How the Finch Stole Christmas

by J. R. Ripley

  The rest of the protesters stood on the street side of the fence. However, there were more people watching from the front porches of the houses inside that comprised Christmas House Village—shoppers, employees, or both.

  Kim stood stiff-backed, taking it in. Even in profile, I could see the frustration on her face.

  I felt Derek’s hand on my elbow. “Can I buy you a cup of coffee?”

  I took one last look at the crowd. Mayor MacDonald and the man from the planning and zoning commission had disappeared. Only Gertie Hammer remained—a distant observer. Her hands gripped the handle of a Lakeside Market shopping cart laden with stuffed plastic grocery bags. Had she had something to do with all this commotion or was she simply a curious bystander?

  The crotchety old woman had sold me my house, then tried to buy it back again. When she couldn’t buy it from me, she tried to snatch it by other means and had failed.

  I’d had little to do with her since then and preferred to keep it that way. “Only if it comes with a cupcake,” I said in response to Derek’s offer of coffee.

  “Deal.” Derek and I started down the block. “Don’t worry about Kim,” he added. “I’m sure she can take care of herself.”

  I swiveled my neck for the second time to look back at the scene, as we strolled hand in hand ever closer to the smell of freshly baked cupcakes.

  I nodded. “Kim’s tough, all right.” But little did I know how tough her situation would prove to be.

  2

  Derek stepped to the side and pulled open the glass door of C Is For Cupcakes.

  I moved inside, enjoying the scent of sugar and cake as much as I enjoyed getting out of the cold. I unbuttoned my coat and draped it over a hook on the coatrack near the entrance. Derek did the same.

  “Welcome to C Is For Cupcakes!” An exuberant young man wearing a blue hat and apron behind the counter waved to us. A woman wearing a pink hat and apron stood behind him filling a plastic to-go tray with cupcakes.

  We approached the sales counter. The pine-topped counter was flanked by two long glass cases filled with every flavor of cupcake imaginable and then some. The bakery’s walls were painted in stripes of pastel pink and blue. The floor was wide plank yellow pine.

  “Do you know what you want, Amy?” Derek asked.

  “Vanilla peppermint,” I replied without hesitation. I pointed my finger at a particularly thick-frosted one near the front of the glass case.

  Derek ordered a pumpkin-spice cupcake with maple cream-cheese frosting and two large coffees. The ever-smiling youth filled our order and placed it on a plastic tray. Derek carried the tray to a small round table on the far wall.

  I rose and crossed to the serving station that held napkins, utensils, and coffee additives. I added some sugar and cream to my coffee and picked up a wooden stir stick. Derek was drinking his coffee black.

  I returned to my chair and peeled back the wrapper on my vanilla peppermint cupcake. I carefully removed the lower half of the cupcake, broke it into two pieces, and popped one in my mouth.

  “What are you doing?” Derek watched in wonder.

  “What?” I licked my fingers.

  He pointed to my decapitated cupcake.

  “I always eat my cupcake like this. I like to save the part with the frosting for last.” I eyed his own half-eaten cupcake. He’d taken a man-size bite out of the side. “Primitive,” I quipped.

  Derek chuckled. “It seems there is a lot I don’t know about you yet, Amy Simms.”

  I plucked the second chunk of cupcake and popped it in my mouth. “Consider that a good thing.”

  “Believe me, I do and I . . . uh-oh.” Derek stopped as his eyes shifted to the door.

  “Uh-oh what?” I turned, catching a frigid blast of air in the face. Mrs. Fortuny and the elderly gentleman who’d been consoling her outside Kinley’s Christmas House Village had stepped inside the bakery.

  Though why she needed consoling after knocking my best friend upside the head with her big purse was beyond me.

  Irma Fortuny was a small, thin woman with a bowl of silver hair on her head. I knew her to be in her upper seventies, but she was still sharp as a tack—and apparently still packed a mean punch, albeit with her purse. Her blue eyes were equally sharp.

  She spotted me, patted the arm of her companion, and walked slowly to our table like the world’s most sluggish bird of prey.

