And Death Goes to . . .

by Laura Bradford

  “You do realize who Lexa works for, yes?”

  “Of course, Ben,” I finally said in lieu of the words I really wanted to utter. “I’m very aware of who Lexa works for. So what’s your point? You think she was going to win because she’s with Callahan? Because if that’s where you’re going with this, Ben, you’re wrong. There have been tons of Callahan nominees for Best Overall over the years, and plenty haven’t won. Case in point, Tom Jergen last year. He lost to Cassie Turner from Ross Jackson. Hell, I’m pretty sure that Ross Jackson has dominated that award the last ten years.”

  “Just because someone hasn’t worked for Callahan doesn’t mean they weren’t involved with the foundation as a volunteer or a donor.” He looked at me funny. “Tell me this isn’t the first time you’re hearing this.”

  Not wanting to cop to my naiveté, I went the devil’s advocate route, instead. “And you’re saying a volunteer would have a leg up over an employee? Because I’m pretty sure Cassie doesn’t volunteer with the foundation.”

  “Maybe last year was an anomaly. Or maybe since Tom was male…”

  Ahhh…

  The male who can’t handle being bested by a woman.

  How refreshing.

  “Maybe, just maybe, last year’s panel of judges simply felt Cassie’s campaign was better because it was…well, better.”

  “Maybe. Or maybe it’s the method someone like that chooses to use in order to get to the top of the ladder.” He threw his shoulders back, cast a dramatic and knowing gaze down at his chest, and then looked back at me and batted his eyelashes.

  I finally got it. He was referring to Cassie’s reputation of using her personal assets to land clients and get promotions. A trick that was as old as time, really. Was it frustrating to compete with that? Sure. But was he seriously going to negate the accomplishments of all females based on a few bad apples?

  “Look Ben, I’ve made it this far without engaging in gossip and backstabbing. And honestly, I’m not about to start now. So, to that end, I’m going to choose to believe that talent, and talent alone, put the four of us up for that award.”

  “You really believe that?” he asked. “Even when you know, as well as I do, that Lexa’s campaign wasn’t even worthy of a nomination?”

  Vinny Junior appeared at the table again, this time holding my plate of Chicken Marsala. I watched him set it down in front of me and then grabbed my fork, my stomach refusing to wait any longer than necessary for this meal. “Until I’m given irrefutable proof to the contrary, yes. After all, Lexa didn’t win. Deidre did.”

  I hoped I sounded convincing.

  But I wasn’t so sure.

  ~Chapter Twelve~

  I wasn’t even fully seated behind the steering wheel when I grabbed my laptop case off the passenger side floor and powered up my computer. The restrained, mature side of my personality knew I should just wait until I got home, but the rest of me simply couldn’t.

  Deidre Ryan had been behind Bitch Pitch.

  Deidre. Ryan.

  The sweet, unassuming woman who came across as being above the deplorable antics of our colleagues.

  I wanted to believe Ben was completely off base, but I’d always suspected the masked blogger worked at Whitestone. It wasn’t that she’d shared an inordinate amount of stories about Whitestone ad execs, but there had been some—enough to ping my personal radar on occasion.

  When my computer was fully booted, I typed in the blog’s URL and watched as the familiar page appeared on my screen. Slowly, I scrolled through the entries until I reached the one Ben had referenced. A few words in, I remembered having read it when it was posted, but, because of the lack of salacious dirt I hadn’t paid it much due.

  I scrolled down some more, chuckling all over again at some of the funnier posts over the past few months, including one I’d read over the phone to Carter as it had been a blatant slam of my former boss. Carter had laughed along with me, commenting on the cleverness of the descriptive words used to describe a man I held in such little regard. Again, I giggled at mention of the “blow hard” who had the same appeal as a “Christmas fruit cake.”

  Eventually, I moved on, scrolling down through the once-a-week entries. I clicked one from September titled “When Talent Comes Back and Scores.” Amusing at the time, I found myself looking at the piece in a very different way now that I knew the identity of its author. Now, references to the “pair of boobs” that “bested me last time” had me wondering what campaign Deidre had lost in the past, and what campaign she’d just landed that left her feeling as if she’d “settled a score.”

