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- Herausgeber: Valley Publishing Ltd.
- Sprache: Französisch
Du luxe à la misère… Le tumulte s’apaise… Tout à coup, c’est le calme plat… trop calme, surtout pour Doreen !
Ce qui était censé être une tranquille promenade dans un cimetière paisible après de récentes funérailles se transforme en début de nouvelle affaire. Quelqu’un a frappé Doreen sur la tête et l’a laissée face contre terre parmi les fleurs funéraires.
Est-ce de la violence gratuite ? Une vengeance ? Un avertissement quant au pire à venir ?
Personne ne le sait, pas même Doreen. Mais une chose est certaine : l’attaque a permis la disparition – peut-être le kidnapping ? – de l’adorable perroquet gris de Doreen, Thaddeus. Hors d’elle, Doreen se prive d’une virée aux urgences pour rentrer directement chez elle, où elle espère que Thaddeus rentrera tôt ou tard.
Mais quand l’oiseau revient, c’est avec un SOS noué autour de la patte, menant Doreen jusqu’à un étrange coin de la ville et un curieux petit garçon qui en sait un peu trop.
Voilà que maintenant, non content de laisser des menaces sur le seuil de Doreen, on semble prêt à les mettre à exécution…
Entre les oiseaux, les garçons et le frère du caporal Mack Moreau, l’avocat qui s’occupe de son divorce, Doreen a du pain sur la planche. Et c’est avant que sa précédente avocate se pointe sans prévenir chez elle ! Perturbée par tous ces événements, Doreen ouvre la porte à une personne dont la rancœur tenace pourrait bien lui nuire…
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Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022
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Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
About This Book
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Epilogue
About Murder in the Marigolds
Get Your Free Book Now
Author’s Note
About the Author
Copyright Page
About This Book
A new cozy mystery series from USA Today best-selling author Dale Mayer. Follow gardener and amateur sleuth Doreen Montgomery—and her amusing and mostly lovable cat, dog, and parrot—as they catch murderers and solve crimes in lovely Kelowna, British Columbia.
Riches to rags. … Chaos calms. … Suddenly it’s quiet. … Too quiet if Doreen’s involved!
What was supposed to be a leisurely stroll through a peaceful cemetery after a recent funeral turns into the start of a new case. Someone clobbers Doreen over the head and leaves her facedown among the funeral flowers.
Is it random violence? Revenge? A warning of worse to come?
No one knows, not even Doreen, but one thing is certain: the attack enabled the disappearance—perhaps the abduction?—of Doreen’s beloved African gray parrot, Thaddeus. Frantic, Doreen foregoes a trip to the emergency room in favor of heading straight home, where she hopes Thaddeus will return sooner rather than later.
When he does show up, riding a branch down the river, coming right home, he’s different, and all he can talk about is Big Guy. He’s also sporting an SOS message fastened around his ankle… Doreen sets out to retrace Thaddeus’s path, while Mack hunts down her attacker.
Between birds and boys and Corporal Mack Moreau’s brother, the lawyer looking into her divorce situation, Doreen has her hands full. And that’s before her former lawyer shows up unexpectedly at her home! Off-balance by all these events, Doreen opens her door to someone with a serious grudge to take her down …
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Prologue
Saturday Late Morning …
The funeral for Rosie happened Saturday morning, two days after the last debacle. Doreen walked away from the graveside. Rosie’s ashes had been laid to rest, and the crowd had dispersed. Her autopsy stated her death a suicide, having ingested the remainder of her husband’s old heart medicine and a cocktail of other drugs she’d hoarded.
That wasn’t why she would be remembered though. No, Rosie had been accused of killing the three little old ladies—the kiwi clique—and her husband, David, which had the entire community up in arms, not to mention the added news of Marsha going to jail for murdering her husband too.
Doreen had quietly stepped out of the hype reverberating around town. She watched as Nan walked away ahead of her. Her grandmother would go to a celebration-of-life ceremony, which Doreen had also backed away from, hoping to go home and to just relax.
