Kisses And Kids (Congratulations Series #1) Read online

  “Do we owe you—”

  “Nah.” The mechanic waved his hand dismissively. “I was just trying to see if I could beat the old master here.”

  “I wish you could have,” Trisha said.

  “Yeah, me, too.” Wayne laughed and then the two men walked off toward Wayne’s car, leaving Trisha alone with the old van.

  She felt like crying. She was so tired of trying to squeeze nickels and dimes from empty purses. At times, it seemed as though all her energy went toward that instead of the kids.

  “The old girl’s dead, huh?”

  Trisha didn’t even have to turn around. It was Clarissa, Trisha’s secretary, assistant, confidante and the club’s chief disciplinarian. Trisha nodded, not daring to speak yet.

  “Well, ain’t no reason for you to look so down in the mouth, honey. Anything that’s got a beginning, got an end. Just like you and me.”

  “It’s my job to provide for the club.”

  “Oh, don’t you worry now.” Clarissa put an arm around Trisha’s shoulders. “My mama always said every cloud has a silver lining.”

  “Where’s the silver lining in a dead van?”

  “You gotta have faith, honey. Faith and patience.”

  Faith and patience. An ability to just relax and handle things as they came up. Trisha wished she had those traits tucked away in her attic, but she was about as patient as a six-year-old at Christmas and had faith only in the fact that another crisis was waiting around the corner.

  “Stuart? P. Stuart?” a young man called over to them. He had headphones over his ears and his head was bobbing to the beat of music only he could hear.

  “Hey,” the man said louder. “Like, where is the dude?”

  Trisha stepped forward. “I’m Patricia Stewart.”

  “Cool.” He pushed a clipboard at her. “Sign at the X mark.”

  Trisha stared at the form on the clipboard. It bore the letterhead of the dealership that employed Wayne. Were they giving her a bill for his time? They couldn’t be—the mechanic had dropped by on his own. “What is this for?” she asked sharply.

  “For your new vehicle, dudette.” He nodded over her shoulder at a shiny new van parked near the club door.

  Trisha turned to stare at it, at the wide red ribbon stretched around it as if it were a Christmas present. “New van?”

  She had no idea where the van had come from or where it was supposed to be, but her hand scribbled her name without hesitation. Was someone donating this vehicle? How would they know one was needed so desperately? It had to be a mistake.

  But it couldn’t be. The club’s address was scrawled across the top of the form—2020 West Colfax. And her name was on it, though it was spelled wrong—Stuart, not Stewart.

  “Thank you, ladies.” He tore off a copy of the form and gave it to Trisha. “Now y’all have yourselves a bodacious day.”

  He unhooked a small motorbike attached to the van. After kick-starting the cycle, he gave them a last wave and hummed off down the street like an angry bumblebee.

  “I can’t believe it.” Trisha just stood there staring at the van. “How many people even knew that we needed this?”

  “Maybe we got a guardian angel, after all,” Clarissa replied.

  Trisha moved toward the new vehicle. A huge banner was strung along with the ribbon. It read Congratulations, Pat.

  No one called her Pat, but she certainly wasn’t going to quibble over that. She opened the front door. A bottle of champagne sat on the passenger seat, a note attached to it.

  Congratulations, Pat. You’re doing one hell of a job. Hope you like the van. Now you can haul your “cargo” in the comfort and style that they deserve. Good luck for the rest of the year.

  The Chamber of Commerce of St. Joseph County

  Signatures of numerous local dignitaries were scrawled all over the card. Trisha let her arms drop and stared again at the van. “This is just so weird.”

  “Wowee,” a childish voice called from behind them. “That’s one cool vehicle.”

  Trisha had been concentrating on the new van so hard that she hadn’t noticed that a number of children had come outside. “Be careful, kids,” she warned. “Don’t go out into the street.”

  “Miss Stewart, are we gonna get to ride in this?” The children were scrambling into the vehicle, opening and closing the sliding door. “Lookit these seats.”

  As the children oohed and aahed over the seats, Trisha quit staring at the exterior of the van and switched to staring at the interior.

