A Kiss to Build a Dream On (13 page)

Even if she wasn't sure what that was.

Burk would probably just go back to work, no doubt accepting the jeers and high-fives of his crew, who had surely heard the headboard slamming against the wall. While Willa…what? Waited up here until they went home?

No
, she thought, sitting up straighter,
that wouldn't do.
Why should Burk get to go back down to his crew like a hero, while she waited in her room like some seventeenth-century maiden?

Screw that. She stood and tugged on the faded bedspread, ignoring the faint smell of Burk that lingered there. She didn't even have the chance to get his scent on her sheets, she realized. There'd been no time to dive under the covers and revel in each other.

Disappointment wanted to rear its head again, but Willa pushed it aside. Instead she made her way to the bathroom to shower and think about her next steps. Underneath the spray of lukewarm water, she decided she'd head to the Rolling Pin and grab a cruller. Then she'd swing by the bank, get her loan, and meet Audrey down at the track in time for practice. Coaching the girls today, she could work off any residual frustration. It was wrong, she knew, to want Burk for more than he'd given her. Oh, but she felt like she could go eight—ten! a hundred!—more rounds with him and still not be satisfied. She watched the water drip down her body, wondering if she'd opened the door to a deluge of desire she had no idea how to control.

The bank had the same smell Willa could remember as a child: a mix of leather, paper, and polished wood. It was a scent that would cling to her dad's clothing when he came home at night. Willa's heart ached with missing him as she sat in one of the wing-backed chairs near the entrance, waiting to see a loan officer.

Beyond the velvet ropes, a woman with long coppery hair talked with the teller on duty. A few employees walked here and there, their heels muted on the plush carpets covering the hardwood floors. The sleepy space was a far cry from the marble and high ceilings of Willa's New York bank, which always seemed to be crowded with people. Their voices, cell phone ringtones, and loud transactions were forever echoing off the cold, stony floor, reverberating in sharp notes. Her bank had been one of the few things about New York that Willa had disliked. She much preferred the homey, comfortable feeling of the White Pine Bank and Trust.

“Willa Masterson?” a woman with stylish horn-rimmed glasses and bright red lips asked her. Willa nodded and stood.

“Right this way,” the woman said, leading her down a short hallway to an office with a huge oak desk and a south-facing window. She gestured for Willa to have a seat, then placed herself at the computer behind her steamship of a desk.

“My dad's office was at the far end of this hallway,” Willa said, straightening the pearls around her neck. “Harold Masterson? He was president here for a long time.”

The woman smiled. “Of course. There's a lovely oil painting of him in the conference room.” She pulled out a business card and passed it to Willa.

“I'm Chelsea Aldermann. I was hired long after your dad's tenure here ended, but I have been in this business for over fifteen years. I'll be glad to help you if I can.”

“Thank you,” Willa said, accepting the card. She wondered if she should ask after some of the employees she once knew here—Lois Maylock, who used to give her peppermints, or Cal Hoopstra, who was the security guard for a time. Then again, Willa didn't want to seem like she was desperate for Chelsea to realize exactly who she was. How important her dad had been.

“So what can I help you with?” Chelsea asked, peering over the tops of her glasses.

“I need a small loan for a bed-and-breakfast I'm starting on Oak Street. It used to be my family home, but it's just me in it now. I've got the renovations under way, but I need twenty thousand more to finish a few projects up, do some advertising, and to make one hire. A cleaning person.”

Chelsea nodded. “I see. And when do you anticipate you'll be open?”

“As soon as possible. Midwinter at the latest.”

“Good. And do you have a proposal for the space?”

“A proposal?”

“A document with, say, your room rates and your P and L?”

Willa blinked. “P and L?”

“Profit and loss. A statement that outlines all your costs—your employees, your advertising, your utilities, your food—as well as how many people have to stay in the hotel each week for you to make money.”

