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Two armed, uniformed guards bounded over the furniture to scoop up the bank’s former loan officer. One hustled their prey, stunned by his fall, out of the room. The other, a long-time acquaintance of Fleming’s, faced Jason.
“We’ve called the police. They’re on their way.”
“Did he hurt anyone out there?” Jason glanced toward the reception area.
“No, sir. Seemed intent on getting in here. Fleming, are you okay? Are you hurt?”
“I’m fine, Mr. Oakes.” With relief flowing to every extremity, but feeling incredibly awkward at the same time, she hid her face as she bent to gather the files she’d dumped on the faded, flowery rug. “He must have tripped on these when he landed.”
“Let me help you.” Jason’s hand brushed hers as she picked up a file, which she dropped immediately.
Mr. Oakes, who’d also provided security for high school football games in years past, managed to retrieve the rest and handed the pile to her. “You should go home.”
“I have to go to work.” She stared into the hall, where Paige suddenly reappeared, writhing against his captor’s hold. “He never said a word.”
“He made his point, though.” Jason looked calm, but his voice seemed a thread huskier. This time, as she stared, fascinated, he looked away, feeling for his tablet underneath the chair. “You might want to stay in case the police...”
“Oh. Okay.”
“I’ll email you the information I was hoping to discuss. We can talk about it again.”
After seeing him attacked, the last thing she wanted to talk about was her money troubles. It was embarrassing. If she lost the shop, she’d lose her home. She’d lose her mother’s respect. She’d lose her own.
“I trusted Mr. Paige.” How on earth could she believe that Jason Macland, whose family name was on the bank, really wanted to help her out of a financial catastrophe?
“A lot of people did,” Jason said, “including my father.”
So he wasn’t here just to fix the bank. He also had someone he didn’t want to disappoint.
* * *
“MR. MACLAND, that was your last appointment.” Hilda was already buttoning her coat. “If you don’t mind, I’d like to go home.”
By the time the police had left, Jason and Hilda and Fleming Harris had formed a triad—the first people Paige had found the guts to attack in person, rather than hiding behind a predatory loan. “You’re coming back tomorrow?” Jason asked.
She nodded. “As long as that man’s in the county jail.”
Which was apparently over the ridge that almost completely surrounded the town.
“You don’t happen to have Ms. Harris’s phone number?” he asked. Fleming had lingered at the edges of Jason’s mind since she’d left the office. She wasn’t the only person Paige had cheated. There was the man whose house was in danger of foreclosure, the two elderly ladies who’d retired to Bliss to open an ice cream parlor. Others, too. And all the while, Jason kept thinking of the woman who’d refused to leave a man she didn’t know when he might be in danger.
“I’ll find the number for you.” Hilda opened a file on her computer and then wrote the phone number on a slip of paper. “She must have been afraid.”
As Paige had sailed past Fleming’s shoulder, every story of workplace violence he’d ever heard had replayed in Jason’s head. His only thought had been to protect her, the innocent bystander who happened to be in his office at the worst possible time.
“I thought I’d offer to meet her somewhere else,” he said.
“That’s kind.”
Jason managed not to laugh. Kind was not a word often used to describe him.
He’d had to make hard decisions before. He normally analyzed a failing business, provided structures and policies for dragging it back into financial profit and then moved on to the next troubled company. He’d never had the slightest urge to work for his father in any of the Macland banks. His involvement now was supposed to be a favor for his grandfather, who’d actually been the one to notice something was going on in Bliss. Jason meant to be in and out, with his report sewn up by the first week in January.
He took the piece of paper. “Thanks, Hilda, and listen, you don’t have to be afraid,” he said. “The guy’s angry with me because I’m the one who told him he got caught.”
“I’m sure a few days in a cell will make him a lot happier.”
“We can hope he’s also cheated any attorney who’s capable of getting him bail. If you hear him coming down that hall again, jump in the nearest closet.”
“I’ve already made that plan.” She turned back to her screen. “You might try meeting Fleming at her shop. My girls and I spend a lot of time there this time of year. The Harrises put on activities for children, and Fleming’s mother makes the best hot cocoa I’ve ever tasted.”
