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ALSO BY RICHARD PAUL EVANS
The Walk Series:
The Walk
Miles to Go
Promise Me
The Christmas List
Grace
The Gift
Finding Noel
The Sunflower
A Perfect Day
The Last Promise
The Christmas Box Miracle
The Carousel
The Looking Glass
The Locket
The Letter
Timepiece
The Christmas Box
For Children and Young Adults
The Dance
The Christmas Candle
The Spyglass
The Tower
The Light of Christmas
Michael Vey: The Prisoner of Cell 25
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and
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Copyright © 2011 by Richard Paul Evans
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First Simon & Schuster hardcover edition November 2011
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Designed by Davina Mock-Maniscalco
Manufactured in the United States of America
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Evans, Richard Paul.
Lost December : a novel / Richard Paul Evans.
—1st Simon & Schuster hardcover ed.
p. cm.
1. Christmas stories. I. Title.
PS3555.V259L68 2011
813’.54—dc23 2011035082
ISBN 978-1-4516-2800-5 (print)
ISBN 978-1-4516-2802-9 (eBook)
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
A sincere thank you to all my friends at Simon & Schuster, for all they do and have done to share my books with the world for nearly two decades.
To my Father, with love.
Lost December
A certain man had two sons:
And the younger of them said to his father, Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth to me. And he divided unto them his living.
And not many days after the younger son gathered all together, and took his journey into a far country, and there wasted his substance with riotous living.
And when he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine in that land; and he began to be in want.
And he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country; and he sent him into his fields to feed swine.
And he would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat: and no man gave unto him.
And when he came to himself, he said, How many hired servants of my father’s have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger!
I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee,
And am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants.
And he arose, and came to his father. But when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him.
And the son said unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son.
But the father said to his servants, Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet:
And bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it; and let us eat, and be merry: For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.
Luke 15:11-24
Contents
Acknowledgments
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
Chapter Forty-Four
Chapter Forty-Five
Chapter Forty-Six
Chapter Forty-Seven
Chapter Forty-Eight
Chapter Forty-Nine
Chapter Fifty
Chapter Fifty-One
Epilogue
About the Author
PROLOGUE
A ninety-year-old man went to confession. “Father,” he said, “I left my wife and ran off with a thirty-year-old woman.”
The priest said, “That’s terrible, but I don’t recognize your voice. Are you a member of this parish?”
The old man replied, “No. I’m not Catholic.”
“Then why are you telling me this?” The priest asked.
“I’m ninety years old,” the old man replied, “I’m telling everyone.”
There are those who share their stories of waywardness with false shame and fond recollection—a misplaced pride in past misdeeds. I am not that fool. I share my story for your benefit, not mine. On my part, I feel nothing but shame and gratitude. Shame for the people I hurt and gratitude that they didn’t desert me when I most deserved it. It has been said that sometimes the greatest hope in our lives is just a second chance to do what we should have done right in the first place. This is the story of my second chance.
CHAPTER
One
Some mistakenly believe that “prodigal” means lost or wayward.
It doesn’t. It means “wastefully extravagant.”
No matter, both definitions are true of me.
Luke Crisp’s Diary
My seventh-grade English teacher, Mr. Adams, used to say, “No matter how thin the pancake, there are still two sides.” Two sides to every story. People mistake that little chestnut for wisdom—as if all real evil in this world can be explained away if we’ll but listen to the other side of the story. Tell that to your local serial killer. I believe that adage amounts to nothing more than moral laziness—a motto for people who carry moral compasses without needles. Make no mistake, all evil has its side of the story.
I’m telling you this because in presenting my side of the story, I do not want you to confuse it for justification. No matter what excuses I told myself at the time, my choices were wrong. I was wrong. I’ll warn you in advance—as you read my story, you won’t like me. I understand. Neither did I. You have likely heard the story of the prodigal son. That’s my story too. I’m here to tell my side of the story.
