In her black dress, a nicely marked-down sale item from a clothing store, she was hardly going to raise any eyebrows. This crowd would wear couture, and the women she met as she walked in the door certainly didn’t buy their dresses off-the-rack.

She’d never seen such beautiful dresses. She felt dowdy by comparison. But then, she saw a few other women who were dressed much like she was. How obliging of the leading citizens to invite the working poor, she thought wickedly, and smiled as she went down the receiving line. She didn’t know a single face, but a tall, handsomely dressed woman came to speak to her.

“You’re Willow Shane,” the woman said gently, using Mina’s pen name. “I’m Pam Simpson, your hostess. I’ve read that copy of SPECTRE that you gave Bart three times already! He was such a doll to loan it to me. It’s going all the way to the top of the New York Times list, I just know it! I’ve bought copies for all my friends!”

Mina flushed. “Thanks so much. I’m glad you liked it.”

“The realism. Wow! You actually go out with commando groups to do the research?”

“I actually do,” Mina confessed. “It’s an ongoing adventure.”

“Well, I love the way you write. And I’m so very proud that you came! You must have invitations from everyone, but you chose to come here.”

Mina laughed. She was still getting used to her pen name. Few people knew it, even around Catelow. “Thank you so much for giving this party for me.”

“It’s my pleasure. I wanted to show you off,” Pam confessed, and laughed. “Your books are so full of humor and adventure. I adore them. You’re so talented! This new book is the best of the bunch. You wait—it will be the one that catapults you to the top of the national bestseller lists!”

“You’ll inflate my head to a shocking size,” Mina cautioned, flushing. “And my ego as well. You mustn’t do that. I’ll become haughty and unmanageable.”

Pam laughed with pure delight. “Never! Come, and let me introduce you to some people. A lot of us read you, including at least one of the husbands. He hunts in the fall. He takes your books with him to read while he’s waiting lonely hours for deer or elk to show up!”

“How very flattering,” Mina said, and meant it.

“And I shouldn’t say,” Pam added, lowering her voice, “but at least one husband used your latest book to compromise his wife. He bought it in a bookstore and brought it home. She said she’d have done anything to get it.” She laughed. “And just between us, I believe she did!”

“Oh my.” Mina burst out laughing.

“And there’s my friend Mary,” she indicated a brunette standing just apart from the others near the drinks table. “She’s dying to meet you…!”

MINA HAD BEEN introduced to so many people, her head was spinning with names. But she and Sassy and John, Sassy’s husband, moved to a corner to talk cattle after the first fervor of Mina’s presence was past with her hostess and guests. They didn’t drink, which set them apart from some of the other guests, who were going through their hosts’ stock of liquor like water.