on Ethan’s features.
“Yes. He died of a heart attack three years ago and I miss his wisdom every day.”
“I’m sorry.”
She certainly knew enough about grief to fill several sets of encyclopedias.
“While Thomas had a longtime partner, whom he married as soon as gay marriage became legal here in Colorado, the two of them never had children. He became a mentor of sorts to me and helped groom me to fill his role.”
He must have been extraordinarily young to take over as CEO of the company after his great-uncle died. She knew he was only three years older than Lucy, who would be thirty in the spring.
He gave her a rueful look. “And now that I’ve bored you endlessly with my family history, I suppose I ought to show you the house.”
“You didn’t bore me at all. I love hearing other people’s histories, probably because I don’t know much about my own.”
He gave a short laugh. “Everyone has a history. We all come from somewhere.”
“True. But not everybody is lucky enough to know all those details. I don’t know anything about my father’s side. I don’t even know his name. My mother would never talk about him. And while my great-aunt sometimes shared stories about her childhood growing up poor in Texas, I don’t know much beyond her parents, mainly because she didn’t know. Someday I might have to do some research.”
“Is that why you’re moving to Austin after the holidays? To find out more about your heritage?”
How did he know she was moving to Austin? Had she told him? Maybe Lucy had mentioned it to him.
“Not really. I haven’t given that much thought, though I suppose that might be an unexpected benefit. No. I just needed something new.”
She didn’t tell him how tired she had grown of living with the memories, of feeling as if she was stagnating in the mire of her pain.
“I decided that if I was going to make a change, I should do it before Christopher starts elementary school. He’ll be in kindergarten next year so I knew time was running out.”
“Yeah. I get that. I moved around a lot in elementary school and middle school. It wasn’t easy. Finally, when I was starting my final year of high school, I told my parents I was done. Lucy and I needed to stay in one place. We ended up living here with our grandmother during the school year and trading custody with our parents during the summer, which made life much better.”
“That couldn’t have been easy for you.”
“No. There was a healthy amount of drama. I want to think maybe our parents both realized how their constant fighting was hurting us, but I suspect Winnie probably laid down the law and threatened to cut them off if they didn’t agree.”
At least their grandmother had stepped up to give them something of a stable home.
“Now that I’ve rambled on, I suppose I ought to show you what you’re up against.”
She wanted to protest that he hadn’t rambled at all, but she knew their time was limited. She would have to help Winnie to bed shortly.
“We can start here.” Ethan opened the closest door. “This is one of the many bedrooms in the house and is a good example of what you will encounter throughout the rest of the house.”
He flipped on a light and stepped aside so she could look in. She brushed past him, aware as she did of that expensive soap scent she had first noticed the day before, masculine and outdoorsy and delicious.
She forgot all about how good he smelled when she caught a look inside the room.
“Oh, my.”
He gave a rough laugh that made her shiver despite herself. “Yes. Exactly.”
“Is every room like this?” she asked faintly.
Everywhere she looked were nutcrackers of myriad shapes and sizes and colors. Scores of them. Probably hundreds or even thousands. The furniture in the room was lovely, a standard bedroom set, but every flat surface, along with several areas of the floor, was covered with wooden statues.
“No. This is the only nutcracker room.”
“Whew. I guess that’s something.”
“And next door is the angel room. Picture this room, only with wings. The room after that I believe is one of several crèche rooms. My grandmother loves to collect things. Can you tell?”
She had no answer, overwhelmed with the enormity of the collection. The nutcrackers alone could fill a museum.
“Winnie isn’t a hoarder, at least not in the classic sense. Or, who knows, maybe she would be if her house