A Dog's Perfect Christmas Read online

  He stood for a moment outside Mrs. O’Brien’s office. On her first day here, she’d declared that, unlike her predecessor, she had an “open-door policy.”

  As far as Hunter had observed, her door had been shut ever since.

  He knocked and, upon summons, entered.

  Hunter had practiced this moment in his mind. He needed to come in self-assured, uncowed, yet respectful of her position in the company. His plan had been to greet her with a cheerful, “Good morning, Mrs. O’Brien.”

  Instead he said, “You wanted to see me?”

  Lame.

  “Please come in and shut the door,” Mrs. O’Brien suggested in an unreadable tone.

  Hunter glanced around the office appraisingly. As was the case in nearly every executive office on this floor, Mrs. O’Brien’s desk was backed by a large hutch. She had decorated it with photographs, mostly of a boy. Hunter tracked the timeline from baby-age to the most recent, in which the smiling child seemed to be about Hunter’s daughter’s age.

  Mrs. O’Brien flashed a smile. “I don’t know much about you, Hunter. I’ve been so busy trying to acquaint myself with the operations of our marketing and development processes that I simply haven’t had time.” She frowned. “The software engineers are not meeting their targets.” A wave of a hand. “We’ll talk about that in a minute. Meanwhile, why don’t you tell me about yourself.”

  Hunter was ready for this one. “Well, I’ve lived here in Traverse City for ten years. I was the assistant facilities manager for Munson Medical Center. Then I worked as director of operations for a software start-up company that failed. I came here a little more than three years ago, and have been running facilities ever since.”

  Mrs. O’Brien nodded. “And?”

  Hunter nodded as if he understood. “And,” he repeated, “we’ve got this major installation.…”

  Mrs. O’Brien shook her head. “I meant and as in, what else about you? I know that you’re married. Do you have children?”

  The questions sounded warm and personal, or at least intended to be warm and personal, but there was nothing in his boss’s eyes that matched her words. They were dark and glittering as they coldly assessed Hunter in his impressive suit.

  Hunter cleared his throat. “Oh, yes. My wife was a litigator for a small firm here in town. Then we had Ello—Eloise—and she was very sick, born premature, and it was a real struggle. So, my wife stayed home to be with our daughter.”

  “Good.” Mrs. O’Brien nodded for him to continue.

  “We wanted to have another child right away, but it was one of those things. Gosh, it’s been three years ago now that the twins were born. Ewan and Garrett.”

  “Twins,” Mrs. O’Brien observed. “That can’t be easy. I have only my son, Sean, who will be living with me now. He stayed back at his old school to finish out football season, and he’ll be coming here over Thanksgiving. He’s fourteen—a little old for eighth grade, they tell me, though that wasn’t the case when we lived in Canada. He’ll be attending your daughter’s school, I imagine.”

  Hunter brightened. “You know what? I am sure my daughter would be happy to show Sean around school when he gets here.”

  Mrs. O’Brien smiled. “That would be lovely.”

  Hunter nodded. Done deal. He just had to remember. His hand twitched, as if to call his wife. Juliana was the rememberer of everything.

  Juliana. He glanced surreptitiously at his watch. Still some time before he had to meet her for lunch. Noting something odd in her manner that morning, he had checked his calendar to make sure it wasn’t their anniversary or a birthday or something. But no, just lunch. So why did he feel like he was in trouble, somehow?

  “Well,” Mrs. O’Brien said, her friendly smile turning off with an almost-audible click, “let’s talk about this installation that I inherited from my predecessor. What can you tell me?”

  Hunter felt a sinking sensation in his stomach. Had his boss not read any of the documentation he had so carefully prepared? Was he really here to explain, in the few minutes he had before he needed to leave, a plan so complicated that he himself could hardly keep it all in his head?

  The “inherited from my predecessor” was a clear signal that he didn’t have her support. What he needed to do was completely win her over, because if she rejected his underlying concepts, he was doomed.