  I read through the post one more time and then, as I tried to scroll down some more, realized “When Talent Comes Back and Scores” had been Bitch Pitch’s inaugural entry.

  Hmmm…

  I was mulling over what to do next when my phone beeped to indicate a text message. A quick peek at the screen made me shut down my computer, slip it back into its case, and start my car once and for all. Soon, I was heading west on Highway 40, my smile growing bigger with each passing mile.

  Sometimes, when I looked back over the past twelve months, the changes in my life were so monumental I felt the need to pinch myself just to be sure I wasn’t dreaming. So I pinched. And, sure enough, I wasn’t dreaming.…

  Yes, I’d quit Beckler and Stanley.

  Yes, I’d put all my cards on the table when I opened my own agency.

  Yes, I’d been on the brink of losing everything when I failed to sign any clients for the first six months.

  Yes, I’d pulled myself up by the bootstraps thanks to Zander Closet Company.

  Yes, I’d signed some pretty impressive clients since then.

  Yes, I’d been nominated for the biggest award in the local advertising community.

  And yes, after having my heart smashed to smithereens by my ex fiancé, I had finally found the kind of guy that made me smile from the inside, out.

  I was at the top of my game as my grandfather would say, and I liked it.

  Yet somehow, despite all the positives surrounding me, an unease I couldn’t ignore was beginning to pick up momentum. And while most people would likely trace it to the horror of watching a woman tumble to her death, I knew its origins preceded that tragedy. By mere seconds.

  The few times I’d let myself revisit the confusion on Deidre’s face in the seconds leading up to her death, I’d quickly seized the reason that made the most sense: the tech crew had started to run the wrong ad. Period. After all, mistakes happened. And if the crew wasn’t privy to the winner prior to Cassie’s reveal, all four ad campaigns must have been ready to roll. Really, the notion someone in the tech booth had pressed the wrong button wasn’t that far out of the realm of possibility, was it?

  Mistakes happened.

  Every day.

  I knew this.

  So why did that moment keep resurrecting itself in my thoughts—more so than the sound of the rope snapping, the horror of watching Deidre plummet to the ground, and the heart pounding chaos that ensued? Was it because I wasn’t as naïve as I liked to think I was? That, like Ben, I was shocked by the fact Lexa hadn’t won the coveted award? Or was it because, on some level, I knew she had?

  In hindsight, I couldn’t help but wish I’d asked Ben whether he noticed the video snafu at the award show, but as always, hindsight was twenty/twenty. Besides, I didn’t need confirmation from Ben or anyone else about that moment right before Deidre fell. I saw the screen. I saw the ad that started to play just as Deidre stepped onto the platform.

  But what did it mean, really? If Lexa’s ad had, in fact, been played by mistake, that simply shored up my theory that Deidre was the target. And now that Ben had clued me into a side of Deidre I hadn’t known, I had to consider the very real possibility that others may have known about Deidre’s extracurricular activity, too. The fact that said activity oft
en involved humiliating the very people who were seated in the audience when Deidre fell to her death kinda had my spidey senses tingling anew.

  I considered calling JoAnna to share what I’d discovered but opted to wait. I wanted and needed this time with Andy. I didn’t want to talk about Deidre, or the fall, or the way the sounds associated with her fall were making it so I couldn’t sleep at night. I just wanted to be with him—to talk about anything but Deidre Ryan. Because here’s the drill: spending time with Andy calmed me. And if there was one thing I knew about myself, it’s that a calm-me was also a better-thinking-me.

  Exit by exit I made my way out to Andy’s neck of the woods, the post-dinner hour making the normally commuter-clogged thoroughfare more manageable. Still, I pressed down on the accelerator all the way to Andy’s exit. A few minutes later, I turned right onto Andy’s road, parked in front of his townhouse, and made my way up to his front door, the promise of his smile making me take his front steps two at a time.

