Second To Nun (A Giulia Driscoll Mystery Book 2) (26 page)

Fifty-One

Mac returned after four o’clock. Giulia and Frank had picked up a pizza on the way back from giving their statements to the police. Mac brought out a bottle of local red wine and the three of them sat at the trestle table in the antique kitchen.

“This is all going to hit me soon,” Mac said. “Lucy was a sweetheart. Always smiling, always full of energy. We used to talk about her plans for the future and ways to get Walter off his lazy butt. I had no idea…about any of this.” She drank her wineglass dry.

Frank refilled everyone’s glasses.

“I don’t understand people who sit and wait for success and good fortune to rain down on them.” Giulia slid another piece of pizza onto all their plates.

“The idea of a mountain of gold is too much like a fairy tale to resist for some,” Frank said.

“About that.” Mac’s puffy lips made a hint of a grimace. “I lied to you.”

Giulia batted her eyes at Mac.

“I know. I’m sorry. You know what possessing a mountain of fairy tale gold does? It makes you distrust everyone.” She adjusted her dislocated arm, now in a soft cast. “How am I going to handle breakfast tomorrow?”

“I’ll help,” Giulia said. “So about this non-mythical gold?”

“I should be paying you. Oh, wait. I am.” Mac’s lips approximated a smile. “To be honest, truly and finally, nothing held back, most of the story I tell everyone is true. We did have an outlaw ancestor who robbed stagecoaches. He was caught and hanged, and he did tell his wife where he hid everything he stole. This is where it changes. She found it and used a very little of it to survive. Her eldest son did the same, and on down the generations.”

“By the time your turn came?” Frank said.

Mac tried for another wry smile. Her lips refused to cooperate. “I did rent scuba equipment and explore the caves. I found a small box with twenty coins. Better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick, I thought. I’d brought a bag with me to collect shells and the like to decorate the house with.”

“And as camouflage just in case you found something valuable?” Giulia said.

“Well, yes. When I cleaned and dried the box, I found a set of directions scratched on the inside, like a puzzle. A few words in each group, all over the inside like a crazy quilt. It took me a couple of weeks to piece them together.” She drank a little more wine.

Giulia leaned forward. “This is as good as the story you tell the newbies.”

Half of Mac’s mouth smiled. “People say I have a knack for storytelling. The directions led me to my great-grandfather’s grave. Seriously. He’d ordered one of those tombstones with a round glass inset for a photograph of himself. The frame of the glass was a different kind of puzzle. When I got it open, a key fell out.” She paused. “That’s where the exciting mystery ends. The key belonged to a safe deposit box in his and my names. I’d completely forgotten that for my eighteenth birthday he opened the box with me and placed eighteen silver dollars in it for me. When I opened it again after finding the key, it was packed to the gills with five-dollar coins from the late 1880s.”

“Quite a nest egg,” Frank said.

“I used a few to help finance the restoration, but I haven’t touched them since. I wanted to make a go of Stone’s Throw on my own.”

Giulia said, “Coming clean to your private investigator helps her get results faster.”

“I know, I know. But I was sure the whole purpose of the scheme was to force me out and take over my successful business.” She eased in the last bite of her pizza via the undamaged side of her mouth. “Walter couldn’t turn a profit with a lemonade stand during a heat wave. I loaned him money to pay off his student loans and he never paid me back. He’s hated me since I bought the lighthouse. Great-Grandpa’s legacy to him was a series of books on how to be successful.”

“That’s why you thought he was behind the haunting.”

Mac stared at Giulia, her eyes surrounded by dark circles. “How did you know?”

Giulia didn’t reveal how she’d been ready to accuse Mac’s best friend. Happy clients paid their bills faster. “Walter plus Lucy, to be precise. Lucy for all the hard work and the constant goad of her half-life over the boat shop.”

That didn’t seem to register on Mac’s consciousness. “Lucy and Walter trying to kill me up on the gallery proves the haunting was phony, doesn’t it? I mean, that means they’ve been behind everything.” She closed her eyes but opened them right away. “I mean, it all means Solana’s a fraud and a basket case. Right?”

Mac probably shouldn’t be drinking wine on top of whatever the ER shot her up with, but Giulia wasn’t about to preach teetotaling to someone who’d escaped death twice in two days. She put on her best reassurance face. “Solana is…enthusiastic. She’s like those ghost hunting TV shows that crank up the sensitivity meters on their instruments so every click and creak sounds like contact from beyond the grave. The only person haunting Stone’s Throw was Lucy and her puppet theater skills.”

Mac deflated. “I’m so glad. Not that Lucy died like that, even though she wanted me to end up the same way. I’m glad there isn’t really a Stone family ghost. I never liked horror movies.”

Fifty-Two

The following Saturday the doorbell rang and a minute later Frank called up to Giulia, “Package for you. I signed for it.”

