Chapter 39
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Marcus stepped out of the driver’s side of the LuxeLife golf cart, surveying the scene like an aristocrat who’d accidentally wandered into a peasant uprising.
Victoria stepped out of the passenger seat; her pristine white pantsuit remained immaculate despite the surrounding wilderness.
Her gaze moved systematically across the scene: conservation booths, fusion food tent, the massive screen displaying Gary the Grouse dance videos, crowds wearing “Save Gary” t-shirts.
Then, Victoria’s eyes found me.
“Oh, oh,” said Brie. “She doesn’t look happy.”
Marcus scrambled to keep up with Victoria’s measured pace as she marched toward me, flinching whenever he made accidental eye contact with anyone wearing tie-dye.
Victoria pressed her perfectly painted lips into a thin line, her eyes boring into me.
My newfound emotional clarity about Noah would have to wait.
Because right now, Victoria Sterling was bearing down on me with the momentum of an avalanche, and I had the sinking feeling that no amount of social media savvy was going to deflect what was coming.
From my peripheral vision, I caught both Noah and my mother converging on my position from opposite sides of the festival grounds, each wearing identical expressions of protective determination.
“I’ve got this,” I said quietly as they reached me, holding up a hand to stop them both. Noah hesitated, concern etched across his features, while Mom’s eyes narrowed with the protective instinct of a woman who once chased a crooked health inspector out of her restaurant with a meat cleaver.
“You sure?” Noah asked, his voice still carrying the husky quality from his song.
“I’m sure.” Our eyes met, and I found strength in his steady gaze. “This is my mess to clean up.”
Victoria came to a stop before me, her heels sinking slightly into the graveled parking lot.
Her perfect features contorted with barely contained fury as she surveyed the surrounding festival.
I watched as she watched the video display above the stage.
I saw her take in the signs. “Save the Grouse!” “Stop LuxeLife!” “No More Corporate Expansions!”
“What exactly do you think you’re doing?” Victoria demanded, each word as sharp as a scalpel. “Besides violating approximately eighteen clauses in your contract?”
I tilted my chin up, refusing to be intimidated. “Saving an endangered species. Protecting a community landmark. Oh, and generating the most authentic content this resort has ever seen.”
Victoria’s laugh echoed off the mountains. “This little …” she waved a manicured hand dismissively at the festival, “… freak show won’t change anything. The development plans are already in motion. The board has approved the budget.”
“You have obligations, Samantha,” said Marcus. “Contractual ones. With very specific penalty clauses for breach.”
Victoria stared at the video screen, frowning.
“What is that, exactly? A bird? Dancing? It looks like the chicken version of Barry Gibb.” She looked at the faces of the crowd gathering around us, most of whom were much younger than she was.
“That’s a Bee Gees reference for all you millennials, by the way.
Greatest disco band of the 70s. Look them up. ”
“We know who the Bee Gees are,” said Brie.
Victoria’s eyes narrowed as she turned back to me. “This little stunt of yours could end your career. One call from me, and you’ll never work with another luxury brand again. Is that what you want, Samantha?”
I took a deep breath, drawing strength from the friends around me. From the community that had come together over the past few days. From Noah’s song, still echoing in my heart.
“What I want,” I said, my voice growing stronger with each word, “is to do work that matters. The Adventure Center matters. The grouse matters. This community matters.”
Victoria’s perfectly shaped eyebrow arched. “Does it really? Do you honestly believe people care about this beyond a few earthy-crunchy wackadoos?” She gestured to the festival-goers around us.
“Did she just call us wackadoos?” asked Diego.
“I think so,” answered Jenn.
“This is a momentary distraction,” said Marcus. “I know it. You know it too. Next week they’ll all be obsessing over some new TikTok dance or one of those stupid challenge things where they dump a bucket of ice water on their heads.”
“People might surprise you,” I said, not backing down. I knew that for a fact because I had even surprised myself.
