“You need gates though,” the captain said. “You’ve got the dog and the cat. You need to gate that off on the side. Both sides actually. You know what? I think I’ve got a little gate back at the house. We could probably frame it up pretty fast.” And that started more discussions.
The new guy said, “If you got any spare wood, I can build a gate for the other side. You’re right that she needs to keep the dog and the cat in the backyard.”
That made absolutely no sense to her when there was no gate or fence down to the creek. But then she did worry about the street in front of the house, and that was no issue at the back. Regardless, as long as the men were happy, who was she to argue? But, as she listened to the men’s logic, she had to wonder. They were all having such fun being themselves. There was such a male-bonding thing going on.
Just then her phone rang. As the men talked, she looked to see it was Nan. Doreen grinned and answered the phone. “Hi, Nan.”
“I hear voices. What are you up to?” Nan asked.
“Well, the guys are all here working on my deck,” she said. “Can you hear them?” And she held her phone up so all the discussions filtered through.
Nan laughed. “Oh my,” she said. “You’ve done well.”
“I don’t know about that,” Doreen said, “but I might get a deck—at least I hope so because right now I have nothing. It’s all been demolished.”
Nan giggled like a little girl. “But, my dear, you’ve found the best thing ever. You’ve found help. You’ve got all those men to come help you.”
“I don’t think I got them to do anything,” Doreen said, chuckling. “This is all Mack.”
“All cops, isn’t it?”
“Well, it was,” she said cautiously, “but we’ve got some new people now too.”
“That’s all good,” she said.
In the background, Doreen could hear Mack explaining about putting patio blocks all the way down to the creek and a bench down there. And the men had an even more heated discussion, but all apparently on good terms because she couldn’t hear anybody getting upset or angry. She was amazed to hear everybody pitching an idea about how to fix up the entire backyard. She just wanted a huge patio and a big deck and a pathway to the creek, but that wouldn’t be enough for these guys. No, it had to be stamped concrete and had to be this and had to be that. The only thing was, she didn’t know if anybody except Mack understood just how dire her financial situation was.
At one point, Nan asked, “Are you listening to them or to me?”
“Honestly, Nan, it’s hard to hear anything,” she said.
“Good,” Nan said. “Then I’ll tell you real quick. The other lady didn’t have a heart condition.”
“Which lady was that?”
“Bella,” she said. “She was the overweight one. She did have a heart murmur, and the one, Kimmy, did have a heart condition, but the other one, Delilah, did not. But she still keeled over as if she did have a heart attack.”
“I suppose that could happen, at her age maybe,” Doreen said cautiously, her mind distracted as she thought about the three women. And the kiwis …
“Maybe,” Nan said. “But believe me, Delilah’s family thinks it’s very suspicious.”
“Why is that?”
“Because she just changed her will. I overheard her talking to Rosie about it at Rosemoor.”
At any mention of money, Doreen’s ears perked up. “For or against the family?”
“I knew you’d ask that,” Nan said, chuckling. “She cut out her nephew.”
“Oh, dear,” she said. “But then, that would be a little too obvious.”
“But still, if he wanted revenge, that’s a good way to get it.”
“But, in another six months, he could have made it so that he was back in Delilah’s good graces,” Doreen said.
“Oh, I didn’t think about that,” Nan said. “Well, I’ll keep digging.” And she hung up.
Doreen put away her phone, slowly wishing all the cops would now start talking about these cases. But she got up and hopped into the kitchen instead, then quickly wrote down notes in her laptop of what Nan had just said. As Doreen was just about done, she heard somebody walking toward her. All of a sudden, Mack filled the kitchen doorway. She looked up guiltily and slammed down the lid. He stared at her laptop, looked at her, and narrowed his gaze. She gave him the sweetest smile she could muster. “How’s all the beer holding up?”
“The beer’s doing fine,” he said. “We’ve got a few ideas we want to run past you.”
“And here I thought you guys were making decisions all on your own,” she teased.
He chuckled and said, “No, we’re definitely asking you. That doesn’t mean you’ll want to hear everything we say beforehand, to reach a consensus.”
“It’s the price tag that bothers me,” she muttered, as she headed out with him. Then was distracted by the captain, holding a gate. She looked at it and smiled. “Where’d you get that from so quickly?”
“My wife just brought it,” he said. “And a can of black metal spray paint. I was thinking that maybe you’d like a little gate along the side here. Obviously we can’t put it in place while all this material’s being moved, but it would fit right up at the front by the house.” And he motioned her to follow him so she could see what he meant.
“It would look great,” she said. “How would we attach it?”
“That’s no problem,” he said. “We can construct a frame for it and have it open and shut. Maybe this direction.” But, as he swung it, he said, “You know what? I think this one can open both ways.”
“Can we latch it?”
And he opened his other hand to show her the metal latch
