Murder Blog Mysteries Boxed Collection

by Pamela Frost Dennis

He patted my back. “Thank you, honey.”

  As if on cue, Daisy ran up and kissed Ben’s hand, then dashed back to her buddies.

  “That does it. I’m getting a Lab. You know, she’s the reason I met you, and then your beautiful grandmother. I cannot begin to tell you what that has meant to me after being alone for so many years.” He brushed away a tear. “Let’s get back to what we were talking about before we were so sweetly interrupted.” He ran a hand over his perfectly trimmed silver goatee, shaking his head with a big sigh. “When I say do not tell anyone outside the family about the coins, I mean immediate family. The more people who know, the more likely it is that you’re going to have problems. Maybe big problems.”

  I slumped on the bench, wishing I’d never found that damned box. “Got it.”

  “I don’t mean to imply that, for example, your great-aunt Edith would try to extort you for money, but she might inadvertently tell someone who might. And you need to warn Emily, too.”

  “I will.” I wonder if she already told her girlfriend? Of course she has. I would’ve.

  His stern lawyerly look softened into a grandfatherly smile. “Okay, I’m done lecturing. Ruby asked if I would help you, and I’d be more than happy to.”

  “I’d love your help because I don’t even know where to begin.”

  “Well, I do.”

  Chapter Eight

  COINS AND CADAVERS

  THURSDAY • JANUARY 22

  Posted by Katy McKenna

  Following Ben’s advice, Pop and I took a twenty-dollar gold piece to a reputable coin dealer today. Upon entry, a portly senior gentleman waved from a recliner in the corner. “Howdy. How may I help you fine folks today?”

  Not ready to commit, I said, “Oh, we’re just browsing. Never been in a coin shop before.”

  “Well, take your time, and if either of you has any questions, I’ll be right here, taking a load off.”

  I nosed around the dark paneled, memorabilia-crammed shop. Glass-topped counter cases displayed money from all over the world. There were boxes on top of one table overflowing with foreign bank notes selling for a dollar each. I selected one from the Cook Islands and admired the colorful illustration of a mermaid riding a ferocious looking shark. Another note showed a ferocious looking Tiki man with a very long you-know-what standing next to an outrigger canoe. Sure made our U.S. currency seem dull and stodgy.

  “How long are you going to stall, Katy-did?” murmured Pop from behind me.

  “Just give me another minute. At this moment, I may be a wealthy woman, but in another minute, I may be back to normal. In other words, broke.”

  He chuckled. “That’s how I feel when I’m about to check my lottery ticket numbers.” We approached the counter, and my father said, “Hate to get you out of your comfortable chair. Got a bum knee so I can sympathize, but we have something to show you.”

  “That’s what I’m here for,” said the jovial man, grunting as he stood. “Got a bad knee myself. One of these days, I need to go in for a replacement, but I’m not looking forward to the downtime.” He jiggled his knee into place and then joined us at the counter. “Let’s have a looksee at what ya got.”

  I removed the coin from its plastic snack bag and placed it on a black velvet pad on the counter. The man furrowed his bushy white brows as his grin faded.

  Oh, crap. It must be worthless.

  “My-oh-my, what have we here?” He picked up the coin and inspected it under a lighted magnifier. “Where’d you get this?”

  I glanced at my father for an answer.

  “It’s been sitting in a drawer for years,” said Pop. “I’ve been watching Antiques Roadshow for awhile now, and got to thinking maybe we should check it out. See if it’s worth anything.”

  “Hold on a sec. I don’t want anyone interrupting us.” The shopkeeper locked the door, turned the Open sign to Closed, and shut the blinds. “I think it’s time I introduced myself.” He held out his hand. “Don Jacobs.”

  Pop introduced us, and we all shook hands, and then he said, “I’m getting the impression that it’s worth a little more than twenty bucks.”

  “Oh yeah.” Don twiddled the curl of his silver handlebar mustache. “You could say that. I should call my wife out. She’s in back, doing the bills, and she’d kill me for sure if I didn’t show her this.” He hollered through the swinging saloon door behind the counter. “Jeri? You have got to take a look at what these nice folks brought in.”

