LITMIR.BIZ

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half his age, but a bigger part couldn’t ignore his line of thinking. What if he was right? What if the winner—no matter who it was—had been the target?

      “Sugar Lump?”

      I snapped my thoughts in line with my field of vision and gave my grandfather what he wanted. “Cassie Turner is one of the darlings of the St. Louis Advertising Community. At least she has been the entire time I’ve been part of it. She’s quite good at what she does and, as you already pointed out, she’s attractive in an almost model-esque way.”

      “Think she could have been irked her reign as winner was over?”

      “Well, there was that snide little remark she made before she announced our names, remember? But if she was irked, as you say, she didn’t appear outwardly so.”

      “Should she have been nominated?”

      “I think she should have. Her St. Louis Coffee Shop ads carried through on the emotional aspect in a way Lexa’s Metro Link ad didn’t, in my opinion. But I’m one person. The judges apparently felt differently.”

      “Think maybe she could’ve tampered with that platform because she was angry she wasn’t nominated? Because that’d give her motive and means considering she was backstage and all.”

      I wanted my grandfather to be wrong, but there was no denying the unease working its way up my spine. Yet just as I was entertaining the possibility he could be right about Cassie and the category as a whole, I found myself back in the Regency ballroom, watching as Deidre’s smile slipped from her face a half second before the platform gave way.

      Deidre’s ad hadn’t been the one playing on the screen as she reached the top of the spiral staircase. Maybe no one else noticed, but I had. And from what I could tell just before she fell, so, too, had Deidre.

      ~Chapter Five~

      Now that Tobias Advertising Agency was finally standing on its own two feet, one might think my occasional pang of longing for my former weekends-only gig at To Know Them Is To Love Them pet shop was a bit odd, and, on the surface, they would be right. Working there, part-time, had been a nuisance nine times out of ten—especially when I wanted to: one, sleep in; two, do something fun with my weekend; and three, keep my hands and arms scratch-free. But there had been good things about it, too.

      Like alone time with Mary Fran.

      Granted, that alone time had included bathing and grooming dogs who weren’t necessarily eager for such services (see above mentioned scratches), but now that I no longer needed to be there to pay my rent, I couldn’t help but notice the hint of emptiness I felt on the occasional Saturday and/or Sunday. Sometimes, when the emptiness was impossible to ignore, I even had to admit I kind of missed Rudder Malone.

      Rudder Malone was an African Gray Parrot who resided at the pet shop. Mary Fran liked to pretend no one had ever expressed an interest in purchasing the bird, but I knew better. In fact, I’d heard no less than six offers for Rudder during my time at the shop, but Mary Fran always had a reason he couldn’t be sold that particular day. When I’d questioned her, she’d pointed to some inexplicable “vibe” she got about the person—something that “worried” her, or “didn’t sit right.” But Sam and I knew the truth. Rudder had successfully wrapped the pet shop owner around his little beak.

      How, exactly, the winged irritant had accomplished that, I’m not sure. Especially when you took into account Rudder’s personality which, on the best of days, was downright cantankerous. He was bossy, impatient, sarcastic, relentless, and a troublemaker of epic proportions. And he loved to yank my chain, reminding me every time he saw me of a certain little habit I was working really hard to stop.

      Yet somehow, despite his laundry list of unattractive qualities, we all catered to him like he was some sort of royalty.

      Don’t get me wrong, there were nights I dreamed of ways to silence my fine-feathered nemesis once and for all. Heck, I’d even searched the internet for techniques to waterboard a parrot, but I also had a soft spot for Rudder I could neither explain nor deny with any believability.

      So when I stepped inside the pet shop and heard Rudder’s succession of snorts, it really didn’t come as any surprise that I smiled in response.

      For a second.

      Maybe two.

      “Good morning to you, too, Rudder,” I murmured.

      “Snort! Snort! S-nort!”

      I rolled my eyes and headed straight for the small hallway off the back of the shop. Sure enough, as I approached, I heard Mary Fran humming from inside her inner sanctum (aka closet-sized office).

      “‘Walking on Sunshine’ for the win!”

      Mary Fran stuck her head out into the hallway and grinned at me. “Very good. And the artist who sang it?”

      “Katrina and the Waves!”

      “Impressive.”

      “You taught me well.” I pulled her in for a quick hug and then stepped back for a thorough once over. “You’re still sporting the proud mama glow, you know that?”

      Mary Fran’s smile widened even more. “How can I not?”

      “You can’t. And you shouldn’t.” I stepped against the wall to let her pass and then followed her back out to the counter and the pair of stools tucked beneath its interior eave. “So did he sleep with his award?”

      “I tried to slip it out of his hand when I looked in on him this morning, but he woke up.”

      I laughed. “I’d have done the same thing if I won. No doubt, whatsoever.”

      Mary Fran’s smile slipped from her face. “Thank God you didn’t.”

      And, just like that, the lightness of the morning was gone. Although, in all fairness, any lightness I’d felt hadn’t started until I walked through the front door. “I still can’t believe it, you know?”

      “I know. Trust me.” Mary Fran scooted my stool around to me and then pulled out her own, stopping short of sitting on it like I did. “I tried to put it out of my mind for Sam’s sake, but once the party was over and we were back home, I found my thoughts going back to that awful, awful moment.”

      “I know. Me, too.” And it was true. Of the roughly four hours I was in my bed, I’d slept maybe forty-five minutes, and that was being generous. Still, I wasn’t sure I was ready to go down that unsettling road again just yet, so I changed the subject. To Rudder, of all things…

      “Has he had his morning kiwi yet?” I asked, waving my hand in Rudder’s general direction.

      “Mor-morning! Morn-ing ki-wi!”

      “Yes,” Mary Fran said to me before widening her glance to include Rudder. “And he knows he has.”

      “Mor-morning! Morn-ing ki-wi!”

      I laughed and snorted.

      “Snort! Snort! S-nort!”

      Dropping my head onto the top of the counter, I groaned. Loudly. “And to think I actually missed him a little this morning.”

      Mary Fran’s gasp alerted me to the words I hadn’t intended to ever say aloud, and I bolted upright on my stool. “You didn’t hear that!”

      “Oh yes, I did.”

      “Yes, yes I did!”

      This time when I groaned, it echoed around the store. “Ugh!”

      “Your secret is safe with me,” Mary Fran said, laughing.

      “Safe! Safe with me!”

      I shot a death glare at Rudder and then turned an exasperated sigh on my clearly amused friend. “He could drive a person to drink, you know that?”

      “I know. You’ve mentioned it before.”

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