Page 67 of Final Proposal

“And your mom? Do you remember much about her?”

He gives a soft laugh. “She was larger than life, and that’s saying something in comparison to my father. I remember vague things about her. Her smile. Her laugh. The way she’d ‘try’ to watch action movies with us only to point out every unrealistic thing about it. And I remember how she loved. It was as if she knew she was going to die young. She was hugs and words and actions. We all knew we were loved.”

“That’s beautiful.”

“It was. It still is.” He clears his throat. “My dad tried to live up to that standard, but he wasn’t my mother. And yet, I idolized every single thing about him. And I don’t mean the man who ran Sharpe International. That man I admired. The man I idolized was the man who we saw behind closed doors. The flustered father trying to do his best and the devoted husband he always remained.” His hands fist and his voice clutters with emotion. It sounds like so much more than the pain of having lost his father.

“Ford . . . I don’t even know what to say.”

“Share then. Tell me about your parents. About—”

We both jump as a bullhorn siren goes off on the sailboat to the right of us. “Time to get to shore, everyone. The party is about to start.”

“We wouldn’t want to miss the party,” Ford says as he puts his hands over mine to help me take the helm again.

I’m not sure why I breathe a sigh of relief for being saved from having to answer.

But I know a lot of it has to do with how both of us have endured the same loss . . . but have ended up on different sides of the spectrum.

And I’m still trying to process how that is. And whether I could ever have the courage to change.

Ford

“C’mon, Celery Ellery,” I chide as I walk out onto the makeshift dance floor. Lights are strung across the park’s concrete square, a cover band is playing on the stage to our right, and an array of booths and food is everywhere else.

“You’re telling me that you, Fordham Sharpe, dance?” Her eyes are wide, her smile lighting up her face.

This was a good decision. To get out of the inn. To experience the town and something other than work together.

She was feeling trapped. I could tell it in the look on her face, and her short fuse when talking to contractors.

But it was more than that. It’s whatever has been weighing her down. Whatever happened with Chandler? Sleeping with me? Something with her brothers and stepfather? I don’t know and she won’t volunteer it.

The woman is a closed book. I’m just having to work at it to slowly crack her open.

And tonight’s a start.

There’s fire in her eyes, much like that first night we met. A sass to her tone that’s been missing.

And God, how I want to kiss her again.

“I didn’t say I could dance well . . . but I have no problem making a fool of myself. None of these people know me. Few I’ll ever see again, so what do I care?” I grab her hand and pull her onto the dance floor. Her head falls back, and her laugh carries loudly as we move to some cheesy pop song.

We dance for what feels like hours. We laugh for what feels like the best kind of eternity. It’s like being off the property has lifted a weight off our shoulders we didn’t know we were bearing. Roles we had to play fell to the wayside.

Here at some simple county celebration, we aren’t partners or co-workers. We are friends . . . and a little bit more.

Her kiss earlier took me by surprise. No complaints by any means because the woman could kiss me any time, and in any place, and I wouldn’t complain . . . but it surprised me.

Especially after we’ve purposely kept our distance from each other over the past few days.

And painfully so on my end.

Every whiff of her perfume. Every echo of her laugh. Every sound of her sigh in frustration cemented her mark on me.

My space in the soon-to-be rooftop bar is as far from her room as possible—and it’s still not far enough.

I want her. Plain and simple.