Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
As predicted, Carol went head over heels for my mural idea.
She told me to make it a contest and post about it right away so people could start designing their entries.
It was nice to have a few wins from the start in a new job.
I brought some takeout back to the inn and spent the night hedonistically eating in bed and playing around on my phone. A girl needs a night like that.
I enjoyed my first good quality night of sleep and woke refreshed and ready to take on another day. The thrill of actually looking forward to going to work had still not worn off. Neither did my love for coffee.
Entering the dining area of the inn, I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply at my lover’s scent. Sweet, sweet java.
“Is this some new kind of yoga? Where you stand still in a room full of food and breathe deeply?”
I opened my eyes and smirked at Aaron. “It’s all the rage. You should join in.”
He lifted his plate. “I would, but I’ve already buttered my bagel. Join me instead?” He motioned to a table where he’d draped his suit jacket over the back of a chair.
“Sure,” I said. “Let me grab some food and I’ll be right over.”
“Namaste.” He gave me a little bow.
I selected a cherry Danish and filled a mug with steaming wake-up juice. Then I took the seat opposite Aaron and gave him a polite smile.
“I’m glad this isn’t weird,” he said. “I was worried it would be weird between us now.”
“Why?” I asked with faux bewilderment. “Just because we found a dead body? That happens to me every time I eat dinner with a man.”
He gave a sharp laugh. “Okay, now you made it weird.”
“I always do,” I said, taking a bite of my Danish. I took a moment to let it melt in my mouth and tried not to moan. “So how are things going?”
“Surprisingly fine.” He took a sip of coffee. “By the way Sheriff Santa, or whatever his name is, acted that night I thought I’d need our family lawyers up here ASAP. But the whole thing just sort of went away.”
“They never asked you to go down to the station?” I asked, surprised.
“Nope. You?”
“No, but they also weren’t accusing me of murder.”
“Lucky you,” he snorted.
“I wonder what happened,” I said. “Not that I’m complaining. I’m glad they’re not giving you any trouble.”
He shrugged. “My guess is they found evidence consistent with an accident.”
Or maybe Mayor Carol made it all go away to keep bad press off the town.
“What are you thinking?” he asked. “You’re frowning at that bite of Danish like it’s poisoned.”
I didn’t want to share a negative theory about my boss. Especially when I had no evidence. So I popped the bite into my mouth and fake-choked.
“Seriously, don’t even joke,” he said.
I pouted. “A girl can’t even pretend to be dying from a poisoned Danish anymore. What’s this world coming to?”
He glanced at his watch. “I don’t even know how to respond to that, but I’m already late for a meeting. Hope to run into you again, you strange and intriguing weirdo.”
I raised my mug in response. Two days in a row, amazing compliments from handsome men. But as I checked my phone, I realized that I, too, had to run to work.
I walked the short distance with a smile on my face.
As predicted, we’d gotten a couple inches of pure white powder overnight.
The roads and sidewalks were already cleared.
Christmasville was on top of that. Tourists couldn’t spend their money if they couldn’t walk to the stores.
And Carol had bragged to me that installing heated sidewalks had been the biggest accomplishment of her first year in office.
But now, Mayor Carol was at the front desk in the lobby of the town hall rather than in her office.
Mary’s desk. She was opening drawers and rifling through papers, looking quite agitated.
She was always put together, not a hair out of place.
But this morning her blouse was misbuttoned and a smear of eyeliner spread from her left eye.
“I can’t find anything,” she said as I approached. “Mary had her own way of organizing, and I’m really flustered here.”
I peeled off my gloves and shoved them in the pockets of my coat. “Can I help?”
“Well, that influencer I told you about is here.” She pointed toward her office. “She’s contracted to stay through the tree-lighting ceremony on Friday night. I’m hoping you can work with her to get the most out of our investment.”
I nodded. “Of course. Where is she staying?”
“The Christmas Creek Inn. So it shouldn’t be hard to keep an eye on her and make sure she’s hitting on all of the best Christmasville has to offer.”
“Absolutely. I’m on it.”
“Wonderful.” She blew out a breath of frustration. “I need to post a job listing to replace Mary. It’s just …” her voice trailed off.
Painful, I guessed. Even though Mary didn’t have the best attitude, they’d worked together for a long while. You see someone every day and then they’re just gone. It’s hard to replace them.
“Perhaps a temp agency can send someone until you’re ready to start the hiring process,” I suggested.
She pointed at me. “Great idea, Kelsey. You’re always thinking.”
I puffed my chest out a bit, pleased with the compliment.
“Shall we go into my office and I’ll introduce you to the influencer?” Carol asked.
“Lead the way,” I said.
As she rose from the desk, I silently stopped her. I fixed her missed button, grabbed a tissue from the desk, and wiped off the offending eyeliner smudge. Then I nodded wordlessly.
“Thank you,” she breathed with a look of gratitude in her eyes.
I shrugged. “Real queens fix each other’s crowns. Now, go be mayor.”
That little moment seemed to snap her back into place. She straightened her shoulders and catwalked to the office, her heels clicking on the floor.
She made it a few steps before me, announcing, “Our social media manager is here, and she’s going to be your main point of contact.”
I followed her into the office, wide smile on my face. Then that smile dropped to the floor.
No. No, no, no.
It was her. With her long, black hair—straight and shiny enough to be in a shampoo commercial. Her gorgeous green eyes, which she filtered to make even brighter in her photos. And her tall, lithe body—that had been all over Trent. I gulped audibly.
Isabella seemed just as startled to see me. Both of us stared, wide-eyed, jaws slack.
