The prompt, professional delivery of Nomi’s campaign flyers should have kicked off her new dream career with a bang. The glossy pages the copy clerk had just handed her read: "Naomi Hanson for Dallas City Council."

Which would have worked brilliantly, except her name wasn’t Naomi Hanson. It was Nomi Hannon. And none of the flyers were useable.

"Hi…" Nomi glanced at Copy Guy's name tag and then back up at his bored, slightly vacant expression, pasting a smile on her own face that would do her high school theater teacher proud. "Alan. These are great. Except for the typos in my name. What can we do to get that corrected?"

"Change fee is seventy-five bucks," he informed her in a monotone.

Or roughly half of what the print job had cost in the first place. "Okay, Alan, that would be no problem if this was a change. But it's not. The printer made a mistake. I have the paperwork that shows it should be Nomi Hannon. My actual name."

Alan examined his fingernails. "Any changes are changes. We take all major credit cards."

This was what she got for using a cut-rate copy place to do the printing for her precious campaign flyers. But until her first fundraiser, even cut-rate meant she'd end up waffling between boiled water and ice water for dinner if she had to shell out any more cash.

Running for city council was supposed to fix her life. Balance the scales in a world gone way off kilter after she'd lost her brother, her legal practice, and her pride all in one fell swoop. In her gallery of screw-ups, she did not have space to feature other people's mistakes. Time to pull out the big guns.

Nomi leaned on the counter casually, a disarming tactic she'd learned as a teen from Boston Legal, which she'd practiced over and over. She didn't get too much call to haul out her courtroom tricks these days since most of her work amounted to little more than research and advice.

"I don't think we're communicating here, Alan." She nodded at his name tag. "How about we add a few letters to your name and call you Altin. Same thing, right?"

He nodded, his eyebrows wrinkling as he seemed to reconsider, and then shook his head. "That's not my name."

"That's true." The little lift she added to the last syllable nicely conveyed mild surprise without an ounce of condescension, a feat and a half, but she pulled it off because she needed new flyers pronto. "Just like Naomi Hanson isn't my name. I can't use these flyers as is, and I know you don't want me to pay for something that isn't my mistake."

She'd done enough of that in her lifetime to earn a big batch of karma. It would be great if that started reaping dividends right this moment.

"Change fee is sevent—"

"I know, Alan." She nipped his argument in the bud with a hand that needed a manicure like yesterday. "So we're not going to call it a change. We're going to call it a new order, one we're going to put a rush on, by the way. And then, when I come to pick up the new flyers, we're going to attach that order to the one I've already paid for."

She held up the receipt with her best Vanna White smile in hopes that she'd revealed enough letters to spell success in today's round of Nomi's Wheel of Fortune.

"What do you say, Alan?"

Either he'd heard the please, please, please she'd silently tacked onto the end, or he had a very strong urge to clear his tiny store of assertive women because he sighed and pulled out his order pad. Dutifully, he took dictation as Nomi detailed the original specs from the receipt in her hand.

"They'll be here next Tuesday," he said flatly. "That's the quickest turnaround there is."

"I'll take it. And these useless flyers that you're going to throw in the trash anyway." She patted his hand and snagged the stack of glossy papers that she might be able to salvage with a package of mailing labels and the printer at her office. "You're good people, Alan. I'll send all my friends to see you as a big fat thank you."

Which wouldn't be hard, since everyone she knew in Dallas lived within a stone's throw of the copy place. After selling the Highland Park house she could no longer afford, she'd landed at Vivo, a unique community complex that included a shared workspace, stores, restaurants and a slew of condos overhead that meant her friends were never far away.

Nomi skedaddled before Alan called her out for absconding with the misprinted flyers, but really, what was he going to say—"I need a bit more trash to line my recycle bin before I call it a day"?

The second she cleared the door of the copy shop, she ran straight into a solid male torso that was the identical density of a concrete wall. She hit it, and when the owner of the male torso threw up his arms to balance, he knocked hers off and they ended up tangled. Falling. Together.

Male torso, Nomi, and a hundred misspelled flyers hit the sidewalk. Definitely not at the same speed though.

Dazed, she blinked up through the fluttery waterfall of papers landing all around her into the horrified expression of Malone DuMar. Who was on top of her. On. Top. Of. Her.

"Are you okay?" he asked in a voice so whiskey smooth it should be illegal, his expression darting over her face like a concerned angel. If angels had a shock of dark messy hair that fell down into their eyes and a body that could make a woman weep.

