Norah set the key on the dresser and began unpacking her life.
Downstairs, Ru's voice drifted up through the floorboards, asking Thomas if the new lady was staying.
Thomas's response was too quiet to hear, but it must have been reassuring because Ru went silent after that.
Outside, wind rattled the shutters.
In the distance, a coyote called.
And Norah Callaway, the mail-order bride from St. Louis, closed her eyes and let herself believe, just for tonight, that maybe she'd made the right choice after all.
The ranch wouldn't fix itself.
The boys wouldn't heal overnight.
Harlon wouldn't suddenly become easy to live with.
But Norah had opened the door with that rusted iron key, expecting just a room.
What she'd found instead was something much more dangerous.
A family that needed her.
And Norah had never been good at walking away from people who needed her, even when she should.
Especially when she should.
Tomorrow, the real work would begin.
Tonight, she let herself rest.
And in that small room at the end of the hallway, surrounded by dust and darkness and the ghosts of a family's grief, Norah Callaway finally allowed herself to hope.
Not for happiness.
Not for perfection.
Just for the chance to build something worth keeping, even if it killed her.
Especially if it meant saving them first.
Morning came too early and too cold.
Norah woke to the sound of boots on floorboards, heavy and deliberate.
The rhythm of men who'd been rising before dawn their entire lives.
She dressed quickly in the dim light, her fingers stiff from cold as she pinned her hair back.
The mirror above the dresser showed a woman who looked older than 32, but that was nothing new.
Hard living aged you faster than time ever could.
Downstairs, she found Harlon already gone and the boys moving through morning routines with mechanical efficiency.
Thomas was outside dealing with livestock.
Eli pumped water into buckets.
Cade had disappeared somewhere.
The younger ones sat at the table looking half asleep and wholly miserable.
No one had started breakfast.
Norah surveyed the kitchen.
Yesterday's success felt like a distant dream now, facing the reality of feeding eight people every single day with supplies that wouldn't last the month if she wasn't careful.
"Anyone know what there is to work with?" she asked.
Porter pointed vaguely toward the pantry.
"Whatever's in there. Pa buys supplies when he goes to town, but that's not regular."
Norah opened the pantry and bit back a curse.
Flour nearly gone.
Cornmeal maybe enough for a few more days.
Dried beans, which took hours to cook properly.
Some salt pork that had seen better months.
A few wrinkled potatoes.
That was it.
This wasn't a pantry.
It was a countdown to starvation.
"When's your father going to town next?" she asked.
Porter shrugged.
"Depends on money. And if the work gets done. And if nothing breaks that needs fixing worse."
Translation: not soon enough.
Norah started coffee first, strong enough to wake the dead, then began working with what she had.
Cornmeal mush wasn't elegant, but it was filling.
She fried the last of the salt pork to give it flavor, added the potatoes diced small, stretched everything as far as it would go.
Eli came in carrying water, his shirt already soaked with sweat despite the cold.