“I thought you couldn’t use your phone during class?”
“It’s an elective. It’s not even a real class,” she said. “Like I was saying, I was playing around and ran across this site for Black entrepreneurs, specifically Black women entrepreneurs. They’re all about uplifting worthy small business owners, and we all know whomyfavorite small business owner is.”
“Kara, come out with it.”
“You’re messing up my big build-up,” she said. “Anyway, I nominated Barkingham Palace and you were picked as a finalist!”
“Nominated it for what?”
“It’s like a scholarship or something. I didn’t read everything, but I know that the grand prize is two hundred and fifty thousand dollars and mentorship by some bigwig business person.”
Ashanti set down the cookie she had been decorating. “Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars?”
“Yes! You also get an ad in several magazines across the country and other online promotion. It is a huge deal!” Shestarted typing on her phone. “It’s a good thing Atilla sent that email the other day. I would have missed their response. Check your phone, I just sent it to you.”
She needed to get back to this order, but it would have to wait. Ashanti opened her email app and stopped cold.
“What is…?” Kara asked.
Ashanti read over the email that had come to her inbox a half hour ago. She brought her hand up to her mouth.
“Oh. My. God,” Ashanti said.
“What?” Kara asked, running to her. She tried to grab Ashanti’s phone, but she pulled it out of her reach. “Step back, Kara.”
“What’s going on? Is it the contest?”
Ashanti read through the short email twice before looking up at her sister. “Up Early with Leah and Luke!wants Duchess and Puddin’ on their show!”
“What! Ohmigod!” Kara screamed. “Ohmigod! Ohmigod! Let me see!”
Kendra came running down the stairs. “Who died?” she asked.
“No one died,” Ashanti said. “Everybody, calm down. Let me read over the email again.” The oven timer buzzed. “Shit! Kara, go get the treats out of the oven.”
“That’s three curse words from you in less than an hour,” Kendra said.
“No shit?” Kara said.
Ashanti ignored them and escaped to her bedroom. She closed the door and sat on the bed, reading over the email for the third time. Then she sent a text to Ridley and Evie.
Get here quick.
An hour later, Ashanti, Kara, Evie, and Ridley all sat around the living room, packaging Duchess Delights dog biscuits and hammering out what Ashanti would need for her national television debut. Kendra had returned to her room, once again a passenger on the surly teen train.
Unsure what Ashanti’s admittedly vague text was about, Ridley had arrived with wine, whiskey, and chocolate—the trio to cure all that ails, in her friend’s opinion. They’d tabled the alcohol for now so they could remain focused. The chocolates, however, had proved to be the fuel Ashanti needed.
“When do they want the dogs there?” Ridley asked. She stood in front of a poster board that had been tacked to the wall, a Sharpie poised in her hand.
“Friday morning,” Ashanti said, rubbing the spot on Duchess’s head that made her dog’s right hind leg shake.
Ridley turned to Kara. “I know you’re used to running point on marketing and promo for the daycare, but this is above your skill set, sugarplum.”
Kara held up her hands. “And above my pay grade. I know when to step back.”
“Good. Now, I have a friend who works in PR who owes me a favor,” Ridley said. “I’m going to bring Dom in on this. She is kickass at this kind of stuff. She’ll have an entire media blitz set up in less than a day.”
“How much does this Dom cost?” Ashanti asked.
