Page 1 of The Charming Checklist
Chapter One
Tonight seemed like the perfect night for Max Del Toro to find a wife.
On Friday, the Salty Dog Bar & Grill in Charming, Texas, was fairly empty, not unusual for mid-October on the Gulf Coast. Most of the summer tourists were gone and only the locals were left. He took a seat on an empty bar stool and simply nodded in Cole Kinsella’s direction, holding up his index finger.
Within seconds Cole plunked his usual IPA in front of him. “You’re a little dressed up. You have that date tonight, right?”
Cole, his best friend and business partner at the Salty Dog, was more curious than most about his personal life. Max didn’t mind. They went far back, to their days as part of an elite SEALs team.
Max took a pull of his beer. He happened to be wearing his best suit, and a lot of faith. “With any luck, I might find the future Mrs. DT tonight.”
“Don’t get your hopes up.” Cole gave the bar a wipe.
Coming from a man who’d recently been reunited with his first love, that seemed ironic. Max had given Cole and Valerie Villanueva long odds, and yet they were now planning a spring wedding. Max figured Cole beat the odds, so why couldn’t he?
“Seems shortsighted of you,” Max said.
“Why? I never had the best luck with blind dates. Who has? I mean, c’mon!”
That might be true if Max hadn’t done the legwork. This wasn’t technically a blind date. He’d put in the hard nights, filling out those ridiculous online questionnaires. Favorite color, music, food, wine. Beach or woods? Ocean or lake? Exhausting work, all of it. He’d rather climb Mount Kilimanjaro or swim to Galveston. He didn’t see what his favoritecolorhad to do with anything, but he’d put his trust in these services. One of them reported a 99.9 percent rate of success. Those were damn good odds.
“Not a blind date. I’ve done my homework.”
Max would approach finding the perfect wife in the same way that he did anything in his life. With a plan, a road map and high odds for success. For a kid who’d come from the strawberry-picking fields of Watsonville, California, to become a savvy businessman, planning waseverything.At thirty-four, it was time to settle down and find a wife. He’d approach this goal the same way he’d achieved all of his success: by doing more than expected of him. He’d signed up for every single one of these services and had dates lined up for six months. But it shouldn’t takethatlong to find the right woman.
“You haven’t heard any of the horror stories?”
“Of course I have. Probably from people who didn’t approach this as analytically as I have.”
“That’s one way of lookin’ at it,” Cole muttered.
The door opened and Max turned to see Ava Long, president of the Chamber of Commerce, make her way to the bar. Blonde and beautiful, she had an ass that should be declared the eighth wonder of the world. Again, as he did nearly every day of the week, Max pushed aside the attraction. They were friends and it would be best not to mess with that, tempting though she was.
“Hi, Cole! Oh, hey there, Max,” she added almost as an afterthought. “Hey, is Valerie working tonight?”
As always, she had the enthusiasm of Christmas Day. Bright. Merry. A friend to everyone. She hugged Valerie every time she saw her, which was just about daily. As usual, she wore every color under the rainbow. Why not, when one of them might get their feelings hurt. Pink, purple and green top. Blue slacks with white stripes. Black-and-white-checkered high tops.
The rest of Ava, her personality, was a little hard for Max to take in anything but small doses.
“Nah, gave her the night off. She’s at home with Sub,” Cole said.
Submarine, known as Sub, was Cole’s loyal Labrador retriever. He’d become the bar’s mascot and usually lounged in the back office whenever both Cole and Valerie pulled a shift.
“I have a little announcement to make,” Ava said.
“Go ahead.” Cole waved in the direction of their customers.
She moved to the middle of the room that divided the bar from the small open dining area.
“Attention, everyone!” She clapped her hands, waved and waited for everyone to hush. “As you all know, the holiday food drive is in full swing! The Chamber is spearheading the event again and we’ve got barrels all over the city. Let’s fill them up this year so that they’re overflowing this holiday! The low-income families and the needy in Charming will thank you. Nonperishables only!”
How about that, she even made being low income and needy sound joyful. Max remembered being on the other side of that coin. Hiding behind his parents as they accepted all the well-meant charity from strangers. He’d come a long way from those less-than-pleasant memories, from those times when he’d been the charity case that wore hand-me-downs.
Well, he wasn’t going to think about that now.
When she rejoined them, Max reached for his wallet, and pulled out two hundred-dollar bills and handed them to her. “I don’t have any canned food in the house.”
“Thank you, Max,” she said, staring at the bills. “You’re more than generous.”
