Jacob stood in the morning sun under a massive oak tree, a wooden shovel in one hand and a bouquet of wildflowers in the other.
The small hill overlooked the Jackson family farm, which stretched out as far as the eye could see—two hundred acres of dark, rich soil near the winding Illinois River. It had been purchased by his adoptive father’s ancestor over a hundred and fifty years ago after he’d struck it big in the California Gold Rush, then returned home to start a family. The land had been handed down from father to son for six generations.
Jacob let out a heavy sigh. He and Jared were the last generation who would ever live here, and they weren’t even fully human, nor blood relatives of the previous Jacksons. His adoptive father and mother were sterile. He suspected it might be from
