When I sat down in front of my nameplate, I added two more reasons. Sherry had sat me on a corner of the table, next to Josh and Lille. Josh sighed when he saw me. I put on a council business smile and greeted the two. “Good morning.”
I turned toward my left and Lille was scowling at me. She wore catlike frames today, making her eyes look larger than normal. “Figures I’d get stuck at the loser table.”
Lille owned the other food establishment in town, a diner called Diamond Lille’s. She also had been dating the town bad boy and thought I’d had a role in sending him up the river. Or whatever they called prison life these days. I guess she didn’t think his dealings with the local motorcycle gang and being an accessory to the last murder in town actually should count against him. I squared my shoulders and made my smile even bigger, then lied. “I asked Sherry to seat us together. I think it’s long past time to mend fences, don’t you?”
Lille’s eyes widened and she looked like she was going to tell me what I could do with my fence work when Bill Sullivan called the meeting to order.
“Quiet down, people, this is a meeting after all.” Bill took a sip of champagne and waited for everyone to settle.
“Could have fooled me,” I uttered a little too loud. Everyone turned their attention from Bill to me, then swiveled to see Sherry’s reaction. Shut up, shut up, shut up. Aunt Jackie shook her head, warning me, again.
Kent Paine stepped up, blocking the icy stares between Sherry and me. “I’d love to stay for your little meeting, but the auditors are coming in and they’ll be upset if I’m not there to welcome them.” He glanced around the table. “Although if I’d known how much fun you have at these meetings, I would have come before.”
Not like I hadn’t personally asked him several times to attend or at least send a representative. I’d even brought cookies three times to tempt him. I guess all I’d had to do was put on a circus clown costume and promise him a good time.
I watched him exit the building, and then saw a woman follow him out. Probably one of the servers. No, most definitely one of the models, tall with long dark hair, the woman was gorgeous. I heard the tap of a gavel. The meeting was starting.
“Jill’s right.” Bill tried to smooth the waters. “It’s more than time to get started. First up, a report from my Mary on the results of the Christmas Festival.” He smiled down at his other half.
Mary Sullivan had rounded up the troops to pull together the decorations at the last minute for a true South Cove Christmas after the mayor’s wife had dumped the project. Then she’d run the entire festival, scheduling carolers, school visits, and setting up a Santa’s workshop on the lawn of City Hall. The woman was amazing in my eyes.
Mary stood, her warm smile enveloping me. She seemed to know exactly how I felt. “Repeating the brief I gave last month, we had a terrific festival. Every business owner I talked to saw an increase in profits over last year this time. I know our bed-and-breakfast is still working bookings we got during December.” She passed out a stack of folders. “This is the final report for the festival numbers and accounting. At the end, there’s a questionnaire for you to complete with ideas for our next festival. Please be honest. Many hands make light work.”
When I got my folder and opened it, my eyes widened. Not only did she have an executive summary I could forward to the council, daily revenues were listed along with a description of the festival activities so we could see what brought in the visitors. At first glance, the Santa visits were high-profit days. Mary needed to be doing this analysis full-time rather than serving breakfast muffins to her guests.
“This is amazing.” Holding the book open to one of the pages for the table to see, I pointed. “Mary’s broken our store traffic down to events and times. We can use this to make staffing decisions next year rather than just guessing.”
Bill beamed at his wife. “Mary used to be in market research before we moved here.”
I didn’t know that. Why didn’t I know that? I thumbed through a few more pages. “We should do this for all of our festivals. We could get a grant from the city to pay for her time. This insight is promotion gold.”
Mary’s cheeks turned a bright pink when I gave her my usually-reserved-for-chocolate grin.
“My store isn’t listed in the book.” Sherry slammed her copy of the report back on the table. She looked toward Bill. “She didn’t include Vintage Duds.”
I didn’t wait for him or Mary to speak. Have mouth, insert leg is my motto. “That’s because your store hadn’t opened yet. She’s not a mind reader, Sherry.”