It Started With A House: Lizzie. Book 1 (The Westport Mysteries) (9 page)

* * * *

The
name Riley had written down on the paper was that of a solicitor in the city. I
can’t be certain because I no longer have the contract, but I’m pretty sure it was
the solicitor who sold me my house. I thought it was interesting he was also
her final contact. No friends or family–just a solicitor. But then what
did I know? He could have been her friend after all.

I gave the
number a ring once we were back in the car and set up an appointment to see a
Mr. Patrick Johns on Wednesday. Hopefully he could shed some light on this. I
was just wondering who John Smith was when my phone started to ring.

“Hello, baby!” It
was Mum. I was about to turn 32 and she still called me baby.

“Hi Mum. What’s
up?”

“Well, I was
thinking that, seeing how your birthday is on Tuesday, we would make Sunday
dinner for you. Would that be okay, love? It’s just…your father and I have a
tournament at the bridge club on Tuesday night and we wouldn’t be able to have
it then?”

“That’s fine,
Mum. Scott has
 
actually organized
a lovely night out for my birthday. I think we are having dinner in the city
and going to a show afterwards. I’m hoping it’s
Wicked
but he won’t tell me.” I smiled, thinking about it. I hadn’t
seen Wicked yet but from what I’d heard, it’s spectacular.

“Oh, that’ll be
lovely,” said Mum. “Maybe he might have a special something for you.” I know
she was hinting at a ring, but I really hoped he didn’t. Yes, about seven
months ago I was hoping for commitment, but I was starting to feel a bit uneasy
with our relationship. I know I’m lucky to have a boyfriend like Scott, but
lately I was feeling like I didn’t want to be lucky. I wanted to be wanted. I
wanted a relationship that was equal, where he felt just as lucky to have me. After
talking to Mum for another few minutes about Grandma Mabel—apparently she
hadn’t stopped talking about Riley since she came over yesterday—I hung
up.

“Grandma says
hello.” I smiled. “I think she has a crush on you.”

“Old ladies
love me.” He smiled back.

“Yeah, not just
the old ones, I bet.”

Chapter
Nine

It
was a bit of a tradition that every Sunday night the family would get together
and Mum would cook a big roast. I must say Mum cooked the best roast. Grandma Mabel
was always there to help her, but after she set the oven on fire last year, she
was told to stay out of the kitchen. When I walked in, I found Molly in the
kitchen with Mum. Danny, Andrew and Dad were
watching
Antiques Roadshow in the lounge. Grandma Mabel was in her usual high-backed
chair, head back, eyes closed, mouth open and sound asleep.

“How can you
hear the television over her snoring?” I asked as I gave Dad a kiss on the
cheek. She sounded like an old chainsaw Dad once owned.

“You get used
it,” Dad said looking around me, obviously more interested in the antiques on
TV.

Mum and Dad had
lived in this house my whole life but every time I came here, it looked
different. Mum got bored very quickly with the decor and, when her and Auntie M
put their heads together, it sometimes became a bit overpowering. Like now for
instance. She’s lucky to have Dad and that he’s a very patient man because this
week she’d changed the curtains and all the cushions on the couch. They all
matched beautifully with a lovely floral print in scarlet. This of course
didn’t match the floral carpet which was an awful mix of brown, mustard and
orange. Nor did it match the purple couch.

“You’ve put new
curtains up,” I said to Mum as I walked into the kitchen.

“Yes, aren’t
they lovely?” Mum was so cute when she was excited. Her whole face glowed and
she kind of had this scrunched-up look around her eyes.

“Gorgeous, Mum.
Do you think there’s anything on the color wheel you might have forgotten to add?”
asked Molly sarcastically.

A lot of people
say Molly and I are a lot alike, but I think this is only in looks. Molly is
far more outgoing than I am, far more confident and much better dressed. She’s
the oldest of the three of us and even though she sits here in her four-inch
Jimmy Choo's, skintight, pink-sequined halter-top and skintight jeans, don’t be
fooled. When she gets her teeth into something, she’s like a bulldog, never
letting go.

