“I want to do the opposite. I’m all glam all the time. I want to undo some of it. I want people to take me seriously. You are such a great balance.”
There were more voices now, chatting together, calling to one another, chairs moving, people settling. Gina hated the thought of turning around to face them, but she was determined to pass out the agendas. It was a tiny thing, but it felt like a turning point.
“How about we chat over lunch?” Lila suggested. “One day this week?”
“That would be great.” Gina took a bracing breath and turned to the room.
She kept everyone in her soft focus as she moved, not meeting any of the stares she knew were following her, ignoring the indistinct conversations that were probably about her and her family, focusing instead on the royal blue tabletops where she was depositing the agendas.
Finally, she finished, ending in a back corner of the room. She quickly sat down in a chair against the wall.
“Hello, Gina.”
She didn’t have to look over to recognize Rafe’s voice.
She’d definitely picked the wrong table.
* * *
Rafe couldn’t help but admire Gina’s moxie as she sat down next to him and his brother Lorenzo. But one look at her stricken expression told him it was an accident.
He waited to see what she’d do. Would she get up and flee, or would she stick it out?
“Hello, Rafe,” she said. “Lorenzo.” Her lips thinned and her posture straightened, but she made no move to switch to another table.
Her brother Ross Edmond walked in then. He scanned the room like he owned the place, which he practically did, the Edmond family being founding members of both the TCC and the Royal Chamber of Commerce.
When Ross spotted Gina, he was clearly confused by her choice of location. The Edmonds were front-and-center kind of people. He was probably puzzled by her table companions as well. He scanned Rafe and Lorenzo for a moment, then walked over to sit next to his sister.
“Hi, Lorenzo, Rafe. Hey, Gina.” He gave her a half hug where she sat.
Asher Edmond entered the room and reacted the same way as his stepbrother, Ross, doing a double take of where his family was sitting.
Rafe could only imagine what was going to happen when patriarch Rusty Edmond walked in. He’d probably move the whole family to some better real estate near the front of the room, as was their due. The family might be persona non grata in the eyes of many business owners, but Rusty was unlikely to let that slow him down.
For now, Asher sauntered over. There were only four chairs at each table, set over half the round so everyone was facing front. Asher commandeered a chair from the next table, dragging it over next to Ross.
“Lorenzo, Rafe. How you guys doing?”
“Fine,” Rafe said, although he was anything but, and these three people were at least in part to blame for that.
“Hey, Asher,” Lorenzo said. “Welcome back to the world.”
Asher gave a half smile at the joke. “Good to be back. Valencia didn’t come out?”
Lorenzo shook his head. “She’s with the horses. She’s shorthanded right now.”
Rafe knew Valencia Donovan had been counting on a share of the ticket sales from Soiree on the Bay. Her charitable horse rescue organization was strapped for cash now that the event had fallen through.
“Hopefully something good will come out of tonight,” Asher said with a gaze around the filling room. “Heaven knows we all need it.”
Lorenzo nodded his agreement.
“Can I have your attention, please?” Lila asked over the microphone.
The stragglers finished picking up cups of coffee and moved to their seats, while the conversation in the room settled down. Rafe couldn’t help a surreptitious glance in Gina’s direction. But when he met Ross’s gaze, he looked away. The other man had to be used to guys eyeballing his sister, and Rafe wasn’t about to be one of them, even if it was tempting.
“I’ll officially call the meeting to order,” Lila continued. “As you can see, there’s only one item under new business tonight. And the minutes from the last meeting are attached. Will someone move to approve the minutes?”
A voice came from the far side of the room. “I’ll move.”
“Thank you. Anyone second?”
Ross closed his package and put up his hand. “Second.”
“The minutes are so approved. Now on to new business. As you all know, the Royal Chamber of Commerce was a supporter of Soiree on the Bay rather than an investor. And while we can’t be involved in any criminal probes or investigations, what we can do is facilitate a discussion on ideas for recouping some of your losses. We’ve been made aware that local businesses are struggling, and we hope this will be an opportunity for everyone to work collaboratively on viable solutions.”
“What are the Edmonds going to do about it?” someone shouted out.
“Where are they?” said another.
“Hiding in the back corner.”
There was swiveling in seats and turning of heads until all gazes were focused their way.
Gina shifted in her own seat, and Rafe felt sorry for her. Clearly, she’d chosen to sit back here to stay out of the fray. That clearly hadn’t worked out for her.
“Where’s Rusty?” someone called out as sidebar conversations arose around the room.
“Shouting isn’t going to help,” Lila broke in. “We’re looking for constructive solutions.”
Ross came to his feet, and people quieted down, clearly curious.
“My brother, sister and I—” Ross began.
Rafe scanned the room, monitoring the expressions of the crowd as Ross spoke.
“—will be donating to a relief fund set up through the Chamber of Commerce for local businesses impacted by the festival cancellation.”
“Cancellation?” someone bellowed out incredulously.
“How much?” another person demanded.