“Be right there.” Giulia checked the timer on her phone and came downstairs. An extra-large FedEx box lay on the kitchen table.

“Who’s it from? Oh, Mac. We didn’t leave anything there, did we?”

Frank handed her the kitchen scissors. “Not that I know of. Maybe she’s giving us one of the gloomy paintings in the dining room.”

Giulia hefted the box. “Too heavy for that. Maybe it’s the evil antique clown doll.”

“If it is, I vote we take it outside and burn it.”

“Agreed.” Giulia sawed open the end of the box and pulled out a thick wad of bubble wrap. “It’s not the doll.”

“I can’t see what’s inside. This is fun.”

“It’s a book on ghost hunting.”

“It’s an invitation to Solana’s new séance gig.”

“How about it’s a check for our fee?” Giulia peeled two pieces of tape from one side of the puffy square.

Frank patted the table. “Come on, come on.”

“For a detective, you sure don’t like mysteries.” She unrolled the bubble wrap a little slower.

“You are a tease, woman.” He feinted a snatch at it.

She slid to the opposite end of the table. “Patience is a virtue…oh, all right.” She flopped the dwindling package over and over until the last of the bubble wrap fell away.

“A tube of Earl Grey loose leaf tea?” Frank’s voice changed from puzzled to disappointed.

“It’s too heavy for that.”

Giulia popped open the lid and poured a stack of gold coins into her hand. Her voice failed her.

“
Cait naofa,
”
Frank said.

The coins spilled from Giulia’s palm onto the bubble wrap. “Three—seven—ten—twelve. ‘Holy cats’ is right. What are these worth? She must have sent an explanation.”

Frank took the empty cylinder from Giulia’s hand. “Nothing else in here.” He tried the lid. “Aha.” He pried a folded piece of paper from the inside.

“‘Dear Giulia and Frank,’” he read, “‘I received your invoice and wrote a check for the total. When I realized you didn’t include a line item for saving my life twice in one week I tore up the check. What you have here are twelve Liberty five-dollar coins from my great-great-great-grandfather’s stash. They were all minted between 1877 and 1883. I haven’t valued the entire collection, but my educated guess is these coins are each worth between,’” Frank’s voice failed, but he shook it off and continued, “‘between eighteen hundred and twenty-one hundred dollars.”

Giulia gasped.

Frank continued, “‘If you’ll take the advice of an old woman who successfully expanded a hotel chain into the entire northeast, you’ll get yourselves a safe deposit box and pretend these don’t exist. Hard work will bring you success, but it’s nice to know you have something to fall back on just in case. With my thanks, Mac.’”

Giulia said in a shaky voice, “Twenty-one thousand dollars at a minimum.”

“
Cait naofa.
”

“We can’t accept this.”

“The hell we can’t.”

“Frank.” Giulia made an effort of strength and looked away from the coins. “This is incredible.”

“Mac’s right. You saved her life twice. You saved her business. It’s a generous and extravagant and perfectly correct gesture.” He poured the coins through his hands. “Now I know why misers fondle their hoard.”

Giulia’s phone buzzed against her hip. She had no idea how long it had been buzzing. Without a word, she ran upstairs into the bathroom and straight to the sink. Her hand trembled the least bit as she picked up the home pregnancy test to see if the window showed one pink line or two.

About the Author

Baker of brownies and tormenter of characters, Alice Loweecey recently celebrated her thirtieth year outside the convent. She grew up watching Hammer horror films and Scooby-Doo mysteries, which explains a whole lot. When she’s not creating trouble for Giulia Falcone-Driscoll, she can be found growing her own vegetables (in summer) and cooking with them (the rest of the year).

In case you missed the 1
st
in the series

NUN TOO SOON

Alice Loweecey

A Giulia Driscoll Mystery (#1)

Giulia Driscoll has just taken on her first impossible client: The Silk Tie Killer. He’s hired Driscoll Investigations to prove his innocence and they have only thirteen days to accomplish it. Talk about being tried in the media. Everyone in town is sure Roger Fitch strangled his girlfriend with one of his silk neckties. And then there’s the local TMZ wannabes stalking Giulia and her client for sleazy sound bites.

On top of all that, her assistant’s first baby is due any second, her scary smart admin still doesn’t relate well to humans, and her police detective husband insists her client is guilty. About this marriage thing—it’s unknown territory, but it sure beats ten years of living with 150 nuns.

Giulia’s ownership of Driscoll Investigations hasn’t changed her passion for justice from her convent years. But the more dirt she digs up, the more she’s worried her efforts will help a murderer escape. As the client accuses DI of dragging its heels on purpose, Giulia thinks The Silk Tie Killer might be choosing one of his ties for her own neck.

Read all about it and/or grab the book from Amazon

CLICK FOR NUN TOO SOON

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