Christmas Box Set Read online

  The main course came—a filet mignon with some buttery sauce and mix of herbs sprinkled on top with a side of seared asparagus and creamy potatoes—and we ate while we discussed what had happened in the week since we’d sat down together in this same restaurant the prior week. Mom and Dad had another social meeting after this—high tea with a friend who’d been in their wedding 40 years earlier—so we didn’t stick around for dessert after the meal, which was fine by me.

  I went straight from the restaurant to the shop in Danbury, which was right down the street from where Maggie still lived. I went in, standing just inside the door while I watched the guys busily working on a few different projects. My Series 60 was being prepped for painting today—we’d decided on dark blue with caramel-colored leather for the interior and a matching convertible top—and I found myself admiring the long, smooth lines on the body of this beauty the way I did every time I saw it, no matter how rough the rest of her looked. She was one fine automobile.

  Jackson was bent over the Cadillac, looking hard at the tall, slender grille before moving on to run his fingers over the surface of the hood, which had been sanded in anticipation of the impending paint job. He noticed me and smiled as he waved me over. I’d never get tired of the smell and sound of this place. It was like coming home. All it was missing was BJ.

  “Hey, man,” Jackson said, coming over as soon as he noticed me so we could slap hands. “How do you like the look of your baby? She’s all ready for her paint job. My guy does his best work overnight, so she’s headed that way in about an hour.”

  “I can’t wait to see everything finished. Are we still on track for the weekend? There’s a car show I’d like to take her to for her debut.”

  “Yeah, she’ll be good to go by Saturday morning like we discussed.”

  I clapped him on the back. “You’re a miracle worker, Jackson.”

  He laughed at that. “Not sure I’d go that far, but I do know my way around a car.”

  “Is Maggie in?” I asked, my eyes still surveying the Caddy’s smooth lines. She’d been a busted up mess when I found her. Now look at her—just about all fixed up.

  He nodded. “Yeah, she’s back in the office going over the books.” He smiled again, this time in warning. “I wouldn’t go bothering her if I were you.”

  I chuckled. “I just stick my head in and say hello.”

  “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” We slapped hands again. “See you on Saturday.”

  I went around the open workspace of the garage to where the office was, directly across from the main entrance to the shop. The door was closed, which usually meant Maggie didn’t want to be bothered. I knew the books were a challenge for her, though she had yet to take me up on my offer to help her out. I could appreciate how independent she was, even if I had to watch her suffer more than was necessary.

  I rapped on the door. “It’s Banks!” I called before she could respond.

  “Come on in!” she called back, and I opened the door, grinning already at how much I’d wanted to see her.

  Maggie

  Thursday

  I hurried out of the shop in the late morning after talking to Jackson and a few of the other guys about how things have been going since BJ passed away. I liked to get regular feedback from them so I knew what needed to improve. They seemed to appreciate being asked how we could make things run more smoothly around here, and they’d been pretty patient with me over the last year. I’d gotten much better, learning things I never thought I’d have a reason to know. I couldn’t really do any actual work on the cars we restored, but I knew how to run this business from top to bottom. What I didn’t know, I figured out on the fly. My biggest concern was handling the books, but we had an accountant for that now. BJ had been great at math and had used an actual written ledger to track the shop’s incoming and outgoing funds. There was no way in hell I was going to keep doing that. I’d taken that ledger to an accounting firm in town and had them enter all of that into QuickBooks. I knew the basics of the program after taking an online course offered through the local community college, but once a month I met with our accountant, Jeffrey, and we went over all our invoices and receipts for services. I was learning more and more with every visit, but I didn’t think I’d ever get to the point where I was ready to fly solo without Jeff’s professional experience serving as my safety net. The last thing I wanted to do was mess up the money.

  My appointment was at 11, and right afterwards I was meeting an old friend of mine for lunch. I was running a little late, but Jeff was pretty used to that. I felt like I’d spent the last year running around like a chicken with my head cut off. I wondered if I’d ever feel like I knew what the hell was going on in my own life or if things would stay just chaotic forever now that BJ was gone. I still felt like I was struggling to catch my breath despite the fact that the shop was thriving and all of my mechanics seemed happy with the way I was running things.

  I made it to Jeff’s office 10 minutes late, but he didn’t seem to mind. I’d dropped off the receipts and invoices a few days earlier to give him time to review my entries in QuickBooks.

  “Hi, Maggie,” he said, smiling like the nice man he was. I’d gone to school with one of his daughters. The other was a few classes behind me. Both sweet girls.

  “Sorry about being late, Jeff.”

  He waved that off. “I went over the books and everything looks great.” He went on to explain how we were looking using a few colorful graphs that compared the last year without BJ to the year before it when BJ had still been running things. Revenue had slowly increased, as it had in the years since BJ started the business. That did my heart good to see. My biggest fear was running the shop into the ground because of my inexperience. I’d gone to college to become an elementary school teacher, not to run a business that focused on restoring classic cars. I didn’t even know how to change my own oil, for crying out loud, and I didn’t really want to learn.