“Well, just
because your house is very sterile looking, Molly does not mean you have to be
sarcastic about mine,” said Mum rather irritably. I have to agree, though. I thought
Molly was right.

Mum and Dad’s
house wasn’t particularly big, so when I left home they converted the bedroom
Molly and I had shared growing up, into the dining room they never had. This of
course had the added advantage of neither me nor Molly ever being able to
return home to live. After Danny moved out, Grandma Mabel moved into the only
other spare room.

As Mum called
dinner, we all piled into the dining room and sat down to eat. Dinner was
always a noisy affair in our family, everyone spoke at once and never waited
his or her turn, but somehow we all managed to follow the conversation, even
Grandma Mabel. After her nap, she was bright and chirpy once more. I looked
over at her thinking how sweet she looked in her purple calf-length polyester
dress, complete with matching purple hair. Just as my heart was melting, she
lifted her left bottom cheek and a distinctive noise coming from her rear end
was followed up by a seriously bad odor. Grandma continued to eat, a completely
innocent look on her face as if nothing happened. A second later the odor hit
and I saw her wrinkle her nose.

“Who let Polly
out of prison?” she asked, looking around the table, her eyes stopping on me.

“Don’t look at
me. Everyone knows it was you,” I quickly stated, making sure everyone knew it
wasn’t me.

“Oh, Mum! We’re
at the dinner table!”

Grandma just
shrugged and feigned innocence. “This meat’s a bit tough, our Nell,” she
complained.

“You just need
your teeth sharpened, Mum.”

“Can they
really do that?” asked Molly. We all looked at Mum. She just shrugged. Grandma Mabel
however, decided she should take a closer look and pulled her teeth out of her
mouth.

“
Ew
! Grandma put your teeth away,” yelled
Molly who happened to have front row seats to this particular event as she was
sitting opposite Grandma.

“I’ve got
something stuck under them and it’s hurting,” replied Grandma, dipping her
teeth in her glass of water and swishing it around. Gagging, I looked up to see
Danny leaning in towards me.

“Hey Lizzie,”
Danny whispered. “I was thinking about Molly’s birthday next week and what we
should get her.” Molly’s birthday is exactly one week after mine even though
she is two years older.

“That’s good,
because I don’t have a clue,” I replied.

“I think we should go out to the animal
refuge and rescue a dog for her,” said Danny.

“Do you think that’s a good idea?” asked
Andrew, who was sitting between Danny and me.

Actually, I
thought it was a great idea. Molly had been a bit down since she’d broken up
with her last boyfriend and something that would give her unconditional love was
exactly what she needed to get her mind off men.

“I think that’s
a great idea. Have you been out there for a look at what they’ve got?” I asked.

“No, but I have
looked on the Internet. There’s this one dog, his name is Harper. He’s a cross
between Maltese and who-the-hell-even-knows. After dinner I’ll show you,” said
Danny, leaning over the table to get a second helping on the potatoes.

Dinner
continued on as usual but I was having a hard time concentrating on the
conversation. I just couldn’t wait to see Harper. Molly had been heart broken
when she split with her boyfriend Adam. So much so that I was actually worried
she would never be the same again. Like I said before, Molly is very outgoing
and loves nothing more than male attention, but after Adam, she just hasn’t
been interested. She’d thrown herself into her work. As a photographer she was
always very talented, but this new hurt had made her talent shine even more. Maybe
there was always an upside to everything.

After dessert,
(Mum’s famous homemade chocolate cake), we left Molly and Andrew with the
dishes—I got out of it because it was my birthday dinner—and got
onto Mum and Dad’s computer.

It didn’t take
Danny long to find the website we were looking for and suddenly, there in front
of me was a full size image of the saddest dog I’d ever seen.

Harper was
listed under the oldies and was described as a pure white Maltese terrier. In the
picture, he didn’t look pure white I can tell you, but he did look old. He was
so old, he had no teeth, and so as I looked at his photo, his tongue was
hanging out of the side of his mouth. But none of that mattered, he’d already
grabbed my heartstrings. He was exactly what Molly needed—something to
love and take care of.

