— Olya, I’m leaving.
Olga froze, a plate clenched in her hands halfway to the sink. A thin stream of water trickled from the faucet—the only sound in the heavy silence that followed his words. She turned slowly. Igor stood in the doorway already wearing his jacket, a travel bag at his feet. Not the one they took to the sea—this was new, made of dark, expensive leather.
“Where are you going?” she asked, her voice sounding strange, muffled. “To your mother’s? Another fight?”
He gave a short, bitter smirk.
“No, Olya. I’m leaving. For good. For another woman.”
The plate slipped from her fingers and shattered loudly on the floor. Olga flinched, and that simple instinct—to dodge the shards—brought her back to reality for a moment.
“For… another woman?” she whispered, staring at him with wide, horrified eyes. “You’re joking, right? We have children… Masha, Kirill…”
“Stop hiding behind the kids!” he exploded. “You use them as a shield for everything! What about me? I’m living in a swamp! I want to live, not just exist!”
He kicked the bag hard—it thumped against the wall.
“What swamp, Igor? We built everything together… the apartment, the dacha… I thought we were solid.”
“You’re solid!” He jabbed a finger at her. “You’ve got everything by the book: library, kids, dinners. And me? I’m suffocating! I’m forty, Olya! And what have I seen? Work and your tired face every evening!”
She looked at him as the ground crumbled under her feet. Fifteen years, two children, shared dreams—all turning to dust under his words.
“I tried…” Her voice shook. “Yes, I got tired… But you wanted the kids to go to activities, to study…”
“Enough!” he cut her off. “I’ve made up my mind. Svetlana… she’s different. She lives, she laughs. With her, I feel like myself. And you? To you I’m just an ATM and a chauffeur.”
Svetlana. The name stabbed like a knife. The blonde from his department. The one he’d once called “striking.” Olga had only smiled then, believing in their family. How blind she had been.
“So what now?” She swallowed the lump in her throat. “You’ll just walk out?”
“Not walk out—leave. I’ll pay child support. The apartment stays with you. I’m taking the car—it’s in my name. We’ll sell the dacha and split the money. I need to start a new life.”
He spoke as if discussing a furniture sale. Then, noticing her stunned silence, he added—quietly, with contempt:
“Oh, don’t make such a tragedy of it. A divorce, so what. You’ll find someone else. Although…” His gaze slid slowly over her worn housecoat, her tired face. “Who’s going to want you now? With two kids? At your age? No one wants that kind of baggage, Olya. Face it.”
Something snapped inside her. Pain, hurt, humiliation—everything flared into a burst of fury. She straightened. Her tears dried in an instant.
“Out,” she said quietly, so icily that he stepped back.
“What?”
“Out!” she shouted, her voice breaking. “With your bag, with Svetlana! I don’t want your presence here! Child support? Our benefactor! Get out!”
He hadn’t expected that. He knew her as quiet, patient. Now a woman stood before him, ready to burn it all down.
“You’ll regret this,” he hissed, grabbing the bag.
“You will!” she yelled at his back. “You’ll crawl back—and I won’t open the door!”
The door slammed. Olga was left alone among the shards—the symbol of their past life. She slid down the wall, sitting on the floor, not noticing the cuts on her feet, and cried. Soundlessly, with her whole body. Not because he left—but because he had crushed her dignity so easily.
Something rustled in her robe pocket. She reached in without thinking and felt a small rectangle—a lottery ticket. The one she’d bought three days ago with the change. “It’ll be a lucky one,” the saleswoman had said. Olga had only smirked then. Luck? Where?
She sat like that for a long time, until a sleepy voice drifted from the children’s room:
“Mom, what broke?”
She started and quickly wiped her tears.
“Nothing, sweetheart,” she said evenly. “I dropped a plate. Go back to sleep—it’s all fine.”
She picked up a broom and began sweeping up the shards. With every movement, one thought grew stronger: he didn’t know. He didn’t know that in that very moment, as he looked at her with contempt, her life had already changed. Forever.
The drawing was yesterday. She’d forgotten to check. With trembling hands she took out her phone, opened the website, entered the number. Her heart pounded as if trying to break free.
On the screen—a green message:
“Congratulations! Your prize is 68,000,000 rubles.”
Olga clapped a hand over her mouth. Sixty-eight million. She read it three times. Not a mistake. The numbers didn’t change.
