“You were hired because you said you had a sense of vision,” Mr. Arbogast continued, “and the board thought that might help revitalize the Christmas Village. For years, this place has been busy, but guests have consistently filled out comment cards saying that it’s not a good experience. You promised to change that.”
“I tried,” Marsh said plaintively. “One misstep—”
“One misstep that could have gotten my son hurt! That could have gotten your Santa Claus killed! And then you didn’t even take responsibility for it. You tried to shove the blame off onto the people whoactuallyhelped.” Mr. Arbogast shook his head. “That’s it. I’m sorry for the disappointment it’s going to cause, but this is the end of the Honey Brook Christmas Village.”
Wade was sure there was some misunderstanding. “For this year, you mean? We aren’t going to open tomorrow?”
“We aren’t going to open tomorrow, and we aren’t going to open next year, either,” Mr. Arbogast said. “I’d like the staff to assemble so we can thank them all for their hard work, but this is it. The Christmas Village is done.”
Chapter Eighteen
Mira felt dizzy.
An hour ago, she had known for a fact that her bonus was toast. She wasn’t going to cooperate with Marsh, and the day was going to end with him smugly firing her for it. It was going to leave her in a difficult fix, but even so, it was a stand she had to take because she didn’t want to terrorize some poor innocent reindeer.
But Marsh had terrorized the reindeer anyway, and the reindeer, acting in self-defense, had terrorizedeverybody.
And now, everything was different.
Better? Worse? It was hard to say.
The Arbogasts had promised that everyone on staff—with the obvious exception of Marsh, who had been ignominiously canned for endangering their son, and good riddance—would receive their holiday bonuses as planned. They would even get paid for their cancelled hours on Christmas Eve. And Mira and Wade were both getting generousbonusbonuses on top of that as thanks for their quick handling of the reindeer catastrophe. The reindeer were even being picked up by a rescue that would return them up north.
She had nothing to complain about, really. She could pay her parents’ entrance fee into the retirement home and have money left over. She could even get an early start on the holidays. And she would never have to wear the Galadriel dress again ... unless she and Wade decided to have a sexy elf-themed night.
... But the Christmas Village was gone.Poof. It had been a Honey Brook institution for years, and now it had disappeared.
Was that her fault? Could she have done more to keep Marsh from dragging the reindeer over to Wade?
No, right? What should she have done, abandoned the child she was talking to and hopped on Marsh’s back, wrapping her arms around him to hold him in place? That was ridiculous.
It wasn’t her fault that she hadn’t been able to control a grown man who hated her. It wasn’t Wade’s fault that he smelled like a polar bear. They had done their level best to keep the day from going the way it had.
So why did she feel soempty?
She couldn’t even concentrate on picking out a gift for her parents. She’d hit on the idea of giving them a present from herandWade, a Mira-selected, Wade-carved bit of woodworking they could take to their new home, now that all the loose ends had been tied up.
Right now, she should have been torn between the hundreds of beautiful pieces she was looking at. Instead, all she could think of was that next year, Honey Brook’s plaza would be so horribly bare. No more cups of cocoa to share with Wade. No more busted and beloathed carol-oke machine. No more of any of it.
“Do you think the Arbogasts might change their minds?” she said, apropos of nothing.
Wade didn’t seem like he thought it was a question straight out of the blue.
“I’ve been wondering the same thing,” he admitted. “Maybe they’ll feel differently this time next year. It’ll give them time to let the bad feelings dwindle down. I mean, every mall has some kind of Santa at Christmastime, doesn’t it? Honey Brook wouldn’t want everybody who’s looking for one to take their business elsewhere.”
“Good point,” Mira said, but it only made her feel better for a second. “But that doesn’t mean they’ll have to have the whole Village. It seems like the Arbogasts think it’s more trouble than it’s worth.”
Maybe it was. There had been plenty of times this year when it had felt like that to her.
But a lot of her problems with the Christmas Village had stemmed from Marsh. Without him—
Well, it would still be busy and loud. Kids would occasionally be bratty, parents would occasionally be demanding. Everyone who worked there would unavoidably get sick of Christmas carols.
But that didn’t mean there wasn’t a real sense of magic. That didn’t mean they had to give the whole thing up.
Once again, Wade was on the same page she was.
“Maybe we can change that,” he said. “I can talk to some other store owners in the mall next year and see if I can build up some support for the idea. The Christmas Village probably brings in extra foot-traffic that we could all use.”
