AN: I still don't own Gilmore Girls.

I also want to say a huge thanks to all of you readers and reviewers! I am amazed at the number of reviews/favorites/alerts that I've gotten on this story. Thank you so much!

Here's chapter five, in which we return to the Huntzbergers.

We will also see how Rory and Logan are faring.

Four days after the dinner, Shira decided that she'd been cooped up in the house long enough, so she booked herself a massage, and went to spend the morning having the stress forcibly removed from her body, followed by some retail therapy.

She returned home several hours later feeling much lighter. "Hello?" she called when she entered her house. "Maria, where are you?"

"Coming Mrs. Huntzberger," the maid called.

"Would you take these bags upstairs for me?" she asked as she thrust her packages at the woman.

"Yes ma'am."

"And do I have any messages?" she added as an afterthought.

"Yes ma'am, several," Maria said pulling a pile of message slips from her pocket. Then she took the bags up the stairs to the master bedroom.

Shira headed into the parlor to read her messages and return the calls. She looked at the first message. Marcy Anderson has to cancel tomorrow morning's tennis match, she'll call to reschedule. Shira was slightly relieved by this message, she only played tennis because Mitchum thought she needed a hobby.

She flipped to the second message. Bitsy Phelps needs to postpone lunch next week she has to fly out of town to see her daughter. Uh-oh. She quickly flipped through the rest of the messages. Every single one of them was a cancellation or postponement. Her face flushed red and tears of frustration streamed down her cheeks; she collapsed into the chair closest to her and exhaled sharply. The phone rang loudly startling her. She went to answer the phone but her hands were shaking too badly, so instead she chose to wait for Maria to get it.

A few moments later Maria called out to her, "Mrs. Huntzberger, Sally Mathews is on the phone for you."

"Thank you Maria, I'll take it in the parlor." She took a few deep breaths trying to calm her nerves and picked up the phone. "Sally, darling how are you?"

"Shira, hi. I'm doing okay, but unfortunately Charles has a last minute business trip and now I have to cancel our dinner plans next week," Sally told her.

"Oh, okay. Shall we reschedule?" Shira asked her calmly.

"Uh," Sally paused, "of course! But I'm not sure how long the trip is going to be, so let me call you when he's back in town."

"That sounds perfect," Shira lied.

"Sorry for the inconvenience Shira. I'll talk to you soon."

"It's no problem, I'll talk to you soon." Shira hung up the phone and swore aloud. She grabbed her cigarettes and walked into terrace.

The other shoe had finally dropped.

Mitchum spent the fourth morning after the dinner in his office working on an acquisition proposal for a new paper, and waiting for Straub to call him back.

Around 3:00 his intercom buzzed. "I told you I was not to be disturbed," he said into the phone.

"I'm sorry Sir, but you told me to interrupt you if Judge Hayden called," Bethany told him.

"I'm sorry Bethany, I forgot. Please put him through," Mitchum told her apologetically.

The phone at his desk rang once and he picked up, "This is Mitchum."

"Mitchum it's Straub Hayden," Straub told him.

"Hello Straub, how are you today?" he asked.

"I'm doing well, and yourself?" The polite society conversation was really annoying sometimes.

"Also fine. So to what do I owe the pleasure of this call?" he asked.

"I'm returning your call from yesterday, I'm assuming you were calling about the Miller deal."

"Oh yes, of course," Mitchum said. "Are you ready to proceed?"

"Yes. However, I do have one small bit of bad news," Straub proceeded. Mitchum felt his heart sink. "Unfortunately I can no longer contribute the amount we had initially discussed."

"How much can you contribute?" Mitchum asked nervously.

"I can only contribute half."

"HALF?!?!" Mitchum said loudly.

"I'm terribly sorry," Straub said.

"May I ask what changed?" he asked.

"I'm sorry, but I believe that information is irrelevant," Straub told him.

"Where am I supposed to get the additional funds on such short notice?" Mitchum asked sharply.

"Again Mitchum, I am sorry. Maybe try Richard Gilmore, I know he's always up for a good investment. I'm due in court in a few minutes so I really must go. Let me know when you need the money and I'll have a check couriered over."

Before Mitchum could even say goodbye the Judge hung up the phone. Mitchum slammed down his receiver and swore.

Where was he going to get that kind of money on short notice? He and Straub were supposed to be equal partners, and how he needed to find someone to come up with the difference. He could always pony up the dough himself, but his financial advisors would kill him. He stood up and stormed out of his office.

"Bethany, I'm leaving for the day. Cancel the rest of my appointments."

"Sir?" she said hesitantly. He never left early, he knew she was curious, but instead of saying anything further he shot her a dark look and strode to the elevator.

Mitchum stormed into his front door slamming it behind him. "Shira!" he bellowed.

"I believe she's on the terrace Mr. Huntzberger," Maria told him.

"Is she smoking?" he asked. The maid merely nodded.

"Shira, I'm home," he called when he opened the door to the terrace.

"You're home early," she said with a sniffle. He looked at her to find that she had a cigarette in one hand and a cocktail in the other. Her eyes were bloodshot and her nose was red and puffy. She'd been crying. "Why are you home early?" she asked.

"Straub finally called," he said in a defeated voice.

"And?" she asked waiting for him to continue. "Did he back out of your deal?"

"No." He sighed. "But he withdrew half of his funding."

"What does that mean?" Shira asked.

"It means that I have to find more investors," he told her.