The last few days had been more media sensation than anything. The police were still piecing together the bits and pieces from Rosie’s life, but it was a pretty simple case, where the same drugs had been used in all three of the women’s deaths, the first one being an accident, and Rosie using that as an opportunity to point fingers at Marsha and to take out the other women Rosie considered her enemies.
The return of Rosie’s cancer had apparently given her the freedom to make a few changes in her life—such as getting rid of the kiwi clique that had been a pain in her butt. And gave her a supposedly God-given opportunity to point the finger at the one other woman who could ruin her life by telling everyone what their husbands had done. Rosie had never wanted her grandson to know and had lived in fear of what he’d do if he found out. And the police had found the same drug had been given to her husband, who she’d killed years ago. It looked like it was a pretty simple open-and-shut case, but the end result had left the community in shock.
And, of course, the local fair would never be the same again.
As Doreen walked by the multiple fresh graves, she stopped to look at various stones and monuments, seeing patches of lilies at various places.
Finally she ended up in a complete circle, as she stood over Rosie’s grave. “I hope you’re at peace now,” she said sadly. “It’s not the end I would have wanted for you.”
She reached out and picked up a lily and sniffed it, wondering why lilies always represented death. As far as she was concerned, flowers should be for life and rebirth. But so often they were used for funerals. She placed it back into the vase and straightened them out.
She didn’t have her animals with her, out of respect for the others attending the ceremonies dotting the cemetery. It’s a good thing she’d left them at home, as No Pets Allowed signs were everywhere. But being without them? … Well, she felt a little lost herself.
Not to mention how worried she was about the upcoming meeting with Mack’s brother, the lawyer. But she’d dragged out as much time as she could here. She needed to go home and to eat before the two men arrived, and she had to face the unpleasantness of her now-defunct marriage.
She stared at the lilies for one last long moment, sighed, and turned to step away. As she did, a shadow fell over her side, and she felt somebody reaching out for her. She turned with a smile, only to cry out at the blow that came out of nowhere and struck her on the back of her head. She didn’t hear anything but the sounds of footsteps thundering away, as she crashed into the pile of lilies at the graveside.
The pain was crushing.
Poor Mack. He would be the one to find her.
Lilies. How appropriate.
Her last thought before the blackness took her over? She had already come up with a name for the investigation into her own death.
Lifeless in the Lilies.
Chapter 1
Saturday Noon …
Doreen woke to sunlight and blue sky, which was immediately overlaid by chaos and a confusion of barks, snaps, yells, and growls. She groaned and rolled, shoving blades of grass into her face. A heavy hand landed on her shoulder. “Stay where you are. You’ve been hit.”
Her eyelids fluttered open to see Mack crouching beside her. She frowned at him. He immediately frowned back. She closed her eyes and whispered, “What happened?”
“That’s what I would ask you,” he said, his tone grim.
Her eyelids shifted open again, but it was a struggle to keep them that way. “I don’t know,” she cried out, only to shudder, as her voice added to the din. “It’s so noisy. What’s with the noise?” She moaned as the cacophony around her increased.
He leaned over and whispered, “If you’ve got the energy, you’ll want to call off Mugs.”
Immediately her eyelids snapped open, and she struggled to sit up. But, as she did, Mack struggled to hold her down. “Stay still,” he ordered.
She growled at him. “Let me go.”
Hearing another bark beside her, she twisted her head to see Mugs, snapping at a crowd of people and keeping them all back. She whistled only once, yet Mugs caught the sound in his floppy ears and raced toward her. She collapsed back in the grass and stretched out a hand, placing it on his head. But that wasn’t enough. Mugs buried his face and his snout against her neck and in her hair, snuffling all up and down her side.
She chuckled. “I’m okay, buddy. I’m okay.”
A collective sigh of relief came from the crowd around her. Something else warm and fuzzy was up against her other arm. When she shifted to look, she saw Goliath curled at her side. She looked up at Mack. “Well, at least they’re here, looking after me.”
He nodded, but his tone was grim, as he said in a quiet tone, “I haven’t seen Thaddeus. He’s gone missing.”
