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fingers, each tip polished to a sheen, to smack Shannon, but she caught her arm and shoved the other woman.
    “You need to keep your hands to yourself,” Shannon told her. Laney’s eyes widened, but Shannon continued to put her in her place. “I know your type. You don’t want something until you see someone else has it. You threw Alex aside like garbage. You even said he was no good just because you weren’t woman enough to talk to him face to face about your problems. And here you are thinking you can intimidate me because you somehow think you’re better— again —rather than talking to Alex about it. I don’t know what your issues are, but even if I’m not a part of his life, he’s way better off without you.”
    “Who the hell—” Laney began, but Shannon held up a hand in her face and walked on by. She didn’t have the time or the inclination to deal with this woman. If her client had left, she was taking it out of the skinny blonde’s hide.
    Shannon reached her apartment and breathed a sigh of relief when she found her client and daughter at her door. The snippy comments about them waiting twenty minutes didn’t help her mood, but she bit her tongue and let them inside. After putting on the teapot for a little tea with lemon to warm them, Shannon got her student started with her voice exercises while she changed. The last thing she needed was to lose another one. If things didn’t turn around soon, she’d have to find a regular nine-to-five. Even the thought depressed her.
    When she sat down at her piano, the girl’s mother accosted her right away. “I know you said to wait and see how much she develops with your strengthening techniques, but I really want her to get into the right school that will be advantageous to her career. To do that would be…” She closed her eyes and gestured with her hands as if she had eaten a mouth-watering dessert. “You get my meaning.”
    “Yes, I understand. This is your dream, and you want your daughter to live it.” Shannon groaned inwardly. There she went with her mouth. That’s frickin’ why she didn’t have a boss. For that matter, it was why she wasn’t successful. “I mean—”
    Mrs. Taylor, her student’s mother, gave her a frosty look. “I know just what you mean. You think I’m one of those mothers.”
    Pretty much.
    “I assure you I’m not. Kailey wants this just as much as I do, don’t you, Kailey?” The two of them glanced around to the eight-year-old, and she nodded.
    Oh, Shannon didn’t doubt her. If she hadn’t seen that sparkle in Kailey’s eyes when she spoke of singing, she wouldn’t have taken her. Shannon always interviewed the students along with the parent when she took a new pupil. Love of singing, that’s what made the exercises and the long hours of practice worthwhile.
    Shannon turned back to Mrs. Taylor, glad the woman was desperate enough to overlook her attitude. She forced a smile to seem pleasant and feared it was a failure. “Kailey has a lot of raw talent, but we’ve just gotten started. Let me have a little more time with her. I think you both will be happy with the results within a few months.”
    She wouldn’t make promises of landing an audition at a prestigious music school, let alone getting accepted, but she would give it all she had making sure Kailey’s voice was the best it could be.
    The hour-and-a-half session went along smoothly, and only when it was over and Mrs. Taylor and Kailey were gone did Shannon allow herself to check her cell phone. There had been no calls or texts from Alex, but then he’d told her this morning that he had a few important meetings and they wouldn’t be able to have their semi-regular quickies. That was a good thing anyway because her body needed a break. She missed him, but a little time alone wasn’t bad.
    She busied herself cleaning the apartment and then searched a children’s magazine for the ad she’d run. A grin spread over her face. If this was successful