See you then,he replied.
Another thrill shot through her, and this one had nothing to do with Mark, or nothing to do with her attraction to him anyway. But the land! If this business partnership worked out, she would get to build her resort after all. And soon. Since she still had a few minutes before she needed to leave for work, she went to her laptop and pulled up her business plan as the bubble of excitement inside her grew.
There would be eight spa cabins to start, each of them equipped with their own personal hot tub fed by the natural hot springs. She envisioned an open area at the center of each cabin so that her guests could soak beneath the stars. Maybe with retractable screens overhead so that the area could be closed during bad weather.
It was going to stretch her budget to its limits to pull this off, but her credit would support a small business loan to help get her up and running. A little hard work had never scared her. She was going to do this, and it was going to be fabulous.
Smiling, she gathered her things and headed for the spa. She worked a solid six hours with a spring in her step and visions of spa cabins dancing through her head. She made it home just in time to change out of her spa uniform before Mark was knocking at her door.
As she walked to answer it, she realized with a start that the pain in her knee was gone. Like, totally gone. Huh. Well, that was good news, especially since she had another training run planned with the girls of Team Flower Power tomorrow. Then she pulled open the door and forgot all about it because Mark stood there in a worn blue T-shirt and khaki cargo shorts, andoh my, he was a sight to see.
“Hey,” he said, a smile softening the corners of his mouth.
“Come in.” She pulled the door open, inviting him inside. “Can I get you anything? Coffee? Tea?”
“No thanks.” He held out the papers in his hand. “I’ve got some numbers for us to look over. Ryan wanted to be here too, but he’s holding down the fort at Off-the-Grid right now since Ethan’s on his honeymoon.”
“Okay.” She motioned for him to sit next to her on the couch.
“Once we agree on all our terms, Ethan knows a lawyer who can write up the agreement for us, free of charge. It should be fairly straightforward. We just need to agree on a competitive offer to top the builder. We’ll be equal owners in all respects, with the option to separate the land and buy each other out at a later date.”
“Sounds good to me.” She’d known all three of these guys since they were teenagers and trusted them not to try to screw her over. “How will we divide up who gets what?”
“I’ve got a topographical map here if you want to try to hash it out now or we can just wing it after we buy the land. From our meeting with Gordon McDermott last week, it seemed like you were interested in a different part of the property than we are. We don’t need that much space for our mountain bike course. Should work out.”
Jessica reached for the map he’d indicated. He was right. They’d probably be fine, but the businesswoman in her felt like she needed to have some clear boundaries defined in their contract. “Show me where you’re planning to put the mountain bike course?”
He leaned in, pointing toward the elevated area on the left-hand side of the map, part of which wrapped around awfully close to the space she wanted for her cabins.
“And I want to build from here to here.” She swiped her finger across the map, landing next to Mark’s. “But I don’t want a mountain bike course running right behind my cabins.”
Mark’s brow furrowed. “We’ll work it out.”
“Yes, but a spa is, by definition, where people go to relax and unwind so I need to make sure there’s enough space between us that they aren’t listening to your clients being rowdy on the mountain bike course.”
“Okay.” Mark looked over and met her eyes, waiting for her to offer a solution.
She rubbed her brow, where a migraine seemed to be brewing. The headaches and fatigue had persisted for a week now after getting over the flu, and she was really friggin’ sick of it. If she didn’t feel better soon, she might have to go back to the doctor. “What if I move my cabins over this way a bit, closer to the stream?”
“And we could do the course like this.” He traced again with his long, calloused finger, indicating a route that kept the mountain bike trail farther from her cabins.
“So, if we divide the land right through here, we should be good.” She traced an imaginary line and then looked up at Mark for his approval. He nodded. She reached into the drawer of her coffee table and came up with a yellow highlighter, which she used to draw the line separating her half of the land from Off-the-Grid’s.
Next, she and Mark talked about money, and once they’d gotten their joint offer all worked out, they sat back and looked at each other.
“So. Business partners.” She forced herself to smile.
“Business partners.” Mark nodded as he gathered the papers from her table. His hand brushed hers, and her whole body lit up from that simple contact.
Business partners.Nothing more.
***
By Monday morning, their business partnership was a done deal. The condo developer dropped out as soon as they presented their joint bid for the land to Gordon McDermott, opting instead to build on the other side of town. And so Off-the-Grid Adventures and the Haven Spa became joint owners of the undeveloped land between their properties.
And Mark was feeling pretty damn good about it. Even Jess had looked triumphant as they signed all the paperwork. Because of the nature of the sale, they’d been able to negotiate a closing date the following Wednesday. None of the parties involved wanted to wait any longer than necessary to seal the deal.
Mark welcomed the new project to keep him busy. With Ethan on his honeymoon and Ryan rushing home to Emma at every available chance, initial work on the mountain bike course had fallen to Mark by default. As soon as the closing papers were signed on Wednesday morning, he headed straight out to the new property to start mapping.
