PART 3 — THE WOMAN WHO CAME TO TAKE THE THREE GIRLS AWAY

Helena Blackwood arrived the following afternoon.

Her carriage appeared around the mountain bend just as the clouds began gathering over Blackwood Ridge.

She stepped down wearing a dark traveling dress, a fur-trimmed coat, and an expression that suggested she had already decided how everything would end.

Wade met her outside.

“You could have written before coming.”

“I sent a telegram.”

“You sent an accusation.”

Helena ignored him.

Her eyes moved toward the cabin.

“Where are the children?”

“Inside.”

“And your wife?”

Wade’s expression hardened.

“Clara is their stepmother.”

Helena gave a short, humorless laugh.

“Is that what you’re calling her now?”

Wade said nothing.

Helena stepped closer.

“I warned you about marrying a stranger. I told you those girls needed stability, not another woman who might decide to leave when the work became difficult.”

Wade looked at her.

“You haven’t even met Clara properly.”

“I know enough.”

“No. You know what you want to believe.”

The front door opened.

Clara appeared with June beside her.

The little girl immediately reached for her hand.

Helena noticed.

Her expression тιԍнтened.

“So it’s true.”

Clara nodded politely.

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Blackwood.”

“Miss Bennett.”

“I’m Mrs. Blackwood now.”

Helena looked her up and down.

“Only on paper, apparently.”

June squeezed Clara’s fingers.

Wade stepped forward.

“That’s enough.”

But Helena had already turned toward the child.

“June, come here.”

June didn’t move.

“I said come here, sweetheart.”

The little girl looked up at Clara.

Clara gently released her hand.

“You can go if you want to, darling.”

June shook her head.

“Can I stay with you?”

Helena’s face darkened.

Wade felt something uncomfortable stir inside him.

His daughter had just been asked to choose between two adults.

And he hated that she had been placed in that position.

“June stays with her sisters,” he said firmly. “Nobody is separating them.”

Helena gave him a cold look.

“We shall see.”

Inside the cabin, Helena sat near the stove while the girls remained close to Clara.

She examined the room.

The curtains.

The shelves.

The small drawings pinned beside the window.

Then she noticed the schoolbooks.

“Who bought these?”

“I did,” Clara answered.

“And who taught the girls to read?”

“I helped them practice.”

Helena picked up Nora’s slate.

She studied the letters carefully.

“You’ve been teaching them without consulting me?”

Clara looked puzzled.

“Why would I need your permission?”

“Because I am their mother’s sister.”

“And I am the woman who cares for them every day.”

The room became silent.

Wade looked at Clara.

He had never heard her speak so firmly.

Helena placed the slate down.

“Wade, I need to speak with you privately.”

He followed her into the bedroom.

The moment the door closed, she turned on him.

“You have made a terrible mistake.”

“What now?”

“Those girls are becoming attached to her.”

“They already are.”

“That’s exactly the problem.”

Wade stared at her.

“Explain.”

Helena lowered her voice.

“Do you remember what happened after Margaret died?”

Wade nodded.

His first wife had been gone for almost two years. The girls had been only five when she pᴀssed.

He remembered the funeral, the long winter afterward, and the months when none of them wanted to sleep alone.

“What about it?”

Helena hesitated.

“Margaret made me promise something.”

Wade frowned.

“What?”

“That if anything happened to her, I would make sure the girls were raised by someone who understood the family.”

Wade’s expression hardened.

“Clara understands them better than most people I’ve met.”

“You don’t know what you’re saying.”

Helena opened her traveling bag and removed a folded letter.

“This was written by Margaret three months before she died.”

Wade recognized the handwriting immediately.

His fingers trembled slightly as he unfolded it.

Helena,

If Wade ever marries again, please make sure the woman understands that my girls have already lost enough. They must never feel that another person has come into their lives to erase me.

I want them to have a mother who remembers that they had one before her.

Wade read the words twice.

Then he looked up.

“I don’t see what you’re trying to prove.”

Helena took the letter back.

“You married a stranger because you wanted someone to manage your household. And now she has allowed those girls to call her Mama.”

“June chose that word.”

“Children don’t understand the consequences of such things.”

Wade’s voice became colder.

