Page 3 of Christmas with the Elkin Billionaires

It was never about the money. Thanks to his parents, he and his brothers were left with more money than they could ever spend in a dozen lifetimes. No, it was more about how the door that had always been open was now welded shut.

Ace Elkin was dead and he was just Chase.

So, when he was ordered home for Thanksgiving, he came. Jonas was already here, since he took care of the day-to-day running of the resort, but his middle brother Gabe claimed a work emergency. Chase suspected it wasn’t much of an emergency, but who could say. Gabe had started a software company as part of a school project in his sophomore year and it had taken off. He’d moved to Silicon Valley as soon as he could, stating that’s where he needed to be, and Chase couldn’t remember the last time he’d willingly come to visit.

The holiday dinner had been a formal affair, even though it was only the three of them, and as soon as they were finished, Grandmother had ordered the servers out of the room and announced her diagnosis.

She’d always been a formidable woman when it came to running the resort, but now, at seventy-four, there was some question about how much of a toll the chemo treatments would take. Was she even going to survive them? Chase wished Gabe had been at the dinner. They were under a new set of orders not to say athingto him until Gran had a chance to speak to him herself. Chase didn’t like to imagine getting the news over the phone. But she wouldn’t do that. She’d probably decide to tell Gabe when he arrived for Christmas, since he’d promised he would come. It would change everything that came after for him, but Chase pushed those thoughts out of his mind.

His grandmother put down her pen, closed the ledger, and slid it to the corner of her desk. Her blue eyes met his. Chase’s throat went tight with emotion. She looked so much older than he remembered. He’d been back to the lodge twice in the year before his accident and then once after it, but somehow time passed at breakneck speed, and she looked older and smaller than he remembered. Chase wanted to throw his arms out and create a barrier between her and the rest of the world. Except it wouldn’t do any good now—the world had already gotten to her.

She reached across the desk, palms up.

Chase placed his hands in hers.Somethings still fit, he supposed. His grandmother squeezed tight, not looking away. “How are you, Chase? You doing all right with the news?”

He let out a sorrowful laugh. “Is anybody?”

She gave him a rueful smile. “This is something we’ve got to face as a family. And wewillbe able to face it as a family, just as soon as your brother arrives for Christmas.”

Cancer.And the doctors weren’t sure if they could stop it or slow it.

For Chase, the thought of his grandmother not being here in her office anymore made his heart ache. “We will. We’ll face it.” He squeezed her hands, the words scratching at his throat and making his eyes burn.

His grandmother gave him a stern look. “Don’t get all choked up on me, Chase Elkin. We’ve got things to talk about.”

“I’m fine.” His tears were reflected in his grandmother’s eyes, but to her credit, she simply laughed.

For a moment, Chase sensed everything would be all right. His grandmother might be sick, but her laugh was still the same. He found himself trying to memorize the sound. No matter what was going on, it would be okay.

She took a deep breath. “Chase, it’s time to start figuring out what your next steps are in life.”

Chase choked back the instinctive response to voice some sort of platitude. What could he say? How could he communicate feeling that everything he’d ever dreamed of was now in his past? “Is that a question, Grandmother?” He tried and failed to put on his most winning smile. “We don’t really have to discuss this. I’ll be fine figuring things out for myself.”

She patted his hands and sat back. “Chase, you’ll always have a place here.” He caught a flash of tears in her eyes again, which almost killed him. He wanted to put a hand to his chest and hold his own heart in. His grandmother looked down at her ledger and pressed her hand to the paper. When she looked back up, her eyes were bright. “Which brings me to my second request. As part of that place, your first task is to help your brother wrangle a replacement for the ski program director.”

Anger made his skin flush at the mention of the previous ski director. Hal had been promptly fired when his grandmother discovered what the man had done—hadbeendoing for far too long. Elk Lodge was a favorite resort of celebrities and wealthy visitors, and unfortunately, Hal thought they wouldn’t notice if he lifted a piece of jewelry here or some money there. The man had set up a whole system around it, creating pockets of time in the schedule where he could go through the guests’ belongings while they were out on the slopes.

The local news station had a field day with the story. His grandmother had gone into damage control mode to protect the reputation of the resort.

“Jonas doesn’t need my help,” he said automatically. “He’s the one who’s great at the resort stuff. I’d be in his way. Besides, I’ve got physical therapy appointments in Salt Lake City.”

“I disagree, and we have physical therapists here in Colorado.” His grandmother picked up her pen and ran it through her fingers. “We got more applications than I expected.Manymore. Jonas needs help weeding through them, and you’re the man with all the experience.”

With being an athlete,he wanted to say.With going through the motions.But how could he say that? She could be dying.He pasted a smile on his face, the way he always had when he got to the bottom of the slopes and met the press. “Fine. I won’t let you down.”

“It would be nice to hire a replacement before the lawsuits wrap up,” she said dryly, a smile playing over her lips. “I’m glad you’re going to help.”

She pulled the ledger back in front of her, and Chase got to his feet knowing that he’d been dismissed.

He kept it together until he was out of sight of her office, then he stopped in front of one of the floor-to-ceiling windows that graced this floor. Guests and staff moved about below him, crisscrossing the grounds carrying skis and snowboards or holding someone close.

He didn’t for one minute think that Jonas needed help finding someone; this was his grandmother’s attempt to give him something to do. He didn’t want something to do. Not at Elk Lodge. Being here was a constant reminder of everything he’d lost.

But that same nagging question came back—what else could he do?As he stared out at the activity below him, he recognized the woman he’d sort of met earlier along with what looked like the youngest age group they taught here at Elk Lodge. He remembered learning to ski at that age. It was also when he’d met one of his best friends, Chris Denton. His family used to come here during the holidays and the two of them bonded instantly over a shared love of skiing and getting into trouble.

He watched as she worked with the kids, making sure they made it safely down the bunny slope. The kids appeared to be excited, and he assumed she was giving them some sort of peptalk while she demonstrated exaggerated lateral and rotational movements and they copied her. As the kids dispersed, some guy joined her and was gesturing to the slope and the kids. Even from where Chase was standing, he could tell from her body language that the conversation wasn’t going well.

Without contemplating why, Chase headed for the elevator. Maybe it was time he introduced himself.

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