Authors' Note: Jenny is my own original character. She was first introduced in my story "Projected Losses," and then returned for its sequel, "Tidings of Comfort and Joy." She also appeared in Way 92 of "100 Ways to Be a Better Father." The following Way contains references to events from those three appearances, so you should probably read all three of them before you read these two Ways!

Acknowledgment: Thank you to Samantha Winchester for allowing me to use her original character Rosemary as Jeff's corporate assistant, and also to her for the quick beta job she made time for!

Way 48
"Don't engage in office politics."

John Tracy loved the businesses his father had built. He loved understanding the projects being undertaken by the various companies under the umbrella corporation. He loved knowing how every part of each of those companies worked. He loved the sense of accomplishment that came from successful project completion, and the thrill of their new discoveries.

But there was one thing about business that John didn't love, and that was what could only be described as office politics. Yes, for the most part the people who worked for Tracy Corporation and all its subsidiaries were good, hard-working people. After all, the Tracys could afford to have the best and brightest employees on their payroll.

No matter how good the people were at their jobs, however, corporations tended to become their own living entities with their own personalities. And inevitably, one of the core behaviors that developed as a company grew in size and importance, was politics.

He stood there in his office on the sixty-fourth floor of the Tracy building in downtown Manhattan, shaking his head over what he'd just heard from his father's assistant, Rosemary. "Are you kidding me?" he asked.

She shook her head and gave him a wry smile. "Do I ever kid?"

"All the time," he grinned.

She chuckled. "Well, not about this."

He eyed the slender woman who was around the same age as his father. She'd led a life of love and laughter, or so the little lines at the sides of her mouth, and the wrinkles at the corners of her brown eyes, said. She always joked with him when he was there for corporation business, and he knew she was probably the most valuable employee they had. If anyone had their finger on the pulse of Jeff Tracy's conglomerate, it was Rosemary.

John sank into the plush black leather office chair behind his large walnut-wood desk, setting his microcomputer on its smooth, polished surface. "I don't get it. Why would the entire department refuse to follow the new protocol we just implemented?"

Rosemary seated herself in one of the two walnut-wood and black leather guest chairs on the other side of the desk from John. "Truth?"

"Of course!"

"I think it all boils down to two things: jealousy and anger."

"Jealousy? Who are they jealous of?"

"One of the authors of that new protocol."

"Well, the three of us wrote it. Dad, me and...wait...Jenny?"

"You got it."

"Why, because she's Dad's fiancée?"

Rosemary nodded. "And anger because of what she uncovered with Garrett Parsons and those other three project managers who were helping him embezzle."

"What?" John asked, incredulous. "Are you telling me they wanted those four to keep stealing from us?"

Rosemary sighed. "Not really. It's just..." Her voice trailed off as a myriad of emotions played across her face. "John, I haven't mentioned a word of this to your father. He'd fire the whole PMO in a heartbeat."

"Maybe he should."

"Well, think about it from their perspective. Because Jenny mainly worked out of the old Kansas office, and spends half the year working from Tracy Island now, she's not as present here where the majority of the PMs are located. Rumors run rampant in these halls. Do you remember when Jeff held a meeting with the staff personally as soon as Parsons and the others were charged? So he could personally tell them what you three had uncovered?"

"Yeah, Jenny and I were with him at that meeting."

"Right. And the next day was when the formal announcement about their engagement hit the airwaves."

"It'd been a month since he'd actually popped the question at her place in Kansas. I'd forgotten about the official press release you had Publicity prepare."

"He didn't want to wait any longer than that. Those two are crazy about each other."

John gave her a wink and a grin.

"So after Jeff tells everyone about the arrests, and clearly states that both you and Jenny had a hand in uncovering the embezzling, it gets announced that they're engaged. Shortly thereafter she gets the Moon Colony and LRSE projects back, and next thing they know, Jeff's making the PMO change the way they've always done things."

John leaned back as far as the chair would let him go, steepling his fingers where his hands rested on his chest. His mind raced. He knew he couldn't tell Jeff about this because his father wasn't a man who took kindly to this sort of behavior from what were normally very reasonable and level-headed people. No, it was up to John to figure this one out.

