Flippin’ Cowboy by Ophelia Sexton
Chapter 3: Cold Comfort
Winnie perked up. “That place is still standing?”
On her trips home, she’d noticed the Snowberry Springs Inn falling into ruin. After its latest owner passed away without a will, it had closed down. His relatives then spent years fighting over the property, which stood vacant on the outskirts of town.
The large nineteenth-century brick building housing the inn had once belonged to Winnie’s several times great-grandmother, Caroline Snowberry, who had helped found Snowberry Springs. After Caroline’s death, it had passed through several owners before becoming The Snowberry Springs Inn & Resort sometime during the 1960s.
“Yes, and I recently purchased it in hopes of renovating it before the LVR arrives next spring,” Grandma replied. “It’s a beautiful old place, but time hasn’t been kind to it.”
“What’s an LVR?” Karla asked, puzzled.
“Stands for the Livingston Vintage Railroad. It’s an old steam train with restored antique carriages that’ll be ferrying tourists from Livingston down to the North Entrance of Yellowstone,” Dad explained. “It’ll have a bus connection from the Bozeman Airport to the old railroad depot in Livingston and stops in Snowberry Springs and a few of our neighboring towns in Paradise Valley.”
“I’m hoping it’ll revive our Airbnb business,” Mom said.
The Snowberry Springs Ranch had ten guest cabins that Mom and Dad rented out during the summer months to earn extra income.
The idea of going home to Snowberry Springs for a while to escape the storm of negative publicity sounded great to Winnie. She needed time to figure out her next step.
“Just to be clear, you’re asking Winnie to take on a restoration project for a historic building in her hometown?” Karla asked slowly.
“Yes!” Grandma Abigail said. “And Winnie would do a great job, don’t you think?”
“Absolutely.” Karla brightened. “And you know what? It’s also the perfect pitch for The Renovation Channel. I’m sure the execs will be on board for a Winnie redemption show, especially if it involves restoring a historic inn in her cute mountain hometown.” She turned to Winnie, her dark eyes sparkling and her cheeks flushed under her smooth brown complexion. “What do you think, Winnie?”
“I really love the idea,” Winnie said with genuine enthusiasm. Rescuing the old building called to her.
Besides, she needed a project that would keep her too busy to think about Geoff and her wedding day humiliation.
And there was one more benefit. “Best of all, this project will take me seven hundred and fifty miles away from Geoff and Melanie,” she added. “Count me in.”
“Oh, that’s wonderful, Winnie,” Grandma Abigail beamed at her. “I bought that building five years ago, and I always thought you should be the one to bring it back to life. But then you got the deal for that TV show, and it’s kept you so very busy.”
“Would you excuse me one more time?” Karla asked, rising from her seat. “I need to make a few calls.”
Winnie downed her second mimosa, then pulled her plate closer. The bacon and fluffy scrambled eggs were suddenly looking good again.
Brunch was over and the kids were helping to clear the table by the time Karla returned. This time, she was smiling.
“Great news!” she declared, as Brock came around to top up everyone’s coffee. “The execs agreed to finance a new show covering the inn’s restoration. We’re calling it Winnie’s Hometown Inn Project for now, but the name may change later.”
“Oh, my!” Grandma Abigail clapped her hands, her eyes bright under her impeccably styled silver hair. “That’s wonderful! Having Snowberry Springs featured on TV is bound to bring in lots of visitors, don’t you think, Bob and Priscilla?”
Winnie’s parents nodded. “Sounds great,” Mom said.
“There’s just one teeny thing,” Karla said.
Winnie instantly went on high alert. She recognized her producer’s tone and expression. Karla was about to drop some kind of bombshell.
“The network execs green-lighted the project on one condition. We need to bring Nick Evans on board to work with Winnie.”
“No way,” Winnie groaned.
The Evans were one of Montana’s oldest and wealthiest families. They’d grown rich from their copper mines over a century ago, when the big cities back east started wiring buildings and streets for newfangled electric lights and telephones.
More recently, Nick Evans had made a name for himself as a historic preservationist and outspoken critic of The Renovation Channel.