Her eyes popped open. “What do you mean?”
He shook his head. “Either he’s gone walking or somebody has taken him.”
She stared up at him, her heart already filled with joy at having Mugs and Goliath here, then shifting to panic-stricken mode after realizing that Thaddeus may not be. “That’s not good,” she whispered. Yet something else shifted in her brain. “I didn’t have them with me.” She shrugged and said, “Or maybe I did. I have no idea.”
“Let’s leave that for the moment. Tell me. What are you doing here?” he asked.
She focused on him, but her mind went blank. “What am I doing where?” she asked cautiously.
His eyebrows shot up. “You’re at the cemetery.”
She frowned, as she thought about it. “Oh.” Her gaze caught sight of the crushed lilies beside her. “Oh,” she said. She reached up a hand to her sore head, then realized what happened. “Someone hit me,” she snapped, glaring up at him. “Did you find him?”
He raised his palms. “Of course I didn’t find him,” he said. “We barely found you.”
She stared at the ground, her head twisting to look at the crowd gathered around. “Who found me then?”
He pointed off to the side, where a little boy stood close to his mom. “Well, Mugs technically, but also that little boy did.”
“Wow. How long ago?” she asked, struggling to sit up again. This time Mack helped her, slipping an arm underneath her back and helping her into a sitting position. She shuddered as the pain ricocheted down her back. “Did he see what happened?”
“He said he came here because of Mugs.”
She looked over to see Mugs, snuffling the little boy’s hand, and the boy’s expression of absolute rapture on his face as he petted him. “Mugs does have that effect on some people.”
“Only some,” Mack said gently. “A lot of people have learned to run.”
“He doesn’t attack everybody,” she said indignantly, not liking the way Mack was thinking.
“No, maybe not,” he said, “but he’s certainly attacked enough.”
“Well, you could say the same for Goliath for that matter.”
“Absolutely I would,” he said, with a humorous tone.
Ambulance sirens screamed in the distance.
“Wow, somebody else got hurt too?”
“Nope,” he said, “that ambulance is for you.”
“I’m fine,” she said, with a dismissive wave of her hand.
“No, I don’t think so,” he said gently. “We’ll get you looked over.”
She leaned up against his knee, tilting her head to look up at him. “I’m really okay, you know?”
“Really? The blood dripping down the side of your head disagrees.”
She winced. “Will they cut my hair again?”
“That’s hardly the issue,” he said.
She twisted and then gasped at the pain. “But it’s not far off,” she muttered.
Just then the ambulance arrived. Two men hopped out and raced toward Mack.
“You know what? I only get that kind of attention because you’re here.”
He sighed. “I am the one who called them.”
“You’re overreacting again,” she grumbled.
“Again?” he said in an ominous voice.
She grinned. “Well, maybe. But you guys should be out looking for Thaddeus.”
“Don’t you worry about Thaddeus. We’ll find him,” Mack murmured. “I want you to go to the hospital and to get checked over.”
“But we don’t always get what we want,” she announced, as she struggled to stand. Just the thought of going to the hospital made her ill.
“Oh no, you don’t,” he said, keeping her seated on the ground. “You’re not getting out of it this time.”
She tried to ignore him, but, with the paramedics hurrying toward her, she knew that she couldn’t avoid it. Mugs immediately stood and barked at the two paramedics. She called him over, and he came back to her, wagging his tail happily. She gave him a cuddle.
“It’s okay, buddy. They’re here to help me.” He woofed several times and shoved his face up against her. She hugged him close, and a paramedic crouched in front of her.
“Let’s take a look at the injury.”
She studied his face. “I think I recognize you.”
“You should,” he said. “I been out to look at injuries you’ve received several times now.”
She winced. “It’s not good when the paramedics get to know me by name,” she announced.
“It’s not good when the cops get to know you by sight either,” Mack muttered, as he pointed off to the side, where several policemen were, including Chester and Arnold, holding back the crowd.
“Oh dear,” she said. “Will I owe them more beer and pizza now?”
