**THIS BOOK IS ON HOLD UNTIL I'M DONE WRITING LOVE CONSEQUENCES** Linda Baxter's trust fund makes life easy, but she learned that things in pretty packages are not worth her time. By twenty-nine, she tried marriage, fabricated a fake relationship, a...
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I place my backpack on the passenger seat of my rental car and enter the address of the construction site that'll be the Chicago location of B-Art. The facility will take over the four-floor annex on Stetson Avenue. Without Brenda's family's real estate connections, I would've been lucky to get two floors outside the Loop. When we open, we'll be the largest luxury fitness center and spa inside the Loop. Right now, it's an empty shell. I watch my step and mind the tape around the area with freshly poured cement forms.
"Roman." My brother moves his eyes from a large plan he was pouring over. His temples are gray, and silver strands pepper his beard and mustache. Early grays run in Papa's side of the family. Last time I saw Roman a couple of years ago, he could pass for someone in his twenties. Today he looks gaunt, tired, and if I didn't know he's only five years older than me, I'd assume he was in his forties. "What d'you have to show me today?"
"Little bro." Roman waves for me to come over. "I have your future kingdom laid out for you." He points at the schematics spread over two tables moved together. "This is the first floor. The reception opens to a cafe and a sitting area that'll be adjacent to the treatment rooms, so people can wait for their appointments there." The lines he slides his hand along take shape, and I can visualize the design that mimics more of the vertical use of space at our original New York location than the sprawling property we completed last year in LA. Less square footage here, yet a lot to pack into it to keep both my and Brenda's sides of the vision.
"Where is the pool?"
Roman shut down the idea of an Olympic size option but promised four twenty-five-yard lanes near the saunas and a leisure three feet deep outdoor pool for the roof.
"That's a surprise. I'll show you later." He moves to the other side of the entryway. "The equipment is here, and this is the free weight area, and we continued with the open feel and the delineation of spaces will come through the columns we need to keep for structural integrity." He guides me through the rest of the floor, and although I'm looking forward to the designer rendering it in 3-D, I get the sense of the place. My place.
With the first location I was monitoring every step, every material order, every design choice took a meeting or two to deliberate. I drove Brenda and the designers up the wall, but I needed to be sure what I was spending my money and reputation on, was what I was getting. The LA location was harder to control. Even with monthly visits, I had to take the back seat and trust the people we hired to make more of the decisions. When I told Brenda I'm going to stay in Chicago as we finalize the Stetson branch, she made me swear I would let the professionals do their job.