  But that would take time—time he didn’t have before meeting Juliana.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Hunter obviously couldn’t tell his boss he needed to cut the meeting short because of lunch with his wife, but as he began speaking, his stomach lurched as if he were falling off of a building—as if he were doing something really wrong to Juliana. Mentally, he shook it off. Time to focus. High stakes.

  “So,” he began, “research indicates that the reason so many software companies like ours have problems is because in today’s world, the engineers and other critical players don’t ever speak to each other. They email, they text, but they don’t talk.”

  Mrs. O’Brien nodded. “Aware,” she replied curtly.

  “Okay.” He registered her blunt reply as a bad omen, but plunged ahead regardless. “So, Thanksgiving Thursday and the following three days, we’ll move all of the furniture out of the building and install new workstations, paint the walls, all that. When everyone returns Monday morning, they’ll find a highly collaborative environment with desks that flow into worktables. To have a meeting, all they need to do is swivel their chairs around and scoot up to the common table. We have pop-up conference rooms that can be folded back into the wall so that at any moment a team can have privacy from others while they work together to solve problems. Every company that’s tried this approach has reported much greater team efficiency and better quality control.”

  Hunter had to make a conscious effort not to appear proud as he sat back in his chair. He stole a quick look at his wristwatch.

  Mrs. O’Brien nodded, looking … what … bored? Hunter suspected she had read his detailed plan after all.

  “I’m sure you are aware that this isn’t just our headquarters,” she said. “It’s our showcase facility. Our branch offices have sales meetings and presentations as well, but this is where the big boys fly in from the Fortune 500 firms. I am more than looking forward to getting rid of this tacky furniture.” She gestured dismissively to the hutch where her photographs were displayed.

  Hunter nodded as if he agreed with this assessment, though to him the towering shelves behind her were actually quite nice. He had wanted to keep the executive offices unchanged, saving hundreds of thousands of dollars, but Mr. Park had insisted on redoing every setup with much more luxurious furniture, regardless of cost. Given Mrs. O’Brien’s stated disdain for the current installation, Hunter was thankful Mr. Park had been so self-indulgent—Mrs. O’Brien would find her new furniture far from “tacky.”

  “And you’ve managed to sell this junk?” Mrs. O’Brien asked, gesturing again at the shelves. “I saw the emails.”

  Hunter nodded eagerly. “Yes—there’s almost no market for used office furniture, but I managed to secure a deal with a start-up in town to buy our executive setups. Everything else goes to a wholesaler, who’s giving us a fair price.” He glanced again at his watch.

  “All right.” Mrs. O’Brien reached for a pad, picked up a pen, and wrote something on it. Probably, I’m making him late for his lunch. “I’m sure you know that if this is successful, and indeed increases productivity at the levels you’ve guaranteed, we’ll want to proceed with similar installations across the whole company. Every location.”

  Hunter had to restrain himself from wincing at the word “guaranteed.” How could anyone guarantee anything?

  “You would be the natural person for the job. It would be a new position in the company—instead of facilities manager for this location, you would be the director of corporate facilities,” she continued, watching him steadily.

  Hunter nodded neutrally, though inside he was uncork
ing champagne.

  Mrs. O’Brien pursed her lips. “And I suppose it has to be said: this installation and its over-budget cost was not my doing. Mr. Parks is gone, of course, but you are not gone, and your name is all over everything.” Mrs. O’Brien gave Hunter a frank and somewhat hostile gaze. “I am a bottom-line leader and, bottom line, if this fails, we will not require your services at our company any longer.”

  * * *

  When Ello shut her locker, Soffea was right there, smiling blandly.

  Grade school had been ruled by the three of them: Soffea, Ello, Brittne. When Ello had moved to her new house, though, she no longer lived a few steps away from her friends’ homes. Ello’s friendship with Brittne had survived intact, but somehow Soffea kept falling farther and farther out of the circle, as if she were on a boat that was slowly drifting away from shore.

