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The station manager and her ex had been best buddies since high school. That’s how he had become an anchor.

And how Alli had landed the reporter job. And then lost it a few years later.

Brian grunted, which was his default when he didn’t know what else to say.

“You need to be more upbeat, more positive,” he tried, shifting the conversation slightly. “They can read your negative energy.”

“Are you making a joke about my aura or something?”

“Actually, yeah. I wasn’t going to say anything, but your aura is a bit grungy. You need to clean it up before the interview.”

She gave him a real smile this time.

“You’re a jerk.”

“But my aura is pristine.” Her brother cleared his throat noisily before taking another sip of his coffee. “You’ll get the job. You always do.”

The tell-tale scritch of Daisy’s paws on the tile floor announced her entrance before she could run over to Alli for love and pets. Her sister-in-law Tara was right behind the canine, her phone in her hand.

“Have you seen this?” Tara’s tone was filled with urgency.

She flashed the phone screen toward Allison and her brother, then planted herself at the edge of the island.

“Seen what?”

“Joel Winslow,” Tara said, voice dropping for effect. “Massive heart attack. He’s at the hospital, barely hanging on.”

She tapped the article open, then read the headline aloud: “Winslow Financial CEO Hospitalized in ‘Grave’ Condition.”

“How old is he?” Brian queried. “He seemed old when we lived here as kids, but then I thought everyone was old then.”

Alli didn’t know for sure, but she’d guess that Joel Winslow had to be in his mid-sixties.

“They say it happened at his home last night. Wife found him. Paramedics called,” Tara read out loud.

Allison scanned the screen that Tara held out. A grainy photo showed Joel Winslow at a ribbon-cutting, his gray hair parted in a line as sharp as the suit he wore.

“Who will run the family empire now?” the brother asked, leaning his hip against the counter. “They manage a lot of other people’s money.”

“It doesn’t say.” Tara squinted at her phone, fingers flying as she toggled between sources. “I’ve heard in town he was grooming one of his sons, maybe the oldest.”

“He’s got like three,” Allison said.

“Four, I think. And two daughters,” Tara replied. “One was a champion tennis player.”

Tara tucked away her phone in the pocket of her hoodie.

“I brought this to your attention because isn’t that the place you’re interviewing at the end of the week? The Winslow firm?”

“I am. It’s probably a hundred other people and me.”

“That might change now,” Brian said, gaze narrowed in thought. “Big shakeup at the top; they’ll need people who can keep things running.”

“Or they’ll freeze hiring until they figure it out,” Allison said, her voice flat.

That was the kind of luck she was having these days.

Brian finished his coffee and stacked the mug in the sink.