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Tree of Hope

By Helen Gray

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Chapter 1
Travis Baker drove slowly along the highway between Cape Girardeau and Jackson, Missouri, watching for the store Jenna had described. Up ahead he spied a large corner lot with a long building that he thought might be it. He slowed the truck even more and eyed the long white façade above the plate glass windows. Sure enough, it read Quinn Landscaping and Hardware. At the far end of that building was another smaller one. A breezeway stretched between them. The sign over that door read Quinn Gift Shop.
Two women were on the walk in front of the first building. One had a mop she was using to reach up and swab the sign. The other stood on a small stepladder, reaching up to attach Christmas lights along the border of the sign. An extension cord dangled from her shoulder.
As he turned into the drive, the woman with the mop lowered it and stuck it in the bucket next to the stepladder. At the same time, the gal on the ladder dropped the lights she was stringing and made an awkward lunge for them.
Travis braked to a halt, flipped off the truck’s engine, and shoved the door open as she lost her balance. As he leaped to the ground and ran toward her, she shot her foot out to the right and made an off balance hop to the ground. But the foot caught on the edge of the mop bucket, tipping it and jerking the mop handle up against her head with a crack he could hear.
As she flailed backward and landed in an undignified splat on the sidewalk, Travis lunged forward onto his belly and slid his hands behind her shoulders to prevent her head from banging on the concrete.
The chilly November wind whipped strands of brown hair across his face, and he gave his head a quick twist and shake to dislodge it. Green eyes, wild with shock, stared up at him from the face in his palms. What a face. High cheekbones. Smoothly arched brows. Peach toned skin.
Her coat had flapped open, and water ran up under her on the sidewalk. She twisted awkwardly around to extricate her right foot from the mop bucket.
Travis hooked his arms under hers and tugged her upright, and then gave her a boost to her feet.
She looked down at her wet foot, ignoring the back of her jeans and hip length black coat that were just as soggy. “Thank you,” she muttered distractedly.
The other woman, who had come running and dropped to her knees, now stood, concern etched in her face. “Are you okay, Reagan?”
The woman in his arms nodded, pulling her coat around her. “I’m wet and cold, but other than that I’m fine.” She shivered.
“I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have set that bucket so near your ladder.”
The disheveled woman waved a hand in dismissal. “It wasn’t your fault, Karen. It was just a stupid accident.”
She turned to face Travis. “Thank you for coming to my aid, Sir.” She pulled away from him, and when she did, her leg buckled. As she stumbled sideways, he gripped her shoulders again and steadied her. “Let me help you inside.”
She shrugged from his grasp, a flush of red rising in her cheeks. She shoved errant strands of hair away from her face, obviously put out at herself. “I’m okay. My leg’s just a little numb,” she insisted as the other woman placed an arm across her shoulders.
He backed off, followed the two inside, and then watched as they marched past the counter to the back of the store.
“I’ll be right back,” the one supporting the one who had fallen called over her shoulder as they disappeared through a doorway.
Travis did a visual survey of the spacious interior. Shelves on the walls held hand and power tools, safety goggles, leather gloves, and a variety of hardware tools. Basic digging tools, rakes, pitchforks, hoes, wheelbarrows and carts were displayed on the floor. At the rear of the store, power tools, including leaf blowers, hedge trimmers and chain saws were being examined by a pair of customers.
The three sided checkout counter formed a box-like enclosure, which he took as an indication of a high volume of business. He supposed the dampness and biting cold was causing business to be slower than usual today. He smiled at the young clerk and walked over to the window to peer outside.
“Is there something I can help you with?” the mop lady asked as she returned.
Travis turned and took a closer look at her—long brown hair, green eyes, and a petite frame—and decided she fit Jenna’s description.
He pulled a deep breath. “A friend told me you might need some extra help during the holidays.”
Her gaze on him sharpened, and then she smiled. “You must be Jenna’s friend. She didn’t say for sure you would come.” She extended a hand.
He accepted her handshake and met her gaze. “I wasn’t sure I would. But I decided it wouldn’t hurt to talk to you.”
She glanced back at the browsing customers. “Would you mind coming over here and filling out some paperwork while I help those two?” She stepped around the clerk whose back was to her as he checked out a customer and slipped behind the counter. She reached under the counter, produced a form, and slid it in front of him.
He shrugged. “Sure.”
While he filled out the basic information on the employment application, she hurried to assist her customers. When the gentlemen left, apparently not finding whatever it was they were looking for, she returned to the counter. He pushed the form back to her.
She barely glanced at it. “If Jenna has worked with you for years and vouches for you, that’s good enough for me,” she said with a tired smile. “But I need this personal info for payroll. That is, if you’re willing to help us temporarily.” She indicated the establishment with a sweeping arc of her hand.
