River Town Box Set

by Grant C. Holland

  Brody grinned and said, “We’re not as backward as you thought.”

  “I didn’t think Coldbrook Bend is backward,” laughed Alan, “But you need a real market to support places like this.”

  “There’s more money than you might think up in those houses on the bluff. It doesn’t take nearly as much to keep up a place like that and eat food like this here as it would even in a place like Red Wing. Tar-Mor middle management can live pretty high on the hog in this area,” said Dak.

  Brody blushed slightly and surreptitiously pointed at Alan while Dak spoke.

  “Oh, is that you?” asked Dak. “Are you in the management structure.”

  Alan nodded and grinned. “I manage Upper Midwest distribution, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, and Illinois. They’ve already thrown a big project my way. In the past, Tar-Mor did all of its own trucking. Last year, the board decided to spin off the transport as its a separate business. They severed contacts between the two companies.

  That means effective next calendar year; we have no one to deliver our materials. I have the job of coming up with a trucking partner for my region.

  “I can give you some pointers on freight shippers in the area,” said Brody. “We don’t hire a lot of outside firms for that ourselves at Home Pro, but some of our suppliers do. I’ve talked to quite a few drivers through the years and listened to their opinions. You’ll have to understand that some of those folks have an ax to grind.”

  “Or two or three,” whispered Dak.

  Alan polished off one of the rice balls and looked across the table. “Dak, what did you finally figure out about your work? Obviously, you’re not moving to the Twin Cities right now.”

  “I’m a man of leisure for now.” He glanced sideways at Brody. “We’ve got several projects to take care of on Brody’s house. I’m working on those. His mom left behind a nice little nest egg that will pay for almost all of it. And then there’s the idea of a kid.”

  Alan’s eyes opened wider. “You’re adopting?”

  “Well, it’s not coming out of either of us the natural way,” said Brody.

  “We don’t want to get too far ahead of ourselves,” said Dak, “But we think Coldbrook Bend is still a great place to raise a kid. The teachers in the schools are good, and crime is low. I’m thinking about part-time options, but if everything works out, I’m staying home with the kid.”

  “You’ll both be amazing parents. I hope I can do that one of these days. My only problem is finding the other dad.”

  Brody nodded to the server as she arrived at the table with a bottle of red wine. While he watched the wine fill his glass, Brody said, “It is a small town, but between here and Zephyr, I can’t imagine you having a tough time finding a good guy. You have a house and an excellent job. A lot of guys would jump at that.”

  “There’s just a few to watch out for, though,” said Dak. “Trust me, I know. I got the best one of the pack right here, but I waded through some stinking disasters along the way. You don’t want that. Be picky. You’ve got plenty of time.”

  Alan nodded. “I’ve never stayed anywhere more than three years, but I’m planning for the long-term here. I’m only 30, and that’s the new 20, right? No big rush.”

  Alan turned his head toward the sound of commotion near the front door. He heard a loud, scratchy voice saying, “I made the reservation three weeks ago. I always have the table in the corner. Now you’ve seated four old white hairs at MY table. Go and move them. I’ll wait.”

  Brody and Dak followed Alan’s example. Dak let out a heavy sigh and held his hands up to his face. Alan turned back around and asked, “Is it someone you know?”

  “Unfortunately, yes.” He pulled his hands down just in time to see Lewis heading for their table.

  Brody whispered, “Just try and be nice. I’ll see what I can do to encourage him to go away.”

  Alan looked from one to the other and then turned back around just in time for the man to reach their table. He wore immaculately tailored clothes with a pale blue sports jacket. He had round black-framed glasses that signaled an intelligent, nerdish personality.

  “Dak! Brody! Good to see you both.” Lewis reached over Alan’s shoulder toward the center of the table to shake hands.

  Brody reached his hand forward and let his gaze bear down on Dak. Seeing no other choice, Dak reached his hand out to shake as well while he bit his tongue to keep from speaking.

  Lewis turned toward Brody and asked, “Who is this handsome man with you?”

