established those boundaries, she gathered charts, maps, and graphs, studied water tables, terrain, and climates. Depending on the type of resort they were considering, summer, winter or a combination, she made her initial recommendations and then went to scout out the place.
That’s where it got interesting, living in the town for two or three months, finding out who was in charge, and it was never the mayor, who had an alliance or a relationship to whom, who could be persuaded, who needed money. These were things you couldn’t find out from studying a piece of paper, you had to get in the trenches, imbed yourself among them, kind of like a computer virus, absorbing information, collecting data without anyone’s knowledge but unlike the virus that corrupts and destroys, Alex thought of her methods as a way to help those who couldn’t or didn’t know how to help themselves. Consider the widowed part-time Super Duper cashier who’d never been farther than an hour from her home. Buying up her property enabled her to go on a cruise with her women friends and purchase a condo near her son in North Carolina. Or the fifty-year old man who’d been laboring in the same factory for thirty-two years. He sold his land, moved his family to a suburb outside of Jacksonville, Florida and opened up a pizza shop.
With research, care and timing, everybody got what they wanted. In the seven years she’d been involved with the property research division of WEC Management, there’d only been two times when an individual had refused to sell. The first happened years ago, when Alex had just taken over the division. There was a farmer in Roanoke, Virginia, Leon “Rusty” Dade, who owned fifty acres of land. He farmed some, rented out some, and kept the biggest section for his most prized possessions, his Black Angus. And no amount of cash incentives could persuade Rusty to sell. The land was his legacy, could be traced all the way back to his great-granddaddy’s granddaddy, and would be his five children’s legacy, too. The last Alex inquired, a year ago, Rusty was still farming and ranching and living out his legacy.
The only other time anyone had refused a WEC Management offer was two years ago when its chief competitor, Cora Ltd., slid in and bought up a track of land an hour from Portland, Oregon. Alex had been sure WEC would get the deal, had been shocked when they didn’t. Until she heard that the CEO’s son, Sam Cora, was keeping very close company with Lilly Arbogast, whose father, Jed, owned thirty-five of the fifty acres in question. And it didn’t surprise anyone, except maybe Lilly, that once the deal was done, so was Lilly.
“So do you want to tell me about the next venture?” Uncle Walter asked, straightening his gray silk tie.
This was when she felt the closest to her uncle, here, in this room, pouring over charts and graphs, watching his eyes spark with interest as she drew him into the planning stages of a certain piece of property, considering and discussing all of its possibilities. The usual stern expression on his face smoothed out, the brackets around his mouth faded, and he seemed almost… relaxed. If you could call a man who spent six and a half days at the office, had his hair trimmed every five days, and never went anywhere without at least a sport coat, relaxed. There was a oneness here, a unity, intangible yet real, that bound them to each other when they were planning a project. Alex felt it, he had to feel it too. So, maybe her uncle didn’t say the words, but she knew he cared. When he nodded his silver head in agreement, she felt like a child on a hot summer’s day, who’d just been given an ice cream cone. Delight. Pure delight.
“Alex? Plan on keeping it all to yourself?”
“No.” She laughed, ran a hand through her hair. “Actually, I think I may have found the ideal location for our next project.” She tried to control her excitement but it burst out, “A year round
That’s where it got interesting, living in the town for two or three months, finding out who was in charge, and it was never the mayor, who had an alliance or a relationship to whom, who could be persuaded, who needed money. These were things you couldn’t find out from studying a piece of paper, you had to get in the trenches, imbed yourself among them, kind of like a computer virus, absorbing information, collecting data without anyone’s knowledge but unlike the virus that corrupts and destroys, Alex thought of her methods as a way to help those who couldn’t or didn’t know how to help themselves. Consider the widowed part-time Super Duper cashier who’d never been farther than an hour from her home. Buying up her property enabled her to go on a cruise with her women friends and purchase a condo near her son in North Carolina. Or the fifty-year old man who’d been laboring in the same factory for thirty-two years. He sold his land, moved his family to a suburb outside of Jacksonville, Florida and opened up a pizza shop.
With research, care and timing, everybody got what they wanted. In the seven years she’d been involved with the property research division of WEC Management, there’d only been two times when an individual had refused to sell. The first happened years ago, when Alex had just taken over the division. There was a farmer in Roanoke, Virginia, Leon “Rusty” Dade, who owned fifty acres of land. He farmed some, rented out some, and kept the biggest section for his most prized possessions, his Black Angus. And no amount of cash incentives could persuade Rusty to sell. The land was his legacy, could be traced all the way back to his great-granddaddy’s granddaddy, and would be his five children’s legacy, too. The last Alex inquired, a year ago, Rusty was still farming and ranching and living out his legacy.
The only other time anyone had refused a WEC Management offer was two years ago when its chief competitor, Cora Ltd., slid in and bought up a track of land an hour from Portland, Oregon. Alex had been sure WEC would get the deal, had been shocked when they didn’t. Until she heard that the CEO’s son, Sam Cora, was keeping very close company with Lilly Arbogast, whose father, Jed, owned thirty-five of the fifty acres in question. And it didn’t surprise anyone, except maybe Lilly, that once the deal was done, so was Lilly.
“So do you want to tell me about the next venture?” Uncle Walter asked, straightening his gray silk tie.
This was when she felt the closest to her uncle, here, in this room, pouring over charts and graphs, watching his eyes spark with interest as she drew him into the planning stages of a certain piece of property, considering and discussing all of its possibilities. The usual stern expression on his face smoothed out, the brackets around his mouth faded, and he seemed almost… relaxed. If you could call a man who spent six and a half days at the office, had his hair trimmed every five days, and never went anywhere without at least a sport coat, relaxed. There was a oneness here, a unity, intangible yet real, that bound them to each other when they were planning a project. Alex felt it, he had to feel it too. So, maybe her uncle didn’t say the words, but she knew he cared. When he nodded his silver head in agreement, she felt like a child on a hot summer’s day, who’d just been given an ice cream cone. Delight. Pure delight.
“Alex? Plan on keeping it all to yourself?”
“No.” She laughed, ran a hand through her hair. “Actually, I think I may have found the ideal location for our next project.” She tried to control her excitement but it burst out, “A year round
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