“Did you get my message?” I asked, scooping her up in a hug.
“Yes, all seventeen of them. I’m sorry I didn’t return any of them. This felt like a conversation we should have face to face.”
Hmm, now where had I heard that before. Sharon. I’d need to call and give her an update since we were unable to meet up before Charles and I headed home again. I had a feeling we’d both be seeing a lot of her in our future, starting with our upcoming nuptials.
“Shall I put on some tea?” Nan offered, hooking her thumb toward the kitchen.
“No,” I said, gently lowering myself onto the couch and patting the cushion beside me. If I gave Nan an excuse to put this off, she’d keep finding more and more reasons to put it off further. If we were going to have this talk, we needed to have it now.
I reached forward and grabbed both of her hands in mine, waiting for Nan to share what was on her mind.
“I’m sorry I kept you away from your grandmother all these years. It’s the one thing in my life I truly regret,” she said with a sigh.
I shook my head emphatically.“I don’t.”
She lifted her eyes to mine, searching.“What?”
“I don’t regret you doing that, and neither should you.”
Nan swallowed.“Was she really that terrible?”
“No, she was actually pretty cool.” I smiled, remembering the moments we’d shared that weekend.
And Nan’s expression pinched.
“But I’m glad I grew up with you,” I quickly added. “Marilyn is nice, and I look forward to getting to know her much better, but you’ve helped shape my life into what it is today. And I love my life. I love you. I wouldn’t have wanted anything different.”
“Really?” Nan looked so frail in that moment. For the first time in a long time, I really saw her age. She’d lived through a lot and carried one very big secret for most of her life. How did she feel now that it had been exposed and that everyone still loved her just as much as before?
“Really, really,” I said in a silly voice.
She laughed at my reference to an old movie we’d watched together countless times in my childhood.
“Will you believe me this time?”
Nan wiped away a tear, then grabbed my hands again and gave them a good squeeze.“I’ll try.”
“Well, that’s the best any of us can do, right?” I winked. “Someone super smart and awesome taught me that.”
“Speaking of all those lovely adjectives, how was she? Did you find out why William…?” She let her words trail off, unwilling—or perhaps unable—to voice what her late friend had done. With that single action, he’d changed all of our lives forever. We’d never know exactly why he’d done it, but I trusted Grandma Marilyn’s interpretation of events. Of course, it led me to wonder if my missing grandpa would have accepted me for who I am, if he’d gotten the chance to meet me before he passed.
Sometimes I had a hard time remaining serious in serious moments. I knew a joke wouldn’t help here, so I called upon my best impression of Charles. “Well, you see, the prevailing theory is that he took Mom away because he believed he was keeping her safe from Marilyn.”
Nan’s eyes bulged. “Was Marilyn dangerous? Is she now?”
I waggled my fingers.“She’s kooky-crazy. Turns out she can talk to animals.”
Nan gasped.“You can’t be serious!”
I just smiled and nodded.“No one would believe her, including Grandpa. He chose never to see his own daughter again rather than to believe something so magical could be possible.”
Nan gasped again.“Oh, that poor old man. He missed out on so much.”
“It was his choice,” I pointed out. “Marilyn never got a choice. You didn’t have much of one, either.”
“He made a choice, but it was the wrong one. That doesn’t sound like the friend I knew. Still, I’m so incredibly grateful for the life we’ve shared.”
“Me, too,” I said, peppering her cheek with a kiss.
Nan shook her head and looked down at her lap.“You and Marilyn must have had a lot of stories to share.”
“We did, and I really like her.”
What Nan said next surprised me more than anything else had so far that weekend.“I think I would, too.”
“Good, because she’s coming over for dinner next month. I figured that would give everyone enough time to let everything sink in, and it’s still well before the wedding. By the way, I have a new friend that I just know you’re going to love. Her name is Sharon, and…”
We stayed up the whole night talking, just like the old days. I had a lot to tell my mom, but that could wait until tomorrow. She had her own feelings about our sordid history, and I’d have to find a way to help her work through them.
But that’s what the people in your life were for.
They were there for you.
And it was okay to lean on them when you needed to.
I learned that this weekend, and I hoped with time my grandma Marilyn would be able to learn it, too.
I couldn’t wait for her to meet the rest of the family, and I couldn’t wait to delve further into our shared ability and what it could mean for us in the future.
Would Pet Whisperer P.I. get a new partner member?
Heck if I knew. But for once, not knowing was actually part of the fun.
15. DEER DUPLICITY
1
My name is Angie Russo, and I live a strange life. Thanks to my charming fianc? and kooky nan, my life is full of love. It’s also full of noise… so much noise.
I can talk to animals, and once they find that out, most don’t want to shut up. It all started with Octo-Cat. He and I met at a will reading, back when I was still working a temp job as a paralegal. His owner had just passed, and I’d just had an unfortunate run-in with a busted coffeemaker. Put the two together and—bam—our odd friendship was born. The first thing we did together was solve the murder of his former owner, which took some doing since everyone else happily assumed the old lady had died of natural causes.
Once I’d officially adopted my tabby companion, I became the trustee for his rather generous trust fund, and the two of us moved into his former owner’s old manor house. I brought my nan along, and she later adopted the most adorable pound puppy, a mostly black tricolor Chihuahua we call Paisley.
Somewhere along the way, our gang realized we had a knack for solving mysteries and started up an official business, which—much to my chagrin—has been dubbed Pet Whisperer P.I. The last thing I want is strangers knowing I can talk to animals, but luckily they all seem to think our moniker is a joke or some misguided publicity attempt.
Whatever the case, they’re always happy once we get the job done. Admittedly, most of our cases are unpaid. And usually we’re not even formally hired. Mysteries just fall into our laps, and well, what else are we going to do to fill our days?
I don’t take kindly to being called an amateur sleuth, mind you. I have an official business with a registered LLC and everything. That makes me a professional, thank you very much.
My fianc? is the senior partner at a local law firm—the same one I used to work at. That place saw tons of turnover until Charles took his place at the top. Now things are nice and steady, and together the two of us make up the small-town Maine version ofLaw and Order.
The last prominent member of our quirky ensemble is our very own trash panda, Pringle. He’s a sticky-fingered raccoon who lives in a treehouse out back. He likes cat food and Nerf guns, but he loves reality TV. Most of the time he causes more problems than he solves, but we love him anyway. Well, most of us do.
Even after more than a year together, I’m pretty sure I only register as “kind of like” on my cat’s affection scale, and Pringle ranks much, much lower.
Me? I’ve got all the love I can handle between planning a wedding and getting to know the bio grandmother I recently reconnected with after a lifetime of not even knowing she existed. The best part? My Grandma Lyn can talk to animals too, and believe me you, we’ve talked about our shared talents until we were both blue in the face.