  Alan reached his hand forward saying, “I’m Alan. I recently moved to town.” He did his best to appear friendly though he knew that both Brody and Dak were uncomfortable. He thought that Lewis was handsome in his own way.

  “A newcomer,” said Lewis. There was something about the way he drew out the word that caused Alan to recoil. “There’s not a lot here in Coldbrook Bend for those new to town. What brought you here? Is Brody hiring at the hardware plex?”

  Alan shook his head no. “I’m working at Tar-Mor. I have a house here in Coldbrook Bend.”

  Lewis barely held back a sneer. He said, “Zephyr’s your town then. It’s much closer to work, and there’s twice as much entertainment. I’m sure we’re a little bit of a backwater for the upwardly mobile like you.”

  Brody interrupted and said, “Lewis, I think your guests are waiting for you, and we have food on the way. It’s good to see you again, and I’m sure you can track down Alan to get better acquainted at another time.”

  Lewis’ thin lips pursed as if he was going to say something else, but instead he said, “Ah, yes.” He glanced over his shoulder for a moment and then cast his eyes around the table. He said, “I do need to go, but good luck Dak and Brody, and pleased to meet you, was it Aaron?”

  “Alan.”

  “Alan,” whispered Lewis. “See you all later. Enjoy your dinner. It’s Coldbrook Bend’s best.”

  As Lewis joined his three guests, Dak asked, in a tone just above a whisper, “Has the hurricane passed yet?”

  Brody grinned. “It did, and the forecasts were exaggerated. There’s no permanent damage. It was just a glancing blow.”

  “Wow,” said Alan. “He’s not so bad looking, though.”

  Dak shook his head. “Scratch that one off your list right now. Nothing good will come of it.”

  “He doesn’t seem to like new people either.”

  Brody said, “You’re going to run into some of that around here. Besides the money, there’s fear up on the bluff, too. It’s not pretty, and it’s not charming, but it exists, and it’s complicated. My mom had to grin and bear it as they wrote fat checks to the library fund every year.”

  2

  Positive Growth

  Diego shuffled through the reports on his computer. His business was in the black, and it was growing. Those were his top two goals, and he’d met them. However, his instinct told him that continued growth was necessary to move forward. It wasn’t time to rest on his laurels.

  Rhea, Diego’s trusted secretary for the four years of the existence of M-Trak, his trucking business, appeared at the doorway to his office. Middle-aged, she wore her hair severely pulled back. It was streaked with gray, and she steadfastly refused to consider any coloring as she aged.

  Diego admired Rhea’s self-assured nature. She was the first to answer his initial ad for secretarial assistance. When he called her for an interview, Rhea presented him with a list of reasons why she would be the best option to hire. She proved right on all counts.

  Rhea ran a tight ship, and she kept the sometimes fiery and emotional Diego on a positive path moving forward instead of sliding into dramatic pits of despair of his own making. Their relationship was a symbiotic one, and it was turning out to be prosperous for both. Rhea recognized the generosity of yearly raises in the range of 10% of the previous year’s income. Each year, Diego smiled and said, “This won’t be forever, but I believe in following the business trend. As it grows, so does the compensation.”


  Rhea wore a solid blue blouse. The neckline was severe, and she pushed the long sleeves up slightly as she waited in the doorway clearing her throat. “Do you need something?” asked Diego.

  “I’ve sent out the mailers and the email marketing. Would you like me to research the possibility of purchasing ads to pop up elsewhere on the web? I think it’s important that you disseminate the M-Trak name as widely as possible. I don’t know what people look at on the highway, but I still have friends that have never seen one of our trucks when I tell them where I work.”

  Diego nodded. “I think that’s a great idea. We still have new contracts coming in, but we need growth. A company that isn’t growing is going downhill.”

  Rhea grinned and nodded. The business operated with a comparatively small number of employees. Counting drivers, Diego had twenty-two men and women working for him. That was enough to satisfy the requirements of his EB5 visa.

