Prologue

"Big Brother? The Board is waiting for you," my sister said.

I pushed my chair back from the computer workstation that occupied half of my corner office and got my suit jacket from the hook on the wall.

"Keep working on that bug, Penny," I said. "I'll be back in a few hours. We should be done just in time for lunch."

"I'll have this one and more fixed by then!" she laughed.

"I know you will!" I agreed. "You're always quick!"

"But you never were!" she giggled.

"Over twenty years and you haven't stopped with the silly comments! You're still cute, Pretty Penny!"

"I am, aren't I?" she laughed.

She jumped up and kissed me on the cheek, something that she'd done every time we parted once we'd started working together.

My sister laughed. "That's almost as bad as calling me Squirt. You've called her that ever since she was in High School."

"True. I assume that everyone else has assembled in the boardroom?"

"Of course," she said.

I walked down the hall, stopping to use a window to straighten my tie. I hated the things, but I felt I should dress properly when I addressed the board. I walked into the room and took my seat just to the right of the Chairman, and my sister sat across from me as she usually did.

"Now that everyone is here, I'd like to call this quarterly meeting of the Board of Directors of NIKA Consulting to order," Joyce said. "The Secretary will record the roll."

"Madame Chairman?"

"Here."

"Doctor Driesson?"

"Here."

"Captain Schumacher?"

"Present."

"Doctor Pater?"

"Here."

"Mr. Adams?"

"Here."

"Mr. Adams, the younger?"

"Here!" I chuckled, as I always did at that reference.

"Ms. Adams?"

"Here."

"Mrs. Kallas?"

"Here."

"Ms. Clarke?"

"Here."

"Everyone is present. There is a quorum," the Secretary announced.

"Let's start with the quarterly financials. Elyse?" Joyce said.

"Revenues are down a bit, as was expected when the indictments were filed against the union leaders and we severed our contracts with them. The pipeline for new business was a bit soft because of Steve's absence, but it's looking better now that he's quashed the rumors that he was running off to Russia to become a monk."

There was general laughter and an "As if!" muttered under my sister's breath.

"If you'll take out the financial report, I'll go over the details with you."

I was bored stiff by these presentations, but they were necessary. I half-listened as I looked around the room and made eye contact with an old friend who was sitting in a chair at the side of the room. I wondered how the board was going to react to my announcement.

"Thank you, Elyse," Joyce said.

"Elyse, our overseas revenue seems to have spiked a bit. What do you attribute that to?" Doctor Driesson asked.

"Our relationship with the firm in Moscow has begun generating more revenue due to expansion. Steve's friendship with their CEO continues to pay off for us very nicely in Europe."

I smiled, remembering my first encounter with the wonderful Russian woman who ran a similarly named, but legally separate, firm in Europe. That had been a long time ago.

"Julia, would you present the business development report and project status update, please?" Joyce requested.

"You have a binder in front of you that contains all current and prospective clients, along with projected revenue from each. There is also a, thankfully short, list of clients who have ended their relationship with us for one reason or another. None of them were of any significant size. As Elyse noted, the pipeline was soft, but thanks to hard work by Cindi's team, it's improved significantly.

"All of our software packages are doing well. Specifically, development of our newest medical office software release is progressing well, and we're on target for our planned release in January. Our beta customers are reporting bugs at about the expected rate, and Dave was kind enough to allow Steve to be pulled out of a debugging session for this meeting. As we all know, he's better off there than here."

More general laughter. Everyone knew I hated these meetings and strongly preferred to be at my workstation with Penny at my side, coding or debugging.

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