  Up close, I noted her owlish features—the rounded skull, big eyes, and flattish face. “Good morning, Mrs. Fortuny.” I extended my hand across the table. “Do you know Derek?”

  The corners of her thin lips turned down. “I’ve not had the pleasure.” Finger by finger, she pulled off her brown suede gloves and draped them carefully over her pocketbook.

  Derek stood. “Pleased to meet you, ma’am.”

  Mrs. Fortuny nodded. “You’re Ben Harlan’s boy, aren’t you?”

  “The one and only. You know him?”

  “Sit,” Mrs. Fortuny said with a wave of the hand. “Are you a lawyer, too?”

  Derek sank back into his chair. “Yes, ma’am.” He winked at me. I gave a small shrug in reply, hoping Mrs. Fortuny wouldn’t notice.

  If I remembered correctly, Mrs. Fortuny had been widowed some years ago. “I hear that Christmas House Village has a new owner,” I said, putting some cheer in my voice. My fingers toyed with the upper half of my cupcake, the thick frosting beckoning. “That must be quite exciting.”

  “Huh!” snorted Mrs. Fortuny in reply. “Is that what you think?” She shook her head side to side. “But then again . . .” She paused to snatch her gloves, which had been in danger of slipping to the floor. “But then again, you would, considering you and Ms. Christy are friends.”

  “Kim?” I drew my brows together. “What’s Kim got to do with this?”

  “Why don’t you ask your friend Kimberly Christy? She and her boss are the ones who are destroying this town!”

  Mrs. Fortuny’s companion sidled up to her, tray in hand. On it were two coffees, one carrot cake cupcake, and one dark chocolate cupcake. “Hi, folks.” He nodded to us. “Ready, Irma?”

  “One moment, William,” Mrs. Fortuny answered. “This is William,” she said for our benefit. “He works in the Christmas House Village stockroom. At least he did.”

  Her companion, William, was a broad-shouldered man of about seventy years. Big brown spectacles rested on a nose that would have looked at home on a former prizefighter. He carried a burled walnut cane in his craggy left hand. William managed a small smile as he settled the tray against his stomach.

  “Isn’t that right, William?”

  “Yes, Irma,” he said, his voice low. “But do try to stay calm. You remember what the doctor said about your blood pressure.”

  She nodded curtly and the elderly gentleman moved to an empty table near the door and sat with his back to us.

  “Oh my gosh,” I gasped, thinking I had finally figured out what Mrs. Fortuny was saying between the lines. “You haven’t been fired, have you, Mrs. Fortuny?”

  “Fired?” Derek said.

  I nodded. “Mrs. Fortuny works at Kinley’s Christmas House Village.” I turned to the woman. “How many years has it been now, Mrs. Fortuny? Thirty?”

  “Twenty-seven,” she answered, clutching her gloves in both hands. “It would have been my twenty-eighth Christmas season, too.” The poor dear looked angry and upset.

  “I was fired once myself,” I said, reaching out and patting her arm. “I know exactly what that feels like.”

  Mrs. Fortuny drew herself up. “Young lady, I was not fired. I quit!”

  My eyes grew wide. “You quit? Why?”

  “Because I have always worked for the Kinleys. I will not work for some New York incomer.”

  “I’m sure the new owner will be fine,” Derek bravely interjected. “If you’ll ju
st give him the chance. I’m something of a newcomer myself.”

  “That may be, Mr. Harlan, but you are not intending to rename the town after yourself now, are you?”

  “I don’t understand . . .” Derek turned to me for help, but I had none to give and could only throw up my hands.

  “What are you trying to say, Mrs. Fortuny?” I inquired.

  “Mr. Franklin Finch—”

  “The new owner,” I interjected.

  “Yes,” Mrs. Fortuny said with clear disdain. “Mr. Finch intends to replace most of us with younger, cheaper help.”

  “I am so sorry,” I said. Derek echoed my sentiment.

  The corners of her lips turned down. “He had the gall to offer us thirty days to stay on with pay if we help train the new staff. After that, he’s letting us go. Well, I, for one, will not give him the satisfaction. I quit today.” She slapped her gloves against her leg. “And good riddance to him, I say!”