  Half a knock later, I got my smile.

  And a hug.

  And a really, really nice kiss.

  When the welcome party was over, he ushered me into his living room and over to his couch. “Can I get you anything? A drink? Some chips? Pretzels? Cocoa Puffs?”

  I aborted my sit just before my backside hit the couch cushion. “You have Cocoa Puffs?”

  His answering smile and its accompanying dimples weakened my knees enough that I completed my sit. “You love them, yes?”

  I nodded.

  “And I love you, yes?”

  I blinked back the tears I knew were only seconds away and nodded again.

  “So of course I’d have Cocoa Puffs on my shelf. What kind of boyfriend would I be if I didn’t?” He leaned over, planted a kiss on the top of my head, and then stepped back. “Cocoa Puffs then?”

  “I’m actually still full from the Marsala you and JoAnna both suggested I order at Vinny’s.”

  He shrugged and then dropped onto the cushion next to me. “Awesome, wasn’t it?”

  “Oh. My. Gosh. It was incredible.” I leaned forward so he could slip his arm around my shoulders and then rested the side of my face against his chest. “The only thing I don’t understand is how and why I didn’t know about this place until today.”

  “Trust me, I’ve been asking myself that same thing.”

  I took advantage of the break in conversation and overall noise of any kind to simply listen to the steady beat of his heart against my ear, the rhythmic sound incredibly soothing after a day with its fair share of stress. Eventually, when I felt like maybe I’d been quiet for too long, I peeked up at Andy. “I have to say, as amazing as that dinner was, this—right here…with you, is exactly what I needed.”

  “You mean I trump food?”

  I moved my head in a weighing gesture and, when I got the laugh I was seeking, I buried my cheek back against his chest. “Yes, you trump food. And that includes Cocoa Puffs.”

  When his laugh receded, I made myself sit up so I could see his face. “So? Did you get anything?”

  His eyebrow lifted in confusion. “Get anything?”

  “From my grandfather. You know, on why he was acting so…weird earlier today.”

  Andy let his head drop back against the couch, his gaze leaving mine in favor of the ceiling. “I never saw him.”

  I reached out, patted his arm. “Hey, no worries. It was a lot to ask as you were heading out the door after a busy day at work. I probably shouldn’t have even asked—”

  “No”—he lowered his chin until he was looking at me again—“I don’t mean I didn’t go. I did. But by the time I was done talking to Ms. Rapple, your lights were off and I didn’t want to chance waking your grandfather if he’d gone to bed early.”

  “Gone to bed?” I turned my head and noted the time on Andy’s DVD player. “Andy, it’s only seven thirty now. So best case, you were at my house at what? Six thirty, six forty-five?”

  “I was on the highway heading back here at six twenty.”

  “There’s no way Grandpa Stu was in bed at that time. He’s a veritable night owl.” I stopped, swallowed, and tried to rein in the disapproving tone I heard in my own ears. “I-I thought you knew that.”

  He fisted his hand to his lips and exhaled. “I do. And trust me, I thought it was weird. But when I took into account what you’d said, about him being quiet and all earlier today, I thought maybe he was napping or he went somewhere with Carter.”

  “Was Carter’s car there?” I asked.

  Andy’s shoulders rose in a halfhearted shrug. “I guess I was more affected by my conversation with Ms. Rapple than I realized because I didn’t even think to look.” He stopped my sudden fidgeting with his hand and squeezed. “I’m sorry, Tobi.”

  I slowly reclaimed my spot in the crook of his arm. “So what was so engaging about your conversation with…” I suddenly sat back upright. “Wait. How’s Gertie?”

  “The vet is keeping her overnight for observation and, potentially, more testing come morning. And Martha, well, she’s absolutely lost right now.”

  “Martha?” I knew I was looking at Andy as if he’d grown a second head, but I couldn’t help myself. First, my grandfather, and now, Andy? What was I missing?

