“Oh, that’s wonderful!” she exclaimed, clapping her hands together. “I’ve always thought some nice new lace curtains would work wonders to—”
“Thank you, Mrs. Banning,” Archie said, quickly patting her on the shoulder and closing the door. He turned back to me just as quickly. “Are you always this crass when you speak to a boss?”
“My boss is your father, and he hasn’t made me nearly as irritated as you have.”
“Ms. Morgan, let me tell you—”
I held up my hand. “Stop. Literally, stop. I’d love to go another ten rounds with you on who’s got the bigger dick, but honestly—”
“If that’s actually in question, then perhaps you have something to tell me that’s not visually apparent?”
“—it’s time to get some work done. Since we seem to be unable to get through a conversation without actually deciding something before the fighting begins, I’m going to tell you everything I think we need to be doing to turn this place around. Since we seem to be unable to stay on topic when we’re both allowed to speak, here’s what I propose. You will listen, you will not speak, and when I am done you may ask questions, but not before. Agreed?”
He fumed. He nodded.
“First, we revise. The hotel closes for ten weeks each winter, which we’ve already discussed. I’ve got a formal proposal I’ll email to you for review—it has all the details on how to handle staffing changes, existing reservations, all that fun stuff that we could argue over for hours or you can just read it, digest it, and then tell me what a genius I am.”
He opened his mouth, and I pointed at him. “Nope, not done.”
He closed his mouth. He fumed. He nodded.
“Second, the room renovations. When I said stuffy, I probably could’ve used another word. How about ‘dated’? I don’t want to get rid of any of the antiques, I agree they’re beautiful and perfect and the workmanship is exquisite and all the other platitudes that begin and end with ‘they don’t make ’em like that anymore.’ So they stay. Some of them. Some of them could maybe be repurposed. Did you know you can take antique bedsteads and convert them into modern sizes to fit a mattress made today? And for some, maybe it’s time to say bye-bye. Can you imagine how much fun selling off some of this stuff would be? Own a piece of Bryant Mountain House history, or something like that. The point is, even the antiques that stay don’t have to necessarily live in the land of flower and doily. I have a designer in mind who I think would be perfect for the job. She worked on a hotel redesign in California that is stunning and could be very much in line with the DNA of Bryant Mountain House.”
He opened his mouth, thought about it, then closed it again.
“If you were going to say anything about how in the world could I possibly know the DNA of this place in the short time I’ve been here, save it. It’s my job to know the DNA, okay? I’ve got this.”
Onward he fumed. Onward he nodded.
“Third, we revive. I want to bring Natalie in, make a bigger pitch for this place to be featured more prominently in the Bailey Falls campaign. While you were mentioned briefly in the initial rollout, I want us front and center in the second phase. Fourth, I want to bring in the community, get them more involved in this place. Chad mentioned to me the other night that he thought the town council would be really receptive to any promotions we wanted to do, and I’d like to talk to him again about it, feel him out. Holidays are a huge deal up here for your loyal guests, I’d like to make it part of the greater Bailey Falls experience as well. Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, all of it. Easter is right around the corner, let’s really go to town. You’ve talked to Roxie about bringing her Zombie Cakes in—do it. And while you’re at it, bring up Leo to help overhaul your summer garden, you could even sponsor a farmers’ market up here in the summer, get people up here to see what it’s like. Hell, let Oscar move some cows onto . . . well . . . no . . . cows can stink up the joint . . . but at least keep his butter in stock. The whole country is going gangbusters for locally grown, sustainably grown food, and you literally have producers in your backyard. Make it happen. You’ve priced this town right out of the mix for the most part, no one who lives around here can actually afford to stay up here, and that’s no good. You could be filling up this place in the off-season with local residents, and that’s exactly what we’re going to do.”
I stopped to breathe. He wasn’t fuming or nodding anymore, just listening.
“Finally, the last thing I want to mention today. Rejuvenate. Price reductions. Yes, this is a luxury hotel catering to a luxury clientele, and I don’t want to lose that experience. But I think we can work on the pricing at slower times of the year, implement a resident pricing system where we offer deep discounts for local residents, and start building up and going after the corporate retreat business. It used to be something this hotel was heavily involved with, and then after ’08 it slowed down to the point where now it’s almost nonexistent. We can get it back, I know we can. But we need to be competitive on pricing. After a few years, when things are on the upswing, you can revisit it. But for now, we need to dig deep.” I stopped, knowing I’d just thrown a lot of information at him all at once.
The only sound was the rain, which had changed from a pitter-patter to a full-on gusher. It was coming down so hard it was eclipsing every other sound. Outside the mountains were gone, everything was gone, the rain like a wall, literally a sheet of water pouring down, blurring the outside world and trapping us inside.
He walked over to the window, looking out at that wall of water, then back at me, and then scrubbed his hands over his face like he was trying to scrape it all away. It was a lot to take in. Everything would change.
“Are you done?” he asked, his voice muffled by his hands and by the rain.
“For now,” I replied, rocking on my heels a bit.
He took a step, then another, then another, until he was standing just in front of me, looking down. His eyes were serious, searching, poring over every inch of my face. I waited, giving him time to let this all sink in. He’d need to think about this, weigh some options, look at everything I’d presented. Which is why what he said next surprised the hell out of me.
“I’m in. Let’s do it.”
My breath let out in a whoosh. “What? Which part?”
“All of it,” he said, shaking his head even so. “Except the part about the staffing. We’ll need to work something out. Cash out some vacation, extend some vacation, hell, I’ll even stop taking a salary for a while, but I’m not letting anyone go.”
“That’s generous.”
He offered me a rueful smile. “What can I say, they’re family. You know how it is with family.”