The previous body shop manager at Marcus Ford-“The Best Deals in Dixie”-was fired for wearing a coffee-stained shirt to work. That the stain hadn’t occurred until after he’d been on the job for two hours didn’t matter. Old man Marcus had an image for his employees, by God, and they’d better live up to it.

Jake Brighton had no idea how many of the stories about Marcus’s tirades were true, but in his current position as spear-catcher du jour, the tales weighed heavily on his mind as he sat stranded in shift-change traffic from the Zebra Plant. It just didn’t seem right that a town the size of Phoenix, South Carolina, should have a rush hour. He checked his watch one more time and sighed. Eight o’clock, straight up.

Damn.

According to the sign on the door, Marcus Ford’s body shop opened for business at 7:00 A.M., six days a week. As manager, Jake made it a point to be at his desk by six-thirty, to greet the tradesmen as they started trickling in around six forty-five.

Jake knew from his interview five months ago that Clint Marcus couldn’t abide tardiness, but he was reasonably sure the seventy-year-old widower would look the other way just this once. Two months ago Jake had given a leg up on the waiting list to Lucas Banks, an obscenely wealthy local attorney whose family vacation had been threatened by a fender-bender. According to the letter of praise sent to Marcus, “Jake Brighton and his team are the best in the business, and you can count on me as a devoted customer forever.”

The letter had stretched Marcus’s scowl into a rare smile. “It’s about time we got a decent man in this slot,” he’d said at yesterday’s weekly employee meeting. “Keep this up, Jake, and you’ll have one hell of a future here.” High praise, indeed, from a man known to roast managers for sport.