I am using a 2 column setup with a featured post. The issue is that if I set it to show 9 posts they all fit correctly on the first page (with the featured post) but the odd number on the second page leaves one slot blank because there is no featured post.
Is there a way to set it so that it completes the whole page?
How did you set up the featured post? Any chance you can link us to the page?
This kind of thing is notoriously difficult to deal with in WordPress. Usually it means using the pre_get_posts filter to change how many posts per page display on those paginated pages.