Willa pulled at the cuffs of her navy suit. She decidedly did
not
have a P and L statement. She didn't have anything except a half-finished house and a table she'd painted blue. She sat up straighter in her chair. “I can, of course, draw all that up for you, but I'm confident this B and B will be profitable quickly. And if not, then I'll just work extra hard to make it so. There's no need to worry about me as a financial risk.”

Chelsea folded her hands on top of the desk's smooth wood. “Tell me, how much did you think you'd charge each night for your rooms?”

On the East Coast, she wouldn't hesitate paying three hundred dollars or more to stay at a nice B and B. That was per night. White Pine might not have exactly the same clientele, but Willa knew that she'd need to charge a premium for her establishment, same as the other B and B's.

“I was thinking two hundred dollars,” she replied. “That would be the average.”

Chelsea studied Willa over the tops of her glasses. “There are certainly wealthy people in White Pine as well as tourists, but do you think the market as a whole can sustain that?”

Willa nodded. “I certainly think it's in the range.”

“All right, let's say that's ballpark,” Chelsea said after a moment. “I'm willing to entertain it, but you need to show me evidence.”

“Excuse me?” Willa asked, wondering if she should remind Chelsea that this was a bank, not a courtroom.

“Willa, I know from the bit of paperwork you filled out here that you haven't lived in White Pine for some time. So you may not realize that this is largely a working-class community. The majority of people—not all, but a majority—might not have two hundred dollars to spend on a hotel room for a night. If tourists or other clientele will supplement the hotel's profitability, then show me that.”

“It's not a hotel. It's a bed-and-br—”

“Here me out,” Chelsea said, holding up a hand. “My point is that a bed-and-breakfast here could work, but you still need to assess the market. Do some research. What do people want? What would they pay for? Show me in data, don't just make a guess. I have stayed at the Great Lakes Inn, I have put relatives up there when they've come to town, and God knows I would love an alternative to that dump. But at two hundred per night? You'd better show me why and how that price point is going to work.”

Willa felt the blood drain from her face. “So are you saying you need this information before you'll give me money?”

“I'm afraid so.”

“So I won't be getting a loan today?”

Chelsea shook her head. “I'm sorry. Not now. Not with your current business model. Or lack thereof.”

“But I'm telling you, this is going to work.”

“You can't tell me. You need to
show
me. On paper.”

Willa's anger kindled. “My dad—he
owned
this bank for years. He practically built it. You wouldn't even have a job if it weren't for him.”

“Is he cosigning on your loan?”

“No, he's dead.”

“Then I'm sorry, but it's not relevant.”

Willa sat back in her chair, the air gone from her lungs. They were turning her down for a loan. They were saying no. She didn't know whether to cry or throw a fit, or both.

Across the desk, Chelsea offered her a compassionate look. “I'm sorry. I know this isn't what you wanted to hear. But there's more. I'm being extra picky about all this because you technically
are
a risk. On paper anyway. You have no savings. You have no job. The only asset you have is the house, which is currently in a half-finished state of remodeling. I'm sorry, but this just doesn't look very good.”

Willa swallowed the knot of emotions in her throat.
I had money
, she wanted to say,
but it was stolen from me. And I had assets, but I had to sell them.
She wanted to argue for days, but what good would it do? Unless she changed her B and B plans drastically—and figured out how to write a P and L statement—she wasn't going to get a dime from this bank.

She stood, and reached out a hand. “Thank you for your time.”

Chelsea gave her a firm shake. “I'll reconsider this situation if you bring me a viable proposal. Until then, I'm sorry we couldn't do business.”

Willa lifted her chin. Her proposal was just fine. She wasn't going to alter it just because some number cruncher behind a fancy desk told her to. “Have a good day,” she said, and strode out the door with as confident a swagger as she could muster.

It wasn't until she got to her car that she let her face fall. She put her forehead against the steering wheel and let the tears plunk onto her navy skirt. They'd turned her down. Never in a million years did she think that would have been possible. Harold Masterson's daughter denied a loan at the White Pine Bank and Trust.

