Page 23 of Guard Bear (Return To Fate Mountain #5)

Chapter

Twenty-One

The blue glow of the computer screen burned into Andre's retinas. His fourth cup of coffee had gone cold an hour ago, leaving a bitter film on his tongue. The police station's war room felt smaller at five in the morning, the walls pressing in with each failed search.

Andre rolled his shoulders, trying to ease the knots that had formed during the night. His fingers moved across the keyboard with mechanical precision. Jason Prescott. Jason Mitchell. Cascade Mountain Development. The same names, the same connections, circling like vultures.

But something pulled at him. A thread he couldn't quite grasp.

He clicked back to the folder of screenshots from the community meeting.

Rollo's presentation filled the screen. Old newspaper headlines, grainy and urgent.

"Crown Mountain Resort Project Collapses.

" "Local Opposition Defeats Resort Plans.

" Samuel Prescott's confident smile in a forty-year-old photograph.

Andre leaned closer. The old man's eyes held something beyond simple ambition. Obsession. The kind that passed from father to son, grandfather to grandson.

His fingers found the keyboard again. "Crown Mountain Resort 1974."

The search results loaded slowly. Andre drummed his fingers against the desk, a nervous rhythm that matched his heartbeat. Most links led to historical society summaries, tourism blogs, dead ends. But halfway down the page, something caught his eye.

County Planning Commission Archives - Digital Collection.

He clicked through. The site was basic, government-issue web design from a decade ago. But the search function worked. Andre typed carefully. "Crown Mountain Resort proposal."

Three results. Meeting minutes from 1974.

The first document opened as a PDF, scanned from old typewriter pages. Andre squinted at the faded text. "Motion to deny Crown Mountain Resort development proposal. Concerns raised regarding environmental impact and community opposition."

Standard bureaucratic language. But in the margin notes, a name kept appearing. Western Development Associates. Not Crown Mountain. Not Prescott.

Andre's bear stirred, hackles rising. He opened the second document. More meeting minutes, but this time from a closed session. "Representatives from Western Development Associates present to address concerns."

The third document was different. A summary of written objections filed by local residents. Andre scrolled through pages of complaints about traffic, water rights, destruction of grazing land. But it was the final paragraph that made him sit up straight.

"Western Development Associates has pursued aggressive tactics in attempting to secure necessary properties for the proposed resort. Multiple landowners report harassment and threats of legal action."

Andre stared at the screen. Western Development Associates. They were using shell companies, even back then.

He needed more. Real documents, not summaries. His searches hit walls of "Document not digitized" and "Available for viewing at County Records Office."

His phone buzzed. Seven forty-five already. How had three hours passed?

Andre grabbed the phone, thumb moving automatically to Joy's number. She answered on the second ring, voice still thick with sleep.

"Andre? Is everything okay?"

Just hearing her voice loosened something in his chest. "I'm at the station. I've been digging into Prescott's grandfather and the old resort plans."

"Did you find something?" She sounded more alert now. He could picture her sitting up in bed, hair mussed from sleep.

"Maybe. There's a company called Western Development Associates. They were representing Prescott back in the seventies, but I can't find detailed records online. Just references in meeting minutes."

Silence for a moment. Then Joy said, "My friend Angela Madison from Fate Mountain Beekeeping Association works at county records. Let me call her and get back to you."

"Good thinking. I'll wait for your call."

Andre hung up and paced the conference room. Within five minutes, his phone rang again.

"Andre? It's Joy. I talked to Angela. She says those would be in deep storage, but she can pull them and have them ready by eleven."

Relief flooded through Andre. "That's perfect. Thank you."

"I'll come with you," Joy said.

“I’ll come pick you up. I’m on my way now.”

After they hung up, he closed the laptop and headed for his truck. The drive to Buck and Maria's house took twenty minutes. Andre had memorized every turn, every landmark. His protective instincts had mapped multiple routes, calculating response times from various locations.

He found Joy in the kitchen, both hands wrapped around a steaming mug. The bandages were gone now, just faint pink lines crossing her palms. She looked up when he entered, and something electric passed between them.

"Coffee's fresh," Maria said from the stove where she was scrambling eggs in a cast iron pan.

Andre poured a cup, grateful for the pick-me-up. Joy shifted her chair, making room for him at the table. "Show me what you found," she said.

Andre pulled out his phone, swiping to the screenshots. Joy leaned close, her shoulder pressing against his arm. Her scent wrapped around him, lavender soap and Joy.

"Western Development Associates," she read. "And they were representing Prescott?"

"That's what I'm hoping to confirm. The meeting minutes reference them multiple times, always in connection with the resort proposal."