His eyes moved to Rosemary's. "You look like you have an idea or two."

"Always," she grinned. "I think you need to get Jenny here, front and center, and show them a Tracy face with her...one other than your father's." She scooted up to the edge of her chair. "Since you're in town, and they know you're taking over more and more of the operations, you need to hit this head-on." Rosemary eyed him for a moment. "Why was the new protocol developed?"

"To minimize the risk of future attempts at embezzlement," John replied. "It was a direct result of what Parsons and the others did when they took over the Moon Colony and LRSE projects after we sent Jenny away for her own safety."

"Right. And what were they told about why Jenny had disappeared for a time and then returned to being the head PM for those two huge projects?"

"Dad met one on one with Yolanda Baker both about Jenny returning to head those projects, and again after he and I okayed Jenny's new methodology for release. As the head of the Project Management Office, Yolanda held a department meeting after both of those events, which included all the remote PMs who work in other locations or from home."

"And were any of you in town when she held those meetings?"

"No," John replied, rising to his feet. "When Dad told her Jenny was coming back, he said she was thrilled about it. And after his meeting with her last month, he told me she totally understood why we needed the new protocol with its system of checks and balances for project schedules and plans. He put her in touch with Jenny, who was in Kansas at the time."

"So Yolanda, at the very least, knew that Jenny was so heavily involved in the creation of the new protocol, that she was the one Jeff had train her...a woman Jenny technically reports to."

"Yes," John replied, the truth of the situation dawning on him. "Yolanda would have to be an idiot not to see that Jenny was behind the methodology."

"And since nobody other than Yolanda met with the PMO both about Jenny's return and the new protocol, we don't know what she actually told them about either of those things."

"No, we don't," John agreed, walking around the desk and making his way to the row of windows on the opposite wall. He stood looking out over Manhattan from sixty-four floors up, folding his arms over his chest. "I'll bet you anything she's pissed because she didn't catch what was going on." He turned to look at Rosemary, who was still seated in the chair. "Thanks to the row Dad and Jenny had when Parson's co-conspirators were rooted out, anyone in the vicinity knew it was really Jenny behind that. Yolanda probably thinks Jenny's vying for her job, and that she'll get it not only because she did what Yolanda didn't do, but just because she's engaged to Dad."

Rosemary nodded. "Yolanda's most likely worried that Jenny or your father, or both, don't think she's capable of doing that job since she didn't know what Parsons was up to."

"Exactly. So I'd wager she isn't behind the new methodology one hundred percent, which rubbed off on her staff, and the next thing you know we have an entire PMO refusing to adopt the new standard."

"Bingo."

"I just don't get it," John said with a shake of his head. "Why the hell would people who've been here for between three and fifteen years suddenly think Dad's trying to screw them all over?"

Rosemary got to her feet. "One word," she said, holding up her right index finger to prove her point. "Gossip."

Author's Note: Way 49 is a companion piece to Way 48. The character Ann mentioned in this Way is my own original character first introduced in my story entitled "Ann."

Way 49
"Refuse to gossip, or talk behind other people's backs."

John's fingers tapped his right knee. Jenny should arrive there at their penthouse any time now; he'd sent a car to pick her up, and she'd called thirty-five minutes ago to say she was en route. He hadn't told his father anything about his call to Jenny yesterday afternoon, nor about the fact that he'd asked her to come here to Manhattan. And he'd asked her not to tell him as well.

As if on cue, the front door chime announced a new arrival. John rose to his feet as the penthouse's door slid open and Jenny came breezing through, a rolling suitcase being pulled by her left hand while her right hand gave him a little wave.

He crossed the room and took her offered hug, then grabbed her suitcase and carried it to one of the suite's four bedrooms. She followed him in.

"Okay, John, you've got me intrigued. You want me here, you don't want your father to know." Jenny plopped down on the edge of the huge bed. "What's going on?"

"You sure you don't want lunch first?" John asked. "I was going to have it brought up."