Chester, who must have been close enough to hear, turned and grinned, giving her a thumbs-up.
Mack burst out laughing.
She sighed. “I am a little tired,” she admitted.
“Well, as long as I know you didn’t do this on purpose.”
She rounded on Mack, then cried out in pain at the sharp movement. “Why did you do that?”
“Why did I do what?”
“Make me turn like that,” she said.
“I didn’t make you turn,” he said, sighing. He moved off to the side, so the paramedic could get a better look at her head. “Besides, why were you outraged at my comment?”
“Do you really think I did this to myself?” she asked in an ominous tone, glaring at him.
“Of course not,” he said, “but you did agree to meet with my brother this weekend.”
“Well, I can’t do it now,” she said, reaching a hand to her head. “I’m hurt.”
He snorted at that. “A minute ago, you were just fine.”
“A minute ago, I forgot about your brother,” she snapped back. At that, one of the paramedics tugged on her, and she cried out in pain.
“I’m so sorry,” he said, “but we’ll need to take you in. Do you want to walk to the ambulance, or shall we bring over a gurney?”
“Oh my,” she said. “I don’t even want to go in the ambulance.”
“Too bad,” Mack announced, as he stood and gently lifted her to her feet. “Now, can you walk on your own, or shall we put you on a gurney and wheel you through the crowd?”
“Now you’re just being mean,” she announced.
“Of course I am,” he said. “I live to bug you and to be mean, apparently.”
She turned to look at him and said, “That’s a failing. You should fix it.” The paramedic looked at her, bemused. She glared at him. “It’s really not nice to knock people when they’re down now, is it?” He immediately nodded, and her eyebrows shot up. “It is?” He shook his head. “Are you confused?” she asked.
“Oh, yeah,” Mack said. “We all are. And I’m taking the decision away from you.” In one smooth movement, he bent and swooped her up into his arms and strode toward the ambulance.
She immediately clutched his shoulders. “You could have at least warned me,” she cried out.
“Why would I bother?” he snapped back. “You just would have argued. And you’re not getting out of meeting my brother this weekend either.”
She poked his chest. “Bully.”
He just shook his head at that. The crowd parted as voices called out.
“Will she be okay?”
“Is she all right?”
“I hope she’s okay.”
“Do we know what happened?”
“Did she get hurt?”
“Did someone hit her?”
But Mack gave no answers. And she didn’t have any to give. She waved to the crowd and was emotionally taken aback when she saw so many people waving their hands, with bright smiles on their faces. “Wow,” she said. “Are they happy that I’m hurt?”
“Of course not, silly,” he said, with an exasperated sigh. “They’re happy that you’ll be okay.”
She leaned back slightly, so she could look up into his face. “But how do they know that?”
The paramedics just looked at each other, then at Mack. He shrugged and said, “Don’t even bother. She’s just being difficult.”
She sniffed. “Can Goliath and Mugs come with me at least?”
“No animals in the ambulance,” the two paramedics said immediately.
She stared at them. “Then rest assured, I’m not going either.”
“Too late for that,” Mack said, as he stepped into the ambulance, still carrying her.
She glared at him. “Who made you the boss?”
“A lot of people,” he said in that ominous voice of his. He sat her on the gurney and stretched her out, so she was lying flat. Immediately he was replaced by the paramedics, who quickly buckled her in.
“Mack?” she said desperately, hating that note of worry in her voice.
He stopped, then looked at her and smiled. “I’ll take care of the animals.”
“But Thaddeus,” she said. “Where is Thaddeus?”
He shrugged. “He wouldn’t have gone far. He was here earlier.”
“But you don’t know,” she said. “You just don’t know.”
“I promise we’ll find him.”
And, with that, she had to be satisfied. As she laid back down, she felt the pain racking through her system. “Why do I always have to get hurt?” she muttered.
“I’m pretty sure Mack would say it’s because you always put your nose into things you shouldn’t,” the second paramedic said.
She stared at him in surprise. “But I wasn’t even doing anything. I was just at a funeral.”
