Phoenix Fire Read Free Page B

environment were never to come up in this project. We planned it all too carefully for there to be any problems. Who are these people? Do we know?”
    “Sure, we know who they are. I’ve talked to a few of them.”
    “You going to be able to satisfy them?”
    “They’re just pest factors. We already have the council votes, so these people will soon fade away. They’ll get a little press time. As you know, the newspapers play up to this kind of crapola. But I do know how you feel. You want everyone to see the beauty of this project. It just doesn’t work out that way. But, look, we’re fine. Not to worry.”
    “So when do we crunch numbers? The bank is waiting.”
    “For the exact figures we’re probably looking at Friday. You want me to talk to Ewing at the bank?”
    “No, I’ll handle it. Are those the final elevations you have with you?”
    “Yes. They came out really neat.” Langley removed the heavy rubber band from the thick roll of architectural drawings and began spreading them across the round conference table.
    The two men spent another hour going over the drawings, comparing, sorting among the various stacks of papers on the table.
    ‘Apple Brown Betty’ was an enormous undertaking that occupied Jason’s business mind for years. The idea actually came from his grandmother Wimsley, to develop a quaint, small Mexican-style village, complete with shops, office buildings, restaurants, houses, school, church, park, all on a large plot of family owned land between Phoenix and Casa Grande.
    The grand plan evolved through the years, undergoing many changes and revisions. Many influential and financially healed people were drawn into a consortium of sorts until the project was now very close to becoming a reality. Most of the tedious planning details were overseen by Jason and he looked upon ‘Apple Brown Betty’ as his life’s work. All of his real estate holdings accumulated over the years made him a very wealthy man, but this project would become his personal denouement, his swan song, his ultimate gift to a grandmother who gave him so very much.
    It would take a projected five years to complete ‘Apple Brown Betty’ once ground was initially broken. Jason would be approaching age forty-five. He wanted so very much to see it completed while his grandmother was still alive. He saw this strong lady as indomitable and ageless. He seldom thought of her dying. In his mind she would live forever. The ‘Apple Brown Betty’ project would make it so.
    When Phil Langley left his office a little before 5:00 PM, Jason began immediately to think about his date with Jenny. This was in itself unusual because, normally, after a meeting on ‘Apple Brown Betty,’ he dwelled lovingly on thoughts of the project, envisioned its completion, saw children playing in the park, diners in the restaurants. These thoughts did not linger this day.
    What was the significance of this woman? He knew many women in his life, before and after his prolonged ten-year affair. Some he liked and they were remembered fondly. Others, not so much. He always pulled away from a relationship when it became too sticky, when he felt the woman getting too close to him. The long ten-year affair was punctuated with breaks along the way because there was a tacit agreement there would be no marriage. It was a pleasant enough arrangement where either one of them could live basically his or her own life. The arrangement had simply uncomplicated their social activities, until, or course, it, too, ran its course.
    He never confronted himself about his retreats from women. Even in his one long affair he retreated time and again. He had an incipient thought that he might have to confront himself with Jenny Mason.
    Was it the dramatic way in which they met that had him thinking differently about Jenny? Was there something that was conveyed to him on that rain-soaked day while he kept pressing his mouth over hers? Was it the first look into those beautiful