"Uh-uh," she said, her long, blonde hair falling over her shoulders as she removed the baseball cap she'd been using to hold it all up. "I know you well enough to know there's something going down, and it's got to be big if you don't want Jeff involved."

"Come out to the living room," John said as he exited the bedroom. He gestured for her to sit on the plush maroon sofa while he seated himself on its matching loveseat. "Want anything to drink?"

"No thanks."

He nodded, pushing himself up to the edge of the cushion and resting his elbows on his thighs. "We have a situation with the PMO."

She frowned. "What's going on?"

For the next half-hour, John told her about his and Rosemary's conversation. The more he explained, the more Jenny's jaw dropped, until, when he revealed their suspicions about how the project managers and Yolanda were feeling about her, she jumped to her feet looking like she was about to spit nails.

"That's ridiculous!" she countered loudly, then began pacing back and forth between the sofa and the loveseat. "I may be engaged to Jeff, but he doesn't show that kind of favoritism! If I couldn't do the job, he wouldn't have put me in the position!"

"You know that, and I know that. But it's like I said, Jenny...you were there working away as Junior PM for quite a while. Then suddenly you get hand-picked by Dad to lead the Moon Colony and LRSE projects. You barely get your team together, then you disappear without any explanation. You suddenly return to the fold a year later, and the four people who took over those projects when you left, are ousted as embezzlers. A year after that, we're suddenly forcing a new PM methodology on them, which makes it seem like we don't trust any of them."

"Well, you and your dad don't trust them, and I don't blame you! Parsons had worked here for ten years. Kramer'd been with your father for four years, and those other two for five years apiece. There had to be a system of checks and balances put into place to prevent that from happening in the future."

"Of course there did. That's why Dad and I asked you to come up with the new protocol," John said, getting to his feet. Jenny's pacing was driving him nuts, so he stood right in front of where she was about to walk, which effectively made her stop. "But whether or not it's fair, Jenny, the fact remains that not one single project manager in the Manhattan office, nor the handful of others who work remotely, are using the new protocol. They're sticking to the old way of doing things in blatant opposition to a mandate from Dad."

"Which means if he found out, he'd fire every last one of them in about ten seconds flat," she concluded, sinking back onto the couch in defeat. "But what can we do? I'm two years into the Moon Colony and LRSE projects, with another four to go before completion. We've only just gotten Dandridge to sign off on the third revision of their automation contract. I can't just quit again."

"No, and I don't want you to. Not that Dad would allow you to."

She rolled her eyes.

"But I've got to figure out a way to get them to adopt the new methodology, and somehow, because your relationship with Dad seems to be at the heart of their refusal to cooperate, you have to help me do it."

Jenny got to her feet again, went to the kitchen and grabbed a bottle of water from the refrigerator. She drank half of it down in one go, then leaned against the marble-topped middle island, fiddling with the blue and white bottle label. John watched her for a bit, then rose from the loveseat and slid onto one of the stools opposite her.

"Penny for your thoughts," he said as she peeled a strip off the label.

"Well," she began, "there's something here that's not quite sitting right with me."

She had his attention. He gestured for her to continue.

"All three of us met with the entire Project Management Office after Parsons and the others were arrested and charged."

"Right."

"I remember how shocked the staff were at the revelation. Now that I think about it, though, Yolanda barely had any reaction to the news."

"Really? I don't remember noticing anything in particular."

"Well, you were the one doing most of the talking," Jenny reminded him as she came around the middle island and sat down on the stool to his left. They swiveled to face each other. "You were focused on telling them what had been uncovered, while I was just standing there looking at everybody."

"True."

"The next day our engagement hit the press. Jeff told Yolanda that he was putting me back on those two projects a couple weeks later. It was his last week here before he joined me in Kansas for the rest of that month."

"Yes, and then a couple months later, when we had a better handle on how they'd managed to embezzle the money, Dad and I approached you to write the new methodology."

Jenny nodded. "It took us nine months to get that thing perfected. I mean, it affects not only the PMO, but Finance and Procurement and four other departments. Biggest, most painful baby I've ever had."

