Little Ghost Lost (Destiny Bay Cozy Mysteries Book 5) Read Free

now,” she was saying. “We moved here in order to keep an eye on the Pennington place, you know. Seeing as how my husband is the rightful heir.”
    “The…what?”
    “The heir. Oh, didn’t you know? My husband, Jerry Moore, is Alexander Pennington’s natural child. Illegitimate, you know, but he still has the right to inherit.” She pulled out a first aid case and flipped it open. “He deserves that property, no matter what the courts are saying now. We’ll go on fighting until he takes his rightful place as owner of the Pennington House. You’ll see.”
    I stared at her. From what I’d heard, things had been settled, a judgment made, and the house had gone to the City Council to dispose of as they deemed proper. If that weren’t true, what was I doing here? But I wasn’t going to argue with her, not while she was dabbing my scratches with peroxide and smearing on the Neosporin.  
    “So the Pennington’s didn’t have any other children?” I asked casually. “Nobody else to inherit?”
    “No, no one living at any rate. They did have a child. Alexander Pennington, Jr. But he died in a tragic swimming pool accident when he was about eighteen. That was years ago.”
    “How awful.”
    “Yes, and it was especially tragic since their daughter had died just a few weeks before. I forget why. Oh, I think it was an accident also. And she was only thirteen at the time. From what they say, the family just fell apart after the two deaths. The mother, Susan Pennington, began wandering around in her nightgown. You know the sort of thing. Two children dead. Who can blame her?”
    I thought about the house and what I’d seen of it and shuddered a little. Were those the ghosts that haunted the place now?  
    “How long ago was that?”
    “Hmm? Oh, I don’t know. Forty years ago at least. Susan died at some point and Alexander just muddled on through.”
    She went on telling me about how much trouble they’d gone through trying to fight city hall.
    “He’s taken a DNA test to establish paternity and everything. You’d think that would be enough for these bureaucrats, but oh no! They need more. Always more.”
    “So he has proof now?”
    “Well, they’re not accepting it. They claim we used a shady lab. So he has to do it again. Always something.”
      While she talked, I looked around at what I could see of her house. As I thought back, I remembered that she was known for painting huge canvases with startling colors, and the word was that she used her own naked body as a paintbrush. Sort of. At any rate, she slathered bright paint on her body and rolled around on the canvas. At least, that was what Carlton Hart had told me. Her pieces were quite colorful and striking. But I didn’t see any of her art from where I was sitting, and I wondered about that.  
    What I did see were antiques everywhere, especially large silver pieces, soup tureens and punch bowls and trays and candelabras. That made me wonder why I hadn’t seen any of that sort of thing in the Pennington House. You expected those things in the home of a wealthy person of a certain generation.  
    Had someone already removed them? Food for thought.
    “Where are your paintings?” I asked once she’d finished patching me up. “As I remember, your pieces were quite popular at the art show at the Carlton Mansion.”
    She looked a little flustered. “Yes. Well, I keep them in an environmentally controlled storage room.” She sighed, looking around the area. “Jerry says they don’t quite go with the décor here. Craftsman style, you know. Austere and Asian oriented. That doesn’t go well with my larger works. They’re a bit flamboyant.”
    I shrugged. I didn’t really care, I was just curious. “All these silver antiques,” I began, but she rushed to cut me off.  
    “Oh, no no! These aren’t mine. Jerry collects, you know. He’s at an estate auction right now, gathering more pieces. They’re his passion. He can’t resist a good buy on