Courtney wanders past the pots to a collection of vintage glasses, the kind with old-fashioned sayings sold at roadside hotels out on Route 66.

  “You really think I should sell the dress?” I ask. “I’m not that bad off for money.” I force a positive attitude not just into my tone but into my entire musculoskeletal system, as well as the circulatory one too. “Maybe I could turn it into a cute little retro dress?”

  She stares at me, one hand poised over an old-fashioned glass that says Sleepy bear lives here. The daggers in her blue eyes tell me a retro dress is an unacceptable answer. “No. You’re not going to wear it again as a cute little dress. That’s bad juju.”

  I arch a skeptical brow. “Wait. You’re a venture capitalist and you believe in juju? Do you believe in voodoo too?”

  She scoffs. “Please. No. Just juju. And we are going to turn your juju around. Also, once you get rid of the dress, you can date again,” she says, bright and cheery, like she’s dangling gummy bears before a child in the woods. Follow the trail of candy now. Come a little closer. They’re so very tasty. “You could even consider answering some of the knocks or pings or pokes you get online.”

  I shudder. “No way. I met Ray online. Not going there again.”

  “Be that as it may, I bet a date or two would take your mind off the whole work situation. Let’s kill two birds with one stone. Come to the masquerade gala my firm is sponsoring. It’s a charity fundraiser and a great way to get you out in the world of the living again.”

  “It’s not as if I’ve been sulking. Work did keep me busy,” I say, because I didn’t go full hermit when Ray ditched me at the altar. More like full office, burying myself in story after story, in investigative piece after feature piece after news article. I took it all on, hungry for every single distraction.

  Now I have none.

  “Let’s find you more work.” Courtney waggles her blond brows and says my new favorite word. “You can network.”

  My ears prick. “Network? Don’t get me excited.”

  “It turns you on, doesn’t it?”

  I laugh. “Yes, the prospect of paying my bills is quite arousing.”

  She presses her hands together in a plea. “Come with me to the party. A ton of tech publications will be there.”

  Before I can answer, the sound of heels clicking across the floor with purpose greets my ears. A voice shrilly shouts, “No.”

  My spine straightens.

  “You.”

  A chill runs over my skin.

  “Go.”

  I spin around to find a woman with jet-black hair, a gypsy shirt, and bangles up one arm. “You with your French braid and the barrettes in your hair.”

  I point at myself—who, me?—but there’s no one else she could be referring to.

  “You brought that cursed dress into my store this morning,” she says, her voice wobbling, as she covers most of her mouth with her hand. My dress is draped over her other arm. She must be Sasha.

  “Are you okay?” I ask, because . . . she reeks of Crazy with a capital, bolded, and underlined C.

  Sasha raises her other arm, the one with my dress in its garment bag draped over it, and brandishes a jagged pink fingernail. “Today alone, I broke a nail.” She turns her wrist in my direction. It’s covered in Band-Aids. “And my cactus tried to kill me.”

  “You have a homicidal plant?”

  Note to self: murderous plants might be an interesting feature story for a consumer magazine. A warning sort of piece. Wait, that’s more Dateline.

  Sasha drops her hand from her mouth, baring her teeth.

  I flinch.

  Her front tooth is chipped. She points to it. “This,” she hisses. “This is your dress’s fault. I cracked a tooth.”

  “On the dress?”

  “On a walnut,” she says righteously. “But I eat walnuts every day and today a nut attacks my tooth. How else do you explain that? Coincidence? I think not. Your dress swirls with negative energy.”

  No kidding. I swirl with negative energy. I’m surprised the store hasn’t swallowed us into a sinkhole.

  Still, I’m not letting my dress take the fall for a broken chopper. “I don’t think it’s the fault of the dress,” I say, trying to reason with her.

  Sasha thrusts her arm at me, pointing to the door. “Take it back, and don’t come here again. I can’t sell it to another bride. I couldn’t live with myself if something horrid happened because of that evil dress. Imagine some unlucky woman struck dead by lightning on her wedding night! And in her groom’s arms.”