John laughed. "I'll bet."

"So when Jeff met with Yolanda, he must've also met with the other department heads."

"Hmm," John said thoughtfully. "From what I remember, he said he met with them individually. Then you trained Yolanda in how the new protocol affected their methodology, and I know you also worked with the other department directors to explain it to them."

"Yes, I did. And never once did I get the idea from any of them that they had a problem with me." She looked him right in the eye. "Nobody from any of those other departments is refusing to implement the new protocol, are they?"

"No. They just can't because the PMO won't change how they're handling the schedules, plans, budgets and change orders."

Jenny cocked her head at him. "I think we should start with Yolanda."

"You think she's at the root of all this?" Off Jenny's nod, he asked, "Why?"

"I don't know, just a gut feeling, I guess. The way she didn't react over being told about the embezzling. The fact that her entire department is basically committing mutiny." Jenny leaned closer. "John, she's the director of the entire Tracy Corp PMO. It's up to her to see that everyone's following the rules. So if they're not..." She shrugged.

"Then she's at the heart of it," John concluded with a nod. "Problem is, unless we directly confront her, how can we know for sure? I mean, if she's not the reason they won't implement, and we accuse her, it'll only make things worse."

At that very moment, the vidphone in the living room announced an incoming call. John got up to see who it was. "Rosemary," he said to Jenny over his shoulder as he answered it. "Hi, Rosemary."

Rosemary made a show of looking past him. "I see you took my advice," she said, nodding toward Jenny as she approached.

"Hi, Rosemary," Jenny said as she came to stand right next to John at the small table near the couch where the vidphone was installed. "I'm afraid I've helped make you guys a big mess." She shook her head. "It seems like no matter what I do, I cause problems for this family."

"Nonsense," Rosemary replied with a warm smile. "So what have you two come up with?"

"We think Yolanda's at the heart of the problem," John told her. "Only thing is, we don't know how to find out for sure without getting her defenses up."

"I may have something for you on that front," Rosemary replied. "You know how my network of administrative assistants talk."

"Gossip, more like," John quipped.

"Oh, hush. Can we help it that the executives forget we exist while they're saying things that should never be said in front of other people?"

John chuckled and waved his hand in the air. "Okay, what've you picked up, Nancy Drew?"

"Well, Lena is Yolanda's admin. This morning before Yolanda arrived, I pulled Lena into a conference room and asked her point-blank if she had anything that could help us figure out what's going on with the PMO."

"And?" Jenny asked expectantly.

"And," Rosemary repeated, looking pointedly at Jenny, "Yolanda hates your guts, for one thing."

John looked down at Jenny, who seemed to shrink into herself, become smaller somehow. He put his hand on her shoulder. "Not your fault." He looked back at Rosemary. "Any indication of why?"

"Pretty much what we thought," Rosemary nodded. "Yolanda figures once Jenny gets those multi-million dollar projects wrapped up, Jeff's going to put her in charge of the PMO."

"But I don't want to be in charge of the PMO!" Jenny protested. "I don't want to be in that kind of management!"

John squeezed her shoulder. "I know you don't." He thought for a moment. "Rosemary, is there anything else Lena gave you? Any clue as to whether Yolanda's behind the project managers refusing to implement the protocol?"

"A doozy, John. According to Lena, Yolanda never met with the PMO about the new methodology."

"What?"

Rosemary nodded. "I'm not kidding. She walked out of her meeting with Jeff, said, 'If he thinks I'm doing that, he's out of his mind,' and told Lena to cancel the department meeting she'd already had her set up for the next day."

"So she never passed the new methodology along to her staff," Jenny said, looking up at John. "She never even told them about it."

"Apparently not," Rosemary confirmed. "Lena said if any calls or emails came in for Yolanda about the new methodology, she was to delete the emails and simply not tell her about the calls. Now Lena's mad as a hornet, because after two months, Larry from Finance, Sam from Procurement and half a dozen others are calling her nearly every day wanting to know when Yolanda's going to meet with them about the PMO side of the equation. It's driving her up a wall. And the one time she tried to ask Yolanda about it, to tell her she had to deal with it, Yolanda bit her head off and threatened to have her fired."