  “You didn’t see her, Tobi. She was utterly lost when she got out of that cab. Her eyes were puffy from crying, her hands were chalk white from the way she was squeezing them so tight, and her voice was so strained it was hard to make out much of what she was saying when I met her on the front walkway.” He rested his head back once again, his eyes cast toward the ceiling even though it was clear to me he wasn’t actually seeing it. “Did you know that Martha’s mother gave Gertie to Martha not a month before she succumbed to cancer?”

  I waited for more, keenly aware of a tightness forming at the base of my throat. But when it became apparent he was waiting for me, I shook my head and added something resembling an audible no.

  “Since Martha never married, her mother didn’t want to leave her with no one. So this dying woman had her live-in nurse bundle her up and take her out to an animal shelter so she could find her daughter a family.”

  “A family?”

  Andy scrubbed his face with his left hand and then let it drop back down to his lap. “I’ve never known that, you know? That not-having-anyone thing. My parents are still alive, Gary and I get along well enough, I’m tight with my cousin, Blake, and his wife, Peggy, and now I have you. I can’t imagine being left with…no one.”

  The tightness expanded all the way up my throat, making it tough to speak, but if Andy noticed, it didn’t slow him down. “I can’t imagine having a good day at work and not being able to share it with you on the phone. Or having a particularly grueling day with a client and not being able to blow off some steam with Gary.”

  I knew what he meant. My parents were out in western St. Charles County—far enough to have my own life, but not too far to go running home for a hug if I really needed one. My Grandpa Stu was never more than a phone call away (assuming, of course, he wasn’t sleeping on my couch). My siblings, while busy and living on opposite ends of the country, were also semi-easy to locate. And beyond blood, I had Carter, Mary Fran, and Sam within a stone’s throw pretty much twenty-four/seven.

  Swallowing around the guilt, I reached past Andy for a throw pillow and pulled it against my chest. “Rapple has…no one?”

  “Other than Gertie? No. Which is why she comes across so different to us when she’s around your grandfather. Because she is.”

  I paused in my pillow-futzing. “Meaning?”

  “The Martha we see out on the sidewalk most days—the one who snaps at Carter, keeps tabs on you, harasses Mary Fran, and grills me every time I step foot on your property—is lonely, sad, hurt, and maybe even a little desperate for human contact, no matter the form. The Martha we see with St
u? She’s happy, content, hopeful, and, thus, a very different person.”

  My face must have reflected my thoughts because Andy met my eyes and then pulled back ever so slightly. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

  “Looking at you like what?”

  “Like this.” He scrunched his forehead.

  “Maybe because you look like Andy Zander…and you smell like Andy Zander… But you sound just like JoAnna.”

  “Meaning?”

  “She said the same basic thing about Rapple this morning, when I was telling her how my grandfather walked in on me bitching about her to you last night.”

  He resituated himself in his spot and then scratched at a patch of skin just below his ear. “I really thought he was hurt by that, but it looks like I was wrong.”

  “Oh?”

  “Martha said she left a message for him today about Gertie acting funny, and then another one an hour or so later when Mary Fran dropped her off at the vet, and then again when the vet decided to keep Gertie and Martha needed a ride home. But he never answered her calls.”

  “Maybe he was out,” I suggested even though I knew how lame I sounded.

  My grandfather hated to let calls go unanswered. He claimed it was the ringing that bothered him, but I knew better. Grandpa Stu loved to talk. It didn’t matter if it was someone he knew, a phone solicitor hell-bent on selling him something he didn’t need or want, or a wrong number. If it had a mouth, he’d say, it had a pair of ears, too. But even more than unanswered calls, he hated the message indicator beep on my home answering machine. If it was beeping when we returned from a store or a walk, he made a beeline for my bedside table just so he could press play, listen to the message, and get rid of the beep.

  Which was a long way of getting to the reality looming large in my brain at that moment: Grandpa Stu knew about Gertie.

  “Do you think there’s a chance she simply didn’t tell him something was wrong?”

  Andy’s left eyebrow shot up in a classic are-you-kidding-me lift.

  “Okay. Okay.” I held my hands up in surrender. “You’re right. Stupid question.”