Wild Love: Chapter 6

“What are you doing here?”

Rosie flips her head around from where she sits at the end of the dock, clearly startled by my arrival. “Enjoying the view.”

I wanted peace and quiet to clear my head tonight. I know that with Rosie here I’ll get neither. I look beyond her at the darkened lake. Without the scattered glow from the solar lights dotting the pillars, it would be pitch black out over the water. But I know the view well, given that this dock sits near the property line between my and West’s houses. Even though there’s nothing visible on the horizon right now, I can envision it almost perfectly.

“What are you doing here?” she asks.

I stay standing, not sure how to act around her. Still. Even though I’m now a perfectly successful and independent thirty-two-year-old. “I came to sit on my dock and escape the new realities of my life in the dark, by the water, where it’s quiet. Except you’re here, and it’s never quiet where you are unless you’re plotting someone’s death.”

She snorts, but it’s half-hearted. Then she turns back to the still body of water again. “First, this isn’t your dock. It’s my family’s. I would know, because I’ve been coming here for years. Second, I don’t plot people’s deaths.”

I stride toward her and opt not to tell her that, according to the land survey, this dock does, in fact, fall on my property. “Fair, you’re more of a crime-of-passion type. But I’ve spent years thinking you planned Travis Lynch’s death out in detail on the pages of that diary.”

She laughs, but it’s not light and airy like I remember. There’s a heaviness to Rosie now that doesn’t match my memories of her. She may be three years younger, but she always kept up with us through her teen years. West never excluded her, and she was always the “it” girl in Rose Hill— popular to the point of being beloved—if that’s a thing.

As someone who was more of a loner, she always seemed that way to me anyway. I only got the summer experience of Rose Hill as a kid though. Now and then, we’d come for Christmas, or the odd weekend getaway, but my family’s life was in the city. My mom’s practice, my dad’s band. He’d go on tour, and Willa and I would go to school. But the summer was sacred. My parents built it that way on purpose. We spent those two months based here in Rose Hill and it was the best escape.

It wasn’t until I was an adult that I started spending more time here just because I wanted to. It wasn’t until the city became too fucking much that I decide to move here permanently.

“Yeah. I’m fairly sure I wrote an entire paragraph weighing whether it would be more humiliating for him if I cut off his penis or his testicles.”

“Dark. What did you settle on?” I crouch down, placing a hand on the wooden boards to take a seat. Several feet separate us, but our legs dangle over the edge as we sit side by side, taking in the view of lights from homes dotting the other side of the lake.

“I forget.”

“That’s a shame. I saw him at the grocery store the other day.”

“Yeah?” She doesn’t look my way, but I can tell by the change in her voice that she’s entertained. “What does it say about me that I hope he’s aged poorly?”

“It says you can take the girl out of the small town, but you can’t take the small town out of the girl.”

At that, she sighs.

“And that you’re still just as mean as you used to be,” I add.

Now she laughs. It starts out as a soft hiccup and grows into more. It grows into the laugh of a younger Rosie. The one who took up every inch of space in a room just by breezing in and smiling.

“Ah, Ford. Thank you. Being insulted by you just feels so right. Please don’t tell me what that says about me though.”

My lips twitch and my legs swing in time with hers as I search for what to talk about next. “So, how’s city life? Seems like you moved away and stayed gone. Job. Boyfriend. Condo. What brings you back now?”

“Oh yeah? Do you come back here often? I thought you bought a bar and founded a wildly successful music streaming app. Figured you’d be something of a city slicker yourself.”

I just shrug. Gramophone is the app she’s talking about. It started as a university project I made with a group of friends—until it blew up into so much more.

It blew up in more ways than one.

“I did all those things, yeah. I thought buying the bar where I worked through college would give me a passion project. And it did for a while. Then the app came along. And that scratched the itch for a bit too.”

“But not now?”

I shrug. “Gin and Lyrics became more successful than I banked on. I was bored, so I hired more people. Put more parameters in place. Now the bar practically runs itself. I started off only booking bands I liked, but when we got busy enough, I started booking groups other people like to keep the crowds coming.”

“Bands you don’t like.”

“Yeah. Business over my personal preference, but that’s okay. That bar doesn’t feel like it belongs to me anymore, even though my name is on the deed. I’m happy that it makes other people happy. I’ll always be proud of that place.”

She nods, body swaying back and forth gently. “And the app?”

“Gramophone started out the same way. But of course, it wasn’t just mine. I had partners. And it became more about the personal fame and fortune than it was about the music.”

“Not a fan of that vibe I take it?”

I sigh heavily. This one hurts. More than the bar. I don’t especially like talking about it.

“I find that when a person’s obsession with money outweighs their commitment to integrity, I no longer want to spend my time around them.”

Rosie hums thoughtfully at the bite in my voice. But she doesn’t press for more. She falls back into teasing me—and it’s a welcome reprieve.

“So now you’re going full recluse on the abandoned land next door? You gonna bury chests of money here? Is this some elaborate eccentric-billionaire thing where you leave a treasure map behind?”

“No. It’s an eccentric-billionaire thing where I open my own recording studio and only work with musicians I like or believe in. I’ve got the capital to launch artists who can’t afford to get their foot in the door, and the connections to help the ones who need a place to do something without their shitty labels meddling. With the internet and streaming services distribution isn’t the challenge it once was.”

“And your dad?”

I sigh. Cora called me a nepo baby, and as much as I hate it, she’s not wrong. Separating my success from Ford Grant Senior and his globally renowned rock band, Full Stop, has been next to impossible. “His name carries clout. I’d be an idiot not to have him come in and guest-produce something at some point. Though we’ll probably clash at every turn.”

“Adorable. And has he met his granddaughter yet?”