"What a bitch," Jenny breathed.

Rosemary nodded in agreement. "And John...Yolanda had Lena book her a ticket on Tracy Corp's dime. She set to leave next Wednesday."

"To where?" Jenny asked.

"Dubai," Rosemary replied, then looked directly at John. "No extradition treaty with the United States."

"Extradition treaty?" Jenny repeated. "What the hell does her hating my guts have to do with her leaving the country to a place our laws can't reach her?"

John's eyes met Jenny's, and in that moment he realized the truth. "Jesus," he breathed. "This isn't about you at all!"

"Extradition...criminal activity...oh, my God, you don't think...?"

"I do," John nodded, then turned to Rosemary. "I love you more than life itself."

"Good. Tell your father to give me a raise."

John grinned. "Done. Thanks, Rosemary. I'll be in touch with you later tonight."

"You betcha."

As soon as the call ended, Jenny laid a hand on John's arm. "You think there's a way we can prove it so that others will know firsthand what's been going on?"

"Firsthand," John said, then snapped his fingers. "That's it. I know exactly what we'll do."

Bright and early the next morning, John was seated at his desk. At eight o'clock on the dot, his admin Jerry ushered Yolanda Baker into his office. The plan had been to catch her off guard, which was why Rosemary had told Lena to take the day off, and sat at Lena's desk to catch Yolanda when she arrived. Rosemary was to escort Yolanda to Jerry, who in turn would bring her to John.

"Mr. Tracy," Yolanda said, all smiles and cool as a cucumber as she shook his hand. Her black hair was curled just-so around her face; her red business suit was so bright it was very nearly blinding in the early morning sun pouring into his office.

"Good to see you again, Yolanda," John greeted as he gestured for her to have a seat across from him. She placed her purse in one chair and sat down in the other, then looked at him expectantly. "I want to talk to you about how the new project management methodology is going in the PMO," he said.

She flinched, he thought.

"Oh, it's going great!" Yolanda exclaimed.

And she's lying.

"Really," he said, not actually asking a question. "So all the Manhattan project managers are up to speed on it, they've all been trained? They're all using it?"

"Oh, yes, I had them going on it within two weeks of finishing my training with Jenny," she replied.

Wow, how long does she think she can keep this act up? he wondered to himself.

He leaned back in his chair, taking up his standard pose of steepling his hands in front of him. "You know, I was talking to Larry, head of Finance," he said.

Another flinch.

"And he said he's been trying to meet with you for the past month-and-a-half about the new process between your departments."

"Oh," she scoffed, waving her hands in the air dismissively, "you know how it is. It's been insane trying to convert all the in-flight projects to the new templates and software. I honestly haven't had time for anything but that. Our project managers are scrambling to keep up."

"I see," John replied with a nod. "And that's probably why you haven't wanted to take the calls of the other seven people who've tried to meet with you on it, all of whom are impacted by the fact that your department is not yet using it."

Yolanda froze for about five seconds, then leaned back languidly in the chair. "I'm sorry, I don't know what you mean."

John reached out with one hand and hit the intercom button on his desk phone. "Jerry."

"Yes, sir," came Jerry's voice through the speaker.

John's office door opened. He watched Yolanda as she turned to look. And he saw her eyes widen when Jerry escorted five men into the office.

"Mr. Tracy, these are the gentlemen you asked for."

"Thank you, Jerry."

With that, the five men were left standing in the massive space between the door and John's desk, while Jerry retreated from the office and closed the door behind him.

"Please," John said to them, rising from his seat and gesturing to the conference table to his right. "Have a seat."

All five of the project managers looked confused as they complied.

"What are they doing here?" Yolanda asked.

John motioned for her to wait, his attention focused on the men. "Which of you is Alex Reagan?" he asked. A dark-haired man in his thirties raised a hand. "I'm John Tracy. Pleased to meet you," John said, reaching out and shaking his hand.

