Page 1 of Fall for You
Chapter One
From 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 wordsback in my dayto 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.
