In that vein, this morning he had gotten up extra early—well, if truth be told he hadn’t been able to sleep—and got into the office early enough to avoid Monday-morning office coffee chat. He’d brought in his own coffee in his stainless-steel travel mug. It was his own brew from his French press, and it was head and shoulders over the dirty dishwater from the coffee machine in the break room. It would also buy him a little more time and give him that extra caffeinated edge he needed to see Caitlyn this morning.
He wasn’t kidding himself; he wasn’t pretending he could avoid her all day. He would have to see her eventually. Avoiding her would be unprofessional and downright juvenile.
That’s what he was thinking when Caitlyn burst into his office, all smiles and electric energy.
“I’ve finally figured out how to fix the park,” she said, those green eyes so bright and lovely it hurt him to look at them.
“You figured it out?” His voice sounded as exhausted as he felt. “Please enlighten me.”
“Yes, I have. What’s wrong with you? You’re scowling.”
He sat back in his chair. “Nothing’s wrong with me, thank you. I was in the middle of something, and you interrupted.”
She frowned at him. “I’m sorry. Should I come back later? Although really, this can’t wait.”
He crossed his arms and put his palms in the air. “I’m waiting.”
He wasn’t sure if she rolled her eyes at him or simply shrugged off his sarcasm—probably both—but it was obvious she was not allowing him to bring her down.
“What Cowboy Country needs is the perspective of genuine cowboys. It needs the heart of folks like the Fortunes—your family. And we need to draft a solid plan of how we intend to give back to the community. Once that’s done, I want to present it to the community at the next town hall meeting. If we can get on the meeting agenda, we can have an open forum and encourage an exchange with the citizens of Horseback Hollow. I want your mother and aunt to use their influence to get us on the agenda. I almost called you this weekend to tell you about this, but I didn’t. Maybe I should have, because obviously you didn’t have a very good weekend.”
Maybe she should have? Did she realize what she was suggesting?
No. Because she probably wasn’t suggesting what he had in mind. The thought took his dark mood down another notch.
He dragged his hands down his face, trying to scrub some of the bad out of his mood. How could she be so chipper on a Monday morning? On this Monday morning, after that Friday night?
Obviously, she hadn’t taken the dance or the near-miss kiss to heart the way he had.
That was sobering.
And a little bit liberating.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I had a rough night. I didn’t sleep very well.”
She studied him for a moment, and he would’ve given his BMW if he could’ve known what she was thinking.
“Everything okay?” Her expression changed from upbeat to concern. “Your family didn’t change their mind about Cowboy Country, did they? I thought everything went so well.”
“No. No worries. My family loves you. How about we start over? Or at least let me start with talking to Jeanne Marie about getting us on the next town-meeting agenda. If we do get to address the citizens, it will put us one step closer to recruiting the genuine cowboys. But let’s tackle the town meeting first.”
* * *
Caitlyn was onto something. She could feel it in her bones.
If the Fortunes were willing to come around, then the rest of the town couldn’t be too hard to win over. Maybe it was optimism, but Caitlyn was sure that they could do it. Especially after Jeanne Marie had agreed to help them get a place on the town meeting agenda.
She’d also shared a nugget of information that had the potential to be golden: apparently the on-property hotel her father had planned to build—the Cowboy Condos—was one of the biggest sticking points with some of the staunchest adversaries. Jeanne Marie couldn’t tell them why, but with a little bit of internal digging, she was able to find the name of an investor who had pulled out of the deal—Hank Harvey, a venture capitalist from Dallas. He was going to be in Lubbock on Wednesday and had agreed to drive to Horseback Hollow to meet Caitlyn and Brodie at the stalled jobsite to talk about what went wrong.
According to Brodie, who had talked to him, Mr. Harvey was prepared to give them an earful.
* * *
Caitlyn hated to jump to snap judgments, but Hank Harvey rubbed her the wrong way from the moment he’d opened his mouth. It was eight o’clock in the morning, and his breath reeked of alcohol, and that wasn’t even the worst of it.
