Chapter 8
S
am was stacking a delivery of fresh, intensely fragrant trees against the A-frame. It was Saturday morning, and they had sold nearly all of the first bunch by now.
“Put the biggest trees on the ends,” Theo instructed him. “They’re not as easy to swipe.”
“People actually do that?” Sam asked.
“Every so often, yeah. Especially the dinky trees. It happens. We get busy, don’t pay attention or we’re inside the trailer—what can ya do? I’m not going to chase anyone. But we don’t have to make it easy for tree-nappers.”
He sounded fairly philosophical about it. Sam shook his head and went back to work. To fit in more trees, he tried to move a big fir with a
SOLD
tag, but he couldn’t budge it. Sam stepped back to see if its branches were caught somehow and saw that the fir’s trunk had been placed in a bucket of soggy peat moss.
“How come this one is getting the royal treatment?” he asked Theo.
“Just keeping it fresh. The customer is going to pick it up soon.”
“Oh. Mind if I shove it out of the way?”
Theo was swinging his arms to warm up. “Go ahead. The new stock is more important. Customers have been asking when we’d get a delivery. Are we ready?”
“Yes, we’re ready,” Sam replied by rote. He knew Theo’s motivational routine by now.
The old man’s deep voice boomed out of his hood. “Hey hey hey! Ho ho ho! All these trees have got to go!”
Sam finished for him. “Let’s sell, sell, sell and make big dough.”
Theo looked his way. “Very good. Greg never gets it right. Don’t tell him I said that.”
“I won’t.”
Theo came over to help Sam with the last of the trees. “The sun is out and so are the kids. Always a good sign.”
Sam only nodded. He wasn’t exactly in the best mood, but he kept a lid on it. He missed Nicole. She had checked in now and again but never talked for long. Putting together a presentation for her upcoming meeting with Kevin Talley wasn’t just a matter of bringing in a portfolio, apparently.
“They bring the parents,” Theo was saying. “And do you see what I see?”
“Nice-looking family.”
A mother and father in a late-model SUV had just pulled over and were lifting identical twin girls out of their car seats.
Theo waved.
“I take it you know them.”
The old man shook his head. “Never saw them in my life. But I treat every customer like a new friend.”
He greeted the family once they reached the lot and chatted with them for a bit, then spun a little tree around on its stand to make the toddlers laugh.
“Oh, we want a bigger tree than that,” the dad said to them. “Which one is the tallest?” he asked Theo.
With a salesman’s flourish, Theo indicated it. Sam wandered away to the far corner of the lot, looking idly at the usual assortment of double-parked vans and cars blocking the vehicles on the other side of the street. Alternate parking days took getting used to. But the cops never bothered them about staying where they were, just waved and drove on.
Looking up the block, he saw Douglas come down the stoop of their building, half-pulled by a small white dog. Sam didn’t remember the Fultons having a dog or cat the one time he’d stopped in. It wasn’t long before the boy reached the tree lot.
“Hey, Douglas,” he said. “When did you guys get a dog?”
“This is Puff,” Douglas explained. “I’m walking her for a neighbor. Is Theo here today?”
Sam had been standing in a clump of tall trees as thick as a forest. He could see over, but Douglas couldn’t.
“Yeah. But he’s with a customer right now. Anything I can help you with?”
“No. I just wanted to say hi. Puff, quit it.”
Sam felt eager paws scrabbling on his jeans. The little dog was straining on her leash and just about airborne in her own efforts to say hello. “Okay, okay. Down, girl. I’ll pet you.”
He squatted on his haunches and got his face licked for his trouble. Sam laughed and wiped off the canine kiss, getting up again when he heard Theo call his name.
“Be right there.” He looked at Doug, who hesitated. “Come on. He probably needs me to bag the tree and get it on top of a car.”
The boy followed. Sam’s prediction was correct.
“Sam, can you take care of this while I finish the sale?”
“Sure.”
The parents held their wide-eyed toddlers while Sam stepped forward to lift the huge tree from the A-frame, fighting the springy branches to get it into the bagging machine. Neatly contained by mesh, it was a lot easier to carry. He took it over to the sawhorse and trimmed the trunk with a portable electric saw.
“Beautiful tree,” he said. “The best on the lot, in my opinion. Where do you want it?” he asked the dad.
“On top of that, please.” The man indicated the parked SUV with his credit card and fluttering receipt, which Theo had just handed back to him.
Sam grabbed a coil of thin poly rope and hoisted the tree over one shoulder. It was quick work to get it secured to the SUV’s roof rack.