He pushed the phone number into his pocket. “That’s a good idea. I’m curious about a place that sells holiday ornaments all year long.”
Or maybe he was curious about the owner of such a place. The year held other holidays. A smart business owner would consider diversifying. Fleming might be able to use his expertise.
* * *
FLEMING MANNED HER post behind the counter until the last of the pedestrians walking past on the sidewalk had disappeared for the day. The night before Thanksgiving was never busy, but she felt anxious. Bliss had never felt anything but safe until today.
Maybe a few customers would have taken her mind off this morning. Business would pick up on Friday.
Her stomach growled. She’d been so intent on making the store as inviting as her mother had when Fleming was a child that she’d forgotten to eat. The hotel at the end of the courthouse square had been doing a turkey dinner with fixings all week.
If she went to the hotel tonight, she’d probably have leftovers for a sandwich tomorrow, and she could finish making the shop shine by Friday morning.
Fresh eyes, she told herself.
It certainly wasn’t that she felt reluctant to go home alone.
She put on her coat and shoved the warm gloves she’d worn in this morning’s heavy frost into her pockets. She left Christmas lights twinkling in the windows and around the long wooden counter and set the shop’s alarm, then locked up before heading for the hotel.
Outside, the streets were almost empty. Earlier in the week, garlands had begun to go up, but the decorations weren’t yet complete. What with the danger of losing the shop and that Paige guy’s rage this morning, she finally admitted her world felt off balance tonight.
“Fleming?”
Startled, she whipped around. A car passed by. The courthouse bell began to toll. And Fleming laughed because she felt ridiculous. Jason Macland stepped off the curb across the street.
“I meant to call you,” he said. “I’m sorry about what happened in my office this morning. Are you all right?”
“Fine.” She did feel fine now. He’d stepped in front of her with Paige, and now he made her feel safe because she wasn’t alone in the streets. She checked herself. How could she ever be afraid in Bliss, the mountain town that was part of her body and blood?
“How about you?” she asked.
His smile was self-deprecating and frustrated at the same time. “Also fine, except you and I will have to talk again. I’m sorry, but we have to discuss your loan.”
So—not so much concern for her as for his bank. “I’m gathering the information your assistant emailed about.”
“Good. The sooner we settle better terms, the safer your business will be.” Jason stepped onto the sidewalk, towering over her, ominous even if he didn’t mean to be. “I’m trying to get you into a better position before the rules of your loan take over. I can’t help you after that.”
“If the loan wasn’t legal...”
“That’s the problem for all of the people in jeopardy because of Paige. You signed the agreement, so you’re responsible for terms that are immoral, but not illegal.”
She was caught between worrying he was another bank guy trying to play her, and respecting his honesty. If he was being honest.
She turned, continuing toward the hotel, and somehow, Jason remained with her. “Why are you trying to help me?” she asked. “Why do you care?”
“I’m trying to help anyone who still wants to do business with Macland. It does the bank no good to write off bad loans. Especially as many as they have right now.”
They? She glanced at him, surprised.
He looked back at her, unbuttoning his top coat button as if he were uncomfortably warm. “We could bring down the local economy.”
“How did Mr. Paige manage to fly under the radar?”
“The former bank manager was taking a cut.” Jason turned toward the hotel with her, but when she reached for the door he stopped, looking down at her hand.
“I’m having dinner here tonight,” she said.
“Oh.” He looked back at the square as if he wished he’d planned to be elsewhere.
As they stepped inside, Lyle Benjamin, the hotel’s owner, appeared at the top of the cellar stairs, his arms full of wood for the fires that would roar until midnight in the parlor dining room and reception area.
“Not you, too, Fleming?” he asked, glancing from Jason to her.
She blushed, and Jason looked impatient.
“The gossip in this town defeats any need for the internet,” he said.
“Sorry.” Lyle sent Fleming an apologetic look. “Will your mom be home for the holidays?”