She sank onto a chair. Not from pain—from shock. His words floated up in her mind: “Who would want you?”
She smiled bitterly. Now she knew the answer. She was wanted—by herself. And by her children. And he… he’d made his choice. He would never know what he’d left behind the door.
First she called her sister. Lena. Pragmatic, sharp, but loyal.
“Len, he left,” Olga said as soon as she picked up.
“Where? To the store?”
“For good. For another woman.”
A pause.
“Son of a…” Lena exhaled something unprintable. “I told you he was rotten! Got her address? I’ll be right over—we’ll have a neighborly chat!”
“Don’t,” Olga said wearily. “Listen, I need a favor. And please—no one. Not a word. Especially not his mother.”
“That witch? I don’t talk to her anyway. Spill.”
Olga took a deep breath and whispered about the ticket. Lena was silent so long Olga thought the call had dropped.
“Olya…” her sister finally breathed. “You serious? Sixty-eight?”
“I can’t believe it myself. I checked a hundred times.”
“God’s grace!” Lena exhaled. “You lucky devil! And he’s an idiot! Okay, listen up. First—change the locks. Today. Right now. Then—get a lawyer. Not just any, a real fighter. I know one—he’s pricey, but he’ll tear your Igor to shreds. And don’t touch the money yet. Under no circumstances. Let him think you’re broken. And you… you’re only getting started.”
“Why, Len? He said he’d leave us the apartment…”
“He ‘said’!” Lena snorted, mocking his tone. “Olya, are you in kindergarten? Today he promises, tomorrow his new fling whispers in his ear and he’ll come crawling to demand his half. And by law he’s got it! The apartment was bought in marriage. And if he finds out about the winnings before the divorce—kiss half the money goodbye! It’s marital property, he’ll grab his share in a heartbeat!”
Olga felt the blood drain from her face. She hadn’t thought of that.
“So keep quiet. Not a word. Only to the lawyer—and only in person. He’ll prep the divorce papers. You’ll file first. His fault, for adultery. Any witnesses?”
“What witnesses?”
“Neighbors see anything? Anyone at work know? It’ll help. And the dacha—whose name is it under?”
“His. But we built it together. Every weekend, every vacation—only there.”
“That’s bad. But fixable. Do you have receipts for materials? Any at all?”
Olga thought. Yes, she’d put everything in one folder: contracts, receipts from the stores, payment slips…
“I think so. In the dresser at the dacha.”
“Perfect!” Lena brightened. “Tomorrow we go there and grab everything. All the documents—apartment, dacha, whatever we find. Then—to the lawyer. Not a peep to Igor. Let him think you’re broken, sobbing into your pillow. The longer he underestimates you, the better.”
Her sister’s plan was simple but brilliant. It brought Olga strength. The fury and pain didn’t disappear, but a new feeling joined them—the thrill of survival, of fighting for herself and her children.
The next day her mother-in-law, Tamara Pavlovna, called. Her voice, as always, was sickly sweet.
“Olénka, hello, dear. Igor explained everything. How could this happen? I always told him: ‘Family is sacred.’ But him… He takes after his father, frivolous.”
Olga listened in silence, fists clenched.
“Don’t be angry with him,” the woman went on. “Sometimes men need… a break. He’ll live with this one, get bored quickly, and come back. Where else would he go? Home, the children… The main thing is to behave with dignity. Don’t whine, don’t argue. Be wise.”
“Being ‘wise’ means I should pack his suitcase and wish him a pleasant journey?” Olga couldn’t hold back.
“Now why say that?” the mother-in-law pouted. “I’m worried about the grandchildren. They need a father.”
“He needed the children until he found himself a Svetlana,” flashed through Olga’s mind, but aloud she said:
“I’ll think about it, Tamara Pavlovna. Thank you for the advice.”
“Good girl. I might drop by—visit the grandchildren. I miss them. And Igor asked me to pick up his winter clothes from the storage room.”
Olga’s heart skipped. In the storage room, in an old suitcase, lay the apartment papers.
“Fine,” she answered as calmly as she could. “Just let me know in advance.”
As soon as the call ended, she rang Lena.
“She’s planning to come! For his things, sure. But I’m sure she’s after the documents!”
“Don’t panic!” her sister snapped. “We’re going to the dacha right now. Then to your place. We’ll turn the apartment upside down and grab everything valuable. Let her come. All she’ll find are her darling boy’s old socks.”