Rafe could see the crowd wasn’t softening toward the Edmonds. They were still suspicious and hostile. He didn’t blame them. Because he felt the same way himself. In fact, he hoped nobody interpreted him and Lorenzo sitting at this table as being an implicit endorsement of the Edmonds.
“Together, we lost millions,” someone else pointed out. “You gonna donate millions?”
“We can’t cover it all,” Ross admitted gruffly.
Everyone started talking at once.
“Please,” Lila tried again through the microphone. She was doing a valiant job of trying to keep order.
“We’re not saying it’s the complete solution.” Ross’s voice rose. “We’re just saying we want to do our part.”
The crowd kept shouting out.
“I’m about to lose my business.”
“Forget your business, my house is at stake.”
“I’ve lost a year’s worth of profits.”
“I don’t know if I can recover from this!”
Gina shifted in her seat, and Rafe checked out her expression, thinking she had to feel like she was under attack along with her brother. Protective instincts welled up inside him, even though it was none of his concern.
To his surprise, she didn’t look intimidated. In fact, she looked determined. She put her hand on Ross’s arm.
He glanced down at her, clearly taken aback when she rose to her feet.
“Let me,” she whispered to him.
It was easy to see he was about to refuse.
“Please,” she implored.
After a moment, he sat down.
The move surprised the crowd enough to quiet them down.
Her voice was slightly shaky as she started talking. “I’m not going to say I understand,” she began. “But I will say that the best thing we can do here tonight is brainstorm some fundraising ideas. I get that
it’s satisfying to complain, and I know you’re all looking for someone to blame.”
Rafe could see that statement was a mistake even if she couldn’t. The expressions of the crowd changed, and they looked like they were about to start shouting again.
“And maybe we are,” Gina said in a clear, ringing voice. “But that won’t help tonight. It won’t help any of you get your money back. We need fundraising ideas.”
Surprisingly the crowd settled again.
“That’s a very productive suggestion,” Lila said. “What about standard things, a walkathon, bowl-athon or read-athon.”
“We could sell T-shirts,” someone shouted.
“A white elephant sale?”
“Those are all local,” Gina said. “We can’t depend on local dollars this time.”
There were nods around the room on that point.
“What about a talent show?” Lexi suggested.
“You mean a festival lite?” someone scoffed.
“We’d need a really big name to get any traction at all on social media,” Abby Carmichael pointed out.
Lila spoke up again, sounding disheartened. “Big names won’t want to be associated with Soiree on the Bay.”
“What about services?” Gina asked. “What do we do here in Royal that’s unique and valuable?”
“A bake sale?” someone asked.
“Too small-time,” another person answered.
Rafe had an industrial kitchen, but he didn’t see a bake sale—or any other fundraising suggestions that had been brought up so far—providing the kind of cash they needed.
Lexi’s idea had been the best of the bunch, but only if they could get a big name, which they couldn’t. No way, no how was any A-list performer going to touch Royal and Soiree on the Bay.
“We have beautiful scenery,” someone said.
“Wide-open space.”
“Cattle.”
“Horses.”
“Ranches!” Gina said, a thread of excitement in her voice.
“Sell a ranch?” someone asked incredulously.
“No. Not exactly.” She started talking faster, her voice growing more animated. “Just raffle the ranch experience. Better still, a cowboy experience. The entire South, no the entire country is full of big-city dwellers who have no idea what it’s like to spend a day on a working ranch with a real cowboy.” She glanced at Lorenzo and Rafe.
Uh-oh. Rafe didn’t like where this was going.
“We do the auction online. We go national. Maybe the cowboys give a little video spiel to entice bidders. We could get some stills of the ranches, show them off. Make it sound fun. Make it sound exciting. Lila, you’re the social media expert.” Gina paused.
Everyone shifted their attention to the front of the room where Lila stood at the microphone. “It’s an...idea,” she said, clearly trying to organize her thoughts. “Maybe it could work...”
“Who’s going to volunteer for that?” a male voice asked. It was Tucker McCoy, sixty-eight years old and still riding his own range. “Video myself yapping about heifers and hog-tying, then take some city slicker onto the range and maybe get them hurt or killed?”
“There’d be liability,” someone noted.
“We’d cover the insurance,” Gina said.
Both her brothers swung their heads to gape at her.
“A rider on the Edmond corporate policy,” she said. “We could donate that. And the flights to get here. We’d donate those, too.” She glanced at both her brothers, who were staring at her in stunned surprise.
“The Edmond family was already planning to donate to the cause. This could be part of the package. We add a high-end dinner to each experience, an outdoorsy day followed by a five-star evening.” She put some cajoling humor into her voice. “If the cowboys are handsome, all the better.”
“You still need willing cowboys,” someone observed.
From the podium, Lila looked expectantly around the room. “Any volunteers?” she asked.
Nobody spoke up.