“Maybe so, but you’ve been stirring up all kinds of chaos.”
“I haven’t been stirring anything up,” she said tiredly, as she collapsed against the weird crackling of the plasticky pillow under her head. “All I’m doing is shining light on some cases.”
“And that’s what I mean about stirring things up,” he said cheerfully. “Not everybody likes to have you bringing light to dark shadows.”
“Well then, they shouldn’t have done something wrong in the first place,” she announced. Just then the ambulance started up, leaving her with the one paramedic. She sighed. “It always hurts worse when I go to the hospital.”
“Well, it shouldn’t,” he said. “The people there can help you.”
“Well, it does hurt. Everybody pinches and prods and pokes with their needles,” she said. “It just hurts.”
“Well, tell them not to hurt you,” he said.
“Like that’ll help.” The jostling ride was blessedly short, and, before she realized it, she was shifted onto a bed in the emergency room. She laid back down, now with an equally stiff, equally uncomfortable sheet over her, and felt the shakes setting in. By the time a nurse came to check her blood pressure, pulse, and temperature, she gave an exclamation and turned and disappeared. Doreen wasn’t sure what was wrong, but, when the efficient woman returned with a heated blanket a few minutes later, Doreen cuddled under it and moaned with relief.
“It’s the shock,” the nurse said sympathetically. “You should warm up soon.”
“Is it just shock?” she asked, her teeth chattering. “I guess I was lying there on the ground for a little bit too.”
“Do you know how long that was?” the doctor asked, as he walked past the curtain.
“No, you’ll have to ask Mack.”
“I can do that,” he said. “But you were unconscious?”
“According to them, I was, yes,” she said. “I just don’t know how long.”
“Good enough,” he said. “Let’s take a look.” His taking a look was just like she had expected. By the time he was done, she felt the tears in the corner of her eyes, and she struggled to not let them pour out.
“We’ll get you fixed up,” he said. “You’ll need a couple stitches, and we’ll get you a shot for the pain.”
She wanted to nod but didn’t dare move because, ever since he had examined her head, the pain was so much worse. She didn’t quite understand how that worked, but it always seemed to be that way. And it wasn’t fair. She felt the tears of self-pity on her cheeks and knew that wasn’t normal for her either.
By the time the doctor returned, he and the nurse wielded needles and other tools from a tray the nurse had brought in. Doreen looked at the tray, him, and bit her lip.
He just waved a hand. “Don’t you worry about this,” he said. “It’ll all be fine.”
“Are you sure?” she asked. “That looks painful.”
“You’ve already been hurt,” he said with a smile. “We’re just fixing it up.”
She knew that in theory but wasn’t so sure how that would work in practice. When the curtain was pulled back again, and Mack stepped in, she glared at him. “You don’t belong here,” she announced.
He glared at her. “Yes, I do.”
The doctor turned to him, smiled. “Hey, Mack.”
“Hey, Doc. How’s she doing?”
“Still as charming as ever.”
“Absolutely she is,” Mack said, grinning. “It would go a bit easier if she wouldn’t be.”
“Too bad,” she announced from the bed. “Remember what I said.”
“Oh, I remember,” he said. “You’ll be you, no matter what.”
“And you wouldn’t like it any other way,” she said, giving him a big fat grin.
Mack chuckled at that. “That’s okay,” he said, “because I know the doc here will put some stitches in that head of yours and fix you up.”
She glared at the doctor.
“Yep,” he said in response. “Stitches. Probably about ten.”
Her smile fell away. “No! That’ll hurt,” she cried out.
“It might,” he said, “but we’ll numb it, so it won’t hurt as much.”
She groaned and laid back down. “I don’t have a choice in the matter?”
“Nope, and it’s the best thing for you,” he said. “This will heal much faster.”
“How much hair will you cut away?”
He chuckled. “No matter how minor the hair removal, the women are always concerned about their hair,” he said, with a smile.
She shrugged. “I don’t really want to walk around with a bald spot on my head.”
“I don’t think that’s the most important issue right now,” Mack said in a repressive tone.
