Will snickered. “Well, that’s never going to happen. I’m sure our father’s—”
She interrupted him. “It doesn’t matter. Mr. Remington. When the bank orders an appraisal, it’s to make sure the bank isn’t making a bad investment. And while your business records and credit scores are impeccable, you still don’t have enough collateral for the bank to feel at ease in giving you the loan amount you’re asking for.”
A thought occurred to me. “What if we lowered the amount of the loan?”
Bryce leaned over to my ear. “We can’t afford a higher down payment.”
I waved him away. “According to our assets, what dollar amount for the loan are we eligible for.”
I heard her typing away at her desk before she spoke. “The loan would have to be amended to somewhere between 2.5 and 3.5 million.”
Will whispered. “We’d need at least a million more, and that’s for the 3.5.”
Bryce sighed. “We could see if Uncle Ryan might be willing to front us the money.”
I felt my heart drop to my toes as I shook my head. “No, he’s got enough on his plate right now with things. Can you reprocess our paperwork for that loan amount?”
“I can certainly amend it, but the process will start all over. It’ll go back to your loan officer where he’ll check all the papers, the three of you will have to sign amended documents, and then the loan will have to go back into underwriting.”
I was ready to pull my fucking hair out. “That sounds wonderful. We’d greatly appreciate it.”
“Great! I’ll keep you updated via email, but I’ll get this paperwork back to your loan officer. You should be hearing from him by the end of the day.”
I nodded slowly. “I appreciate it, Miss Branfield.”
“Of course. I’m sorry it wasn’t better news. Good luck!”
We’re going to need it. “Thanks.”
Bryce hung up the phone and tossed it back to me as Will stretched his arms over his head.
“So, prematurely celebrating hasn’t ever really been our style,” he said.
I rolled my eyes. “We don’t need jokes. We need ideas. How are we going to come up with the other million?”
Bryce shrugged. “We’ll easily have it with the selling of the building in Houston.”
I shook my head slowly. “I don’t think we should bank on that just yet.”
Will paused. “Why not?”
“Before that call, Mr. Derecho called me. Our top three properties are already off the market.”
Bryce rubbed the back of his neck. “You’re kidding.”
I shook my head. “Nope. So, the money we get from the sale—”
“—is going to have to go to improvements and remodels. Just fucking grand,” Will said.
Bryce groaned. “What if we posed the issue to our investors?”
I scoffed. “And risk them backing out? We’d be screwed if that happened. No, no, I’m not comfortable tipping those scales.”
Will shook his head. “Then, what the hell are we going to do?”
Bryce placed his hand on my shoulder. “How long do we have to decide from the three remaining refinery properties.”
I chuckled bitterly. “I told Mr. Derecho I’d call him back before dinner.”
“Jesus,” Will whispered.
I shrugged. “The only way I see this panning out is if I go back to Houston to personally oversee the loan process so I can find other realtors in the area.”
Bryce furrowed his brow. “Realtors? Why?”
I held out my arms. “Look at what just happened! In the blink of an eye, we lost our top three properties. And I’m sorry, but none of the other three properties are anywhere near what we need. Our only hope is to find an abandoned refinery or something either in Houston or on the coast. And that requires me to travel back.”
Will shook his head. “We were supposed to bring this business back to Conroe. We promised Dad we would.”
I shrugged. “Well, sometimes shit doesn’t pan out the way we want.”
I looked back at the house and saw Willow standing on the porch with the kids. Sadie stood there with her hand on her back and her other hand planted on the top of her rotund stomach. But, Luna was nowhere to be found. I knew that if I had to go back to Houston, I’d be gone for days. Possibly weeks. And while I knew I needed to tend to my office and my career there, I didn’t like how much time I’d be spending away from Luna.
I turned to Bryce. “If you came with me to Houston, we could knock this out in three weeks. I’m sure of it.”
He shook his head. “I can help from this end, but Willow needs my help here with the kids.”
Will nodded. “Especially now that Sadie’s about to pop.”
Bryce motioned to Will. “And he can’t go for obvious reasons.”
I started grasping at straws. “I mean, he’d only be a thirty-minute plane ride back.”
Will glared at me. “Are you serious right now?”
I raked my hands through my hair. “Well, I’m sorry you two decided to run off and play house in the middle of us expanding our family’s company. But that wasn’t my decision.”
Maybe Luna’s right.
Bryce put his hands on my shoulders. “We can always put this off a year or two.”
Will ruffled my hair. “Yeah. We can always put this on hold—or press pause—until we have our feet underneath us again.”
Maybe this thing between Luna and me was always supposed to be temporary.
“No, no. It’s fine. I’ll go to Houston and work it out,” I said.
Bryce looked into my eyes. “Are you sure about that?”
I shrugged. “That’s the only way it’s going to get done. And we promised an entire town we’d find a way to make this work. Even if the refinery doesn’t come here, we still have our new headquarters here, which will bring our conferences with it.”
Will nodded. “That’ll breathe a least a little bit of life into this place.”
I continued with my train of thought. “And eventually—when we do expand—we can expand to one of the smaller properties here. Or even build our own. The refinery plant doesn’t have to be built here. There are other facets of the business we can always bring to Conroe.”
Bryce murmured. “But, that’ll keep you in Houston. Away from family.”
I shrugged. “Sometimes, you gotta do whatcha gotta do.”
But even though I tried consoling my brothers, what they didn’t know was how quickly my mind was racing. How much my palms were sweating. How much my heart was breaking.
What they didn’t know was that I had started to regret every decision I’d ever made that had brought me to this point.
14
Luna
Every time I went out somewhere, I felt myself looking over my shoulder. Every time I made a trip somewhere, it felt like everyone was staring at me. Every sound in the dark made me jump. Every creak in the floorboards made my eyes water. I hated feeling this way. I hated feeling so scared and so paranoid every time I left the guesthouse and traveled out into the world.