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encouraged her to look at a few old carved ivory buttons, too. At least the ones I could find. She took thirty-six different buttons with her to look at and consider. You know, so the designer she’s flying in from Paris can look them over, too.”
    “Uh-huh. Yeah. Sure.” Stan’s mind was still a million miles away.
    I guess I couldn’t blame him. He was a man, after all, and I mean, what woman on the face of the earth could even begin to compete with Kate the Great? It was small-minded of me to be offended. Which didn’t mean I didn’t deserve a little revenge.
    “I think when she comes back, I’ll show her some of the other buttons I keep in that treasure chest I have buried in the back courtyard between my building and the ones on the next street,” I said, as innocent as can be even though I was pulling Stan’s chain. “You know, right near that outdoor pen where I keep the elephants. And that herd of dinosaurs I found roaming in Lincoln Park and brought to the shop with me.”
    “Anything you say, kiddo.” Stan closed the newspaper, folded it, and tucked it under his arm. He popped out of his chair faster than any man his age should have been able to. “I’ve got to get going, Josie. See you later. Bye.”
    He made it to my front door in record time, and call me crazy, but something told me all this dodging and scrambling was more than simply a sudden case of Kate Franciscus appreciation.
    I stepped into his path to keep him from getting away, and looked from Stan to that newspaper tucked securely under his arm.
    Securely being the operative word.
    I am not the suspicious type. At least I never had been until Kaz gave me so much to be suspicious of. Now, my suspicion radar triggered, I motioned for the newspaper.
    “Hand it over,” I said, and even though Stan gave me a vacant look designed to make me think he was as innocent as the driven snow, I knew he knew what I was talking about; he tightened his grip on the paper.
    “I’m going to be late for my softball game. See you later, Josie.”
    I let him get past me. All the better to slide the newspaper out from under his arm. “What’s the deal?” I asked at the same time I flipped back to Kate’s picture.
    Stan made a move to snatch the newspaper out of my hands. “You don’t want to see that.”
    “Oh, yes I do.”
    Note to self: a thirty-three-year-old woman in her flannel sleep pants, her Chicago Bears T-shirt, and her Crocs can move faster than a seventysomething guy. Over near the window and far enough from Stan so that I didn’t have to worry he’d grab the newspaper back from me, I took a closer look at the photograph and saw what Stan had seen. What I hadn’t had a chance to see the first time I looked at the picture.
    Pikestaffed, I stood there with my eyes wide and my mouth open. Oh yeah, I looked like a Lake Michigan carp, all right, and at that point, I didn’t even care.
    Because the only thing I could do was stare.
    At Kate in the center of the picture, the light catching the highlights in her hair and accenting the sparkle of her smile.
    And at me, over in the corner.
    With my head under my desk.
    And my butt sticking out.
    Stan came up behind me and put a reassuring hand on my shoulder. “Hey, kiddo, sure, a million or more people are going to see that picture this morning. But look at the bright side. At least you’ve got a nice butt!”

Chapter Three

    SOMETIMES, MITCHELL KAZLOWSKI STILL SHOWS UP IN my dreams.
    Though there are certain . . . er . . . benefits that can result from the situation (like the night I had that vivid dream about how we were back in Barbados on our honeymoon . . . in that cute little hotel with the ocean view . . . in that darling little tropical-colored suite . . . in that big ol’ bed we hardly ever left except when we needed food, rum drinks, or the night we dared a little sex on the beach), this is not necessarily good news.
    Having warm and fuzzy thoughts about Kaz is like dealing with a