  Soffea had also missed the memo that eighth grade was supposed to be about forming fleeting, collapsing alliances with different malevolent factions, knives out and backs stabbed, the gossip quick with judgment. Soffea somehow sailed through life unperturbed, oblivious to all of it. Pretty much the opposite of Brittne.

  “Have you seen her?” Ello asked, as if Soffea could read her mind. “Brittne, I mean. She didn’t answer my text.”

  “She’s around,” Soffea answered with a shrug.

  “Okay.” Ello glanced up and down the halls but couldn’t spot Brittne anywhere.

  “Glad we’ll finally be back in gym class,” Soffea announced mildly. “About time.”

  Ello stared. Why would Soffea mention that? Did she know? Ello had two more hours before gym class and then her Life Was Over.

  “Well,” Soffea said, signing off with her trademark unbothered expression, “see you later.”

  Ello turned, trudging to her first class. Soffea’s reminder had punched solid holes in Ello’s denial. Gym class was going to happen. Ello could not pretend otherwise.

  To make everything perfect, perfect, on this Perfectly Awful Day, Brittne flowed across the hall, seemingly oblivious to the boys who tracked her every movement with haunted expressions. That’s what her thick, shiny blond hair and her high cheekbones and gloriously large, dark brown eyes did to people.

  “So,” Brittne greeted her. “What did she want?”

  She. The model-thin Brittne evidently held their childhood friend in utter contempt now, and Ello had a sick feeling she knew why.

  “I guess we have gym class today,” Ello replied faintly.

  “I guess,” Brittne agreed.

  As if it were no big deal at all.

  * * *

  Hunter was technically not that late, except that it took him eight minutes to find a place to park and another five to hoof it to the restaurant. Of course, Juliana was already seated and reading the menu. She had probably arrived early and was mentally subtracting ten points for every minute he was delayed. By his calculations, Hunter was down about seventy billion points so far in this marriage.

  “Hey, honey,” he greeted her, a bit breathless. “So, so sorry I’m late. I thought I had plenty of time, but then traffic…”

  She was waving off his apology. “Didn’t you wear an overcoat this morning?” she asked, frowning. Hunter looked blankly down at his sport coat. No wonder he’d been so cold as he hustled down the sidewalk.

  “Oh, yeah. I must have left it hanging on the hook in my office.” He took his seat. “Honestly, I thought you’d be more angry I left you waiting.”

  Her return look was challenging. “Is that how you see me? Angry for no reason?”

  “Well, no,” he fumbled, though it seemed that she was always irritated by normal male behavior. “I just know you don’t like to be kept waiting.” There; that seemed like a safe explanation. Hunter looked around the restaurant. He wasn’t much interested in the aesthetics of design; he hired professionals to match colors and pick out artwork for his facility. But he was intrigued by the layout of any place where furniture could enhance or inhibit efficiency. This restaurant seemed to lean toward the latter, with so many tables jammed into the tight space that they impeded the ability of a server to navigate them. Hunter started to calculate the trade-off between a) having more places to seat more customers, and b) restricted access, resulting in slower service, so that table turnover took longer.

  “What are you thinking?” Juliana asked.

  Hunter blinked at her, not sure he knew the answer to that. “Oh,” was his response.

  Juliana nodded as if this were an actual answer. Hunter decided he’d better run to safe ground.

  “I really admire how organized you are,” he told her. He was utterly sincere—she was his Atlas, and if she shrugged, the whole family would tumble into an abyss. “It’s why you were such a good trial attorney.”

  Her eyes flashed. “Were?” she repeated.

  “What? No. I mean, you’re an excellent trial attorney. Are. You’re amazing, Juliana.”

  How many more feet can I stick in my mouth?

  He watched as some sort of dismal change came over his wife, something he’d observed more than once recently in her posture, often at breakfast, as if his Atlas were indeed growing weary of the world on her shoulders.

