“You’re giving me a headache. Make sure we have enough vet wrap for tomorrow. And duct tape and diapers. There’s a hoof abscess on the schedule.”

“Sure thing, boss.”

Stevie sauntered out, leaving Morgan to wonder, as she often did, whether her technician mainlined Red Bull whenever her back was turned. Sighing, she retreated to her office and the paperwork awaiting her. There would be no stopping by the dock tonight. Paperwork, beer, and bed. Idly, she wondered if Emilia had been back to her boat, or if her dip in the Atlantic had scared her away. The latter thought brought disappointment. Whatever Morgan had told Stevie, Emilia Russo offered a welcome distraction.

Chapter Four

Renting a sander had seemed like a straightforward venture. All she needed were the sander, belts, extension cord, safety goggles, and a face mask. Nell would spend this time on the porch. Just because Emilia wasn’t sure if she wanted to practice medicine anymore didn’t mean she was going to forget about the risks exposure to dust and chemicals posed to dogs.

The reality proved a little more challenging. The hardware store in town didn’t rent out tools—at least, not the ones she needed—and so she had to track down the nearest ACE Hardware. Then she spent a good thirty minutes of her life listening to a white man several years her junior explain in terms better suited for a five-year-old how the tool worked, all while staring at her chest.

The acquisition barriers, however, paled in comparison to the real challenge: the walls themselves. Smoke darkened the wood by her father’s favorite chair. Elsewhere, oil from the fur of long dead dogs revealed their preferred nooks and routes. She couldn’t just sand them away. These walls were proof her father had lived, proof that for all his faults, he’d sat here in this room, listening to his bluesy music while the sun set over his meadow. Who was she to sand and paint this house, erasing all traces of that man? Who was she to judge his life?

She put down the sander and touched the worn leather of his chair beneath the drop cloth. Perhaps this had been a terrible idea. Perhaps she should have taken her mother’s advice and left the house in the care of an industrious real estate agent practiced in dealing with the possessions of others, someone who didn’t balk at hauling the refuse of spent lives away in dumpsters and luring new tenants into the haunted remains.

No. She squared her shoulders and faced the empty room, turning in a slow circle to take in the knots and whorls of the pine boards and the faded wood of the windowsills. Her father’s last gift to her was this house. She needed this time and this house and something to do with her hands besides administering death. She would do right by all of them: the house, her father, and herself.

Still, she didn’t need to do everything today.