In its first season, Restoring Seattle had been a frequent target for his ire. Newspapers and blog articles had widely reprinted his scathing remarks about Geoff’s design decisions on a Queen Anne Victorian restoration, catapulting Evans to online expert status.
Winnie had come under fire a few episodes later, after choosing to demolish the original termite and dry rot-riddled kitchen and butler’s pantry in a Gothic Revival house and replace them with a single large, open-plan kitchen her clients wanted. Evans had called her “one of those fake celebrity flippers butchering our country’s architectural heritage.”
Her burst of excitement and relief evaporated. She felt like Karla had just yanked the rug out from under her feet.
“Well, I guess that means our new show is doomed,” she said in a monotone. “There’s no chance in hell this guy will want to work with me.”
But Grandma Abigail only smiled serenely. “Leave it to me, dear.”
Karla nodded in agreement. “Don’t worry about a thing, Winnie. I intend to make Mr. Evans an offer he can’t refuse.”
∞∞∞
Snowberry Springs, MontanaThree weeks later
“So, what do you think?” Grandma Abigail asked eagerly as she and Winnie made their way down to the ground floor of the former Snowberry Springs Inn & Resort.
The wide wooden stairs, with their beautiful Victorian bannisters and carved newel post, were one of the few remaining original features in the building.
Unfortunately, each tread emitted alarming creaks and bounced slightly underfoot with each step Winnie took. She made a mental note to contact Brock’s friend Jason, who owned a carpentry business here in town, and ask him to evaluate the structural integrity of the staircase.
“Would you be able to complete the renovation before our first Vintage Railroad Festival in June?” Grandma continued, her breath puffing in white clouds in the gloom of the building’s decrepit interior. “I think that would be the perfect time for the inn’s grand reopening.”
Between college and working with Geoff at Snowberry & Schaefer Renovations, Winnie had spent the past nine years in Seattle’s mild coastal climate. She’d forgotten how cold Montana winters could be.
But the wintry beauty of her hometown had been a balm for her broken heart and bruised pride these past two weeks. The bright blue skies, breathtaking mountain views, and brilliant sunshine on the thick, sparkling carpet of snow were all in refreshing contrast to the unending gray skies and persistent rain of a Pacific Northwest November.
And then there was her family, who had supported her with love and gentle comfort during the frantic week of activity following the wedding as she prepared to move home. She had ended her apartment lease in Seattle and moved all of her belongings into storage.
She and Geoff had also put all of their upcoming renovation commissions on hold while their lawyers negotiated a division of the company’s assets. Geoff had protested at Winnie’s insistence in shutting down their company, but honestly, how could he expect her to continue working with him like he and her former best friend hadn’t stabbed her in the back and then trash-talked her all over social media.
It was good to be home for Thanksgiving. And even better to have a project that would keep her busy and occupy her mind with thoughts that had absolutely nothing to do with Geoff, Melanie, the wedding disaster, or all of the nasty gossip currently making the rounds of the Web’s celebrity gossip sites.
“Grandma, I don’t know if your timeline is realistic,” Winnie said, opting for brutal honesty. “And I’m sure that Nick Evans will tell you the same thing, once he shows up.”
“Even though this will be your only project and you won’t be splitting your time with work elsewhere?” Grandma Abigail asked.
“Renovating during winter months can be tricky,” Winnie explained. “We’ll need to run heaters day and night to make sure that temperature-sensitive things like paint dry correctly. And getting materials shipped will depend on the weather and road conditions. One blizzard could shoot our renovation schedule all to hell.”
The disappointment on her grandma’s face sent a pang through Winnie’s heart. She quickly added, “On the other hand, it might be easier to hire framers, carpenters, electricians, and plumbers than during the summer, when they’re in higher demand.”
“Oh, I hadn’t thought about tradespeople and contractors being cheaper and more available during the winter months!” Grandma Abigail exclaimed. She beamed at Winnie. “And if we can’t get anyone local, I’ll phone Grandpa Frank’s friend Rob Swanson over in Idaho. He owns Swanson Construction, you know. It’s the second-largest construction firm in the state. I’m sure he’ll be able to recommend tradespeople looking for winter work.”
