Once Upon Stilettos (Enchanted Inc #2) by Shanna Swendson Page A

happen with Ethan. The kiss had been a good start.
    “It’s a date,” I said. “Should we leave from here, meet somewhere later, or what?”
    “We can leave from here. I’m not planning anything fancy you’d need to change clothes for.”
    “What are you planning?”
    He gave me a wink. “That would be a surprise. See you Friday after work.” Then he got out of his chair, opened the office door, and left.
    Within seconds, Trix was hovering in my doorway. “Hmm, looks like the date last weekend went well.”
    “I guess so.”
    “He did come to ask you out, right?”
    “Yeah, looks like it. Did he have any other business here?”
    She shook her head. “Nope. He’d just shown up when you came out in a caffeine frenzy. I think he was here specifically to see you.”
    “Wow.” I wasn’t used to someone actually pursuing me—aside from the brief time when Jeff was stalking me, and that was part of an enchantment, anyway. I had to admit it was kind of nice.
    “He’s not bad at all, for a human.”
    “Yeah, I suppose I could do a lot worse. I have done a lot worse. And now I need to think of something to wear to work Friday that will carry over to a casual post-work date.”
    “Did he tell you where you’ll be going?”
    “He said it was a surprise.”
    She rolled her eyes. “Men! Don’t they know we need to prepare ourselves?”
    She had just fluttered away when Merlin appeared. “Have you made any progress on the investigation?” he asked.
    “Just enough to know that all of our employees are entirely dysfunctional. Is there a company policy against magical duels during working hours on company property? I sure hope so.”
    “Have none of the tips been helpful?”
    “No, not really. Most of them have nothing to do with the immediate situation.” My phone rang and I ignored it, letting it add to the pileup of voice mail. “I’m starting to wonder if that might be the point to all this. Maybe it’s more about sabotage than about spying.”
    “Sabotage?”
    “Well, think about it. If everyone’s making calls to rat out their co-workers, they’re not doing their work. You can’t have effective teamwork if people don’t trust each other, and nobody trusts each other right now. We’re at a standstill.”
    He stroked his beard in thought. “You may be right. How would you go about investigating that angle?”
    Suddenly it struck me that this was something I knew all about. I was from a small town, so I was an expert in gossip. I might not know anything about investigating corporate espionage, but I knew all about how rumors spread. With increased confidence, I said, “Track the grapevine to its source. Find out who told whom what and when. You said it yourself yesterday—the only people who knew about the spying were you, Owen, me, and the spy. If we find out who was the first one so eager to let others know there might be a spy, it might lead us to our mole.”
    “Excellent deduction. I look forward to seeing the results. Please keep me posted.”
    Coming up with a reasonably valid-sounding theory made me bold enough to say, “Sir? There is one other thing I wanted to talk to you about.”
    “What is it, Katie?”
    “My parents are coming to town next week, for Thanksgiving. I know we already get Thursday and Friday off. I was wondering if I could maybe take a little more time off that week, just a few hours here and there. I know we’re busy, and I’ve got this investigation to work on, but if I’m spending time with them, then they can’t be asking to visit me at work.”
    “I don’t see a problem with that. We can see how things are going later in the week and decide then when would be best for you to take off.”
    “Thank you. I really appreciate it.”
    “In the meantime, continue your efforts. That was an excellent theory. Good work.”
    There was one possibility with my theory that I hated to consider. If the object was more to stir things up than to actually spy, it took