  A petite curly redhead joined us, beaming a sweet smile. “This better be good, Donny. Those bills aren’t going to pay themselves, you know.”

  Don handed his wife the magnifier. “Take a gander at this, honeybunch.”

  She gasped. “Oh, my word. An 1876 Liberty Head in mint condition. It’s magnificent. Not a scratch on it.” She turned it over several times, even checking the edges.

  “We’d love to buy it,” said Don, looking like a kid in a candy store. “But first I suggest you do some research, so you feel comfortable with what we offer.”

  “I did a little online research,” I said. “But I don’t know how accurate that would be. It’s not like I know anything about old coins and—” I stopped, realizing I sounded like a gullible idiot.

  The look Pop was pointing my way told me he shared that opinion. “Your shop has a good reputation,” he said. “Of course, we understand that whatever you offer takes into consideration the fact that you’ll probably resell it for a profit. That’s to be expected.”

  “Thank you for understanding that, Kurt. These days, people do a little research online. Watch some of those pawn shop shows on TV. And then come in here and expect to get top dollar not realizing that to stay in business, we have to make a profit. We’re just a mom and pop shop.”

  “With extremely high insurance,” said Jeri. “Every year the premiums go up even though we’ve never made a claim. And then there’s the IRS. You do understand that you’ll have to pay taxes, right?”

  “Goes without saying,” said Pop. “But how does it work in a case like this?”

  “If you were to bring in coins that are worth more than $10,000, we’d give you a federal form to fill out right here in the shop,” said Don. “In the past, more than a few dealers have wound up in prison for not conducting proper business. Like paying a customer half in cash and the other half by check, then only reporting the check amount.”

  “And I think the fine may be up to $25,000 now, so it’s not worth fudging on the tax issue,” said Jeri. “If it’s under $10,000, it’s up to you to report the sale. We will, of course, report it on our end.”

  Don put his arm around his wife’s slim shoulders. “If you’ll excuse us a moment, I’d like to confer with Jeri before we make an offer. In the meantime, why don’t you put the coin back in your purse.”

  They went in the rear of the shop. I could hear their buzzing voices, but couldn’t make out a single word. Several nerve-wracking minutes had passed before they returned.

  “We’d like to offer $8,500 for your coin,” said Don. “You may be able to get more from a larger dealer, and we would understand if you’d like to shop it around. I could suggest some very respectable ones down in Los Angeles and up in the San Francisco Bay Area.”

  I tried to keep a poker face. “Pop? May I confer with you a moment?”

  “Take all the time you need.” The couple went to the back again.

  I pulled Pop to the far corner of the shop and whispered, “That’s way more than I expected. What should I do? I mean, it could be worth thousands more. Maybe we should go see one of those dealers in San Francisco.”

  Pop grinned all through my speech.

  “What are you smiling about?” I asked.

  “Confer? You want to confer with me?”

  “Yeah.” I rolled my eyes. “I do.”

  He set his hands firmly on my shoulders and looked me square in the eyes. “Here’s the thing, Katy-did. Right now, you can walk out of here with a big fat check in your walle
t and not worry about looking for another graphics job for a while. And don’t forget, you have two safes full of gold coins at home. This is just the tip of the iceberg.”

  “So you’re saying take the money?”

  “And run!”

  The woman I contacted on PedigreeTree.com responded.

  Hi, Katy

  What a fun surprise to hear from you!

  I already knew that Eugene Cranston was a bigamist. He married my great-great-grandmother in California and then left her when my great-grandfather was a toddler. Told her he was already married. I wonder how many times he did this. My grandfather told my dad that years later Eugene contacted his father to make amends. He died shortly after.

  So I guess this makes us cousins. I’d love to meet you someday. Where do you live?

  Hugs,

  Your new cousin,

  Erin Cranston

  P.S. Let’s be Facebook friends!