She glared at him. “Nobody asked you.”
“Nope,” he said, “nobody did. But, if you don’t want me calling Nan and telling her about this, then you’ll behave yourself, starting now.”
“That’s just blackmail. That’s what it is.”
“Maybe, but, as long as it works, I don’t really care.”
And again she glared at him, but it was futile. Because he really would call Nan. “You’ll just make her worry needlessly,” she muttered. “Besides,” she said, as an afterthought, “she probably already knows.”
Chapter 2
Saturday Early Afternoon …
Of course Doreen was right. Nan did already know, and she was in a fine mess by the time Mack finally drove Doreen home. As she slowly made her way out of the truck, refusing to wait for him to come around and help her, the front door of the house burst open, and chaos ensued, as the animals flew out toward her. Nan stood on the front step, shaking her head. She looked at Doreen’s face and cried out, “Oh my. Oh, dear. Oh, my dear.”
Mack walked around the truck, wrapped an arm around her shoulders, and helped her up the steps. In the meantime, Mugs barked and jumped all around both of them.
“It’s okay, Mugs,” Doreen murmured, feeling a whole lot woozier than she had expected. Once inside, she collapsed on the first pot chair and reflected on the fact that she’d gotten rid of all the other furniture. “It’d be nice if I had something comfy to sit on,” she muttered.
Mack snorted at that. “If you hadn’t sold everything, you might have.”
“Well, I don’t know if it’s sold or not,” she said. “I haven’t heard from Scott in weeks.”
“Oh, dear, I hope it’s okay,” Nan said.
“I would hope so,” Doreen muttered. The moment she sat down, Goliath jumped into her lap. Tears collected in the corner of her eyes, as she hugged the great big behemoth. She looked over at Mack. “Thaddeus?”
He shook his head slowly. She buried her face against Goliath, her shoulders trembling. Nan clucked at her side, gently patting her shoulder. “We’ll find him. I know we will.”
Doreen nodded. “I know. I know,” she said, “but …” And she let her voice trail off. It must be the painkillers making her mumble like an idiot. She wasn’t normally like this.
Nan stepped back and said, “I’ll put on the teakettle.” She turned and raced into the kitchen.
“How do you find a bird?” she asked Mack.
“Well, everybody knows about him, and everybody knows what he looks like,” he added. “And, yes, we’ve put out an alert, asking everybody to keep an eye out for him.”
A few minutes later, as she sat here, cuddling Goliath, Nan returned with a tray. Doreen looked at the tray and asked, “Where did you find that?”
Nan seemed momentarily confused. “I don’t know,” she said with a shrug. “I just reached into the cupboard, where I always kept it, and there it was.”
Doreen frowned and studied the tray, but she didn’t know if it was something that maybe Mack had kept and decided that they needed when they were sorting stuff or if they had missed something else in the kitchen. Nan looked around for a place to put the tray, and Mack hopped up, grabbed a chair from the kitchen table and brought it over and put it there for her.
“You know what?” he said. “You might feel better if we sat outside.”
“We might,” Doreen said, with a yawn. “But I don’t have anything to sit on out there either.”
“There is that,” Nan said. “When you get the money for the antiques, you’ll have to buy yourself some outdoor furniture.”
“I need to buy some indoor furniture first,” she said, with a note of humor. “A couple chairs in this living room really don’t do the job.”
“Not if you’ll be a socialite,” Nan said, with alacrity.
Doreen gave a tiny shake of her head. “I’ll admit that I’ve had more people through this place than I thought possible over these last few weeks,” she said, “but that won’t continue.”
“No, maybe not,” Nan said, “but you’d be surprised. People will start to gather around you now.”
“Why would they do that?” Doreen asked, looking at her grandmother in surprise.
“Because you’re becoming somebody,” Nan said, with that wise look in her eye. “Everybody wants to be around somebody.”
“I’m a nobody,” she said, with a yawn. “And apparently those painkillers are really having an effect on me.” She reached up and rubbed her face gently.
“Maybe you should go lie down,” Mack said.
