Matt had kept an eye on the languishing property while he’d worked to find the cash to cut a deal. Earlier this year, he’d played with the numbers and figured out how to both retain the motel’s character and make it work. Last week, he’d finally been approved for a resort liquor license. After renovations and the addition of a restaurant, this place would be a gold mine during tourist season. As would the property in Keene’s Harbor he planned to renovate.

Matt was all about envisioniiveut enving. While he’d negotiated this deal, he’d imagined himself kicked back on the new restaurant’s terrace, saluting his bird buddies with an ice-cold beer. Weird, though. Right now, as he pictured it, a small and curvy blonde named Kate had planted herself in the middle of the vision. He’d had a lot of daydreams about the brewery over the years, but they’d always been his daydreams. Just him and the brewery. He kind of liked having Kate there.

After checking his watch, Matt headed back toward the truck. The last thing he wanted was to be late for a meeting with Travis Holby. Like Ginger and the Tropicana flamingos, Travis was an original. A sometimes cranky original. He was also a prodigy of a master beer brewer and key to restoring this motel. For that, Matt would deal with the guy’s quirks.

NINE MINUTES later, Matt pulled up to the office building housing his third-floor walk-up office space on Traverse City’s Front Street. It was small but had a great view over Grand Traverse Bay, the long natural harbor separating Lake Michigan from the town. The largest city in the area, Traverse City was a grown-up version of Keene’s Harbor, with a sleepy population of 15,000 in the off-season, swelling to the breaking point with tourists and summer people in July and August.

Travis had made himself comfortable in Matt’s office, taking up residence in the reception area from the seat behind Ginger’s desk. “You’re late, Culhane.”