Travis wanted to smile, but couldn’t dredge up one. “Jenna didn’t say a lot about your business, just that your dad is sick and you need help during the Christmas season without him.”
Her smile disappeared, and pain flashed in her eyes. It made him want to help her. Maybe it would be good for him to help someone. He needed to get out of his house—do something—find a new direction for his life. “Tell me more about your business, the kind of work you do.”
She nodded and placed her palms flat on the counter, as if steadying herself. “My parents built this place from the ground up and have run it for over twenty years. A few months ago Dad was diagnosed with cancer, as I’m sure Jenna told you. A few years ago they added the far section.” She jerked a thumb toward the other end of the building. “They put a gift shop in it. Mom ran that, and Dad ran this.”
“You do landscaping and sell hardware and tools in this building, right?”
Her head bobbed. “Dad kept coming to work, thinking he was indestructible. But he’s not.” Her voice caught, and she placed a hand over her mouth for a moment. “Last year he had to undergo chemo. When he didn’t get any better, my sister resigned her school position and took over the gift shop for Mom so she could stay home with him. I was already taking care of this by that time. Now he’s having more chemo.”
S o the other woman was her sister. He didn’t recall Jenna mentioning a sister. But he hadn’t been absorbing much—until she suggested the possibility of him working for her friend.
“Don’t you have other family who can help?” Like husbands?
“My husband runs a pharmacy in Cape. Reagan’s not married. My son isn’t old enough to help. He’s in kindergarten. And I’m expecting another child in early April.”
He hadn’t realized. “So neither you nor your husband wants to run the place permanently. What about your sister?”
Her mouth pulled back in a tight line. “She likes running the gift shop more than she thought she would, and has even added an online store. Mom and Dad were planning to sell the businesses, but they’re torn about it now. Reagan would like to continue running the gift shop, but she can’t handle both businesses by herself, and I don’t think I can give this one the hours it needs without slighting my family. We’re hoping they can find a way to sell this and keep the gift shop for Reagan.”
“I can see that the gift shop would be busy this time of year, but what about this?” He indicated the room with a swivel of his head.
“Our landscaping work is in hibernation right now, but we get numerous calls from people wanting to have their houses and property decorated with Christmas lights. Dad always did that, but his hired hand retired last month, and I’m not up to that and this too. I’m also uneasy about doing a lot of climbing,” she added self-consciously. “Those same customers will most likely want their decorations taken down after Christmas, keeping us busy through mid-January.”
“I think I can handle that,” he decided impulsively.
She smiled, her body seeming to relax. “Then you’re hired.”
*
Reagan crawled into a pair of her dad’s old work overalls, the only clothes she could find in the storage room. The dirty things swallowed her, but they were dry. She tugged off her wet shoe and sock and tossed the sock on the chair over which she had draped her coat to dry. The shoe she tucked under an arm before marching back into the store to join Karen.
The man who had arrived in time to witness her ungainly tumble stood at the counter talking to Karen. Reagan gave him a more thorough look.
He was tall. Dark brown eyes. Walnut colored hair with touches of lighter shades, cut military style. An air of quiet authority. Dressed in neat jeans and a fleece lined denim coat. She started to speak, but was forestalled.
“Reagan, meet Travis Baker, our new employee.”
She glanced down at her ragtag appearance, suddenly self-conscious. And gulped. “Welcome aboard, Mr. Baker. Sorry we met so …ungraciously, but thank you again for your timely help.”
“The name’s Travis.” He spoke solemnly, his eyes taking in her bare foot and the shoe hugged to her side. “Glad I happened along at the right moment.”
The guy was quiet and reserved. She thought she detected sadness in him. Yet something about him triggered a spark of awareness in her.
Reagan raised her bare foot and ran it against the leg of her dad’s overalls for warmth. “My foot’s cold,” she admitted sheepishly, edging past them. “I’ll be right back.”
She went to the back of the store where they stocked heavy work socks along with the gloves and hats, and grabbed a pair. She pulled one onto her bare foot and returned to the counter. “I owe you for a pair of socks,” she told Karen, dropping her shoe onto the floor and shoving her foot into it.
She turned to their new employee. “When do you start work?”
He shrugged. “Any time is fine with me. I can start now and clean up outside for you and finish putting your lights up if you want.”
Karen glanced at her watch. “That sounds great. Why don’t you do that, and then come to the work room in the back and have a bowl of chili with us.” She pointed at a door. “Then I’ll give you the address of an older couple who want their Christmas decorations put up for them.”
As Mr. Baker went out the door, Reagan couldn’t help but wonder about him. The time or two she had heard Jenna mention a colleague by that name to Karen, back before Jenna’s husband was killed in a car crash caused by a drunk driver, Jenna had described him as a funny guy, an easygoing fellow with a quick wit and ready wisecracks.
There had been a story about the two children who were now Jenna’s step children running away, and a fellow officer—this guy—had helped them deal with the children. If this was that guy, he sure had lost his funny bone.

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