"Nice to meet you, too," Alex replied.

"I understand you five have been working on the new defense contract for the hydrogen-and-water-based jet VTOLs."

"That's right," Alex said, all five of them nodding. "I'm the lead on that, and George, Milo, Antonio and Dmitry here are managing the four different components of the contract."

"I understand you're all doing a fine job," John said, specifically to put them at ease. If their smiles were any indication, it worked. "But I'm a little confused about something."

John could practically feel Yolanda tensing up behind him as Alex asked, "What's that?"

"Two months ago, my father mandated a change to the project management methodology for the entire PMO," John stated...and knew he need go no further. The looks on all five of their faces as they turned to stare at each other, and then looked open-mouthed back at him, spoke volumes.

"This is ridiculous!" Yolanda said. John turned to look at her. She'd risen from the chair and somewhat resembled a caged rabbit trying to figure a way out.

"Yes," John agreed. "It sure is." He moved to the other side of the conference table and opened a door panel in the wall. "Okay," he said to the woman standing on the other side of it.

And in walked Jenny.

"You!" Yolanda seethed.

"What about her?" John asked.

"This is her fault."

"Really," John said as the panel swished closed behind Jenny. "How is it Jenny's fault that you never told your staff about the mandate from my father?"

Yolanda's mouth opened and closed, but no sound came out.

"Why didn't you implement it, Yolanda? How could you so blatantly disregard my father's direct order? Did you think there'd be no consequences for something like that?"

"It's a completely unnecessary change!" Yolanda replied, voice rising in pitch as she spoke. "She got your father to do it because she's sleeping with him! There's no reason for it; the ship runs fine as-is!"

To Jenny's credit, she remained quiet...though John was quite certain that later, behind closed doors, she'd be swearing up a blue streak about Yolanda's words.

"It doesn't run fine as-is," John said, shaking his head. "If it did, we wouldn't have had millions of dollars of project budget siphoned out of the corporation."

"You're just trying to catch somebody doing something that you can fire them over," Yolanda spat, "because she's sleeping her way into my job, but you don't want it to look that way!"

John, who was pretty much ready to start unleashing his own blue streak of curse words at the woman, walked around the table and moved to stand right in front of Yolanda. "If you're not doing anything wrong," he said calmly, "then why would you be concerned that the new methodology would make it look like you were?"

"See? You're accusing me already! That just proves my point!"

"The only thing I'm accusing you of is disobeying a direct order from the man who sits at the very top of this entire corporation." John paced away, and then turned back to face her. He held his hand out toward the five project managers still seated at the conference table. "These men are heading one of the largest DOD projects we've undertaken in the last five years; a project that demands utilizing the new protocol we implemented two months ago. And yet you never even told them about it. What do you have to say for yourself?"

Yolanda clamped her jaw shut, folded her arms over her chest and raised her chin in defiance.

"I'll tell you what I think," John said, rubbing his hands together, pacing the length of the table and wondering if he was somehow channeling the old TV show character Perry Mason. "I think maybe when we uncovered the Parsons embezzlement; when we rooted out the other project managers and the couple of people in Finance who were working with him on the scheme..." He stopped pacing only a foot away from her. "Isn't it true that Jenny's relationship with my father has nothing to do with why you didn't implement the new methodology?"

Yolanda took a step back, nearly falling over the chair she'd been sitting in.

"Isn't it true that you're worried about losing your job not because you really think Jenny is trying to get it, but because you think she will get it if you're found out?"

"If what's found out?" Yolanda ground out between clenched teeth.

John advanced on her. There was nowhere left for her to go. It was time to move in for the kill. "Isn't it true," he said softly, "that you were up to your neck in the embezzlement scheme, and that as soon as Jenny had trained you in the new protocol, you realized actually using it would expose the part you'd played?"

John felt, more than heard, Jenny moving around the table. Confirmed when she appeared at his side. "This was never about me and Jeff," she said to Yolanda. Her voice, rather than sounding angry, just sounded...sad. "You started gossip about me and Jeff; got the rumor mill going about my aspirations. You led people to believe that as a member of management, you knew something they didn't. You've got the entire PMO thinking that I'm a gold-digger sleeping my way to the top. And all this time, that was nothing more than a ploy to divert attention from your activities."

