Unzipped?. Karen Kendall

again, “So what does your mother know? What details did she give you?”

      Shannon twisted her long curly hair into a knot and secured it with a pencil from a can on the countertop.

      “She knows very little about my biological mother and father—only some basics. Apparently this woman who gave birth to me was very young, just out of high school. My bio father was a student at one of the local colleges. He played basketball for B.U. They were from completely opposite religious back-grounds—he was Catholic, she was Jewish.”

      “Do you want to find out more?”

      Shannon fidgeted and crumpled what was left of the paper towel into a ball. “I don’t know. I’m torn. For better or for worse, my parents are the people who raised me. The ones who spoon-fed me and changed my diapers and kept me from sticking my fingers into electrical outlets. The ones who taught me how to read and ride a bike. The ones who sent me to college. You know?”

      Lilia nodded.

      “I may never be proper enough for Rebecca, but she’s my mom. It’s her voice in my head that governs my basic human values—her voice and Dad’s. Not the voices of two strangers who happened to conceive me at a frat party or something.”

      “But you can’t help wondering.”

      “No. I am so utterly confused and blindsided by this—” Shannon checked her watch “—and I need to get it together and convince three different appointments today that I am the self-assured answer to their prayers. Hah.”

      “Well, if it’s any comfort to you, you look great. You are the only person on the planet who can get away with those clothes and still look professional.” Lil’s brows rose as she scanned the black-and-orange outfit.

      “I know.” Shannon grinned. “It’s all in the attitude.”

      “Add your leopard-print reading glasses and some concealer, and nobody will have a clue you were just bawling.”

      “Hey, hey, hey. We all know that I am waaay too cool to bawl. I just emoted a little bit.”

      It wasn’t in Lilia’s nature to snort. But her look said it all.

      SOMEHOW, SHANNON MADE IT through the morning and her first two appointments. The first one, Mrs. Drake, was a divorcée who’d recently graduated with honors from law school at age forty-two. She just needed some basic posture lessons—“Shoulders back! Stomach in! Chin up! Project confidence!”—and help putting together an acceptable corporate wardrobe. She also needed to hear, after twenty years of being put down by her ex, that she was bright, talented and had a great future ahead of her.

      Shan loved helping women like Mrs. Drake. She felt such a sense of achievement when, after a few sessions, she sent them out into the world again, re-born in a new skin.

      Her second appointment was a teenage girl who looked highly intimidated by her new coach and surroundings. Shannon’s heart went out to awkward, homely Janna, and she forgot her own problems. Eyes desperate behind her ugly glasses, Janna confessed that she was in love with a “cool” boy who would never look at her unless Shannon helped her. She was going to pay for her Finesse sessions with her babysitting money, and it seemed all too likely that her mother didn’t know she was there.

      Shannon hesitated for a moment, debating the ethics. Then she caved in. After all, it wasn’t as if she were going to outfit the girl with a thong and spike heels. But take her babysitting money? Shannon couldn’t.

      “Hold on just a sec, sweetie,” she told her. “I’ve just got to run get some paperwork.” She smiled reassuringly and slipped out of her office, closing the door behind her. Moments later, she stood in Jane’s office.

      “I can’t charge this one,” she said. “It would be criminal. She’s all of fifteen. Isn’t there something she can do around the office?”

      Jane tapped her pen on her nose.

      “Stop that! I thought we broke you of that habit when you drew all over your face.”

      “Dominic thinks I’m sexy with a Bic mustache. Can the girl type?”

      “I don’t know.”

      “Hmm.” Jane sat for a moment, thinking, and then brightened. “Mailings! She can help do the direct mail stuff. How about that?”

      “Perfect.” Shannon spun on her heel, grabbed a generic information form off Jane’s credenza and returned to her own office.

      “Here we go,” she said, handing the sheet of paper to Janna, who peered at it from under her stringy bangs. “If you’ll just fill this out, we can get started. The good news is that we’ve just begun a student discount program. Oh, and by the way, we’re looking for someone to help out here a few hours a week. Would you be interested? I know you’re not technically employment age, but we could just reduce your bill by the hours you work.”

      Janna looked as if she might kiss Shannon. Mentally Shan pieced through her closet for a few things that would fit the girl. Babysitting money wouldn’t go too far in terms of haircuts, clothes and makeup.

      When Janna left, it was noon, which vaguely surprised Shannon. She wasn’t hungry. She felt restless, her identity crisis rushing back into her consciousness. Who had actually given birth to her? Where was she now? What did she look like? What nationality was she? What were the circumstances under which she’d had a child—and given her away?

      The questions flooded her mind and made her feel unbalanced. She had to get out of here for a while—especially before she faced Hal Underwood, a brain who had single-handedly built his own software company, so successfully that he was now taking it public.

      That was impressive. A lot more impressive than failing as an actress; trying to make a living as just one more pretty face in an ocean of them. It also beat out a career grooming people like a monkey.

      The unknown Hal Underwood was already giving her an inferiority complex; taking her back to high school where she’d been treated as the stereotypical dumb blonde.

      Shannon swept her keys off the corner of her desk and grabbed her lime-green suede hobo bag. “Gotta run some errands!” she called to Lilia and Jane. “Back by one.”

      She made her way outside, into the gray, chilly Connecticut spring. Hey, God. Don’t you know it’s April? Could you improve the weather just a bit?

      Shannon got into her white BMW roadster and put the top down in defiance of the weather. The car, a gift from her parents, now seemed all wrong for her. Suddenly she hated it, hated the tan leather seats, hated the logo in the center of the steering wheel, hated the way she must look in the thing: like an expensive, privileged blonde with not a care in the world. What if her real mother was a waitress? A teacher? A postal worker? What if a car like this represented a year’s salary to her? The beemer seemed shameful in light of these questions.

      She squealed out of the parking lot, the cold April wind in her hair, and headed for Highway 84.

      Within moments the sky decided to dump on her, and it seemed fitting. Instead of putting the top up, Shannon let the rain soak her in a cold shower of reality. She pushed the leopard-print reading glasses to the top of her head and drove under the raindrops like a madwoman, not caring what she looked like to others.

      Though the rain pelted her face and hair, trickled down the neck of her jacket and damn near froze her in combination with the wind, at least she felt alive. Not numb, as she’d been all afternoon yesterday and all night.

      How ironic that I’m an image consultant. Because that’s all I am: an image. Everything about my life has been a lie.

      4

      HAL GRITTED his teeth, still obsessing about the information leak in his company. He’d satisfied himself that it wasn’t via an outside hacker, but only after hours upon hours of searching through the logs.

      He turned into the Finesse parking