I paused, giving the audience a moment to catch up, to appreciate the twists and turns of the story. “This brilliant architect, my sister, whom I hadn’t spoken to in almost twenty years, showed up at my doorstep and she needed me.”

A restlessness hummed through the crowd. The protesters Jackson had corralled, undoubtedly the ones who made the threats against Lexi, were shifting where they sat probably looking for the exits about now. Good.

“My sister, Alexandra Brewer—” I began but Lexi interrupted.

“Alexandra Daire,” she said. Then she whispered, “I’ve made it legal and everything.”

Oh crap, I felt the tears well up in my eyes. I would rather have my leg give out and fall on my face than burst into tears. I blinked several times, willing them back, and cleared my throat.

“Alexandra Daire,” I said. I savored the sound of it for just a moment. “She needed me because she was trying to do something so big, so extraordinary, so out of the box, that the big thinkers of the city didn’t know what to make of her and neither did the younger crowd who believed this was just another gentrification project.”

The student protesters turned embarrassed shades of red. Good. I gestured to the different displays around the room. The architectural model of the twenty small houses currently under construction took up the center space. It was massive and it was extraordinary, but Lexi had also brought models of the solar, wind, and water generators that were the main sources of power for the development. They sat around the room, chugging away as if this were a science fair.

“That’s all right,” I said. “It took me a minute to appreciate it, too. But as the founder of the Sunshine House, a local nonprofit committed to helping families torn apart by substance abuse start new lives, I have recently acquired several tax-reverted lots in the city on which Lexi will be designing more net-zero small house communities for low- to middle-income families who need a new start.”

I heard Lexi gasp. I turned to her and said, “That’s assuming you’re willing to stay for a while.”

She was crying. It looked like happy tears since she was grinning at the same time. I laughed and grabbed her hand, holding it in mine.

“Excellent. With the commitment of those in the community with the ability to look forward to the future, Lexi has broken ground on the first development that will revolutionize urban housing, and secure Phoenix’s ranking as the most innovative city in the country. Now it’s up to us to keep it going.”