Bennett shifts on his feet and clears his throat. “What about the inheritance?”
I give him a sharp look. I’ve vehemently ignored my inheritance since the moment I was told about Uncle Jakob’s will. Because it came with the worst possible condition he could have placed on me. “Did you conveniently forget the condition?”
“So follow the letter of the law, not the spirit of it. You don’t have to find true love to get married. Just someone willing to partner with you and treat it like a business venture. You could find someone in a heartbeat, I bet.”
Sighing, I massage the bridge of my nose. “Right. Because I have such a wide social circle, and it’s made up of single people chomping at the bit to marry for money.”
“I mean…we could figure it out. Park and I would help you.”
“B!” Parker yells from outside. “Leave the man to brood in peace!”
“All right,” Bennett mutters, heading for the hallway. “Hang in there. Let me know what you decide. And if you change your mind about the inheritance, I mean it—we’ll help you find someone.”
“I’m not that desperate.” I stare down at the paper burning a hole in my hand. “At least, I don’t think so. But thanks, Bennett.”
Following him down the stairs and outside, I stop on the porch.
Skyler pauses puddle-jumping and squints up at me. “You look extra grumpy today, Uncle Ax.”
“What can I say, Skyler. It’s a good day to be grumpy.”
Hands on hips over her superhero-cape rain jacket, she tips her head and examines me. “I think you need a good kiss.”
Parker covers his laugh with a cough.
“Really,” I say to her. “Wonder who’s been telling you that.”
“No one!” she says, leaping for a puddle right next to me and dousing my legs.
“Skyler,” Bennett chides.
“They’re already soaking wet,” I tell him.
She lands in another puddle. “I just know that when Daddy’s grumpy, BiBi kisses him, and then he’s all better. So go find someone and get a kiss. Then come back for more Candyland so I can kick your butt.”
“This child,” Bennett says wearily, taking her by the shoulder. “All Parker.”
Parker grins as he backtracks toward the car. “Out of the mouth of babes, Axel!”
I give him the appropriate hand gesture when Skyler turns her back and gets into the car. Then I watch the three of them leave, hands waving out the windows from their extended cab truck. When it turns onto the main road, I open the paper Bennett handed me.
And it’s a very good thing Skyler isn’t around to hear what comes out of my mouth.
I am so absolutely fucked.
Pocketing the quote, I lower myself onto the porch. Wind moves through the trees, sending fiery gold and scarlet leaves fluttering to the ground and painting the earth, doing a damned better job at making art than I have in months.
A knot tightens in my chest. I shut my eyes, and there she is, vivid, breathtaking.
Rooney.
This is all her fault—not the house, but those blank and half-finished canvases back in my studio. It’s her fault that I’ve been fighting a losing creative battle for months. And it’s that fucking charades kiss that was the death blow.
Now, every time I pick up a brush, it’s not abstract lines and bold colors. It’s peaches and pinks, ocean blue-greens and spun honey-gold. I paint something—someone—I shouldn’t.
That has to end. I need so much money, and fast. I haven’t painted anything I can sell in over two months. Everything I have painted is already sold. If I can’t get past this creative block, I don’t know what I’ll do.
Well, that’s not true. I know what I’ll do. I just really don’t want to do it.
Pushing off the steps, I turn back inside, shut the door, and lock it behind me. My eyes land on the family photos along the hallway wall. My parents’ wedding day. My siblings and I, in all stages of childhood. Formal family portraits and candid photos of skinned-kneed kids—flushed faces, sun-tanned, freckled skin.
Then there’s the photo from years ago. I spot my mother’s brother, Uncle Jakob, who came all the way from Östersund, a man whose quiet intensity, whose daily ritual of sitting outside early in the morning, drinking coffee, and sketching the view, I’ve recognized in myself. A man who I thought would respect a person’s choice for a solitary life if they decided that was for the best.
And then he left me a shocking amount of money with the condition that I had to be married.
It felt like being slapped.
He didn’t know me well, but he saw me enough times that I’d thought he would intuit marriage wasn’t likely for someone like me, someone who can barely talk to unfamiliar people, whose words come out blunt and sharp with the people I do know and love, who avoids unfamiliar touch and rarely hugs and disappears when rooms grow loud, no matter how happy the occasion, because it’s just too much.
I’ve tried not to be resentful. But right now I am. That inheritance could really come in handy. And I have to get married in order to access it.
Could I marry someone, even if only for the sole purpose of money? A business arrangement in which I get my inheritance and they barter their cut?
I stare at Uncle Jakob’s photo and sigh. “What were you thinking?”
He doesn’t answer. Of course he doesn’t. He’s a fucking photo, and he’s been dead for over a year. I’m losing it.
Beneath my feet, I hear an ominous clunk, then a surge of water, meaning something else just went wrong. I’m not even surprised at this point. Sighing, I turn and make my way toward the basement.
3
Rooney
Playlist: “Alex,” Wild Child
I didn’t get lost. I took a detour. That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.
After my “detour,” I reach the end of the drive and throw the car in park. I almost kiss the ground when I step out and shut the door behind me. My drive took nearly two hours, and my stomach pains are persistent—not bad enough that I was worried about needing a roadside stop but bad enough that I’m thoroughly relieved to be here. Pain is always a warning, and it’s vulnerable, not knowing when pain will become urgency.
I take a deep breath, more relaxed now that a bathroom is within reach if I need it. Thankfully, I don’t need it right now. For now, I can stand and drink in the view before me.
My gaze settles on the A-frame. Two tall stories. Floor-to-ceiling glass, the exterior rain-darkened to a deep brown-black. Towering evergreens and deciduous trees flank the property. The rush of nearby water marries the sound of rain slipping off branches to the earth in a soft pit-pat.
It’s so peaceful—quiet and hushed. The kind of silent stillness I never thought I’d be drawn to, but here I am, mesmerized. A carpet of crimson and copper rain-slicked leaves spreads across the clearing, a trail leads into the woods, a view of the lake is to the other side, and…there’s another car here.
That’s strange.
I frown at the black Jeep Wrangler that looks like it’s as old as me. I don’t recognize it. Probably an old standby car that the Bergmans keep here.