  I give Sasha a look. “Okay, let’s not be so dramatic. When was the last time a bride was hit by lightning on her wedding day? Just say you don’t want the dress. I get it.”

  I grab the dress from her, and she recoils as if it’s burned her.

  “You need a dress exorcism,” she says. “You need a ghost hunter to cleanse your dress of evil spirits.”

  I wave her off. “I’m sure you have a cousin who’ll perform such a service for $159.99.”

  Sasha shrugs. “I do. I come from a long line of ghost hunters.”

  “Okay, I’m going. I’ll get my evil dress out of your store,” I say, turning my tone spooky before we get the hell out of Once More, land of the Looney Tunes shop owner.

  Out on the sidewalk, fumes of frustration roll off me. “Can you believe that? Can you freaking believe that?”

  Courtney frowns. “I’m sorry, sweets. I had no idea she was one of those dresses are cursed people.”

  “Is that a thing now? To believe dresses are cursed? Maybe I’m cursed. No wedding, no job—maybe I’ll go home and find a crazy rabbit has tunneled through my place and my cousin is kicking me out of the last rent-controlled apartment in all of Manhattan.” I heave a sigh of irritation so gigantic it stretches to Brooklyn. “I can’t believe I can’t sell this freaking dress.”

  “We can find another shop.”

  I shake my head. “Nope. I made a promise to be done with this dress. If this dress is cursed, I’m not going to bring that kind of bad luck on another bride.”

  “What are you going to do with it?”

  The wheels turn so quickly in my head, they’re a blur.

  But the answer is clear. So clear I can’t believe I didn’t see it sooner.

  I don’t need to sell this dress. I need to sacrifice it.

  A wicked grin forms on my face as I stand on Christopher Street in the Village, New Yorkers rushing past me and barking into phones, hailing cabs, and ordering Ubers.

  “You want me to go to your costume party?”

  “Of course I do,” she says, excitement etched in her eyes.

  “I’ll be there.”

  When I reach my apartment, I grab my scissors because I have the perfect idea for a costume.

  * * *

  Chapter 3

  Flynn

  * * *

  “Would you like me to start your morning coffee, Flynn?”

  “Yes, Kate.” Grinning wickedly at the query from the melodic female voice, I lean back in the leather armchair and stretch my legs on the ottoman in front of me as the nearby coffee machine whirs to life. “Please run the dishwasher too.”

  Kate replies, “Of course. I will get that started on the energy-saving mode right away. Just the way you like it.”

  I laugh, pointing at the white disc on the chrome coffee table. “I love how you know what I like, Kate.”

  “Would you also like me to turn on the heat in the shower?”

  Damn, this woman is an absolute genius. I do enjoy a toasty shower. Shaking my head in admiration, I answer her, “Yes, and please turn off the lights when I leave this morning. That’s all I need right now.”

  “As you wish.”

  Spinning in my chair, I turn to my two colleagues—Carson and Jennica, my right- and left-hand people. Carson’s dark eyes are lit up with excitement. As one of my top executives, he’s been working tirelessly on the final touches for the voice recognition in our smart-home system. “Carson, all I’ve ever wanted since I was a kid is to live inside The Jetsons, and it’s happening at last.”

  “I’ll work on launching you into space next. But for now, I’m glad this works so well,” Carson says, gesturing to the showcase for our system, dubbed Haven.

  I give Kate, the voice I like to converse with, one final command, telling her to cancel the shower, since I don’t actually plan to shower here in our demo home. But man, am I ever glad the system is firing on all cylinders.

  Haven rocks. If I’m popping into a wine shop on the way home, I can check on the dog cam and see if Fido, Fritz, and Mitzi are lounging in their dog beds or eating yet another roll of toilet paper. From the subway, with the press of a button, I can flick on the thermostat to warm the place—I can even start the washing machine. If I want to talk to the lamps or the blinds, I can do that too.

  Jennica flips her red hair off her shoulders and chimes in. “How about giving me the hot British voice when you’re showing me all the whizz-bang features? Do I have to listen to Kate? Or can I please have Henry, Tom, or Daniel?”

