Page 18 of The Christmas Fix
Noah nodded. Once. “Fine. But if you step one foot over any line, I’ll make your life miserable.”
She grinned, a sharp feline smile that any other man would have found sexy as hell. Noah found it evil. She offered him her hand, and with reluctance, he took it and shook. The spark that he felt ride up his arm? That was his body warning him away from the evil before him.
“I’ll have cameras here tomorrow so you might want to spread the word. If you need any help acting like a human being, let me know, and I’ll have marketing write up a script for you.”
She turned and strutted back into the restaurant, her glossy hair bobbing in its tail. He stared after her and clenched his hand into a fist.
Noah had just made a deal with the devil herself.
CHAPTER NINE
Eight weeks to Christmas Eve
Cat, with the network’s blessing and sense of urgency, mobilized an army in less time than it took most people to pack for vacation. By morning she had a small camera crew rolling through Merry scouting locations and shooting cleanup. She had PAs calling local news stations looking for any flood footage the show could use.
Cat shoved the first story editor on location out the door with a preliminary list of interviewees and the task of figuring out which stories would be followed on the five-episode arc.
The first of the RVs the cast and crew would be staying in were setting up camp in the side parking lot of the grocery store. Noah had signed the permits himself, which Cat considered a personal victory. He’d been a tougher nut to crack than she thought. Though why a city manager would balk at having a TV show with deep pockets finance most of a town’s rebuilding budget was an unpredictably stupid move.
She’d enjoyed making him squirm with the adorably verbose April. No man who loved his daughter could say no to a little face calling him a hero. Cat 1-Noah 0.
She only hoped he’d crawl off to lick his wounds and leave her the hell alone for the rest of the shoot. They had eight weeks to craft the story, rebuild a town, and air the finale live on Christmas Eve. If Noah knew what was good for him and his town, he’d stay out of her way. But there was nothing Cat loved more than a good challenge.
She let the RV door slam behind her as she stepped down onto the asphalt of the parking lot. Her list was eighteen miles long, and she was going to start knocking items off it.
“Hey there, Madam Producer.”
Cat spun around.
“Well, if it isn’t my gorgeous and deeply talented sister-in-law!” She grabbed Paige for a hard hug.
“For now, I’m your gorgeous and deeply talented director.”
Cat pushed her back a step. “No! The network said they were sending Martinez!”
Paige pushed her short dark waves out of her face. “They were until I volunteered my time for free.”
Cat felt tears prick at her eyes. “You didn’t. You noble shithead!”
Paige nodded, grinning wider. “It’s a good cause, and my next project doesn’t ramp up until January.”
“You didn’t have to, but I’m so damn glad you did,” Cat said, clearing the emotion that lodged in her throat. “What about Gannon and Gabby?”
“We’re a mobile family,” the deep raspy voice, as familiar as her own, announced over her shoulder.
“Shut the front door!” Cat launched herself at her brother. Gannon King, handsome as a devil and prickly as a cactus, was dressed for work in worn jeans and boots that should have seen the inside of a trash bin months ago. He wore a Kings Construction fleece and a ball cap. He hugged her back, hard.
“Gotta make sure my idiot sister doesn’t go floundering through any more floods.”
Cat snorted and punched him in the chest. “Like you wouldn’t have done the same thing.”
“And you would have been just as pissed at me for not inviting you.”
He had a point.
“Where’s Gabby?” A devastated town and TV set was no place for her niece.
“We called in a favor,” Paige said. “Your parents flew back from Florida. We’re renting a place about ten miles from here—I’m not sharing an RV with our daughter and my in-laws. They’re ecstatic about the grandparenting emergency.”