  It was indeed furnished sumptuously, with captain’s chairs and little tables for refreshments. A vehicle with bench seats would carry more kids, but she quickly rejected the thought. Just thank your lucky stars, she told herself, and be grateful for any favors that come your way.

  “Come on, kids.” She herded the screaming kids out of the vehicle. “Let’s not wreck our new van the first day out.”

  Clarissa leaned closer to Trisha. “I’m gonna make me a few calls,” she said. “The world needs to know when someone gives us a gift like this.”

  * * *

  “I don’t understand,” Pat said. Riding halfway across town wasn’t what he needed to be doing. “Why didn’t someone from the office pick up the van in the first place?”

  Ben paused for the stop sign and looked both ways before he proceeded through the intersection. “Because the media people were going to be at your office and the delivery would have made good press. You know, showing how the whole city is behind you in your efforts to bring new jobs to the area.”

  Pat just shook his head. The air-conditioning in Ben’s car was turned on high, sealing them in a world apart from the sweltering heat outside. But it wasn’t enough. He could feel a trickle of sweat amble down his back.

  “So then why couldn’t our summer intern go get it now?” he asked. “Why do we both need to troop out here?”

  “Hey, just relax,” Ben said. “We’re almost there. You can drive the van back. The media guys’ll take your picture and then you can get back to work.”

  Pat dropped back against his seat. Ben was right. He should relax. It just was hard, coming back out here to the westside after he’d vowed never to return.

  His old west-side neighborhood slid past the car window— dilapidated buildings looking much the worse for wear. About the same as it had looked fifteen or twenty years ago, back when he was a kid roaming these streets.

  He’d gone through a lot since then—a lot of anger and bitterness and disappointment. But no matter what his grandmother said, he’d found true happiness: he’d achieved his financial objectives and had no one and nothing tugging on his coattails to pull him down.

  “I don’t know what’s with people these days.” Ben paused to pull around an old station wagon, filled with house-painting gear, lumbering down the street. “They had the address totally wrong.”

  “They didn’t check the name?”

  “That’s the funny part,” Ben said. “We had it set up to be delivered to you, P. Stuart. And there’s a P. Stewart at the other address.”

  “It’s not an uncommon name,” Pat said.

  “Yeah.” Ben laughed. “Or maybe you got a twin.”

  “No.” Pat popped up in his seat, his stomach twisting into a knot, as yet another echo of his grandmother’s words danced around the back of his mind.

  Pat forced himself to relax and lean back. He casually glanced down at his watch. August 22. His stomach took a sideways dip but now he knew what was going on. It was his birthday. His subconscious had been working overtime and dredging up birthdays past to haunt him. He just needed a good night’s sleep. “I don’t have a twin.”

  “Relax,” Ben said. “This one’s a woman and she spells her name S-T-E-W-A-R-T. She’s the director of the West Side Boys and Girls Club.”

  Pat just grunted. That was where the kids in that photo in the paper had been from. And the good-looking blonde. Her image came back; something in her eyes seemed to speak to h
im. Jeez, he was tired. This was not his sort of daydream. He closed his eyes, pushing the image away.

  “You grew up around here,” Ben said. “Didn’t you?”

  “I lived in a lot of places,” Pat replied, keeping his eyes closed.

  It wasn’t that he was ashamed of where he came from; the west side had its share of good people, and some not so good, just like any neighborhood. But he didn’t want to talk about it. Something that Ben wouldn’t understand.

  No amount of explaining could make Ben understand the dark side of this kind of neighborhood—the lure of the streets, of a life where polite society’s do’s and don’ts had little meaning. Mackley had grown up on a farm about fifty miles east of the city. To him, streets were just something to drive your car on. No, Ben wouldn’t understand at all.

  “Uh-oh.”

  Pat’s eyes flickered open. “What’s the matter?” They were approaching the Boys and Girls Club and the van was standing out like a Christmas tree in a snowswept field.

  Ben slowed his car to a crawl. “Look at all those kids around the vehicle.”

  “So what?” Pat said. “Kids like cars, especially new cars.”