“Then perhaps the adults should stop making them feel guilty for it.”

Helena looked away.

For several seconds, neither spoke.

Then she said something that made Wade’s stomach тιԍнтen.

“There’s another reason I came.”

“What?”

“I’ve been speaking with a lawyer in Helena. Margaret’s parents left a small inheritance for the girls. The money has been held in trust until their eighth birthday.”

Wade frowned.

“I know about the inheritance.”

“Then you know that the person managing the household must be approved before the funds can be released.”

He stared at her.

“What are you talking about?”

“Clara’s position in this house could complicate everything. If the lawyer believes the girls are being encouraged to abandon their mother’s memory, he can recommend that they be placed under my guardianship.”

Wade’s face darkened.

“You want to take my daughters?”

“I want to protect them.”

“From what?”

Helena glanced toward the kitchen.

“From a woman who has already started calling herself their mother.”

Wade opened the bedroom door.

“Get your things ready. You’re leaving tomorrow.”

Helena looked genuinely surprised.

“You would throw me out?”

“I would throw out anyone who tried to take my daughters away.”

That evening, Clara noticed the change in Wade.

He was quieter than usual.

He barely touched his supper, and twice she caught him looking toward the girls as though he were trying to memorize their faces.

After the children went to bed, she found him sitting on the porch.

A cold wind moved through the trees.

“May I sit?”

Wade nodded.

Clara settled beside him.

“Helena told you about Margaret’s letter.”

He looked at her.

“How did you know?”

“She asked the girls whether they remembered their real mother. June cried afterward.”

Wade closed his eyes.

“I’m sorry.”

Clara looked toward the dark mountain ridge.

“I don’t want them to forget her.”

“I know.”

“I’ve kept her pH๏τograph above their bed since I arrived. We talk about her birthdays. I let them tell me their favorite memories. I would never ask them to replace her.”

Wade was silent.

Then Clara spoke again.

“When June first called me Mama, I was frightened.”

He turned toward her.

“Why?”

“Because I knew how much that word meant. I didn’t want her to believe that loving me meant she was being disloyal to her mother.”

“What did you tell her?”

“That love doesn’t have to push someone else out.”

Wade looked down at his hands.

His late wife had been the center of his world.

After her death, he had convinced himself that the best way to honor her was to keep everything unchanged.

He had preserved her bedroom, her books, and even the old blue curtains she had chosen for the kitchen.

But he had never understood that his daughters needed more than memories.

They needed someone to hold their hands while making new ones.

“I never knew how to talk to them about their mother,” he admitted.

Clara turned toward him.

“You don’t have to pretend it doesn’t hurt.”

Wade stared into the darkness.

“Sometimes I still expect to hear her walking across the floor.”

Clara didn’t interrupt.

“And when I look at the girls, I see her. Their expressions, the way Nora tilts her head when she’s thinking, the way Daisy laughs…”

His voice faltered.

“I thought if I let someone else become important to them, I would somehow lose the last part of her.”

Clara was quiet for a moment.

“Wade, your daughters don’t need you to choose between their mother and their future.”

He looked at her.

“They need you to be there for both.”

For a long time, he said nothing.

Then he asked the question he had been avoiding.

“Do you still want to teach?”

Clara nodded.

“I do.”

“Even if it means leaving the ranch every morning?”

“Yes.”

“Then we’ll find a way.”

She looked surprised.

“You mean that?”

“I should have asked you months ago.”

Clara lowered her eyes.

Wade reached into his coat.

The divorce papers were still there.

He removed them, unfolded them, and looked at the signature line.

Then, without another word, he tore the papers in half.

Clara stared at him.

“Wade…”

“I came home planning to end this marriage.”

He dropped the pieces into the empty woodbox beside the porch.

“But I think I’ve spent enough of my life running away from things I don’t know how to fix.”

Clara’s eyes filled with tears, though she quickly looked away.

Wade continued.

“I won’t ask you to stay just because the girls need you. I want you to stay because you deserve a life here too.”

For the first time, Clara had no immediate answer.

Then a small voice came from the doorway.

“Papa?”

They turned.

June stood there holding an old pH๏τograph.

Her sisters were behind her.