The drive to the dacha felt endless. For the first time, Olga sat behind the wheel of Lena’s old Lada. Igor had never trusted her with the car. “Women drivers are a menace,” he used to say. Now she felt a wicked satisfaction as she steered smoothly.
The dacha greeted them with silence. The house they had built over five years now seemed alien, empty.
“Got the keys?” Lena asked.
“Yes.”
They went inside. It smelled of cold wood and neglect. Olga headed straight for the living-room dresser. She pulled out a drawer.
“Here,” she whispered, taking out a thick folder. “Everything’s here.”
At the table they began sorting the papers: the land-plot deed, building permit, receipts, payment slips, the contract with the work crew.
“Look!” Lena suddenly cried. “Card payment. And it’s your card!”
Yes, she had paid for a big batch of insulation with her salary card. She remembered that day—Igor didn’t have cash on him.
“That’s evidence!” Lena crowed. “You put money into it! That means you’re entitled to a share!”
An hour later Olga came across a strange paper—a yellowed deed of gift. Handwritten, with the village council’s seal, from 1992. The land was gifted by Pavel (Igor’s father) to his wife, Tamara Pavlovna.
“That’s odd,” Olga frowned. “I thought he bought the plot from some old man. That’s what he told me.”
“Give it here,” Lena took the document. “Deed of gift to the mother. And here’s a sale contract—2010, seller: Sidorov, Ivan Petrovich. Not an old man, just a front.”
“Why did he lie to me?”
“So you wouldn’t claim anything!” Lena guessed. “The scheme is clear: the mother couldn’t just gift the land to her son—then you’d have no rights to it. Gifts aren’t divided. So they staged a sham sale—and the plot gets counted as bought during the marriage. Which makes the house joint property. You have a claim. If you’d known the land was his mother’s, you might not have even tried to contest!”
“My God…” Olga breathed.
“That’s putting it mildly,” Lena said darkly. “This deed of gift is our main weapon. It proves the sale was fake. The lawyer will be thrilled. Guard it like the apple of your eye.”
They packed everything into a bag. As they left, Olga looked back at the house. So much effort, love, dreams—and all of it built on lies.
Back in the city, they tore through the apartment at once. From the storage room they took all the folders with documents, photo albums, even Igor’s old laptop.
“Let him look for his files in the cloud,” Lena grumbled, stuffing the gear into the bag.
That evening a locksmith came and changed the locks. When Olga took the new keys in her hand, she felt for the first time in a long while like the mistress of her own life.
The next day she met with the lawyer—Mark Borisovich. Stern, experienced, with a penetrating gaze. He listened in silence, studied the documents, especially the deed of gift and the receipt from her card.
“Interesting situation,” he said at last. “Your husband and his mother are crafty, but not very smart. The sham sale trick is old, but hard to prove. However, you’ve got strong cards. We’ll file a counterclaim: invalidate the transaction and split the house as joint property.”
“And the winnings?” Olga asked softly.
“The winnings are your ace up your sleeve,” the lawyer smiled slightly. “We say nothing. By law, anything acquired during marriage is divided, including lottery winnings. So we divorce quickly—before you declare the win. We’ll file for divorce due to his fault. Do you know the woman’s name?”
“Svetlana. I don’t know her last name. She works with him.”
“Excellent. We’ll find out. For now—stay quiet. Let him think you’re broken. That will lower his guard.”
Leaving the office, Olga felt relieved. She had a plan. Protection. And a secret that gave her incredible strength.
Two days later Igor called. His voice was angry.
“Olya, I can’t get into the apartment. Did you change the locks? Have you lost your mind?”
“I did,” she answered calmly, remembering the lawyer’s words. “This is my territory now. You have no business here.”
“Are you out of your mind?!” he exploded. “My things are there!”
“I’ll pack them up. You can pick them up on Saturday. The boxes will be by the door.”
“I want to come in! It’s my apartment too!”
“All questions through the court,” she said crisply. “My lawyer will contact you.”
Silence on the other end.
“What lawyer?” he faltered. “Are you seriously filing for divorce?”
Olga smirked.
“What, you thought I’d wait until your Svetlana got bored with you? You made your choice. Now it’s my turn.”
She hung up. And for the first time in a long while, she laughed—loudly, freely, with relief.