Uh-oh, thought Winnie. Time to give her a reality check before she’s off and running.
“Speaking of money, I’m concerned about your renovation budget,” she continued ruthlessly. “This place needs a lot of work just to bring it up to code and make it habitable again, not to mention restoring it for historic charm. Whoever renovated and updated this building back in the 1960s tore out almost all the original features.”
Her grandmother’s face fell. “I noticed that,” she admitted. “Your grandfather and I met while we were protesting the city council’s plans to tear down almost all of the old buildings surrounding the town square, and replace them with a parking lot, fast food restaurants, and a strip mall.” Her lips thinned in remembered anger.
“No way,” Winnie said, shocked.
What would Snowberry Springs be without its charming town square surrounded by historic brick buildings, and its train station, built in 1902 as part of the Livingston-to-Yellowstone rail line?
“They called it ‘urban renewal’ back then, and a lot of towns lost their historical heritage. We were determined to save what we could.” Grandma’s expression softened. “And I think we did a pretty good job. In the end, we only lost a couple of buildings, and those were likely too far gone to save. The structural engineer our historical preservation society hired told us they probably would’ve collapsed in another few years—foundation issues.”
“Well, I’m afraid that this place has everything but foundation issues.” Winnie raised her gloved hands and ticked off the biggest issues she’d discovered during their walkthrough. “First of all, it needs a new roof. I’m going to guess originally there were either wooden shakes or slate tiles, and that the Bonhams added layers of asphalt shingles over that. But I won’t know for sure until I can climb up there.”
“And how much will a new roof cost?” Grandma halted on the steps. Her gaze turned upwards to the maze of tiny, derelict rooms on the second floor. “This is quite a large place.”
“It’s not going to be cheap,” Winnie warned. “I won’t know for sure until I get some estimates, but I’m guessing a minimum of eight or nine grand if we use the cheapest roofing materials. But if you want something fireproof that matches the look of this house’s original roof, then I’d recommend either concrete tiles that look like wooden shingles or stone-coated steel shingles. Either of those will cost a lot more than asphalt shingles, but they’ll also last three times longer.”
“I did notice a lot of water damage in the upstairs rooms,” Grandma Abigail said, cautiously resuming her descent.
She halted as she stepped from the bottom tread onto the hideous orange-and-brown tiles covering the floor of the wide entrance hall. She gazed at Winnie, her bright blue eyes filled with concern.
Winnie nodded. “Yeah, fixing that damage is going to be another big-ticket item in this renovation. Those walls are lath and plaster—you saw all of those thin boards where chunks of the upstairs bedrooms’ walls and ceilings fell away?”
“I did. Can they be repaired?”
Winnie shook her head. “It looks like they’re too badly damaged. What we saw upstairs isn’t just damage from one storm, it’s from years of water getting in thanks to roof damage. Plus, I saw signs of black mold.”
Grandma shuddered. “Oh, dear.”
“Yeah,” agreed Winnie. “And there may be more mold growing inside the walls. I think we’re going to have to take the second floor down to the studs, reframe everything, and put up new walls. Which brings me to items three, four, and five.” Winnie touched her middle, ring, and pinkie fingers in turn. “Demolition, mold remediation, and…” She tapped the newel post, its delicate carved pattern of vines and birds blurred by layers of white paint chipping away to reveal layers of mint-green and dark red beneath. “Lead remediation, too. I’ll have to get someone out here to take paint chip samples from all the layers on the trim and moldings, but based on the age of this house, and that its last renovation happened during the 1960s, there’s a 95 percent chance they used lead paint.”
Grandma Abigail’s shoulders sagged. “I knew restoring this building would take a lot of time and money, but I didn’t think it was quite this bad,” she murmured. She looked around the downstairs rooms. “What else?”
