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“Please, Willy,” she said, putting her hands together. “This lady’s killing my holiday bottom line. My stocking stuffer sales are down twenty percent.”

I glanced at Lauren.

“A little cease-and-desist letter maybe?” Lauren held the penis next to her face like a trophy and smiled.

I turned back to Mrs. Clements. “I will look into it,” I said.

“Oh, thank you thank you thank you.” She patted my cheek. “I can’t pay you, you know that, right?”

“Yes, I figured.”

“I’m gonna make you a fruitcake. Best in the state.”

“I cannot wait,” I said.

“Also, I want you to know that I never believed it was you who burned the post office down, no matter what they said.”

I choked.

She squeezed Lauren’s hand. “You can keep that penis, hon.”

Lauren waved at her while she shuffled off. “Thank you!” she called after her. She turned back to me. “She was nice.” She tucked the penis into her purse. “So you burned the post office down, huh?”

I scoffed. “It was a lithium battery fire and I was in law school in Illinois at the time, nine hours away.”

She narrowed her eyes at me. “The William lore here is fascinating.”

“Ha. Do you want a drink? They have a signature cocktail. A Frosty the Snowman or something.”

“Sure.”

We left Nicholas talking to his cousin and made our way toward the bar.

“Hey, we should probably game plan our best man/maid of honor speeches,” she said.

“I didn’t even think about that,” I said, getting in line. “Why do I feel like all I’m doing is playing catch-up?”

“Because we are. We’re being asked to do in three days what usually takes a year.” She cocked her head. “Is it going to be hard for you, someone who doesn’t believe in love, to find something nice to say?”

“Uh, I actually do believe in love. I just do not believe in love in three days. And I already have the first part of my speech.” I cleared my throat. “Look at each other. The person you’re looking at is statistically most likely to kill you.”

“Wow, that is romantic. By the way, I saw your tenth-grade picture today,” she said, still tittering.

I wrinkled my forehead. “You did? Where?”

“At the salon. It’s behind the counter with grainy surveillance photos of people banned from the premises.”

I scoffed.

“And what did you do to them?” she asked.

“Okay, first of all, none of my crimes was the work of a lone offender. Nick was highly involved.”

“Nicholas? Jesus himself? Your photo is the only one that’s in there.”

“Somebody had to take the heat,” I said. “I was leaving, whereas Nick is going to grow old and die here. I wanted him to be able to go on to be an upstanding member of Little Christmas society, unmarred by juvenile delinquency.”

“Huh. Well, despite your torrid past, you are also an upstanding member of society. Why didn’t you set up a practice here? Sounds like they could use a lawyer.”