“What’s wrong, sweetheart?” Wade asked.

June approached slowly.

“Can we show you something?”

She placed the pH๏τograph in his hands.

It showed Margaret sitting on the porch with all three girls as babies.

On the back, someone had written:

To my three little stars. One day, I hope you will know that a family can grow without anyone having to disappear.

Wade recognized the handwriting.

It was Margaret’s.

But beneath the sentence was something he had never noticed before.

A second line, written in smaller letters.

And if Clara ever becomes part of your lives, please let her.

Wade looked up sharply.

“Where did you find this?”

June pointed toward the old sewing basket.

“Clara keeps Mama’s things safe. We found it when we were looking for the blue ribbon.”

Wade turned the pH๏τograph over again.

His wife had written Clara’s name.

But how could that be?

Margaret had died almost two years before Clara arrived.

Wade stared at the pH๏τograph.

Clara slowly shook her head.

“I’ve never seen that writing before.”

Then Helena appeared behind the children.

She had been standing in the hallway.

Her face had lost its color.

Wade looked at her.

“You knew about this?”

Helena said nothing.

“Helena. How did Margaret know Clara’s name?”

The older woman lowered herself into a chair.

For several seconds, the only sound was the wind against the windows.

Finally, she spoke.

“Because Clara wasn’t supposed to be a stranger.”

Wade looked between the two women.

“What does that mean?”

Helena reached into her bag and removed another envelope.

It bore Margaret’s handwriting.

But this one had Wade’s name on it.

“I was supposed to give you this after you remarried,” Helena whispered. “I never thought you would choose someone whose name was already written inside it.”

Wade took the envelope.

His fingers moved carefully beneath the old seal.

Inside was a letter and a small pH๏τograph.

The pH๏τograph showed Margaret standing beside a young woman with dark hair.

Wade recognized Clara immediately.

But the picture was dated nearly eight years earlier.

He looked at his wife.

Clara had gone completely still.

“I don’t understand,” she whispered.

Wade unfolded the letter.

Wade,

There is something I never found the courage to tell you.

Before I married you, I had a younger sister named Clara. She was sent away to live with relatives when our parents could no longer care for us. I spent years trying to find her, but the letters eventually stopped.

If she ever returns to Montana, please don’t let her believe she has no family.

Wade slowly raised his eyes.

Clara was staring at the pH๏τograph.

“I was adopted,” she whispered. “I always knew I had an older sister. But I was told she died.”

Helena covered her face.

“Margaret spent years searching for you. She finally found your address shortly before she became ill.”

Clara’s voice trembled.

“Why didn’t anyone tell me?”

Helena looked at her.

“Because Margaret wanted to tell you herself.”

Wade stared at the pH๏τograph again.

The woman he had married to help care for his daughters had been connected to his first wife all along.

Clara had not entered his family as a stranger.

She had unknowingly returned to the place where her own sister had once belonged.

And now the three little girls were standing between them, holding the pH๏τograph of the mother they had lost.

June looked up at Clara.

“Does that mean Mama is our aunt too?”

Clara knelt and gathered the three girls close.

“I think it means your mother loved you enough to leave you a very special gift.”

But Helena suddenly stood.

“There is one more thing you need to know.”

Wade turned.

“What now?”

Helena looked directly at Clara.

“Margaret didn’t just leave that letter. She left instructions about the inheritance. And the lawyer has already received a request to change the guardianship.”

Wade’s expression hardened.

“From whom?”

Helena hesitated.

Then she reached into her bag and produced a second document.

The signature at the bottom belonged to someone Wade trusted more than anyone.

His own brother, Daniel Blackwood.

“He intends to claim the girls,” Helena whispered. “And he says your marriage makes you unfit to raise them.”

Wade stared at the document.

Outside, the wind began howling against the mountain.

Inside, three little girls clung to Clara.

Wade looked at his daughters, then at the woman whose hand he had almost let go of.

He had spent six months believing he needed a wife to help manage his household.

Now he understood he needed to fight for something far more important.

A family.

And this time, he would not let anyone decide its future without him.

But the next morning, Daniel Blackwood arrived with a lawyer—and a letter bearing Margaret’s original signature that could change everything.

To be continued…