Page 1 of August 20

Chapter One

The two-bedroom cottage sat up on a knoll three blocks from the shoreline. Brooke Harrison turned away from the house, gazed toward the ocean, and smiled. Though there were houses between her and the Pacific Ocean, the property's elevation gave her a clear view of the water.

It would take a fifteen-minute walk to put her feet in the sand—just like her new boss, Mr. Graham, promised.

The offer of employment to manage Sea Lion Hotel in Seaglass Cove, Oregon, came at the perfect time. Going to her old job, cleaning a fifty-bed hotel in Beaverton, had turned into a dead-end employment because upper management was related to the owner. There was nowhere for her to advance within the inner circle. She would've stayed cleaning toilets, making beds, and never having enough in her paycheck—and that was no way to live when you were responsible for someone else.

"Skye?" She turned toward the car. "Let's check out the house."

Besides a better job, she looked forward to giving her niece a smaller school district and town where she could have more freedom and opportunities. It was safe here.

She'd raised her niece for the last four years. Ever since her estranged, drug-addicted older sister, Janelle, was killed in an explosion caused by a meth lab in the same house she raised her child.

Her heart warmed at the sight of her niece opening the car door.

She hadn't even known she was an aunt until the day she received a phone call from the police department regarding her older sister. At twenty-one years old, her daily struggle was to keep a roof over her head since her grandma had died when she was nineteen.

Raised by her grandma, all she knew was that it took money to put food on the table and keep social services away. Once Grandma passed away, life only got more challenging. She had no one to turn to if she needed help.

With a twelve-year difference between her and Janelle and the fact that her sister ran away at seventeen, she had no memories of a time when they lived in the same house.

Because of the way she was raised, she would never allow her niece to get shuffled into foster care. Skye was in the same proverbial boat as her—alone.

They were the only family each other had.

Skye's mother was dead. So was Brooke's mom. They both had drug addiction problems.

While Skye's father was in prison and out of her life, Brooke never knew her dad.

They were two people alone in a big world, and together, they were learning how to lean on each other because that's what family was supposed to do.

Neither one of them had a good example of family. Her mom had given custody of her and Janelle to their grandma when Brooke was a baby. Because of their age difference, Janelle had known a different life with their mom—one that included abuse, addiction, and neglect.

At the time her mom abandoned her, Brooke was four years old. The same age as Skye when she lost her mom and came and lived with her.

In all honesty, Brooke never knew her sister. Only the stories her grandma told. Occasionally, Janelle showed up at the house her grandma rented and asked for money for her drug habit. Neither she nor Grandma knew about her sister having a child.

"Why did we have to move?" Skye dragged her feet, getting out of the car. "It's so far away from my school."

Long brown hair swung as Skye refused to look at the house. Brooke hooked a strand of hair behind her niece's ear and walked with her to the front door.

"The house comes with my new job." She held the key in her hand. "You'll make new friends at your new school. But first, we have the whole summer to enjoy living so close to the beach. You like that idea, right?"

"I don't know."

She pointed to the side of the house. "Look at the play structure."

"I don't have anyone to play with."

"You will. Give it time."

She put the key that was delivered yesterday to her in Beaverton into the lock. Usually, all the jobs she'd investigated in the hotel industry provided a hotel room if she was single. If she had a family, there was no off-site housing available.

She counted her lucky stars. Mr. Graham contacted her by email and sent her the employment package after getting her boss's recommendation. Considering her boss rarely had two words to say to her, she took the new job offer as a sign her current employment was ending soon.

Because of her history at her previous job, she was hired without having to do an in-person interview.

Swinging the door open, she slipped her keychain into her pocket. Her first opinion of the house was that it smelled. It was musty.

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