I go still. I feel like I’ve barely met her myself. West knows about her and now Rosalie does too. I looped Mr. and Mrs. Belmont in too, only because they figured it out themselves after snooping around. After years of having to suss out West’s antics, they’ve developed a sixth sense for any sort of drama.

“It hasn’t come up yet.”

“What?”

“They’re traveling. I was thinking I would tell him and my mom when they get to Rose Hill. They’re spending the summer here, at their place.”

“Ford.” She sounds genuinely horrified.

“What? I’ve barely had a minute to wrap my head around this development. I’m drowning in emails and calls and promises I made to people to have this place up and running. I didn’t imagine this being my life. I planned to renovate the house and office here on my own, but now I’ve got Cora registered in school. She needs support. And I don’t even know for sure how long she’ll live here.”

“Will she be here full time?”

“No one planned for this. Her mom’s in deep depression after losing her husband. That’s how the sperm donor thing came to light, I guess. Which is why Cora tracked me down.”

Rosie chuckles softly. “Resourceful kid.”

I sigh and dip my chin. “Marilyn was devastated when she realized the way Cora had been covering for her. We talked with her doctors and her and I had a heart-to-heart. She doesn’t want to drag Cora through the ups and downs of her early treatment—doesn’t want Cora seeing her that way anymore. She asked me to let her work on getting better for a month. So at least that long. And they just… they really have no one to help them, you know? No family at all.”

“Shit, that’s heavy,” Rosie mutters as she kicks her feet.

All I do is nod and continue venting.

“Yup. And I can barely stay on top of buying snacks and trying to find the black sheets she requested. Snacks for children are loaded with an absurd amount of sugar and every black bedding set I find looks all shiny, like it belongs in a porno. Trust me, I just spent the better part of an hour scouring the internet.”

She groans and covers her face with her hands, but I can see her smiling. “You still need to tell them.”

My molars clamp as I weigh how much I really want to divulge tonight. Then I tell her anyway, because I don’t like the thought of Rosie judging me for my decisions.

“A fan went to the press when Willa and I were younger, claiming my dad was the father of her child. It wasn’t true, but it was messy. I remember my parents arguing and him having to go to court. I remember the way they talked about that woman—about that baby. He was furious, and my mom was hurt. It all worked out in the end, but I don’t know how they’ll react to this.”

Rosie’s eyes are wide, her tone hushed. “I don’t remember that.”

“You wouldn’t. It was just before we started coming to Rose Hill. That one event changed the way they parented us. His touring stopped, and they got their place out here to get us away from the media.”

“They might need a heads-up. Processing time.”

I groan. I’m the one who needs processing time. Processing time without my dad going off about this, calling in lawyers and private investigators to discredit Cora and her mom.

I’m his son, and he’d do it to protect me. Just like I’m withholding this information to protect Cora.

Rosie pushes though. She’s always pushing on my sore spots. Needling me. “You can’t just spring this on your family, Ford.”

And unfortunately, I’ve always been snippy with her. That’s been my defense mechanism where she’s concerned for years. And it’s all too easy to fall back into old habits.

“Oh, like the way you just showed up on West’s doorstep with tears in your eyes and zero explanation for what was going on?”

Her head whips in my direction, and I take in her face on the dimly lit dock. Dark blond strands tumble out of her high ponytail and skim over high cheekbones that narrow in on a heart-shaped face. Her lips are shapely but delicate. Eyes bright. Nose slender but perfectly straight. She complained about her nose as a teenager. She’d say it was too big, too strong. But to me, it’s always been one of her most striking features.

To this day, she remains the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.

“These things are not the same. I don’t owe West an explanation of what’s going on in my life. I’m an independent adult. And he’s my brother.”

“An independent adult with a car full of suitcases and bags, who’s crashing in her brother’s bunkhouse with no expected departure date.”

Her jaw tenses, and her eyes narrow. “I don’t owe you an explanation either, Ford. And I sure as shit don’t need your approval. Shouldn’t be throwing stones, not when you’re sitting in a glass house.”

I consider her words, realizing my concern for her probably came off condescending.

“I’ll talk about it when I’m ready,” she continues. “But rest assured, this isn’t how I imagined my life either.”

I want to tell her I feel the same way about my situation, but she doesn’t give me an opportunity. “Thanks for the chat.” Then she’s up and walking away. The boards rattle beneath me as she goes, but then her footsteps cease and all I hear is the gentle lapping of the lake beneath me.

“Actually,” her voice cuts through the night and I feel her head back in my direction. “You leave. This is my dock, and I want to be alone.”

I smirk into the night because that feels exactly like something Rosie would say. Exactly like a stupid fight she’d pick with me. The type of fight I’d always let her win.

And the more things change, the more they stay the same, because with that smirk still plastered on my face, I push to standing and she moves past me, her body brushing against mine on the way.

She takes her seat, smack dab in the middle of the dock, like she’s staking her claim. All she needs is a flag bearing a family crest that she can nail to a board.

I’m about to walk away, but I allow myself one last glance in her direction. Shoulders tense, her nose tipped up high. I’ve pissed her off, but not that badly. Not enough that it stops me from reverting to my teenage self.

I bend down and reach out to wrap my fingers around her high, bouncy ponytail.

I give it two firm tugs, watching the way the light hits the column of her throat. She growls with annoyance, but it doesn’t scare me.

“Goodnight, Rosie Posie.”

“Fuck you, Junior. I hate you.” The old insult flies so easily from her lips, but it does nothing to wipe the smile from my face. “I thought I told you to get off my dock.”

I relax my hand, and the silky strands of her hair slip through my fingers. I hear the soft whoosh of her breath as I let go.

And then I turn and walk away.

This may not be her dock, but if she wants it, she can have it.