Wild Love: Chapter 22

Willa and I walk into the Rose Hill Reach, a pub that sits right on the water, and she looks around in wonder. “Damn, they really cleaned this place up. It used to be a total dump.”

She’s not wrong. It was a total dump when we were younger. Just dumpy enough that we all got away with drinking here before we were legal.

Now it screams elevated ski lodge. They have entirely redone the dock out front, providing a bridge out over the water to a massive floating patio. West and I met here for a beer the other day, and I couldn’t help but take a trip down memory lane while we chatted.

“Wanna sit outside?” Willa carries on without me saying anything. “It’s pretty nice tonight.”

The dock reminds me of Rosie. Sitting there with her, getting pushed into the lake, holding her.

“Nah, let’s sit inside. I can kick your ass at pool and buy you a drink.” Cora seemed pretty happy to spend her Friday night with West and the kids, so I might as well take a load off. Try to shake this funk I’ve been in.

Willa snorts a laugh and starts in that direction without complaint. “You owe me a lot more than a drink. Buy me this entire bar, Ford.”

“No.”

“Come on! I see so few benefits to being the little sister of the World’s Hottest Billionaire. I get radio silence, a secret niece”—she peeks over her shoulder at me—“who I’ll admit is really fucking cool, and what? I bet you’ll buy me shares in that genealogy testing company for Christmas.”

That makes me laugh.

But the laugh dies on my lips when we turn into the section of booths near the pool table and I’m met with a set of crystal blue eyes I’d know anywhere.

“Oh, thank god!” Willa announces when she sees Rosie and Fuckboy sitting together in their booth. Looking at him reminds me I really need to talk to Cora about how sometimes we just insult people with our eyes rather than our words. Or at least behind their backs. “Some people who aren’t Ford to hang out with.”

My sister turns and sticks her tongue out at me while I just roll my eyes. This is our dynamic. We pretend we can’t stand one another’s company when in reality, we get along well. Since she got married and moved to Chestnut Springs, we do spend less time together. I’m not managing the bar in the city anymore, and she’s not bartending. In fact, she has two kids now, and she’s the one who barely reaches out anymore—even though she makes it sound like I ignore her.

I’m perceptive enough to see that she’s living a life that doesn’t involve talking to me on a daily basis. And it’s a good thing. Her lack of contact means she’s happy. Or at least that’s how I interpret it.

“Hey, guys.” Fuckboy says it good-naturedly enough. A friendly wave in our direction. He seems like a nice enough guy.

And I hate him. I hate every last thing about him.

Cora mumbled something about him looking like a douchey Ken Doll earlier. I couldn’t place what she was talking about then. But now I see it.

He stands up and gestures for Willa to sit on the bench across from him and slides in next to Rosie.

Rosie, who is staring at me.

Rosie, who works for me.

Rosie, who has a boyfriend. One I thought she was on the outs with, but seeing them here, together, makes me realize I was dead fucking wrong. They seem too damn happy to be broken up.

That realization has my heart plummeting hard and fast into my gut. My stomach rolls and I grit my teeth to cover the corresponding nausea.

She might be West’s little sister. She might be my employee. She might be taken.

But none of that stops me from wanting her almost obsessively. Working across from her day in and day out has my brain operating at a fever pitch to keep from crossing any lines where she’s concerned. I’m unaccustomed to not getting what I want.

And I want Rosie Belmont.

It has become downright torturous pretending I don’t.

I cut my gaze away from her and drop onto the bench next to my sister. As usual, she starts talking. Something about her kids, her friends, bull riding, hockey, and calving season.

Honest to god, no one can get a word in edgewise with Willa’s monologuing. Even the server can’t break her flow. I would usually find it annoying, but having to sit across from Rosie and Ryan while they’re out together has me stewing like a petulant child.

I’m so jealous it hurts.