  “No, you’re right,” Juliana admitted with a sigh. “You either are a trial attorney, or you were a trial attorney. I haven’t had that job since I got pregnant with Eloise.”

  Hunter kept a watchful eye on his wife while they ordered lunch. Something was going on that he did not understand. For reasons he didn’t comprehend, his pulse rate had increased. He took a long pull on his iced tea. “Well, hey, I had my meeting with Mrs. O’Brien,” he informed her. “She seemed really excited about the installation project.” If ‘excited’ is a synonym for ‘threatening.’ “If it goes well, I mean really well, I’d be put in charge of all facilities company-wide. Promotion.”

  Juliana regarded him with an unreadable expression. “So it’s for sure that you would take the job,” she stated carefully.

  “Well, yeah.” Hunter shifted in his chair. Once again, a sense of imminent danger rose within him. “We talked about it, remember?”

  “Yes,” she agreed evenly, “we discussed it. We said there were many variables. You also told me it would mean a lot of travel.”

  “Right, well, we have twenty branches in the United States and four up in Canada. They’re small operations, some of them no more than five or six people, but all facilities share the same characteristics.” Hunter leaned forward excitedly. “For example, I’ve always wanted us to order all of our supplies as a national account so that we could accrue savings across our locations. Currently, though, each individual office manager…” Hunter’s enthusiastic gush trailed off, halted by the unhappy shape of Juliana’s mouth.

  A long silence followed.

  “What is it?” he asked.

  Juliana looked away from his gaze. Hunter’s nagging fear bloomed into full-on panic. This was Juliana Oliveira, a woman who was never anything but blunt and up-front. He had never seen her avoid his eyes before. His heart was pounding again, and he could almost predict the next words that came out of her mouth.

  “Hunter,” she sighed softly. “I’m just not happy in our marriage.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Ello stood and stared at her gym locker as if fascinated. The school administrators had taken advantage of the repairs necessitated by a broken pipe to change the gym’s décor. Now the metal lockers were sprayed a pastel yellow, and the walls were pastel blue with pastel green accents, as if they lived in Florida and not a state where all liquid water spent half the year frozen as hard as rock. Around her, classmates were struggling into their workout clothes, feeling awkward and unfamiliar after having gone more than a year without regular physical education classes.

  Well, This Was It.

  Ello seized the hem of her draping, baggy sweater and lifted it over her head in one quick motion, revealing her sports bra, not looking left, not looking right.

 
She heard an inhalation. Not a gasp, but definitely an involuntary intake of air. And, as ridiculous as it seemed to recognize someone by her breathing, Ello knew exactly who had pulled in a lungful of shocked oxygen.

  It was, of course, Brittne.

  Ello deliberately did not look at her best friend. Did not so much as glance at what she knew would be an expression that could Literally Kill.

  In Brittne’s mind, Ello was guilty of a betrayal, of maturing past Brittne in a time and a place and a clique where such changes were anything but welcome. Next year, maybe, high school, everything would be fine again. But in eighth grade, for now, in Brittne’s circle of devotees, it was a curse.

  When Ello finally turned away from the locker, Brittne was gone.

  * * *

  Her husband watched in stunned silence as Juliana reached into her purse, pulled out a small spiral notebook, and opened it to a numbered series of entries on the page.

  “You have a list?” he demanded. “A list of everything wrong with our relationship? With me as a husband?”

  Juliana pressed her lips together. This was as hard as she had imagined it would be. The hurt, the fear, and the shock in Hunter’s eyes completely unnerved her. She wanted nothing more right then than to put the list away and tell him it was all a misunderstanding. But that wasn’t how Juliana operated—she made a plan and stuck to it.

  “These are just some things I wanted to talk to you about and was afraid I’d forget,” she corrected reassuringly. “Just listen, okay?”

  Hunter gave a faint nod, staring at her like a man watching his firing squad line up.