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wasn’t part of the deal, but she noticed that all employees partook. There seemed to be an unwritten policy—they’ll never miss a few fries, but let’s not be obvious about it. And never in front of customers. Also, it was not healthy! It was calorie intense, carb heavy and salted to the max. After a few weeks, her pants felt uncomfortably tight and her ankles seemed chronically swollen.
    September arrived and with the start of school, the teenage employees vacated the day hours, so at least she worked that shift. She was sure there had to be a better job for her somewhere and equally sure it wouldn’t be easy to find it. Emma never thought of herself as having it easy while growing up—she held part-time jobs during high school and college, went to college on loans and scholarships, but she was given an old car to use to get to school and work. Still, she’d had it a lot easier than Riley had.
    Her first couple of years in New York had been a real eye-opener—urban living was incredibly expensive. But she was a beautiful, single young woman in a city full of them and in no time she had roommates. She took the subway, learned all the cheap haunts for entertainment and had dates—quite a few of them. The thing about New York City—she never felt alone.
    And here, in her two rooms in Sebastopol there was an interesting transformation—the girl who had wanted to design and decorate the interiors of mansions and five-star hotels found living simply to be a welcome pleasure. There was no flab in her life, no unnecessary junk to carry.
    She had one dinner with Lyle and Ethan and it had been passably friendly on Ethan’s part. She visited with Penny when Penny was enjoying the patio, but fall was approaching, the weather was getting cooler, so Penny wasn’t outside as much. Penny’s car was often gone; she was a very active senior and had many friends.
    Emma walked through Sebastopol on her days off, anonymous and reluctant to look for work there for fear she’d alert them that the notorious widow was among them. She answered every ad for work in Sonoma County that paid more than minimum wage.
    Sebastopol was lovely; old buildings and storefronts were brightly painted, many with their wares and fresh fruits and vegetables on sidewalk display. Ethan liked to put out big pots of fresh blooms, and Emma stopped there often, complimenting him lavishly, fully intending to win him over to her side. She loved buying two apples, two tomatoes and one banana at a time. She even occasionally splurged on a small bunch of flowers and when she did, she noticed Ethan gave her a discount and Lyle smiled slyly.
    And, after eight weeks, when the leaves were just beginning to turn, she went home from Burger Brain-Bleed, hungry and swollen, smelling like grease and body odor, and lay down on her bed and cried. If this was what her life was going to look like from now on, she wasn’t sure she had the stamina for it. And she was damned afraid if she started dipping into her precious nine thousand dollars, she could end up homeless.
    Spoiled , the devil on her shoulder chided her. You said walking away from the money was the least of your concerns, but did you really mean it? Because here you are, working for a living like the rest of the world and you can’t take it!
    She was immediately ashamed. So she got in the shower to cry, trying to hide from her conscience. Then she got out and dried her hair and heard that voice again. If you think it’s hard busting your ass for minimum wage, think about how you’d feel when you learn your life savings is gone. That it was spent on a second home in Aruba and a private jet.
    â€œI can’t do this,” she said aloud. “Please, it wasn’t my fault. Please.”
    * * *
    The next afternoon, while she was wiping down tables in the burger joint, she saw a familiar face. Actually, she saw the familiar back of a head. She knew it