LITMIR.BIZ

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part for charity and hunting a story like a basset hound.

      “A vibrator’s cheaper.” Lauren’s foster sister, Aurora “Rory” Constable, was still smiling over her motorcycle crack. Lauren glanced at the drink on the table in front of her, illuminated by a little Victorian lamp that tried to compete with the colored spotlights and the glittering bling-bling of the twentysomething crowd all around them. Rory would nurse her drink for the next hour on the principle that the calories in it would get burned off in proportion to her activity—which, at this charity event disguised as a key party, could amount to anything from casual conversation to sex in the broom closet.

      “A vibrator doesn’t have that ‘mess with me and I’ll kick your butt’ appeal,” Lauren pointed out.

      “Bad date, sweetie?” Michaela Correlli, the middle of the three foster sisters, slid an arm around Lauren’s shoulders and gave her a quick hug. She was also the clever so-and-so who had slipped Lauren an éclair during their regular Saturday-morning gabfest at Lavender Field last week and who, when her defenses were down, had talked her into coming tonight.

      To survive in the foster care system, Lauren had learned that when life tossed you a lemon, you made lemon chiffon pie and invited other people to eat it. So, even though a key party wasn’t her usual scene, she could use it to further her career and to help out a good cause at the same time. But she was the lucky one. Poor Rory had had less than a week to come up with the donation of baked goods for five-hundred-plus people that Mikki had recklessly promised on her behalf in exchange for the tickets. It was a good thing Rory’s staff at Lavender Field, her chain of bakeries, all possessed the California attitude that considered goodies for five hundred a “challenge,” never a problem.

      Mikki was good at talking people into challenges. Nobody messed with her. In high school, nobody had messed with Lauren, either, once they’d found out Michaela was her foster sister. Even now, after one look from those merciless blue eyes, deputy D.A.s and social workers alike dropped to their knees, begging.

      For a lot of things.

      “The worst,” Lauren replied over the canned pop music that was playing until the band was ready to start. “Remember that really sweet guy I met online about four months ago? The wealth-planning advisor?”

      “Didn’t you show us some of his messages?” Rory asked. “And his picture? I thought he looked nice.”

      “Oh, he is nice,” Lauren assured them. “His mom told me so during our date.”

      Mikki set her diet soda on the table with a clank. “You’re at the meet-the-parents stage already? Is there something you didn’t tell us about this guy? Should we be looking at poufy pink bridesmaid dresses?”

      “God forbid. There’s a lot of stuff he didn’t tell me.” Lauren glanced longingly at the bar again, then back to her sisters. “Such as the fact that he isn’t a wealth planner at all. He’s a finance major at San Francisco State and a permanent student. As in thirty and still living with his mom.”

      “So how did she get into this?” Rory wanted to know.

      “He brought her on our date. In fact, she was a lot more interesting than he turned out to be. He writes beautiful e-mails, but in person?” Lauren waved her hand, shooing away the memory of her brief foray into online relationships that had started out as research for a story and had ended as…well, as dinner with an entertaining fifty-year-old archaeologist. Oh, yeah, and her son.

      “As of tonight, I’m going to be like you, Mikki. I’m putting men on hold and focusing on important stuff, like nailing down this story.”

      It was clear Michaela was trying not to laugh at the sad state of her love life. “Are you sure you want to do that?” She fingered the white-gold locket on the chain around her neck, a little suitcase-shaped charm identical to the ones worn by Lauren and Rory and half the crowd at this fund-raiser. “What if Johnny Depp shows up with the key to your suitcase and you win the getaway for two?”

      “He wasn’t invited. But even if he was, I’d swap with you and you could have him, Mikki Mantis. I’m here to mingle and interview people. That’s all.”

      Mikki swatted her on the arm for using the nickname she hated, and while Lauren got the last laugh on her sister, Maureen Baxter pushed aside a burgundy-velvet curtain and grabbed the microphone. The music faded and when she said, “Welcome to Clementine’s, everyone,” the noise level in the crowded club dropped by a couple of decibels. “I’m Maureen Baxter and I’m your hostess this evening.”

      She paused while the crowd hooted and whistled. Maureen knew everybody here, and if she didn’t know you, she had a contact who did. Tall and elegant, with dark hair cut in a bob, her taupe chiffon gown hugged her curves and its sequins caught the spotlights trained on the stage. Mikki and Rory both knew her better than Lauren did. Maureen, too, had been one of the kids at the old house on Garrison Street where Emma Constable, Rory’s real mother and Lauren’s and Mikki’s foster mom, took in the teenage hard cases from the foster care system.

      Where Lauren had finally found her mismatched but true family.

      “You’re probably wondering what the deal is with the keys and lockets you were given at the door. Well, here’s how it works. All the men have keys. All the women have locked suitcase charms.” Maureen dropped her voice. “Yes, girls, these are white gold, from Deerfield, and we get to keep ’em.” More hooting and some applause. “Guys, your job is to find the woman whose lock fits your key—and I mean that strictly in the practical sense. Every couple who gets a match gets a prize and a chance at the grand prize for tonight’s charity event—a getaway for two. Best of all, you get to meet new people and have some fun.”

      Cheering from the crowd. Maureen waved a hand for quiet.

      “And let’s not forget why we’re really here. Tonight’s event is incredibly important to me because it will make the building fund for Baxter House healthy again. So far we have the land, which I inherited, the planning cycle is complete, the foundation has been poured and a couple of contractors—among them a wonderful guy who is actually here tonight—have donated their services.”

      Lauren glanced at Mikki and Rory and made an “I’m impressed” face.

      “Good on you, Maureen,” Mikki said in the direction of the stage, then turned to her sisters. “With land at a premium around here and contractors booked a year in advance, you’ve gotta believe she worked her butt off for this.”

      “I wonder who the guy is?” Rory said.

      “Our little suitcase charms mean something, as anyone who has ever been in the foster care system knows,” Maureen went on. “Sometimes all you have is what fits in a single duffel bag. Your whole life, all your memories, everything that is unique to you, stuffed inside a single suitcase. Some of you here know what I’m talking about.”

      The three women glanced at each other again. Some kids came with a lot of stuff. Some came with nothing. Lauren had been one of the one-bag kids—a gangly fifteen-year-old with nothing to her name but a picture of herself as a baby with her parents, a pair of jeans and a couple of T-shirts and a battered copy of the Norton Anthology of English Literature that she’d lifted from her last school.

      Mikki’s face told her she remembered the same thing and she slid an arm around Lauren’s shoulders.

      “Your fifty-dollar cover is not paying for the club or media coverage,” Maureen assured them. “It’s going toward the building fund, to purchase rebar and beams and drywall. This may not seem very glamorous, but I can’t tell you how much it will mean to an eighteen-year-old girl who has just been released from the system and has no idea how to go about starting her life other than taking it to the streets. Baxter House will mean a new start for that girl, and I’m grateful to each of you for coming out to support it.”

      Maureen grinned at the crowd and waved behind her at the band, who had been quietly filing onto the stage while she was talking. “But now, we’re going to have fun. So go out, find your key partner

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