Part 7 (1/2)

”Well, sort of.” That had sounded stupid and made him look like a real jerk. This wasn't going well. ”I don't like having to be the bad guy,” he said. Boy, there was an understatement. Why, of all the business choices in the world, had he chosen banking?

Oh, yeah, he'd wanted to help people fix their money problems, make their dreams come true, blah, blah. Talk about naive. Banks didn't cure financial stupidity. They profited from it. He was no hero. He was a profiteer.

”Then don't be a bad guy,” she urged. ”Work with us.”

She looked so helpless, so desperate. He wanted to wrap his arms around her and tell her he'd come up with some way to save her.

Wait a minute. What was he thinking? He wasn't, of course. Women like this one, they made a man's brain melt. He gave himself a stern reminder that Samantha Sterling wasn't the only person in town with financial needs. He had employees and other bank customers depending on him.

None of his other customers looked like this one.

Oh, no. He wasn't about to follow old Arnie right over the cliff and take the bank with him. Yes, legions of men did dumb things for women. They spent money they didn't have on women, stole for them, even committed murder for them. He didn't have to join the legions.

”We're making plans for something that could benefit not only Sweet Dreams but the whole town,” Samantha said earnestly.

There. She'd be fine. He'd known it all along.

This was a town full of fighters. It had been ever since the shutdown of the lumber mill and the relocation of the railroad left Icicle Falls in bad straits during the Depression. It'd been almost a ghost town by the fifties, but the people of Icicle Falls had self-administered CPR and spent the early sixties transforming their town into an Alpine village and haven for skiers. Sweet Dreams Chocolate Company was one of their success stories, weathering the hard times and giving the town a source of pride, and how it was founded had become a local legend. Like the other residents of Icicle Falls, Samantha Sterling was a fighter. She'd pull out of this.

”If we could have a little more time,” she added.

That again. So much for the false rosy picture he'd been painting. His morning coffee began churning up acid in his gut. ”I wish I could,” he said. And he did. No lie.

There went the eyebrow once more. ”Do you?”

Yes, d.a.m.n it. But what was he supposed to do, rob the bank for her? Did he look like a money tree with hundred-dollar bills sprouting out of his ears? ”Like I said before-”

”I don't think I want to hear what you said before,” she snapped. ”It was depressing the first time around.”

In under a minute she'd reduced him from six feet two to twelve inches, the world's smallest man with the world's smallest heart. ”If there's any other way I can help,” he began.

”You're helping enough,” she said coldly, and marched off to the order counter, her back stiff.

But not her tush. How did women manage to walk like that? Honky-tonk badonkadonk, mmm-mmm.

Nice, Preston, he scolded himself. You're about to take her business and you're thinking about her b.u.t.t. What kind of b.a.s.t.a.r.d did that make him? He supposed his ex-girlfriend would be glad to tell him.

There had been a superficial relations.h.i.+p that was doomed from the start. After they broke up he'd vowed to be more cautious and not let his common sense get anesthetized by a pretty face. Or a nice tush.

Talk about doomed relations.h.i.+ps... Samantha Sterling is not for you. Still...that didn't mean he couldn't step back and a.n.a.lyze her situation once again and maybe come to a new conclusion. Really, was the bank wise to be so hard-nosed to a business that played a vital part in the local economy?

He tossed his coffee and stepped out into the cold. Instead of returning to the bank he went down to Riverfront Park. With the exception of a couple of brave walkers the footpath was deserted. He took out his cell and dialed Darren Short, his district manager, all the while telling himself that he was not following Arnie over the cliff.

”Blake, how's it going?” Darren greeted him. ”Are you settling in?”

”Well enough,” Blake said. ”But now that I'm here I'm getting a bigger picture than we had on paper.”

”Oh?” Now Darren sounded cautious.

”Look, I think we need to reevaluate a few of these loans, especially the one to Sweet Dreams Chocolates.”

”Don't go soft on me now,” Darren said. ”You're up there to stop the hemorrhaging.”

”I know.”

”Then don't let me down. You're our wunderkind and we're depending on you to turn that branch around and make it an a.s.set for Cascade Mutual. h.e.l.l, the people who work up there are depending on you, too.”

”I have every intention of doing that, but-”

Darren cut him off. ”Good. I stuck my neck out for you. Don't make me regret it.”

”Don't worry, I'm doing my job,” Blake said. ”But part of that job involves evaluating the situation and-”

Darren cut him off again with a brusque, ”It's been evaluated and I'm sure I don't have to remind you of bank policy-to which you've already made an exception.”

”I haven't forgotten,” Blake said through gritted teeth.

”I'm glad to hear it. You can give me a full report when we meet on Friday.”

”I will.” In fact, Darren was going to get a much fuller report than he expected. One way or another Blake was now determined to make his boss see reason. He had to. He couldn't take living the rest of his life as the world's smallest man.

Samantha had been looking forward to a caramel latte all morning, but once she had it she took no more than two sips before throwing it out. She started back to the office but changed direction at the last minute, instead walking over to Gingerbread Haus, owned by her business buddy Ca.s.sandra Wilkes.

Between her visits to the bakery, and Ca.s.s's visits to Sweet Dreams it was inevitable that the women would become friends. In addition to a love of food and a pa.s.sion for business, they also seemed to share a common snark bone.

Ca.s.s was a single mom, now in her early forties, with three children. She'd come to town a bitter thirty-four-year-old divorcee with barely a penny to her name and went to work for Dot Morrison, who owned the Breakfast Haus restaurant. Dot had lent her the money to start her fantasyland bakery seven years ago and Ca.s.s had taken the money and run as fast as she could for success. She'd never looked back.

Samantha opened the door and was greeted with a rush of warm air carrying the scent of cinnamon and nutmeg. From behind the gla.s.s counter gingerbread cookies in every imaginable shape beckoned. Cream puff swans swam inside a refrigerator display case, along with German-style kuchen loaded with whipped cream. A huge gingerbread castle perched atop the counter and the shelves behind it displayed other examples of Ca.s.s's creativity.

Today she was in the kitchen, covered in flour and rolling out cookie dough for sugar cookie pizzas, but when she saw Samantha standing at the counter talking to her oldest daughter, twenty-year-old Danielle, she washed her hands, slipped off her ap.r.o.n and decided to take a coffee break.

Ca.s.s wasn't a bad-looking woman in spite of the fact that she tried her best to look bad. She never bothered with makeup and when her dark hair wasn't in a net it was pulled into a sloppy bun. She was thirty pounds overweight and proud of it, and she rarely dressed up beyond jeans and a sweats.h.i.+rt or T-s.h.i.+rt. But it was probably more her att.i.tude than her looks that kept her single. Where something about Muriel said, ”Call me,” Ca.s.s sent out signals that said, ”Don't even think about it.”

Now she regarded Samantha with that penetrating gaze of hers and said, ”Okay, who do you want to kill today?”

Samantha couldn't help smiling at her perceptiveness. ”Not my mother and not myself.”

”That's a step in the right direction,” Ca.s.s said as they settled at a corner table with some cake pops.

”But maybe the new bank manager.”

”I didn't get to the open house but I was in making a deposit this morning and saw our hometown boy.” Ca.s.s shook her head and smiled. ”I've gotta say, even though my ideal man is made of gingerbread, this one brought my hormones back to life for a minute there.”

”I always knew you were a cougar,” Samantha teased.