  We are now FB friends, bringing my total to thirty-six friends. She’s single, really cute, lives in Palo Alto, and works at Google—how cool is that?

  I can’t wait to meet her.

  Update on the squirrels in my attic

  Life’s been crazy lately, and they have become low on the priority list. And yes, I know it’s actually rats, according to my sister. But I prefer to think I’m sharing my home with adorable squirrels. No matter what they are, the pesky critters are still up there, and I know there’s going to have to be a day of reckoning.

  I hate the idea of killing any animal, but there doesn't seem to be any way around it. The beepers were a bust, ditto the peppermint cotton balls, and relocation would probably kill them. So, with a heavy heart, I called an exterminator and set up an appointment for an inspection next Wednesday. They wanted to come tomorrow, but I’ve got a lot going on. Or maybe I’m still hoping I’ll get a brilliant idea on how to get rid of the pests without murdering them.

  Chapter Nine

  COINS AND CADAVERS

  FRIDAY• JANUARY 23

  Posted by Katy McKenna

  Emily left at the crack of dawn to visit her ex in Santa Monica. Sure hope all goes well. Since I have the house all to myself, I invited Josh over for a slumber party. Woo-hoo!

  That also means I have to clean the house because his home is immaculate. Super tidy, and not a speck of dust (I checked). Drawers organized (I peeked). No clothes on the floor, no dishes in the sink, and get this—he caps the toothpaste. Who does that?

  So my house has to be spotless—something it is never.

  In the late afternoon, I hit up the Whole Foods deli because I was too pooped from cleaning to cook. Besides, you don't have to be a good cook to put on a good spread. You just have to be a good shopper.

  When I got home, I popped the food in the oven to warm it, set the timer, and tossed the cartons, although who did I think I was fooling? When Josh rang the bell, Daisy dashed for the front door and woofed to her sweetheart on the porch. Guess who kissed him first?

  “Whoa, Daisy. I’m glad to see you.” He leaned over the squirmy girl and pecked me on the lips. “Happy to see you too. I brought another bottle of that red you enjoyed the other night.”

  That little kiss was like a double espresso for me, and as soon as the door shut, round one of the smooch-fest began. I finally said, “Really happy to see you too.”

  Josh followed me to the kitchen and set the Petite Syrah on the tiled counter. “Where do you keep your corkscrew?”

  “Top drawer, left of the sink.” Then I remembered the jumbled chaos in the drawer. “I’ll get it for you.” Doing my best to shield the mess, I fumbled through the clutter and pulled one out.

  Josh filled two glasses, and we clinked rims and sipped the luscious wine. And that led to more kisses. And that led us to…

  An hour later, Josh sniffed the air. “Do you smell something burning?”

  “That would be our dinner.”

  There was no point in jumping out of bed to save the meal. Besides, that would have meant exposing my bare derrière in walk-away mode, and I wasn't ready for that, so I waited for him to make the first move.

  “How about I get it out of the oven?” he said. “Maybe it’s not as bad as it smells.”

  The food was worse than it smelled, so we strolled over to Suzy Q’s for dinner. It’s a neighborhood organic vegetarian cafe with a boho vibe and outrageously good food. After we were seated on the heated patio under a trellis of magenta bougainvillea, we ordered a bottle of local pinot noir, then read our menus in comfortable silence.

  The waiter arrived with our wine, unscrewed it with a flourish, and after he filled our glasses, I said, “Remember the last time we had dinner here, Josh?”

  “You’d just been nearly choked to death by that lunatic, and I’d lent you an ugly Christmas turtleneck sweater to cover the bruises. You sure looked sexy in it.”

  “Well…you’re gonna laugh about this, but I thought we were on a real date until a few days later when you referred to me as your buddy and, um….”

  Josh set down his glass and leaned in close, taking my hand. “I was crazy about you, but I didn’t feel ready for you.” He shook his head, looking forlorn. “I had hurt my ex-wife so badly, and I didn’t want to take a chance on hurting you, too.”

  “Can you tell me about it? I remember you said your job as an undercover narcotics cop destroyed your marriage.”