Without Willa filling all the space at the table, I’d say something I regret. Ryan, annoyingly, is a great conversationalist and asks engaging questions to keep the chatter going.

I try not to stare at Rosie. And I fail.

Her finger slides up and down the exterior of the pint glass. Condensation drips down in the movement’s wake. Her nails are hot pink. The same color she recently painted Cora’s.

When I lift my eyes, I realize she’s caught me staring. But it doesn’t stop me. Now she’s doing it too. We watch each other carefully for a beat. Then two.

Her lips part on a sharp gasp.

I try not to imagine her with the guy beside her. His hands on her. His lips on hers. I hate the flash of that image so much that my brain swaps those hands out for mine. On her waist. Tracing the column of her spine through the silky shirt she’s still wearing. Fisting her hair. Giving it a tug like I have before.

But this time I don’t let go. I tilt her head and drop my mouth to her neck. She moans in my ear. Wraps her legs around my waist.

A sharp kick to my shin from under the table startles me. And I find Rosie giving me a what-the-fuck-are-you-doing kind of glare.

I know that vision in my head can’t be me. But it doesn’t stop me from wishing it were. I adjust myself in my pants and go back to focusing on polite conversation, though the ideas running through my head are anything but polite.

“Tell me about your job,” Willa says to Ryan.

He comes back with something about oil and gas and pipelines and finishes with, “But, ya know, I’m really just getting started with the company. Still working my way up.”

That foray into the dark and forgotten recesses of my mind has me feeling more agitated than I already was.

I clear my throat. “I suppose that explains why it’s been so hard for you to get away and see Rosalie.”

Rosie’s eyes look like they might roll right out of their sockets, but Ryan gives me a confused quirk of his head before saying, “Yeah. Totally.”

“Do they not give you vacation days at your job?”

From the corner of my eye, I glimpse my sister watching the exchange, subtly leaning forward.

Ryan rubs at the back of his neck. “I mean they do. I was just saving them for something⁠—”

I cut him off with a patronizing smile. “More important?”

He turns a pink hue, going bashful. “I mean, I don’t know if I’d put it that way.”

He doesn’t seem all bad. I should back off and give the guy a break. But I don’t. I smirk and give him my best asshole glare. “Really? I would.”

I hear my sister try to stifle a snicker from behind her hand.

“Ford—” Rosie starts right as Ryan says, “Hey, man, not all of us⁠—”

“Go to bat for the woman we’re with?” I cut him off sharply, knowing he did nothing in the wake of her being assaulted at her workplace. “Yeah, I’ve noticed.”

Ryan is bright red now, but he’s clearly given up on defending himself. Might as well roll over and show me his tummy. Rosie leaps to his defense. He doesn’t deserve it. But she’s such a good fucking person she does it anyway. “You’re being a dick, Ford. I have vacation days in my contract, but some of us can’t afford to just take time off willy-nilly. I was perfectly capable of going back for a visit too.”

I tilt my head in her direction, hating that she’s going to bat for him. “And yet you didn’t.”

She sucks in a breath, her shoulders rising toward her ears. “Can I please speak to you outside?” She elbows Ryan, who drops his eyes and moves out of her way. Too much of a pushover to stand up for his girlfriend. Too damn nice for a girl like Rosie.

“Oh, Ford, you idiot,” Willa whispers while looking up at me with slack-jawed amusement all over her face. “You are down so bad for that girl.”

All I offer back is a roll of my eyes as I slide off the burgundy banquette. Seems less incriminating than trying to deny it. After all, I need to pick Cora up from West’s house after this fiasco of a night out, and Willa has a big mouth. I don’t need her sharing this theory with my best friend.

That would be a goddamn disaster.

One disaster at a time, I think to myself as Rosie digs her nails into my forearm and drags me toward the door.

“I’ll take the bill,” I say politely to the server as we blast past her computer station. “Be back in a moment.”

“He won’t be back,” Rosie mutters as she storms out the door. “I will leave his dead body in the parking lot and you can frisk him for cash.”

