Samantha and Gianna Rucki

LAKEVILLE, MINN. — For over two years, the parents of two missing teenage sisters said they had no idea what happened to them after they mysteriously vanished. But it turned out the girls were living less than three hours away the entire time.

Samantha and Gianna Rucki ran away from their Lakeville, Minn., home on April 18, 2013.

At the time of their disappearance, the girls and their three other siblings, Nico, Nia and Gino, were at the center of the bitter divorce and custody dispute between their parents Sandra Grazzini-Rucki and David Rucki.

Grazzini-Rucki claimed Rucki was physically abusive to both her and their five children. The couple’s two daughters Samantha and Gianna were also vocal about their father’s alleged abuse. But David Rucki has always denied abusing his ex-wife or any of his children.

While the court investigated the allegations, the five children were placed in the custody of two aunts, Grazzini-Rucki’s sister Nancy Olson and Rucki’s sister Tammy Love. When Olson said she could no longer care for the children, Love agreed to take them full time. On the day they disappeared, police had just dropped off Samantha, then 14, and Gianna, then 13, with Love.

After their disappearance, a month went by without a single sighting of the girls until they appeared on a local FOX 9 TV report alleging their father threatened to shoot the siblings and their mother, which he has denied. After the story aired, the girls disappeared again.

Samantha and Gianna were finally found by Minneapolis police in November 2015 at a farm called White Horse Ranch, in Herman, Minn. White Horse Ranch offers 90-minute sessions with their animals, designed as a form of therapy for children who have been abused.

The ranch’s owners Gina and Doug Dahlen said the girls were dropped off at the farm by Sandra and one of her longtime supporters Dede Evavold. They said Evavold knew them and respected their work on the ranch.

“(Evavold) just said that they needed a temporary place and that they were working through a court case,” Gina Dahlen told ABC News’ “20/20.”

Gina Dahlen said they thought the girls would be staying for just three days, but when Sandra never returned, Samantha and Gianna lived with the Dahlens for 2 1/2 years.

The Dahlens said Sandra only called four or five times during the girls’ entire stay. They said they thought it was strange she never spoke to the girls on the phone or visited.

“I mean she was very concerned about them and (would say) tell them that I love them. I almost feel like she knew that they were safe here,” Gina Dahlen said.

The Dahlens said the girls made new lives for themselves while at the ranch but that they were free to leave whenever they wanted to.

To see more, go to ABC News