“You’re good to go, people.”
“Thanks.” The dad handed him a five. Sam tucked it in his pocket. Getting tipped didn’t bother him. He passed them all on when he got a chance, slipping the bills and change into the charity bucket manned by the bell-ringing Santa on the other corner.
The family drove off, and he turned to see Douglas chatting with Theo, the dog’s leash wound around his hand. Puff pulled toward Sam, begging for another pat.
“Nothing doing.” Sam kept his distance. “Even if you are cute.”
A honking war broke out on Eighth Avenue. “Back in a flash,” he called to Theo. Sam strolled away from the lot to see what was going on.
As if he’d been waiting for his chance, Doug took a white envelope out of his pocket and gave it to Theo. “This is a note from my mom,” he said. “She says it’s okay if I work so long as it’s just for an hour and during daylight.”
Theo felt inside his jacket and took out a pair of reading glasses before he opened the envelope and unfolded the note. “Guess I don’t need these,” he said, putting the glasses away. “Nice of your mom to use big type.”
“She wrote it on her laptop,” Douglas said. “You can change the size of the letters to anything you want.”
“Ah,” said Theo. “I don’t have a laptop.” He read the note with a smile. “Well, we can use you,” he said as he put it away inside his jacket. “These dry needles underfoot need sweeping up right now. And it’s all right if the dog stays.”
He sat on the folding chair, and Puff jumped up into his lap, content to be held.
“Hang on a sec. I have to check in with my mom. She gave me her old cell phone.” He pulled it out of his pocket and speed-dialed her. “Hi, Mom. It’s me.”
Her clear voice asking a question hung in the air.
“I walked Puff down to the lot. Is it okay if I stay here for about an hour? Theo, say hi.” Douglas held up the open phone.
“Hello, Maureen!” Theo boomed.
Douglas put the phone back to his ear. “I didn’ t forget my gloves and it’s nice out,” he said to his mother. “Okay, see you later.” He hung up.
“She went to talk to some people about cakes,” Douglas said. “Amanda is with Julie.”
He didn’t waste a minute. He’d spotted the broom and big dustpan with the handle for himself, and got to work.
By the time Sam came back with a take-out tray of hot drinks for all three of them, the boy had finished sweeping. He poured the needles into the tall can they kept handy for trimmed trunks and other tree debris.
“What next?” he asked.
Theo looked around. “You could arrange the small trees. Put the really little ones in front and the bigger ones in back.”
“Like a class picture,” Douglas said.
“Exactly. ”
Sam set down the take-out tray. “And you can have a cup of cocoa when you come back. Theo, I got us a couple of hot ciders.”
“Over there, Doug. Thanks, Sam.” The old man set Puff down at his feet, holding onto the leash. Douglas ran to the group of small trees, studying them for a minute. Then he started to move them around as Theo had requested.
Sam smiled and turned his attention to Theo. “You putting the kid to work?”
“Why not? He wants to buy something for his mother, surprise her. He’s growing up.”
Sam took both lids off the ciders. Apple-scented steam wafted into the cold air. “Better let these cool.” He glanced at Douglas, making sure he was far enough away. “What’s the deal with his father?” he asked, too quietly for the boy to hear.
Theo’s expression was suddenly tinged with sadness. “Hank Fulton died four years ago,” he replied just as quietly. “An accident, so I understand. I don’t see the family except for this time of year, but you get to know people in this job.”
Sam looked over at Douglas again, absorbed in his task. Theo got up and tied Puff to the A-frame. “Customers.”
“Go for it. I’m here if you need me.” Sam stayed where he was, keeping an eye on Douglas. Theo’s answer explained why the boy seemed so self-reliant. And why he was so protective of his mother and little sister.
He picked up his cider and drank it quickly. Sam turned to throw away the crumpled cup and spotted a pickup truck running the red light at the avenue. Instinct—and a good memory—put him on alert.
Sam craned his neck to look through a gap in the tree display. The truck had pulled over into a loading zone before a delivery van could claim it. Was it the same truck that had clipped the frame and sped away the other night?
He looked closer. The back was heaped with bagged Christmas trees, but it seemed to be a different vehicle entirely. The paint was faded red with blotches of rust. He was pretty sure the other truck had been dark gray.
The van driver leaned on his horn. The unseen truck driver rolled down his window and made a rude gesture. Then a different van pulled out farther up the street and the driver of the first gave up on the argument to take the spot.
That seemed to be the end of the confrontation.