She shrugged, then shook her head, wincing. “It’s pretty early though.”
“Still, a nap won’t hurt,” he said.
“Maybe not, but it feels like I already had one out in the grass.”
“That one was unintended,” Nan said. “By the way, I would make you something to eat, but there’s not much food in the house.”
At that, Doreen grimaced. “I haven’t done any grocery shopping.”
Nan stood here, her hands on her hips, her fingers moving up and down, almost like a piano rhythm. “Are you eating?”
“Of course I am,” she protested. Nan looked over at Mack, then peered down at Doreen. “But are you eating enough?”
“Well, I stopped losing weight,” she said, “so I would presume so.”
But Nan didn’t appear to be satisfied with that either. “Do I need to go grocery shop for you?”
“Not at all,” she said forcibly. “I’m fine.”
Nan sniffed. “I don’t want you so worried about money that you’re afraid to spend it.”
“Now that’s a lesson she needs to learn,” Mack said. “She is definitely afraid to spend it.”
“Well, it’s just that I don’t really know where the next dollar is coming from,” Doreen protested. “So it’s a little hard to go out and just spend money, if I don’t know that I’m getting more.”
“I was hoping you’d be getting on okay by now,” Nan stated, her worry evident in her tone.
“Well, if I get the antiques sold, I will be,” she said. “And I’m not doing badly, but I don’t really have much in the way of prospects for getting a decent job. People look at me differently now.”
“Of course they do,” Nan said. “Like I said, you’re somebody.”
“I’m somebody without a job,” she said in exasperation.
“Where have you tried?” Nan asked.
“I haven’t really,” Doreen said glumly. “I started on my résumé and then didn’t know what to say because there’s really nothing to put down. How do you list socialite as an occupation?” Both Mack and Nan stopped, then looked at each other and over at her. She shrugged. “So you can see the problem, right?”
“But some places don’t need any experience, my dear,” Nan said. “You could probably get a job at the grocery store.”
“I probably could,” she said, yawning. “And I promise I’ll look at it, when I am feeling better. I need just a few days to get over this.”
“No, you need more than a few days,” Nan said. “You’ve been going nonstop for a long time.”
“Maybe,” she said. “And now I have another problem to deal with.”
“What’s that?” Nan asked, perking up. “Anything I can help with?”
Doreen thought about it for a moment, then realized that wasn’t fair. “No,” she said, “Mack won’t let you.”
At that, Mack turned and looked at her. “What are you talking about?”
She glared at him. “I’m talking about your brother.”
He gave her a hard look. “No, you’re right. Nan can’t help with that.”
“Oh my,” Nan said, looking at Mack. “Can you help her?”
“That depends on what my brother has to say,” he said.
Nan looked positively thrilled.
Doreen just looked at her grandmother sourly. “You know how hard this will be, don’t you, Nan?”
“Absolutely it will be hard,” she said immediately, with a nod of her head and a commiserating look in her eye. “But it’s necessary.”
“Why is it necessary? I could just walk away from the whole thing.”
“And let him get away with it?”
“At least then I wouldn’t have to deal with it or him,” Doreen said, sagging into the seat and closing her eyes.
“You can’t hide forever.”
“I’m not hiding,” she said, eyes closed. “Being determined to not get involved is a whole different thing.”
“No, it’s not,” Mack said. “It’s hiding.”
She glared at him. “You don’t know what it was like.”
“No, I don’t,” he said. “And you’re right. It’s not for me to judge. I can understand you not wanting to get involved, but you’re the one who can’t put food on your own table, while he’s living high on the hog in his massive mansion. He’s got all kinds of money that he’s not sharing, and you have an equal right to it.”
She groaned. “There’ll be a payback for arguing. You know that, right?”
“What kind of a payback?”
“He always gets back at people,” she said tiredly. “It’s not like I’ll be happy with any money if I have to look over my shoulder, always thinking he’ll find ways to get to me.”
There was silence in the room. Nan looked at her. “I don’t think you ever told me how bad it was, dear.”
