Chapter 5 #4
The donkey chose that moment to stick her head through the open kitchen window—an alarming trick Loretta pulled the first time Tessa raised the window to let in a spring breeze. The donkey sniffed pointedly at the counter where Tessa's last remaining cashmere cardigan was folded.
"Don't even think about it, you fabric-eating menace."
Loretta brayed indignantly at a volume that rattled the sunflower magnets on the refrigerator. She could swear that beast understood every word she said.
A spit of gravel made Loretta jerk her head back and turn to stare at the visitor. Tessa's heart stuttered for an instant as she spotted a silver pickup truck coming up the drive. Dillon's truck was silver—
Wrong make and model of truck for Dillon. His truck was sturdy. Utilitarian. Made for getting to country patients in any weather. This truck was a fancy limited edition model with lots of chrome trim and nowhere near enough mud on its fenders to be local.
She snatched up the cardigan and shoved it into a kitchen cabinet with the pots and pans for safekeeping and went to answer the door.
She remembered him from Fern's funeral. Name was Dale Hutchins. Tailored suit, firm handshake, not a sincere bone in his body. He'd identified himself as an oil man. Said he'd been negotiating something with Fern but that he would wait until after she was properly buried to bring it up with Tessa.
He glanced at Makayla in the rocking chair and at the menagerie of animals surrounding her and then shot a patently fake smile at Tessa that set her teeth on edge.
"Mrs. Lawrence. I hope I'm not intruding."
"You are, actually, Mr. Hutchins. But go ahead."
If her bluntness surprised him, he didn't show it. "I got a public records notice that Mrs. Lawrence’s will has been filed. I also saw the property can't be sold for a year."
"Then you understand the situation perfectly."
"I do. Which is why I'd like to make you an offer you can't refuse."
She highly doubted that. She'd refused some pretty pricey offers in her day.
Her parents had offered to release the entire contents of her trust fund to her if she would come back from her spring vacation ski trip to Montana and not elope with the hot ski instructor she'd met and two weeks later announced she was marrying.
Her trust fund had been valued at almost a hundred million dollars.
Of course, when she chose Mick over money, her parents promptly froze the trust fund.
The oil man was talking again. ". . . prepared to offer twice the appraised market value of this property—payable in full the day after the one-year period expires. All you'd have to do is agree now and sign a letter of intent."
“Make that twice the commercial market value and I might be willing to consider it,” she retorted.
He blinked, looking startled. Few people knew the difference between appraised and commercial value, and fewer still of them lived on isolated farms in Montana.
“Of course I would have to clear that with my employer,” he said smoothly, “but I think it’s safe to say my company would agree to that.”
He was offering in the neighborhood of twenty million dollars that would go straight into a trust fund for Makayla. Her daughter would be able do anything with her life, go anywhere, be anyone she wanted to be.
The number was staggering. And tempting. Desperately so. She was standing here in muddy boots with scratched hands and black smudges on her t-shirt from where she'd wiped the mascara she’d cried off in Mick's shop.
"Why exactly is an oil company willing to pay twenty million dollars for a hundred-acre farm in Montana?" she asked her guest.
His smile didn't waver. Not even a flicker. She'd known men like this her whole life. People whose smiles were instruments of commerce, not expressions of human warmth.
"This property has significant mineral potential. Our geologists have identified promising formations beneath—"
"You want to frack Fern's farm."
A beat of silence. "We prefer the term 'hydraulic condensate extraction.' Geological surveys indicate substantial oil and gas reserves beneath this property and the surrounding area."
Over his shoulder the lake shimmered blue and gold in the late afternoon sun.
The mountains beyond rose in shades of purple and gray, still capped with snow, toward a sky so blue it hurt to look at.
She gazed at the old-growth forest Fern had fiercely protected—ancient oaks and towering firs that had been standing since before Cobbler Cove had a name.
And she looked at her daughter rocking gently on the porch with a three-legged dog, a blind goat, and an old brown mutt for company.
"I appreciate the offer," she said, her voice so smooth and pleasant it would have made her mother proud.
"But signing your agreement might violate the terms of my mother-in-law’s will and cause neither of us to end up in possession of the land.
You're welcome to reach out again after the year is up. "
He handed her a business card. She took it with a smile as polished as his own and watched his back all the way to his snazzy pickup truck.
When he'd driven out of sight, she leaned against the front door and exhaled hard.
Twenty million dollars. And she hadn’t instantly said yes. Which was objectively sheer madness. Nobody sane turned down that kind of money.
She wasn't sure why she’d put him off, but the answer had come out of her without a second's thought, more by instinct than conscious consideration. Before the workshop and the toys, before the sound of Makayla laughing in the barn, she might have seriously considered signing away the farm.
Who was she kidding? She would've jumped at his offer in a heartbeat.
She pushed away from the door wearily. Time to feed the critters. Again. She paused at the top of the porch steps, searching for Bonnie and Clyde. They'd taken to hiding in the bushes or around the corner of the barn and ambushing her the moment her back was turned to them.
As she reconnoitered the goose threat, she spotted Arlo standing at his fence, staring grimly at the cloud of dust left by the Hutchins's truck.
Her neighbor wasn't laughing now. His weathered face was hard, and he gripped the fence rail tight enough to whiten his knuckles.
Brown Dog pressed against his leg, ears flat.
He caught her eye as she gazed at him. He didn't wave or nod or offer up a cryptic observation. He just looked at her with an expression that needed no translation at all.
Beware of that one.