  At the end of the explanation, I smiled sweetly at Jeff. “Thank you. I’m so relieved every time we meet. This business was BJ’s baby. I don’t want to see it close because I don’t know what the hell I’m doing.”

  “You’ve done an excellent job keeping this business going in the last year, Maggie. It’s a wonder that you have no prior business experience. BJ would be very proud of what you’ve managed to accomplish here.”

  I was suddenly on the brink of tears again. I cursed my still raw emotions. Would I ever get to a place where I wasn’t about to melt into a puddle of tears at the mere mention of my husband’s name?

  I shook his hand gratefully. “I’ll see you next month.”

  He smiled, his kind face so open. You could see where his daughters got their compassionate natures. “Take care of yourself.”

  I walked out to my car as quickly as possible, keeping my head down. Once inside, I gave myself a second to pull it together after the surge of emotion I’d experienced in Jeff’s office. After the threat of tears had passed, I drove further into town to meet Eliza at one of our favorite lunch spots. We met up a few times every month. We’d gone to kindergarten together and had been best friends ever since. She was actually my only friend, or at least the only friend that had survived after the dark couple of months that directly followed BJ’s death. I went incommunicado during that time, only speaking to people who went out of their way to keep in touch with me—Mom, Brian Sr., Eliza, Banks.

  I blinked as I parked in the lot outside of the diner. Banks was a friend, right? We saw each other once or twice a week since the accident. He seemed like a friend, but I wasn’t really sure. I only knew him because of BJ. Did you inherit your spouse’s friends? I was new at this being widowed thing. I didn’t know how everything worked yet.

  I went inside and was pleased to see that, for once, I’d beaten Eliza. I set up in a booth facing the door so I could gloat as soon as she strolled in, which was only a few minutes after I arrived and before noon, which technically made her early.

>   She walked over to where I was sitting, all smiles, her long, curly blonde hair pulled into a messy braid. She had on a pair of jeans and a thick sweater along with a pair of suede boots that looked more like elaborate slippers. She slid into the bench seat across from me and cracked open the menu.

  “I can’t believe you got here before I did,” she said, eyes scanning the menu we both knew by heart. This place hadn’t changed since high school. I already knew this morning that I was going to order the bacon cheeseburger with onion rings and a small strawberry milkshake. I didn’t care how cold it was getting outside. I’d order a milkshake from this diner in the dead of winter.

  “I finished at the accountant’s earlier than I thought I would, even with arriving late,” I replied.

  She puffed up her cheeks as she blew out her breath. “I don’t even know why I’m looking at this menu. I already know what I’m getting.” She looked up at me with a grin.

  “Chicken sandwich with bacon, mayo, lettuce, tomato on the side, and French fries.” I smiled as she laughed. “And a chocolate shake.”

  “You know me better than I know myself, Maggie.”

  When the waitress wandered over with two glasses of water, she smiled at us and said, “I put your orders in already. Your shakes will be right up.”

  Giggling, we thanked her. She’d been working here for a few years—her dad was the owner—and so she knew exactly what we wanted and how we wanted it, and that we tipped well for great service. I’d never had a bad experience here.

  “How are things at the shop?” Eliza asked, tilting her head as she looked at me.

  “Pretty good, actually. Jeff just said the business growth model looks great. Revenue is increasing slowly but steadily. The rate of growth is no different than when BJ was at the helm.”

  She smiled, her dark eyes shining. “So you aren’t running the business into the ground then?”

  I shook my head. “Not yet.”

  “What about everything else?” she asked. “Your non-shop life?”

  I heaved a big sigh at that. My non-shop life was my least favorite topic. “I don’t have a non-shop life.”

  “Bullshit.”

  I blinked at her brazenness, and then smiled. “You are my only friend, Eliza. My non-shop life consists of hanging out with you, my mother, and Brian Sr.”

  She made an impatient noise, her dark eyes rolling in a half circle. “Please. What about Banks?” Her eyebrows lifted a little.

  “I’m not sure if I can call him my friend,” I said, frowning slightly. “How would that even work? He was BJ’s friend, not mine. Do friends transfer after your spouse dies?”

  Eliza shrugged. “If you and BJ broke up, I’d think that would be the last you’d see of Banks. But since you still see him all the time, I’m pretty sure you can count him as a friend. Does he feel like a friend?”

  “Sometimes.”

  The waitress came over to deliver our milkshakes, which we descended on immediately, making pleased, childish noises at how good they were.

  “Do you want to know what I really think?” Eliza asked in between sips of her milkshake. Neither of us touched our glasses, just leaned over like little kids and slurped directly out of the straw.

  “Not really, but I’m sure you’re going to tell me anyway.”

  She stuck her tongue out at me, completing the feeling that we’d somehow traveled back in time to a point in our lives when the biggest problem we had was how we were going to study for a huge test and make it to the most important party of our high school careers.

  “I think Banks has a thing for you. That’s why he’s sniffing around all the time.”

  I gave her a harsh look. “I don’t know that I’d call what he’s doing sniffing around. He’s checking on me. I think he feels like he owes that to BJ.”

  “That excuse might’ve checked out if he stopped after a few months, but he’s going out of his way to keep in touch with you, always dropping by the shop and coming by the house with dinner.”