  “That’s terrible!” I squawked. “I wish there was something I could do. Derek?”

  Derek threw up his hands. “It’s not illegal to hire new staff. In fact, it’s not uncommon for a new owner to want to bring his own people in.”

  I frowned. “I never dreamed Kinley’s Christmas House Village would not belong to a Kinley.”

  “Oh, it won’t be Kinley’s Christmas House Village any longer,” Mrs. Fortuny said with a touch of bitterness.

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “It is going to be Finch’s Christmas House Village.” The elderly woman arched her brow at me. “And this is all your friend’s fault.”

  “I don’t see how Kim—”

  “I don’t know how the woman can live with herself.” Mrs. Fortuny turned without further ado and took a seat beside her companion, William.

  I picked up my mug. My coffee had gone cold and I’d lost my appetite.

  Derek reached across the table and patted my hand. “Are you okay, Amy?”

  “Finch’s Christmas House Village?” I said with a pinched voice. “It just doesn’t sound right.”

  In fact, something was very wrong.

  3

  That evening, after closing up Birds & Bees for the day, I locked up, climbed into my minivan, and drove to Kim’s house. I had not heard a single peep from her the rest of the day, despite having left her two phone messages.

  It was time for the personal touch.

  The sun sets early in western Carolina this time of year. It was long past dark as I pulled into the steep drive behind Kim’s sapphire-blue Honda.

  The front-porch light was off. The curtains were pulled and there was no light visible inside the house from the street. Kim lives on the opposite side of town from me in a Craftsman-style bungalow in her parents’ old neighborhood. An expansive front porch with white square posts atop chestnut redbrick piers rising to slightly above the white porch railing was a great place to while away a warm summer’s afternoon.

  An ever-empty red flower box attached beneath the triple attic window held the occasional bird’s nest but never a flower. The bungalow, with its stone-colored weatherboard, white trim, and deep red front door, reminded me of the house I’d grown up in.

  Though Kim’s car sat in the drive, she could have been out on a date. My gut told me she was home.

  I turned off the motor, dropped my keys in my purse, and pulled my collar tight as I marched determinedly around back to the kitchen door. I didn’t bother knocking. When Kim was in a mood, she wouldn’t answer anyway, not even for me.

  I bent and reached for the spare key she keeps hidden beneath a flowerpot on the back stoop. I didn’t get a chance to use it.

  The door shot open. Kim stood at the entrance in a pair of brown corduroy jeans and a billowy cream-colored sweater. “Come on in,” she said rather wearily.

  “That was my plan,” I quipped as I replaced the key under the pot.

  Kim turned and walked to the kitchen table against the far wall. Furry yellow slippers covered her feet. When she moved, it looked like two baby chicks following her around.

  “Can I get you anything, Amy?” A crumpled package of pecan sandies and an open bottle of rum sat within hand’s reach of her.

  “Are you okay?” I removed my coat and hung it over the back of an empty chair.

  “Everybody hates me,” Kim said, wrapping her fingers around a crystal tumbler with a splash of dark liquid at the bottom.

  “Don’t be so gloomy,” I replied. “Things can’t be that bad.” I pulled a cookie from the protruding sleeve and took a nibble.

  “Are you kidding? The entire town hates me.” Kim brought the glass to her lips and polished off her drink. She reached for the open bottle of rum.

  I grabbed the bottle and set it out of reach atop the fridge. “How about if I make us some coffee?”

  Kim pulled a face but did not protest. She reached for a cookie, put the whole thing in her mouth, and clamped her jaws down on it like a vise.

  “How’s your head?” I called as I grabbed the glass carafe and filled it from the tap.

  “What?”

  “Your head. I saw Mrs. Fortuny clobber you with her purse.”

  Kim made a face as her hand went to her ear. “You saw that?”

  I nodded. “Half the town saw it. It was kind of hard to miss.”

  Kim rubbed her ear once more, then dropped her long locks over it. “Mrs. Fortuny didn’t miss, that’s for sure,” she muttered.

  I couldn’t help but laugh.

  “It isn’t funny, Amy Simms.”