Sam watched as a hulking man in a dirty jacket got out of the truck and pulled a folding sign out of the back. He put it right on the sidewalk, partially blocking it.
FRESH CUT TREES R BAGGED
2
GO! NY’S LOWEST PRICES
!
Then he dragged down a few trees and leaned them against the truck’s fold-down door.
They covered the license plate, Sam noticed.
The man jammed a dark ball cap down over his forehead and added a red scarf for a touch of cheer. He talked to a few pedestrians and didn’t seem bothered by the rebuffs. No one stopped to buy. He leaned against the truck and thrust his hands into his jacket pockets, looking around. One hand came out again, holding a metal flask. He unscrewed the cap and took a big swallow that made him cough.
The man waited.
If the prices were low enough, he would get takers sooner or later.
Plus he could move that truck every fifteen minutes if he wanted to, Sam thought angrily, and use it to make deliveries. Theo was right. Fly-by-night operators were bad for business.
He was inclined to go talk to the brazen SOB, but he knew better. It might end up in a good old-fashioned fistfight, which wasn’t good for business either. The cops had to be on the scene to do anything about an unlicensed seller, and a call to the precinct house in the busy holiday season wasn’t going to be a high priority.
Besides, the hulking man hadn’t broken the law yet.
“What are you looking at?” Douglas came over to him, brushing needles off his hands.
“Nothing. You ready for that cocoa?”
“Yeah. Thanks. I owe you.”
Sam had to laugh. “I don’t think so, kiddo. But you should drink it while it’s still warm.”
“Wait a sec.” The boy took out his cell phone again.
“Checking in with your mom?”
“Uh-huh.” He waited. “It went to voice mail. I’ll send her a text.”
Maureen sat at the side of a cluttered desk in the business office of Nash & Thomas, Gourmet Purveyors. They were on the fourteenth floor of an Upper East Side building with a great view that she wasn’t looking at. She unwrapped three sample cakes and set them on a small disposable tray.
Fred Nash himself had stepped out of the office to see to something. She smoothed her hair, then looked in her purse for a compact, flipping it open. Her makeup was fine, but an anxious line had appeared between her eyebrows. She drew in a calming breath and willed the line to go away when she breathed out. It didn’t work.
Her cell chimed in the bottom of her bag and she looked at it quickly, seeing a text from Douglas on the screen.
Going back to Julie apt w Puff. Sam says hi.
The brief message put her mind at ease. He had been out exactly an hour, and she would be home soon.
She heard Fred Nash returning and put the phone back, turning it off.
“Sorry about that, Maureen.” His loud voice made her jump a little, but her first impression of him had been that he was a nice man.
“Not a problem. I appreciate your taking the time to see me, Mr. Nash, especially on a Saturday. This must be your busiest time of year.”
“You got that right. I work seven days a week in December. And you can call me Fred.” He passed in back of her and dropped into his swivel chair, throwing a pile of printouts on top of everything else.
Fred Nash was not that young and far from thin, but he crackled with energy and so did his shaggy gray hair. Behind black square-framed glasses, his blue eyes regarded her with interest.
“Okay, bring me up to speed before I taste.” He looked down at the little cakes and then into a drawer filled with a jumble of plastic cutlery, taking out a fork.
“Starting from the left—your left, I mean—” Maureen paused for a second to compose her thoughts. “That’s spice cake, chocolate babka, and a cinnamon-walnut bar.”
“Okay.” He jabbed the fork into the spice cake first and took a bite, finishing it fast. “I like this. Real flavor, just enough ginger and the allspice is nice. The nutmeg too.”
He’d listed every spice in it accurately. She was impressed. “It’s my son’s favorite.”
“He has good taste buds.” Nash moved on to the babka, helping himself to a bigger bite of that. “Mmm,” he mumbled. He reached back into the drawer for a paper napkin.
His expression was thoughtful. Maureen waited nervously for the verdict while he wiped his mouth.
“Love it,” he said with a happy sigh. “Absolutely love it. I’m a huge fan of babka, just so you know. My grandmother was Russian. She used to make babka just for me.”
Maureen smiled. She could see how he had acquired his girth.
Nash poked the cinnamon-walnut bar with the fork until a bit of it fell off. He ate it and thought some more. “Nice but maybe too crunchy. But again, good flavor.”
Maureen let out the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.
“So,” he said, setting the tray of cakes aside, “tell me something about yourself.”
This was the part of being interviewed that she liked the least. “Well, I—I used to own and manage a bakery over on Ninth Avenue.”
