Page 14 of The Christmas Fix
“Thanks,” Noah gasped.
“No problem.”
“You all want some cookies?” Mrs. Pringle asked, as they chugged away from Mistletoe Avenue.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Present
That son of bitch Noah Yatesmadeher resort to this. She had to bring in the big guns since he couldn’t be bothered to take her calls anymore. Except that one time that he answered with a curt “Stop. Calling. Me.”
Cat drummed her fingers in time to the blaring beat of Bon Jovi as she headed north to Merry for the second time in a week. Not only did she have the blessing of the network for this special but also their throbbing hard-on for the idea. They saw schmaltz and advertising dollars, a multi-episode arc of pure profit. She saw a chance to save Christmas for an entire town. Drake was committed to co-starring. Sponsors were lining up.
The only thing she needed was a yes from an asshole.
She took the exit for Merry, steering the SUV she’d rented around piles of still-soggy trash arranged at the curb in front of nearly every home. For some, renovations had started immediately. For others, they needed more time to process. Soon, they’d have volunteers to help where they could, replacing insulation and drywall, ripping out old carpet, laying new.
Cat turned onto the main street, a road that only days ago had been underwater. Storefronts showed the water damage, but there were people, still smiling, still waving. And that was the appeal of Merry. That was why they needed camera crews here now, shooting B roll and capturing the post-flood, pre-reno. This is what people cared about seeing.
She’d enjoyed the week they spent here with the show a few years ago, getting to know the town and its residents. She’d never known a community to be so protective and supportive of their own.
She came to a stop in front of the diner. Sunshine’s was where locals gathered for breakfast and strong cups of coffee seven days a week. The cook and owner, Reggie, sprinkled a bit of his Jamaican roots into every traditional diner dish. Cat had been especially fond of the banana fritter pancakes.
But the diner as she’d known it was gone. In its place was a muddy hull of a building. People still gathered there, she noted. Reggie was serving up coffee and donuts from a folding card table in front of the building.
The steadfast New England spirit. She could respect that.
Cat eased down the block to the three-story brick building that housed Merry’s police station, community room, and city manager’s office. The building, marred by a line of mud demarking the flood level, was remarkably intact.
She turned off the SUV and flipped down the visor mirror to check her reflection. She’d gone all out in the weaponry department. A subtle smoky eye, bright red lips, perfectly coiffed ponytail. She was dressed casually in leg-hugging jeans and a gray sweater. One did not strut onto the scene of a disaster in four-inch stilettos and a miniskirt.
She’d taken a rash of shit from Gannon when he found out she’d “fucking frolicked through hurricane floodwaters.” Her brother wasn’t exactly thrilled when she mentioned that was exactly why she hadn’t told him in the first place.
And she had a feeling she’d be taking another rash of shit from the man three floors up in a minute. But she was prepared. Catalina King didn’t back down from a challenge. No, she pounded and sawed her way through them and then flipped them the bird once she was on the other side.
She slid out of the SUV and marched up the stairs to the building’s glass doors. It smelled like all old buildings. A little musty, a little dusty, with a hint of polished wood.
Noah Yates’ office was on the top floor, and Cat used all three flights to walk herself through her argument. A King by birth, she mostly resorted to yelling, or—if the situation called for it—throwing something that would make a satisfying smash. She had a feeling that wouldn’t work with Mr. We Don’t Need Your Help.
The desk outside his office was empty, and the door open. Cat took it as an implied welcome. The office itself was empty, but judging by the wallet on the desk, Cat assumed its occupant and his stubborn streak would be returning shortly.
Papers littered the desk and credenza but in a seemingly chaotic sort of organization. Buckets in varying sizes sat under weak spots in the drop ceiling catching the occasional drip. The carpet was old, stained, and the coffee pot looked as though it had been purchased in the 1980s.
The windows overlooked Main Street and the evidence of the town’s trauma. A constant reminder of the work that needed to be done.
Cat snooped around the desk and picked up a framed photo. Noah, who she hadn’t had the misfortune to meet when she’d been in town shooting before, appeared to be a good-looking man. The glasses gave him a hint of nerd, but the dark, tousled hair and happy grin upped the appeal. The girl next to him had mischief and magic written in her pretty brown eyes.
Cat wondered if he was as hard-assed a father as he was town manager.
She’d looked up her show notes and discovered that Mr. Yates had been on vacation with his daughter the week they’d shot here in Merry. He’d cut his vacation short when he got word of her “confrontation” with one of the townsfolk in the one and only bar during her birthday celebration. When he’d shown up on set, she’d been sleeping off a hangover in her trailer.
A production assistant and the field producer were able to talk him down and get him off set before Cat could blow up on him. She didn’t care how beloved Handsy McGrabber was in the town of Merry. Her ass was off-limits,especiallyafter an ignored verbal warning. She’d given the drunken grabber one chance to keep his beefy hands to himself, and when he paid her no heed and went for the gold, she’d clocked him in the face maybe just a little harder than she should have. But in her defense, she was six or seven sheets to the wind, and her tolerance for bullshit was at an all-time low.
She didn’t overdo it as much anymore. Sure, she still enjoyed a good time. But she was a little more careful when it came to weighing the consequences. Especially since hangovers had stopped being inconveniences and turned into raging days of “wishing for a swift death.”
Yates’ desk phone rang and the blinking red light told her there were already several voicemail messages awaiting him.
“Can I help you?” He stood in the open doorway in jeans and a fleece. His hair, a dark brown, was longer on top than it had been in the photo, curling just a little. His eyes, a bright, sharp green, crinkled a little at the corners behind those glasses that were actually pretty sexy in real life. He had broad shoulders and, from what Cat could see under the layers, a very athletic body.
