For His Daughter

Rafe knew he could have found a newer, more affordable, more practical place to call home, but he had a silly attachment to this building. He had an unexpected fondness for Victorian architecture—a sense of history tucked into crazy corners and fancy turrets. Maybe because he’d spent too many years living in nondescript apartments in too many nondescript neighborhoods.

But it was more than that, somehow. Perhaps it was the odd belief that if he could bring the Three Bs back to its former grandeur, he could resurrect his old life here as well.

His father would probably laugh at that idea.

A door slammed behind him, and Rafe turned to find an older man getting out of a battered truck. In the front seat, the biggest German shepherd Rafe had ever seen hung out the window, whining like a puppy when the man joined Rafe on the sidewalk and left him behind.

The guy gave him a short nod, then tossed his chin toward the building. “Gonna be a mess of work to get this place back to what it once was.”

“Probably,” Rafe agreed. “But it will be worth it.”

“Heard you were back in town. You don’t remember me, do you?”

Rafe looked at the man more closely, but couldn’t place the face. “Afraid not.”

“Leo Waxman. Waxman Electric. Good friend of your father’s.”

Rafe held out his hand. “Of course, I do remember. You used to have a lot of shepherd pups in a shed behind your house.”

“Still do on occasion,” the man said, obviously warming to the subject. Behind him the dog began an earsplitting whine, and Leo turned toward the truck. “Hush up, Brutus.” He swung back to Rafe. “I missed the town council meeting the other day. Heard you got elected publicity chairman for the festival.”

“Yep. If you’re here to tell me you want the job, I won’t fight you for it.”

“Nah. I’ve got no interest in the festival, and definitely no interest in trying to get those three committee knuckleheads to agree on a plan.” He indicated the building again. “But I also heard you bought this place, among others, and that does interest me. You plan on living here, or selling for a profit?”

“I figure four spec condos, plus my own place. Then I want to see about redesigning a few other buildings I’ve picked up downtown on First Street.”

“You gonna need help with the electric? If so, I’m your man.”

Leo handed Rafe a business card, and for the next few minutes they talked about what it would take to bring the building up to code, the improvements and modifications Rafe wanted to make to the existing structure. The electrician seemed eager for the work, knowledgeable and forthright. In spite of the differences Rafe had with his father, he knew Sam would never have kept the friendship of someone who couldn’t be trusted to do an honest day’s work.

Agreeing to get together later in the week, Rafe and Leo shook hands.

Leo grinned. “You know the Three Bs history?”

“That’s part of what drew me to it in the first place.”

The Three Bs, built in the 1880s, had originally meant beds, baths and breakfast, and had catered to the area’s silver miners looking to strike it rich. But widow Ida Mae Culpepper had discovered a more profitable way to make a living, and the social club had become very “social” after a few months in operation. The Bs soon translated to betting, booze and bad women.

Then during the Korean War, Myrtle Culpepper had taken over, following in her great-grandmother’s foot- steps to transform the establishment into the perfect place for enlisted men to listen to lively music, drink good liquor and spend a few hours of pleasure in the company of what the newspapers of that time had called “agreeable companions.”

Evidently drawing on some memory, Leo laughed. “You know, your father and I spent many a night in this place.”

That Rafe didn’t know, and he was surprised. “Really?”

“Oh, not when it was that kind of place. That was before our time. After Vietnam it got turned into just a social club, a place where a bunch of old leathernecks could compare war stories and drink a few beers. I used to play piano back then. Your dad used to pick up extra bucks by playing fiddle with the band.” He slid an amused glance at Rafe from under bushy brows. “Bet you didn’t know that, did you?”

His father a musician? How could that be? No one, not even their mother, had ever hinted at such a thing. “No,” he said, shaking his head. “I sure didn’t.”

“That’s because he was god-awful. Two cats fighting in an alley sounded better, but nobody threw us off the stage. You get a few drinks in a bunch of guys, tell a few war stories, and everyone gets mellow.”

“I’ve never seen him pick up a musical instrument.”

“He quit fooling around with it once you kids came along, and things got cranking up there at the lodge. Way too busy to devote the time. Kinda went by the wayside, the way lots of things do once you start a family and you realize what’s important.”

What’s important. For a moment Rafe could envision his father making that conscious decision, putting aside the idle playthings of his younger years and taking on the responsibility of home and family.

Sam had always been able to focus on what needed to get done. He was a practical, goal-oriented man who had never understood the desire to see over to the other side of the mountain when you had what you needed right in your own backyard. It must have been particularly galling to him that his youngest son had refused to toe the line.

“I’ll give you a discount, you being Sam’s son and all.” Leo Waxman cut into Rafe’s thoughts.

“Thanks. I’ll look forward to working with you.”

“You’re not afraid of this place?”

“You mean the rumors that it’s haunted? No.”

In his youth, Rafe had explored the building by popping a broken board off a back window. The place had been deserted for years. He had been fascinated, and the teenage girls he’d brought here had found his arms just the right protection against the whispery night shadows of abandoned rooms. Depending on who you talked to in town, the Three Bs was either haunted or hiding a secret treasure, or both.

“Probably kept the price down,” Leo speculated.

That was true. When Rafe had decided to bring Frannie home to the family, he couldn’t resist seeing if the old place was still up for sale. He had big plans for it, and he couldn’t wait to move himself and Frannie into the place he’d already decided would make a suitable home for them both.

He knew Frannie was benefiting by spending so much time with his family, but he was eager to get out of the lodge, where Frannie must feel confused by all the hustle and bustle that came with running a thriving business. Where the air around his father was thick with tension.

The foreman of the construction site waved at Rafe, and seeing the opportunity to break away from Leo, he shook hands one last time with the man, clapped him on the shoulder and left him at the curb. They were tearing down walls in the club’s front room today, and he was eager to see what kind of workmanship lay behind the flocked, garish wallpaper that the Culpeppers had thought so attractive.

Once Rafe was satisfied the work was progressing well, he could move on to his next mission—getting one newspaperwoman to buy into the idea that the second Broken Yoke summer festival wasn’t geared strictly to make money for its citizens. Downtown revitalization, worthwhile causes, civic pride rebuilt. Could he persuade her that there was good to be done?

Maybe he was worrying too much. After four years of working for Wendall Crews and his far- flung empire, Rafe had honed the art of gentle, and not-so-gentle, persuasion. He had the talent to spin the festival any way the town wanted it. And just how bright a journalist could this Danielle Bridgeton be if the paper had stuck her out here in no- man’s-land?

Besides, big brother Nick had been right. Rafe still had the D’Angelo charm, and though he liked to think he’d changed, that he wasn’t prone to the old ways anymore, he hadn’t forgotten any of the old tricks.

If all else failed, he’d lay it on thick and deep. He’d make Ms. Bridgeton feel as though she were the center of his universe. He’d have her eating out of his hand.

By the time he was finished with her, she’d give them more newspaper coverage than the winter Olympics.

MAYNE SHE WASN’T the world’s best journalist, but Dani thought she could recognize a losing proposition when she saw one. She regarded the three stories spread out on the desk in front of her.

It would be hard to say which would be more exciting. Or which one was more likely to put Gary to sleep when he read it.

She began to feel helplessly angry again at the fates that had dropped her into the dullest news corridor of Colorado. This certainly wasn’t the future her mother had scrimped and saved for her daughter to have.

If Wanda Bridgeton could have seen her now, how disappointed would she be?

Not wanting to give in to another fit of useless emotion, Dani decided that maybe a second opinion was called for. After all, she was biased about what interested people in this neck of the woods.

“Cissy,” she called out the open office door. “Could you come in here a moment?”