I smiled.
“That’s the plan.”
She nodded, apparently satisfied.
Then she leaned toward my ear.
“Okay. Then I can finally tell you Daddy’s secret.”
My smile froze.
Children say strange things.
I knew that.
I expected something harmless.
Maybe Marcus had eaten the chocolate I’d hidden in the pantry.
Maybe he had bought a puppy.
Maybe there was another ridiculous wedding surprise waiting somewhere.
Instead, Sophie whispered:
“Daddy goes to see a lady every Saturday.”
For half a second, I thought I hadn’t heard her correctly.
“A lady?”
Sophie nodded enthusiastically.
“The lady with the curly hair. Daddy said you couldn’t know yet.”
The sounds around me seemed to dull.
“What lady, Soph?”
She shrugged.
“I think her name is Camille. Or Camilla. Something like that.”
My stomach tightened.
Marcus had spent most Saturdays away from home for the past several months.
He always said he was dealing with suppliers, meeting contractors, or trying to rescue what remained of his struggling construction design business.
And I had believed him.
Why wouldn’t I?
During the previous year, his company had come dangerously close to collapsing.
One major commercial project had fallen through.
Two clients had delayed payment.
Marcus had stopped taking a salary.
Employees had been let go.
There had been nights when I found him sitting at the kitchen counter at 3:00 a.m. staring at spreadsheets with both hands buried in his hair.
I had watched the stress eat through him.
And eventually, I had done something I hadn’t told anyone except my best friend.
I had given Marcus almost everything I had saved.
Not retirement money.
Not emergency funds.
Something more personal.
My Blue Ridge Fund.
I had started it when I was twenty-two.
Every promotion.
Every year-end bonus.
Every tax refund.
A piece of every paycheck.
All toward one thing.
Land.
When I was nine years old, my grandparents had owned a small farm in western Virginia.
Nothing glamorous.
An aging red barn.
Apple trees.
Six chickens.
A vegetable garden that produced far too many tomatoes.
And acres of uneven land where I spent summers running barefoot until my grandmother yelled that I was going to step on a nail.
Then my grandfather got sick.
Medical bills piled up.
The property was sold.
Nobody warned me.
One afternoon, I came home from school and saw cardboard boxes in the kitchen.
Three weeks later, another family owned the farm.
