Fall for You (King’s Inn #3)

Chapter 1

Chapter One

F rom the top floor of his family’s flagship hotel in Downtown Bozeman, Dallas had the perfect view of the shoppers and families bustling about on Main Street—not to mention the cars and trucks that clogged every intersection.

He could practically hear his grandfather’s sigh. “Back in my day, this place was a blink-and-you’d-miss-it cowboy town.”

Not anymore. It may have been a small ranching town once, but now the streets were lined with pricey boutiques, ski tourists from Big Sky checking out the five-star restaurants—and hotels.

Like this one.

Dallas leaned forward so far, his forehead clunked against the window. Sure, it wasn’t the same town he’d grown up in, but he had always loved watching the condos being built, the tech companies flocking, the bar and restaurant scene flourishing.

Until recently.

Now he found himself echoing his freakin’ grandpa. Just this morning he’d said the words back in my day to his assistant.

Seriously? He was thirty-one!

“But maybe I’m getting old,” he muttered, scratching the back of his head with a wince before smoothing it back into place.

“What’s that?” His assistant Clara’s voice in the doorway had him jolting upright, shoving his hands into his slacks as he strode away from the window with purpose.

Like he was a man on a mission and not…well, bored.

There was no other word for it.

“What’s up?” he asked Clara.

She took a step into the office with a frown.

The earnest, eager-to-please recent college grad had been tasked with keeping his calendar organized and sifting through the never-ending emails that flooded his inbox. It was a job she took seriously.

Which was great, since he’d lost the energy to care much about every little crisis that popped up.

Truth was, it used to be fun to problem-solve and pitch new ideas on ways to expand. But now his family’s hospitality group was a well-oiled machine. The sort of problems that cropped up now were the sort that any decent manager could handle.

“It’s the Kinkaids,” Clara said with a wince.

He just barely held back a sigh. Case in point. The Kinkaids were a filthy rich family from the East Coast who’d booked a wedding at Bridger Terrace, their new boutique hotel at the edge of town.

The Kinkaids were the sort of family whose connections and influence could make Bridger the destination wedding venue for years to come.

“What now?” He crossed his arms and leaned back against his desk.

The Kinkaids were also the sort of family who made you wonder if all their influence was worth the hassle.

“It seems the photographer we recommended?—”

“Jeffers?”

“Yes.” Clara winced again, and once again Dallas held back a sigh.

Was he brusque? Yes. Did he suffer fools? No. But had he ever acted like such a jerk that Clara’s winces were warranted?

Man, he hoped not.

He did his best to soften his tone. “Whatever it is, we’ll deal with it, Clara. Just tell me the problem.”

She nodded and took a deep breath. “It seems Jeffers doubled his rate at the last minute, and now the Kinkaids are furious. I just got off the phone with the bride’s mother, and she’s threatening to move the wedding to another location because she says we’re scam artists and—” Clara stopped babbling as abruptly as she’d started.

Dallas ran a hand over his short beard and took a moment to swallow down his anger.

Not at Clara, but at the woman who’d clearly spoken so harshly to his young assistant that the poor girl looked on the verge of tears.

There was never a call to be rude to his staff, no matter how much money they had.

Clara shifted in her shiny black pumps, bouncing on her toes and clutching her notepad in a death grip as she awaited his response.

“Call Martha at Bridger. Tell her to reach out to the Kinkaids. She’s the general manager, she’s the one who should be dealing with them.”

She started jotting down notes.

“Tell Martha to tell the bride’s family the hotel will immediately find and hire a replacement photographer of equal or better quality at the original price point, absorbing any difference in cost.”

Clara scribbled furiously, her brows drawn together in that earnest expression of hers. Like she was Moses taking down the Ten Commandments rather than an assistant taking the obvious steps to avoid disaster.

She lifted her head with wide, prompting eyes. And then?

“Then call Marnie Dawson. She’s a photographer out of Livingston. She’ll likely tell you she’s booked for the season, but she owes me a favor.” He waited until Clara looked up again. “Feel free to remind her of that.”

“And if she still says no?’

“She won’t.”

He saw his phone light up on his desk with an incoming text. From where he stood, he could make out his twin sister’s pet name but not the message.

“That’ll be all,” he said, already reaching for the phone as Clara slipped out.

He hadn’t even realized his chest had swelled with hope…until he read Bailey’s text to the siblings’ group chat and he slumped with disappointment.