Carol glanced back and forth between us awkwardly. “Do you two know each other?”
We continued to stare unblinking like a game of chicken.
Isabella’s mouth opened.
“Yes!” I blurted. “Actually, we worked together before. On a previous client. Very brief. Kelsey, remember?”
I held my hand out, narrowing my eyes with a silent “play along” message.
“Of course,” she said coolly and gave my hand a limp shake. “I’m Isabella.”
“Right,” I said, as if the name hadn’t been burned into my memory. Along with her personal photo of Trent. In her bed. Naked.
“Ah, that’s right,” Carol said. “When I was researching your work history, Kelsey, I found myself on your agency’s website. They had a list of influencers they work with, and that’s how I found Isabella here.”
“Wonderful,” I said with a tight smile.
“Hey, shorten that to Belle and you’d really fit in here,” Carol said with a chuckle. Then an uncomfortable silence stretched on for a long moment, until she clapped her hands. “Well, I’ll let you take it from here, Kelsey. In your office. And I’m going to get to work on that temp idea you had.”
“Of course.” I smiled sweetly. “Isabella, you can follow me next door to my office, and we’ll come up with a game plan for the day.”
As soon as we were in my office with the door closed, I dropped the act. “Did you know this contract would have you working with me?”
“Of course not,” she snapped. “I never intended to see you again, let alone work with you.”
“Well, we agree on one thing.”
Her scowl deepened. “I’m not even on the agency’s list of recommended influencers anymore, thanks to you. I’m lucky I got this stupid gig. I’m going to tell the mayor that you ruined a person’s career out of a personal vendetta.”
I gritted my teeth. “Or maybe I’ll tell our buttoned-up mayor that you submitted inappropriate photos to your last client, and I don’t think you’re a good fit for our family-friendly town.”
She let out a sound that was as close to a roar as I’d heard from a human being. “You wouldn’t!”
I pointed a finger at her face. “Try me.”
Out of arguments, Isabella crossed her arms and pouted for a long moment, like a child denied candy from the grocery checkout lane.
I closed my eyes and took a breath. Cool heads had to prevail here.
As much as I would have liked to light her up and get her fired, it wouldn’t be a good look.
I’d have to explain our sordid history to Carol.
And Carol may not like finding out that I quit my last job without notice.
My manager had been sympathetic and gave me a great recommendation, but I’m sure a couple of the clients I left in the lurch would feel differently.
I didn’t want to lose this job. I was happy here.
And I was sure Isabella wouldn’t want to lose another contract.
Especially after it appeared our old agency dropped her.
“How about this?” I suggested. “You do your job. I’ll do mine. Then you leave, and we never work with each other again.”
She hesitated for a long moment, like she had any other choice. Then she spat, “Fine by me.”
Okay, how were we going to do this? Carol wanted us to spend a lot of time together, but we’d end up killing each other.
However, the one thing I did know about Isabella—other than the fact that she was a boyfriend stealer—was that she was good at her job.
She had a loyal following with a high engagement rate and good overall metrics.
She could help maximize the reach of a campaign.
And she didn’t need me holding her hand to do it.
“Here’s the plan,” I said. “Let’s head out now. I’ll show you the basics, the places you want to hit, and trust you to take it yourself from there. We let Carol think we’re spending more time together than we really are. You kill this campaign, get paid, and move on.”
I could tell from her squinty-eyed expression that she wanted to find fault in my plan, just to argue with me. But there was none. It was the best thing for the both of us.
Sighing like I’d asked her to climb Mount Everest, she grabbed her handbag and slipped on a pair of oversized sunglasses. “Let’s go.”
As we strolled down Main Street, I pointed out some shops and restaurants she might want to visit.
I told her about the park with the gazebo and skating pond.
Then I explained the details and timing of the tree-lighting ceremony Friday night.
After that, she would leave town, and I would breathe again.
“You may also want to do a live or two from the inn you’re staying at, Christmas Creek,” I suggested. “It’s beautiful. And they have cookie decorating contests and visits from Santa. Plus, the owner, Grace, is a single mom who works her butt off.”
But Isabella seemed to have stopped listening to me a while ago. She scowled, her nose turning up like she’d sniffed sour milk.
“This town is a total cheese-fest,” she sneered.
I stared, stone-faced. Did she really think a town that celebrated Christmas every day wasn’t going to be cheesy? “That’s the point. It’s supposed to be over-the-top.”
“But not in a cheap way,” she said dismissively.
It wasn’t a cheap way at all. In fact, I found the whimsy and charm to be elegant at times. But I didn’t want to prolong our argument, so I kept my mouth shut. Isabella, however, didn’t follow suit.
“Of course you’d like it,” she muttered under her breath.
Despite my best intentions, I took the bait. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
She paused, looking me up and down like she was racking her brain for an insult. She finally settled on one and said, “Your bag’s a knockoff.”
I gripped the strap of my handbag tightly. Trent had bought it for me, so I wasn’t exactly shocked to find that he’d gifted me a fake. But I wouldn’t be giving Isabella the pleasure of that knowledge.
Shrugging, I said, “Labels don’t matter to me. Unlike other, more superficial, people.”
I honestly didn’t know how we were going to make it three days. We couldn’t even do a one-hour tour without fighting. Maybe I just should end it now, I thought. Tell Carol the truth about my history with Isabella and let the pieces fall where they may.
“I don’t need you anymore,” Isabella suddenly declared. “I’ve got this.” And then she pushed her way past me and clomped down the sidewalk toward the park.
I lifted my eyes to the sky, grateful. Here it was. My first Christmas miracle.