“Do you think she’d want to take on two more?” Nicole tried to make it sound light, but couldn’t hide how hard Josefina’s desertion had hit.

Cyndi heard the story with sympathy that looked and sounded genuine. “That’s terrible of her, to spring it on you like that,” she said. “Still, if it’s family, what can you do? You can’t very well tell your mother not to be sick, you have to stay in the States and take care of other people’s kids.” She hesitated. Probably she could feel Nicole staring at her, thinking at her – wanting, needing her to solve the problem. “Look,” she said uncomfortably. “I understand, I really do. You know? But I don’t think Marie would want to sit any kids who aren’t family, you know what I mean?”

Nicole knew what she meant. Nicole would have felt the same way. But they were her kids. She was left in the lurch, on a bare day’s notice. “Oh, yes,” she said. She hoped she didn’t sound as disappointed as she felt. “Yes. Of course. I just thought… well. If my family were here, and not back in Indiana… Oh well. It was worth a try.” She did her best to make her shrug nonchalant, to change the subject without giving them both whiplash. “Ten-thirty, you said? I’ll see what I can catch up on till then. Lord, you wouldn’t believe how long it took me to get here this morning.”

“Traffic.” Cyndi managed to make it both a four-letter word and a sigh of relief. Off the hook, she had to be thinking.

Lucky Cyndi, with her sister in town and not in Bloomington, and no chance of her disappearing into the wilds of Ciudad Obregon. Nicole mumbled something she hoped was suitably casual, and retreated to her desk. She was still riding the high of Ogarkov’s news, though the bright edge had worn off it.

The first thing she did when she got there was check her voice mail. Sure enough, one of the messages was from Sheldon Rosenthal, dry and precise as usual: “Please arrange to meet with me at your earliest convenience.” She’d taken care of that. Another one was from Mort Albers, with whom she had the eleven-thirty appointment. “Can we move it up to half-past ten?” he asked.