  “We could have a problem here.”

  Pat sighed. “What kind of problem?”

  “The kids might get upset.”

  “Why?” Pat’s voice was sharp, but he was getting tired of everything. “The damn thing belongs to us, doesn’t it? We’re not stealing it.”

  “Of course we’re not.” Ben stopped down the block from the club and turned off the ignition. The August heat started oozing into the car with a vengeance. “But when it first got delivered, the kids thought it was for them. You know, for the club.”

  “These kids aren’t dumb,” Pat said. “They know mistakes happen.”

  Ben rubbed his chin. “Unfortunately, they need a new van of their own.”

  “Fine,” Pat said. “Give the damn thing to them and let’s go back to the office. I have work to do.”

  “The chamber bought the van for your outfit.”

  “All right, then.” Pat opened his door and stepped out. “Let’s take it and get out of here. Make up your mind—which is it going to be?”

  Ben got out of the car, so Pat strode ahead. But he hadn’t taken more than three steps when he stopped. That wasn’t just a crowd around the van. That was a—

  “Oh, great,” he muttered. The damn kids had gone and formed a human chain around the van, with arms interlocked and fierce looks on their little faces.

  He didn’t have much experience dealing with kids, but he suddenly found himself agreeing with Ben. This smelled like trouble with a capital T. A dull ache grew in his head as he watched a high school girl step away from the crowd around the van and walk toward them.

  She looked cute in her summer blouse and culottes and, dressed properly, she might even be beautiful. But first she’d have to get rid of that wide-eyed innocence that dominated her face. Probably some suburban kid spending a summer saving the world, looking for something that would look good on a college application.

  “Hi,” she said, thrusting her hand toward Pat. He was surprised to see how firm both her hand and voice were. “I’m Trisha Stewart.”

  “Hello,” Pat replied. “I’m Pat Stuart.”

  “Ah,” she said. “The lucky P. Stuart.”

  “Lucky?”

  “You get to keep the van.”

  Suddenly Pat recognized her as the blonde from the newspaper picture. Or he thought he did. But the person in the picture had been the director of the club. And this woman looked awfully young.

  “Hello, Mr. Mackley.” She turned her attention to Ben, shaking his hand. “I’d like to thank the chamber again for our new roof. It was very generous of them.”

  Pat grimaced. This certainly wasn’t a high school kid. That wide-eyed innocence was just a facade. She knew what side her bread was buttered on, and the unobtrusive, inoffensive way she handled Ben said she was probably very good at milking dollars from the fat cats.

  “We’re always glad to help.” Ben had cleared his throat and was fingering his tie. “Now, do we have some kind of a problem here?”

  The woman shrugged, a pixielike grin on her face. “The children really love the van.”

  “It is a very nice vehicle,” Ben agreed.

  Pat took a deep breath and sighed. He had things that needed doing. He didn’t have time to play all these games. “I’m sorry about their feelings,” he said. “But we really need to get going. Will you tell them to step back?”

  “I’ve already discussed that with them.”

  Left unsaid was that since they were still clinging to the van, her talk had been ineffective.

  Pat tried another tactic. “How about I load them all into the van and drive over to the Ice Cream Shoppe? I’ll spring for cones all around.”

  She stared at him for a moment. “Your generosity is just too much.”

  “You can come along.” Pat was uncertain what her tone meant, but knew it wasn’t positive.

  Her lips twisted into a frown. “You plan on spending ten, maybe fifteen dollars max,” she said. “And then you’ll drive away with a van worth around twenty-five thousand dollars.”

  “But it’s not your van,” Pat protested. “It’s ours.”

  The little blond twerp just glared at him.

  “You know,” Pat said, “I could just call the cops.”

  “And you expect the police to march in here with clubs and start throwing ten-year-old kids off your vehicle?” She glanced at something behind him, then a broad smile filled her face. “I don’t think so.”

  Pat slowly turned around to see two TV Minicam trucks parking and other media people pulling in behind them. He turned to glare at Ben.

  “I guess they got tired of waiting,” Ben said with a shrug.