  “Amy Simms?” I poured the water in the chamber of the machine and popped in a fresh paper filter. “Now you sound like my mother.” I scooped a half-dozen spoonfuls of ground coffee into the filter, closed the lid, and hit the brew button.

  I pulled out a chair and sat across from Kim. “I ran into Irma Fortuny at C Is For Cupcakes. She told me that the new owner of Christmas House Village is getting rid of all the employees and replacing them with younger, cheaper help.”

  Kim groaned and held her head in her hands. “He promised he would keep everything the same.” Kim looked up at me. Her eyes were red and bloodshot.

  “So it’s true?”

  Kim shrugged. “Pretty much.”

  “Is it true that he also intends to change the name of Christmas House Village to Finch’s Christmas House Village?” The coffeepot hissed and burbled in the background. I rose, pulled two mugs from the mug tree, and filled them. I set one in front of Kim. I added cream and sugar to mine.

  Kim dunked a pecan sandie in hers and let it sink to the bottom. I tilted my head as she did so, thinking that it might actually be quite flavorful. I plucked a cookie from the sleeve and followed suit. “Franklin showed me the rendering for the new sign.” Kim tugged at a strand of her hair. “It’s true.”

  I brought my cup to my lips and drank. “Why didn’t you tell me that Kinley’s Christmas House Village had been sold?” I set my mug on the teak table. “I didn’t even know it was for sale.”

  Kim picked up her spoon and stirred it slowly around the lip of her mug. She fished out the sodden cookie and popped it in her mouth. She chewed and swallowed before answering. “It was a secret. Mr. Belzer said the Kinley family insisted that everything had to be kept confidential.”

  Ellery Belzer, Kim’s boss, was the owner of Belzer Realty. Ellery was a widower himself and worked seven days a week at his business. Kim worked for him on a part-time basis. After graduating junior college, she had started selling real estate in the office of Mac MacDonald. But he had closed his office after becoming our town’s mayor.

  “Why the secrecy?”

  Kim leaned back in her chair. “It was meant to ensure that the sale went through without a hitch and without creating any disruption to the business.”

  “I’d say that plan backfi
red.”

  “Big-time,” agreed Kim. She rose, fetched the rum from atop the fridge, and poured a splash into her coffee, giving me a look daring me to admonish her as she did so. She tilted the bottle my way.

  “No, thanks.” Coffee, rum, and pecan sandies did not sound like a winning blend.

  Kim replaced the bottle and sat. “I still don’t get it. The entire time the sale was being negotiated, Franklin repeatedly assured Mr. Belzer and me that he was going to keep Christmas House Village just the way it was. Then, the day he takes over . . .” Kim threw her hand in the air. “Whoosh! Everything goes out the window!”

  “I’m surprised that the Kinley family agreed to sell. It has been in the family forever.”

  Kim nodded. “Yes, but when Tyrone died last year—”

  “Tyrone?”

  “Tyrone Kinley.” I nodded and Kim continued. “Anyway, when he died a widower, that left only his grown kids: two boys and a girl. They all live out of the area and had little interest in running the business. I guess they have careers of their own.”

  As Kim talked, I borrowed her spoon and used it to fish out my own submerged cookie. I lifted it carefully and popped it on my tongue. It was delicious.

  “The kids decided to sell?”

  Kim managed a small grin. “They wanted to. They contacted Mr. Belzer and asked him to try to work it out with Virginia, but she absolutely refused to sell.”

  “Virginia?”

  “Virginia Kinley Johnson. She was Tyrone’s sister. She was married to Chris Johnson. He passed some time ago, leaving her a widow.”

  “With no children of her own?”

  “That’s right. Virginia owns, or owned, ten percent of Christmas House Village. Tyrone’s children owned thirty percent apiece.”

  “And she wouldn’t sell her share?”

  Kim shook her head. “The nephews and niece reached out to her several times. Each time, she steadfastly resisted the idea of letting Christmas House Village out of the family. Finally, Tyrone Kinley’s children contacted us. Belzer Realty, that is.” She pouted and took a drink. “The rest is history.”