Total pages in book: 109
Estimated words: 101501 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 508(@200wpm)___ 406(@250wpm)___ 338(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 101501 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 508(@200wpm)___ 406(@250wpm)___ 338(@300wpm)
“Guilty about what?”
“Chance. Logan said Josh called a spade a spade, but he wouldn’t say anything more since he was told in confidence.”
Jamie’s eyes clouded over for a moment, then she nodded. “I bet it had to do with the other day. Gail saw Josh in a heated discussion with your big brother. Said Josh looked smug when he walked away.”
We didn’t see Chance in town that often, and when we did, we didn’t usually acknowledge him. The fact Josh had was a surprise. “You think he thinks it’s his fault Chance called in the loan?”
She shrugged. “Makes sense to me.”
I nodded in agreement. That would make complete sense to a fifteen-year-old.
“Have you heard back from Matt at the bank?”
I grabbed another bucket and filled it with salted peanuts still in their shell. We opened at noon, and with everything that happened that morning, I was running behind.
“He said he would call around to Bozeman and Billings, but it would take a few days.”
“Did he give you a sense that he could make it happen?”
Fear tried to grab hold, but I pushed it down. I was done being afraid. Fear wouldn’t keep my family together. “He said he was certain we could get a loan, but he wasn’t sure if it would be for the full amount.”
She paused wiping down a tabletop and looked up. “How much did Matt think you could borrow?”
“About half because of my lack of credit.”
She slumped into a chair and blew her hair out of her eyes. “I don’t understand how a private citizen can buy your loan. Aren’t there rules or something? He isn’t a financial institution, and you didn’t sign anything saying you would pay him back. Maybe you could take him to court? Say he paid the loan off as a gift.”
Just thinking about it revved up my anxiety, so I forced it down with a deep breath and shook my head. “I asked Matt the same question. He says the loan states they can sell it at any time to another financial institution. That Chance had his attorney file paperwork months ago, so one of his companies passed as a financial institution in order to buy our loan. The bastard’s been ready to step in for months.”
“But there have to be rules. He can’t just give you thirty days if it’s a thirty-year note.”
“Probably, who knows how any of it works, but our problem is that it wasn’t a mortgage. They had two buyers at the time Dad bought the bar. To secure the sale quickly, Dad took out a line of credit. But when Dad got sick, everything changed.”
The mere thought of losing everything caused a burst of adrenalin to dump through my system. I curled my fingers around the edge of the table while I tried to slow my heart rate. Needing to center myself on an object to control my fear, I glanced around until my eyes landed on Rocky, the moose behind the bar. I tried to focus on his eyes, but all I could think about was the day my dad had hung him. How we’d joked about putting Christmas ornaments on his antlers and tying a bow of garland around his neck. That bittersweet memory sped my heart up instead of slowing it so I darted my attention to the stage. My eyes traveled up to Edger and his stupid tasseled hat and I tried to focus on the muted colors. I unfocused my eyes until all I saw was a kaleidoscope of color, but that didn’t work either because I remembered my father wearing that stupid tasseled hat on his head while he hung Edger above the stage. I tore my eyes away, desperate to focus on anything that didn’t remind me of my father, and they landed on Logan. My heart rate began to calm within seconds as I remembered how he’d known exactly what to do to calm my fears that morning. How he’d come to my rescue on the highway. How he’d handled my brothers, and taken care of Josh as if he’d been doing it every day of his life.
“Hey, are you okay?”
I gritted my teeth and nodded as my heart rate slowed further, not taking my eyes off Logan until I was in full control. I wouldn’t let this fear beat me. Not again. Never again. “It was only supposed to be temporary,” I answered, ignoring her concern, shoving off the table to keep moving and burn off some of the adrenalin, “but Dad got sick, so Matt looked the other way and extended the loan for another couple of years. We made monthly payments like a mortgage, but the principal was due at the end of each loan term. It’s up next month, but instead of applying for a new loan Matt agreed to extend the loan again since I was covering the payments.”