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“From where?”
“New Onyx.”
“What a downgrade for you.” I straighten my cuff. “Did you piss someone off at Corporate?”
Harold chuckles. “Actually, I requested it to make my wife happy. Her folks live here.”
“Ah. She was raised here?”
Harold nods. “She was.”
“Her name?”
Harold quirks an eyebrow, but answers. “Natalie. Her maiden name was Johnson.”
I nod, searching my memory for Natalie Johnson. Ah. I recall her. Quiet, very smart. Blended into the background and avoided trouble. She’s safe.
“I went to high school here,” I explain. “I wondered if I knew your wife back then.”
“Oh? Did you?”
“I don’t think so. Anyway, the reason I’m here.”
“Yes.” Harold straightens his shoulders.
“I need a list of all commercial and residential properties for sale, to include any potentially risky properties such as foreclosures.”
Harold appears startled by my request. “Why wouldn’t you seek a real estate agent for your request instead of a bank?”
“Because I do not want to. This bank has records on every property in town, and I’m told, owns many of them since the town has fallen on hard times. Is this accurate?”
“Uh, yes,” he answers, now flustered as his cheeks redden and he shuffles a few folders around on his desk. “But we have an agent—”
“Mr. Turner. Harold. Let me be clear. I intend to work directly with the bank. I am a cash buyer and will not stand for unnecessary red tape.” I lean across the desk. “I am going to save this town, Harold, and I’m going to do it my way. Surely your superiors will be pleased to move these properties off your books?”
Harold swallows hard, and I can hear his quickening heartbeat from where I sit. He nods. “Y-yes. One moment. I’ll get the list.”
He hurries from his office, leaving me alone and amused. Step one: buy all the empty and struggling properties. If this town is anything like it was, word will spread fast, and by tomorrow morning, everyone will have heard about this.
Harold returns a few minutes later with several sheets of paper in his hands. As he sits in his chair, he forces a nervous smile onto his face. “I can give you the list, but you’ll need an agent to tour the properties.”
“Touring isn’t necessary.”
I take the papers from him, flipping through them. Almost all of Main Street is vacant or close to it. The only car dealership the town had is closed. There are two pages of commercial properties.
“I heard there were some developers here three years ago who abandoned the projects?”
Harold shifts in his chair. “Uh, yes, sir. They had a disagreement that couldn’t be resolved by the then mayor of town, Garrett Landon.”
The name still makes my chest tighten with stress. The bane of my teenage existence. “What is Garrett up to these days?”
Harold visibly blanches as if the name makes him as uneasy as it does me. “He owns the only still-operating factory in town. In the former commercial district.”
“Former?”
“Everyone pulled out after the developers left town. Most of them moved to New Onyx or Clearbrook, a new suburb east of here.”
“I see. Do people blame Garrett for the conditions in town?”
