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Prologue
Boise, Idaho
April 18, 1985
Chase McEnroe stared down at the cashier’s check, greatly annoyed. Distrust darkened his clear blue eyes. Two-hundred-thousand dollars. More money than he’d made in all of his thirty-two years and it was being handed to him on a silver platter. Or with strings attached.
“So what’s the catch?” he asked cautiously as he dropped the slip of paper onto his letter strewn desk. Ironically the check settled on a stack of invoices that were already sixty days past due.
“No catch,” Caleb Johnson replied with a satisfied smile. “We’ve been over all this before, and everything’s spelled out in the contract.” The older man grinned encouragingly and thumped the partnership agreement with his fingers. “I trust you had your attorney go over it.”
Chase stared straight at Caleb’s ruddy face and nodded, but still he frowned and his chiseled features didn’t relax. His tanned skin was drawn tight over angular cheekbones, square jaw and hollow cheeks.
“Let’s just say that I don’t trust strangers bearing gifts.”
“It’s not a gift. I own fifty percent of your company if you take the money.”
Ah, there it was: the trap!
Rubbing a hand wearily over his beard-roughened jaw, Chase stood and walked over to the window of his small office, which was little more than a used construction trailer. He poured a cup of coffee from the glass pot sitting on a hot plate beneath the window.
“I don’t like partners,” Chase said almost to himself as he glared through the dusty glass to the empty parking lot. Sagebrush and grass were growing through the cracks of the splitting asphalt, as if to remind him how much he needed Caleb Johnson’s money.
“The way I understand it, you could use a partner right now.”
“How’s that?”
“Didn’t most of your staff walk off the job five weeks ago?”
Chase didn’t answer. Instead he frowned into his chipped coffee cup. But Caleb’s point had struck home; the unconscious tightening of Chase’s jaw gave his anger away.
“And aren’t they planning to start a rival company in Twin Falls with a man named Eric Conway as president?” Johnson added.
“There’s a rumor to that effect,” Chase replied tightly.
“So they’ve got the expertise, the money to back their project, the manpower to work efficiently and all the contracts that you worked ten years to develop. Right?”
“Maybe.” Chase felt his muscles bunch with tension. The deceit of his best friend still felt like a ball of lead in his stomach. He’d trusted Eric Conway with his life, and the man had kicked him in the gut.
“So, the way I see it, you’re just about out of options.”
“Not quite.” Chase took a long swallow from his coffee and set the cup on the windowsill. “I still like being the boss.”
“You would be.” Caleb smiled and shrugged his broad shoulders. “Think of me as a silent partner.”
“So what’s in it for you?”
“Your guarantee that when I’m ready with the resort—”
“Summer Ridge?”
“Right. I’ll let you know, then you can come up to Martinville and make Grizzly Creek viable for trout. When the job’s complete, I’ll pay you by returning twenty-five percent of Relive, Inc., just the way it’s outlined in the agreement.” Satisfied that he’d taken care of everything, Caleb pointed a fleshy finger at the document.
“And what about the final twenty-five percent?” Chase asked, his blue eyes narrowing.
“Oh, that you’ll have to buy back.”
“For a substantial profit over what you paid,” Chase guessed.
“Market value. Whatever that is.”
“Sounds fair enough,” Chase thought aloud. Not only had he looked for catches in the agreement, but he’d had his attorney poring over the documents for two weeks. Everything appeared legal. And too good to be true.
He returned to his chair, glanced again at the check on the thick pile of invoices and then studied the slightly heavyset man in front of him. He’d never laid eyes on Johnson before in his life, and suddenly the man was here, in his office, offering him a godsend.
“So why me?” Chase finally asked. “Why not go with Conway’s outfit?”
The easy Montana smile widened across Caleb Johnson’s face. “Two reasons I suppose—you’ve got a track record and, even though you’re slightly overextended right now, you plow all of your money back into the operation of Relive. Unless Conway was the brains behind this operation, you’re the best in the business.”
“And the other reason?”
Caleb Johnson’s eyes glittered a watery blue. “I knew your mother,” he said with a reflective grin.
Something in the older man’s voice brought Chase’s head up. His gaze narrowed speculatively on the big man. “I never heard her speak of you,” he drawled.
“It was a long time ago,” Caleb replied. He tugged thoughtfully on his lower lip and gauged Chase’s reaction. “Before you were born.”
“And that was enough to convince you?”
“Any son of Ella Simpson had to be a scrapper.”
“Her name was Ella McEnroe,” Chase said slowly.