The battle was only beginning. She was ready.
But Olga didn’t know that the main blow would come not from Igor, but from his mother.
On Friday evening, the day before Igor came for his things, Tamara Pavlovna called again. Her voice was anxious.
“Olénka, I stopped by the dacha to tidy up… and I couldn’t find one folder. An old cardboard one. There were Grandpa’s letters from the front, documents… Did you take it?”
Olga froze.
“No, Tamara Pavlovna. I haven’t been there in a long time.”
“Strange… I turned that dresser inside out. Well, maybe Igor moved it. I’ll ask him.”
Olga slowly put down the phone. Lies. Barefaced lies. She had been there. She had searched for that very folder. But why?
Suddenly Olga remembered: they hadn’t taken everything. There were other papers in the dresser—certificates, awards, employment booklets. What if something important was among them?
She rushed to the bag and sorted through the documents. Everything was in place. But the unease wouldn’t go away.
Then she remembered: on the bookshelf stood a thick book, Housekeeping Tips—Grandma’s. A corner of paper was sticking out of it. She hadn’t thought anything of it at the time.
What if it wasn’t a bookmark?
She had to go back. Immediately.
But most likely it was already too late. If the mother-in-law had been there, she could have found it, hidden it, or destroyed it.
Olga understood: Tamara Pavlovna wasn’t just a doting mother. She was a player. And she had just made a move, hiding something very important.
The only question now was: what exactly had she hidden—and how would it change the course of their war?
“Lena, she was there! She was looking for something!”
Olga paced the kitchen nervously, as if she could burn off her anxiety with her steps. She held the phone to her ear with her shoulder, her fingers kneading the hem of her robe.
“Pull yourself together! Who was? What happened?” Lena’s voice was sharp, alert.
“My mother-in-law! Tamara! She just called, all innocent: ‘Olénka, you didn’t happen to take a little folder? With Grandpa’s letters…’” Olga mimicked her. “She’s lying through her teeth! She was at the dacha! She was looking for that very folder we took! But she mentioned the dresser… And then I remembered the book! On top of the cabinet—Housekeeping Tips. There was a piece of paper sticking out! Lena, I’m sure—she found something and took it!”
A brief pause. Lena was thinking it through.
“So the old fox decided to outsmart us,” she said at last. “Clever. She realized you weren’t broken and rushed over to clean up after herself. The only question is—what was that paper?”
“I don’t know! But if she drove all that way for it, it means it’s important! Maybe something that incriminates her… or, on the contrary, that helps us!”
“Then we’re going. This minute,” Lena said firmly. “I don’t care that it’s night.”
“But she might have taken everything already!”
“Maybe. Or maybe she missed something. Or noticed, but overlooked another detail. When you think you’ve outsmarted everyone, that’s when you start making mistakes. Do you have a second set of keys to the dacha?”
“Yes, I do.”
“I’ll be at your place in fifteen minutes. Dress in black. We’ll be shadows.”
Driving off into the night felt insane, but Olga knew—it had to be done. Inside, anxiety roiled with a strange, desperate resolve. As Lena guided the Lada along the empty road, Olga tried to recall every detail.
“The book is in a blue binding,” she muttered. “On the very top shelf. Housekeeping Tips.”
“Let’s hope our Tamara Pavlovna, in her panic, left something behind,” Lena said grimly, turning onto the dirt road.
The dacha community slept. Their house stood dark, as if abandoned. Lena parked the car around the bend and switched off the headlights.
“Quiet,” she whispered. “Not a sound.”
They slipped through the gate. The key turned softly. Inside they didn’t turn on the lights, using only their phone flashlights. The bookcase. Top shelf. The book was in its place. Olga took it with trembling hands. She flipped through it. Nothing.
“Nothing,” she whispered, sinking onto a chair. “She took everything. We’re late.”
“Don’t give up,” Lena took the book. “Let me.”
She began turning the pages slowly, methodically—not reading but studying each one in a thin side light.
“There’s a forensic trick,” she said suddenly. “If you write on the top sheet of a stack, impressions remain on the sheets underneath. You can see them at the right angle.”
“You think there could be an impression here?”
“Why not?”
Lena angled the beam almost parallel to the page. And suddenly faint lines appeared on one of them. Not text. A signature. Clear, with a characteristic flourish. And below it—a second, more modest one. And the stamp’s embossed circle.
