Heartstrings and Diamond Rings Read Online Free PDF Page B

around the table, and jerked the check out of Brandon’s hand. He looked at it with disbelief. “No. No way. You did not just convince that woman to give you fifteen hundred dollars to find her a husband.”
    “Did you think I couldn’t do it?”
    “Hell, yes, I thought you couldn’t do it!”
    Brandon plucked the check out of Tom’s hand and stuck it back into his pocket. “I thought you had faith in me all these years.”
    “Of course I have faith in you, as long as it involves a real business. But conning a woman into believing you’re a matchmaker? Who the hell would have ever thought you’d ever be able to do that?”
    “Con?” Brandon said. “There’s no con involved here. I fully intend to deliver the services I promised.”
    “Right. You don’t know crap about matchmaking.”
    “What’s to know? I’ll look through my grandmother’s files. Find a guy who looks decent. Set her up with him. What’s so hard about that? I have five shots at it, for God’s sake. The odds are with me.”
    “Okay,” Tom said, racking up the balls. “So you managed to get fifteen hundred bucks out of one client. That’s a far cry from the thirty thousand you need. Where’s the next client coming from?”
    “I placed an ad on the Dallas After Dark website. When it comes out next week, I’ll have more business than I know what to do with.”
    Tom lifted the rack, and Brandon grabbed a cue to break.
    “Our option to buy the warehouse is good for only six months,” Tom said as Brandon’s break drove the six ball into a corner pocket. “If you don’t get the money by then, I’ll have to bring in another partner. But you’re the guy I want. Are you sure you can pull off this gig?”
    Yes. He was sure. Because there wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do to make it happen.
    For years, Brandon had crisscrossed the country, making real estate deals and making money. He stayed in no-tell motels, played a little pool in the evenings, had a few drinks, and then got up the next day to guide a crew in renovating his latest project. It had been an incredible high—finding distressed properties in cities across the country, then racing the clock to turn hovels into showplaces and get them sold before his construction loans came due. Once in Vegas he had four projects going at once, and the money piled up until his bank account was so stuffed he couldn’t imagine ever being broke again.
    Then the bottom had fallen out of the real estate market.
    He still remembered that horrible feeling when he had loan payments due and not a dime left to pay them. The projects had gone into foreclosure, leaving him with big losses, bad credit, and nowhere to turn.
    Brandon and Tom had partnered on several projects in the past, so when Tom contacted him about the Houston deal, he sat up and paid attention. The owner was so motivated to sell that he’d have taken just about any offer, but it took a guy with vision to be able to see the possibilities for the old warehouse.
    Brandon was that guy.
    Turning that dilapidated warehouse into loft apartments was going to take some work, but even in a depressed market that area was so hot it practically sizzled. They couldn’t miss. And if the company that owned the adjoining property succeeded in getting the zoning changed from residential to mixed use and put in the urban living center they wanted to, Brandon and Tom’s investment would go through the roof. That part was a long shot, but even without it, they could easily walk away with a substantial profit, and Brandon would be off to the races again.
    The seller had agreed to finance the deal as long as they came up with the down payment cash he was desperate for, so their creditworthiness had never been called into question. The only thing that stood between Brandon and that project was a lousy thirty thousand dollars, his half of the down payment. Three years ago, he’d have never been concerned about a pitiful amount of money like that, but