The Game Changer Read online

  Table Of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Cherry Chocolate Chunk Muffins

  About the Author

  Sneak Peek of Out of the Picture

  The Game Changer

  Copyright @ 2019 Jennifer Brown

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereinafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Print ISBN 978-1-947892-41-5

  eBook ISBN 978-1-947892-72-9

  www.hallmarkpublishing.com

  Chapter 1

  Mary Jean, my editor at the Parkwood Chronicle Weekly, sat over my three-paragraph article with a red pen and made maddeningly slow circles and comments. A million of them.

  “You’ve repeated the word giblets quite a few times here,” she said, not looking up.

  Mary Jean—or Mary Mean as I’d heard a couple of the middle school carriers call her behind her back—used this method of editing for every piece submitted to the Chronicle Weekly. Print it out, deliver it to her desk, and then sit there while she pored over it with one of the thousands of red pens that rolled around in her desk drawer.

  Mary Mean was a misnomer. Mary Jean was perfectly nice, with kind eyes behind her cheater glasses, of which she had an entire drawer full, just below her drawer full of red pens. But Mary Jean was old school. The whole Parkwood Chronicle Weekly was old school. My life was old school.

  At least that was how it felt compared to the life I’d left behind when I moved here a year ago.

  But the life I’d left behind included getting phased out of being the youngest lead reporter on the homicide beat—a job I was good at, I might point out—at a certain very high-profile Chicago newspaper. And then getting phased out of a three-year relationship with a very high-profile newspaper cartoonist named Trace, who’d completely broken my heart when he refused to follow my career to Missouri. And then, most heartbreakingly, getting phased out of a friendship with the best and sweetest bulldog ever—my little Tink—because he belonged to Trace, too. So, yes, the life I left behind was much more modern and cosmopolitan than my life in Parkwood, but it was also a life that had been phased into nonexistence.

  However, if I’d ever used the word giblets in a story at my old paper, it would have been something along the lines of, The body was discovered buried in the bottom of a standalone freezer in the suspect’s basement, frozen among packaged ground beef and chicken giblets. Forensics examiner Lucy Fang and her team are working to decipher the significance… Not, Giblets are the secret to the chewy bits, and chewy bits are the secret to happy potatoes.

  Mary Jean made a circle and flicked her eyes up at me. Seeing that I was watching her, she half-turned the page toward me. “See. Right here.” She tapped the circle she’d just made and read aloud, “‘I really like Esther’s new giblets,’ said customer Roy Bunson. Most residents agree—when Esther put giblets in her gravy, she took dinner, and possibly giblets, to a whole new level.’” She glanced at me again. “Do you hear it? Do you hear how that many giblets in such short space may sound a little…off?”

  I winced. “Yes, ma’am.”

  She returned to the paper. “You’ve got to read things back to yourself.” She tapped her ear with her finger, the point of her red pen dotting her temple. “That’s what I’m here for. To teach you how to listen to your words before you release them into the world. You’re your first and most important editor.”

  It wasn’t that I was so in love with giblets. And it wasn’t that I didn’t know how to self-edit. It was that giblets were just as good for bulking up an article as they were for bulking up gravy, and every giblet got me one word closer to my word count goal—a goal I struggled to hit with every story I wrote.

  I was bored. It had taken me a year to admit it to myself, but there it was. Giblets this, sale on soccer cleats that. Sale ads. Obituary after depressing obituary. I missed reporting on the homicides that led to obituaries.

  When I’d chosen the job in Parkwood, I was freaked out and fraught. I could have held out for a bigger paper, a bigger town. But at the time, no other offers were coming in—I was too young, too inexperienced, too overpaid, and the industry was too saturated and shrinking too rapidly. I was far from the only out-of-work reporter in the world, and I had student loans to think of. And then when it became obvious that my boyfriend Trace wasn’t willing to relocate to be with me, I was desperate to get out of Chicago altogether to mend my broken heart. Parkwood had extended an offer and a charming, sleepy community filled with trees and historic homes and smiling strangers seemed like the best place to catch my breath, lick my wounds, regain my pride and get over Trace. If I could accomplish that, I could try again. Except, I hadn’t yet tried again. And I hadn’t yet gotten over Trace.

  Don’t get me wrong—Parkwood, Missouri, population 4,944, was an adorable little town. One supermarket, one high school, one bowling alley, three gas stations, a bank, more chain pizza joints than you could shake a ball of mozzarella at, and not a single designer shoe store to be found.

  No daily rush hour traffic jams. No pollution. Lots of little kids playing on really green lawns. Your mail carrier, produce clerk, and librarian actually knew your name. And the dogs here looked really happy all the time—if you didn’t think it was possible for a dog to smile, just take a look at a Parkwood dog on a walk and you would change your mind. Parkwood was small and sleepy, but it was also really nice. The kind of place you see in allergy medicine commercials. Until I moved here, I didn’t think this type of town really existed.

