LITMIR.BIZ

       Chapter One

      Leah Holloway stood inside the old ranch house in Columbine Springs, Colorado, unable to believe that in the twenty years since she’d last been here, everything seemed almost unchanged. Except for the silence and emptiness.

      “It’s weird not seeing Grandma Nellie sitting in her rocking chair, isn’t it?” her sister Erin said, coming behind her.

      Leah turned. “She wasn’t our grandmother.”

      “The closest thing we had to one. Besides, everyone called her Grandma Nellie.” Erin put her arm around her and gave a squeeze. “You doing okay?”

      Everyone asked her that, and Leah hated having to answer the question. Of course she wasn’t doing okay. How could anybody be okay when everything in her life was falling apart? Everyone had a million questions for her, and Leah hadn’t had the chance to process what had happened. She’d been too busy trying to stay strong for her kids, doing everything she could to keep a roof over their heads, and now this.

      Not that being here on the ranch was necessarily a bad thing, since the surprise bequest was literally the only reason she and her kids wouldn’t be living on the streets. But it was one more set of emotions being thrown at her that she didn’t have time to deal with.

      Fortunately, her sister Nicole came in, carrying a box. “Isn’t this great? I can’t believe this is all ours.”

      Erin gave their sister a small smile. “The happiest I remember being as children was the summer we spent here with Helen. The Colonel was on another temporary assignment, and she brought us here to her family’s ranch. I remember wishing we could stay here forever and never have to see the Colonel again. Who would have thought the wish of a ten-year-old would come true twenty years later?”

      For a moment, Erin looked wistful, but then she shook her head. “It’s crazy to think that Helen remembered us enough to leave us her family’s ranch. I feel bad that we didn’t stay in better touch with her.”

      Leah shrugged. “The Colonel would’ve never allowed it. Not with the way he threw her out. He thought she was a bad influence, allowing too much disorder in his household.”

      “I don’t remember that,” Nicole said. “I barely remember Helen at all. I still think it’s weird that she left us her estate.”

      The lawyer had given them a letter from Helen, outlining the reasons for her bequest. They’d all read the letter, but Nicole, who had only been six when the Colonel had divorced Helen, hadn’t responded to it the way Leah and Erin had. How could she? She’d been too young to understand so much of what had happened.

      Unfortunately, Leah had been twelve, which meant she had understood far too much. Nicole being so young had been a blessing.

      Sometimes, it was the only thing that gave Leah hope that her sons, Dylan and Ryan, would come through their own family tragedy unscathed. At seven and two, they barely remembered their father, who’d emotionally checked out of their lives long before his death six months ago. In some ways, her sons’ childhood mirrored so much of what Leah’s had been that it scared her. She’d spent her whole life vowing to do things differently when she had children of her own. The only differences were Leah’s mother had died when Nicole was a baby, and their father had been a monster. When the Colonel had died several years ago, she hadn’t felt the level of grief she did now for Helen.

      Leah would like to think

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