  Diego had a growing reputation for generosity with his drivers and ruthlessness in bidding for new contracts. His personal wealth allowed him to occasionally take a loss if a new contract was essential for higher profits down the road. He rarely lost a bid, and, when he did, Rhea was there to reign him in from lashing out and making emotion-laden contacts until he calmed down and was ready for the next project.

  “Are you having any luck looking at houses?” asked Rhea.

  She lived on a farm approximately five miles from the nearest town. She married early in life only to divorce five years later when she caught her husband in bed with his high school sweetheart. When Diego heard the story, he answered, “It’s a good thing you didn’t have a gun.” She said nothing in reply. She only nodded with an enigmatic smile.

  “I’m torn,” said Diego. “I love those grand old Victorians, but I’m not sure I want to look so ostentatious. Then there are the neighbors. They pay lip service to diversity, but I’m not sure they would truly welcome a tattooed Mexican in their midst as a fellow homeowner.”

  “And the other option?”

  “I met a hotshot architect at a bar in the Twin Cities.” Diego held up a hand. “Don’t go thinking too far in that direction. It was purely a business discussion. I took his card. He’s involved in repurposing old building materials to construct new homes. He gets excited about green projects and European design ideas. I thought about buying some land about five miles or so outside of Red Wing and building something new and exciting.”

  Rhea looked around at the walls that lacked decoration in Diego’s office and sighed. A repurposed elementary school building housed the M-Trak headquarters. When a developer purchased the old school to convert to office space, only minimal structural work took place. Rhea called the refurbishing project the “lipstick on a pig” approach. The office was three miles away from the parking pad that Diego rented for his drivers who needed to park a rig in anticipation of a load assignment.

  Rhea asked, “Are we considering new headquarters any time soon?”

  “Where would we do that? I hear nothing but complaints about new commercial construction. They tell me the neighbors will attack me for the noise of the trucks and the smell of the exhaust. Back home in Mexico, someone would build a palace next to the parking lot. It’s too much complaining.”

  Rhea shrugged. “I’ll do some research on that question, too.” As she turned away, she said, “My sister Andi says you’re handsome. She spotted you at the Chili Cook-Off in Red Wing.”

  Diego buried his face in his hands. He kept his private life to himself, far away from prying eyes in southeastern Minnesota. He watched for any signs of leaks, but as far as he could tell, no one knew that he was drawn to men instead of women. Rhea did her best to make him aware of any eligible women who gave him a second glance. He waved a hand toward the door and said, “I need to get to work unless you have something place.”

  Rhea turned without a word to return to her office space. Diego turned his attention back to the announcements of new trucking contracts and offers for individual shipments. One, in particular, caught his eye. It was for the machine parts factory Tar-Mor in a town called Zephyr on the Mississippi River. Diego’s grasp on Minnesota geography was still tenuous at times. He pulled up a map and discovered that Zephyr was less than an hour away.

  Diego climbed out from behind his desk and visited Rhea out front. He said, “Tell me what you know about a company called Tar-Mor.”

  She looked up and asked, “Down in Zephyr? Why do you ask?”

  “They have a request for proposals out. Apparently, they are shifting away from in-house transport and are looking to sign a large contract with an outside shipping agent. It sounds perfect for us.”

  Rhea said, “Tar-Mor has been in Zephyr for generations. As far as I know, it’s still family-owned. It’s the Tarrant family. If you go down to Zephyr, their name is on everything. It’s on schools, the public library, and football fields. They even built a place for plays and music.”

  “It sounds like they love their town.”

  Rhea looked up at her boss. “I guess that’s hard to know with the younger generation. About ten years ago, they moved their headquarters out to California, but they kept the factory running in Zephyr. It was a controversial decision. I heard that most of the workers worry that their jobs could evaporate at any moment.”

  Diego shrugged. “Signing a new contract for regional shipping doesn’t sound like the action of a company that’s ready to leave. I’ll send out some feelers and see what we can do. I hope I’m not too late. It looked like the ad has been out for some time.”