Captain Bossy: Don’t forget, it’s Grandma’s bday.

What had he expected? That Bailey would send him some SOS telling him they were short-staffed at the inn and needed him to step in again?

He sank into his desk chair.

Yeah. Okay. Maybe that was exactly what he’d been hoping to see.

Two weeks ago, he’d come back to his real life in Bozeman after taking off to help out at his sister’s inn up in the mountain town of Paradise Springs.

It’d killed Bailey to admit that his assistance had been necessary, and even then, it’d been made clear to him that his help had only been acceptable because it was temporary.

Their younger brother Brandon had needed to take time off to be there for his now-fiancée and their infant son, and Dallas had stepped in.

But Brandon was back at work, managing the front of house, so Dallas was… not needed.

Not wanted either, if he knew his twin.

He watched the rapid-fire text responses in the sibling text thread.

Tinkerbell: On it! Already sent her a batch of her favorite cookies.

Big B: Card’s in the mail. Might be late… I’ll FaceTime her now!

Antman: Crap. That’s today?

Dallas shook his head. Typical. Everyone in their family knew their roles and played them to perfection.

Like Willow—their little Tinkerbell.

Of course she’d sent cookies.

A smile tugged at his lips as he thought of his youngest sibling hard at work in The King’s Inn kitchen.

The girl was cute as a button but a powerhouse chef. She owned that culinary space and made do with only the barest of part-time help. If she ever complained about her long hours, he hadn’t heard it.

But then again…she had been acting strange. Not in an overly stressed way, but in an I’m keeping a secret way.

As the oldest of five—and yes, he was older than Bailey by a few minutes—he knew the signs.

He was used to it with Antony, who was pretty much always up to something the rest of the family would freak out about if they knew. And he’d seen it a time or two when Brandon and Bailey were trying to keep their budding romances on the down-low. But Willow?

That was new. She was normally an open book, especially with him.

He eyed the text chain that hadn’t stopped—and wouldn’t for hours. His siblings were all busy, but they still found way too much time to text.

Finally, Dallas chimed in with a thumbs-up.

If he hadn’t, he would have gotten a nagging call from Bailey to make sure he hadn’t dropped the ball.

Although, the satisfaction of telling her that he’d already called Grandma and she’d gushed about the massive bouquet of flowers he’d sent and how his sweet note had made her morning… had almost been too tempting to resist.

But then Bailey might have wrangled out of him that he probably would have forgotten if it weren’t for the world’s most organized assistant.

Clara might need to work on being more assertive, but she kept his life in order like a champ. She’d make a good manager one day.

He was still staring at his phone and the ongoing text thread when it lit up with an incoming call from Antony.

“Hey, Antman,” Dallas said.

“Cowboy.” The one word was as good a greeting as Dallas would get. And as much as he hated the nickname his siblings refused to drop, he could accept it from Antony.

His brother was not a man of many words. Maybe that was why they got along so well.

“You coming back anytime soon?” he asked.

Antony was what their mother affectionately termed “adventurous.” The rest of them had other names for his adrenaline-seeking lifestyle.

“Nah. I’m getting certified to do solo jumps.” Dallas could picture his younger brother’s shrug as he added, “Maybe after that I’ll swing by.”

Dallas nodded. Skydiving certificate? That tracked. Dallas had jumped with him a time or two. But while he enjoyed the rush, he didn’t crave adventure so much that he’d quit his job and make a life out of chasing it.

“Wanna meet me halfway? We could do a cliff jump,” Antony suggested.

Dallas could hear his cocky smirk.

He should just say no. He’d already taken time off from work to help at the inn. There was no good reason to take off again. But instead of saying no, he heard himself ask, “Why would I do that?”

“Uh, because you’re bored?” Antony said like this was a no-brainer.

Maybe it was. He supposed no one could empathize with the restless feelings he was battling like Antony.

But he wasn’t quite ready to succumb to them, so he played it off as no big deal. “Bored or not, some of us enjoy living in the real world. And that includes holding down jobs that aren’t always exciting.”

“Uh-huh.” Antony sounded unimpressed. “You know that’s the exact response Dad would give me, right?”

Dallas flinched. Point to Antony.

It had long been a bone of contention between him and his siblings that he’d been raised to follow in their father’s footsteps, and the fact that he even looked like the patriarch didn’t help the comparisons.