“I never go that far west in Manhattan. What was it called? How long did you have it?”
“Icing On The Cake.”
His blue eyes crinkled with amusement. “Oh, yeah. I heard of it. Memorable name. Bet you got a lot of kids coming in.”
Maureen smiled. “How did you know?”
Fred Nash leaned back in his swivel chair and chuckled. “Stands to reason. We run a family business too. My wife and I started this one. Twenty-five years and counting.”
“That’s great.” She was beginning to relax a little. Just a little.
“We wouldn’t let our kids in the company kitchens,” he went on. “They went straight for anything that was iced and waiting to be boxed. And then they tried to sneak a spoon into the icing vats.”
Maureen knew what he was talking about. “Exactly. Whenever I let my son have a cupcake, he would poke a finger in the icing and eat that first. So I invented a treat for him. I called it Poke-A-Dot Cupcakes. White icing, with one big colored dot in the middle. We sold an awful lot of those.”
“I bet you did.” Fred laughed. “How old is your son?”
Maureen brightened a bit. This wasn’t one of those interviews where you didn’t dare mention that you had children. Fred Nash was genuinely interested—and he was going out of his way to put her at ease.
“Douglas was six then. He’s ten now. And he has a little sister who’s three.”
“So who came up with the bakery name?”
Maureen hesitated. “My late husband.”
Fred Nash nodded without asking any questions on that subject. Maureen guessed he was shrewdly filling in a lot of blanks.
“Well, it sounds like you know the business. There’s no substitute for that kind of experience,” he said warmly. He tapped the tray with his fork. “These samples are excellent.”
Maureen looked at him hopefully.
“But I have to tell you, we contracted for our Christmas orders months ago. You aren’t looking to sell into the holiday market this late in the year, are you?”
She lifted her head high. “No. Of course not. These aren’t specifically for Christmas. I was looking ahead to spring and summer.”
“Good, good.” He rocked forward again. “Now, we don’t do our own baking anymore. I take it you’re not working out of your apartment.”
“N-no.”
The slight catch in her voice went unnoticed. Deliberately or not, Maureen couldn’t tell.
“With a background like yours, I’m sure you can rent work space and professional ovens. Can you deliver in quantity?”
“I have contacts and good friends in the business. I don’t anticipate any problems on that score.”
It had been so long since she’d thought of herself as a businesswoman, she was almost surprised to hear how confident she sounded. But her answer was the truth.
“All right. Tell you what. Let me give these samples to my partner and get his opinion. I’d introduce you to him, but he’s down at our place in the Chelsea Market today. He’s the other half of Nash & Thomas. That’s him.” He pointed to a framed photo on the wall. “Jonathan Thomas.”
Maureen barely glanced at the photo. She just hoped her disappointment didn’t show.
Maybe it did. Fred Nash gave her a reassuring smile. “It’s possible we might be able to do a deal as early as January, depending on our Christmas sales. You know how it is.”
“Oh, I do,” she said quickly. “But I can give you some fresh cakes for Mr. Thomas.” She reached into her bag and took out a box filled with wrapped samples, placing it on the desk.
“I was hoping you’d say that.” Nash looked happy. “I hate sharing. These would go great with my afternoon coffee.”
“I’m glad you like them. And thank you. It really has been a pleasure. Oh—here are a few business cards.”
He rose when she did and took the cards, leaning over his desk to shake her hand. “The pleasure’s all mine. Best of luck. Happy holidays. ”
Maureen wished him the same and made her way out, stepping carefully between other sample boxes. Fred Nash’s office was stacked four and five deep with them in places. There was competition. She was going to have to take her chances like anyone else.
She thanked the receptionist in the front space and went through the double glass doors to the elevator, looking for her gloves in the bag.
They were under the remaining sample boxes inside. This had been her first stop. Fred Nash had been more than nice, but he hadn’t made any promises. Still, it was a start.
Maureen entered when the elevator arrived, absently watching the floor numbers on the panel display go down to 1. There was a faint chime and the doors opened.
She was already thinking about her next potential customer, too preoccupied to notice the tall, well-groomed man with a pepper-and-salt crew cut standing to one side as she exited.
But he looked at her with frank admiration as she went past him, taking in the details in a respectful way.
Classic profile, silky blond hair, coat not buttoned yet over a slender figure. And great legs.
Jonathan Thomas watched the lady in the lavender coat go through the revolving door. The elevator doors began to close automatically and he snapped out of it. He got in and pressed 14.