“She and Hugh are on a vacation.” A month in a fancy hut in Bora Bora. She couldn’t control a smidge of envy for their carefree thirty days. “But they’ll be back for Christmas.”
“Good to hear it.” He carried the wood to the hearth near his check-in counter and tossed a log into the flames. “Table for two?”
“No.” Fleming flinched as Jason’s voice echoed her own, and they both turned down the opportunity to share a meal.
“I’ll call down for room service,” he said.
Fleming breathed a sigh of relief. She had to create a battle plan. This man wanted his bank back in the black. He might claim he was helping her, but he’d take Mainly Merry Christmas if shutting her down bettered his bottom line.
CHAPTER TWO (#ud9f8e295-b3cb-5612-b5a3-34d995d4522e)
AFTER A SOLO Thanksgiving dinner in his room the following evening, Jason tried to concentrate on his tablet. He’d just about decided what he could do for Fleming. Next up was a guy who ran one of the last barbershops in America.
All these people were becoming far more than names on electronic files. He’d turned Paige’s information over to an assistant DA friend in New York. He wanted someone to make sure the local prosecutor put Paige away for as long as he deserved. Jason had several more weeks to negotiate small-town, Christmas-spirited Bliss.
He feared he wouldn’t be the only one who doubted the existence of Santa by the time he finished this favor for his grandfather.
On the up side, he was charging his father top dollar for work that was a lot less complex than his usual contracts.
He stood, stretching the muscles in his back. Voices from downstairs had risen through the old floorboards as families celebrated while he worked. He’d been so focused on his task he’d hardly remembered it was Thanksgiving.
Lights seemed suddenly to dance on the courthouse steps. He crossed to the window. A group of people with glow sticks in Christmassy colors was gathering.
Carolers? He shrugged.
Not that he was hot for singing holiday songs, but he hadn’t been outside these four walls all day.
He grabbed his coat and hit the hallway. Downstairs, the lobby was empty. When he went outside, he heard the first strains of “We Wish You a Merry Christmas.”
He almost turned back, but a little boy going by waved a shy hello with the hand his mother wasn’t holding. Jason didn’t have the heart to show his cynical side to someone too young to understand.
Instead, he smiled and waved back.
He didn’t cross the square to the carolers, but he walked quickly along the sidewalk. Fresh air. He needed some of that.
Apparently, he was witnessing some kind of Bliss, Tennessee, ritual. Most of the citizens and shop owners appeared to be trailing toward the courthouse. It wasn’t until he reached a cotton-swathed window displaying a Christmas village and a running train that he saw another human being not joining in the singing.
He looked up. A rich red sign hung overhead, emblazoned with the words Mainly Merry Christmas. He looked inside again. Fleming, on the wide-plank floor inside, was engrossed in putting together another train track, clearly set to run around a verdant Christmas tree.
Jason tried the door. To his surprise, it opened.
She looked up eagerly at the sound of the sleigh bells above her door. Her face sobered as she saw him.
“What’s going on at the courthouse?” he asked.
Her smile was a surprise that made him feel less at loose ends. They shared a puzzling intimacy after yesterday.
“It’s tradition.” She scrambled to her feet as he shut the cold out behind him. “Everyone goes to the courthouse, and we sing carols to welcome the holiday season. Your bank files must show you we do a lot more business around here this time of year.”
“Until spring,” he said, “and then there’s a slight dip until summer vacationers arrive.” He went to get a closer look at the train track. “Need some help?”
She joined him. “I do, but not with this. Why don’t we talk about my loan?”
The figures were burned inside his head, but he didn’t want to make a mistake. “This isn’t a workday. Why aren’t you out there singing?”
“I’m maybe weeks away from losing my shop. I have to work today and sell tomorrow.” She sat and started placing the track again.
“You could sell this train set and make a sizable sum.” His grandfather had a similar one he’d bought at an auction and shared with Jason all the Christmases they’d spent together.
“More tradition.”
He retrieved a box of spare track from the window seat and carried it to her. “You could run this all around the store.”
“I’m torn between the charm of how that would look and the risk of children stepping on it.”
“Take the risk.”