Strike one: when she introduced herself and offered her hand for him to shake, this textbook Texas good ol’ boy raked his gaze down her body as he gave her fingertips a lackluster press.
“Ma’am.” Now his gaze veered somewhere over her right shoulder. She wanted to turn around to see who he was looking at. Before she could, he turned and vigorously pumped Brodie’s hand with a solid man-grip and slapped him on the back.
“Brodie Fortune Hayes. Good to meet ya, man. Are you kin to that bunch of Fortunes?”
“Guilty as charged,” Brodie said.
As the boys exchanged pleasantries, Caitlyn glanced around the empty construction site. Located on the east side of the property, the parcel was far enough away from the park so it would not interfere with business as usual. The two ventures were separate, but the original intent had been for them to feed each other. Out-of-town guests coming to the park would stay at the hotel, and exhausted revelers, tired out after a long day of Cowboy Country fun—or those wanting to extend their visit—could book a room and stay right on the property.
After the construction had come to a halt, the worksite, which had sat untouched for several weeks, had been secured with chain-link fencing. The leveled ground was mottled by the elements and littered with trash; weeds grew amidst the infrastructure, which the workers had begun to build before the investors had pulled out. The sky was overcast, and it was a little cooler today than it had been recently. The clouds seemed to cast everything around them in gloomy shades of gray. As it stood, this part of the property looked like a razed ghost town.
It was a little sad and eerie.
“So you’re from London, are ya now?” Hank asked, hitching the waistband of his blue jeans over his ample belly. “The wife keeps pushing for me to take her there, but Vegas is more my style. No offense to you and your queen and all. I’m tellin’ you, if ya know the right people you can get in on some pretty sweet gambling junkets in Vegas. Let me know if you’re interested. I can hook ya up.”
Okay... Let’s stay on topic.
“Mr. Harvey,” Caitlyn said. “We really appreciate you meeting us out here today. I know you have a plane to catch in a couple of hours. So we won’t keep you long. We are looking into the possibility of resuming construction on the Cowboy Condos. Apparently, there was a problem that caused you and the other investors to withdraw support? Brodie and I are trying to piece together what happened.”
Hank pulled his cell phone out of his back pocket and looked at something displayed on the screen. He didn’t answer her.
Maybe she needed to be more specific.
“Would you mind telling us the reason you withdrew your support from the project?”
He typed something on his phone with his fat thumbs.
“Uh, yeah. It wasn’t a...” he muttered as he typed.
When he looked up—strike two: his gaze landed and stayed on her breasts.
“Uh, yeah. It just wasn’t a...” His voice trailed off. “Wasn’t a good investment. Didn’t work for me.”
Caitlyn crossed her arms over her chest, shielding herself from his invasion of privacy. Brodie must’ve noticed, because he stepped slightly in front of her and diverted the creep’s attention.
“What didn’t work for you, exactly?” he asked.
“All kinds of things,” Hank murmured. “So now, do
you actually live in London? I hear it’s one of the most expensive cities in the world.”
“Yes, I own a flat in Notting Hill. Mr. Harvey, would you mind being more specific? Why did the project not work for you? What about it caused you to pull your investment? We need to know so that we can make corrections going forward.”
“Hank. Please call me Hank. Mr. Harvey is my dad. I’m Hank.”
“Fair enough. Hank it is.” Caitlyn could see Brodie’s profile. He smiled at Hank’s nonsense.
Caitlyn wanted to stomp on Harvey’s toe. Why was he being so chummy with Brodie when he was having a difficult time answering her questions with complete sentences?
Then came the coup de grâce.
Strike three: misogynistic creep not only turned his back on her, he actually clapped Brodie on the back and motioned with his fat head for Brodie to walk with him.
And Brodie did. Giving him the benefit of the doubt, he cast a remorseful glance back at Caitlyn. From that glance she read, Bear with me. This might be the only way to get the info out of the guy.
Caitlyn should’ve stomped his foot when she’d had the chance.
