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“Have you ever taken money from the victims?”
“Well, no…”
“That’s exactly my point.”
“But I have a successful business and don’t need the money. And while I’d love you to think the whole thing is completely altruistic, I have to admit I do get a certain adrenaline rush when I beat the system and manage to pull it off.”
“I can imagine. I have a similar feeling when I find and retrieve the item I was sent after.”
Claire laughed, the sound tumbling past her lips like a summer stream over weathered pebbles. “You mean steal it back?”
“I don’t steal, Claire, I retrieve stolen items and return them to their rightful owners.”
“Pfft. You say to-may-toe, I say toe-mah-toe. It’s the same thing. But it’s okay. It’s something we have in common—restoring or retrieving valuable pieces of jewelry. Only you take yours back to those who obtained it illegally, and I give it back to those to whom it truly belongs.” She looked back and couldn’t see the headlights of the sedan. “Shouldn’t Carter and Mia be behind us?”
“They’ll join us at the cottage. I said we’d pull the dust sheets from the furniture, and get the lights and heat turned on while they went and got supplies like food and drink.”
“Both good to have,” she quipped as Fletch pulled up to the cottage’s stone fence.
Claire seemed to lose her spark as he put the car in park. “Are you all right?”
She nodded. “It’s just been a while since I was here. Poppi died here. Don’t get me wrong, I had private hospice and it was very peaceful. It’s just been a while since I’ve been here, and with everything that’s been going on, I’m just feeling a bit haunted.” He took her hand in his and just held it. “There are times I feel so close to him, and others he feels so far away.”
“He may have had a slightly warped sense of morality, but he loved you. He’d want you to be happy. Come on, let’s go inside. We’ll see if we can’t create happier memories to offset the sad ones.”
Her smile was radiant and ravaged at the same time. “You just want to get laid.”
“Don’t you?”
“That’s beside the point,” she teased.
He helped her out of the car, and she stopped by the gate. She seemed almost unwilling to walk through.
“We can make other arrangements,” he said softly.
“No. I’ll be fine. You’re right. This is probably the best place for us.”
He led her inside, noting the door was not rectangular as most doors were, but rather arched and set into what he knew were stone walls. Once inside, he found a lamp and switched it on; the soft glow it emitted revealed a large room that was simple in its elegance. An enormous fireplace dominated one wall with an open kitchen on the other.
All of the furnishings were covered with sheets that he and Claire began to remove.
“There’s a stack washer and dryer behind one of those doors off the kitchen. The other is a big walk-in pantry.” She pointed to the wall opposite the front door. “The door on the left is to the primary suite with an attached bath. The door to the right is to the secondary suite, which also has an attached bath. The staircase leads up to a second floor with three more bedrooms and another bath. Why they call this thing a ‘cottage’ has always eluded me.”
“It’s lovely,” said Fletch as he looked around. “It has a rustic elegance. Lots of windows and light for something of its age.”
Claire nodded. “Poppi added some of the windows. The primary suite has French doors leading out to a small patio. Just enough room for two chairs. He used to like to sit out there in the evening and have a pint with his pipe.” Both her face and tone of voice indicated a nostalgia for the things that had gone before.
“You loved him a great deal.”
“Yes, I did. He was everything to me. The only memories I have of my parents are the ones he shared with me. On my own, I don’t remember them at all.”
“They were in a car accident, right?”
“No. They were run off the road. They were murdered as surely as if someone had put a gun to their heads and pulled the trigger.”
As Claire continued to pull the furniture coverings away, Fletch lit a fire in the fireplace.
“There is central heat and air conditioning,” said Claire. “Poppi loved the ambiance of the fireplace but wanted it to be comfortable all year round.”