  Mary Jean mercifully finished destroying the article and slid it across the desk, then removed her cheaters and set them on her disaster area of a desk and attempted a smile. “Don’t look so glum. It’s just a rewrite. Didn’t they ever make you do a rewrite at that Chicago paper of yours?”

  “Of course they did.” I just wasn’t writing about giblet gravy in the first place.

  “It’s still missing something, though.” She picked up her glasses—a different pair this time, that seemed to appear out of nowhere—and lightly chewed the plastic earpiece before pointing at me with them. “Did she give you the recipe?”

  I shook my head. “I tried.”

  Mary Jean’s eyes narrowed. “That Esther Igo can be stubborn as the day is long. She knows the town is itching for it. She’s toying with us. And you pressed her?”
>
  I nodded. “She wouldn’t budge.” Although, to be fair, I hadn’t pressed all that hard. I liked Esther, and if she wanted to keep her recipe to herself, I didn’t see what the harm was. “But, I mean, why would she reveal it? It’s her new prized recipe. People are lining up for it. If everyone can just make it themselves, won’t they stop going to the Hibiscus?”

  Mary Jean gave me a curious look and then laughed.

  “First of all, if someone around here gives you their prized recipe, you can guarantee it’s missing an ingredient or two. Or maybe has an extra one added. Or a measurement that’s just a little off. That way yours comes out okay, but not quite as good as theirs. They look generous, but they’re still the better cook.”

  “That’s devious,” I said.

  “That’s tradition,” she corrected. “Secondly, nobody would stop going to the Hibiscus for any reason. People have been going there since Parkwood was a stop on a dirt trail and the Hibiscus was a table in Esther’s great-great-grandmother’s kitchen. That is also tradition. People want the recipe to the new giblet gravy. That doesn’t mean they want to make it.”

  “But wh—” I started, but then thought better of it. The answer was likely to be tradition.

  “Go read that through,” Mary Jean said, pointing at the article. “Pay close attention to the giblets. And then, I need you to go back to the Hibiscus and get that recipe. Offer her something in return.” She gathered up what seemed like the most random and unchecked assortment of papers and whisked away from her desk.

  I followed, clutching the article in one hand. “Offer her something? What do I have to offer Esther Igo?”

  “A deal,” she said over her shoulder. “Offer her a deal. Tell her she can read the article and make whatever changes she likes before it goes to press.”

  I gasped and nearly fainted. I could feel the cosmic force of all of my University of Chicago Journalism School professors and all of their professors and the professors before them gasping and nearly fainting with me. “Let her see—I can’t do that. That’s…unethical. It’s censorship. It’s partiality. It’s—”

  “It’s not a big deal and we do it all the time.” She slapped the random papers on our part-time receptionist’s desk. “Joyce, I need you to file these,” she said.

  Joyce set down her sticky bun in slow motion, licked two fingers clean, pulled out an earbud in even slower motion, swiveled in so-slow-she-was-almost-backward-in-time motion, and said, “Huh?”

  “File these, please,” Mary Jean repeated. She turned to me and put a motherly hand on my shoulder. I must have looked as much in the throes of journalistic panic as I felt. Plus, sometimes I was pretty sure Mary Jean saw herself as a surrogate mother, since mine was so many miles away. She was always trying to feed me, make me wear a jacket, tell me I looked like I needed sleep—it was as if she had a direct line to my mom. “We’ve been making that deal since this paper opened. We aren’t reporting cutting edge exposés here, Hollis. We’re running a small-town paper. It’s for the people, and they have expectations. Whether or not we have a job on Monday morning depends on whether or not our customers keep reading. And they’ll keep reading if they can get their eyes on that recipe.”

  Joyce was slowly picking through the random papers. She’d gotten a manicure over the weekend—extra long, extra pointy, and extra shiny. It looked nice, but also cumbersome. “Where exactly am I filing these? I think this is your dry cleaning receipt, Mary Jean.”

  Mary Jean ignored her and headed back toward her own desk. “You should hurry over to the Hibiscus so you can get back before the parade clogs up the square. Eat something while you’re there. You look hungry.”

  “I do?” I looked down at myself. How exactly did I look hungry?

  “Afterward, go on over and cover the parade, then take the rest of the day to rest up for the game tonight. You’ll be covering that, too.”

  Oh. Right. The game. The high school homecoming football game. The biggest event in town. Everyone would be there.

  And I would be there, too. Not to cover the game itself. That honor would go to long-time reporter Ernie Holden, who would sleep through one hundred percent of the game, but would still somehow instinctively know what had happened when he woke up, like he had been telepathically tuned in. Or like he had been using the same article for thirty-five years and just changing the names. Which was much more likely, especially since that article used the phrase Can you dig it? and referred to the quarterback as One cool cat.

  No, I would be at the homecoming football game to cover a much more riveting story: the new hot dog roller. That’s right, ladies and gents, no more pulling wilted dogs out of murky boiling water. Thanks to the tireless fundraising efforts of the Glove and Handbag Club, Chapter #1696, Parkwood was catching up with the rest of the world and heating up their game-time protein on rollers. Bleacher snacks were about to reach a whole new level.

