Page 68 of Texas Glory
“Then the hotel … it will be yours as well?”
“Ours. But I’ll be a silent partner.”
“What does that mean?’
“You’re free to do whatever you want with the hotel. Make it into whatever you want it to be, and I’ll keep my mouth shut. But if you ever want an opinion on something, I’ll be here.”
She folded her hands in her lap and stared at them.
“Nothing has changed, Dee.”
“Everything has changed,” she said quietly. She lifted her gaze to his. “What if I want the hotel to take up two of these spaces on the map?”
He raised a brow. “Two spaces?”
She nodded. “I want it to be a grand hotel. When people pass through here, I want them to talk about it.”
He walked back to the desk. “Then mark off another block.”
Smiling, she dipped the pen into the inkwell and with deliberate strokes, wrote her name in a space on the map. She peered up at him. “What if I want three?”
“I have some plans for the town, too.”
She leaned forward. “What are your plans?”
Her question echoed through his heart. He’d felt slighted when she hadn’t shared her plans with him before, and what had he shared with her? Not one damn thing.
He sat, placed his elbow on the wooden arm of the chair, and brushed his mustache. He’d only ever told people what they needed to know in order to get the job done. He couldn’t recall ever telling anyone everything he hoped for.
“Uh, well, I’ve got a newspaperman interested in coming to Leighton.”
Her eyes widened. “A newspaper? We’ll have a newspaper?”
He liked the way she’d said “we.”
“Yeah, we’ll have a newspaper. He’ll be able to do announcements and post bulletins for people.”
“What will the paper be called?”
“The Leighton Leader.”
“What else?”
“A mortician.”
She visibly shuddered.
“People die,” he said.
She looked back at the map and traced her finger along the lines that represented streets.
“McGirk, Tipton, Phillipy …” Her voice trailed off, leaving the names of so many other streets unspoken. “Who did you name these streets after?”
He stopped stroking his mustache. His mind suddenly filled with the sounds of cannons, explosions, and gunfire. “Men I sent to their deaths,” he said quietly. “They were boys really, more afraid of me than they were of the enemy.” He lifted a shoulder. “Naming the streets after them is my way of remembering them, honoring them.”
“You weren’t very old during the war.”
“Few soldiers were.”
