“You’d earn the money, Griff. Seddledowne needs a fire department. Do you know what the response time is for the volunteers right now?”
I did not want to do this. I was tired, my legs hurt from standing so long, and I really, really wanted to find my wife and go home. “On a good day? Twenty-two minutes if you live within ten minutes of a station,” I clipped. I checked the response times now and then, just for fun.
“Exactly. Your house is more likely to burn to the ground than to have the fire put out. Imagine how much faster it would be if we had paid firefighters already at the station instead of having to wait for volunteers to drive from home or work just to get the firetruck.”
“Regardless, you don’t needmeto start your own department. There are far more experienced men who’d jump at the chance, especially if you throw that outlandish salary their way. Post that online, and you’ll have the position filled in twenty-four hours. Take your pick.” I waved a hand. “I mean, did you research fire chief salaries at all?”
He chewed his bottom lip for a second. “Fine. Maybe I overshot the salary. I just?—”
“Thought I wouldn’t be able to turn it down?”
“Yeah,” he said, like I must be insane.
“Well, you thought wrong.” I folded my hands on top ofmy head, trying to rein in my frustration. “The last thing I need is people whispering as I drive by, talking about how my wealthy uncle created an entire fire department just to get me to move home. And like a sucker, I sold out and did it.”
“Don’t let your pride be the deciding factor here,” he said, on the verge of desperation. Why did he want this so much? “Think about what this could do for you and Juliette?”
I tried not to let it, but that rubbed me the wrong way. I needed my family to get up in the middle of my marriage like I needed a hole in my head. “Me and Juliette?” I asked, voice rising. “Juliette has a job she loves back in Vegas.” I threw out my arms. “Juliette is not a small-town girl. She lives in a high-rise penthouse. She hasn’t driven her own car since she began at DayGlow, because she has her own driver. And I’m supposed to uproot her in the middle of her very lucrative career and move her back to podunk Seddledowne?” I scoffed. “Do you really think she’d be happy here after that kind of life?” It was meant to be rhetorical.
But Ford answered with a firm, “Yes, I do.”
I guffawed. Then I cranked up the twang. “Hate to break it to you, but not everybody wants to fish all summer, hunt all winter, live on venison, Busch Light, and chewing tobacco, cry about their high school truck, their tractor, their granddaddy’s shotgun, and the dirt road they grew up on all while they rock on a porch swing with a coon dog, guitar in their lap, writing songs about the woman they met in a bar, spent ‘one reckless night’ with, and still aren’t over it a decade later.”
I tried to make myself stop. I really did. But something about standing on Seddledowne soil short-circuited whatever part of my brain controlled my mouth. Once somebody got me riled up, my words were a freight train about to jump the tracks. I could pull back on the brake all I wanted—tell myself to be quiet and that I was going to regret it later—but therewas no stopping until the whole wreck finished unfolding, scattering every ugly, hateful word across the ground.
The worst part was not only that I was a hypocrite—because I’d also technically met my wife in a bar—but also, I’d just used Ford’s own lyrics as ammo against him. Half of the things I’d listed were direct lines from his greatest hits. The truck, the shotgun, the coon dog. The one reckless night was specifically about how he’d met Aunt Peyton.
What was wrong with me?
As if the hurt on my uncle’s face wasn’t bad enough, right then, my dad—who I hadn’t known was behind me—barked, “Whatthe hellis wrong with you?”
I whipped around.
And hissed out a cuss word.
Because it wasn’t just my dad. Holden, Ashton, Gramps, and Blue had all heard my horrible diatribe, and their disappointment ran me straight through.
My hands locked behind my neck. “S-sorry,” I stuttered stupidly. “I?—”
“You aresorry,” Dad growled. “Who do you think you are talking to Ford like that? Do you have any idea what he’s done for this family? How much helovesyou?”
I did. I loved him too. I loved them all.
Which was exactly why I had to go back to Phoenix. I was a monster here, and the only way I could stop was by leaving.
“Silas,” Gramps said in his peacemaker voice. “Careful, son.”
It did nothing to calm Dad. “I don’t know what happened to you out there.” He pointed a finger in my face. “But you were raised better than that. Apologize.Now.”
I turned to Ford and made myself look him in the eye. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have?—”
“No. It’s cool,” Ford said. “Message received.” He pattedme on the shoulder. “Glad you could get that off your chest.” Then he straightened his tie and walked inside.
But a punch to the stomach couldn’t have hurt more than the tears I saw in his eyes.
My uncles and Blue filed past me one at a time. Holden shook his head. Ashton met my eye, his deeply disappointed. Blue wouldn’t even look at me. I deserved it. If my words were buckshot, they’d been caught in the blast. Because they were as cowboy as Ford. Every one of them.
Only Dad and Gramps stayed behind. Dad, to light me up, no doubt, and Gramps to make sure he didn’t kill me in the process.