"Well it shouldn't be that hard to find a person willing to invest," she encouraged. "It's only half of what Straub originally agreed to. I'm sure there are lots of people that can do that."

Mitchum looked at her like she'd lost her mind. "Shira, you don't even know how much money it is. Not a lot of people have that much money to invest on short notice. This is going to delay the deal, and I'll probably have to get more than one person to pick up the slack. That means more partners, which means more problems. I wish you could have just kept your damn mouth shut at that dinner the other night."

"How do you know it was the dinner that made him back out? Maybe he and Francine are having problems."

"Shira, he suggested that I call Richard Gilmore for the other half of the funds. Of course it had to do with that dinner!" he shouted. She burst into tears.

"At least yours is only one deal Mitchum!" she shouted back at him.

"How was your day dear?" Mitchum shot back at her sarcastically.

She began to tell him about her day full of cancellations and postponements.

"Maybe it's a coincidence," he said.

"I got a call from Susan Smith on the hospital fundraising committee, and she told me that she knew I was busy and therefore I didn't need to worry about the committee this year. She kicked me off a charity committee! They always need help!" Shira shrieked.

"Calm down Shira. I'm sure this will all blow over."

"You need to make this stop Mitchum. I can't believe this is happening because of that stupid girl!"

"I'm not sure what I can do, but I can tell you that calling her "that stupid girl" isn't going to help at all," he told her sharply.

"Mitchum!" she whined.

"Fine," he acquiesced, picking up his cell phone.

Logan and Rory were curled up watching a movie when his phone began to ring. He looked down at the number. His father. He sighed deeply. "I'm sorry Ace, I've got to take this call. I've been ignoring him for the past few days, and if I don't take a call soon he's going to show up."

"That's fine," she told him as she paused the movie.

"Huntzberger," he answered his phone.

"Logan, it's your father."

"Hey Dad," he said exasperatedly. "What can I do for you today?"

"Would you please tell your girlfriend that vengeance isn't an attractive quality?" Mitchum said sharply.

"Rory," he emphasized her name, "is the least vindictive person I know."

"Sure."

"What's going on Dad?" Logan asked getting annoyed. Mitchum went on to tell him about all of the things that had happened to them during the day. "Well I'm sorry about that Dad, but I'm positive that Rory had nothing to do with it."

"Fine, then could you at least ask her to make it stop?" Mitchum asked.

"Sure Dad. Anything for you and Mom," he said with a smirk.

"I'm serious Logan, your mother is about to have a break down!"

"I'll see what I can do" Logan told him, and then hung up the phone.

"What was that about?" Rory asked curiously, snuggling back into Logan's side.

"My dad called to cry uncle!" he told her with a laugh.

"What does that mean?"

"Apparently my mom has been voted out of society, and one of my dad's business deal, the one with your grandfather, has gone slightly sideways. My dad thinks that you're behind it, and told me to tell you that vengeance is not an attractive quality. "

"He thinks I'm behind this?" Rory asked incredulously.

"Yep. And if you're not behind it, he'd like you to make it stop. I told you Ace, he's off his rocker."

"Do you think my grandparents are behind this?" she asked nervously.

"Absolutely!" he exclaimed.

"And you're not mad?"

"Ace, my parents deserve it. If the situation was reversed I have absolutely no doubt that my parents would do the exact same thing."

"But it's so mean!" she said.

"They're defending you Rory! It would be weird if they didn't," he told her with a laugh.

"I just never expected it, not from the Haydens."

Logan put his arm around her and tugged her close. "You deserve it Ace."

"Oh, speaking of grandparents, Emily called today. She expects us for dinner tomorrow night."

"Rory," Logan whined.

"Since we had dinner with your parents, Emily thinks its only fair that she gets to have dinner with us too," she told him relaying her grandmother's call.

"Alright," he agreed. "Hey, speaking of your grandparents, I believe you owe me a story missy!"

She chuckled at the thought. "What are you doing tomorrow?"

"Aside from dinner at your grandparents?" he asked. She nodded. "I have one class in the morning, then nothing else, why?"

"Just a sec," she told him as she pulled out her cell phone and dialed a number.

"Loin fruit!" Lorelai answered on the second ring.

"Mommy!!" she said back.

"What's going on?" Logan knew Rory had told him about the drama from the dinner the other night, and he was sure Lorelai was still expecting fall out.

"Not much, I was just wondering if you wanted to have lunch with me and Logan tomorrow."

"I guess I can do that for my only daughter," Lorelai told her.

"Great! We'll come to the inn for lunch tomorrow."

"See you then Kid," Lorelai told her.

"Ace, what's going on? You want me to have lunch with your mom, then dinner with your grandparents in the same day? That might be a little much."

"You want to hear the story about the rhinestone penis shirt right?" she asked.

"Why can't you tell me the story?"

"Trust me, she tells it way better than I do."

"Okay," Logan said, deciding to trust her judgment on the matter.

"Don't worry, my mom is cool," she said, leaning in to kiss him on the cheek. "Now lets get back to the movie.

AN: Are you guys ready for the last chapter? I don't intend to go as far as dinner with Richard and Emily, just lunch with Lorelai at the inn – in which I'm sure she will tell us how she feels about the whole situation.

A couple of people have asked if Christopher would be making an appearance, and my answer is not really. We may hear a little about Christopher's reaction during lunch with Lorelai, but since Lorelai is currently not speaking to Christopher (the rewedding debacle), he will not be joining us for lunch.

Thanks again for reading and reviewing – I look forward to your opinions! - S