  “It did. When you take on a job like that, you live and breathe it. I was hanging with lowlife scum, and after a while the lines got blurred, and eventually Nicole had enough of it. Said she didn’t know who I was anymore.” Josh shook his head, and his eyes filled. “Hell, I didn’t know who I was anymore. I was drinking too much, scared most of the time, wouldn't talk to her let alone listen to her.”

  Josh broke eye contact, absently straightening the flatware. “After she left me, I realized I had to get out of it, so I quit my job and hit the road, finally winding up at my mother’s house in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. I was broken, and it took a long time to heal.”

  “Do you ever hear from her? Nicole, I mean.”

  He turned his baby blues back on me. “All the time. We’re still close friends. She’s doing well. Has a good job as a paralegal at a big firm in Los Angeles. I hope she finds a decent guy one of these days. She deserves it.”

  His story wrenched my heart. “Do you think you two might, you know—”

  Josh cupped my chin and pulled me in for a soft kiss. “No.” Kiss. “We’re friends. Just friends. Nothing more. She’s my past.” Kiss. “You, on the other hand….” Kiss.

  Chapter Ten

  COINS AND CADAVERS

  SATURDAY • JANUARY 24

  Posted by Katy McKenna

  Everyone keeps telling me that Mabel’s money is mine, so today I returned to the coin shop with a partial inventory of the coins.

  “So let me get this straight.” Don looked at me like I had a screw loose. “You’re telling us that you have how many coins?”

  “Nine hundred and seventy three.” I handed him my list. “I wrote down the denominations, but I know I should’ve recorded the dates and where they were minted, but I was running short on time. But the list will give you an idea of what I’ve got.”

  Don’s eyes practically popped out of their sockets, as he scanned the list with his wife. “If what you’re saying is true—”

  “And we don’t doubt you, dear.” Jeri patted my hand. “It’s just that this is so astonishing.”

  “I’ll say,” said Don, waving the list. “It’s amazing when even one gold coin is found, let alone this many. Some of the dates you’ve got here go all the way back to the California Gold Rush. And you say they’re all in the same condition as the one you brought in the other day?”

  I nodded, trying not to hyperventilate.

  “This will cause quite a stir in the numismatic world,” said Jeri, supporting her slender frame against the glass counter. “And to think that we get to be a part of the excitement. Oh
my.”

  Numismatic? I had no idea what that meant. “Should I bring the coins here?”

  “Oh no.” Don shook his head, waving his hands. “No-no-no. Too risky. We’ll come to you.”

  The shop doorbell buzzed, and he glanced at the security monitor. “It’s Corky. He’s an old and trusted friend, Katy, but I don’t want anyone hearing about this. Why don’t you and Jeri go in back and set up an appointment for us to come to your house on Monday.”

  Chapter Eleven

  COINS AND CADAVERS

  SUNDAY • JANUARY 25

  Posted by Katy McKenna

  Last night Josh and I enjoyed Suzy Q leftovers and watched one of my all-time favorite quirky movies, O Brother, Where Art Thou?

  Josh tickled my arm. “Hey, Cupcake. Got any more of that mint-chip ice cream? You’ve got me hooked on it, you know.”

  “There’s a little bit left, and it’s all yours.”

  He started to get up and then I remembered the clutter of boxes and bags jammed in the freezer.

  “I’ll get it for you.” A few moments later, I handed him the carton and a spoon. “Here ya go.”

  “You sure you don’t want any? We can share.”

  “Nope. I’m good.” I wanted some, but I’ve been trying to cut back since seeing his firm, bare tushie.

  When the carton was empty, he stuffed it in the garbage can under the kitchen sink and yelled, “Can you put it on pause while I take out the garbage?”

  Oh. He’s taking out the garbage. Who knew that domesticity could be so sexy? While he was outside, his cell beeped a text message. It was sitting in plain sight on the coffee table, so I leaned forward for a quick peek at the screen. It was from Nicole. His ex. Part of the message was visible without signing in. I have bad news and need to…