Rafe had to hand it to Lila, she was willing to make them all sweat it out. He had to give Gina props, too, for standing there with her idea crashing and burning in front of the whole town. Turning, he took a quick glance at her face, and saw her brave smile but also the trepidation in her eyes. He felt a spike of pity.
Aw, hell.
He came to his feet. “I’ll do it,” he said.
Lorenzo looked astonished.
Rafe motioned to his brother with his head, get up, being the clear message.
Lorenzo gave an imperceptible shake.
Rafe came back with a glare.
But before Lorenzo could stand, Tucker McCoy stood. “I’ll do it, too,” he said. “Don’t see why a pretty gal wouldn’t want to spend a day with me. I got more exciting stories than any of you young cowpokes.”
“I’ll volunteer Matias,” Lorenzo called out.
More men stood, and the joking began.
Gina’s shoulders drooped in obvious relief.
Three
Gina’s brothers stayed silent until they were halfway across the chamber parking lot and out of earshot of the other meeting attendees.
“What was that?” Asher demanded.
“We had a plan,” Ross added.
“Our plan wasn’t working.” Gina knew she’d gone way off script, but the crowd was turning on Ross, and she’d felt like she had to do something to help.
Ross stopped next to his car. “I can’t imagine what Dad’s going to say about this.”
The three of them formed a small circle to continue the conversation.
Gina couldn’t imagine what her father was going to say, either. “If he cares so much, he should have come out to the meeting,” she boldly stated.
“Is that what you’re going to tell him?” Asher asked.
Gina had hoped they’d talk to him together about the auction and their financial pledges to the cause. She wasn’t afraid of Rusty, but she was intimidated by him. She always had been. “I’ll tell him we’re hoping to recoup some of the town’s losses. That’s a positive.”
“I’m not sure he’s in the mood for a positive,” Ross ventured as vehicles started up around them, headlights sweeping as people pulled out for home, a few curiously craning their necks to look at the Edmonds as they passed.
“Rusty’s not thinking straight on any front,” Asher added. “He’s raging at everyone right now.”
“He has a right to be mad at Billy,” Ross said.
“Maybe,” Gina offered, not feeling a whole lot of sympathy or respect for her father given the revelations about his infidelity. “But you also have a right to be mad at him,” she said to Ross.
Ross nodded. “I know. But it’s hard to stay angry and be so happy at the same time.”
“I admire your capacity for forgiveness.” She wasn’t sure she’d have done the same.
Ross had almost lost his child and the love of his life because of Rusty’s machinations.
“Charlotte’s the forgiving one,” he said. “Dad has her to thank for that—Mom, too.” He gave his head a shake. “After all she went through.”
Gina understood the reconciliation with their mother more easily, since Sarabeth had been wronged by Rusty, too. “Has Dad thanked her?”
“In his way,” Ross said.
“That man,” she said through gritted teeth. “He almost sent Asher to jail.”
“I did go to jail,” Asher said ruefully. “But I got out again.”
“We should have trusted you from the start,” Gina said more softly, regretting that she’d ever doubted her stepbrother’s innocence.
“Billy did a damn good job of framing me,” Asher said. Then he gave Gina a playful bump with his shoulder. “If I didn’t know for sure it wasn’t me, I might hav
e been swayed by the evidence.”
“We were wrong about you,” Ross said with regret.
“Water under the bridge,” Asher stated. “And besides, we’ve got bigger problems than regret right now.”
Ross shook his head, his attention going back to Gina. “I can’t believe you went rogue on us back there.”
“I think it’s going to work,” she said, feigning a confidence she wasn’t feeling. They’d have to ramp up interest in the cowboy experience auction, get some attention on social media, and hope and pray that city people with deep pockets would be excited to fly to Texas.
Ross’s tone was fatalistic. “I guess we’ll all find out together.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” she deadpanned, taking out her key as she prepared to head for her car on the other side of the parking lot.
There was a glass of brandy at home with her name on it. If she could make it through the mansion undetected by her father and whatever industry or political VIPs he was collaborating with tonight, she might just wrangle an hour of peace and quiet on her balcony overlooking the pool.
“I better get home to Lani,” Asher said.
“Night,” Gina murmured to her brothers, before turning to make the walk to her metallic blue convertible.
As she approached with her fob, the lock on her car clicked open automatically. She then caught sight of Rafe angling his way to an SUV two stalls down. Gina knew she should thank him for supporting her on the auction, so she stopped and waited.
He slowed as he came up to her.
“Thanks,” she said. “You didn’t have to do that.” In fact, she was still surprised that he had.
He wasn’t even a rancher anymore, but he’d stepped up when nobody else was willing, getting the ball rolling instead of leaving her standing there.
His broad shoulders came up in a shrug beneath his nicely cut business suit. “Somebody had to do something.”
“To help with the fundraising.” That made sense.
“To save the princess from public humiliation.”
His words shocked her to silence. What an appalling thing to say when she was trying to be polite.
“You’re too accustomed to the free ride,” he elaborated.
Bidding on a Texan Page 3