Maria set plates in front of them. "Eat. You can't investigate on empty stomachs."

They ate quickly, Andre barely tasting the food. His mind kept circling back to Western Development. Why use a shell company? What was Prescott hiding even then?

Joy's hand found his under the table, fingers interlacing. "We'll figure it out," she said quietly.

At ten-thirty, they drove to the county courthouse. The building sat square and solid in the middle of town, red brick faded by decades of mountain weather. Andre parked in the visitor lot, his truck dwarfing the compact cars around it.

Inside, the records office occupied the entire basement level. Fluorescent lights hummed overhead, casting harsh shadows.

Angela stood behind the counter, a woman in her late twenties with shoulder-length brown hair. Her face lit up when she saw Joy.

"I've got everything pulled," she said, gesturing to a cart loaded with banker's boxes. "Three boxes, all from Western Development Associates. 1974 to 1975."

She led them to a small viewing room. The wooden table bore decades of scratches and coffee stains. Angela helped them unload the boxes, dust motes dancing in the air.

"Take your time," she said. "I'll be at the desk if you need anything."

Andre opened the first box. The smell of old paper filled his nose, musty and somehow threatening. Joy sat beside him.

"Where do we start?" she asked.

"Chronologically." Andre lifted out a stack of folders. "Let's see how this began."

The first documents were routine. Property surveys. Feasibility studies. Market analysis showing projected tourist revenue. Andre photographed each page with his phone, building a digital record.

Then they found the offers.

"Look at this," Joy breathed.

The letterhead read Western Development Associates in bold typewriter font. Below, in formal legal language, an offer to purchase "the property commonly known as Timber Bear Ranch."

Joy gasped. “The ranch,” she whispered.

Andre checked the date. March 1974. The offer was generous, above market value.

"And here's the rejection," Joy said, holding up another letter. This one was simpler, signed by someone named Harrison Kincaid. "The property is not for sale at any price."

Andre found the second offer, dated two months later. Twenty percent above the first. Again, rejected.

The third offer came with additional pressure. References to "the changing economic landscape" and "opportunities that won't last forever." Fifty percent above market value.

Joy's hand tightened on the paper. "They were desperate."

The fourth offer abandoned all pretense of professional courtesy. Nearly double the market value, but the language had turned aggressive. "Final opportunity" and "consequences of shortsighted decisions."

"Look at this," Andre said, pulling out a folder from the second box.

Legal documents. Threats of eminent domain. Claims that the resort would benefit the entire community, that the Kincaids were selfishly blocking progress. Each document met with responses from the family's lawyer.

“This is insidious,” she said through clenched teeth. “Why did I never hear about this?”

Joy organized the papers by date while Andre photographed. They worked in focused silence, only the click of his phone camera and the whisper of old paper breaking the quiet.

In the third box, Andre found what he'd been looking for.

"Articles of Incorporation," he read aloud.

The document was standard legal boilerplate, except for one line. "Western Development Associates, a subsidiary corporation. President: Samuel Prescott."

Joy's breath caught. "There it is."

Andre photographed the page, then the next document. A hand-drawn map of the proposed resort. His stomach clenched as he recognized the boundaries.

"This is our ranch," Joy said, her finger tracing the property lines. "Every acre."

The map showed everything. The main lodge was positioned exactly where the Kincaid house now stood. Estate homes dotted the pastureland. A private airstrip ran through where Joy's hives had burned just days ago.

"He'd already spent a fortune," Andre said, finding architectural blueprints, engineering studies. "Look at this invoice. Fifty thousand dollars just for the initial site planning."

Joy found a folder marked "Investor Package." Inside, letters of intent from wealthy backers. All contingent on securing the necessary land.

"Without Timber Bear Ranch, he had nothing," she said.

The final documents told the story's end. Investors withdrawing. Loans called in. Prescott's empire crumbling because one family wouldn't sell their heritage.

Andre photographed the last page, his hands trembling slightly. The weight of history pressed down on them. Fifty years of resentment, festering and growing, passed from grandfather to grandson like a poisoned inheritance.

“We need to talk to my dad about this, see if he remembers anything,” she said quietly.

They packed up the documents, thanked Angela, and headed for the truck. The afternoon sun felt too bright after the dim records room. Andre's bear pushed against his control, wanting to run, to fight, to protect.

As they drove toward the ranch, the mountain road winding through familiar curves, Andre couldn't shake the feeling that they were racing against time. That somewhere, Jason Prescott was looking at the same maps his grandfather had drawn, planning to finish what had been started fifty years ago.