“You were gone for six,” she said, taking a tub of vanilla yogurt out of the refrigerator.

“Things changed while you were sitting in the dirt overseas.

Brandon handles the real estate now.”

“Brandon isn’t a Sterling,” I said.

“He’s marrying me in June,” she said, dragging out the last word until it buzzed in the quiet room.

“That makes him family enough to manage Walter’s assets.”

I poured black coffee into a heavy ceramic mug and didn’t offer her any.

“Walter built Sterling Construction from two pickup trucks and a cement mixer,” I said.