Page 10 of Final Proposal

Most of it I knew. Some of it I learned for the first time and will be forever grateful to have more to hold on to of the man who was our whole world for most of our lives.

And who now is gone.

What I didn’t expect was to feel curious—hopeful even—to get insight into how he looked at me as a man. And when I read his take on Callahan and then his thoughts on Ledger, I held my breath when I turned the page.

“So you have Callahan the rebel and Ledger the Type A, tell us about your middle son, Fordham.”

Maxton’s eyes grow wistful, and a smile ghosts his lips. “My wife went to Fordham University. That’s where I met her actually. I had a side job delivering flowers, and I accidentally ran into her. I plucked the card out of the bouquet right then and there and gave them to her instead.” His smile widens. “That’s where Ford got his name from. A nod to the day I knew I would marry Carly.”

The imposing man sits back in his chair and looks out the window of his tower in the sky. The city moves at breakneck speed beneath him, and I wonder if he misses the pace or if he enjoys his unhurried life now.

I wait for him to gather his thoughts. Moments pass. Memories are silently relived, and the emotions from them fleet through his expression.

“Ford is . . . the peacekeeper of our family. The even keel in our sometimes-stormy life. He’s . . . just Ford.”

Just Ford.

Not Fordham Rhys Sharpe, second in his class at Wharton by a very small percentage. Not Fordy, son of Maxton and Carly, who kept the family together after his mother’s death. Not Ford, the man who streamlined some of S.I.N.’s chain-of-command issues to make the company more efficient and more successful. Not my son, the one who called every night to make sure I was okay.

Fucking Just Ford.

And that’s all I could think about tonight as my brothers and their wives, Sutton and Asher, stood before a whole host of people with wide smiles and welcoming hugs.

How do they look at me? Am I invisible to them too? Am I Just Ford, the middle son they often forget—and surprisingly—don’t really know much about?

“It’s the book, isn’t it?” Ledger asks, pulling me from my thoughts. “Reading through it has reminded us of everything we’re missing with him gone. Was it as hard for you to read as it was for me?”

“For that.” I give a measured nod. “And for other reasons.”

The drink I’ve rejected all night long is calling my name right now. But I don’t move toward the refrigerator stocked with beer. I think once I start, I won’t stop. Rather, I hold Callahan’s stare.

“It doesn’t mean anything,” he finally murmurs quietly, almost as if in a warning.

What the fuck?

“What doesn’t?” Ledger asks while I wonder if Callahan’s comment means when he read the book, he noticed it too. Or more to the point, my absence in it.

Surprising if that’s the case. My brother, who used to only think of himself, noticed while the one who typically knows every “T” that needs to be crossed and “I” that needs to be dotted, didn’t.

But why the warning?

“God forbid, Just Ford rocks the boat, right, Cal?” I ask.

“Does someone want to clue me in why the two of you are staring at each other while I’m over here standing in the fucking dark?”

“Just Ford,” I repeat.

“What about it? Did you forget your name? What am I missing?” Ledger asks, but I know the minute it registers because his hand falters bringing his drink to his mouth.

“Like I said, it doesn’t mean anything. Like all books, not everything is included in a final product. Things are edited out. Winword probably had a lot left on the cutting-room floor that he just couldn’t use,” Callahan says, referring to the author.

“Edited out? You mean the boring parts that aren’t interesting, right? Because why would he use anything Dad said about me when he has the bad-boy Callahan and protégé Ledger to talk about?”

Because he didn’t have anything to say about me that was worthy of being in his book.

And there it is.

Most things roll off my back. Little affects me emotionally. Rarely anything. But to think that my dad thought so little of me is upsetting. I’m confused by this pressure in my chest. I’m confounded by this need to prove I’m more than Just Fucking Ford.