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"Okay." She nods with certainty, but twists her hands in her shirt.
"An investor is interested in helping me expand. He wants to open a brick-and-mortar store with my candy in every state in the country."
She blinks, then blinks again. "Wow. That's… I mean, that's… great?"
"You're not a fan of the idea?" I'm not sure when her opinion started to matter so much, but it bothers me that she doesn't seem impressed.
"It's not that… It's just…" She looks up at me. "Is that what you really want?"
Her question bugs me even more than her apparent disapproval. I have to fight the urge to snap back defensively. "You don't think I can do it? You don't think my candy is good enough?" Okay, that came out snappier than I intended.
She doesn't seem fazed. "Why would you want to expand? You live in an amazing, beautiful small town, with your family and your friends close. Everyone knows you and you're so involved with the community and helping everyone. I guess I just don't understand why you'd want to leave this place." She pauses and presses her lips together tight like she's worried she's said too much. "I'm assuming you'd have to leave to make the expansion happen?"
"It's not that I want to get away from this place. It's not even about me. Expanding is my way of giving back to this town that's given me so much. It means bringing more attention to Yuletide year round."
"Will you stay here and find other people to run the stores in the new cities?"
"I'll need to leave for at least a while, to get the other stores set up. But it'll be fun to travel and see the world." I love Yuletide. It's home to me. I don't want to leave forever, but it'll be good to get away for awhile. "The investor advised me to dump all the Christmas from my store and my online site to make my brand more universal. It made sense at the time, but sales have been way down since I made the changes. Your ideas are exactly what I need to get my numbers back up to where they need to be."
She lets out a little squee of celebration. The hope and excitement on her face make me want to give her whatever she wants. "Are you sure? I can come up with other ideas if this isn't—"
"I like it. This one for December and the ballerinas for January."
She turns her attention back to her laptop, her smile jaw-crackingly huge. "Okay, so I've been thinking about the interior of your store. Your displays and arrangements are good, but you need better packaging. This is gourmet candy, your customers need a top-tier experience from the moment they see your window display until the moment they leave your shop."
It isn't what I expect. She's so flashy, but she's chosen simple, elegant packaging that's not ridiculously expensive. I give her the go-ahead to get it.
"Awesome." She bounces in place, making the whole bed bounce. "Now, let's talk about your website."
"No more tonight." Not just because I'm tired, but because being so close to Cherry on her bed is giving me thoughts that are only going to get me into trouble. "We need a plan for breaking up Alice and James. And I need to tell you about a job opportunity I found for you."
She shuts her laptop. "Other than the job you just hired me for?"
"If you need another job, Josephine Winters runs a reindeer farm just outside of town. She has a reindeer visiting center in town for school groups and tourists. She's looking for someone to help with that and with caring for the reindeer."
Cherry's eyes go almost comically wide. "Reindeer? I've never seen a real reindeer in person."
"If you're interested, I can give you her contact information."
"I'm interested," she says, quickly. "A marketing consultant doesn't make much money when she only has one customer."
"Great. Give me your number and I'll send you her information."
We make the exchange and she hops up from the bed and starts pacing. "What we really need is a big whiteboard."
"For what?"
"For brainstorming how to break up Alice and RJ. Isn't that what you came here for?"
"We don't need a whiteboard," I say. "We just need to find out what nefarious things James is up to and prove to Alice what a bad guy he is."
Cherry rolls her eyes. "I get you aren't a fan of RJ, but he's not up to anything."
I snort. "I'm afraid love and lust are blurring your vision of the man."
She smiles, so sure of herself. "It's the opposite, actually. I know RJ at his best and his worst. I've got the blinders off." She paces again. "That's the mistake my mother always made. She met a handsome man who swept her off her feet, and she allowed herself to be enchanted by the romance of it all." She pauses and curls a strand of hair that's fallen from her messy bun around one finger. "That and his bank account, of course." She meets my gaze like she's waiting for a reaction.
"An element of practicality. I get it." Some people see women who marry a man for his money as opportunistic, but women haven't historically had the advantages men have had. Sometimes, they've had to climb the social and financial ladder via marriage. It's no different from a man networking and making connections, pretending to like people only for financial or social gain.
