Ashley’s smile was trained toward the sagging façade. Her voice echoed off the rock faces of the surrounding mountains. “Don’t you want to take a closer look? The carriage house over there is where the shop will be.” She reached Laurel’s side, breath shooting streams of fog in the cold mountain air.

Laurel ran her eyes over the row of boarded-up windows. “I guess I just don’t see how you’re going to turn that”—she nodded at the derelict outbuilding—“into what you described. Even with all of Mom’s money.”

Ashley’s white teeth disappeared behind a thin line of dark lipstick. “Don’t start, Laurel. We agreed; it’s a fresh start.”

“The only thing fresh up here is the snow. Where are we going to sleep?”

“There are over 50 rooms in there. You can pick your favorite.”

“Ash, that building does not look safe to sleep in.”

“It’s fine. I had it inspected. It’s rundown, but it’s sound. Just needs a little spit-shine.”

Laurel watched a tattered curtain wave in one of the third-floor windows. Broken glass caught the light glaring off the undisturbed snow. She did not feel comforted. The structure might have been sound beneath all that rot, but something about the place—the matte shadow of the windows, the cracks between boards that seemed to heave as if breathing—its hollowness felt like her hollowness. She had too much in common with this ruin. She knew what she would find inside, and she didn’t want or need to see it.

“Ashley, it needs a gas can and a match.”

“Fine. Sleep in the truck. I’m going to go pick the room with the best antiques. The furnishings are all still there, you know. From 1906. And we didn’t have to pay a dime for any of it—just the cost of the land.”

Ash started back toward the house, snow sticking to the wool lining of her boots. Warm boots. Not like Laurel’s. Laurel followed her.

“They’re for the shop. You can’t keep them there, Ash. I need to get them out before you start tearing the place apart.”

“Then get your ass inside and stop whining.”

Ash bent to the space beneath the porch steps as Laurel climbed them. “Foundation’s good,” she said. “Set right on top of the rock.” She ran her hands over a sloping pillar. “It’s built on quartz, you know. Can’t you feel the incredible energy here?” She closed her eyes and breathed deeply. “Quartz holds on to its past,” Ash said. “This place is rich with history.”

Laurel shook her head and wondered what those broken windows meant for the antiques inside. Holding on to history isn’t always a good thing. Not when the past is broken. Not when everything rots.

***