LITMIR.BIZ

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but it’d been sprawling enough to house the fourteen-year-old boy Seth had been when Billy had married Jenny Wawausuck and adopted Seth and big enough to hold them all when Julie had been born the next year.

      It’d been a family home. And that was not what Seth wanted, as he had no plans to start a family anytime soon. Not even by accident. He was careful.

      So he wasn’t settling down. Not even a possibility. Billy Bolton—hell, all the Bolton men—might be dyed-in-the-wool family men, but Seth was a Bolton in name only.

      Still, he needed a place to keep his stuff and the freedom to come and go—and have guests over—without his parents keeping tabs on him.

      He looked at the photos of the four or five houses she’d pulled up, but nothing jumped out at him. “I need to walk through them,” he said.

      “Absolutely,” she agreed. “Pictures can tell us a lot, but they can’t give you a real sense of how the house will work for you. I’ll need to schedule tours, if that’s all right. Only a few of these houses are empty. Unless you are looking to buy today?”

      Seth snorted. “This isn’t a snap decision. I want to make sure I find the right place. Even if I don’t live there full-time, I still want it to be home.” He didn’t know if that was possible or not, but at the very least, he wanted something he could be proud of.

      Besides, owning and caring for his own home would just further prove to his father and his uncles that they’d made the right decision in making Seth a partner in Crazy Horse Choppers, and he couldn’t let the Bolton men down. Not after everything they’d done for him.

      His parents hadn’t been huge fans of Seth relocating to a hotel and, aside from room service, neither was Seth. But as much as he loved his family, he hadn’t been able to move back in with them after a year in LA. So if he had to pay for a hotel, then he paid for the hotel. He had the money to spare.

      Kate nodded eagerly. “And if none of these houses are right, there are always more houses coming on the market. Sometimes we get notice before properties are officially listed—as long as you’ve got the time, the right house for you is out there.”

      She made it sound like it was only a matter of patience. Seth was not always the most patient of people. His dad said it was because he was still young and stupid—although Seth didn’t feel particularly young or particularly stupid.

      Seth was afraid it was something else. Billy was a good father—but it wasn’t his blood that ran through Seth’s veins. What if this restlessness wasn’t just youth?

      What if it was something he’d inherited from his birth father, the sperm donor?

      Seth pushed that question away. He didn’t like to compare himself to the man who’d abandoned Jenny Wawausuck when she’d been pregnant, never to show his face again. Seth was a Bolton now. The past didn’t matter. Only the future.

      A future where he owned a sizable chunk of a family business as well as his own home. “That’s fine. Saturday? We can make a day of it. Unless you have other plans?”

      Because he had no idea. It was a fair assumption that, since she was no longer at the office where Roger worked and—he glanced down at her hand—she wasn’t wearing any ring, she wasn’t actively involved with anyone. Kate didn’t strike him as the kind who rebounded indiscriminately.

      But that didn’t mean she might not have something to do on a Saturday.

      Kate smiled and damn if Seth wasn’t dazzled by it. “Saturday would be perfect. Now tell me about this museum you’re planning. Does it need to be close to the production facility? Do you want to build to suit or adapt a preexisting space? Do you have a handle on how much square footage you’re looking at?”

      Seth took a deep breath. The museum was his idea—he’d toured the Harley-Davidson museum in Milwaukee a while back and had been damned impressed. He didn’t want to replicate that facility, because the Crazy Horse collection was vastly different from the Harley collection.

      Seth still remembered the first time Billy had taken him to see all the choppers that he’d built. Seth had been like a kid in a candy store. The original choppers were impressive, but what had blown his teenaged mind had been the wild prototypes Billy had created over the years.

      That was what he wanted to capture—that feeling of shock and awe that only a Crazy Horse chopper could inspire. And he wanted to capitalize on that experience. The motorcycle business had its ups and downs and having a secondary stream of income—or even tertiary stream—to help even out the lows was a good business decision. After several interesting discussions—and only one fistfight—the Boltons had agreed to spot him the capital. He just needed a property.

      Besides, it wasn’t like he was making it up as he went along. He had a master’s in business administration. He hadn’t needed a college degree to build choppers—he’d been doing that by Billy’s side since he’d been thirteen.

      But running a business was not the same thing as welding a frame. And the Bolton men had been good to Seth for last ten years of his life. His father and his uncles were demonstrating a great deal of faith in Seth. He couldn’t screw this up and run the family legacy into the ground. His adopted last name meant he had to make sure the family business stayed relevant and important.

      “We’re still in the idea phase,” he finally said. Which really meant it was all still in his head. “At least sixty thousand square feet. I’m envisioning the museum, a gift store, a café—maybe an area where we can have special exhibits. And possibly a showroom. We’re still selling bikes out of the factory, but I don’t think that’s sustainable. If it’s closer to the original factory, that’d be ideal, but it doesn’t have to be. I hope that makes sense,” he added.

      Her eyes lit up. He couldn’t tell if she was excited by the vision or the commission it would generate. Which was fine. He didn’t need her to be excited about his big plans. Once he’d realized she was in real estate, the whole reason he’d come looking for her at work was to give her the commission. It’d been important to him.

      He honestly wasn’t sure why—she wasn’t his responsibility. But he needed several properties, and he wasn’t on a first-name basis with any other real estate agents. So why shouldn’t he help out a soon-to-be single mom? God knew that Seth’s mom could’ve used a hand up before Billy came into their lives.

      He was paying forward the good fortune Billy Bolton had brought into Seth’s life. It was that simple.

      But it didn’t feel simple when Kate leaned forward, her gaze locked on his. It felt messy and complicated and...right.

      “It makes perfect sense,” she told him. “But I’m going to need to do some research as to what’s available. Do you have a budget in mind?”

      Seth shifted nervously. The budget was, predictably, the part Ben and Billy objected to the most. “I’d like to get a list of potential properties and the associated costs first so we can budget for design and building after that.” Billy was not in the mood to spend millions and millions of dollars on this. The only reason he’d agreed to the museum in the end was because Seth had promised that he’d take care of everything and Billy could just keep right on building bikes.

      Kate nodded and took a few notes. “This will be a process,” she warned him. “We could have a house under contract in a matter of weeks. The commercial property is much more involved—months of looking at properties, negotiating with sellers and dealing with architects.”

      Months of riding around with Kate, spending time with her when neither of them were under extreme duress. Months of getting to know her. Months of seeing that particular smile.

      “Are you trying to talk me out of this?” God knew Billy had. He hated anything that distracted from building bikes.

      And yeah, it was true that they didn’t have a company without the bikes. But no one could compete in today’s market without having a plan for the future.

      So

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