“That’s… that’s Pavel Andreyevich’s signature,” Olga whispered. “I’ve seen it on old documents. And the second one—like a notary’s…”
They looked at each other.
“It was a document,” Lena breathed. “Notarized. Judging by this—a will. And she removed it.”
“How does that help us? The impressions aren’t proof.”
“What helps is that now we know what to look for,” Lena’s eyes gleamed. “And we know she’s afraid. And when people are afraid—they make mistakes. Which means we have a chance.”
The next day Lena suggested an unexpected move.
“We need someone with weight. Experience. Connections. Uncle Fyodor—remember him?”
Olga remembered: a stern retired colonel, her father’s friend, with a piercing gaze and rare visits.
“But he’s old…”
“Age doesn’t matter when it’s about injustice,” Lena cut her off. “He worked twenty-five years in investigations. He can smell a lie. And he has connections. One call from him is worth ten court requests.”
Fyodor Stepanovich met them in his old apartment. Tall, gray-haired, watchful. He listened in silence, then studied the photo of the page’s impression for a long time.
“Pavel…” he said at last. “He was a good man. As for Tamara… I always sensed something off about her.”
He lit a cigarette, looking out the window.
“All right, girls. The picture is clear. The family decided to outflank you both. The sham dacha deal is a template. And the hidden document is their Achilles’ heel. If she rushed to remove it, it hits the bull’s-eye. Most likely—a will. Maybe Pavel didn’t trust his wife and wanted to protect his grandkids.”
“But how do we find it?” Olga asked.
“Notarial documents are registered. But to access them, you have to know the notary. That’s the long way. We’ll take the short one.”
He squinted.
“Every family has old neighbors. People who saw everything. Where did Tamara and Pavel live?”
“On Rechnoy. The old apartment.”
“Excellent. Lena, that’s your job. Go there. Find the old ladies on the bench. Pretend to be a social worker, a relative. Ask questions. People love to reminisce. The main thing—listen. Sometimes a tiny detail is the key.”
“And me?” Olga asked.
“You prepare for your meeting with your husband. He’s coming for his things tomorrow, isn’t he?”
“Yes.”
“Then show him you’re not someone who can be dumped. Cold, calm, contemptuous. Like he’s trash. Let him see you’re not broken. That will knock him off balance. Meanwhile I’ll track down the notary. The signature impression is smudged, but I think I can make out the surname.”
At exactly noon on Saturday, the doorbell rang. Olga looked through the peephole. Igor stood on the threshold. Alone. She took a deep breath and opened the door.
“Here, take them,” Olga nodded at three large boxes neatly stacked in the hallway. “And go.”
He stared at her, puzzled. She wasn’t in a frayed housecoat now but in a simple, neat dress. Hair done, light makeup—no trace of tears.
“Aren’t you going to invite me in?” he tossed with a strained smirk.
“What for? You’re no longer master here,” she leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed.
“I’m the father of these children. I want to see them.”
“The kids are with my sister right now. You’ll see them only through the lawyer. During the set hours.”
Igor flushed.
“What are you playing at, Olya? Courts, lawyers… We could have split like civilized people! I left you the apartment!”
“‘Left me’?” she arched a brow. “The apartment where your children are registered and which you can’t legally take? And the dacha we built together—you nobly decided to sell and split? How generous.”
“We built it on my land!” he shouted.
“Yours? The land you supposedly bought from some old man?” Olga smirked. “My lawyer finds that story… fascinating. Especially now that we know the land was a gift from your father to your mother. And the sale was a sham. That’s called fraud, Igor. And that can land you in court.”
He froze. Confusion flickered in his eyes.
“How do you know that?”
“The world isn’t without kind people,” she said calmly. “And without old documents. Your mother went through them recently. A pity she didn’t find everything.”
“So you stole the papers from the dacha?” he hissed.
“Stole?” Olga laughed. “We took what concerns our property. But your mother seems to have really hidden something. Or destroyed it. For example, your father’s will, which he left to his grandchildren and hid in his favorite book. Care to tell me what it said?”
He said nothing, fists clenched. Hatred and fear showed in his eyes.
“Don’t bother answering. We’ll find out. Now—take your things and go. Tell your Svetlana that instead of a share of the dacha she’s looking at half the court costs.”
