Gen, behind the huge reception desk, covered the mic near her mouth and said to Mia, "They just got here."

Mia nodded and pulled Hope around a corner, where Tess sat at her large L-shaped desk. She also wore a headset and was talking into it. "No, that's unacceptable. That's right, but we're nothing if not flexible. How ‘bout we meet you halfway?" She began handing over a stack of phone messages and another stack of files to Mia while she continued her phone conversation. "That's great, uh huh, gotcha. Buh-bye now." She looked at Mia. "I've given them coffee and donuts and set them up in the conference room. You've also got that Danville account meeting right after this one, and they've called to confirm. Steven, Dillon, Janice, and Tami are all planning on being there with the artwork and presentation. And later the fire marshal is coming back to interview. Oh, and then a staff meeting where you-know-who is going to be hailing you with questions, so I've made a list-"

"Tess." Mia put her hand on Tess's arm. "You stopped breathing. You know what the doctor said about that."

"Ha ha. If I'm anal, it's your fault. You're a slave driver." But Tess let out a long breath, then drew another, pressing a hand to her belly. "This is all giving me ulcers. Did I tell you I put the Anderson people in conference room three because your office still reeks of smoke from yesterday, speaking of which, nice makeup job on the brow." Taking another breath, she blinked at Hope, who stood off a little to the side, chewing on her black fingernails, looking more than a little out of place.

"Hello," Tess said.

"This is Hope," Mia said. "She's my…" She broke off, because, damn, this was going to bring up a whole host of questions she didn't want to answer.

"Long-lost daughter," Hope interjected in the thickest Southern voice Mia had ever heard. She held out a hand. "Yeah. My momma here gave me up at birth. Left me in the Piggly Wiggly Dumpster, actually, but don't judge her, she's served her time."

Tess's mouth fell open.

Mia resisted banging her head down on Tess's desk. "Funny, Hope. Tess, this is my niece, car thief and wannabe comedian."

Hope rolled her eyes.

"She's going to need something to do," Mia decided aloud. "Just keep her away from your car keys."

Hope rolled her eyes again.

"What did I tell you about that?" Mia asked her. "I'm going to get a jar-"

"Yeah, yeah, so I can just shake my eyeballs instead of roll 'em. I remember."

Tess smiled warmly at Hope. "Oh, my goodness. You're just like her!"

Both Hope and Mia gaped at her. "What?"

Tess came around her desk to hug Hope tight. "I love your aunt dearly, and I've been dying to meet some of her family. The two of you are two peas in a pod."

Over her head Hope stared in shock at Mia.

And if Mia hadn't felt that same shock, she'd have laughed at the look of horror on Hope's face.

Alike?

"You really need to lay off that morning crack pipe," Mia muttered to Tess. "Now let go of the girl and give her some slave labor filing or something. You do know your alphabet, right?" she asked Hope.

Hope started to roll her eyes, then stopped. "I know that my favorite Aunt Apple-"

Mia bared her teeth and Hope stopped talking, but her eyes were still lit with more than her fair share of trouble.

Damn it. Mia took an exaggerated deep breath. "Just try to be good until I can come for you."

Hope smiled sweetly. "You know it, my very dearest, dearest aunt."

What could she do? Child services would frown on locking the kid in the closet, so with no other choice she went off to her meeting and worked on forgetting it all. Ted, and the upcoming meetings. Tess, and the questions in her eyes. The impossible, Turns-inducing Hope. The irritating, infuriating Kevin McKnight.

Okay, make that sexy as hell Kevin McKnight.

Especially if he wasn't talking. My God, when that man wasn't intent on making her brain explode with frustration, he could really turn her on.

She grabbed some things from her office to take into the meeting, then did a double take at her plant.

Its leaves were dragging on the floor and no longer quite green. "Damn it, if you die, I'll kill you." She hurried out and stopped outside the conference room. Pasting a smile on her face, she entered.

And an hour later she was in the midst of outlining her plans for the creative personnel, production department, media planners and buyers, and the goals and objectives of the campaign. When she needed access to another file, she picked up the phone in the middle of the big conference table and dialed Tess's extension.

"Danny's Dunkin' Donuts," boomed a voice in her ear. "What's your pleasure this morning?"

