Almost A Family. Roxanne Rustand
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once—at Stephanie’s funeral. It was one of the most difficult services she’d ever attended. All of Stephanie’s friends and relatives had been grieving the loss of such a young, vibrant woman, but from her parents there’d also been a palpable undercurrent of hostility toward Connor.
In return, he’d been stony-faced and silent, holding in whatever emotions he might have felt. When Erin offered him her condolences at the grave site, the flat, cold expression in his eyes had chilled her blood.
Drew’s seven-year-old brother, Tyler, tentatively edged closer to her, thumbed up his thick glasses and peered down the sidewalk, a worried frown wrinkling his forehead.
Erin rested a reassuring hand on his thin shoulders, wishing for the thousandth time that she could erase everything the boys and Lily had gone through in their young lives before they’d come to live with her. She’d adopted the boys ten months ago and Lily five months later, and they were all still struggling with the adjustment.
“Maybe that man doesn’t remember my name. It’s no big deal.” Forcing a cheery smile, she shifted her gaze to the minivan and beckoned to Lily. “Come on, let’s get the key from the Realtor so we can settle into our new place, okay? The mover’s truck should be meeting us out there in an hour.”
Lily climbed awkwardly out of the vehicle, her Harry Potter book still clutched in her hand, a page marked with her thumb. The trip north from Wausau had taken just a couple hours, and every mile of the way she’d been immersed in the story.
A good distraction, Erin mused as she herded her troops into the small, brick Dolby Realty building. When she’d told the kids about their move to a small town in the far north of Wisconsin, Drew had masked his worries with his usual belligerent bravado. Tyler had become even more withdrawn. But Lily—
Lily had cried over leaving her beloved fourth-grade teacher. She’d been even more distraught over leaving the little house in Wausau and her newly painted pink bedroom. The apple tree in the backyard. The flower beds they’d all planted in a riot of colors. And no wonder—it was the first real home she’d ever had, even if the illusion of permanence hadn’t lasted very long.
When Erin’s husband, Sam, had abruptly announced he was leaving her for another woman, he did more than simply end a six-year marriage. He brought even greater insecurity into the lives of three children who’d already endured too much.
And for that, Erin would never, ever forgive him.
Squinting at them through her bifocals, the Realtor behind the single desk in the office patted at wisps of gray hair escaping the loose bun at the top of her head. “You must be the…um…”
“The Langs, Mrs. Dolby. I called you last week to let you know we’d be coming this afternoon.” Two months ago, the woman had taken her for a tour of four rentals in the area. “We’re here to pick up the keys for the house out on Aspen Road.”
The woman pursed her lips as she shuffled through a stack of files, withdrew one with a gusty sigh and spread it open on the desk. “Of course, the Hadley cabin. Six-month lease. Gas and electricity not included. Option to renew for a one-year period.” She shook two silver keys out of the envelope and handed them to Erin. “Looks like everything’s already signed and in order. If you have any problems, call me.”
“Thanks.” Erin gestured for the kids, who were riffling through the bass-fishing magazines stacked on a low coffee table under the front window. “Let’s head out.”
“You got that job as the new hospital administrator, right?” The older woman’s voice stopped her at the door.
“Yes.” Erin turned back to her and smiled. “I start on Tuesday.”
“I never use the local hospital.” Though Mrs. Dolby had appeared a tad absentminded, she’d been pleasant company during Erin’s house-hunting expedition. There was no trace of that friendliness now.
Surprised, Erin sent the kids on out the door, then she lowered her voice. “Why not?”
“Because I’m no fool.”
“Did you have a bad experience there?”
The woman gave a derisive snort as she picked up her phone and dialed a number, then launched into a rambling conversation with someone about housing inspections and septic tanks.
Erin watched her for a moment before heading back outside to join the children.
She’d worked as a nurse for years before going back to college, and knew situations could be misconstrued by the public. Rumors could start over nothing. Grieving relatives sometimes figured that modern medicine should have been able to save their loved one, no matter how hopeless the case, so they blamed the staff, the hospital, the attending physicians for their loss.
But as Erin stepped out into the early September sunshine, the stark reality of her situation hit her. She was alone now, with three children to support. She had no friends here, no relatives within several hundred miles.
Maybe this move had been a mistake.
THE KIDS WERE SILENT as Erin drove down Main Street. Lily pressed her face to the front passenger-side window, her heavy book clutched to her chest like a security blanket. In the back, each boy huddled at a window.
Three blocks of small businesses—mostly gift shops, upscale clothing stores and the sort of arts-and-crafts stores that appealed to the tourist trade—soon gave way to pine trees and a scattering of coffee shops and bars. Beyond the downtown area, a string of sporting goods stores, geared to outdoorsmen who needed anything from fishing rods to snowmobiles to mountain bikes, rimmed the shore of Sapphire Lake.
The sparkling, dark blue waves crested in the Saturday morning sunlight, jostling the array of brightly colored boats docked at a marina near the highway. The smart, white facilities and sprawling supper club overlooking the lake spoke of money. Lots of it, if the largest boats were any clue.
Past the marina, a pretty county park followed the shore for a good half mile, then a haphazard network of tumbledown docks and aging fishing boats. A shack with a hand-painted sign promised Fishing Guide—Good Rates.
“Wow,” Tyler whispered as a glittering red boat swept close to shore, sending a high spray of water arcing like diamonds. “Can we—”
“Yeah, cool,” Drew broke in, leaning across the backseat to give his brother’s shoulder a bump. “Are we getting a boat like that one?”
Erin thought about the debts she still had to pay and the shaky financial situation at the hospital, and smiled at Drew through the rearview mirror. “Probably not for a long while. I’ll bet we can rent one, though. Wouldn’t that be fun?”
He flopped back in his seat. “Yeah, right. Like that’s gonna happen. You’ll think it’s too dangerous, or say it costs too much money. Like with the horses.”
Erin shifted her attention back to the road, knowing that explanations would just provoke an angry response.
Back in Wausau, there’d been an old man with horses who lived just a mile away. She had no doubt that Drew had badgered the poor guy until he finally agreed to let Drew clean the stalls in exchange for riding privileges.
The next day, a woman at the local saddle shop had rolled her eyes when Erin asked her opinion. The two geldings had been used for barrel racing and had been hot as pistols, she’d said, so who knew what they might be like after not being ridden for ages?
It had been clear to Erin that a boy from the inner city would be no match for twelve hundred pounds of barely leashed energy, but Drew still hadn’t forgiven her for refusing to let him ride.
A mile farther out of town, she slowed down after passing a ramshackle shed emblazoned with a faded Smoked Fish! sign. She turned up a narrow gravel road leading through a stand of aspens, then into a dark pine forest that crowded the road on either side.
“Almost there, guys,” she called out.
Lily