"What is goingon?" I'd thought I was whispering, but everybody in a ten-foot radius answered me, all of them speaking simultaneously and so fast it was hard to make out who was saying what.
"Rooster said he was the only Santa—"
"Darryl swung first, after Rooster said people from Nashville were wimps—"
"That UltraShopMart guy is offering money to everybody, but—"
"Don't want no corporate overlords in Dead End," a very familiar voice shouted. I turned to see Otis hunched over a table with the Peterson brothers from Dead End Hardware. Otis had brought Fluffy into my life in a roundabout way that had involved multiple pawns and a few hundred dollars. Since Otis hadn't had a job in maybe forty years, I wasn't sure exactly what he thought corporate overlords might be and didn't really want to find out.
Jack shook his head. "This is worse than I thought."
"That our peaceful little town is devolving into shouting and fist fights?"
"No. Lorraine just told me they're out of strawberry pie."
I heaved a sigh and sank into a chair, but then popped right back up out of it when Santa Darryl took a swing at Santa Rooster.
"Oh, no, you don't," I shouted. "Santa, leave Santa alone! What iswrongwith you two?"
Jack reached for my hand, but I easily evaded him and stormed over to the angry Clauses and turned first to the one I knew.
"Rooster! I'm surprised at you!"
Rooster Jenkins, who was roughly the size of a fire truck, gave me a sheepish look and wiped blood from his nose with the back of his hand. He was far too old for shenanigans like this.
"Aw, Tess. I'm sorry. We just got carried away. Darryl's been telling everybody he's the real Santa, and I'm just a … fake. He even used foul language, but I won't repeat that in front of a lady."
A harsh bark of laughter interrupted whatever I'd been about to say. Darryl, who was maybe a foot shorter than Rooster and all stringy muscle and scowl, sneered at me. "Whatlady? That's just the freak who owns the pawn shop and pretends she knows how you're gonna die."
I turned to face the rude Santa, only to see his hand coming right at me, as if to shove me out of the way. But, just then, a different, very familiar hand shot out between the two of us and slammed Darryl's arm away.
This hand had claw-tipped fingers.
Darryl gulped loudly and stumbled back. "I wasn't going to touch her. I just—"
"You willnevertouch her," Jack said in a quiet, deadly voice that shimmered with violence. "You will also apologize to her for what you said."
Darryl's eyes tightened, but he looked at Jack's face and muttered an "I'm sorry" in the direction of my shoes. Then he turned and stomped through the restaurant and out the door.
I gave Jack a look but pitched my voice low. "Remember how we talked about your overprotective tendencies?"
His brows drew together. "Thatman was about to slam his grocery cart into you."
I sighed and pinched my nose between my fingers and thumb. "Jack. That man in Target was probably eighty years old."
"Which is why I simply blocked his way," he said, giving me his best innocent face.
He was trying. I knew he was. Since we'd been … intimate, he'd become about a thousand times more protective than before, which was saying a lot.
I just shook my head and resolved to discuss it with him later, at home. Meanwhile, I patted Rooster's arm. "Maybe Lorraine can give you some ice for that nose?"
Jack stared at Rooster. "What is this Santa beef about, anyway?"
"I've been Santa at City Hall for over forty years. But about ten years ago, Emeril and Harold Peterson started having their cousin from Nashville come down to spend the holidays with them. They got him to dress up and give out candy to the kids at the hardware store. Which is fine. I don't mind a little friendly competition. But this year, that rat b—boyhas been telling the kids that I'm a fake. I asked him to stop doing it when I ran into him this morning and things got ugly."
The rat boy was probably forty-five or fifty years old, but I was sureboywas better than whatever Rooster had been about to say.
"I'm going to get ice," he muttered, before trudging toward the kitchen.