CHAPTER
Two
Only those who never step, never stumble.
Luke Crisp’s Diary
If the seeds of my fall were planted in my youth, they didn’t begin to bloom until my years at Wharton business school at the University of Pennsylvania, carefully cultivated by a gardener you’ll learn about later.
Before then, I lived where I was born, in Scottsdale, Arizona, an upscale suburb of Phoenix. My childhood was a little unusual. My mother died of breast cancer when I was seven, and my father threw himself into his work to deal with his grief. My father, Carl Crisp, was an innovative and brilliant man—a corporate visionary. Through his industry he built an international company. Unless you live in an Appalachian cave or a shanty in an Everglades swamp, you’ve probably heard of it: Crisp’s Copy Centers. There are currently more than two thousand locations throughout the U.S. and Canada, the number of stores rising monthly.
My father threw himself into his work, but he didn’t neglect me. Rather, he took me with him. I spent my early years at his side. When most boys my age were learning to throw a curve ball, I was learning how to replace a toner cartridge in a color copier.
By the time I was sixteen, I was managing my first copy center—a small Crisp’s copy shop in Gilbert, Arizona. I’m pretty sure that I was the only sophomore in high school driving a self-financed BMW. I oversaw twelve copy centers while going to college. By the time I was twenty-one, I had graduated summa cum laude from Arizona State University.
People always say that I look a lot like my father, which I consider a compliment. We are both tall and a little gangly, with light brown hair. But that’s where our likeness ends. My father’s most noticeable trait is his intense, dark eyes, partially shadowed beneath bushy eyebrows. He always told me that the secret to success is “laser focus,” and he had the eyes for it. He could always see through me.
CHAPTER
Three
On the calendar, all days look the same,
but they do not carry the same weight.
Luke Crisp’s Diary
If I had to pick a day that my life turned, I’d peg it to six weeks after my December graduation from ASU. My father and I had been working together on a presentation and stopped to have dinner at our favorite restaurant, DiSera’s, a fancy and popular Italian restaurant halfway between our home and the Crisp’s corporate office building. We ate there almost weekly, and the owner, Lawrence “Larry” DiSera was a close friend of my father. We even had our own table in the restaurant, beneath a painting of a buxom Tuscan girl stomping grapes. On special occasions—birthdays and celebrations—Larry himself would come to our table and play the mandolin.
But the night my life changed, it wasn’t my birthday and we weren’t celebrating anything. We were just eating. Somewhere between the antipasto and the primi piatti, my father said, “I think you should get an M.B.A.”
The comment came as far out of the blue as a meteor. I was glad to be back to work at Crisp’s and already felt like college had been an unnecessary delay. For a moment I just looked at him. “Why?”
“I think it would be good for you.”
I hoped he wasn’t serious, but from his demeanor I knew he was. It was the same look he’d had when he suggested I take over as area manager of our Phoenix stores.
“I’d rather learn business in the real world,” I said, “You didn’t get an M.B.A. It hasn’t hurt you.”
“More than you think,” he replied.
“You founded one of America’s largest companies. How can you say it hurt you?” I punctuated my argument with a bite of caprese salad. When I finished chewing, I said, “Besides, we’ve got enough going on getting ready for the public offering.”
“That’s why I think you shouldn’t wait,” he said
“You want me to go back to ASU?”
“I was thinking somewhere out of state. Maybe Harvard or Wharton.”
Our conversation seemed to be spiraling off in the wrong direction. “What’s wrong with staying here?” I asked. “ASU’s got a great business program. And there’s Thunderbird.”
“They’re good schools,” my father said. “I just think it might be good for you to get out on your own for a while. Going back East would help you get a feel for the climate outside the Southwest.”
Up to that point in my life I had always lived at home with my father. “You sound like you’re trying to get rid of me.”
