The boy turned his head to look at her and nodded.
“I’m Kimberly Burke. I was recruited to help you—although I was told you’re one of the best painters in the sixth grade.” She watched his brushstrokes and frowned, the front window of Creative Cupcakes flitting through her mind. “Do you know how to paint the Grinch?”
“I don’t paint much,” the boy said, dabbing paint on another brown dot. “I like drawing better.”
“Charcoal, pen, or pencil?”
“Pencil.”
Kim pointed to the sketchbook sticking out of the black backpack by his feet. “Can I see?”
Max climbed down the ladder, set down his brush, and wiped his hands on a white cloth. “They aren’t great.”
Kim took the sketchbook he handed her and flipped through the pages. The first image was of a pilot boat used by the Coast Guard to help navigate ships through the Columbia River.
“These are wonderful,” she said, looking at the next drawing of a wooden dock covered with sea lions. “You’ve really captured the fine details.”
She turned to the next page. There was a sketch of a woman about her age, in her mid to late twenties. The woman’s expression was sorrowful, yet it held a hint of hope. “Who’s this?”
Max looked away. “My mother.”
“Has she seen this?”
“No.”
“You should show her,” Kim encouraged. “I think she’d like to see this, Max.”
“She left.” He turned back around and met her gaze. “She promised to come back for Christmas, but she never did.”
Kim hesitated. “And your father?”
“In jail. He gave up his rights to me a long time ago.”
“I’m sorry, Max.” She didn’t know what else to say. “My mother died in a plane crash a long time ago. I do have a father, but . . . we’re not very close.”
“Were you in foster care?”
“What? Me?” Kim laughed, but then sobered when she saw his expression. “No. No, I wasn’t. Are you in foster care, Max?”
He shrugged and reached out for the sketchbook but not before she turned the page and saw the drawing of Creative Cupcakes.
“You drew a picture of my shop.” She glanced up and caught the startled look in his eyes. Was he the boy who painted a Grinch on their storefront window?
“My mother used to work there,” he said, taking back his sketches. “Before the place was a cupcake shop, it used to be called—”
“Zeke’s Tavern,” Kim finished. A closer look revealed his sketch was of the building before they’d added their frilly pink-and-white curtains and changed the name on the sign.
“I used to play there while she worked,” Max said softly. “Sometimes it still feels like . . . home.”
Kim stared at him, trying to imagine what his life must have been like up to this point, and something inside her clicked into place, like an answer to an unspoken question.
“I know the feeling, Max,” she said, opening a can of paint. “Everyone needs a home.”
MAX LEANED AGAINST the side of the building, next to the back party room door, waiting for Mia to come back. She’d already given him a coat, actually—it was a black magician’s cape—which she said might help him disappear if he really wanted to. It didn’t work, but at least it kept him warm. And in couple of minutes she’d return with a cupcake.
The side door opened, and Mia held out a white candy bird on top of whipped blue frosting. “Do you know the song about the twelve days of Christmas? Today is seven swans a swimming.”
“Awesome.” The smell of the sweet creamy icing was nothing compared to the homemade taste of the vanilla cake when he popped it into his mouth. “Must be great owning your own cupcake shop.”
Mia scrunched up her nose. “They won’t let me use the mixer or the oven. So I asked Santa for my own Easy-Bake Oven for Christmas.”
Max finished off the cupcake and threw the wrapper in the garbage can beside him on the street. “I don’t believe there is a Santa Claus.”
“Yes, there is,” Mia argued.
“I never get presents.”
“Did you tell him you moved? Maybe he doesn’t know where you live.”
“Believe me, Santa wouldn’t want to come to my house.”
Mia frowned. “Why not?”
Max shook his head. She was just a little girl. What did she know? “Well, for one thing, we don’t have cookies waiting for him; there’s no tree, no stocking—”
“I made you a stocking,” Mia said, her eyes wide. “I hung it on the wall of the shop next to mine. Santa Claus has to give you a present this year.”
