Page 63 of The Heartbreaker Next Door

Dean

After locking up the admin office, I climbed into my truck and sat for a second, keys in hand. The sun was going down behind the water tower, and the orange light came through the windshield. I wondered if Felicity would want to sit on the porch and have a glass of wine while I had a beer to watch the sunset before dinner. I’d been looking forward to dinner all day, the smell of it, Felicity’s laugh as Maverick tells a horrible knock-knock joke.

I’d just pulled onto the fire lane, which was a shortcut to the Foster farm when the display screen lit up with a call. Blackburn and Associates, law firm.

“Lockhart,” I answered.

“Dean, Raymond Blackburn.” His voice landed like a gavel. “Glad I caught you. Since finding that deal your Grandaddy made with Foster, I’ve been looking into my records for the ranch, and there’s a development.” The word development was doing a lot of heavy lifting.

That got my attention. “Development?”

The pause that followed from a man who charged four hundred dollars an hour told me everything before he even answered. “A loan your granddaddy took out. The one with a private lender attached to the western acreage. It appears the note has been sold to a third party who might not be as… patient as the original holder.”

My grandfather’s debt was supposed to be ancient history, bundled into the overall mortgage and renegotiated the first year I took over as CFO, eight years ago. But the boundaries on the west side of the ranch had been a sore spot for decades, ever since a failed irrigation project left some of the land basically useless except as scenery. When I took over, I cleaned up as much as I could, but paperwork from the seventies and eighties was a mess, and sometimes old ghosts found their way into the present.

“Who’s the third party?” I asked.

“Well, now that’s the funny thing, it’s not disclosed.” Blackburn exhaled audibly. “If I had to guess, I’d say they’re an investment group interested in the upzoning potential along the highway. If they call the note, you’d be responsible for the full balance, plus interest, within sixty days.”

I let that sit. The number would be ugly. “Is there anything we can do if they do call it in. Legally.”

“Well, first things first, we need to know who we’re dealin’ with before we turn on the charm and start makin’ him feel pretty,” Blackburn explained. “I’ll let you know what I find.”

I hung up with the distinct feeling life was about to bend me over a barrel and skip the courtesy of buying me dinner first. My stomach had tied itself into a knot a Boy Scout would’ve been proud of.

Unknowns were the bane of my existence. My worst enemy. The emotional equivalent of a shopping cart with a fucked-up wheel, a low-battery smoke detector at 3 a.m., and a hundred paper cuts on my balls.

I wanted facts, no matter how bad things were. If I knew what I was dealing with, I could handle it. This wishy-washy, third-party, handshake deals, borrowing from Peter to pay Paul way Grandad had run the business, made me want to punch a wall, fix the hole, then punch it again on principle.

Thankfully, I was going to see two people who had quickly become two of my favorite people in the world. I parked and got out of my truck, and headed up the porch steps just like I had last night and the night before that and the night before that. Felicity had been crazy busy the past few weeks with the fall Founder’s Day fundraiser, so I didn’t see her during the day. She was in town getting sponsors and selling tickets. She was hosting a black-tie benefit to raise money for the town.

These dinners had become my favorite part of every day. I expected certain things. I expected Maverick at full volume, a kitchen full of mismatched plates, possibly a burnt dish. What I didn’t expect was the person who answered the door. It was the man from the framed photograph in Maverick’s room. The one Felicity never said much about, the missing piece of the story she rarely ever alluded to.

Tanner filled the doorframe, tall, sandy-haired, with the kind of easy tan that came from years outdoors rather than effort. But it was his eyes that stopped me cold, warm brown, slightly heavy-lidded, the exact eyes I’d been reading bedtime stories to for the past few weeks.

He wore the same kind of smile as in the photo, one that I’d say belonged to used car salesmen, but that would be an insult to car salesmen. “You must be Dean.” He shook my hand, the grip a fraction too tight. “I’m Tanner, the dad.”

His presence left something sharp at the back of my throat, like a bad cup of black coffee—familiar enough to recognize, unwelcome enough to notice.

Felicity appeared behind him, visibly tense in a way she never was around me, a little too bright, a little too light. She tucked her hair behind her ear, her other hand nervously fiddling with her phone. “Dean, hey. Sorry I didn’t message you, I sort of got distracted.” She glanced up towards Tanner.

“It’s fine,” I lied, even though everything about the situation was suddenly not fine. As I stepped inside, the air felt thick enough to choke on.

Maverick, completely unburdened by the adult tension, cannonballed off the couch and tackled me around the knees. “Dean, Dean, Dean! Dad says he’s gonna teach me how to rope a cow like a real cowboy.” He looked up at me, eyes wide, missing the strain in his mother’s smile and the way Tanner hovered, just a little too interested. “Did you know my Dad is the best at everything?” his four-year-old self said it unironically.

“I believe it,” I told him, ruffling his hair. “But you know who’s better than the best?”

Mav grinned up at me, his eyes brimming with affection. “Me?”

“You know it.” I held out my hand, and we did our handshake. Maverick jumped back onto the couch, and I suddenly felt like an outsider. “I’m gonna take off. You all have a nice dinner.”

“No!” Mav protested loudly, grabbing my arm. “You promised you’d come for dinner tonight.”

The kid was right. I had promised and there was no reason to go back on my word, because of the joke that had been donated to Maverick’s DNA.

I glanced up at Felicity, to try and silently communicate whether or not dinner was still on the table, no pun intended. There was a definite undercurrent of anxiety and stress radiating off her. I hoped it had to do with Tanner’s sudden appearance and nothing to do with me.

She gave me a tight smile and a nod.