John nodded and picked it up from there. "You needed the PMs put off long enough that you could wrap up here and flee the country without any of them finding out with that new protocol, that there was a lot more to the scheme than what we'd already uncovered."

"What did Lena tell you?" Yolanda asked, her voice making John think of a chisel getting ready to make a huge gouge in a hunk of rock.

"Leave Lena out of this," John said. "And leave Jenny and my father out of it. This is about you, the money you helped steal, and the fact that you're about to flee the country. To a place, I might add, that has no extradition treaty with the US."

Yolanda sidestepped him, grabbed her purse from the other chair and moved toward the door. "You have no proof of any of this. I'm going to sue you for defamation." She stopped and looked at the five men still seated at the table, their chins on their chests. "Can't you see what's happening here?" she asked. "It's like I told you, it's all her, using sex to get my job!" she snapped, pointing a finger at Jenny. "And now she's succeeding, doing everything she can to get me fired!"

Jenny raised an eyebrow. "Who should be suing who for defamation?"

John had to resist the urge to laugh. He kept his face as carefully placid as he could. "I'm sorry, Yolanda, but as we speak, I have a team of investigators working with the New York Police Department and the FBI." John sat down in his desk chair, pressed a button to turn his microcomputer on, and opened his corporate email account. There, front and center in his inbox, was the message he'd been hoping would be there. "And according to this," he said as he double-clicked the message open, "they've already searched your apartment."

Yolanda stumbled as though someone had pushed her, then scurried to the door. Hand on the doorknob, she turned and glared at him. "You're lying."

John shook his head. "Unfortunately for all of us, I'm not. They found your bank records for the account you opened three years ago at Mashreq Bank in Dubai. You had Lena book you a flight for Dubai, due to leave next Wednesday. And," he continued, rising to his feet, "if we hadn't realized you'd never implemented the protocol, by the time we figured out what you'd done, we wouldn't have been able to touch you."

Saying nothing, Yolanda turned to face the door, twisting the knob with her hand. She flung it open...and stopped dead in her tracks. Slowly two men in black suits and ties and two NYPD officers crowded her back into John's office.

"Yolanda Baker," one of the officers said, "you are under arrest for Grand Larceny in the First Degree." He pulled a pair of handcuffs off his belt and reached out for her. "You have the right to remain silent."

As he continued stating her rights, and cuffed her wrists together in front of her, Yolanda turned to look at Jenny, eyes shooting daggers at her. "You're behind this," she hissed. "I know you are. You won't get away with it."

John moved to stand next to Jenny, placing his hand protectively on her shoulder. They watched as the other NYPD officer picked Yolanda's purse up from the floor, and as the two suit-clad FBI agents, the officers and Yolanda exited the office.

"Don't worry about her," John said. "She'll get the max of twenty-five years if Dad's attorneys have anything to say about it. And that's only on one count."

Jenny nodded, strangely silent. John turned to the men at the table as Rosemary and Jerry walked into the office. "Gentlemen, I have a job for the five of you."

All of them rose to their feet as Alex asked, "What's that, sir?"

"I want you to go back to the PMO department. I want you to tell each and every person what just happened here."

"Really?" George asked.

"Really," John answered. "You tell them every single solitary detail, including the fact that Yolanda's smear campaign against Jenny was a ploy to divert your attention from what she was up to. Now I want your promise that you will tell everyone, and starting tomorrow, you're getting a new director. Every single project manager's going to be trained in the new methodology beginning Monday."

The project managers stared at him, then Alex nodded. "Can we go?"

"Promise me," John said.

"We promise," the men replied in unison.

"Okay. You can go," John said with a smile. "And thank you."

They hurried from the office. Rosemary clucked her tongue and shook her head as she approached him. "Using the gossipers to your advantage?"

"Hey," John said with a wink, "I always say, if you can't beat 'em? Join 'em!"

