My first programming job was at a small contract programming house. When my paychecks started bouncing (the company was about a million overdrawn at Citibank) I kept working when the president of the company paid me through his wife's checking account. There were two main reasons:
1) I didn't have another job
2) The project was about 90% done, and I didn't want to leave the customer stuck (AND I was subconsciously hoping to be hired on there).
