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"He's doing a heroic job; I try to remember that."
"That's true, but it doesn't excuse him for letting you and Leo down."
"We're doing okay." She didn't really want to rehash the past. "I should get back to work."
"Me, too. Hire the contractor," her mother said. "I'd like to get started as soon as possible. I'll let you decide what is really necessary and what isn't."
More decisions she would have to make. "Okay. I'll figure it out. Before you go, do you know anything about Eleanor's family?"
"Like what?"
"I know her husband died. Did she have kids?"
"No, she didn't. I remember your grandmother saying that after Eleanor's husband, Hank, died that she was all alone in the world."
Which made her wonder again how Eleanor could have been connected to Decker's father.
"We'll talk soon," her mom said. "Give Leo a kiss for me."
"I will." As soon as her mom hung up, she punched in Decker's number. "Hi," she said, when he answered. "You're hired."
"That was fast," he replied.
"My mom is ready to go."
"So am I. But we need to address the junk issue as soon as possible."
"I know. I have to pick up Leo at two. I'll bring him over. He can play with the train while I go through things. Unless you don't think the house is safe."
"I've marked off any areas I believe to be unsafe. It's mainly just that one spot where you fell through the floor. What are the odds that the spider would be in exactly the wrong place?"
"Just my luck," she said dryly.
"Maybe it was lucky," he countered. "You didn't get hurt, and you revealed a problem that might have taken a long time to discover. Now, we know exactly what we're dealing with."
"That's true. You're a glass half-full kind of guy, aren't you?"
"I try to find the positive. I think you do, too."
"Some days are harder than others," she muttered. "But not today. I feel better knowing that you'll be in charge of this project."
"I won't let you down."
She slipped her phone into her pocket and headed back into the dining room, feeling like she'd finally checked one item off her To Do list. But it also meant that she was going to be seeing a lot of Decker over the next few weeks.
ChapterEight
Decker staredat the array of photos on Eleanor's piano. The woman featured in many of them at various ages was the woman from his memories—Ellie. She'd been an attractive woman. When she was young, her hair had been dark brown, but in later photos, it had turned white. She was often pictured with a stern-faced man, who was probably her husband. He seemed to be annoyed that he was in the picture. Ellie didn't always look that happy, either, although she seemed to try harder to look like she was. Clearly, she had been a woman of secrets all her life.
As his gaze moved away from the photos to the rest of the living room and dining room, he wondered if there could be a clue to those secrets in the mess. It certainly seemed possible, since it didn't look like she ever threw anything away. Clue or not, he needed to clean up the house so he could do the renovation. He might as well get started.
For the next two hours, he worked in the dining room. Since it was directly under the broken flooring, he didn't want Chloe working in that area. He tried to continue the organizational system that Chloe had set up earlier. Some items were easy to decide on, like the basket containing probably a hundred spools of different colored threads, and the collection of plates depicting life in the forties or fifties. She also had three silver tea services. He had no idea why anyone would even need one. But he put them in the donation box, hoping someone would want them.
As he worked his way through the pile on the dining room table, he kept an eye out for mementos from the past. But there was nothing. The only thing that really became clear was that Eleanor had obviously had some mental health issues. No one needed to keep hundreds of ketchup packets from various takeout restaurants or menus from every restaurant in Whisper Lake. No one needed to keep junk mail catalogs from twenty years ago, which he quickly tossed in the recycle pile.
But what really concerned him were the toys piled up under the dining room table. The train actually ran through the stacks of unopened toys and stuffed animals, many of which seemed to date back twenty years. Eleanor practically had a toy store in her dining room. Shaking his head in bemusement, he started moving the toys toward the front door. They would eventually be donated, but if Leo was coming over, he could play with some of them in the meantime.
He also took a ridiculous amount of time to reroute the train, so that it didn't go into the perilous area of the dining room. If Leo wanted to play with it, it could safely run around the coffee table and couch.