Later that evening, after hours of conversation with Jeff over the vidphone, in which they told him nothing about the rumor mill and everything about Yolanda's criminal activities, John and Jenny were working on a very late dinner.

Well, at least, John was. It wasn't lost on him that Jenny had barely touched her plate of food, nor that she'd been extremely quiet since Yolanda's arrest.

"Hey," John said, folding his napkin and placing it atop his plate. He waited until she looked up at him. Boy, did she look miserable. "What's up? I thought you'd be happy we nailed her."

"Oh, I am happy about that," Jenny said quickly. She put her fork and knife down on the plate next to her untouched steak.

"Then why the long face?"

Jenny leaned back in the chair. John was surprised to see her eyes filling with tears. "Dammit," she whispered, angrily swiping at them. "I'm so tired of this, John."

"Of what?"

She got to her feet, paced a few steps away, and about a minute later, turned back round to face him, leaning against the back edge of the loveseat. "I would never have become a project manager if it hadn't been for my so-called uncle...the goddamned Hood...suggesting it as a career move when he sent me to college." John watched her carefully; he could see the internal struggle she felt as though it was a play he was watching through a window to her soul. "That liaison nearly got half your family killed. Then a year later, it almost happened again. We think everything's taken care of and bam, I unearth an embezzlement scheme right here in your own back yard. Not to mention all the spies the Hood had in place that you had to bust your ass to root out."

"Jenny," John said, getting up and moving to stand in front of her. "You had nothing to do with those other spies. We know that. And we know that you didn't realize who your benefactor was. Plus when you found out, you put your own life in danger trying to stop helping him. If not for you, we wouldn't have known the extent of the corporate espionage, and we probably wouldn't have figured out the embezzlement scheme until all eight of them had fled the country with millions of Corp dollars."

"I know all that," she replied miserably. "But don't you see? Every time I come into the picture, some horse shit goes down that puts someone in danger, or screws up, in this case, an entire department of people! I'm more trouble than I'm worth! I hate how much I've put you all through, and there seems to be no end to it!"

Well, John supposed he could see it from her perspective. Everything she'd said, after all, was true. But he knew...and he knew that deep down, Jenny knew...that without her becoming involved in their father's life, a lot more could be wrong now, all this time later, than was actually wrong. And because of something that had started out as a problem with the corporate political game and gossip mongers going gangbusters at Jenny's relationship with Jeff, they'd be getting rid of the final thief in their midst. Had Jenny's presence stirred up multiple shitstorms? Yes.

Was that, in this case, a bad thing?

No.

"Come here," John said, opening his arms and pulling her into a hug. "It'll all settle down. The rumor mill will stop grinding the Jeff-and-Jenny conspiracy and go back to their average, ordinary gossip. You'll make the Moon Colony and LRSE projects the biggest successes this company's ever seen. And," he finished as he pulled away from her and watched a small smile form on her face, "my father will do anything to keep you by his side, shitstorms or no shitstorms."

"Yeah, I guess he is kind of attached."

"Kind of? When he saw you sitting right here next to me, I thought he was going to bolt for Tracy One and take off from the island right then and there!"

Jenny laughed out loud. "Something tells me he probably already has...and if I know Tracy wives, I'd say it's a pretty safe bet that a certain lady named Ann is with him!"

John felt his face flush, causing Jenny to laugh harder. "Shut up," he groused, but couldn't keep a stupidly wide grin from settling on to his face. "Now go to bed so you can get some sleep before they get here." When she didn't move, he added, "Or I'll fire you."

"Yessir!" she saluted. "But you know," she said conspiratorially, "I might have to get Jeff and me a different place to stay."

He frowned. "What? Why?"

She gestured toward the four bedrooms. "Those walls aren't exactly soundproof."

His jaw dropped. "Oh, my God, no you didn't. Oh, my God, I do not need to hear my father doing...that!" He moved to the vidphone and began to dial a number, horrified at what was running through his mind.

"What are you doing?" she asked between peals of laughter.

"Getting Ann and me our own suite!" he replied...and went about doing just that.