My father smiled. “Maybe I am,” he said. “I’ve been thinking a lot lately. It’s a parent’s job to give their children roots and wings. I’ve given you roots—maybe too many of them—but not enough wings. I think I need to nudge you out of the nest a little. I want you to fly.”
“Or plummet to my death,” I said.
He grinned. “That’s not going to happen.”
“I didn’t think I was doing so bad here,” I said.
“Bad? I couldn’t be more proud of you. You were successfully running a multimillion dollar business at nineteen. This isn’t about not measuring up. This isn’t even about business. This is about your life. I want you to have the opportunities I didn’t have. I don’t want you to have any regrets.”
“I don’t have any regrets,” I said.
He looked at me for a moment, then sighed. “Maybe I have them for you. You didn’t have the childhood most of your schoolmates had.”
“I don’t want their childhoods. I like my life the way it is. I like working at Crisp’s.”
“It’s a lot bigger world out there than just Crisp’s.”
“You don’t want me to work at Crisp’s?”
“I’m not saying that. You know that I want you to take over the company someday. But I want you to make that choice with your eyes wide open. It may be that in the end Crisp’s is exactly what you want—or maybe it’s not—but, whatever you choose, at least you had a choice. I won’t take that away from you.”
“If I went back East, who would take care of things here?”
“Henry will do until you get back.” Henry Price was my dad’s chief financial officer and number two. “I’m sure he’ll relish the chance to step up.”
I had no doubt he would. Henry had always struck me as ambitious. “Who will take care of you?”
My father looked at me and I saw a mixture of sadness and pride in his face. “That’s what I was afraid of,” he said softly. “You’ve been watching over me instead of the other way around. I’ll be fine. Besides, I’ve got Mary.”
Mary was my father’s personal assistant. She had been with my father even before my mother died—way back in the early days of Crisp’s when there were just three stores and they were still running to the local office warehouse to pick up boxes of copy paper. Mary was in her late fifties, single, childless and affable. She didn’t have a high school diploma, but what she lacked in scholarship she made up for in devotion to my father. I always thought she seemed more like a mother than an assistant.
My father went back to eating while I thought over his proposition. After a few minutes I breathed out slowly. “I’ll think it over.”
My father said w
ithout looking up, “Fair enough. In the meantime, we have the national conference to prepare for. So hurry up and eat. There’s work to do.”
CHAPTER
Four
Under the right circumstances, a tiny spark
can grow into an inferno that can overcome an entire city.
So can an idea.
Luke Crisp’s Diary
The spark from that dinner conversation caught fire. By the next week I had sent in my application to Wharton business school. My father had an old investor friend in the Wharton administration who was able to help expedite things, and a month later my father and I were on a plane, flying to Philadelphia for my enrollment interview.
In spite of my initial resistance, I liked what I saw. I suppose that my father was right—a part of me wanted to venture out and see what else was out there. I was accepted into the program, and I enrolled with a major in operations and information management. A week after my acceptance I returned to Philadelphia to find housing. I found an apartment in Sansom Place, a tower within walking distance of the campus, and by the next August I was back in school.
Even though I was in my twenties, I was homesick those first few weeks away. It was the first time I had lived alone and Philadelphia was a strange new world. The city was crowded and old and, for most of the year, cold—a far cry from the dry heat of the Arizona desert. I had my own room in Sansom, which was a double-edged sword. The good news was that I had privacy. The bad news was that I had too much of it. Those first few weeks I was agonizingly lonely. I had no idea how much that was going to change.
My fifth week at Wharton, I was sitting in a management communications class when a pretty young woman sitting two chairs to my right, suddenly leaned toward me, her long, brown hair spilling over the vacant chair between us.
“Hi. I’m Candace,” she said. She had beautiful dark, almond-shaped eyes, the kind you’d probably stare at if you knew you wouldn’t be caught. I instinctively looked behind me to see if she was talking to someone else. That made her smile. “I’m talking to you,” she said. “What’s your name?”