She turned and walked into the apartment. He cursed, grabbed the boxes, and, clattering, lugged them to the elevator. Olga closed the door and leaned against it. Her heart was pounding not from fear—from exhilaration. It was her first real breath of freedom.
Two days later Lena called, breathless with excitement:
“Olya, sit down! I found it! A real treasure!”
“What are you talking about?”
“I was on Rechnoy! Talked to the grannies on the bench. One—Granny Nyura—turned out to be the best friend of Grandpa Pavel Andreyevich’s wife! She knows everything!”
Lena paused to catch her breath.
“First, Tamara married Igor’s father for convenience. No love. He’s from a family of professors, she’s a migrant from the provinces. Second, the dacha land is the family’s ancestral property! Pavel put it in Tamara’s name for tax reasons, but he always said, ‘This is for the grandchildren.’ And now the main thing: a year before his death, Pavel Andreyevich made a will. He went to Granny Nyura himself for advice. He was afraid Tamara and Igor would blow everything and the kids would be left with nothing. He left everything—the house, the land, all property—to Masha and Kirill. And he hid a copy in the book—Housekeeping Tips! He said, ‘If anything happens—Nyura knows.’”
“In that very book…” Olga whispered.
“Exactly. But you moved, and contact was lost. Granny Nyura thought everything was fine with you.”
That same evening Fyodor Stepanovich called:
“I found the notary’s archive,” he said without preamble. “He’s retired, but the documents are intact. The will exists. Pavel Andreyevich bequeathed all his property, including his share of joint assets, to his grandchildren—Masha and Kirill.”
“So… the dacha too?” Olga asked, heart in her throat.
“Yes. The house built during the marriage is joint property. He had the right to bequeath his half. Tamara knew this. That’s why they staged the sham sale—to make the house look like Igor’s personal property. And when she realized you were digging, she hurried to snatch the copy of the will. She thought no one would find the original in the archive. Foolish.”
The trial played out like a play. Igor and his mother hired a lawyer who painted Olga as a vindictive wife trying to ruin a “hardworking man.” Tamara wept, lamented her “ungrateful daughter-in-law.” Igor told tales of “working three jobs for his family.”
Then Mark Borisovich presented Pavel Andreyevich’s will.
The courtroom fell deathly silent. Tamara turned pale. Their lawyer was at a loss.
Next, Granny Nyura took the stand. Leaning on her cane, the old woman clearly and calmly spoke of Pavel’s last wishes, his fears, the will.
The final blow was the deed of gift for the land and an expert conclusion that the sale was a sham.
The court ruled: the sale contract was void. The house was jointly acquired property. The half belonging to Pavel passed by will to Masha and Kirill. Tamara, the owner of the other half, was obliged to sell it to pay Olga compensation for her investments, confirmed by receipts.
Igor was left with nothing. His new “Svetlana” disappeared after the first hearing, once she learned her fiancé was not an heir but a bankrupt.
A week later he called Olga. His voice trembled.
“Olya, I was an idiot. I’m sorry. My mother lied to me, Svetlana is empty… Let’s start over? For the kids’ sake…”
“No, Igor,” she said firmly. “You can see the children on weekends. But there won’t be any ‘starting over.’ You made your choice. You destroyed the family yourself. Live with it.”
She hung up and blocked his number.
A month later, when all the paperwork was signed, Olga went to the lottery office. She received the money. She bought a new apartment—bright, spacious, next to a park and a good school. She put the rest into the children’s accounts.
Tamara Pavlovna sold her apartment to settle up. She ended up in a rented studio on the outskirts. Igor, having lost his job and reputation, tried to find a new one—without success.
The next summer the dacha rang with noise and laughter. The air smelled of barbecue, fresh paint, and mown grass. Olga, Lena, and Fyodor Stepanovich sat on the veranda watching Masha and Kirill kick a ball around.
“Life’s a strange thing,” Fyodor said, blowing out smoke. “Your father-in-law—God rest his soul—seemed to foresee everything. He wanted to protect his grandkids. And he did.”
“He protected them, and I just got lucky,” Olga smiled.
“Not luck,” Lena corrected her. “Justice. You fought for this happiness. You earned it.”
Olga looked around at her house, her family—her sister, her children, the friend who had become everything to them. And for the first time in many years, she felt not just peace, but real, warm happiness.
She was home.
And fate, as it turned out, sometimes shuffles the deck so that even the biggest losses turn into the biggest win.