"So are you going to open it or not?" a squeaky voice said behind her.

Helen gasped, her hand flying to cover her heart, which, her doctor assured her, was as strong as an ox. Slowly she turned to find Matt lounging against the microwave, an insolent grin on his face, looking just like Steven at thirteen. Brad looked like their mother, but Matt and Nicky were Steven all over again, red hair, freckles, and a smile to make girls swoon. Matt's hair had started to lighten to that strawberry blond color Helen so loved on Steven. In a few years the girls would be lining up outside Matt's door. Hopefully by then the boys would have a real mother with a stick to beat off the undeserving girls. Only the best for her boys, the middle one of whom was a real sneak.

"How long have you been standing there?" Helen demanded, her eyes narrowing.

Matt just grinned wider. "Long enough. Yenta."

Helen bit back a grin of her own. Insolent pup, using Fiddler against her at his age. "I am not matchmaking." Not yet, she thought, and not without a phone number. "How did you know?"

Matt shrugged. "I was listening last night when you and Dad were talking about Brad."

"Eavesdropping? Matthew Thatcher, I'm shocked," Helen said, deadpan.

"It's the best way to get information around here. Besides, how could I resist when you're saying something bad about Mr. Perfect?"

Helen frowned. "I can't believe you're taking pleasure in whatever's wrong with your brother," she said severely. "I thought I raised you better than that."

His face fell and he looked down at his feet. "Man, you know how to take all the fun out of life." He looked up, ducking his head like the little boy he used to be, when, just yesterday? How had he grown so tall and so old… so fast? "Look, I'm not happy that Brad's in trouble, but I am happy you're not yelling at me for a change."

She put on her imperious face. "News flash, Matthew. I'm a versatile woman, capable of multitasking. I can yell at two boys at the same time."

"Now you tell me," he mumbled, then she watched his expression slide from sullen to sly.

"What?" she asked, narrowing her eyes.

Matt leaned forward. "I also heard Dad call Brad's teacher by her first name last night. Very interesting. You want to know what she looks like?"

Helen bit her lip. The boy was incorrigible. Utterly. It was one of the things she loved most about him. "Your dad said she was sixty."

Matt cracked out a laugh. "And you believed him?"

Helen stiffened her back. "Of course not." She tilted her head to one side and crossed her arms over her chest. "You have a picture?"

Matt pressed the lever on the microwave, popping open the door and exposing a bound book sitting on the glass turntable.

Helen glanced up to find his brown eyes dancing. "Brad's yearbook?"

"I'm surprised at you, Aunt Bea. I thought you would have already thought of this yourself."

"I'm old. Cut me some slack. And don't call me Aunt Bea." Helen reached for the book only to have Matt grab it first. She sighed. "What do you want?"

"Lemon meringue, apple, and pumpkin."

"And pumpkin?"

"She's a looker. Aunt Bea."

"Okay. And pumpkin. You're going to get fat."

"I am a thirteen-year-old growing boy. I won't get fat. Oh, and I want ice cream with the apple pie. Vanilla "

"You're pushing me, boy. Give it."

Matt handed over the yearbook. "Page forty-two."

Helen flipped to the page and stopped short. "Oh, my goodness."

Matt looked over her shoulder and let out a low wolf whistle. "Yeah, mama."

Helen looked up and over her shoulder with a glare. "Matthew!"

He grinned. "Come on, Aunt Bea. I'm thirteen. If I didn't drool a little you'd say I was sick and take me to Doc Theopo-lis for a shot."

Helen considered and conceded. "Okay, you have a point. This time." She dropped her eyes back down to the photo where a tall, black-haired woman and ten lab-coated teenagers held a test tube in each hand and beamed sunny smiles. "If she's sixty, I want to know what she's been cooking up in her lab to keep her face so smooth. She's beautiful."

"Great legs, too."

"Matthew!"

"Oh, like I'm the first guy to say that. I'll bet every one of those six guys in the science club joined for 'academic stimulation." " He punctuated the air.

"Matthew!" Helen choked on the laugh she tried to stifle. "Please. That is a picture I don't need in my head. Okay, fine. She's pretty and obviously very smart."

"Probably too smart for Dad."

"Probably," Helen agreed. "But maybe she won't figure that out until it's too late."

"So are you going to open the briefcase or not?"

Helen shook her head. "It's an invasion of privacy. It would be wrong." Matt shrugged nonchalantly, putting Helen on instant guard. "What do you have, young man?"

"A business card." He grinned. "With her address and phone number."

"Hand it over."

Matt sulked. "I was going to hold out for turkey with trimmings."

"If it's good enough, I'll throw in the turkey for free."

"I love you, Aunt Bea."

"Shut up, Matt."

He grinned. "Check the back."

Helen turned it over and read Jenna's address and phone number. "She has good penmanship."

"And great legs. Hey," he added at her impatient sigh, "at least I stayed at her legs."

"And this is supposed to please me? Don't answer that. Where did you find this card? Or do I not want to hear the answer to that either?"

"In Dad's suit pocket. I was looking for loose change to support my arcade habit."

"Uh-huh. Okay, so I guess the ball's in my court now."

"So you'll call her and invite her for dinner?"

"Was my plan so transparent?"

"Predictable, at least."

Helen looked up at him, suddenly suspicious. "Why are you helping me?"

Matt pulled a glossy brochure from his pocket. "I found this under the cushion on the couch. When I was looking for-"

"Loose change to support your arcade habit," Helen finished and took the brochure from his hands. "Africa, the Dark Continent," she read. "I was wondering where I'd left this."

"And I overheard you talking to your friend Sylvia."

"Quite the little spy, aren't we?" Helen asked, not sure whether to be annoyed or repentant.

"I didn't mean to," he defended himself. "You were right here in the kitchen and I got hungry. I didn't sneak or anything. Anyway, I heard you tell her you couldn't go on the safari because no one could watch the kids for that long. I started to think about all the cool places you went before you came here and…" He let the thought trail off with an awkward shrug.

Repentant it would be. "You know I love you guys," she said, relieved when he nodded.

"You just want to have fun. I can buy that." He gently yanked a hank of her hair. "You know you'll have to get a buzz cut when you go to Africa or the tsetse flies will make nests in your hair."

"I'll have to take my chances," Helen returned dryly. "You want mashed potatoes or Stove Top with that turkey tomorrow?"

Mart's eyes lit up. "Which is easier?"

"Which do you think?"

"Then you know which 1 want." He took the yearbook and sauntered out of the kitchen.

Helen watched him go, wanting to swat his sauntering behind and marveling at his growing maturity at the same time. She'd done a good job raising these boys if she did say so herself. And Brad would come around. "Mashed potatoes, turkey, three pies, and repentance," she said aloud to no one at all. "This Jenna better be worth the trouble."

Saturday, October I, 2:30 P.M.

Marvin Eggleston surged to his feet, pushing back from his kitchen table so hard the chair fell to the floor with a clatter that made his trembling wife jump in her chair. "So you're telling me you are no closer to finding my daughter than you were two fucking days ago!" he exploded. He leaned on the table, balancing on the knuckles of his clenched fists, his face inches from Steven's. "What the hell have you been doing, sitting with your thumbs stuck up your asses?"