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“Oh god,” I muttered.
Apparently, Samantha Wett and Nathan Beaver were getting married. The picture of the young couple showed them staring lovingly into each other’s eyes, seemingly unaware of the headline over their announcement.
“Wett-Beaver,” I said, trying my best to suppress my smile.
“Don’t you laugh; this is an embarrassment!” Bess shrieked. “I TOLD YOU to proof those pages for me!”
I’d proofed them. Maybe. I couldn’t remember. But we weren’t stopping the press over this—it was too expensive to make a change and reload everything.
“Is her name really Samantha Wett?” I asked. “And is his Nathan Beaver?”
Bess was riffling through papers on her desk, her face the shade of a ripe tomato. “Well, I’ve known the Beaver family my whole life; they live in the Beard. And this is a woman he met at college, so I don’t” She buried her face in her hands. “I will never live this down. Did you proof those pages or not?”
Bess and I had gotten along well during the days and nights I stayed with her and Harry. He was a quiet man who seemed to genuinely enjoy listening to her talk from the moment she woke up until she went to bed. I was suddenly glad I was back at the apartment, though, because I’d never seen Bess this angry.
“Let’s say I didn’t proof them,” I said mildly. “Would it have changed anything since those are their names? Could we have changed it to Beaver-Wett?”
“No, the bride’s name always comes first.”
I shrugged. “Well then?”
“I would have wanted to know! We’ll be a laughingstock!”
Poor Bess. She was working herself into a tizzy over this, and I couldn’t muster an ounce of outrage. I’d gotten the solid follow-up story I needed for this week’s edition. We were meeting payroll. No one was prank calling us anymore. I had nothing to complain about.
I put my coat on and picked up my copy of the new edition of the Chronicle.
“Where are you going?” Bess demanded. “You’re leaving me here to field all the Wett-Beaver calls?”
It was all I could do not to burst out laughing at the sound of Bess saying, “Wett-Beaver.”
“I need to drop off this paper for Grady, and then why don’t we go to Taco Train for lunch?” I said. “After a couple margaritas, we’ll be laughing about this.”
She scoffed. “I will never laugh about this! It’s”
A loud shattering noise stopped her short, and I looked at the long, wide window that faced out onto Main Street just in time to see a massive spiderweb crackling outward. An instant later, the glass fell in shards to the ground in one fell swoop, not one by one like you see in cartoons.
“Oh my God!” I dropped the paper I was holding and crouched down. “What the hell was that?”
Squealing tires sounded outside, and I immediately took my phone from my pocket and pushed the contact for Grady, listening as the phone dialed his number.
“Hey, are you here?” he asked.
“Can you come over? Something just shattered one of our windows.” I peeked around the corner of my desk to check on Bess. “Bess? Are you okay?”
“I’m on my way,” Grady said.
When Bess didn’t answer, I stood up to look for her. She was slumped sideways in her chair, her right hand covering the front of her left shoulder.
“Bess!” I screamed, running to her. “Oh God, Bess!”
There was a faraway look in her eyes when I reached her, blood seeping through her fingers as she tried to cover her shoulder.
“Hurts,” was all she could manage to say, her voice a whisper.
“Help!” I screamed over my shoulder. “Somebody, help!”
Dandy came running as I pulled off the cardigan sweater I wore and pressed it to Bess’s steadily bleeding wound.
“She’s been shot,” I said tearfully. “Call an ambulance and get everyone evacuated.”
Grady came through the front door right then, eyes wild and out of breath.
“Someone shot through our window,” I said, forcing my voice to remain level. “Bess was hit.”
He pushed a button on the radio on his shoulder. “Command One, I need an ambulance and backup at the Chronicle. Shots fired. One person hit.”
He ran to me then, and by the time he reached me, my vision was blurred with tears.
“She has to be okay, Grady. Please help her.”
“Listen to me,” he said. “Get under a desk and stay there. I’ve got her.”
He took over, holding my sweater over the wound, picking up Bess in his arms, and settling onto the floor with her. Her moan of pain was like a knife in my gut.
“Avon,” she said weakly. “Tell Harry I love him.”
“No!” I swiped at the tears wetting my cheeks. “You’re telling him yourself.”
I looked out from beneath the desk next to hers. Grady was pressing my sweater to her wound so hard his knuckles were white, and through all that effort, Bess’s eyes had started to flutter closed.