  “Just steer clear of any of the actual family members. They are like the Kennedys. Too many of them died far too young. It’s a mystery I’d rather not get close to.”

  Diego retreated to his office, looked up a phone number for Tar-Mor, and placed a call to the shipping department. A cheerful voice greeted him, “Tar-Mor shipping. This is Elaine. How may I help you?”

  As Diego explained the purpose of his call, he typed on the computer with a free hand and pulled up a city website for Zephyr. Rhea was correct. The Tarrant name was everywhere.

  “Sir, I have good news. Calling today is perfect timing. My supervisor says that he is holding face-to-face interviews next week on the shipping contract. He wants to speak with representatives of each company about the scope of the project before requesting a detailed proposal. I see that you’re up in Red Wing. If it’s okay with you, he asked me to go ahead and put you in a time slot.”

  Diego considered whether he would need to speak directly to the supervisor before agreeing to a face-to-face meeting. As he glanced again at the website, he decided that it wasn’t necessary. He was already curious about a corner of his new home state that he’d failed to explore. He would turn it into a full day and see a part of the Mississippi further south than Red Wing. Diego was still awestruck each time he saw the broad expanse of a body of water so far inland.

  Diego shared the good news with Rhea. He said, “I’ll drive down there myself. Maybe I’ll even spend the night. Do you have any relatives that live down there? They seem to be scattered all over the state.”

  Rhea shrugged. “None down there that I’m aware of.” Diego watched as she contemplated further and continued her comments. “My good friend Jeannie has relatives in Coldbrook Bend. I think it is an aunt or something.”

  “Coldbrook Bend?”

  “It’s another little river town just north of Zephyr. I don’t think I’ve been down there for at least fifteen years. It used to have a pretty downtown. It’s hard to know what it’s like now. Some are all boarded up while others have tourist places that keep them alive.”

  “It sounds like I have exploration to do,” said Diego.

  Rhea pointed back toward Diego’s office. “Make sure you put it on the calendar, and then I hope you have a good trip. If you decide to spend the night, Zephyr has a few chain hotels out by the highway.”

  Diego returned to his office and plugged the dates into his
calendar on the computer. He smiled and remembered the days growing up when his parents had a staff to do all of those tasks. Diego’s father woke up in the morning, had his breakfast brought to him in the sunny courtyard, and asked his assistant Edgar about the daily schedule.

  When Edgar made his reports, Diego remembered that many of the days were empty. That didn’t mean Diego’s father stayed home. He always had somewhere to go, but his family often didn’t know the details. Diego knew that his mother worried more and more as the years passed.

  One day, Diego’s father didn’t return. He accompanied his wife to a meeting about the restoration of an ancient Catholic mission. Diego’s parents were among the primary benefactors. They were slaughtered in a drug gang hit as their car rolled along the streets three blocks away from the central square. Five bullets penetrated the vehicle, two each for Diego’s parents, and one through the head of the driver. The car crashed into the outside wall protecting the home of a wealthy friend.

  Although Diego was 24 and had moved away from the family’s ancestral home to a luxury apartment in a suburb, he was home visiting for his mother’s birthday. Diego, his older sister Gabriela, and younger brother Alberto waited in a house filled with balloons and a four-tier birthday cake. The guest of honor never appeared. They buried her four days after her birthday.

  Diego was resolute about taking care of his own personal schedule. He knew that the thought process was not rational, but he feared that the delegation of personal tasks was part of the slow progression of events that eventually led to his parents’ untimely death. For Diego, control meant safety. Relinquishing it meant inviting risk.

  3

  Interview

  Alan pored over the list of his first day of interviews as he alternated sips of a morning cup of coffee with bites of his breakfast of an aged Cheddar bagel and cream cheese. Three of the names were familiar. Tar-Mor signed contracts with the companies in the past when they made shipments for large-scale projects. The company’s own trucks handled the regular smaller shipments, but large projects were beyond their capacity.