“Charming,” I murmur back to her.

“World’s Deadest Billionaire will be the new magazine headline. The cover will be a picture of your face, and I’ll be personally invited to complete the design by drawing devil horns and scribbling out your eyes.”

“Shame that I’ll be dead. I might actually be interested in reading that article.”

The cool spring air hits us in the face and her nails dig deeper into my bare forearm. I should hate it, but it just makes me think about fucking all the venom right out of her while she scratches at my back with those pink nails.

A few purposeful steps and we’re around the corner of the building. Standing in the dark. She’s panting in fury, and I’m breathless for a whole other reason. Her eyes are so blue they almost trend white in the dim light that filters around the side of the building. Patio lanterns strung around the property dot the darkness of the night with warm bright spots. The smell of lilacs permeates the air, emanating from the bush behind us, while the minerality of the lake water beside us adds a soft undertone.

I will forever associate this smell with the look of rage on Rosie’s pretty face right now.

“You’ve got some fucking nerve! You know that?” She’s mad enough to give me a soft shove. One hand on each shoulder pushes me up against the pub’s pale-yellow vinyl siding. She doesn’t stop her forward motion and closes the space instantly.

“Careful, I’m still your boss.” I keep my palms flat against the wall behind me.

She barks out a laugh in my face and lifts her hands beside her head in frustration. “You’re also the asshole I grew up around. And I know what a prick you can be, but goddamn it, Ford, that was too fucking far. He’s already had a rough day. That was mean. A dick-measuring contest is unnecessary.”

“I genuinely don’t give a fuck about his day. My dick is definitely bigger. And I’m not concerned with my likability. I don’t care about him. But I do care about you.”

That takes her aback, but only for a moment. One swift blink and she’s right back at it.

“Ford, you are going to walk in there, and you are going to apologize.”

I cross my arms defiantly, leaning back against the siding in a way that appears a hell of a lot more unaffected than I feel. “Have fun scribbling my eyes out because over my dead fucking body will I apologize to him.”

Her mouth pops open again, true disbelief lacing her every feature as her hands fall limp at her sides.

I can tell she’s about to go on scolding me, so I cut her off before she can. I spit out the words I’ve been swallowing for the past several weeks. “He doesn’t deserve you.”

Her teeth clank as she slams her mouth shut. “Excuse me?”

I repeat the sentence even though we both know she heard it. “I said he doesn’t deserve you.”

Her cheeks flush, and her eyes are wild. She is spitting mad. I fucking love her like this.

“Oh, what? And you do?” She bites the words out, stepping even closer to me. The tips of her shoes bump the toes of my boots, her breasts pressing against my forearms where they’re now crossed against my chest.

“No, Rosie. But I’m not the type of man who will let that stop me.”

I don’t think. I just reach for her. One hand on her jaw, the other gripping her waist. Holding her like I could shake her in frustration—except I never would. Instead, I flip us. I turn her quickly so she’s the one pressed up against the wall.

Her heavy breaths puff out against my skin. Her eyes flash down to the silver chain around my neck, but she makes no other move to escape me. “Oh, cute, now I’m Rosie and not Rosalie? What does that mean?”

Her words are a taunt; her eyes are defiant. I know her boyfriend is inside, and it just makes me want her more.

My eyes race over her face. Flushed cheeks. Twinkling eyes. The tip of her tongue on that full bottom lip. “Rosie, shut up.”

She pauses at the use of her nickname again.

Then she straightens slightly before spitting, “Don’t tell me what to do,” back at me.

And I just shake my head at her, tightening my grip and shifting my hand over so I can brush a thumb over her damp lips. “Rosie, shut up because I’m going to kiss you right now unless you tell me not to.”

I love that she doesn’t go all soft on me.

Our gazes latch onto to one another. She tips her chin up.

And for once she doesn’t say a fucking word.