“Yes, well, the numbers don’t support your confidence,” said Marcus. “Our projections for the curated authenticity expansion are quite clear. Thirty-eight million in first-year revenue alone. Do you really think we’re going to just give that up because of some half-baked festival?”
Victoria stepped closer, lowering her voice. “Samantha, you realize LuxeLife has an entire army of lawyers at our disposal. We will use the full resources of our corporation to push this development through. The Adventure Center will be gone, and no one will even care or notice.”
Victoria stepped back and smiled, letting the weight of her threats settle in. She was right, of course. LuxeLife had more money, more lawyers, more corporate resources than we could ever hope to fight against.
But then, as if on cue, Parker’s massive screen shifted from the grouse footage to a comment feed from the event’s livestream. Messages scrolled past too quickly to read them all, but certain phrases jumped out:
“Does the resort offer grouse viewing tours? Trying to book now!”
“Tried to reserve a room for next month but the website says you’re sold out??”
“My daughter has a school project on endangered species. Can we visit the disco chicken???”
Victoria’s head whipped toward the screen. “What is that? Where are those comments coming from and what exactly are they talking about?”
Marcus frowned at his phone, fingers flying across the screen. “This can’t be right. The booking system shows we’re at capacity for the next three months. That’s impossible.”
“Not impossible,” Parker said, stepping forward with his iPad. He turned the screen toward Victoria, displaying graphs and analytics. “The festival livestream has driven over a thousand unique visitors to the booking portal in the last three hours alone.”
Maya moved to stand beside me, her professional manager’s smile locked in place. “If I recall correctly, Victoria, you promised to extend the Adventure Center’s contract if Sam and Noah increased revenue and helped you make your booking targets.”
“Yes, but they didn’t,” Victoria snapped. “After their little osprey rescue, they never budged.”
“Until now,” Parker interjected, swiping to a new screen on his tablet, “and the numbers are still climbing.”
Marcus’s expression soured as he consulted his phone. “He’s right.”
“What exactly is going on?” asked Victoria.
Marcus shook his head. “I don’t know.”
Maya scratched hers. “Well …
The crowd fell silent all around us. Blank stares all around.
“Can anybody tell me what’s happening right now?” shouted Victoria.
Realization dawned on me like the sunrise breaking over the mountains. “I can.”
“Can what, Samantha?” Up until that point, the way Victoria was staring at me would have made me crumble.
But this time when I looked her in the eyes, I noticed something I didn’t think was even possible.
There it was, on her forehead. A tiny bead of sweat.
“Tell me, Samantha. What the hell is going on?”
“We missed it,” I said, gesturing at the scrolling comments from the livestream. The festivalgoers all stared at me, nervous chatter grinding to a halt. “We all did.”
“What are you talking about?” Another bead rolled down Victoria’s forehead.
“We had the what and the how,” I said. “What we didn’t have was the why.”
Noah looked confused. “I don’t understand, Sam.”
From the looks on all the faces, neither did anyone else.
“The what is the luxurious resort experience,” I explained, gesturing toward the LuxeLife property up the mountain.
“The how is the authenticity, the real Colorado experience you, and Jenn, and Diego provide. But the why was missing.” I turned to Victoria and Marcus.
“Why should people pay premium prices to go on an authentic Colorado adventure at a LuxeLife resort?”
“Your job was to figure that out,” said Marcus. I noticed he was sweating too. But a lot more than Victoria.
“We have to give them a purpose first. That’s the why.”
Understanding dawned on Maya’s face. “Ecotourism,” she said, nodding slowly. “It’s been one of the fastest-growing sectors in travel for years. People want to feel their vacation dollars are making a positive impact.”
“Exactly!” I pointed to the comment feed still scrolling on the massive screen.
“These people aren’t just booking rooms because they want luxury amenities.
And they’re not all looking for Colorado adventures either.