* * *
“Shoddy construction?” Caitlyn asked once she and Brodie were back in the office. “What the heck is that supposed to mean?”
Brodie could tell she was irritated. Personally, he’d wanted to deck the guy when he’d noticed him ogling Caitlyn.
“That’s what he said. I’m sorry. Don’t shoot the messenger. He said he didn’t want his name associated with an inferior product. When Cisco Mendoza withdrew from the project, Harvey said he was done.”
She stammered a bit. “Inferior product? How— What was inferior?”
Cisco Mendoza was engaged to his cousin, Jeanne Marie’s youngest daughter Delaney Fortune Jones, but Brodie hadn’t had the opportunity to get to know him since Cisco had only been in town almost as short a time as Brodie had. From what he understood, Mendoza had been a real-estate developer in Miami, who had been handpicked to head up Cowboy Country’s hotel division—to act as a rainmaker of sorts and bring in investors. From where Brodie sat, it seemed Mendoza had done more damage than good. That’s one of the reasons Brodie hadn’t been keen on talking to him about Cowboy Country. Brodie needed Alden Moore as a client. He wanted to come in and assess the situation with fresh eyes and not be influenced by someone who had left with a bad taste in his mouth.
Apparently, after Cisco left, operations at the park had gone from bad to worse. Shortly after that, his supervisor—a man named Kent Stephens—had thrown in the towel, and then Alden Moore had suffered the heart attack.
It was too soon to pump Alden for more information. It was a sore subject, and Brodie didn’t want to bring him any stress. He had been hired to fix things, not tally up the problems and present them to Moore.
In fact, wouldn’t it be nice if, in addition to opening the park, he could sort out the issues with the Cowboy Condos and present Alden with a new workable plan?
“I’ll talk to Cisco and ask him to level with us,” Brodie said.
Caitlyn nodded. “Yes, please. There has to be more to the story than what Harvey Wallbanger is telling us.”
Brodie snorted at the name.
The color spiked in Caitlyn’s cheeks.
“Not only did the jerk completely marginalize me, but if what he’s saying is true, I’m really worried about my father. Brodie, why would a man who has built his name in the theme-park industry settle for something of bad quality? It just doesn’t make sense.”
Brodie had wondered the same thing himself.
“And did you see him staring at my—” She gestured toward her bodice. “He wouldn’t even look me in the eye.”
Brodie cleared his throat. “Well, I wasn’t going to say anything, but since you brought it up, yes, I did notice, and I wanted to punch the guy.”
Her face went soft, and her lips curved up at the corners. “You would’ve done that for me? Defended my honor?”
He nodded.
“But you do realize I hate violence. So you did the right thing by distracting him instead.”
They sat there in silence for a moment. Brodie stared at his clenched fist and then flexed his fingers because she’d just said she didn’t like violence. He didn’t, either. Yet he’d been perfectly prepared to defend her.
“At least the guy left us with some information to go on,” Caitlyn said.
Brodie looked up and fixed his gaze on hers. He didn’t find it difficult to look at those beautiful eyes. They were actually quite mesmerizing.
Through the hazy fog that was addling his brain, he heard himself saying, “Don’t worry. I’ll talk with Cisco and find out the rest of the story. We’ll find a way to make this right.”
Chapter Eight
A knock on the frame of her open office door made Caitlyn look up from her computer. When she saw Brodie standing there, her stomach did a low flip that made her breath catch.
“Hi,” she said, noticing the rolled-up papers he held. They looked like blueprints.
“Hi, do you have a minute?” He smiled. “I have good news.”
She motioned him in. “I’d give you an entire day for some good news. Please, do tell.”
“Let’s go over here where I can roll out these.” With the blueprints, he gestured toward a small conference table set up on the far side of the rectangular room.
“Are these what I hope they are?” she asked.
“If you mean the plans for the Cowboy Condos, you’re spot on.” She watched as he began spreading them out on the table.
“Where did you get them?” she asked.
“I made a couple of calls late yesterday and got in touch with Cisco Mendoza. He dropped them off and filled in some of the missing pieces.”
