The Bull Rider's Redemption

Time to finish her beer and head home. The chat with Danny’s sisters hadn’t been anything more than a little girl talk. A lot of water and everything else had passed under the bridge since Danny and she had been a couple. He might be a better kisser and had aged well. That didn’t mean anything more than that she’d been working too hard and neglecting her social life. She’d take care of that as soon as this project got off the ground.

She’d spend her time reworking her numbers and tweaking her presentation for the council. She planned to win over this town and prove to her father she was the kind of executive he needed. Not much at all riding on this upcoming meeting, where she’d be laying it on the line in front of an old boyfriend who could still make her forget her name when they kissed.

Chapter Five

As he waited for the town-council meeting to start, Danny’s tongue pushed at the empty space between his teeth. The dentist required payment up front and Danny was a little short. He’d been desperate enough to look on the ground around the stairs for the knocked-out tooth but he hadn’t found it. He’d been nodding along to the conversation, not opening his mouth and holding his lip down over the gap. He’d never thought of himself as vain, but a big old hole in his mouth made him want to hide.

Of course, Clover, in a professional but formfitting suit, sat front and center in the audience at the council meeting. Her proposal was number two on the agenda, after the Pledge of Allegiance. He looked around at the four other members of the board. They’d called Angel Crossing home all of their lives, and like a lot of the old-timers, they didn’t want their town to change. But they also understood that without change their children and grandchildren would never stay. He had a vague idea of how they might view Van Camp Worldwide’s proposal. He’d been explaining his own ideas, but they were long-term solutions, not the quick one that Clover would be presenting.

The president of the board looked at his watch and hammered down the gavel. “Let’s get this show on the road. I want to be home before that dancing program starts. Everyone stand for the Pledge.”

Danny stood, turned to the flag and caught the gleam of Clover’s auburn hair out of the corner of his eye. He would not be distracted by her or the memories of their recent kiss.

“Miss Van Camp,” said Bobby Ames, the president of the board and Angel Crossing’s lone attorney and taxidermist. “Your presentation, please. You have ten minutes.”

Clover stood and picked up a stack of printouts. She quickly went down the table handing out the colorful and slick paper. Danny would not feel bad that he hoped her big-city presentation raised the hackles on his fellow board members.

“I am here on behalf of Van Camp Worldwide,” Clover started.

“We know that, missy. Get to the point. What do you want us to do for you?”

She looked a little flustered, but her smile seemed genuine. “It’s more what we can do for you all,” she said, a Texas twang suddenly entering her voice, making her sound more like the girl he’d met on the junior rodeo circuit.

“Give everyone a job and a thousand dollars,” Loretta Miller said.

“I wish I could help y’all out.”

Boy, she was laying it on thick. Didn’t she know that Arizona wasn’t Texas?

“Seven minutes,” Bobby said.

Clover took in a long breath and stood with regal, beauty-queen posture. “Van Camp Worldwide can provide the town with a viable plan to transform it into a new style of resort that will bring both jobs and tax revenue.”

“That’s what they all say,” Loretta muttered to Irvin.

“The materials I’ve provided outline in detail our proposal.” She went on before Bobby could interrupt her with another time check. “We will and have purchased properties at fair market price, but I’m before this body because we need to secure permission to rezone the Miner’s Gulch corridor and demolish the properties from just north of the town hall to the railroad.”

“Wait,” Danny interrupted. He had properties along Miner’s Gulch. He needed the zoning to remain as is for his own plan to work. He’d already sunk a chunk of his savings into his own revitalization project. She’d messed up part of his plan when she’d purchased the warehouse properties. “I talked with everyone about what I wanted to do. I’ll use local labor and end up with affordable housing for residents—a mix of senior, family and singles. It’s just what we need.”

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