They’re booking because they want to see Gary the Grouse, to be part of something meaningful. ”
Maya nodded. “Studies show ecotourists spend up to thirty percent more per trip than traditional tourists,” said Maya, backing me up yet again.
I watched as Victoria’s eyes scanned the festival. Dollar bills being exchanged for Gary the Grouse t-shirts. The see-through plastic donation bins filled to the brim with wrinkled bills and shiny coins. The vendors and food tables and merch tents.
“And they stay longer,” Maya added. “More nights, more meals, more activities.”
Victoria’s expression shifted from skepticism to calculation as she ran the numbers in her head.
“The data doesn’t lie,” said Parker, flashing more numbers and graphs on his iPad.
“Ecotourism?” Victoria frowned. “People pay money to … help things?”
“Think about that new property you bought in Alaska,” said Maya. “The one between the brown bear sanctuary and the whale migration route.”
“That place is a money pit,” said Marcus. “Should have shut it down months ago.”
“Unless …” Maya waited for Victoria to connect the dots.
“They have bears there. And whales. People like those, right?”
“People love bears and whales,” Brie confirmed.
“And the new acquisition in Florida, too,” said Maya. “Think about it.”
“The one near Miami right next to the swamp?” Marcus shook his head. “The whole thing needs renovated.”
“Yes,” said Victoria. “But the permits keep getting held up by those stupid sea cows.”
“You mean manatees?” asked Diego.
Overlooking all of us, the massive video screen above the stage shifted back to the grouse footage. Gary strutted and bounced, air sacs inflating, his distinctive mating calls broadcast from the loudspeakers over the entire forest.
That’s when the miracle happened.
“Look! Over there!” One of the girl scouts pointed to something beyond the stage, her hand trembling. All heads turned to follow her hand.
At the edge of the festival grounds, where the parking lot met the tree line, a mottled brown bird emerged from the underbrush. She moved cautiously, head tilting as the recorded calls of her species were amplified through the festival speakers.
“Is that...” Marcus began, his corporate cynicism momentarily forgotten.
“A female grouse,” Noah whispered, his voice filled with awe. “Here? Now?”
We’d spent days planning this festival to save a bird we’d captured on video, and now the bird itself had shown up to the party. As if the universe was finally ready to stop messing with me and start helping instead.
The best part? Noah stood right there beside me.
The festival crowd froze in collective astonishment. Phones raised and recording as people instinctively understood the gravity of the moment.
For several moments, nobody spoke. Nobody moved. Nobody breathed.
Then, impossibly, another movement at the tree line. The male grouse, the same one from my video, identifiable by the distinctive pattern on his neck, strutted into view. His chest inflated as he began his courtship dance in real time, just yards away from hundreds of star-struck festivalgoers.
“It’s him,” I said, clutching Noah’s arm. “Gary has returned!”
Victoria and Marcus stood transfixed alongside everyone else, corporate strategizing momentarily forgotten as nature delivered its own perfect presentation.
The male grouse bounced and strutted, popping sounds emerging from his air sacs in perfect sync with the recording playing on the speakers.
The female watched with what I could only interpret as avian skepticism, making the male work harder, his movements becoming more elaborate, more desperate for her approval.
Jenn looked like she might faint from the significance of the moment. “This confirms it. This is an active lek. Their ancestral mating ground. They’re still using it.”
For several magical minutes, the entire festival stood witness to a courtship ritual millions of years in the making. Then, with the same mysterious impulse that had brought them, the grouse pair retreated back into the forest, leaving behind a stunned silence.
For a long time, nobody breathed, nobody spoke, nobody moved.
Then …
“Bye, Gary!” Noah waved at the spot where they’d vanished into the trees.
“Bye Mary!” I waved too.
A smile twitched on Noah’s lips. “You named her Mary?”
“Yes. Mary. Seemed like a good fit.”
“I guess we’ll see.”
In addition to his smirk, I couldn’t help but notice the twinkle in Noah’s eye.