She narrowed her eyes and cocked her head. “You met with Mendoza without me?”
Brodie held up his hand. “I did, but don’t get upset. He left for business in Red Rock this morning. He’s training for his new job with the Fortune Foundation. If I hadn’t gotten together with him last night, he wouldn’t have been available until next week.”
“You should’ve called me.”
“Really? You wanted me to call you after hours?”
Yes, I wish you would.
She could’ve read so much into his gaze, his tone, that question. Instead, she put her hands in her lap and squeezed them together so tightly that her nails dug into her skin. That touchstone brought her back to her senses.
“Of course, you can always call me...”
But she let the words hang there so he could form his own conclusion.
“Next time I will.”
He smiled at her, and there was that instant rush attraction that pulled her right in. She could’ve sworn he felt it, too.
She smiled and looked away. “I’m surprised Mendoza was willing to meet with you on such short notice. Because from what I understand, he didn’t leave here a very happy man.”
“Obviously, you don’t know that Cisco is engaged to my cousin Delaney,” he said.
Caitlyn laughed. “Why am I not surprised? Is anyone in this town not related to the Fortunes?”
Brodie considered the question. “Not many people.”
“Wait,” Caitlyn said. “Cisco and Delaney were not at the barbecue, were they?”
“No. They were in Miami packing up Cisco’s apartment. He’s moving to Horseback Hollow permanently. They just got back, and Cisco left for Red Rock this morning. That’s why last night’s meeting was more like a hand-off of the blueprints than an actual meeting. He brought me the blueprints and told me his side of the story. Really, there wasn’t much to tell.”
Caitlyn blinked at him, reality eclipsing the attraction she’d felt just seconds ago.
“I thought you said you had good news.”
“Sometimes good news comes in small packages. Mendoza didn’t have much to say, but what he said was important. He didn’t back out because of shoddy constru
ction. It had nothing to do with the quality of the hotel. It was the style that had everyone in an uproar. Apparently, the architect your father hired had designed something very kitschy—buildings shaped like cowboy hats with cowboy-boot-shaped windows, that sort of thing.”
Brodie raised his eyebrows for emphasis, and Caitlyn cringed.
“That sounds dreadful.”
She crossed her arms and thought about it for a moment.
“However, I hate to admit that my dad may have gotten a little bit carried away. You have no idea how this cowboy obsession of his can take over his better judgment. Never in a business sense, but sometimes the kitschy-tacky knows no bounds.”
Brodie laughed. “Well, it’s good to know that even the master can get it wrong once or twice.”
“Yeah, he’d never admit that. I’m sure he would give his eyeteeth to stay in a cowboy-hat-shaped hotel.”
Looking past Brodie’s good humor, she saw true reverence in his eyes. He really did respect her dad. For some reason she found it a little curious given his tendency to keep his own family at arm’s length.
She remembered what Amelia had said and had the urge to ask him about it. But he changed the subject, and the moment was lost.
“Apparently, Cisco Mendoza left because of creative differences. He knew one of the main reasons the locals were opposed to the park was because of the kitsch factor. He’d had a whole new set of plans drawn up, but his supervisor, Kent Stephens, refused to take the plans to the next level. Mendoza seems to believe that Stephens was in bed with the original architect, and that’s why he put up roadblocks to keep Mendoza’s plans from your father. The investors left when Mendoza pulled out. Stephens left about a week later, and then that’s when things happened with your father.”
“It all makes sense,” Caitlyn said. “You said he had the plans drawn up?”
Brodie nodded.
“Did he happen to mention the name of the architect?” she asked.
“He did one better.”
Brodie lifted the cowboy hat blueprints to reveal another set underneath.
“Take a look at this. This design is much earthier, a better complement to the feel of Horseback Hollow. Cisco ran it by some of the locals, and they were much more amenable to something like this that better fit into the landscape. In fact, if landscaped properly, it would probably almost disappear rather than sitting out like a dozen giant cowboy hats that somebody forgot to put away.”
My Fair Fortune Page 9
