Page 16 of There's Only One Sleigh
I wouldn’t have minded staying a few more hours. Maybe we could have looped right into supper. “When I drop you off, I’ll put all of this in the inn’s garage so it’s in one place.”
She nods. “Good. That’ll give me the opportunity to separate gifts from prizes and so on, sincesomebodyjust threw everything on the belt in random order, so it all got bagged together.”
It’s so sexy when she tries to scold me, but the curve of her lips gives away the fact she actually finds me charming. “You’re not going to leave me much to do.”
“Literally my job,” she says, and then she laughs for a second before pulling out her notebook and flipping to a page filled with very neat printing. “Do you have stuff scheduled for tomorrow that I should know about, or should I just drink extra coffee and hope for the best?”
“I think we’ll drive around and get people to sign those participation forms in person, so at least the parade line-up will be checked off. And we need to figure out who has the Santa suit.”
“You don’t know who has it? Is this like a Sisterhood of the Traveling Santa Suit situation?”
“Well, you know how it goes. It went to one person for cleaning. And then somebody else was going to stitch up some loose seams. But the fake fur trim was looking raggedy, so…somebody has it, though.”
“And you don’t just buy a new suit because…”
“I think the current suit is older than me, and they don’t make them like that anymore.”
She shakes her head and slides out of the booth. “Okay, so tomorrow is paperwork and a Santa suit scavenger hunt. I’ll bring the coffee.”
Chapter
Thirteen
Whitney
I open my notebook to the page my pen is clipped on and make a checkmark next to the bakery’s name to indicate we have their signed paperwork and that task is complete. Everybody who signed up is now parade official.
Now we’re on our way to the last known location of the wayward Santa suit.
Through the corner of my eye, I see him watching me stow the notebook back in my bag. “You’ve got the laptop and the tablet and your phone and the watch, and you seem like a very plugged-in kind of person. And yet you use a notebook instead of a digital notepad app.”
“I learned a long time ago, when my mom bought me a notebook for Christmas, that I think best with pen and paper. Brainstorming and just letting thoughts come and stuff like that. You know I love my spreadsheets and lists and tables, but those are boxes the info goes into. If you start with those, the creative part of your mind is trying to fit those boxes. When you have anempty page in front of you, you can do anything you want and then worry about slotting it into the proper boxes later.”
“So what you’re saying is that your mom got you a Christmas present that changed your life?”
“Maybe not as life-changing as vinegar on fries, but yeah.” I don’t really want to talk about my mom. Something about this town has me thinking about her a lot, and I keep remembering the sad resignation in her voice when I told her I’d be busy at Christmas, catching up in the office after being stuck in New Hampshire for two weeks.
So I change the subject. “Do you drive this vehicle in the parade?”
“I should. My predecessor drove his with the lights on and one of the guys drove the firetruck. But my deputy chief owns an excavation business and he likes to drive his own truck, pulling a backhoe they decorate with lights and stuff. Another one of the guys owns the antique tractor that pulls the church’s float, and he won’t let anybody else drive it. The others have small kids and they gear up and walk along the parade route with their families, interacting and stuff. So I drive the firetruck.”
“That’s way cooler than an SUV, anyway. Anybody can drive one of those.”
“That’s what I think, too.” He turns right onto a poorly paved road, and I’m thankful I wasn’t sipping my coffee at the time or I would have worn it. “You should ride in the firetruck with me for the parade.”
I laugh until I realize he’s serious. “I’m not riding in the firetruck with you. What if a problem pops up I need to address?”
“You found Donovan refills for his favorite pen from across the ocean. If something comes up at the fair, I’m confident you can fix it from the middle of Main Street. We go pretty slow, so you could even jump out if you had to. Just tuck and roll.” Hetakes a left onto a dirt road. “Actually, you’re so good at your job, I don’t think there will be any problems at all.”
His praise warms my cheeks, and I look out my window so he can’t see it. “What happens if there’s an actual emergency during the parade? Do you just turn the sirens on and make everybody scatter?”
He laughs as though he’s imagining doing just that. “We report as out of service during the parade, and our mutual aid partners from nearby towns handle anything that comes up. We do the same for them. Most of Charming Lake isatthe parade, though, so it’s rare to have an emergency pop up. We had a fall on the ice once, but mostly we just yell at the people on the floats for not dressing warmly enough.”
“It’s like Halloween. Nobody wants to cover their costumes.”
“Nobody likes getting frostbite, either. But I think Charming Lake’s only had one fire on the day of the Christmas fair during my lifetime. An older couple was rushing so they wouldn’t miss the parade and each thought the other blew their scented candle out. Their cat and some Christmas decorations were involved somehow—I was in high school still, so I don’t know all the details—but FD was able to save everything. Things got a little soggy, of course, but it could have been worse.”
After flipping on his turn signal, Rob pulls into a driveway and throws the SUV in park. “I’ll be right back.”