“All I want is for my mom to come back.” He dug in his pocket and took out the postcard he’d kept for the last six years. “When she left, she handed me this picture of Hawaii. She told me to stay here, and she’d be back before Christmas. Then she’d take me there. But she never came back.”
“Is she in Hawaii?”
Max looked at the white sand beach and palm trees on the front of the postcard. “I don’t know.”
“My dad left and never came back.” Mia frowned again. “That made my mom cry. Then we met Jake and Taylor, and Taylor didn’t have a mom. Now my mom is her mom, and her dad is my dad, and we are a new family. Do you want a new family, Max?”
Before he could answer, voices came from inside the party room behind her.
“Oh, no,” Mia whispered. “Here they come. I have to go, Max. Bye!”
Mia ran from the door but left it open a crack. Max peered inside, careful not to let anyone see him. Two people entered the room, Jake and Mia’s mom.
“I spoke with his social worker,” Jake said, “and she confirmed that the Gilmores have filed for divorce. Mrs. Gilmore isn’t even living there, and Mr. Gilmore said she did. He lied right to my face.”
“Sounds like he just wanted his name in the paper,” Mia’s mother replied.
“Max was there,” Jake said, his voice raw, “hiding in the bushes, listening to that guy paint him as some kind of monster. I feel sorry for him, Andi. Earlier that same day, Max came up to me on the sled hill and asked if I could help find his mom—but that’s not happening.”
Mia’s mother dipped her head to catch Jake’s eye. She looked concerned. “Why not?”
Jake let out a grunt. “Max said his mother promised to come back before Christmas. He thinks she never returned. But she did.”
“And?”
“I found out she signed away her parental rights just like his drunken drifter of a father did a few years before.”
No! Max sucked in his breath. It couldn’t be true. Jake was lying, just like his foster father had lied. They were all a bunch of liars.
Suddenly, his eyes burned, and he pulled himself away from the door. In fact, he was so filled with heat he didn’t even need the stupid cape Mia had given him. Ripping it off, he threw it to the ground and stomped on it again and again.
“What happens now?” Andi’s mother asked, her voice faint.
Max paused in his cape stomping to listen—even though Jake was a no-good-dirty-stinking liar.
“Right after Christmas he’s being placed with another family, but he’ll be in foster care until he’s eighteen.”
Max could hardly breathe, probably because of all the energy he’d used to stomp on the cape. His heart pounded in his chest, and his stomach squeezed tight.
He looked at the postcard still in his hand. Why had he kept this ratty thing for so long? There wasn’t even any handwriting on the back. After tearing Hawaii in two, he lifted the lid of the garbage can and threw the pieces in with the remains of his finished cupcake.
“Hey!” someone shouted. “What are you doing here?”
Not just someone, but Garth Gilmore.
A wave of weakness flooded over Max, making him dizzy. That’s probably what made it so easy for Garth to grab him by the shirt collar and haul him away.
Chapter Eight
* * *
>
The best of all gifts around any Christmas tree: the presence of a happy family all wrapped up in each other.
—Burton Hillis
“STOLEN AGAIN?” ANDI demanded. “How is that possible?”
She looked around the vacant shop, trying to quell the uneasiness in her stomach. The day before, Creative Cupcakes could have been mistaken for Santa’s workshop with all of the colorful new gifts, toys, candies, and little “elf” kids running around. Today, there was nothing left to suggest Christmas was only two days away—no tree, no red stockings, no mistletoe. Worse, the handmade gray bakery mouse ornament her mother had made her so many years ago had also been taken.
As the room spun, she gripped the counter. Her mother’s ornament was irreplaceable, one of a kind. Something she’d never get back.
“There’s no sign of breaking and entering,” Ian Lockwell informed her. “The thief must have had a key to come into the shop and then lock the door on his way out, unless he dropped down from the roof. But since you don’t have a chimney, I think we can rule that out.”
“How would this thief get a key?” Rachel asked. “From one of our employees?”