  I filled my mouth with chocolate shake to avoid answering. He did come by the shop a lot, but we were working on his Cadillac, the last project he and BJ had worked on together. He was just overseeing the restoration. Half the time, he spent more time chatting with Jackson than he did me. He did come by the house sometimes too, but not very often. Maybe twice a month. I wouldn’t call that an obsession. I was his best friend’s wife…or, at least, I had been.

  “You should go after him, Maggie.” Eliza’s dark eyes were narrowed and serious, and she’d leaned over onto the table to keep her words between us.

  “What?”

  “I know you loved BJ, but it’s been a year and you’re a young woman with the rest of her life ahead of her. Banks is obviously interested in you. I’ve seen the two of you together a few times over the last couple of months.” Her sly smile cut through the seriousness of her expression. “Lots of fireworks there.”

  “You’re dreaming,” I said, shaking my head. “You just have this whole scheme set up in your mind and you’re bending reality to try and fit that scheme. But it’s not the truth. Banks is barely even my friend. He’s a very nice guy, but he’s probably just hanging around out of loyalty to his friend. He knows how much BJ cared about me.”

  Eliza didn’t get the chance to respond before the waitress came over with our food. She lost interest in pursuing her argument as soon as she set eyes on her chicken sandwich. I’d been hungry too, but now my stomach was upset from the conversation. It wasn’t that I didn’t like Banks, but this really didn’t have anything to do with him. Some days it felt like I’d only just lost BJ. I wasn’t ready to move on yet. Right?

  Instead of answering that loaded question, I dug into my burger, taking a monstrous bite.

  Banks

  Saturday

  Today was the big day. I’d been looking forward to it for well over a year. I wished for the millionth time since the accident that BJ was here to celebrate, that I’d pull up to the shop and he’d come outside grinning like the Cheshire Cat. But he was gone.

  I hitched the trailer to my truck and drove across town to the mechanic’s shop. They didn’t usually open this early in the morning on the weekend—it was just past 7—but Jackson had made arrangements to meet me so I wouldn’t be late getting to the fall car show in the neighboring town. I just had to load the car into the trailer, swing by to pick up my father, and get to the show before registration ended at 9. I had plenty of time.

  Jackson was waiting just inside one of the open bay doors, sipping on a cup of coffee, dressed in jeans and a T-shirt instead of his coveralls. The shop didn’t open until 10, so he was really doing me a solid by getting here this early. I made a point to tip well, and send other gifts throughout the year to make sure he knew how much I appreciated all the hard work he and the rest of the guys had done on my cars over the years.

  Jackson lifted a hand as I pulled in, positioning the trailer so we could just drive the Caddy right inside once I got the doors open and pulled out the ramp. My stomach was in knots I was so excited to see this car completed. No one was going to believe I had a restored Series 60. They were rarer than a $2 bill.

  I killed the engine, jumped out of the truck, and watched as Jackson, who’d disappeared back into the garage, came driving slowly out of the bay in my baby, the dark blue paint sparkling even without the sunlight, which was doing its best to creep over the distant line of the horizon. He was grinning like mad at my stunned expression. The convertible top was down and my old girl looked like a dream. My heart hurt over how much BJ would’ve loved to see how nicely she cleaned up.

  “What do you think?” Jackson called. The engine was purring like a big cat underneath the long, curved hood. I couldn’t take my eyes off of the car.

  “She’s gorgeous,” I said, raising my voice to be heard over the engine, which sounded like I could really get it roaring on an open stretch of road. I was anxious to try it, but I needed to get to the car show first.
Playing around with her would have to wait until tomorrow.

  Jackson pointed to the closed door of the trailer. I got moving, unlocking it and then pushing it up. I pulled out the ramp next and then got the hell out of the way. Jackson drove the car into the trailer as soon as I moved aside. I stood at the end of the ramp as he cut the engine and hopped out of the Caddy. He came down to where I was and we slapped hands the same way we always did.

  “She’s all set,” he said. He was a man of few words, choosing to let his handiwork speak for him. If you got him going on cars—and provided ample beer as tongue loosener—he’d talk your ear off. Those occasions were pretty rare, though. He’d been the straight man to BJ’s hilariously raucous personality, and the two of them had worked side by side for years without even a single argument. BJ told me he considered Jackson more partner than employee.

  “She looks like she just rolled off the lot,” I said, unable to peel my eyes away from the curved, sparkling blue back of the Caddy.

  “Yep,” he agreed, dropping a nod in my peripheral vision.

  “I can’t wait to pull her out of the trailer at the car show. People are going to lose their fucking minds. I can’t even think of the last time I saw a Series 60 at one of these things.”

  “You gonna sell her?”

  “I’m not in any hurry to see the back end of her. I need to get several long Sunday drives under my belt with the convertible top down.”

  Jackson chuckled at that. “Winter’s on the way. Better hurry.”

  “Speaking of hurrying, I need to go pick up Dad and then get to the show.” I pulled out my wallet and put three fresh hundreds in Jackson’s hands. “Killer job. I can’t even remember the mess she was before.”