“Danny, you’re
a genius.” I turned and gave him a big hug. He really was the most thoughtful
brother a girl could ever ask for.

“By the way,
for your birthday, I’m giving you a makeover,” he said. Like I said, always thoughtful.

“I can meet you
there tomorrow and we can have a look at him, if you like?” I said.

“Sure, tomorrow
works for me but it will have to be in the morning. I have a big day planned.”

* * * *

Trying
to find the animal refuge was a feat in itself. When I did finally find it, I
realized it was not a track that liked little Mini Cooper’s. It was muddy,
bumpy and full of potholes big enough to actually lose my car in. But I could
hear the dogs barking as I drove closer, so even though my car complained every
inch of the way, I forced it to negotiate its way around the holes and over the
bumps until I reached the gates. Sitting in the car, waiting for Danny to
arrive nearly broke my heart. I decided there and then that if I ever win a big
enough lottery, I was going to buy a place like this and turn it into an amazing
place for dogs to live. I’m sure the people here look after the dogs just fine,
but it’s nothing compared to a warm comfy bed, snuggled up to the one you love,
is it?

When Danny
finally arrived, we made our way to the reception area and asked to have a look
around. Now, you would think the amount of noise coming from behind these gates
would have been a good indicator to me as to how many dogs were actually here. But
no, I was shocked by the sheer number of abandoned animals. There were big
ones, small ones, medium-sized ones, black ones, brown ones…the list went on. They
were all so beautiful I didn’t understand how anybody could leave them.

We found Harper
pretty quickly, which was good as I was starting to get a bit upset. He was
standing in a pen with two other dogs, both of which were jumping up and trying
to get our attention. Harper, however, was just standing back checking us out,
his tongue hanging out of his mouth, just as it had in the photo. The attendant
told us he was about ten years old and needed to go to a home without a cat. He
hated cats apparently. Luckily he wasn’t coming to live with me.

“What do you
think?” Danny asked.

“I think I want
to take him and run. This place is really starting to get to me.”

Danny bent down
near the fence and called Harper over. It took some coaxing but Harper
eventually succumbed to the pressure. As Danny managed to put his hand through
the wire and give him a pat, the other two dogs seemed to back off. I wondered
if they had some sort of gentleman’s agreement concerning visiting humans where,
once a dog was selected by a human, the other dogs backed off and respected the
chosen one.

Probably not. I’d
say it was more likely they had grown bored with the lack of attention.

I could tell
Harper probably was white but at the moment he was almost a yellow color, and
looked to be a few kilos underweight. He had the darkest brown eyes, allowing
me to fall in love with him even more.

“He has the
biggest wanger I’ve ever seen, and believe me I’ve seen a few,” said Danny
incredulously. I rolled my eyes. Trust Danny to notice the dog’s manhood. Bending
down next to Danny, I took a look.

My God, he was
right.

“Maybe he used
to be a stud dog,” I suggested.

“I think the
other dogs might be a bit jealous of that, little man,” Danny said talking to
Harper.

“Do you think
Molly will like him?”

“I think she’ll
love him, but we should probably bring her out here before we buy him,” said
Danny thoughtfully.

He was right. Molly
really needed to bond before she took a dog home. “We’ll bring her out here on
Thursday. It’s the only day I’ve got any free time this week.”

“What if he
sells before then?” I was already falling in love with him and the thought that
somebody else might buy him made me want to cry.

“We’ll ask if
we can leave a deposit on him and that way if anybody else tries to buy him
they will have to ring us first.” Danny really was the smart one.

“Oh okay, that
makes sense.” Saying our goodbyes to Harper, we headed back to reception. They
were very happy to take a deposit, but kept checking that we were talking about
Harper, the small white Maltese.

“What’s
wrong with him?” I asked.

“Oh, nothing. It’s
just people don’t usually want the oldies, they usually only want the puppies. We
all thought Harper would be here for the rest of his life.”

“A housebroken
one is definitely what our sister needs. She’s had enough of un-housebroken
men,” said Danny with a smile.