  Well, it looked as if someone had to take charge here and, since no one else was stepping forward, Pat figured he’d better. He walked over to his van, turning on his charm-the-visiting-executives smile as he went.

  “Okay, kids,” he said, making sure his voice was deep and authoritative. “Let’s break it up. You guys go back and play inside, while I take this van to where it belongs.”

  “Stuff it, Pretty Boy.”

  Pat looked down at the kid who’d spoken. It was a little girl, around ten or eleven, dressed in a T-shirt and shorts. A wild mass of dark hair framed a face so full of innocence that Pat barely realized she was glaring at him.

  He tried again. “I know you don’t want to keep something that isn’t yours, so—”

  “I said stuff it, butthead.”

  “Angie.” Trisha had moved up alongside him. “Remember our chat about manners? You’re supposed to treat others as you’d like to be treated.”

  “But Bozo here is a jerk, Miss Stewart. I can tell. He just wants to take our van.”

  “It isn’t your van,” Pat pointed out, fighting to keep his voice reasonable as the cameramen and reporters moved in on them.

  “It got delivered here,” Angie said.

  “Yeah,” the other kids shouted. “Finders keepers, losers weepers.”

  The TV cameras were rolling. Pat glared over at Ben, who appeared to be discussing the fortunes of South Bend’s baseball team with the reporters. Swell. Pat hadn’t made the mess, but he had to fix it.

  He turned to Trisha. “I understand you need another vehicle.”

  “Pretty Boy’s a real genius, ain’t he, Miss Stewart?”

  “Angie, be nice, please.”

  The girl was now smiling sweetly at him, but Pat wasn’t fooled. She probably figured “nice” would be hitting him with a broomstick instead of a baseball bat.

  “What we really need is money,” Trisha said.

  “So, you get this van when we get a new one,” Angie said.

  Pat took a deep breath. He wished the media people were someplace else at the moment.

  “Angie’s right,” Trisha said. Her smile was soft and
kind, but her eyes looked like a banker’s foreclosing on a widow’s farm. “If you want to give us the money for a new vehicle, I’m sure the children would release this one.”

  “Get cash, Miss Stewart,” Angie said.

  Pat kept his smile in place. “I’d be happy to help with fund-raising,” he said. “And in the meantime, if you need transportation, I’m sure we could work—”

  “You mean that whenever we need a ride, you’ll drive us?” Angie said.

  “Well, essentially, but that’s not exactly—”

  “Yahoo,” Angie shouted. “Pretty Boy’s gonna take us to camp, Miss Stewart.”

  The other kids started cheering and Pat felt his stomach falling. “What?” He looked quickly to Trisha for help, but she had adopted an angelic smile.

  “Great idea, Pat,” Ben said. “Just fabulous.”

  Pat was about to protest that he wasn’t taking anyone anyplace, but Ben had pushed past him and started talking to the reporters. Something about how hard these children had worked to earn their way to camp. How the club’s van broke down and how Mr. Patrick Stuart, the executive director of the Committee for Industrial Development of St. Joseph County, was stepping in and helping out.

  Ben went on about the new plant that Pat had brought into the community and the club’s new roof that the chamber of commerce helped pay for. There were a lot of words about community and people working together, but Pat just looked at Trisha, his eyes pleading for help.

  All she did was smile at him. “Thank you, kind sir,” she said. Then, after a quick glance at the media, added, “You’re quite the hero.”

  Everybody was smiling, but Pat felt like a rabbit who’d been caught in a cage. And everyone was closing in on him.

  “How about a group photo?” someone shouted.

  “Wonderful,” Ben said, stepping back now that the damage was done. “Wonderful.”

  “Hey, Pat, get between that little dark-haired girl and Miss Stewart, will you?” one photographer asked.

  Pat moved where he was told, forcing a smile for the cameras. He should have stayed in L.A. He should have gone straight home. He should have become a hermit and moved out to the Gobi Desert.

  “What a life our old Pat has.” Ben laughed, inviting the reporters to share the humor. “Look at him, there between two beautiful women, without a care in the world. We should all be so lucky.”