Mia stared at the phone. "Sorry, Danny. Somehow I got the wrong number." She hung up. Ignoring the bad feeling sinking like a pit in her belly, she tried again.

"Danny's Dunkin' Donuts."

Mia blinked. "Uh…" She hung up and glanced at her clients. "Could you excuse me a minute?" Then she walked out to the main floor. Anyone and everyone at a desk was standing up, phone to their ear, looking confused. Margot and Ted came out of their offices. So did Dick.

Tess frantically waved Mia over. "Someone's rerouted all our phone lines to Danny's shop downstairs," she said quietly. "Danny's getting a kick out of it, but he doesn't know how it happened."

"Where's Hope?"

"Filing."

"Uh huh." Mia went to the filing room. No Hope. Damn it. Mia searched the floor and finally found the kid in the women's bathroom, sitting on the counter, back to the mirror, head tipped up as she smoked a cigarette, blowing lazy smoke rings into the air.

"Jesus!" Mia snatched the cigarette from her black lips and stuck it under the tap. "You can't smoke in here, the alarm'll go off!"

"Nah, it hasn't been reset since your fire adventure yesterday." Hope smiled. "Gossip train is running full steam ahead in this joint. Did you know no one but Tess likes you?"

Mia pinched the bridge of her nose. "You haven't been doing anything but filing and smoking, right?"

"In any of our conversations, did I ever mention I'm an electronics wizard? No?" She smiled. "Oh, probably because, like, we've never really had any conversations."

"Goddamnit, it was you."

"Well, I don't like to toot my own horn, but-"

"Did you fuck with the phones, Hope?"

"Wow, do they let you say fuck here at work? Cool."

Mia could feel each and every individual hair on her head going gray, especially when Hope let out a little smirk as if to say Chaos, panic, and disorder, my work here is done. Mia drew a purposeful breath. "Fix it. Now!" She twirled on her heels and started to leave the bathroom, then whirled back, snatching Hope's pack of cigarettes and lighter.

"Hey!"

"You can thank me when you're old and still have your lungs." She stalked back into the conference room, pasting a smile on her face as she did. "Well," she said to her waiting clients. "Where were we?"

They dug right back into media development and later. Without warning, the speakers went from discreet sort jazz to off-the-charts, earsplitting. .. hip-hop?

Two of the reps from the Anderson company jerked, spilling their coffee over some of the files. Two others put their hands to their chest as if having a heart attack.

Everyone jumped up and started talking at once.

Not that anyone could hear a word over the unbelievable noise coming from the speakers.

Mia tried to tell everyone to relax, but no one could hear her. Finally she just lifted a finger, signaling she'd be right back, and hurried out into the hall.

Like this morning's donut/phone incident, people were standing there in various stages of shock. Mia headed directly to Tess. "Where's Hope?"

"She's safe!" Tess yelled. "And, ohmigod, she's just the sweetest thing ever! Did you know she helped fix the phones? Also, she helped Dick with his computer-"

Mia shook her head. "Where is she?"

"I gave her a break! She's in the lounge!"

Which was next to the janitor's closet, which was next to the sound system closet.

Shit.

Mia went running. The sound system closet was open, all the equipment in it blinking like mad. Hands over her ears, she searched, searched… and finally found the power button and hit it.

Blessed silence.

Mia slumped against the door, exhausted. When Dick popped his head in and saw her, he frowned. "Where the hell is your niece?"

God, could it get any worse? Remembering the threat of layoffs, she decided it was never too late to do a little senior butt-kissing, so she smiled. "Working somewhere, you know, helping out. Why?"

"Because I think she's lifted my wallet."

Chapter 10

After summer school ended, Kevin walked across the field toward the teen center, hoping against hope Mike would be there for his interview with the board members.

Unfortunately, Mike had a bad habit of "forgetting" appointments like this, even though Kevin knew that was just a self-defense mechanism. People could say they were politically correct all they wanted, but most had a problem hiring a handicapped man.

Mike knew this all too well; he'd lived it. And Kevin had lived it with him.

The day was a hot one, and Kevin swiped his forehead with his arm. He'd spent the morning teaching science to himself. The kids had been there plenty, but as a group of teens required to take this class to make up for a failing grade, not one of them had showed signs of life. He might as well have taught How to Scratch Your Ass Effectively, because no one gave a shit.