Not the Bride He Wanted novel · Chapter 6 of 24

Chapter 6: Paid in Full

The Ridge House was the white farmhouse above Lac La Belle where my mother was born.

When I pulled into the drive on Thursday morning, Aksel's truck was parked on her lilac bed.

There were pink curtains in the kitchen window.

Tilde leaned forward in the passenger seat.

"Is that a wreath? In October? Who hangs a wreath in October?"

"My sister."

"Your sister lives in your mother's house?"

"Since last night, apparently."

The bank slip was folded in my coat pocket.

I'd shown it to Magnus at midnight, and he'd read it twice and asked how many guards I wanted.

I'd said one sister-in-law would do.

I knocked once and opened the door, because it was my mother's door.

The front hall smelled of new paint and vanilla.

My mother's photographs had gone from the stair wall.

In their place hung a row of framed pictures of my sister.

The last one was Kirsten and Aksel at a motel in St. Ignace, his arm around her neck.

"Bren?"

Kirsten came out of the kitchen in a silk robe with a mug in her hand.

Aksel came behind her in sweatpants, bare-chested, scratching his stomach.

"You can't just walk in here," Kirsten said.

"Where are her pictures?"

"What pictures?"

"Our mother's. My mother's. Forty years of them, on that wall."

Kirsten shrugged.

"Daddy said we could do what we liked. It's our wedding present. He's putting it in our names."

Keep reading free with an account. Start Not the Bride He Wanted from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.