Chapter 3

B ack inside her living room now, Doreen noted that the animals followed close behind her every step. When she looked down, even Mugs seemed to be depressed and bored. “I know. It’s been weeks since we had a case.” She didn’t want to sit here, hoping for cases. That would imply wanting people to commit crimes, resulting in more dead bodies showing up. That was not what she wanted, not really. She didn’t want to be bored though.

When her phone rang a few minutes later, she stared down and groaned. “Hello, Nan,” she answered cautiously.

After a moment of silence, Nan chuckled. “That sounded as if you are very worried about something I might say.”

“Not so much worried you might have something to say,” Doreen clarified, “but worried you might be asking me to come down and do more preparations.”

“I certainly was,” she stated briskly. “It is a party for you, after all.”

So Doreen owed Nan because the party was for Doreen? “How does that work?” she asked with a note of humor. “I mean, you’re the one supposedly putting this party together.”

“Sure,” Nan agreed, “but it’s a lot of work, so that requires you to help.”

“I see,” she muttered, with a smile playing on her face. But there was no seeing at all. There was never any seeing when it came to this stuff, particularly with Nan involved. Still, Doreen might be better off doing something constructive, even if it was for her own party, rather than sitting here doing nothing.

“I agree,” Nan replied.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“No, but you would have,” Nan declared cheerfully. “You’re much better off coming here and giving us a hand than to sit there and mope.”

“Mope,” she cried out. “I’m hardly moping.”

“Are you sure?” Nan asked, doubt in her tone.

“Of course I’m sure,” Doreen declared. “That’s not something I would do.”

“Maybe not,” Nan conceded in a dismissive tone. “Yet we don’t really want you to have that opportunity either.”

“Good God,” Doreen muttered, half to herself.

Nan laughed. “Yes, very good, and you should be thanking Him because He gave you me.”

At that, she stared down at the phone and started to laugh. “I can’t argue with that because you have been a lifesaver, indeed.”

“ Ha . In many ways you’ve been our lifesaver. Things have never been so much fun since you arrived in town.”

“Maybe,” Doreen replied, “but that’s not necessarily a good thing.”

“Sure, it is,” Nan said, with a laugh. “Don’t you worry about all those other people. They can go off and do their own thing. You need to enjoy life a little bit.”

“Maybe,” Doreen muttered. “I have to admit I was wondering about trying some Christmas baking. I think Mack would enjoy it.”

“Yeah, and what are you getting him for Christmas?”

Doreen froze and whispered, “ Uh-oh .”

Nan cried out, “You don’t have anything for him?”

“ Um , nope, I don’t have a thing.” She frowned. “I guess a gift is expected, isn’t it?”

Nan snorted. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah, I am serious, Nan. I don’t have anything for him, okay? I wasn’t really thinking that was a thing. We’re adults after all.”

“Yes, you are adults,” Nan agreed in exasperation, “but that doesn’t mean you’re dead. And adults still want gifts.” Then she laughed. “Can I assume that means you didn’t get me anything either?”

“Oh, criminy.” Doreen sank into the nearest living room chair, one of a matching pair. She still hadn’t purchased any other furniture yet.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” Nan noted cheerfully. “Good thing I’ve given you a heads-up. That gives you at least a week to get something.”

“A week,” she repeated, staring at her phone in horror. “What can I possibly buy in a week?”

“I don’t know,” Nan replied, her tone turning crafty. “What am I now? Your Fairy Godmother? Good Lord, you and Mathew really didn’t celebrate Christmas at all? Just another reason I loathe the man.”

Doreen didn’t have a clue how to respond to that, so she just stayed quiet.

“You’ll need to figure that out, and soon.”

“Maybe you should turn that around and tell me what you would like.”

“I want a surprise.” Nan chuckled. “Something that would make me very happy.”

“Something that would make you very happy,” Doreen repeated in complete bewilderment. “What could that be?”

More silence came, and then Nan added, “You really do need to think about this, dear.” And, with that, Nan ended the call. Doreen was still recovering from this revelation when Nan called her back. “By the way, if you’re still thinking about baking, shortbreads would be good. We love them down here.” And, with that, she ended the call again.

