Monique pursed her lips dismissively. “Nothing to worry about on that score.” She sent Grant the sweetest smile, a real one, and it made Sadie almost as happy as Grant’s proposal had done. Monique looked at them both. “I'm glad he was there for you, and after what you’ve put him through, I know he always will be.” She raised her glass again and said, “Welcome to the family.” Rick and Ginny joined, and Sadie heard both happiness and a tinge of relief in their voices.
“I still can’t believe they dumped Julia Menlo,” Rick said. “Not that Sadie won’t do a much better job.”
Grant shook his head. “Turns out Julia’s made quite a few enemies over the years. It’s sad, really, to think of someone being so successful and yet so disliked.”
“She certainly had an enemy at that party,” Monique said. “Whoever uploaded those videos on the spot knew exactly what they were doing.”
Ginny used her finger to trace something invisible on the table. “They were pretty brilliant, weren’t they?”
“I’ll say,” Grant said. “I would’ve lost my career without them.”
Sadie leaned in to give him a shoulder bump. “I’d already lost mine. Those videos resurrected it.”
“Huh. So, I guess we owe that person some major thanks,” Ginny said.
“If only we could,” Sadie said. “They were uploaded anonymously.”
“Ya don’t say…” Ginny said simply, but an unexpected lilt in her voice caught Sadie’s attention. Ginny must have noticed Sadie giving her side-eye, because her tracing finger came to a stop. “Maybe youcanthank them.”
Certain something was up, Sadie swiveled in her seat to face her sister. Ginny’s resting-mischievous-face looked positively devious. A cat that had swallowed an ostrich could not have looked more self-satisfied. “What do you mean?”
Ginny made a show of downing her now cold coffee, though she barely managed it through the impressive smirk on her face. Watching her, it struck Sadie that Ginny had known where Sadie was headed that night. She was also no stranger to online videos. Her memory flashed back to the mysterious server in the yellow coverall standing oddly close during Julia’s meltdown. “Gennifer Heppner, was ityou?”
It was Ginny’s turn to sit back and count her teeth with her tongue. “Let’s just say…one of usdidattend your wedding.”
Sadie, Grant, Monique, and Rick tilted back against booth twelve’s vintage bench seat so hard it gave a concerning creak. “What?” they said in unison.
Ginny’s eyebrow arched with impish perfection. “You’re not the only Heppner sister who can blend in with the shrubbery.”
THE END
