Excerpt of Threaded for Trouble by Janet Bolin

First, Felicity banished my dogs.

Naturally, I objected. "When In Stitches is open, Sally– Forth and Tally–Ho always stay in their pen." They could wag their plumelike tails at shoppers or trot downstairs to the apartment whenever they wanted a nap, snack, or drink.

Felicity glanced at my name tag, embroidered in willowy green script on white. " Willow—" She scrunched up her nose as if my name smelled. "Our guests may have allergies."

Most of our guests would be my usual customers, ladies who came on the Threadville tour bus four days a week to shop and take classes in all of the crafty stores. Threadville tourists loved my dogs and had never complained about allergies.

However, Felicity was my guest—sort of—and I would have to put up with her only during the first part of the morning. Hiding my annoyance, I gave in and herded my two active dogs, a brother and sister, one of whose parents must have been a border collie, into the stairway to the apartment and closed the door.

That's when the real reason for their banishment became clear. Felicity informed me that their vacant pen would be a perfect stage for our speeches.

Speeches? True, I had memorized a short one about how happy I was that someone from this corner of Pennsylvania—not that I'd ever met her—had won a top–of– the–line sewing and embroidery machine in a national contest. I supposed Felicity might want to say a few words as she presented the carton to the winner.

But no. Felicity was not handing over a carton. "Why is our Chandler Champion not yet unpacked?" she demanded. "Did you not test it as instructed?"

I attempted a smile, but my teeth clenched together, which could not have looked either friendly or professional.

"We checked it thoroughly. It works well. It's a great machine. I got up early and packed it—"

"No, no, no, no, no!" Felicity didn't really need to say no that many times. I caught the gist before the second one. "It must be seen and admired. We do want to sell more of them, don't we." It was a command, not a question.

I gestured to the row of sewing machines behind me, which included a Chandler Champion exactly like the one in the carton, and two other, more modest Chandler models.

Felicity gasped. Actually, it was more like a shriek. "We must, simply must, hide all of your machines except the Chandlers. Before our audience arrives. We wouldn't want them looking at Chandler's competitors, would we."

Another command.

But not one I was about to take. "They'll want to compare," I pointed out, "feature for feature."

She folded her arms and tapped the toe of one scuffed brown shoe against my shop's beautiful walnut floor. "And price for price. Okay, they can stay. Our business plan at Chandler is to make the best machines for the best price."

Yes, it was also their motto, printed in huge red letters on the white plastic banner she'd had me string above my display of natural fabrics. Call me snooty, but if I had been in charge of making that banner, I would have used my machines to embroider it. On canvas or ripstop nylon.

She marched toward the front of the store. "Let's bring that small table . . ." She shoved aside my two cute bistro chairs, then lugged my round metal table, complete with the tablecloth I'd embroidered, toward the back of the store.

She was careful not to clank against the Chandlers, but I had to steer the table's legs past the other sewing machines and racks of dazzling embroidery threads.

She banged the table down in the middle of the dog pen, wadded up my tablecloth, and thrust it in my direction.

"Get rid of that. Those aren't Chandler motifs."

I had designed those autumn leaves myself, using photos I'd taken and software from another manufacturer, one of my favorites. "Is Chandler planning to produce digitizing software?" Best software at the best price? That would be good.

"That's for me to know." A trade secret—fine. "Now, unpack that machine and put it here for everyone to admire." For the first time, she seemed to notice the chairs I had lined up for our audience. Another little scream. "You'll have to put most of those chairs away. Fewer chairs filled with people will make a better impression than lots of unoccupied chairs, and Mr. Chandler should already be here." She looked about to go into a panicked tailspin.

Mr. Chandler? The owner of the company? Felicity should have warned me. Not that I would have arranged my embroidery boutique differently or cooled a magnum of champagne, but it would have been nice to know what to expect. What other surprises did this woman have up her brown polyester sleeve?