“The electrical wiring looks like the original knob-and-tube,” Winnie reported. She had spotted the wiring in places where the wall plaster had crumbled away. “Bringing it up to code could run us anywhere from four to ten grand, plus we’ll want to add extra outlets everywhere. Then there’s the cast-iron plumbing both inside this house and in the hot spring spa pavilion in the back. Those pipes are well beyond their intended lifespans and probably corroded as hell. In fact, it wouldn’t surprise me if some of the water damage down here—” she indicated the large downstairs rooms with a sweep of her parka-clad arm, “—isn’t due to plumbing leaks rather than the roof.” She shook her head. “Grandma, truth is, we’re going to spend most of your renovation budget before we even get to the stage where we can restore this house’s historic details.”
There was no doubt about it. The Snowberry Springs Inn & Resort was a sad wreck of a building. It broke Winnie’s heart to see how the beautiful old mansion-turned-hotel had fallen into ruin.
And then there was the crime of the mid-century renovation, when all the building’s charm had been stripped and replaced with the cheapest, tackiest materials available.
With a heavy heart, she delivered the bad news. “Are you sure you want to restore this place? I mean, it used to be beautiful, and I get wanting to save it because of our family connection, but I have to be honest. Based on the budget you’ve given me, I can’t do this project justice. If you can’t double the amount, it might be more cost-effective to demolish this building and sell the land than it will be to fix all the problems and restore everything.”
The front door crashed open. A blast of icy air roared into the dank entrance hall. Startled, Winnie spun to see what was happening.
A tall figure loomed in the doorway.
“Demolishit? Over my dead body!” an angry male voice boomed. “Mrs. Snowberry, when I invested in your mansion, you promised me we’d save it and restore it to its former glory!”
Winnie stared in dismay as the newcomer strode in.
Thanks to the Internet, she immediately recognized the strong jaw covered with perfectly tended stubble, the steely gray eyes fringed by sinfully long dark lashes, and the sculpted features of a movie star or a Greek god.
Nick Evans. Rich as sin. Devastatingly sexy in person. And clearly in a bad mood.
As his gaze skewered her, Winnie caught a faint, intriguingly spicy whiff of his cologne.
Her knees went weak. And it wasn’t because he intimidated her.
She raised her chin defiantly and scanned him from head to toe. He was one of the tallest men she’d ever met, clad in expensive outdoor wear from his designer knitted alpaca wool beanie hat to his North Face insulated coat, and down to his top-of-the-line hiking boots.
“Oh, there you are!” Grandma Abigail exclaimed, apparently unbothered by his dramatic entrance. “I was hoping you’d be able to join us in time for the initial walkthrough.”
Evan’s perfectly tanned face darkened. “Sorry I’m late,” he growled. “But you can’t seriously be considering a complete demolition of this historic house!”
“My general contractor and I were simply discussing all of our options, now that she’s had an opportunity to tour the property. We haven’t decided on anything yet,” Grandma said smoothly. Then the corners of her cornflower blue eyes crinkled as her lips curved in a mischievous smile. “Nick, have you met my GC? Winter, this is Nick Evans, my partner investor in the Snowberry Springs Inn, and a passionate historical preservationist.”
Evan’s eyes widened. Hadn’t he recognized her without her stage makeup and trademark pink hard hat?
“I know who he is,” Winnie said. She wondered how Grandma and Karla had managed to bring him on board.
Guess I’m going to have to treat Autumn to that mani-pedi, after all, she thought. Her sister had bet her that Grandma could bend Nick to her will. Winnie had scoffed and taken the bet without hesitating.
Grandma Abigail continued serenely, “Nick, this is my granddaughter, Winter. You may have seen her on TV.”
His eyes widened. “Winter… Winnie Snowberry? The Winnie Snowberry? From Seattle?” He sounded incredulous.
Winnie couldn’t help grinning at him. “The one and only fake celebrity flipper,” she said acidly. “Nice to meet you, Nick.”
He glared down at her from his imposing height, then turned to Grandma Abigail.
“This is the ‘experienced and trusted contractor’ you and Karla Jones want me to work with? You’ve got to be kidding me!”