  I hold out my hands in a question. “What is it with British guys?”

  Jennica leans forward, her blue eyes bugging out. “Hello? Have you heard them talk? It’s like listening to sexy British butter.” She brings her index finger to the tip of her tongue then touches the air, making a sizzling sound.

  Jennica and I have worked together for ten years. I knew her in college, and she was by my side when I had my first company, and now she’s here again with Haven. She’s an unstoppable force and like an older sister to me. A second older sister, since I have one already.

  “Butter?” Carson shoots her a quizzical gaze.

  “Butter good. Butter yummy,” Jennica says. “And I want Kate to be a hot guy with a sexy British butter voice. Switch her to Daniel for me, please.”

  Carson shrugs and tips his goateed chin at me. “We can’t compete.”

  “Hey, speak for yourself. I have a deep baritone that’s like sexy American butter.”

  Jennica cracks up. “Flynn, you should use that voice to go as a bad boy to the masquerade ball.” She snaps her fingers. “Wait. I have a better idea. Why don’t you go as a bad boy piece of code? Just get a leather jacket, some boots, and write some crap code on a T-shirt. Speaking of, I’m going as a Polaroid.”

  I pretend I’m deeply annoyed. “Why’d you tell me? Now I can’t guess what you are when I see you.”

  “If you couldn’t tell I’m a Polaroid, then I’d be doing it wrong. Steve is going to be a Snapchat filter,” she adds, mentioning her husband.

  “I already have a costume. Plus, I find bad code so morally offensive, I’m not sure I’d choose that. But my costume does rock,” I say, proud of what I picked out.

  “Tell us.” Jennica grins.

  “I’m going as ID theft,” Carson blurts, and I spin and stare at him.

  Dread drops into my stomach. “What did you say?”

  Carson nods excitedly. “I have one hundred name tags, and I’m going to slap them all over me with different people’s names.”

  And there goes my idea.

  “That’s a great plan,” I say with a forced smile.

  “What about you?” he asks innocently, since he doesn’t know he picked my idea.

  “Guess you’ll all just have to wait and see.” I rub my palms together, moving on. “Now, let’s review the final tweaks in Haven.”

  “No one can come close to Haven.” Carson walks us through the updates he’s made to the automation system that’s rolling out next week. “Haven is far better than anything else on the market. And it’s absolutely better than ShopForAnything,” he says, meeting my gaze. There’s a touch of nerves in his eyes, and I get it—I feel them sometimes too. Our newest competitor is merciless, and I have to guard our company from its pending ambush.

  I can’t fail because I have hundreds of employees depending on me to succeed, people counting on me for paychecks, for jobs, to make sure the company doesn’t become ShopForAnything’s cornflakes.

  I won’t let us fail. I’m well aware that while I might be fine and dandy in the nest-egg-for-generations department, I have people who rely on me for their daily bread. What motivates me every day at work isn’t making more money to pad my coffers. It’s building something new and taking care of the people who make it possible.

  “And you’re ready to roll out the marketing plans on a wide scale?” I ask Jennica.

  “We are going to market this like Christie’s marketed the holy hell out of that lost da Vinci. That was genius. Advertising, PR, videos—the works. And, go figure, but for some reason”—she points at me and rolls her eyes—“people seem to like you, so we’re going to market the hell out of you. The secret weapon of the boy-next-door genius.”

  I laugh it off. The attention is still weird to me. “Recap the plans for me.”

  She spreads her hands like a movie director making a pitch on Sunset Boulevard. “You have the morning shows booked where you’ll demonstrate all the cool aspects of Haven, and we also have magazine features lined up that’ll reach some high-end consumers.” She twists her index and middle finger together. “And I have Up Next interested in a potential in-depth feature on you, and how you made the change from your first business to this one. I’ll know soon if it’s a go.”

  The mention of the prestigious magazine makes me sit a little straighter. That publication is the holy grail when it comes to feature profiles. “That would be quite a coup.”

