PROLOGUE

      LEADEN SILENCE CRACKLED down the line, turning the armchair Brenna had inherited from her grandmother from snug and comfortable to something resembling a hard plinth beneath the suddenly tense muscles of her bottom.

      ‘Hunter? I said I’m missing you.’

      ‘Missing you too, Bren.’

      The tension didn’t back off. It ramped up. That was not the voice her fiancé used with her. At least that was what he would be if they actually openly acknowledged they were getting married next summer, and if they finally got around to choosing a ring to validate their enduring love for each other.

      But Hunter seemed to have a lot on his mind at the moment that had nothing to do with them.

      ‘Tell me what’s happening in Kamloops. How’re your parents?’ she asked.

      Again, that awkward silence. They didn’t do silences—usually had too much to say to each other.

      ‘Hunter? You’re scaring me.’

      ‘Hold on, will you?’

      In the background she heard a door open, then shut, followed by footsteps on a wooden floor. Was he on the deck? Winter in the Okanagan wasn’t even close to tropical. What he had to tell her must be something he didn’t want his family to overhear.

      Was his father in a worse state than his mother had indicated yesterday? All he’d said was that she had been in hysterics when she’d rung, saying the family orchard was in crisis and he had to get over there urgently for his father’s sake. He’d left Vancouver within three hours, an overnight bag and his laptop over his shoulder, despair in his eyes and a one-way air ticket in his hand. He hadn’t driven as snow had been forecast near the Rockies.

      ‘Bren, I was going to ring you later tonight. Everything’s in turmoil here.’ The harshness of his voice frightened her.

      What was going on?

       Talk to me.

      But if she demanded information from him, he’d shut down. Shut down? It seemed he was already under lock and key. She looked around the familiar, cosy sitting room of the house she’d grown up in, her gaze not alighting on any one object for more than a few seconds, her heart pounding faster by the minute.

      Finally she had to say something or go spare. ‘Do you want me to come across for the weekend?’

      ‘Bren, I don’t know where to start. Dad’s—’

      She heard him swallow, and a gnawing feeling there was bad to come began deep in her stomach.

      ‘The business is on the verge of bankruptcy. I don’t know if it can be saved. The insurance company’s fighting paying out for the flood damage done last year. The same thing’s happening with many of the orchards in this area. I haven’t gone into the paperwork yet, but people are muttering about the company that owns the power station being at fault.’

      ‘Can’t the insurance company pay out and then go to the power provider for the money?’ Of course she knew that wasn’t how these things worked, but anything to delay whatever was about to slam-dunk her.

      ‘Insurance companies are not charities. If there’s an out they’re going to take it, and to hell with what Dad’s been paying them over the years.’

      The bitterness in Hunter’s voice shocked her. But he was loyal to his parents so their troubles would be his, regardless of his own aspirations. Just like her and her family, especially her dad. She’d always been encouraged to follow her dreams.

      ‘I guess I’m aware of that. I was hoping for more, that’s all.’ A fairer outcome for Hunter’s family and a happy improvement in the way he was talking right now wouldn’t go amiss.

      ‘There’s a lot to do here.’

      Here it comes. Brenna waited, tensing as though Hunter had a gun aimed directly at her chest. More specifically, her heart.

      ‘Dad’s worried he’s failed again. It’s like he doesn’t know what to focus on to get things sorted.’

      Brenna swallowed hard. There was more to this—but what? ‘Darling, I’m so sorry. What can I do? For you?’

      The sound of a long indrawn breath had her fingers gripping the phone, her thighs tight.

      She hurried to add, ‘I’ll come at the end of my shift tomorrow night to be with you. I’ll pack more of your clothes too. Let me know what else you need. I can fill the car till there’s no room left but for me. Fingers crossed the storm will have passed through by then.’

      ‘No, Brenna. You can’t come. There’s nothing you can do here.’

      ‘I can support you—be with you. I love you. You know that.’

      ‘Yes, I do.’

      Was that resentment in his quietly spoken words?

      ‘Hunter?’ Now her toes were tucking under and her knees were pushing together. There was ice in the air, yet the heat pump was blasting out a toasty twenty-two degrees.

      He was dragging in a lungful of air. Then, ‘The only thing I want you to do for me is pack up all my gear and send it across. I am not returning to Vancouver.’

      ‘But what about your job? Your study?’ Me? ‘Vancouver’s your happy place. You’ve said so a hundred times. We’re a couple—we stick together through everything. I’ll do whatever it takes to help you through this.’

      ‘I have to move back to the orchard. It’s the only chance there is to make the place viable again. Mum and Dad need my support to get through this.’

      Did he mutter again?

      ‘It’s not the first time I’ve had to step up for them.’

      ‘What do you mean?’

      ‘It’s how our family works. Ever since that quad-bike accident they’ve made me think I owe them for the trouble it caused and that I can never repay them, but I keep trying.’

      Hunter had just stolen any words she might have been about to utter. Their relationship wasn’t being taken into consideration. Not at all.

      ‘Hunter, we’re a couple—for better and for worse,’ she gasped through frozen lips.

      It was happening again. Someone else she loved was deserting her.

      ‘Would you pack up and move out here to join me?’ he whispered.

      Anger flared. How dared he ask her that? ‘You know I would—after I’ve finished my exams and when my dad’s...’

      The thumping in her chest slowed, creating a pain under her ribs and a knot in her belly. Dad. Her mainstay as she’d grown up trying to understand how her mother could leave and never contact her again. Not once.

      ‘Oh.’

      ‘Exactly. We’ve both got too many commitments. I don’t want you putting aside your medical degree for me either. You’re an amazing doctor, Bren, and you have to finish what you’ve started.’

      Did he