Not her though. They'd been friends too long for her to think about him like that. At least not until today. Hard not to notice when Exhibit A currently covered enough of her to keep her dry in a rainstorm.

He wasn't moving. He should be moving. "I'll be much better when you're not suffocating me."

Instantly, he rolled away with a sheepish smile. "Sorry. I was too busy making sure you weren't bleeding to think about how much I weigh. Are you hurt?"

"Depends. Is it normal for my head to feel like a velociraptor ambushed me from behind?" The squishy sensation was probably spilled gray matter that no doctor would ever be able to shoehorn back inside her skull and she hadn't even gotten a Jurassic Park T-shirt for her trouble.

Malone helped her sit up, his strong hands holding her steady the same way they'd done for years, and she almost turned into his embrace just because it had been that crappy of a day. Except they weren't touchy-feely with each other. Or rather, he wasn't. She'd be okay with a hug.

"Only if you don't watch where you're going when you exit a store into a busy courtyard." Malone tilted her head to let his gaze rove over her with a critical eye, checking for whatever he might deem out of place. "You're lucky you ran into someone who will help you pick up this mess. What is it?" He fingered one of the flyers, flipping it long ways as he read. "Who's Naomi Hanson?"

Nomi waved two fingers in a smart aleck salute. "Moi. Today's joke courtesy of the universe. You know how hilarious it is when someone calls me Naomi."

"Sorry."

Malone made a face like he sympathized, but no one ever got his name wrong, especially when he mentioned his mom had named him after the character who owned the bar in the TV show Cheers. That, inevitably, led to a long round of squeeing over which episodes were their favorites, yadda, yadda.

Meanwhile, Nomi's head still felt like it had met the wrong end of a meat grinder, namely the part with teeth. "I need an aspirin."

"Want me to carry you to the elevator and tuck you into bed?" he asked with a wink, but she didn't dare say yes because he'd do it and never think twice about how weird it would be to wind up in the bedroom of a girl he'd known since high school.

Just like it hadn't been weird for him to wind up in what essentially amounted to a compromising position. Nomi, on the other hand, couldn't get her brain to close the file folder called Suddenly Aware of Malone as a Guy.

"Save it for the ladies," she advised him blithely since she could never be sure if he was serious when he made racy comments. They were old friends who had somehow wound up in the same place at the same time as adults, but they'd never crossed over into googly eyes territory.

At least not on her side. She valued Malone as a friend, period, end of story, and she'd had enough torn away from her already, thanks. Risking the loss of her solid oak support beam wasn't happening.

Ever since her brother Mikel had gone to prison for fraud, Malone was all she had, and they clung to each other in a world that had failed them both. Well, she'd done most of the clinging, since she'd been the one who'd shared a womb with Mikel. Her brother and Malone had been running buddies as teenagers but they'd fallen out of touch, likely because of the element her twin had started hanging around with. Criminal types who thought it was fine to funnel funds into offshore accounts and forget to mention them the IRS.

Malone was her friend. She shouldn't still be kind of fluttery inside over what was nothing more than an unfortunate accidental meeting of two bodies in motion.

"So I have to ask." Malone held up one of the flyers, completely unconcerned about diving into a nice chat while she still sprawled on the little patchy area of grass outside the copy place as the rest of Vivo swirled around them. "Why didn't you have these reprinted?"

"I am." Her smile included more teeth than were probably necessary. "But maybe these can get a lovely sticker with my real name and you might be persuaded to lay a few on plates at Paulo's?"

Malone gave her a look. "I'd have to run that by George. I just serve pizza and punch out when my shift is over."

Yeah, yeah. She waved off his reminder that he'd jumped out of the corporate world without a parachute, landing at a pizza place, of all things, while he sorted through his next entrepreneurial endeavor. Malone DuMar, genius inventor of a revolutionary smart bracelet that monitored the vital signs of athletes, was slinging pizza. It boggled the mind.

"I'll come by later." After she'd salvaged the lot with stickers and some down-on-her-luck girl magic.

This was the point when a gentleman would help a lady to her feet, and Malone finally clued in on that thanks to her rather loud eye rolling. He stood and hauled her up with him as if he scarcely noticed the extra weight of a clumsy female.

"Thanks," she said and bent down to start collecting her hard-won flyers. Malone did the same, but his much larger hands held a good number more, so it didn't take all that long. "My knight in shining plaid."

Malone grinned and glanced down at his T-shirt that in no way resembled the flannel shirts he preferred, but then it was July. "It'll be plaid shirt season soon enough and then you can make fun of my wardrobe all you want."

