Page 18 of Christmas By The Book

“What’s wrong?” I asked her, and she shook her head, picking up one of the papers and handing it to me.

“The print shop made a mistake on these flyers.” She sighed. “Look, it’s the wrong date. They say the book fair’s on Tuesday, not Thursday. I can’t use these. And they won’t give me a refund.”

“Why not?” I exclaimed. “If it’s their mistake...”

“Because Wharton owns the print shop,” she replied, shoulders slumping down. “I don’t want to think that he would have put the word in to make them do this on purpose, but...” She shook her head, trailing off.

“I don’t have the time to print a new batch, “ she replied. “Or the money, either. I was going to use these to advertise it, but now...”

“It’s okay,” I assured her. “Here, can I borrow your laptop?”

I reached across the counter to her computer, and she pushed it toward me. I clicked around until I found a simple graphics program, and transcribed the correct information from the flyer on to the computer, along with some slightly more polished graphics that would read as well on social media as they did on real life.

She watched as I worked, and I could feel the tension leaking from her body as she took in what I was doing. She always seemed to jump to the worst case scenario, but I wanted to show her that she didn’t need to approach life like that, not always, not so constantly. I got it, I did. After everything Wharton had put her through, it was only natural that she was suspicious when things went wrong. But we had the permit, and we weren’t going to let Wharton get what he wanted. No matter how many dirty tricks he tried to pull in the process.

“Wow,” she muttered, when I handed the laptop back to her. “That’s... that’s way better than anything I could come up with.”

“Event planning,” I reminded her. “It’s not the first time I’ve done that.”

She finally cracked a smile. “Thank you,” she murmured, looking up at me over the top of her glasses.

“No problem,” I replied. “You can print out a few of these and post them to social media. You have social media accounts for the store, right?”

“I’m not quite that out of date.” She laughed. “Yes, I have social media accounts. I’ll put them up as soon as I get the chance.”

The two of us were supposed to be heading out for dinner this evening. I had suggested another get-together so we could focus on what we were going to do with the book fair, though, in truth, I really just wanted more time alone with her. I could tell that whatever walls she had put up had started to come down at last, and I was finding myself drawn to her, as far more than just a friend. Maybe I should have kept my distance, but there was this pull in my gut that I felt when we were together, as though someone or something was pulling me in her direction, and who was I to fight it?

There were boxes stacked up next to the counter, and she stepped over them and headed into the back office to upload the file. When she came back, I nodded to the stack.

“You need help unloading those?” I asked her.

She glanced down at them. “Oh, right, the boxes,” she sighed. “Haley’s just left on her trip, she was supposed to do them before she left, but I guess she ran out of time.”

“We can do it together, if you want,” I suggested.

She cocked an eyebrow at me. “What about dinner?”

I shrugged. “We could order in,” I replied.

“Are you sure?” she replied, biting her lip. “I don’t want you to think I just got you down here to work.”

“Jorja, I’m offering,” I reminded her gently.

“Then, yes,” she replied at once. “Yes, I really need help getting these books into the display before the fair. I want to make sure they’re all set up, and I don’t know when I’ll have time to do it in the next few days.”

We dialed the Italian place we’d met at for our first date, and ordered in a generous helping of pizza and garlic bread before we set about starting to unpack the boxes. They were packed with a mix of new bestsellers and classics, which she assured me usually did well over the Christmas season.

“People either want to seem cultured by giving their family classics,” she explained. “Or they just grab a new book that’s on the bestseller list because they don’t have any other ideas.”

“Or maybe it’s a carefully-chosen gift for a loved one,” I teased her. “You ever think about that?”

“I think about my bottom line,” she replied. “Well, mostly.”

“Have you read many of these?” I asked, gesturing to the pile of classics that we were currently stacking in a bookshelf close to the door.

“Oh, yeah, most of them,” she replied. “I want to know what I’m talking about when people come in here asking for recommendations.”

“You must be pretty well-read.”