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Fia let out a long, slow breath. “They denied the permits.”
“Fia...”
And she saw Fia was dangerously close to crying, which was not something she had ever seen from her older sister.
Her older sister was strong. She had to be. She had led them all these years, since their dad had left and their mom had moved away.
When Fia was a teenager, she’d been volatile. But later Quinn realized it was because she’d been the one who was so much more aware of how their parents were falling apart. She’d been angry and it was understandable. She’d fought with their mother like she’d hated her.
After she’d come back from running away she’d changed. She hadn’t bothered to fight with their mother anymore. It was like she’d come back with a decision made. From then on Fia had treated the ranch and the house like hers. She treated them like hers.
Like she’d known their parents would abandon them and she’d needed to make the conscious choice to stay and care for it and them.
Right now she looked absolutely defeated, despairing. Quinn hated that. From the bottom of her heart she felt like they owed Fia for all she’d done for them. She wanted to fix this for her. Desperately.
“I don’t know what we’re going to do now,” Fia said, shrugging. “We built the whole thing, we’re almost ready to go, but if we have to make everybody drive down this dirt road... Most people are going to decide it isn’t worth the hassle.”
“But they can get here,” said Rory. “And maybe we can make it so amazing that it actually just seems like an adventure. Like you have to go deep into the wilderness to go to this little store in rural Oregon. Almost as if you’re traveling through an enchanted wood.”
“That’s ridiculous,” said Fia.
“It’s the kind of ridiculous that would probably end up getting a million views on the internet,” said Rory.
But Rory was always way more dream than reality. The sort of person who thought buying a lottery ticket might be a viable retirement plan, and Quinn and Fia were a lot more grounded. Which was truly painful in moments like this.
“We have one more option,” said Quinn, feeling absolutely filled with indignation and purpose.
And that all-encompassing, ever-expanding sense of something she felt whenever she thought of him.
“It’s not an option, Quinn,” Fia said, “and you know that. He was the chief objector to us getting that extra road access...”
“Because it was going to bypass the town. But going through his property will not bypass the town. It solves the problem. Barring us from using that road would just be petty.”
Unfortunately, she had the feeling that Levi Granger was petty.
“Quinn...” Rory shook her head. “We might just have to acknowledge that we’re in a little bit over our heads.”
“I will not acknowledge that,” said Quinn. “Because this makes sense. It’s logical, and we aren’t wrong. He’s wrong.”
They needed this. If they couldn’t get this up and running, they really were going to be the dead tree branch of Four Corners. They might as well lease out 100 percent of their land to the Kings, and Sullivan’s Point would lose its identity altogether.
And her dad would be right.
About her. About what she could accomplish.
She couldn’t have that.
“I don’t know,” said Fia. “I feel defeated. We tried to do this the right way, we tried to take the community into consideration, but it has been an uphill battle the whole time. The Kings were against us... We don’t even have the full support of Four Corners. They’re indulging us. Don’t think I can’t feel that. They never thought it was going to succeed, not really. We aren’t the same as them. We aren’t men, we don’t have cattle, we don’t have horses. They don’t respect what we do.”
“That’s not true,” said Rory. “They’re not all that way.”
Fia wiped a tear from her cheek. “I know. This was just... It’s my dream and I...”
“And you’ll have it,” said Quinn, fiercely. “Everything that you’ve done for us, all the sacrifices that you’ve made, none of it is going to be in vain, Fia. I swear to you. I swear. I am not going to let you lose your dream.”
“That’s really sweet, Quinn, but I don’t know that there’s any way around it.”
“There is,” said Quinn. “I’m going to prove to Levi Granger that I’m right. I’m going to...I’m going to offer him something.”