It wasn't that she hated his flannel shirts, it was that he should be wearing a suit and saving the world. Not serving pizza to ungrateful millennials who did their own business deals over the salad course.

An old argument that wouldn't be resolved today unless she'd whacked some of his stubborn out when she'd run into him. Unlikely. And she had her own brand of crazy to contend with because she'd voluntarily turned her life into a three-ring circus when she'd thrown her name into the hat for city council.

After handing off his share of the now slightly wrinkled glossy pages, Malone loped off to start making dough at Paulo's in anticipation of the lunch crowd. Nomi had a mountain of a to-do list that wasn't getting shorter.

May it please the court for typos on expensive flyers to be the worst challenge of the day. But when she sat down at her desk, the first email in her inbox blew the Naomi Hanson fiasco out of the water.

At this point, changing her name just might be the way to go.

"Oh, this is not good." Nomi pinched the bridge of her nose.

In response, Katie Rightmyer glanced up from her laptop. There were two empty chairs between them, one for Ivan Anderson next to Nomi and the other reserved for Carolina Kline, neither of whom had made an appearance at Vivo Community Desk yet this morning. They were both around somewhere though, a surety when you lived and worked in a place where you didn't have go more than a few steps to get coffee, hit the gym, or eat.

"Problemo?" Katie asked and immediately shifted her attention back to her laptop where her multi-colored fingernails flew across the keys in a rainbow of motion. She could multitask like nobody's business.

"Smear campaign-o," Nomi confirmed with a grim smile at the first email in her inbox, which unfortunately wasn't alone. Like tiny little word rabbits, the vile things had multiplied all over her digital space.

Final count—eighteen requests for interviews to capture her response to the photograph circulating of city council candidate Nomi Hannon frolicking in an unseemly manner with the former CEO of DuMar Technologies. Someone had snapped a picture of Malone sprawled on top of her outside the copy place and in case she wanted to see it, several of the news outlets had cheerfully attached it. It was captioned "When's the Wedding?"

Her opponent had been all over that, quick to issue his own statement. The words distasteful and offensive leaped out at her, along with lack of family values and a lovely callout highlighting her role in the fraud case involving Mikel Hannon and Hannon Family Partners. Of which she got the supreme pleasure of counting herself as all three; a Hannon, family, and Mikel's partner in the law firm where all the fraud had been going on under her nose.

"Just your garden variety disaster," Nomi told Katie as she read through the text again, in case she'd somehow misread it the first twelve times. "Check out this picture and tell me it doesn't look that bad."

Katie rolled her chair closer and whistled as her gaze roved over the photo. "I didn't know you and Malone were a thing."

Groaning, Nomi rubbed her temples. "We're not. That's not a thing. I ran into him on accident and we got, you know, tangled up. It lasted literally four seconds, and then he helped me up."

"Um, I hate to point this out, but he's pretty built. I could see someone making an argument that a head-shorter woman had no shot at knocking him over." Katie squinted at the photo. "Also, he's kind of looking at you like he wants to kiss you."

"What? He is not." Was he? Nomi's insides did a dance again as she stared at the photo, recalling perfectly how he'd stared down at her with what she'd have called concern. But then she had gotten all fluttery. "We're friends. We have never… I mean, sure I can objectively admit he's good looking but that's it—"

"Nomi, you're not thinking about this like a political candidate," Katie interrupted in a maddeningly calm voice because you know, her life wasn't falling apart. "And you're protesting too much, by the way. Work on that. All I'm saying is that someone with a vested interest in spinning this picture in a negative light can and will do so. The question you should be asking is not how bad does it look. The question is—what's the plan for fixing it?"

"Stick my head in the sand until it goes away?" she offered hopefully because news flash. All the stuff on her brainstorming list of How to Combat a Muddy Reputation had gone toward salvaging what little of her legal career remained after the trial. "I'm all ears if you have some suggestions."

"What are we suggesting?" This from Eliza Moore who had popped in on her way to the salon she owned. She was already dressed to the nines, including stilettos that defied all architectural principles and logic. The woman would be on her feet for hours.

"Ways for Nomi to wipe the collective public memory of Dallas proper and or dirt on the other guy that can be used to combat a smear campaign," Katie responded helpfully. "What's his name?

"Carl Porter." Nomi pulled up his bio on her laptop and tried not to puke on the screen. "Married to the love of his life, two kids so perfect I'd be tempted to believe he rented them, and owner of a successful dry-cleaning business that has never been tied to the mob. He even teaches Sunday School at a non-denominational church in Uptown."

