A Cowboy Under My Christmas Tree by Janet Dailey Read Free Book Online Page B

while Bob shucked his.
    “You need to eat more,” Bob told him. “Keeps ya warm.” He patted his substantial paunch and adjusted his suspenders.
    “Did you find a spot for the van?” Nicole asked.
    Hank launched into an explanation. “Me and Bob could hardly get the new framework into it. We wanted the van close in case we had trouble getting it out. It’s double-parked on a busted hydrant around the corner.”
    “Busted or not, you’re begging for a ticket,” she told him.
    “Nah. The car next to the hydrant will get ticketed. Double-parking isn’t that big of a deal.”
    She looked hopefully at Sam.
    “Can I lift the framework by myself?” Sam asked the older man. Bob and Hank were suddenly very interested in the free breakfast in the paper bag. They weren’t about to budge from the warmth.
    Bob dug in the pocket of his ample chinos and tossed him the keys. “Your grandmother could lift it. Thanks.”
    Throwing on his denim jacket and Stetson just in case he was out there long enough to get cold, Sam headed out. He found the van and opened the double back doors. The second framework didn’t look too different from the first one.
    He unhooked the bungee cords that kept it from rattling around in the back of the van and took a closer look. It was the first one, with a whole lot of new additions nailed and glued to it.
    Bob wasn’t wrong about its being light. It was just awkward.
    Sam felt a tap on his shoulder. A parking officer fixed him with a stern look when he rested the framework on the rear floor of the van and turned around.
    “You planning to move that van, cowboy?”
    He held up his ticket printer in warning.
    “I just have to take this thing to a shop around the corner. Give me a minute.”
    The officer made a big show of looking at his watch. “You got exactly sixty seconds. Then you better giddyap on outta here.” He chuckled at his own joke and continued on down the line of cars, stopping at the next double-parked vehicle.
    “Understood.”
    “Fifty-nine,” the officer called over his shoulder. “Fifty-eight.”
    “I hear you,” Sam muttered.
    He watched the officer write up a ticket on the gizmo and slap it on the windshield of the car in front of the van.
    Sam hesitated, then took out his cell phone to call Nicole. He explained the situation. In another minute, Hank came around the corner, still huddled inside his jacket. He took the framework and went back.
    After slamming the double doors and getting behind the wheel, Sam turned the key in the ignition and moved on, tapping the horn when he passed the parking officer.
    Dodged that bullet. Now to find a legit space. How hard could it be?
    He drove around the block. And around another block. And another. He saw cars that had been parked for so long, the asphalt under the tires was a different color. There was not a single free space anywhere in the immediate vicinity that was big enough for a van.
    A while later, he called Nicole. “Tell Bob I had to put it in a parking garage. Twenty bucks plus tax for two hours and an extra charge for an oversize vehicle! Can you believe it?”
    “That’s cheap,” she said. “He’ll be thrilled.”
    Sam shook his head, tucking his cell phone into his shirt pocket as he exited the cavernous garage under a large apartment building. At least it was close to the boutique.
    The other men and Nicole had gotten a head start on the first window in his absence. She was bending over a worktable they’d improvised with a sheet of plywood over two sawhorses, smoothing out a huge piece of very thin vinyl by lifting it.
    Sam guessed it was the vintage photo, blown up to wall size.
    Lettering she’d cut out backward to reverse in the window had been set aside to be applied to the glass.
    The boutique was open for business. A salesclerk had cordoned off the part of the store they were working in with colorful scarves strung between two undressed female mannequins.
    Sam averted his gaze from the