  And I, with just over $60,000 left in student loan bills, was going to crack that case wide open. Eat your heart out, Trace.

  I took my article back to my desk and sank into my chair.

  Lucky me.

  Chapter 2

  Traffic accidents were a social event in Parkwood, and when they happened, they caused a huge headache. The entire town simply had to get a gander at the accident, no matter how small, so they could relay the story that evening over dinner.

  And when it came to fender benders with Wickham Birkland—or anything with Wickham Birkland, from trampled azaleas to missing mail—there was no such thing as small.

  Wickham was Parkwood’s most notorious bad mood waiting to happen. He skulked around town with a scowl and a list of grievances as long as his uncut hair (unsurprisingly, his list of grievances began with his ex-barber), and when you were the new kid in town, one of the first things you learned was that you should try your level best to never, ever cross his path in any sort of way, but especially not in any sort of bad way. And that was exactly what had happened to the poor soul who had the misfortune of running through the stop sign at the intersection of Oak and Tutor, just two blocks north of the Hibiscus.

  There was a lineup of lookie-loos four blocks long. Betty Ramp—I knew her from a story I’d penned about the new First Methodist Sunday bulletin format (they were shaking things up with Cambria font!)—was toting lawn chairs and a pitcher of lemonade up the sidewalk for the older folks who’d abandoned their cars for a better show. Betty Ramp was thoughtful that way.

  An unlucky police officer was having a heck of a time trying to direct traffic. I’d never seen him before. He must have been new to Parkwood, likely filling the opening left by Officer Jamie Martin, who’d retired and moved to the coast just a few weeks earlier. This new officer was closer to my age, and was tall, dark-haired, and had a muscular build that didn’t look half bad—okay, actually looked really good—in a uniform.

  Nobody was paying him the slightest bit of attention. By the time I drove up to the stop sign, he’d given up on hand signals, as several cars had simply taken up residence right smack in the middle of the intersection, their owners sitting on someone’s open tailgate sharing a bag of cookies. He pleaded me with his eyes to just move on. They were nice eyes, I couldn’t help noticing.

  Like a good reporter, I quickly surveyed the accident, even though I knew the Parkwood Chronicle Weekly would never report on such things. People don’t want to read about accidents, Hollis, I could hear Mary Jean saying. They want to read good news. New babies and award-winning cakes and spelling bees.

  “Just as long as they’re not spelling g-i-b-l-e-t-s,” I whispered to myself as I tried to assess the situation.

  A man had popped into the front of Wickham Birkland’s Mercedes, knocking a big hole into the grill and shattering the headlight. My windows were rolled up, so I couldn’t hear what Wickham was saying, but from the looks of things, he was either throwing an utter fit o
r dancing the Y-M-C-A. Or maybe practicing to be head cheerleader for tonight’s homecoming game. I tried entertaining myself by making up the cheers and seeing how they aligned with Wickham’s furious body language. “Hey-hi-ho-hoo! We’re the team that’s gonna beat you!” I giggled. “It works! Jump to the left! Jump to the right! Raise your fists up high and—” A knock on my window startled a squeak out of me. The officer was right on the other side of the glass. His nametag read HOPKINS.

  Sheepishly, I pushed the button to roll down the window. Now that I could hear, I could definitely tell that Wickham Birkland wasn’t cheering. In fact, the police chief had arrived and was now standing between him and the other guy, and probably for good reason. Wickham was looking a little more than unhinged.

  “You think you could keep traffic moving, ma’am?” the officer asked in a very official voice. It was a smooth, baritone voice—I couldn’t help noticing that, too.

  “Sorry,” I said. “I was just cheering…um…” I squirmed. “Sure, I’ll move. But… Can I ask you a question first?”

  “I’m directing traffic, ma’am.” We both looked at where traffic should have been, but obviously wasn’t, moving. He sighed, closed his eyes briefly, refocused on me. “What’s your question?”

  “Do you have any thoughts about Esther Igo’s new giblet gravy, by chance?”

  The Hibiscus Café—a local institution and hub of activity at any time of day in Parkwood—was abnormally quiet. Everyone was still at Oak and Tutor, watching Wickham Birkland dance circles of anger around the man who’d crashed into his Mercedes.

  The scent of gravy and butter rolled out as soon as I pulled open the door and my mouth immediately began watering. Esther’s gravy may not have been something I got excited to report on, but I have to admit there really was something special about the new recipe. Even I wouldn’t have minded getting my hands on it, and I lived on a diet of microwavable macaroni and cheese for one.

  “Well, Hollis Bisbee! You’re back again! Welcome, welcome!” Esther, in many ways the matriarch of Parkwood, was a fluffy woman in every possible sense. Her graying hair was a fluffy cloud of curls, her fluffy-ruffled apron concealed a fluffy figure, and even her words were fluffy. When you walked into the Hibiscus, the fluffiness enveloped you and you felt like you were…home. Not just any home—your childhood home.