In other words, a squeaky-clean disaster. The only dirt that dared land on Carl happened after he planted azaleas in his beautifully landscaped garden. There was a photo of it conveniently placed next to the one of his family, in case anyone got confused about whether Carl had hobbies outside of being perfect.

The tight little ball in her stomach might be jealousy, but she'd lie under oath if anyone said so.

Lilith Parker glided in from the courtyard that connected all the shops with the shared workspace, presumably because she'd just spied Eliza, her partner in all things beauty related, lounging around by Katie and Nomi's desk. "What's up, party people? Did I miss a memo for a powwow?"

"Yeah, the invitations are from Naomi Hanson, so you probably tossed it," Nomi muttered. Besides, it was a powwow twenty-four seven around Vivo.

"Nomi's opponent for city council is a bit of a Stepford husband. Is that a thing?" Katie asked the room at large. "Anyway. There's a somewhat compromising photo of Nomi and Malone circulating and our friend Mr. Stepford is making it sound like she's a Jezebel of the highest order. Throw in the history with Mikel and she's in trouble. We need a plan like yesterday."

We. Instantly, her friends closed ranks around her, chatting out their suggestions faster than a Kardashian went through spouses.

"If you come by the salon, I'll cut your hair for you," Eliza offered, as she sucked down what was likely her fourth latte of the day in her quest to single-handedly keep the coffee shop next door, Java by Brydie, in business. "I've been dying to get my hands on you."

Because Nomi had so much wrong with her for Eliza to work with?

Nomi touched her dark, shoulder-length hair reflexively. It didn't look that bad, did it? A few split ends were totally normal after switching to a less expensive drug store brand of shampoo and conditioner and okay, yeah, she hadn't been by to see Eliza in a few months. Who had time? Or the money? Not that Nomi had any intention of bringing up her lack of funds as her excuse, not when all of her friends were well established in their careers and she…was not.

"Come on, honey." Eliza stuck one hand on the chair's arm and swiveled it back and forth to eye Nomi from all angles as if she'd spied a stray mutt who'd dared wander into a pedigreed dog show. "You're going to be on TV and doing campaign appearances and stuff as you fight this guy, right? You want to be polished."

"Exactly," Lilith cut in, her attention thoroughly snagged by the mention of polish, which was the eternally chic woman's wheelhouse. She perched on Nomi's desk, her outrageously slim skirt impeding her ability to balance, but she handled it with her usual flair because she had a lot of practice managing clothes at the high end of fashion and the low end of comfortable. "See Eliza about your hair and then let me work on the rest of you. We just started doing this new exfoliating massage that is so great, you can feel the toxins leaving your body—"

"She doesn't need to focus on her skin," Katie insisted with a scowl. "I just wrote an article on how few political candidates are prepared to discuss issues important to the voters. If she wants to fight back against whatever this Carl Porter is saying about her, Nomi needs to brush up on the city's challenges, not visit a spa."

"Hey, there's nothing wrong with our spa." Lilith bristled and bumped fists with Eliza when the other woman stuck hers out. "Relaxation is good for the soul."

And that was about enough from the peanut gallery.

"Thanks for all the suggestions, guys," Nomi said in her moving-on voice that had always quieted a rowdy courtroom in a flash. Back before she'd been barred from the courtroom, of course.

A brother sitting in jail for fraud was bad enough, but guilt by association had spread its tentacles into places she'd never have anticipated. And the fact that she'd been the lawyer who had unsuccessfully defended him against the fraud charges had iced that career-ending cake nicely. The photo might not have made a dent if she didn't already have a bad reputation that her opponent had been all too happy to build on.

A total catch-22. The election was supposed to clean up her reputation.

"I'm afraid I need more than a makeover or the responses to a few hot button issues at my fingertips," she said. "I need a magic bullet."

"You rang?" Carolina Kline stepped into the community desk area and slung her laptop bag into the chair next to Katie's where she sat to pore through comments her viewers left after watching an episode of Ask Carolina, an enormously popular relationship advice show on YouTube. "You're not allowed to solve problems without me. What kind of magic bullet do I need to produce?"

"Yes, dating tips are totally relevant to a political campaign," Eliza retorted with an eye roll that only she could get away with since she'd been friends with Carolina practically since birth. Nomi was the newcomer to the group, but they never treated her like one.

"My advice is always relevant," Carolina shot back and elbowed Lilith out of the way since the woman had encroached on her space, then jerked her head at Eliza. "Don't you two have a backlog of unkempt women to beautify?"

