ‘world’s fastest man’ after all.”

Ell shrugged in acquiescence.

“But then the interviewer pointed out to Fentis that she’d acknowledged him as the, ‘world’s fastest
man
,’ not the world’s fastest
person
. It looked like Fentis’ head was gonna explode! A lot of bleeping of the conversation, in which Fentis essentially said there was no way
that girl
could outrun
any
man in modern track and field, much less himself.”

Ell grinned, “He
does
have a very high opinion of himself doesn’t he?”

Shan leaned forward and whispered, “
Could
you outrun him?”

Her eyes widened in shock, “Of course not!” Then she raised an eyebrow and leaned forward conspiratorially, “Donsaii might be able to though.”

***

Stacy looked over at Bart, “Well, I almost got you a port today.”

“Really? What happened?”

Stacy told him about tossing it in her purse but someone seeing it. “She told me that the FBI’s involved in making sure no one makes off with any flammable ports. Apparently, they’re so careful with those ports because they’re worried about terrorists getting them.” She glanced at Bart out of the corner of her eyes.

He looked frustrated. “That’s crazy!” a beat later, “Do you think you can figure out a way to get me one next time?”

Stacy tossed back her beer, “Hey, sweetie, how ‘bout you show me this racing hot rod I’m stealing a port for?”

“Uh, I’d love to, but it’s in the shop right now… Getting a new… header.”

“Humpf,” Stacy leaned against him, “How about we head back to
your
place?” She turned to him and lifted an eyebrow, “Where we can have a little bit of privacy?”

Bart got pretty flustered. They left the bar, but not before Bart went back to the bathroom. 

It wasn’t lost on Stacy that he might have called someone during his little trip to the boy’s room. She rode with him, her car following them. His car pulled into an apartment complex. She
thought
he’d told her he lived in a house, but now she couldn’t remember for sure that he’d definitely said that, maybe just implied it. She wondered just where he would be keeping that hot rod though. No garage after all.

When Bart’s car had stopped, he didn’t immediately get out, but turned to look at her. Stacy thought about turning to him and seeing if he’d kiss her, but her suspicion levels kept her from wanting
a kiss. She opened her door. “Let’s see your place.”

Bart got out slowly and led her to his door. Inside his door, she turned brightly to him, “Wow, this is a big apartment for just one guy, what is it, three bedroom?” She
glanced into the living room. Before he responded, she said, “Hey Bart? Can you forgive me? I hope you won’t feel like I was leading you on tonight, but I just remembered that I’m switching to day shift tomorrow.” She shrugged, “I’ve got to get up at six. Can I take a rain check on seeing your bedroom?” She lifted an eyeb cifts room. row and tried to look flirty.

Bart actually looked relieved. “Hey, no problem.”

Before she’d been suspicious… now she despised him as well.

Basir walked her back out to her car. When he was almost back to the apartment Farshid stepped out of the shadows, “Fool!” Basir said, “You left the Quran out in plain view!”

Farshid sneered, “The word of Allah hides from
no one
!”

“
That may be, but leaving the word of Allah out in plain sight is going to keep us from getting that port we wanted!”

“Bah,” Farshid waved dismissively, “we’ll get it from someone else.”

***

Carter’s HUD chimed and he looked up at it from the story he’d been reading to Jenny. Hi
s pay had just been deposited. Curious about the promised bonus, he told his AI to open the statement. “Damn!” he breathed.

“What is it Daddy?” Jenny said, looking at him with concern in her eyes.

“Nothing bad, kiddo,” he said smiling down at his serious daughter. “I got a bonus for helping with the rescue of those people on the space plane.”

She frowned, “What’s a bonus?”

“It’s when they pay you extra.”

Her eyes widened, “So that should help you pay down your college loan?”

“Yep,” he grinned. Jenny focused on his loan because her mother wanted so badly to pay it off before they spent money on frivolous things like going out or movies or vacations. Sometimes it seemed like the little girl looked forward to getting the loan paid off like it would be the beginning of a new life. He winked at her, and in a slightly louder voice said, “Maybe we can talk Mom into going out to dinner and seeing a movie this weekend?”

Abby looked around at them, “What?”

Carter smiled at his wife, “I got a bonus. Jenny and I are thinking we could splurge on dinner and a movie with a little of it this weekend?”

Abby looked at him and sighed, “
Come on Carter, I hate always being the bad guy, but we’re still $35,000 in debt. If we can just continue to control our spending, at the rate we’ve been going we’ll have it paid off in a couple more years.
Then
, we can start ‘splurging.’ But until we’re actually out of debt…” she shrugged, “I want to keep to our promise to avoid extravagant spending.”

Carter turned down to Jenny and grinned, “You heard your Mom,” he stage whispered. “No frivolous spending… until my AI transfers some of this money to Bank of America.”

Out of the corner of his eye he saw Abby shoot to her feet, putting her hands to her cheeks, “Carter!” she squeaked, “How big
csizye was
this bonus?!”

He grinned up at her and quietly said, “Fifty K.”

“Oh my God!” Abby put out her hands and Jenny, then Carter rose. She gathered them in a big hug and a moment later they were all jumping up and down together. “Oh, Kiddo,” Abby said to her daughter, “are we gonna
splurge
this weekend or what?!”

***

Warren’s AI said, “You have a call from Vivian Varka of Portal Technologies.”

“Accept. Hello Ms. Varka, what’s up?”

“One of our employees has been offered money to lift a flammables port. I’m not sure of all the circumstances. There may have been some seduction and a falling out, but in any case, we have an address for you and your FBI boys to check out…”

Thirty minutes after the team had arrived at the address Varka gave him, Warren’s AI said, “DNA on the doorknob matches the DNA in a house that blew up in a propane explosion in Atlanta, as well as DNA on a suspicious package diverted at the Memphis FedEx center. That package contained a port addressed to the White House.”

Abbas went to the door to take delivery of the food they’d ordered. Farshid and Basir both looked up in surprise as Abbas backed back into the room. Then Farshid found himself staring into the barrel of a weapon as men in helmets and bulletproof vests bearing the “FBI” insignia poured into the room.

As he lay
on his stomach, arms cuffed behind listening to someone read him those silly “Miranda rights,” Farshid wondered,
how did this happen? We were so careful!
”