“Shouldn’t be long, now. What will happen is, the painters will finish, and the next day a parade of moving vans will arrive, and by nightfall, the place will be furnished.”

Stone laughed. “When I think of how long it took me to get settled in my house.”

“And where is your house?”

“I inherited one in Turtle Bay from a great-aunt, and I spent a couple of years renovating it. Did a lot of the work myself.”

“You seem to inherit everything—clothes, houses.”

“Just those things, nothing else.”

“What sort of work did you do on your house?”

“Carpentry, mostly, but a little of everything.”

“And where did you learn to be a carpenter?”

“Same place you learned to cook: at my father’s knee.”

“Oh, right, I forgot; he was a cabinetmaker.”

“He was more than that, really; he was a kind of artist in wood.”

Somewhere, a cell phone rang. Callie picked up her straw handbag and rummaged in it, finally coming up with a phone. “Hello? Oh, hi. Where are you? Okay, I’ll be back at the house by the time you get there. Oh, and the cars came. The Mercedes convertibles? Remember? See you shortly.” She hung up. “That was Thad. He’s just landed.” She laughed. “He’d forgotten all about ordering the cars. Come on, eat up and let’s get back.”

Stone ate up, wondering about the kind of man who could order three Mercedeses, then forget about it. The longer he hung around Thad Shames, the more bizarre things got.

Chapter 11

11

STONE AND CALLIE ARRIVED BACK AT THE HOUSE SIMULTANEOUSLY with Thad Shames, who climbed out of the back of a limo and tossed two briefcases to Juanito.

“Hey, Callie, hey, Stone!” Shames called out.

“Hey, boss,” Callie said. She pointed at the convertibles. “There are your cars.”

Shames looked them over. “Nice,” he said. He bent over, removed the keys and tossed them to Stone. “Use it while you’re here,” he said.

Stone walked along with him toward the house. “Actually, I was hoping to get a lift back to New York with you on Sunday,” Stone said. “Not much more I can do here.”

“Sorry. I’m headed to the Coast on Sunday,” Shames replied. “Why don’t you stick around for a few days and relax a bit? Callie could use the company, and I can tell she likes you. You got anything urgent waiting for you in New York?”

“Nothing that couldn’t wait a few days, I guess,” Stone admitted.

“It’s settled, then.”

They walked through the house, and Shames inspected the work done on the central hallway. “Oh,” he said to Callie, “I think we’ll have cocktails and dinner in the house. Big buffet, okay?”

“But Thad, the house isn’t finished being painted,” Callie replied.

“It will be by morning,” he said.

“But there’s no furniture.”