Doreen wondered if that meant, because Nan and the other residents loved those cookies, then Doreen was supposed to bake them some, or if it meant they would get some from the Rosemoor cook, so it wasn’t something Doreen needed to worry about. Sometimes Nan was incredibly confusing. Doreen loved her dearly, but, at times, Nan made absolutely no sense.

Doreen contemplated the conversation, searching her phone to see just what went into shortbreads. When she saw the amount of butter required, her eyebrows shot up. Now that was something interesting. Cornstarch too. She went to the cupboards to see just what she might have, knowing that, even if she did have some of it, she wouldn’t likely have the full amount or every ingredient. Besides, how many cookies should she make, and could she give Mack cookies for Christmas? Would that be okay? She had money coming now supposedly, so maybe she should buy him something. However, she had no clue what that would even be.

At least baking cookies showed that she was trying hard to make things work and to do things on her own, even if it did sound a little lacking. She was meticulous when it came to detecting and investigating, but Christmas gifts? She had to wonder how the topic had completely escaped her attention up until now. Maybe it was the fact that her husband had never bought her a Christmas gift. As she thought about it, it was probably more because he didn’t want to spend the money. Any gifts he had given her were usually when he had made a business deal of some kind, and she never got access to those gifts anyway. They were labeled as investments and put under lock and key.

She hadn’t yet sorted out all of his estate issues, and, since probate was happening, it would take some time to get all that resolved. She definitely didn’t want any of those old gifts from Mathew anyway. She didn’t even want to think about them. Yet she would have to deal with it, no matter how much she wanted to ignore it. Ignoring only went so far, and, when Mack’s brother got into the picture, Nick wouldn’t let her ignore very much. He was all about taking care of the current issues before the issues became too big. As she had found out recently, some of these issues were already big.

She was checking out shortbread supplies in her cupboards when her phone rang, and she groaned when she saw who it was. “Hey,” she greeted Nick.

“Hey,” he replied, with a smile in his tone. “I’m trying not to take it personally, but you never sound very happy when I call you.”

“It’s not that,” she clarified. “It’s just that you always bring up issues I must deal with, and, just because I have to deal with them, that doesn’t make them easy.”

“Of course not,” he agreed. “But the good news is that, by dealing with them, we get them off your plate… permanently.”

She brightened at that. “You mean, there’ll be an end to this?”

He chuckled. “Absolutely. There’ll definitely be an end to this.”

“I’m glad to hear that, but something tells me that’s not why you’re calling today.”

“No, I’ve got more paperwork for you to deal with. Also these houses are full of material.”

“What do you mean by material ?” Her mind envisioning dry wall, clothing, or any other nonsense her husband could have put to use.

“Not what you’re thinking, I’m sure, but they’re all full.”

“Meaning?” she asked cautiously.

“Meaning, furnishings.”

“Oh,” she muttered, frowning at that. “What am I supposed to do with that then?”

“That’s what I’m asking you,” Nick said. “If you still want to sell these homes, do you want to sell them furnished or empty?”

She sighed. “That makes sense, but it’s not today’s issue, is it?”

“No, it’s not necessarily today’s issue,” he replied a bit indignant, “but it is an issue we need to plan for. Doreen, don’t be afraid of making a decision. There is no right or wrong answer here, just more about your preference.”

“Right,” she muttered.

He started to chuckle. “I had no idea that you would be so difficult at this stage,” he shared, amusement rolling through his tone.

“It’s not that I’m being difficult,” she clarified, “but if it isn’t something I have to deal with right now, then… you know.”

“So,… what is so important in your life right now that you’re struggling to answer a few questions and to give me a hand trying to figure out what you want to do with all this stuff? You need to deal with this, Doreen, and you need to do it soon.”

She thought about it for a moment and then asked, “What should I get your brother for Christmas?”

The softest of chuckles slipped through the phone. “Interesting,” he murmured.

“What’s interesting?” she grumbled, glaring at the phone as if she had let loose some major secret, and she was the only one who didn’t understand it.

“You’re more worried about Mack’s Christmas gift than you are about what to do with millions of dollars’ worth of furnishings?”

She gasped. “Did you say millions of dollars?”

“Considering the number of houses he’s got and the amount of furnishings he’s filled them with, I should hope so. Some of them have incredibly expensive paintings.”

“Oh, well, we can auction off furniture and artwork, and we already know somebody we can get to handle it all. Scott at Christie’s. Have them cart off what they want for auction and leave anything else behind to make the house look lived in.”