“Of course not,” she said, with a gentle smile. “I didn’t want to worry you.”
Nan then just clucked and clucked several times. “Oh, dear,” she said. “You know that’s not the answer I wanted to hear.”
“Maybe not,” she said. “But no point in lying at this stage. I was very ashamed of what was going on, and I wasn’t sure how to handle my life as it was. I didn’t want to get you in trouble, and I didn’t want to bother you,” she murmured. “You’ve always been there for me, and I didn’t want you to see how badly I was faring in life.”
“So you seized the chance, and you walked away from him,” she said. “Don’t ever feel like you’re a failure because of that.”
“Maybe, but I haven’t done very well since.”
“Well, we’ll get to the bottom of it now,” Mack interrupted. “First, I want you to have a rest and to relax a little bit, before my brother gets here.”
She stared at him, her eyes going wide. “When is he coming?” she asked in an ominous tone. “Surely you pushed it off until next week.”
He glared at her. “No, I didn’t. He’s coming this weekend. I just have to confirm with him when.”
“Oh, Lord,” she said, sagging back again. “And here I was hoping that this might push it off.”
“Getting yourself injured by some unknown assailant won’t stop me from trying to get you back on your feet financially,” he said in a severe tone.
“And you should be grateful for his help,” Nan chimed in.
Doreen opened her eyes to see Nan looking at her with worry. Doreen reached out her hand, and her grandmother immediately snatched it up with both of hers. “I’m sorry, Nan. You’re right. I just don’t want to go through the whole headache of reliving the details.”
“But getting to the other side will be so much better,” Nan said, patting her hand. “And, if Mack is willing to help you, let him help.”
She smiled. “Do I have any choice?”
“No,” Mack said in a determined voice. “You don’t.” After a brief pause, he added, “Let’s get you upstairs to bed.”
Chapter 3
Saturday, Midafternoon …
Doreen woke up from her unexpected nap with a crick in her neck from lying the wrong way while wrapped around Goliath. The house was silent. Nan and Mack were probably gone. Immediately her eyes lit on the empty rod where Thaddeus usually slept, and she snatched up her phone and texted Mack. Any news on Thaddeus?
His response came back with a no. She sighed, looked down at Goliath, scratched his tummy, and asked, “Could you find him?”
Goliath twitched his tail, but, other than that, there was no sign that he had even heard her request. But then why would the cat worry? Half the time the two were at odds anyway. But Doreen wanted to believe that they were a bonded family and that Goliath would miss his friend. At least she could hope so. Mugs was stretched out on his back, with four feet to the wind, looking like he didn’t have a care in the world.
She frowned at that. “How come you guys aren’t worried?” she asked, but neither animal answered. Did they know something she didn’t? She wondered because it seemed like they were oddly content. She hopped to her feet and then froze, as the room swayed around her.
“Wow,” she mumbled to herself. “That was a little too fast.”
Moving slowly, she made her way to the bathroom and used the facilities, then stood in front of the mirror, gasping at the image reflected back at her. “You look like a witch.” Her hair stuck out in all directions, and the stitches in her head poked out like black sticks in the air, looking painful.
She wondered about a shower and then figured that there was probably no point right now. Nobody would give her the go-ahead, and she vaguely remembered the doctor saying to give it a couple days. She managed to scrub down her face and neck with a washcloth, getting off some of the worst dirt, mud, and blood, feeling marginally better.
With that, she slowly made her way back to her bedroom, then realized her clothes were bloody and dirty as well, and managed to get changed in an attempt to at least feel fresher. With that much done, she headed downstairs to her trusty coffeepot.
As soon as she had a pot dripping, she opened the back door and let Mugs and Goliath, who had come downstairs with her, outside to do their own business. She walked out to her deck and felt the same pleasure she had felt every other time. She was just so thrilled to have it.
The old rickety table and two chairs were serviceable but just barely. It was in her plans to update them, when she had money, whenever that was. Pulling one chair back, she went to sit on it, when the leg buckled. She cried out and just managed to stop herself from falling.