Kim shook her head. “Eric, Heather, and Theresa deny losing or giving their key to anyone.”
“And if it wasn’t any of us,” Andi said, trying to think, “or the guys . . . that means somehow someone got a key to this shop without us knowing about it, or he found a way to magically appear inside.”
Rachel pursed her lips. “Should we ask Mike for ideas? He knows about magic tricks.”
“Yes,” Kim agreed. “But why would he take our tree?”
Andi frowned. “It’s as if the culprit shanghaied the tree and all the new gifts I’d collected for the foster children. Except our shop doesn’t have a trapdoor or a hatch leading out of the building like the Captain’s Port.”
“He must have used the side door of the back party room,” Ian explained, “because the interior security camera showed he didn’t use the front door. Whoever did this came up to the camera from the inside and smashed a cupcake into the lens before it could get a clear shot of him.”
Andi pointed to the pages of the Cupcake Diary spread out on the counter next to the glass display case and looked at Rachel and Kim. “Did you leave this open?”
Both shook their heads and drew closer.
Rachel’s eyes widened as she read, “Got Grinch?”
“This person isn’t just being funny,” Kim said, pointing to the green lettering. “He wants to be known.”
Rachel waved her hand toward the coatrack. “Can you believe it? The Grinch even stole Mike’s red Santa suit.”
“He really is a Grinch!” Kim said with a scowl.
“I guess you don’t have to worry about Mike wearing the Santa suit at your wedding,” Andi said, glancing at Rachel.
She’d meant the comment as a joke, but the crack in her voice ruined the humor. All she could think about was that she’d failed again, failed to gather the gifts she’d promised those poor foster care children.
Later that day, Andi agreed when Jake suggested they take the girls to the Port of Ilwaco Christmas celebration. Jake needed to write an article on the event, and he said it might help take her mind off the Grinch and all his cold-hearted thievery.
Ilwaco, Washington, was just a short ride over Oregon’s Astoria-Megler Bridge, and many of Astoria’s locals made the trip to see “the World’s Tallest Crab Pot Christmas Tree,” “the World’s Shortest Fireworks Display,” and the renowned Lighted Boat Parade.
Mia and Taylor, excited to be off from school for two whole weeks of winter break, ran ahead as she and Jake strolled through the Christmas Market featuring Pacific Northwest arts and crafts vendors. Caroling and the lively, uplifting music of the jazz band filled the frosty night air.
Jake stopped at a food booth and bought them each a slice of pizza. “Reminds me of the pizzeria my family owned when I was growing up. Can you smell the fresh oregano and garlic?”
Andi could smell it, all right. “I can taste it, too. You won’t want to kiss me after this.”
Jake grinned. “Of course I will. I was raised around people with pizza breath. You know the East Coast is famous for its pizza. My grandmother came from Italy and helped my father start his first pizza store in New York. Then Dad decided to move to Lake Tahoe, and our family started a second store there.”
Andi’s gaze traveled past him to a tent vendor selling ornaments. “You know, some of those look familiar. I’ll be right back.”
She browsed the Christmas ornaments decorating the six mini tabletop trees lining the fold-out table and pointed to a painted glass ball with a reindeer.
“Where did you get this?” she asked the seller.
The woman pointed to another vendor three tents down who sold the same generic ornaments. “Would you like to buy?”
“No, thank you,” Andi said and returned to Jake and the girls.
“A change of scenery might be good for you,” Jake said, taking her arm. “Have you thought more about—”
“Jake! The tree lighting is about to start.” She waved to the girls to throw their pizza-stained napkins in the trash and taking their hands, led them toward the gathering crowd.
Dozens upon dozens of stainless steel boxed-wire crab pots had been stacked one on top of the other, forming the shape of a giant tree. A golden star lit the top, and the rest of the “tree” was decorated with multicolored lights and hundreds of fishing lures.
“Looks like it’s at least twenty-five feet tall,” Jake said and scribbled a few lines in his notebook. “Almost as big as the Capitol Christmas tree in Washington, D.C.”