“Right, that’s not a bad idea. I can hire a local Realtor to show Mathew’s places and to deal with Scott and his people. A lot of Mathew’s acquisitions would probably have provenance, and it appears to be quite the art collection Mathew was working on.”

“I think he was collecting some of it when I was there,” she said, trying to sound businesslike, but it rattled her. “I never really knew the artists, but maybe some were by Picasso and Rembrandt.”

He whistled. “See? I need this kind of input from you. I’ll dig further into these collections because, if that’s the case,… that’s millions more.”

“Oh,… does that mean millions more questions and answers?” She could almost see him shaking his head on the other end of the call.

“You really don’t care about money, do you?” Nick asked.

“I care about money in the sense that I have enough to get by,” she explained. “I don’t care about money in terms of buying apparently valuable paintings that I don’t even particularly like.”

“Can you think of any you do like?” he asked curiously.

“Nope, but then I haven’t had a chance to really see much in the way of art.”

“And yet you lived with some of these pieces.”

“Sort of, but they were all stuffed in temperature-controlled fancy rooms, and, if I went in there, Mathew always hovered. So it’s not as if I got a chance to really see anything.”

“Right,” Nick noted, humor lacing his tone. “Do you want to keep anything? We found lots of jewelry in his main residence.”

“Oh, right.” She groaned. “Am I supposed to care about that stuff?”

“No, you don’t have to care about any of it. But, if you do care about it, this is the time to speak up, so we can set aside what you want to keep versus what you want to sell at auction.”

“I don’t think I care about any of it,” she replied. “If any are pieces he gave to me, I wouldn’t have been allowed to have them anyway.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning that they had to be kept in the safe all the time. Mathew required it all to be locked up all the time, so what is the point of having jewelry I can’t even wear?” She thought it was a reasonable question.

Nick laughed. “I won’t argue with you on that, but your response is definitely different.”

So she assumed he didn’t agree. “I am absolutely different,” she said crossly, “but I don’t know if you’re trying to tell me whether that’s good or bad.”

“I’m not telling you either way,” Nick pointed out. “I’m just telling you that these things are yours to do with what you will. If you don’t want anything to do with any of it because of bad memories or whatever reasons, I’m more than happy to help you get rid of it all.”

“I would love to get rid of it all,” she stated. “Maybe I should take a look at what’s there before I make such a blanket statement, but I can’t imagine anything there has any meaning to me. Oh, except Nan had given me a necklace at one point in time, and Mathew insisted I get rid of it and not wear it because it just wasn’t good enough, as far as he was concerned.”

“What a nice fellow,” Nick quipped.

“ Not , but, if that happens to be listed in his estate inventory, I would like that. It was Nan’s grandmother’s necklace.”

“Ah, so a family heirloom. So, you want to keep nothing, but you won’t make that final decision until we get the estate list, is that correct? Or maybe we should make a trip down there in person. Help you to get clear on what’s there.”

“I was wondering about that, but I would want Mack there too. Are you okay with that?”

“I am okay with that, but maybe we should just get a realtor to film the contents, so the three of us don’t have to coordinate our calendars,” he suggested.

“Yeah, I like that idea.”

“Good. I’ll arrange that for each of his homes. Also some money is going into your bank account today, if you need something to buy those Christmas gifts with.”

“Oh,” she muttered.

“Okay, that doesn’t sound positive.”

“I don’t know what to do about Christmas gifts,” she admitted, with a sigh. “It’s not something we ever did, so it wasn’t really on my radar.”

“Mathew didn’t buy you Christmas gifts?” he asked.

“No, he told me that Christmas was fake and too commercialized and that nobody should be spending money based on a date on the calendar. It was just this big commercial exercise that was a lost cause.”

“I won’t argue regarding the commercialization of it because that’s true. However, it can also be a wonderful time to show people that you love them,” he reminded her gently.

“Oh.”

At that, he started to laugh again. “And you just need to sort it out, without causing yourself major stress because that would upset Mack completely. So, what it is that you want to give him, or what do you think he would appreciate?”

“I have no idea,” she said helplessly.

“Yes, you do,” Nick encouraged her. “You absolutely do. Don’t think in terms of money, don’t think in terms of need, just think in terms of something he might like.” And, with that, he ended the call.