Lilith glanced at her phone and yelped. "How did it get to be nine o'clock already?"

"Same way it does every day. Time warp," Carolina suggested and booted up her laptop as Eliza and Lilith scrambled out the door. "Meet us at Butterfly Palace for lunch later?"

Eliza and Lilith both tossed out their RSVPs as they dashed off to open Relâcher, which lay just on the other side of Brydie's next door.

"Now that the riffraff is gone, tell Carolina your troubles."

She patted her desk encouragingly, but her expression was all shark. The woman loved to rip apart a problem, and the scathing commentary she employed on her show usually left blood in the water. Though to Eliza's point, her expertise lay in the male-female dynamics that went along with all things romantic. Not a lot Carolina could do to rewind the clock, but if she couldn't talk to her friends, who could she talk to?

"My opponent dug up this picture and started spreading around how unsavory of a person I am. Coupled with Mikel, he's got all the dirt he needs to bury me," Nomi said with a sigh. "But it's fine. I'll figure it out. It's not anyone's fault I'm running against a distant relation to both Santa Claus and Mother Theresa. Unless you've got a brand-new bio in your back pocket, there's not a lot I can do to compare."

"That's exactly what we're going to do." Carolina's eyes went flat and glassy as her dorsal fin cleared the water. She was one Jaws soundtrack away from being in her element. "You need to get voters out of the past and into the present. Give them something to chew on that will leaving them smiling instead of looking around for the second course."

Nomi had to grin. Carolina hadn't even tried to avoid coming across as anything other than a predator at the top of the food chain. Must be nice to have your place in the world secure. "How do we do that?"

"Before I tell you, you know the drill." Carolina jerked her head at the bumper sticker slapped across her laptop's closed lid and probably half the minivans in Dallas. "If you can't handle the truth—"

"Don't Ask Carolina," Nomi filled in dutifully. Everyone knew the slogan, and that it always preceded something you probably didn't want to hear. It was how she got you invested in the answer before she gave it to you. Psych 101. "Hearing it and agreeing to do it are two different things. Lay it on me."

"You and Malone need to get married."

Nomi choked on a laugh as Katie gave up all pretense of working and rolled her chair over into the middle of the fray. "That's brilliant."

Say what? Nomi smacked Katie in the arm. "Don't encourage her. I need a husband like I need a hole in the head. Actually, a hole in the head would be more pleasant."

Because a man left a hole in your heart, and those didn't heal. Daniel had lasted somewhere north of five minutes after the trial, mumbling about how he needed to reevaluate things. Code for I can't be associated with you anymore. She'd thrown his five-carat diamond into White Rock Lake and sent him the video, then blocked him from her phone. Her principles had dictated that one—though the money would come in handy right now.

"No seriously." Katie flung a hand at Ivan's desk, the empty one between Carolina and Nomi where the man she'd recently started seeing sat. "That's how Ivan and I got together. Carolina's advice. Keep an open mind."

"But I'm not looking for a man," Nomi protested. A cause she could believe in? Sure. But marriage wasn't it.

"No one said you were." Shark-mode ramped up a touch as Carolina drummed her fingers on the desk. "I don't mean a real marriage. A fake one. Window dressing. Show everyone that you're not a failed lawyer or a hussy on the prowl, but a devoted wife who's picked up the pieces of her life with a loving husband who isn't afraid of public affection. Paint the public a lovely picture of a candidate who can out-Norman-Rockwell her opponent."

A murky watercolor snapped into focus, gaining bold primary colors and sharp lines as she imagined Malone standing by her side at a political event. He'd be her plus one at fundraisers. Provide interesting conversation at meet and greets. Best of all, he'd give her campaign bio stability while drawing attention away from the negatives.

And it would be Malone. The same guy who'd been in her corner for forever. She'd never have to worry about him spilling anything he shouldn't to the press—accidentally or on purpose which, after Mikel, was worth its weight in gold.

It wouldn't be real. She could have all the benefits of a spouse with none of the heartache.

That was quite a picture.

Against her will, she started to like it.

And that's when her brain woke up. "Why in the world would Malone volunteer for something like that? Why would anyone?"

"You might be surprised," Katie said with a laugh. "I said the same thing when Carolina suggested a similar solution to my problem, and Ivan scarcely let me get the sentence out before he raised his hand."

"Well, Ivan's taken," Nomi pointed out without a drop of sarcasm, which no one appreciated except her, apparently.

"Oh, most definitely." The goofy smile that crept over Katie's face put an exclamation point on that. "And only one man will do for this fix-it plan."