Andi pointed past the tree to another vendor. “Do you see the bag of presents that guy is holding?”
“The man by the beach offering Pirate Santa Photos?” Jake shot her a look of sympathy. “Andi, the guy’s legit. Those aren’t the gifts stolen from our shop.”
“I’m sorry. I keep picturing the foster children having a blue Christmas like in that old TV special, The Year without a Santa Claus.”
The Lighted Boat Parade immediately followed. Floating vessels of all shapes and sizes, from dinghies to crabbers, sailed past in single file through the marina. They went out to Cape Disappointment and back, giving people plenty of time to judge which boat’s lighted mast, garlands, and other festive holiday decor they liked best.
While the red, blue, yellow, and green lights reflected in the dark nighttime water were some of the prettiest images she’d ever seen, Andi’s gaze strayed back toward the vendors, especially to one man selling gifts and ornaments out of the back of an open truck.
Excusing herself, she left Jake with the girls and made her way toward him. He even had some macaroni angels, similar to the ones she and Rachel had made when they were younger, except with different decorative detail.
“I’ll make you a deal,” the guy said, giving her a wink. “Two for the price of one.”
Then she saw it. Her mother’s handmade gray bakery mouse clutching the silver spoon with her initials and the date she’d made it, engraved on the back.
“How about I call the cops,” Andi countered, “and you explain how you stole this ornament from my cupcake shop?”
The police questioned the man for fifteen minutes, during which he claimed he’d bought the items from someone else he couldn’t name. Then when some TVs and other high-dollar gifts that had been reported stolen were also found in his truck, the man was handcuffed and taken away.
“We’ll let you know what we find out,” an officer promised, handing her his card.
Andi turned to Jake, who had joined her once the cops started closing in. “Can you believe that guy? I hope they get him to confess he’s the Grinch who’s been stealing from us.”
“I hope so, too,” he said, an urgency tingeing his voice as they walked with the girls back to their car. “But about our move to D.C.—”
“We didn’t say we’d move,”
Andi corrected. “And . . . I really don’t want to talk about this right now.”
“We have to talk about it,” Jake said, the expression on his face anxious. “The editor of the Post called and said they’d prefer to hire me, but if I don’t give him an answer, they’ll give the job to someone else.”
Andi stopped walking and met his gaze. “Okay, we’ll make a decision after Christmas like we agreed.”
“No.” Jake gave her a solemn look. “They want to know tonight.”
RACHEL SMILED AS she stepped over the threshold of the boutique where she and Kim had decided to shop. The beat of her heart kicked up a notch as she breathed in the scent of new clothes, sweet perfume, and the promise of another glorified purchase. She couldn’t understand why anyone—like her cousin—wouldn’t love to shop.
Okay, Kim didn’t exactly share her enthusiasm either, but she had been excited to come along to find a gift for Nathaniel—which made all the difference in the world.
“Last night Nathaniel took me on a horse-drawn sleigh ride at one of the farms by Youngs River Falls, and he kept hinting he got me something special for Christmas,” Kim explained. “I want to find something special for him, too, something that shows how much I care.”
“I take it luggage tags are out?” Rachel teased.
“He talked to my dad,” Kim said, twisting the shoulder strap of her hobo bag around and around.
“What about?”
“He won’t tell me. Nathaniel said he saw my father in town, and they went for coffee. Coffee! Can you believe it? First I asked him if he was sure he had the right father, because my dad’s never chatted with me or Andi over coffee.”
Rachel frowned. “I thought you said your father had been opening up more with you and Andi over the last few months?”
“Yeah, but not enough to have a full-blown conversation. What could they possibly have talked about?”
Rachel laughed. “You look nervous. Maybe Nathaniel asked your dad for your hand in marriage. Nathaniel is a traditional kind of guy.”
Kim shook her head. “Nathaniel hasn’t even hinted at marriage. If anything, he keeps pressing me on my thoughts of continuous travel.”
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