LITMIR.BIZ

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      She’d turn to me and say, “Charli Rae, I think we need to test these recipes before we tell our customers that these here books are full of recipes to die for, don’t you?” In her voice, there would be that rich, heavenly tone she always had when we shared our favorite family holiday treat. It was like she was experiencing the burst of flavor on her taste buds as soon as she saw the covers of the cookbooks. It was the same look she had when my dad made peppermint milkshakes while we decorated the Christmas tree.

      With one difference. If Dad was making his famous peppermint milkshakes, my mom would mosey on over to where he stood at the kitchen counter, her hips moving back and forth with a sassy sway, and she’d look up into my daddy’s eyes and tell him no one could tempt her to sin the way he did as she took that first sip. Little did I know at the age of ten that her tone had more to do about the passion between them than the homemade milkshake. For me, it was all about the dessert.

      I loved it.

      There was nothing special about the ingredients—Homemade Vanilla Blue Bell Ice Cream, with milk, peppermint extract, and candy canes blended into one cool, scintillating dessert that I’d savor until the very last drop I didn’t want to reach but couldn’t wait to devour. To this day, I associate peppermint shakes with family and love.

      All the wonder, however, disappeared after my tenth Christmas, after Momma died from cancer. Our first holiday was brutal. Dad made peppermint shakes in an attempt to give me normalcy. But I misunderstood the gesture and thought he was saying life would go on without Momma—nothing would change. I ended up throwing my milkshake, glass and all, across the apartment we lived in above the store. I shocked my dad as I screamed and stomped through the kitchen to my bedroom.

      It was only when I heard him crying as he cleaned up the mess I’d made in the other room that I realized he was hurting just as much as I was. I returned to the living room and knelt beside him. He tried to hide his grief, but even at ten, there was no way I was going to let him. I needed to know I wasn’t the only one utterly destroyed by her death…and for the next six years we spent the holidays sharing only one shake on Christmas Eve to remember my mom in our own special way.

      “Are you going to open that box, or sit there and wait for the books to break out like Black Bart broke out of Hazel Rock’s jail?”

      I laughed at the lean man who had more gray than pepper on the top of his head. Daddy liked the Old West history of Hazel Rock. It was how my momma convinced him to settle in the Barn when I was eight.

      Daddy returned to his worn leather chair behind the counter and sat with his feet propped up on the counter and crossed at the ankles. He rested his chin in his hand as he leaned against the arm of the chair and pondered what the blue blazes I was up to.

      “You’re supposed to be manning the register, not spying on me,” I told him.

      “If I was spying, I’d be asleep. Your life is about as exciting as the wind blowing.”

      “What’s that supposed to mean?”

      “It means get out of the Barn and live a little. Stop lollygagging around here on your day off.”

      “But the new books have arrived,” I objected.

      Daddy pulled his feet off the counter and stood. He was a handsome man just past his prime, with a laid-back manner and a twinkle in his eyes that belied his innocent expression. He was lean and fit, and could almost always be found wearing a plaid shirt with jeans and a pair of ancient cowboy boots. His skin had the weathered tan of a man who worked on a farm, or around a barn, like ours was before it was a bookstore. I’d idolized him as a child, demonized him as a teenager, and begun to appreciate him for the man, father, and husband he’d been as I approached thirty. He’d literally become my world once again.

      Which didn’t exactly say a whole lot for my social life. It was pathetic, and I was well aware of it.

      “I’ll have the new books on the shelves tomorrow when you come to work,” he scolded.

      “I want to open them today. Lucy Barton’s book should be arriving any day…”

      “And here I thought you were looking for cookbooks.”

      I grinned. He knew me better than I’d expected considering I’d run away from home to live with my aunt at the age of seventeen. It’d taken me a dozen years to find my way back to my hometown, but I wasn’t about to completely confess my weakness for a good holiday treat.

      Princess squawked from under my daddy’s feet.

      “If we’re disturbing your beauty sleep, Princess, you should have stayed upstairs,” I replied. “Quit complaining.”

      Princess stuck her pointy pink little nose out from behind the counter, yawned, and then disappeared from my view. Before moving back home, I would have never, in a million Texas years, believed that I would live with a nine-banded armadillo, let alone talk to one, but she intruded on our conversations like a little toddler dying for attention. Sometimes she smelled like one too.

      I’d inherited the little creature from my dad when I returned home and moved into the apartment above the store on the backside of the Barn overlooking the Bravos River. Princess wasn’t your typical pet; she was pink, sometimes stinky, and had a hard shell. A freak of nature abandoned at birth that my dad took in and gave a home. Then he gave her to me when I returned because she liked the Barn. As much as I grumbled about the little thing, I’d fallen in love with her beady eyes and cocky attitude. We were pretty much inseparable—unless she was out back digging for grubs…or stunk to high heaven and needed a bath…or I decided to get out of bed and not sleep all day long.

      Daddy scooted across the concrete floors. He stopped in front of me as I struggled with my box cutter that was about as sharp as a pair of kiddy scissors. In other words, it wouldn’t cut a piece of construction paper if it was perforated.

      Daddy swayed his head from side to side and his lips curved in a smile of surrender. He’d given up on telling me to replace the blade. “Let me help you with that.” He pulled out his pocket knife from his well-worn Levi’s and bent over to grab the edge of the box.

      “Don’t cut any of the books,” I warned.

      His lip quirked but he said nothing as his knife made a clean cut down the center of the box, the blade slicing through the thick packing tape like it was butter on a hot sunny day. He made two more cuts at the ends of the box and I didn’t wait for him to get out of the way; I immediately started pulling out the cardboard and paper packing that protected the books from damage during shipping.

      Daddy’s cell phone rang and I waited for him to take the call. I knew he wanted to see the books as much as I did. When his expression turned somber, a bad feeling stirred in my gut. Something was wrong. I listened for any hint of what the caller had to say on the other end of the phone. It was only when he said, “I’m sorry for your loss” that I knew how bad it was.

      I pulled Princess onto my lap and hugged her tight. Daddy told the caller not to worry, that there was no rush, and asked that they put us on the list before he hung up the phone.

      “What happened?”

      Daddy clipped his phone to his belt and broke the bad news. “Matt Allen died this morning.”

      I couldn’t place the name. I recognized it; I just wasn’t sure who it belonged to.

      Sensing my confusion, Daddy explained. “Matt was the electrician who was going to install the lights on the front of the store to light up the Book Barn Princess sign.”

      “What happened to him?”

      “It seems he got electrocuted at a jobsite he was working on this morning. Now Warner Electric is short-handed and they’re not sure when they can get someone out to install the lights.”

      “That’s horrible. I hope they realized the lights weren’t that important.”

      “Yeah, but they’re a good, reliable company. They have a good safety

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