Page 6 of A Little Naughty

“If you’re lucky.”

She was lucky—her village consisted of her mom, and a pretty decent support network of friends. It’s what I was counting on finding when I came back for my sister’s Halloween wedding.

Of course, I wouldn’t have missed the wedding regardless, but I needed to see if there was a place for Nikki and me to hide out.

My plan to save her just happened to coincide with an ICE raid of Wolf, first name Bill’s place, and as I suspected, he was running a low-key sweatshop staffed with kids ages nine to thirteen.

I didn’t stick around to find out where they all came from—maybe they were runaways, maybe they weren’t. All I know is, I’d just sneaked in the back door when the front door was blown open.

Nikki’s eyes met mine, and she took my hand. As the SWAT team stormed in the front, we ran out the back, and I stashed her with Monay and the other girls while I came here.

But that wasn’t the end of it. Bill decided we had a beef, and once the feds were off his back, he came looking for us.

We weren’t too hard to find either, considering Monay is pretty unforgettable with her height and Dolly Parton wig. Not even Trixie could keep us off his radar.

That combined with the war on drag queens, Monay sold her car, we hopped on a bus, and got the hell out of Branson.

I’m pretty sure nobody knows where we are now, but I’m not resting on my laurels just yet.

Working with Piper at the newspaper is a big plus. I can keep an eye on the news wires and police reports. Only one job would be better—working with Cass’s other best friend Britt Bailey at the courthouse, but I don’t want to be that close to law enforcement until I know more about Nikki’s backstory.

“Are you planning to come back to work?” She lingers at the front door, her hand on the knob.

“If you’ll have me. I need money to pay you rent.”

Another grin. Another dismissive shake of her head, as if she’d let me stay here for free. She probably would.

“How soon can you start?”

“Is today too soon? I hate sitting around doing nothing.” Or not knowing what’s happening.

“Your desk is waiting for you just like you left it.”

My job with Piper was supposed to be as an office assistant, but I quickly transformed it into reporting. I’m actually pretty good at it, too. I go beyond the boring old facts and get right to the juice of the story.

Piper tries to edit me, saying theEureka Gazetteisn’t a gossip rag, but it’s hard to argue with success. Circulation went up 10 percent after I joined the staff, and I even started a paidPersonalssection to cover my salary.

With Martha her mom writing snappy headlines, we had everybody in town talking.

And they say newspapers are dying out. Not in Eureka, South Carolina.

“You left town so fast, I never got to thank you for that engagement performance.” Piper squeezes my arm. “I’m pretty sure Adam would never have come up with something like that on his own.”

“It was all because we love you.” I boop her shoulder. “Honestly, I don’t know why more people don’t use ‘Love Story’ for proposals. It has the perfect setup, and I bet it was your favorite song when you were fifteen.”

I don’t mention I had my first French kiss to it at twelve. Not everyone agrees with me that kissing boys is the best, and the badder they are, the better they kiss. I suppress a little shiver.

Although, now that I’m taking care of Nikki, I’m doing my best to be more respectable and not go around kissing bad boys all the time.

“I was more of a No Doubt fan.” Piper shrugs. “But who didn’t like ‘Love Story’ at fifteen? It’sRomeo and Juliet.”

We’re standing at the front door, and even though it’s January, a warm breeze blows outside. The sun is shining, and it’s really lovely.

I walk to the bottom of the stairs and call up to Nikki. “What do you think?”

Her dark head appears, and she’s smiling so big, it makes my chest hurt. “It has a real shower with a door, and a room just for me!”

Smiling, I hold out my hands. “What did you expect?”

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