“I’m building you somethin’ strong that’ll last,” his dad had replied.
Jace closed his eyes against the heat building behind his eyes.God, he’d forgotten about so much, hadn’t he?His dad had had his faults, but he’d loved Jace through and through.
“And I turned the man away,” he muttered.
“What’s that?”Cammie asked.“You turned who away?”
He’d turned completely away from everything that supported him, if he was being honest.Brad and Paige had been good friends back in the day, had even snuck out for a drink with him once or twice.Had he even checked in once about their lives after he’d left?
The answer was damning.
As was the question he couldn’t get out of his head.
Who the hell wanted a ranch without everything that made it a ranch?And was willing to pay top dollar for the property?If he said yes to this deal, he’d get to go back to Hollywood, focus on that audition he’d been vying for his whole career, and leave Banberry and Montana behind for good.
Why didn’t that sound as good as it had earlier?
He raked his hands down his cheeks, the stubble rough against his skin.He hadn’t bothered to shave that morning, one of the other, less pressing, perks of not being in the city.Why bother?
For some dumb reason he couldn’t fathom in the moment, Aurelie and her smooth, island-baked skin, full ruby lips, and jade-green eyes flecked with gold-like small jewels, came crashing into his thoughts.His subconscious argued that it wouldn’t mind impressing her.Not one bit.
He closed his eyes and shook the image away like an Etch-A-Sketch he was desperate to erase.It backfired, though, and not only did Aurelie’s face stay seared against the back of his eyelids, but it highlighted the flush of her cheeks when she’d stormed up to him the morning before, the way her eyes danced with rage at him, a stranger who’d come a little too close to wrecking her world.
It wasn’t him, but that guy was still out there.
Then all the pieces fell into place.
This phone call from Cammie… That was the reason Aurelie had been so upset at dinner.Jace posed a threat to her friends, to her world, if he, indeed, was there to put up a hotel.
She’d put him and her friends face-to-face with the problem.He walked out to where his dad usually had the morning paper delivered.There, on his dad’s front porch, was the damning headline on yet another paper.
Mystery Millionaire Buying Up Farms in Banberry for Hotel Project, it read.
Shit.
It sure didn’t bode well that he was a millionaire who’d just acquired a farm in the same damn town as this mess.He picked up the paper and read the subhead.
Will Banberry become the next Jackson Hole?As farms are being bought up one by one—for half their worth—we have to wonder if our mystery buyer is savior or soulless.
Shit, shit, double shit.
“Cammie, you still there?”
“Yeah, boss.Ready to make a deal?”
“No.I want you to take the property off the market.”
There was a beat of silence, then some whispering to someone nearby.
“Say what?”she finally asked.
“I want you to block my calendar for two months.”
“What about the audition?If it happens, it’ll be next month.”
Jace let that settle while he sat on the porch, crowbar back in hand.This was the crossroads he’d been on his whole life: a simple life of ranching, the days repetitive but never quite the same, or the high-octane life of a Hollywood star.He’d always been a man divided, but now, it wasn’t so simple.
Banberry had been easy to walk away from at one point, but even with the role of a lifetime at his fingertips, he couldn’t muster up the courage to leave again.
