Best Foot Forward Read Online Free PDF

Chicago, so much so that she turned the second floor above the store into decent office space. Decent for her, that is.
    As desks go, mine wasn’t much—a scratched steel monster shoved against the wall. I’d been reading articles in magazines about how to turn a cramped, windowless corner into something that shouts home. I moved the fake ficus tree to the side, dusted my plastic foot model, adjusted the fringed pillow my grandma made for me when she could still sew. A little better, but not quite home.
    I was wading through Mrs. Gladstone’s report, The History of Gladstone Shoes and Our Insistence on Quality No Matter What. There aren’t too many surprises when you have a title like that—it’s like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. You know the gist before you’ve even met the characters. As business stories go, it was a good one—how Mrs. Gladstone and her husband, Floyd, started the company right after World War II with a loan from the GI Bill; how they built it, shoe by shoe, with heart and quality. When Floyd died suddenly, Mrs. Gladstone took over. “I didn’t have his business experience,” she wrote, “but I knew his heart, so I started there.”
    I liked the thought of one person’s heart being so strong, it could be a foundation to build on. My grandmother’s heart was like that; Harry Bender’s heart was always open to the needs of others. In different ways, they’d both known such hard times, but it seemed to make their hearts bigger, not smaller.
    â€œI did the boxes.”
    Tanner Cobb stood by my desk. I only jumped a little. He couldn’t have finished that job already. It would have taken me all day.
    â€œWhat’s next?” he asked.
    Mrs. Gladstone shouted from her office, “I think you deserve a break. Jenna, show Tanner where we keep the refrigerator.”
    I tried to signal how profoundly bad an idea this was, but her phone rang and she was off. “Yes, I know we can save money by using cheaper leather, but we’re not going to do that on the Gladstone brands. Ken Woldman and I have already discussed this.”
    I gulped. “Let’s go look and see what you did first, Tanner.” And pray that I’m not making the mistake of my life.
    We headed to the back room. I wondered how Tanner would take criticism. That’s one of the signs of maturity. You can’t be in business without learning to take it on the chin.
    I opened the storeroom door and gasped.
    There were the boxes, all of them cut, tied, perfectly stacked. The knife was lying on a table, which I was glad to see. I scanned it for signs of blood—it was clean.
    Okay, I was impressed. “You did a great job, Tanner. Thanks.”
    He shrugged, half smiled. “So where’s the food?”
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    Tanner had just guzzled three bottles of apple juice and was eating his second banana. He looked around the stockroom, piled floor to ceiling with shoe boxes. Was he trying to figure out how to steal them?
    â€œGot a lot of shoes here,” he said.
    â€œWell, yeah, it’s a shoe store.”
    He half laughed like the joke was on me. “So when am I gonna sell shoes?”
    â€œI don’t know about that, Tanner. You just got here.”
    â€œI can do it.”
    â€œEveryone thinks selling shoes is easy; it’s not. ”
    â€œYou gotta read people. Right?”
    â€œRight.”
    â€œSo, I read people.” He leaned toward me, too close. “I know what they want.”
    I said, “That’ll only help you if you’re right.”
    He laughed. “I read you. ”
    I don’t like this.
    â€œAnd you don’t like me. You think I’m trouble.”
    I looked at him—his dark eyes laughed at me. “I don’t like people who steal.”
    He pointed a finger at me. “See, I was right.”
    â€œAnd you,” I said, “like to make people feel