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“Think that might have been the creepy nutcrackers.”
Her hand came up to cover her mouth.
“No, really. You did me a favor. I hate them.” I crouched down to open the box and sure enough the animatronic head was in two pieces.
“Then why did you buy them?” she asked as she swayed with the baby.
“I didn’t.” Gillian had. I didn’t think I needed to mention that. I stood with the box and pitched it into the large trash can. Then I pulled down the bin for her and flipped off the top so she could look through it safely.
She came closer and peered down. “I know it’s not exactly Christmas, but I figured there might be…” She picked up the oversized stars. “Exactly what I wanted.”
“Tree?”
“You got it. I can have the guys hook them to the chain and let them drip down for a perfect photo.”
I was more of a spatial vision kind of guy. I could tell you how many tables would fit on a patio or in a dining room. I could even decorate a Christmas tree evenly. Anything else was beyond my scope.
“I’ll take your word for it.”
“It’s gonna be great.” She pushed aside some other things, but it seemed like the stars were what she was really after.
I took her over to the box of lights and she whistled. “No wonder you said I couldn’t get the boxes.”
The lights were wrapped on a huge spool. I knew she’d need a lot to cover the massive oak, and this was far cheaper than buying a bunch that needed to be linked together.
“I got one with cool lights and the other two are warm. Figured some contrast.”
“I can’t wait to get them up there.”
Lucky pushed through the door to the storage room. “There you are.”
I shoved my hands into my pockets. “We were just talking about you.”
“Yeah?” Lucky grinned. “Good or bad?”
“Depends on how you look at it.” Emma lightly kicked the boxes. “We’ve got lights.”
Lucky’s eyebrows shot up. “Well, then. We better get moving. I got the SOS to pick up the kids from daycare at three.”
Emma pulled out her phone. Her smile faded for a second before she recovered and stuffed it back in her pocket. “We’ll make the most of it.”
I moved to the bay doors and opened them up. “If you want to bring your truck over, we can load them up for one trip.”
“Sounds good.” Lucky hopped off the dock. “I’ll be right back.”
Emma’s gaze tracked to me with an arched brow.
“He knows where he’s going. Lucky has been all over this restaurant during the remodel.”
“Ahh. Gotcha.”
“C’mon, let’s get you back into the restaurant. Do you guys want to take a quick nap in my office?”
She nibbled her bottom lip.
“It’s going to take us a half hour to load what you need into the truck and then get it back up to the tree.”
“Would you mind?”
