My name is Gary Allen, and I represent Ashby and Associates, a development firm specializing in mountain resort properties. We’ve been watching the Copper Creek area with great interest, and we believe your property, The Rusty Spur, would be an ideal acquisition for our clients.
We understand you recently inherited the property and may be weighing your options for the future. We’d like to discuss a potential purchase that would be mutually beneficial. Our clients are prepared to offer significantly above market value for the right location.
As you know, the Copper Creek region is poised for significant growth and development, and we believe this property has great potential as a part of a larger resort and hospitality project. The location on Mountain Road is ideal, with excellent visibility, ample space for expansion, and the kind of authentic mountain atmosphere that attracts high-end tourism.
We envision transforming the area into a destination experience: boutique accommodations, upscale dining, event venues, and spa facilities. Your property would serve as an anchor for this development, and we are prepared to make it worth your while. I’m talking about a number significantly higher than your current inheritance evaluation.
I’d welcome the opportunity to discuss this with you in more detail. Would you be available for a call this week? If you prefer, I’m happy to drive to Copper Creek to meet in person and present our full vision.
Best regards,
Gary Allen
Senior Acquisitions Manager
Ashby & Associates
I read it twice, then a third time.
A development firm wants to buy The Rusty Spur. Wanting to turn this weathered honky-tonk with its neon cowboy boot and string lights into some part of some upscale resort project.
My inheritance appraisal valued the property at two and a half million. If they’re offering “significantly above” that…
I close the laptop and lean back in Mavis’s office chair and stare at the wood-paneled walls covered with photos of smiling people, of community gatherings, and forty years of memories.
This should feel like good news. Like a solution. A way out if I need one.
But all I feel is sick.
I think about Dolly’s story from our workday when she talked about the developers who bought up Main Street five years ago with big promises, and then about the businesses that closed and the families who had to leave. I think about the community that showed up last Sunday to help fix a bar they don’t even own. And I think about what The Rusty Spur would become in the hands of developers. Probably torn down. Replaced with something sleek, modern, and expensive. Something that doesn’t belong here.
I should delete the email. I should respond with a firm “not interested.”
But I don’t.
I just close the laptop and try not to think about why I’m keeping it.
“You okay in here?”
Wyatt appears in the doorway, leaning against the frame in that casual way he does. He’s in his usual jeans and flannel, his hair slightly mussed, like he’s been running his hands through it.
“You know, just finishing up some paperwork.”
He looks at me carefully. “You sure? You got that look.”
“What look?”
“The one where you’re overthinking something and trying to convince yourself that you’re not.”
I laugh. “I don’t have a look.”
“You absolutely have a look.” He comes in and sits on the edge of the desk, close enough that I can smell his cologne. “Want to talk about it?”
Yes. No. Maybe.
“It’s nothing. Just thinking about money, the bar, and what happens at the end of the six months.”
“Wow, that’s a lot of thinking for a Thursday night.”
