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She threw herself, panting, into the seat beside Will. Then she picked up her mic, turned it on, and asked, grinning, “So. What’d I miss?”

Chapter Fourteen

Iwasn’t entirely sure what had just happened.

All I knew for certain was that Will Price had called me smart. Smart, complicated, andbeautiful, as well.

People say all sorts of nice things they don’t mean, of course, because they want something from you, or simply to be polite.

This didn’t feel like that, though. It had felt genuine.

More than that, it had feltgood. Will had apologized to meagain, but this time it was on record, in front of witnesses. Witnesses who could actually hear him—all five hundred of them, even if they may not have understood what he was actually referring to.

He’d admitted he wasn’t perfect. He’d made a mistake, and he was hoping to grow and learn from it, like a character in one of my books.

One of myexcellentbooks.

Of course, he still hadn’t told mewhyhe’d said something so profoundly stupid (and mean) to that reporter. But that didn’t make me feel any less like dashing from the auditoriumthe second our panel was over and running outside to yell, “Wheeeee!”

But of course I couldn’t do that, because while I wrote children’s books for a living, I was a grown adult, and there was one more panel and two speakers to go, plus our group signing, before the festival broke for lunch.

So instead I whispered, “Is Sophie all right?” as Bernadette and I walked from the stage together after our panel finished.

“She’s fine.” Bernadette beamed. “Didn’t even need stitches, just a bandage and strict orders not to play Horsies in the dining room until the floors are sanded.”

“Great.” The audience was still applauding us as we returned to our seats—or perhaps applauding Garrett and Kellyjean, the next authors coming up to the stage.

“How did it go withhimwhile I was gone?” she asked, nodding back at Will, who was still onstage. He had to moderate the next panel, after all.

“Oh, fine, fine,” I said. I wasn’t going to squeal, “He called me smart! And complicated! And beautiful! And said he likes my books!” because that would be absurd. Instead, I said, “Listen, I need to make a quick call of my own. I’ll be back in a few minutes. All right?”

Bernadette looked surprised. “Of course! Is it your dad? Is everything okay?”

“Everything’s great. I’ll explain later.”

I hurried up the aisle as the houselights, which had come up in order for us to find our way down the stage stairs, and Kellyjean and Garrett their way up, descended again. In the sudden dimness, however, instead of heading for the glowof the Exit sign, I found a vacant seat tucked in the last row, then sank into it. There, I switched on my cell phone, holding it low so that it wouldn’t disturb anyone.

Then, as Will did his best to moderate Kellyjean and Garrett’s continuing argument about the morality of young people using dark magic, I checked my messages.

Still nothing from Rosie.

But, as I sat there in the darkness wondering what could possibly have happened to Will to have made him change so much since I’d last seen him, something came over me, and I began to type. Words began pouring out of me.

And not just any words, either. The words toKitty Katz #27, which I realized in that momenthadto be about Kitty’s breakup with her longtime boyfriend, Rex Canine.

This was going to beexplosive. Rex was a fan favorite—readers adored that he was the star player on Cat Central High School’s basketball team while also always being there for Kitty, no matter what jam she happened to find herself in with all those kittens she cared for on weekends to make money to buy the latest designer duds she loved so much (and to save to pay for tuition at Cat Community College, of course, where she intended to major in criminal justice).

But let’s face it: Rex was boring.Soboring.

This was partly my fault, because I’d been writing him that way for twenty-six books—well, twenty-one, since he hadn’t shown up until book six, when Kitty’s best friend, Felicity, tried out for Cat Central’s cheerleading squad, and suddenly Kitty began going to all the school’s games to support her.

Now seemed like the perfect time to move a secondary character up into the spotlight: Raul Wolf, Kitty’s biggest rival. Editor of Cat Central High’s school paper, Raul was always beating Kitty at the things she loved: debate, spelling, the science fair. And he could be pretty arrogant about it, too.

But what if all this time that arrogance had been hiding a sensitive side that Kitty never knew existed? Plus a dark secret she’d discover while puppy sitting for Raul’s newly adopted baby sister, Mittens!

Suddenly Kitty is spending a lot of time with Raul Wolf, a boy she’s never liked... until now. Because now that she’s learned Raul’s secret, Kitty is feeling emotions she’d never thought possible for a dog she’s only ever considered her archenemy.

But whatisRaul’s secret? And what’s drawing Kitty to him? Could it be that beneath that arrogant lupine surface beats the warm, passionate heart of a—