The Bravo Billionaire. Christine Rimmer

knew that it was his mother’s money and influence that had landed the dog groomer in such a prime location. And it was Blythe’s connections with wealthy animal owners all over the Southland that had brought the Hewitt woman a huge clientele right from the first.

      But he also realized that it was the Hewitt woman herself who had somehow managed to keep all those fickle, demanding, big-spending pet lovers coming back. From the day it opened its doors, PetRitz had been a success. Everyone who was anyone took their precious pedigreed pooches to Emma Lynn Hewitt’s exclusive pet salon.

      And Jonas had been standing on the sidewalk long enough.

      He strode up to the glass door and went inside, where he was instantly bombarded with color and sound.

      The waiting room boasted hibiscus-pink walls, lots of big, soft chairs and a skylight overhead that let in plenty of light. There were plants everywhere, palms and huge, trailing coleus, ficus trees, giant ferns and big-leaved begonias. Among the greenery, there were several fish tanks in which bright-colored tropical fish darted about and a couple of huge terrariums where large reptiles basked under glowing heat lamps. A few customers were waiting, sitting in the fat chairs, looking prosperous and contented, thumbing through copies of Pet Life and People. Their animals waited with them. A dignified Irish setter, patient on a leash. A Burmese cat hissing in a carrier. A parrot that kept whistling and asking, “What’s the matter, pretty baby?”

      Music was playing. The Dixie Chicks, he thought. Which figured.

      And he could also hear bird sounds—not including the parrot. Piped in or real? Had to be recorded. He didn’t see any birds perched among the greenery.

      There was a reception counter opposite the door. Behind it, at a computer, sat a plus-sized young woman with hair the same color as the counter: jet-black. The young woman wore a smock the same screaming pink as the walls.

      Jonas crossed the room and stood right in front of her. She punched up something on the keyboard, scowled at the screen, then looked up at him, ditching the scowl for a welcoming smile. “Hi there. Need some help?” She wore a rhinestone in her nose, three studs in her left ear and four in her right. On her ample pink bosom rode a black lacquer name tag with pink metallic lettering. Pixie, it read.

      “Well, Pixie. I’d like to speak with Emma Lynn.”

      The black brows inched closer together on the wide forehead. “Wadeaminute. I know who you are. Blythe’s son. The one they call the Bravo Billionaire.”

      “Call me Jonas. Please.”

      Pixie beamed in pleasure. “All right. I’ll do that. Jonas.”

      “May I speak with Emma Lynn?”

      Pixie heaved a huge sigh and her rather close-set eyes grew scarily moist. “I’m so sorry—about Blythe. She was the greatest.”

      “Yes. There was no one quite like her. Now…would you get me Emma Lynn?”

      “Oh. Yeah, sure.” Pixie got up from her chair and went to a black door on her side of the counter. “I’ll tell her you’re here. Won’t be a sec.”

      Pixie was gone for more than a sec.

      Approximately two minutes after she disappeared, another woman in a pink smock came through the black door and took Pixie’s place behind the counter. Jonas continued to wait, moving to the side every time a client approached to pick up a pet or drop one off.

      It occurred to him after he’d been standing there for about five minutes, listening to twittering birds and the Dixie Chicks and then after the Dixie Chicks, to Sheryl Crow, that he felt like a salesman. Someone in pet supplies, briefcase in hand, waiting for the owner to come out and grant him a few minutes of her precious time.

      Waiting.

      His least favorite activity.

      And he’d been doing it a lot lately. Way too much.

      Because Emma Lynn Hewitt wouldn’t make up her damn mind.

      There was another black door on his side of the counter, on the same wall as the one behind it. A third woman in a pink smock came out of that door twice to take pets from the people at the counter. It didn’t take a Mensa candidate to figure out that the two doors led to the same hallway.

      When the second hand on the big wall clock behind the counter had gone around for the seventh time since Pixie had left him, Jonas decided he’d had enough. He turned around and went through the door on his side of the counter.

      “Uh. Excuse me,” the woman behind the counter called after him. “You can’t go back there….”

      He ignored her and pushed the door shut behind him.

      He was in a long, pink hallway, with three black doors on either side, and one at each end. Sheryl Crow and the birds continued to serenade him.

      He stepped across the hall and pushed open a door. It was some kind of lounge, with counters and a refrigerator, a coffeemaker, a couple of couches against the wall, a round table and several chairs. Yet another pink-smocked woman sat at the table sipping coffee and reading a paperback novel. She looked up and frowned at him.

      “Excuse me,” he said, and pulled the door shut again.

      He tried the door next to it.

      An office, with a desk and a big pink swivel chair. Lots of plants, just as in the reception room. Pictures on the bookcases—one of his mother, his sister and the Yorkies out by the pool at Angel’s Crest.

      Her office, he thought. But where the hell was she? He ducked out of that room and shut that door, too.

      Before he could open another one, Pixie emerged from the door at the far end of the hall.

      She frowned at him reproachfully. “Jonas. I said I’d be right back.”

      He walked toward her. “Where is she, Pixie?”

      Pixie stopped looking reproachful and started looking nervous. She backed up against the door she’d just come through. “Uh. I’m sorry. Right now, she can’t be disturbed.”

      “She can’t.”

      “No.”

      Jonas halted about two feet from where Pixie stood blocking the door at the end of the hall. “Why not?”

      “She, uh, she’s working with an especially sensitive client at the moment. She told me to tell you she’ll be getting in touch with you real soon.”

      “Real soon?”

      “That’s right.”

      Jonas flexed his fingers around the handle of his briefcase. “Pixie.”

      “Uh. Yeah?”

      “I want you to move away from that door.”

      Pixie’s plump chin quivered and the rhinestone in her nose seemed to be blinking at him. “No, I can’t do that.”

      “Yes, you can. And I think you should.” He took the three steps that were necessary to bring him right up close to her.

      She looked at him and he looked at her.

      “I’m not a very nice man, Pixie. Do you understand?”

      Slowly, she nodded.

      “Get out of my way.”

      Pixie maintained the stare-down for another ten seconds. That was all she could take. Then, with a small moan, she sidled to the right.

      “Thank you.” Jonas opened the door.

      Beyond it, the walls were cobalt blue with white trim and the floor was black-and-white linoleum, a classic checkerboard pattern. A pink-smocked Emma Lynn Hewitt stood by a metal-topped table with some sort of adjustable pole attached to it, a noose at the end of the pole. On the table, below the dangling noose, sat a dog. A very small dog—perhaps seven inches tall and six pounds, max.