LITMIR.BIZ

       CHAPTER ONE

      “BE CAREFUL OF that box,” Lola Martinez called from behind the cash register as Finn Culver came in through the front door of the feed store. “It’s full of pottery.”

      “Right.” Finn sidestepped the box blocking the aisle and barely kept from shaking his head as he crossed the store to his grandfather’s office. Two weeks had passed since he’d returned from overseas deployment, and he was still having trouble wrapping his mind around the changes that had occurred here during the year he’d been gone.

      He’d left a dusty space containing the bare essentials for serious ranching and farming and come back to a full-blown Western gift boutique and coffee corner—thanks to his cousin’s new fiancée, Jolie Brody. The crazy thing was that his grandfather, Mike, who’d taught him his frugal ways, was good with it. No, he was great with it—because his friends hung around the store now, and he didn’t have to wait for Thursday-night poker to be with the guys. Business was booming, despite competition from chain ranch stores, and how strange was that when a year ago he could have fired a cannonball through the store and not come close to hitting someone?

      “Hey, Finn.” Karl Evans, one of Mike’s best friends, hailed him from inside the office, where two of the three chairs that usually sat side by side in front of the small television had been swung around to face Finn’s desk. “We need an opinion.”

      Finn gamely made his way to stand behind the chairs. He’d given a lot of opinions and settled a lot of bets since returning home. Debating and small-time wagering were a way of life for his granddad and his friends Karl and Cal Sawyer.

      Karl looked over his shoulder at him. “We’re thinking of introducing Cal into the wonderful world of online dating. Which photo?”

      On the desk were printouts of three hilariously unflattering photos of the missing member of the geriatric trio.

      Finn’s face grudgingly split into a smile as he picked up the photo that made it appear as if Cal’s eyes had rolled back into his head. “You guys wouldn’t.”

      “We’re just going to mess with his head,” Karl said with a laugh. “Teach him that it’s dangerous to miss buddy time.”

      Finn pointed at the photo he’d just set down. “That one. Definitely.”

      He left the two guys cackling and typing up Cal’s bogus profile.

      “I have the grain order ready for approval,” Lola said as he came out of the office. She was an easygoing woman in her midforties who used to live next door to Mike. She was there temporarily until his cousin Dylan and his fiancée, Jolie, returned from Colorado, where Dylan was training in forensic biology. But with the way business was going, they could probably keep her on. He went to the counter and pulled the papers closer, reading through them slowly and making a checkmark by each item as he approved it.

      “You okay?” Lola asked.

      Finn glanced up in surprise. “Yeah. Why?”

      “You seem...preoccupied?”

      He jerked his head at the office door. “Just concerned that I might be the next guy in their sights for a prank.”

      “Yeah. That wouldn’t be good. Those guys...they have too much time on their hands.”

      “That’s what I’m afraid of.”

      * * *

      “THIS IS A CUTE HOUSE and all, Molly, but what’s with these closets?”

      Molly Adamson’s younger sister, Georgina, stood in front of the pint-size closet, holding a fistful of hangers and looking perplexed. At nineteen, she was a year older than Molly had been when the family moved from Eagle Valley, Montana, to Darby, Illinois, where her father had been tasked with reviving yet another failing store. Moving every year or two, depending on how long it took her father to work his magic or declare the store a bust, had been a fact of Adamson family life. But Molly had been lucky that the family had stayed in the Eagle Valley for three whole years, allowing her to finish high school there. It’d been the longest she’d ever lived in one place and probably the reason she was back. Eagle Valley was the closest thing to a hometown that she had.

      Georgina set the hangers on the dresser and propped a hand on her hip as she regarded the space. “Didn’t people hang up clothing in the 1940s?”

      “They probably didn’t own as much clothing as you do.”

      “Point taken, but seriously, look at the size of this thing.”

      Molly had to agree it was small, but other than the tiny closets, the house was perfect. Situated on the edge of town with a creek on the other side of the backyard fence and beyond that fields and mountains... It was more than she’d hoped for after making the decision to return. Housing options were limited in the Eagle Valley, unless you were rolling in money, which Molly definitely was not. Thank you, Blake. Her ill-fated relationship with an almost-pro ballplayer had played hell with both her finances and later her self-esteem, but it had also helped her to grow a backbone.

      “I would have loved this closet when I was eight,” Georgina said. “Kid-size.” She tapped a finger on her chin. “Maybe I could build something. You know, shelving and stuff.”

      Molly had seen that light in her sister’s eyes before. “Uh...give me a heads-up before you start knocking out walls, okay?”

      Georgina flashed a smile. “I’ll probably be too busy with classes to do any serious renovation, but at semester break...don’t worry,” she said with a laugh. “I’ll have a plan in place.”

      “Yes, I’d appreciate a plan.” Then it wouldn’t be like the time her sister had taken it upon herself to join her room to Molly’s by knocking out a space between wall studs with a hammer. Both girls had gotten a lesson in drywall installation and repair shortly thereafter, with Molly handling the brunt of the work, since she was sixteen and Georgina had been six. Their brother, David, who perfectly split their age span, being five years older than Georgina and five years younger than Molly, had enjoyed himself immensely, since for once he wasn’t the Adamson in deep trouble.

      Molly walked down the hall to the kitchen, which was crammed with unopened boxes. She leaned against the door frame, letting her glasses slide down her nose as she regarded the room. Yes, she would make order of chaos, but she didn’t have much time, because her new job started in less than a week. Feeling a surge of adrenaline at the thought, she pushed off the door frame and opened the box closest to her and starting unwrapping her grandmother’s china and loading it carefully into the cupboards. Rain beat on the roof as she worked, a sound she hadn’t heard all that often in Phoenix, where she’d recently finished up her degree. Now it was a sound she’d been hearing for the past twelve hours.

      “Need some help?” Georgina, apparently having given up on closet plans for the time being, drifted into the room. She opened a box without waiting for an answer and began unpacking kitchen utensils.

      Finally, at nine o’clock, Georgina straightened from where she’d been kneeling next to the linen

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