  “Your assistant has all the others in your calendar, and she’ll be sure to tell you what color shirt to wear when you’re on TV,” she says with a wink.

  I give her a thumbs-up. “Good. Because fashion is hard for me,” I say, deadpan, since clothing is no laughing matter, which may explain why my wardrobe consists of jeans, pullovers, and the occasional business button-down that my sister picked out for me. Without her help, I’d be lost.

  I head to my office, and I’m tackling some of the items on my to-do list when my assistant, Whitney, pops in. “Hi. I have all the name tags for your costume for the masquerade party tomorrow night. Do you want me to google popular names and mix them up with weird and bizarre ones?”

  I drag a hand through my thick brown hair. “Nope.”

  “You’re going to do it yourself?” she squeaks. Whitney’s voice is naturally high-pitched—she almost always sounds surprised. This time, though, it seems legit.

  “Why don’t you give the name tags to Carson? I need a whole new costume. Any ideas?”

  She taps her lip then blurts out, “A headless horseman. You’d totally be in disguise.”

  I cringe at the image as Whitney nods enthusiastically, delighted horror in her eyes. “That would be a fantastic costume. You could be totally hidden under a creepy cloak. It would be so scary and gross.”

  “Thanks, but I think I’m going to pass on the bloody stump for a head.”

  But I do need a kick-ass costume. Something that makes people think. That reminds them that I’m at the top of the game. Something as clever as ID theft.

  As I review a set of proposals from hot young start-ups, the new costume idea descends into my brain, fully formed and entirely entertaining.

  Surely, everyone will get it.

  After work, I do a little shopping for the costume then head to the racquetball club to take my mind off work for a bit.

  My sister, Olivia, joins me, her brown hair pulled back in a ponytail, her game face on. “Get ready for me to crush you and crush you quickly, because I have plans tonight.”

  “Got a hot date?”

  She looks at me. “Yes, with my six-month-old. It’s called breastfeeding, and she’s going to be hungry in about an hour.”

  “Glad to hear you still know how to party. How is my perfect niece?”

  She points her racket at me. “Zoe is awesome, even though her uncle is being a pain in the ass for saying I have no life.”

  “Teasing.” I grab a ball and bounce it. “Although, clearly you have no life if you’re hanging out with a guy like me.” I lower my goggles, lift the ball, and smash it toward the wall.

  “I’m not teasing when I say I’m going to kick your pain-in-the-butt ass.” As the ball rockets to her, she slams it back.

  We proceed to pummel the hell out of the ball for the next thirty minutes. Olivia works in the same field as me—she’s an ethical hacker, and like me, she’s also highly competitive. She also hates when I win, so she makes sure I don’t, finishing our match with a victory at the last second.

  She smacks my shoulder. “Take that. Your older sister still has it, even while she’s nursing.”

  Panting, I grab a water bottle and down a gulp. “Damn, you and your boobs are the toughest. Also, can we pretend I totally did not acknowledge your boobs right now?”

  She thrusts out her chest. “You can’t deny what nature gave me and what my baby made even bigger.”

  I cringe and cover my eyes. “Make it stop. Put on a bag.”

  When I open my eyes, she says, “Speaking of hot dates, what’s your excuse for hanging out with me when you could be, I dunno, out with a sexy single woman? Assuming any sexy single woman would want you.”

  “Thank you, as always, for your support.”

  “It’s endless.”

  I grab a towel and wipe my brow, answering her seriously now, “Same old story. Two days ago, I was propositioned after a keynote speech.”

  Her eyes widen. “For sex?”

  “No, for marriage. That’s what made it even crazier,” I say and share the details of Nova’s pitch to become Mrs. Flynn Parker.

  “Damn,” she says, whistling, “it must suck to be you.”

  She raises her racquet like a violin and plays a lament.

  “Tell me about it. It was as sad as a sad song.”

  “Seriously, though, can you even imagine what it’s like for athletes and really rich and famous people?”

  “I can’t. I honestly don’t see how you could ever trust that someone was truly into you. Especially given what happened with Annie last year.” I shudder at the memory of my ex.