Oh, heck, she had pondered long and hard on whether or not to tell her super half-cousin that she'd been suspended, but was still undecided. But now-it was decision time!

'Great!' she answered enthusiastically. How could she possibly confess that she had so dreadfully let him down? `How are things with you? Still loving and leaving them?' Greville had been divorced for a number of years and, having been badly hurt, now, while having women friends, was careful to steer clear of emotional entanglements.

'Saucy monkey!'

She laughed. `Did you want Astra? Fennia's out.'

'Any one of you,' he answered. 'I'm having a party on Saturday if all or any of you want to come.'

'We'd love to!' Yancie answered for the three of them. Greville threw wonderful parties.

They chatted for a few minutes more, and Yancie, having managed to stay cheerful enough while talking to him, felt immediately guilt-ridden once she had put the phone down. She didn't like the feeling.

Fennia came home in low spirits too-her mother hadn't wanted to know. Yancie did her best to cheer her, telling her of Greville's phone call and party invite. `Did you tell him?'

'That I'm suspended? I couldn't.'

Astra came out of her study and, when Fennia volunteered to make some coffee, it was Astra who insisted on making it.

All three of them went into the kitchen.

'Greville's having a party on Saturday we're invited,' Yancie told her.

'Just what I could do with,' Astra declared. `Thanks for taking the call-I was up to my ears in complicated calculations. Did you tell him?'

Yancie knew her cousin didn't mean had she accepted for the three of them. `I couldn't,' she admitted, and was plagued all night when her guilty conscience kept her awake. Greville had always been there for all three of them she owed it to him, after all he had done, to keep her job.