Summer In Stanton (Stanton Falls #3) by Kaci Hart Page B

than a minute or two.  He had to hold
his tongue.  There was a part of him that truly wanted to tell her that
she could take her annoying attitude and leave his bed and breakfast.
 Instead he shook his head as he watched her.    

 
    “Hello?  Oh never
mind.  This is a stupid waste of time.  Let’s go.”

 
    For his part the old
man, most likely her husband, was trying his best to keep her in check.
  Chances are he was used to this kind of behavior.  

 
    “Calm down Dorothy.”

 
    “Don’t you tell me to
calm down Jack.  I told you we should have gone to that big place we saw
on the way here but you wanted quaint and cozy.  You need to listen to me
sometimes.  As you can see, that equals poor service.   Now
let’s go.”

 
    Connor saw the resigned look
on the man’s face as he grabbed his bag and turned towards the exit.
 Connor sighed before putting on his most welcoming face.  As
unpleasant as it may be, he needed to keep them there rather than letting them
take the twenty-mile drive that he hated.  

 
    “Hi there.  Sorry
for the wait.  Can I help you?”

 
    “Not now.  Two
minutes ago you could have but I don’t have time for this backwater town.
 Excuse us.”

 
    Connor didn’t try to
stop them.  He was pretty sure of where they were going and it was probably
more their speed than The Cammelia.   She wanted to go to one of the
cookie cutter, frequent stayer, chain hotels in the town next door.  He
didn’t have anything against the big chains. They had their place with the
corporate types or people that were making a stop on their drive to one of the
major cities.  

 
    Those were never his
customers.   He catered to the people who wanted to get away from all that.  The problem was that it seemed like less people were
looking for what his place had to offer.  Recently it had gotten pretty
bad and the traffic to the bed and breakfast had become practically
nonexistent.  He had to stop it or The Cammelia would go out of business
permanently and he couldn’t let that happen.   

 
    It had been in his
family for generations.  The inn, as well as his family, had been a
mainstay of the very close town since his grandfather bought the old great
house.  It was named after his wife whom he constantly called the single
love of his life.  Despite all of its rich history in the area, the bed
and breakfast had fallen on hard times.   In a community so loyal,
most local businesses did well because everyone bought from one another.
 That was a major problem for Connor.  

 
    Call it whatever, but a
bed and breakfast is nothing more than a hotel and in Stanton Falls that meant
a great majority of their business had been historically based on travelers
looking for a small town getaway.  For the past year and a half, tourism
in the area slowed down and the inn was going through a serious drought.  

 
    Of course, Connor did
have options.  He could have sold the place to Mr. Anderlien the hotel
renovator and developer.  The problem was that he didn’t like the man at
all.  Anderlien wanted to modernize the place but Connor wasn’t stupid.  He
knew that was code for tearing down the building and replacing it with all the
cutting edge technology and design.  Basically, guys like him would rip
the heart out of the bed and breakfast and make it no different than the big
chains.  While it may make more money, it wasn’t what Connor wanted.
 There was no way he was going to sell.  His pride simply wouldn’t
allow it.  

 
    That’s why Connor had
taken on every task he could to make things work.  Still, he was having a
hard time with it.  If the fact that he was behind on most of the bills
wasn’t enough, he hadn’t been making enough money to pay for the upkeep of the
place so it felt like it was falling apart bit by bit.  If he just had the
money, he could fix the worn down parts of the building but that still
wouldn’t change the sad