Mari lays a set of photographs on the table to start her presentation.
Everyone except me cranes to see the photos. I don’t need to crane—or, like Hanna is doing, throw my body on the conference table—to see them. I’ve already seen them. Clark and I spent an hour yesterday talking about what bad news they were for us.
They’re photos of glamping sites. Really fucking luxurious glamping sites. In Rush Creek.
Owned by a competitor.
“Ohhhhh,” says Jessa, Clark’s girlfriend, leaning in to look more closely. “Those are—amazing.”
Clark glares at her.
“They are amazing,” says Lucy, her hand capping Willow’s sleeping head. “Gabe, we should book one of those for a getaway weekend!”
Another sharp Wilder brother glare.
Lucy and Jessa exchange glances, smiling.
“Where are the sites?” my brother Brody asks.
Clark rakes a hand through his hair. “On the Jensen brothers’ land. Garth and Mick wanted to capitalize on the spa-and-wedding tourist crowd, too. So they pitched ten of these tents and are slowly reeling in customers.”
“Well, shit,” Brody and I say at the same time.
“Don’t panic.” And we all turn our attention to Mari. She’s smiling. “I’ve got a plan. I know your original vision for the Airstreams was to make them luxury trailers. But if you do that, you’ll be going toe to toe with these guys, and it’ll be hard for you to stand out.”
She’s wearing an outfit that looks like layers and layers of scarves. It gives the impression of unfolding wings. Her rings, bracelets, and long earrings flash as she moves, but they’re not as bright as her hair, which is, as always, down and in disarray. She’s small, wild, and fierce, and just like that night in Vegas, I want to reach out and take her narrow wrists in my hands. Hold her still. Tame her and contain her, share in her completeness.
She looks around the table, meeting each of our eyes in turn. “Your Gilderness trips work because they combine two things that don’t usually go together: luxury and survival. And people like that. It’s different. People want to test themselves, but they don’t want to suffer. No one else is doing it.”
Another round of glances ping around the table; she’s done her homework. Lucy and Gabe are impressed—not easy to accomplish.
“But straight up glamping? It’s everywhere, now, and to win at it, you have to out-luxury everyone else. You don’t want to go there, trust me. What you want to do what Gilderness, Brody’s Boat, and your winter snowshoe-and-cocoa outings do so well—mix it up. Make it whimsical. Give people something they can’t get anywhere else.”
“Lavender sachets and A-frame shelters,” Gabe murmurs to Lucy, and she gives him a thousand-watt smile.
Mari leans on the table—the pixie equivalent of the alpha male coming in for the kill. “I’ve done quite a few themed trailers in the past,” she tells us. “And I think themed trailers would be perfect for what you’re trying to accomplish.”
“Themed trailers? Like, what, Elvis?” The scornful voice is, no surprise, Hanna’s. She rolls her eyes.
But Brody’s voice cuts across her objection. “Yes!” he says. “I can do theme nights on the boat and then we can upsell people on the trailers, or we could do combo packages.”
We all turn to look at him.
You have to know Brody to know just how odd this is. Until Rachel came along, the Brody we knew didn’t get excited about much—least of all marketing. He always had that bad boy go-ahead-and-try-to-raise-my-heart-rate thing going on. But right now, he looks like he’s going to start jumping up and down.
And Rachel is nodding, too. “I love it.”
“Me too,” Lucy says.
Hanna scans the table, looking for an ally. Her eyes fall on me. And I don’t know… I’m not all-in like Brody seemed instantly to be, but neither am I ready to side with Hanna and Clark—who’s still scowling.
Before I can make up my mind, though, something entirely unexpected happens.
Gabe says, “That’s brilliant.”