“Oh God,” she groaned, her emotions raw from all the disappointment of the day. First Burk's hasty departure; now this.

She wasn't going to change the past. And she wasn't going to carve out a future. Which left her with exactly nowhere to go from here.

“Except track practice,” she grumbled, starting the engine. Not even a grueling workout could make this day any worse.

Willa and Audrey turned their backs to the biting autumn wind that whipped over the Birch River and onto the field where the track team was practicing.

“Man, it got cold!” Audrey said, jogging in place a little. “That's Minnesota for you. One minute it's sixty and sunny, the next minute it's snowing.”

For her part, Willa was plenty warm, thanks to the mile she'd jogged with the track team, and the back-and-forth coaching she'd done. Plus, frustration at how her day had gone—from Burk to the bank—had her insides flaming with irritation.

“Earth to Willa,” Audrey said, tugging gently on her sleeve. She started.

“Sorry, what?”

“Where did you go? You've been spacy all practice.” Audrey's brown eyes flickered across her face, trying to read her.

“I just—it was a tough day,” Willa admitted as another gust of wind tore through the trees on the edge of the field. Around her, the girls were finishing up their practice, long legs flashing as they carried the hurdles and starting blocks and shot puts back to the gym. Willa watched them feeling a pang of envy. Track practice, then homework. She'd give anything to have an agenda as simple as that.

Audrey reached out and linked her arm with Willa's. “The girls are out of earshot. You want to talk about it?”

Willa stared into the gray edges of the darkening sky. The weather had changed right along with her mood. “It's Burk,” she said, feeling her skin prickle involuntarily. “We had sex.”

Audrey's brown eyes went wide. “Really?”

“Really.”

“You're frowning like it was bad. Was it?”

“No, it was amazing. I mean, mind-blowing. It's just that he took off right after. Like he regretted it or something.”

“You're kidding.”

“I wish I was.”

Audrey shivered a little—whether from the cold or from the idea of Burk bailing after sex, Willa wasn't sure.

“Was it that way when you guys were in high school?” she asked. “Is it a…pattern?”

“No! I mean, we were kids, we barely knew what we were doing. But still, he always stuck around after. He was patient. So sweet about everything. And just the right amount of…”

She trailed off, unable to finish. Talking this way about Burk was starting to get her riled up again. It was the feeling that had started all this—the one that had led her to proposition him in the first place.

Audrey squeezed her arm. “I'm sorry. That's so frustrating.”

“It's not the only thing,” Willa said. “I went to the bank and tried to get a loan to finish the B and B, but they turned me down. They were asking me for things like market research and P and L statements, and I didn't have anything to show them. This woman about laughed at me for what I wanted to charge per night per room.”

“What
do
you want to charge?”

“Two hundred.”

Audrey's brown eyes widened. “Two hundred dollars?”

Willa rolled her eyes. “Not you, too!”

Audrey shook her head, her glossy ponytail swinging. “Sorry. It's just—a lot for locals. But maybe that's not who you had in mind to stay there. Is it?”

“I don't—I'm not sure.”

“Maybe you could talk to Betty about it? She's kept Knots and Bolts in the black for years now. Plus she's got that whole Halloween business on the side. She might be able to help you formulate a plan.”

“Right. Because she totally wants to help the girl who bullied her in high school.”

Audrey shrugged. “The past is the past. We said so the other night. You might be surprised at people's willingness to move on.”

Willa stared at the leaf-littered ground. It was the same thing Burk had told her. Just because you stayed in a location didn't mean you stayed the same person.

“Have you ever had anything like this happen?” Willa asked.

“No, I've never tried to start my own business before. The only loan I've ever gotten was for my car.”

“No, I mean, the other stuff,” Willa said, “the Burk stuff.” She didn't mean to sound hopeful, but she was dying for someone to be able to relate.