A Dollhouse to Die For(132)

            “What do you mean?” Eleanor asked.

            “A Chippendale desk is not the right time period for a Victorian house. It was made about a hundred years earlier. To historically anal Harriet, this would have been a giant red flag.”

            “Aye up now, I beg to differ. That’s not quite true.” Cyril swiveled around and pointed the pin at me. “According to this book on dollhouses ah’m reading, there were all kinds of furniture styles in the Revival period that hearkened back to the past. A desk like this would be perfectly acceptable in an 1860s Victorian home.”

            “Oh God, all right, fine, fine. Just focus, please,” I begged, waving his attention back toward the desk.

            Cyril wrestled with the drawer for a few more minutes, and finally it broke free. The drawer itself was empty, but when he turned it over, an envelope was taped to the underside.

            “You’re a man of so many talents.” Martha beamed at him.

            Cyril handed the envelope to Serrano, who opened it carefully.

            “Appears to be the last will and testament of one Sophie Rosenthal,” he said. There was silence for a few moments as he scanned the document.

            “Why would Sophie go to such lengths to hide it?” Martha said. “Why not just give it to Harriet?”

            PJ shook her head. “Chip was always skulking around, watching her at the end, perhaps suspecting she might pull something like this.”

            “Maybe Sophie was planning on giving her the dollhouse but never got the chance,” Eleanor said.

            I couldn’t take the suspense anymore. “What does the will say, Serrano?”

            He looked up from his perusal. “Basically she gave this house and some miscellaneous possessions to her nephew, Chip Rosenthal.”

            At the outer fringe of our group, I could see the real estate agent breathe a tiny sigh of relief. It might have made things a bit tricky with the closing if the will had said otherwise.

            “And the fifty prime waterfront acres along the Delaware River to one Margaret Jane Avery.”

            “My God, PJ, do you know what this means?” I exclaimed. “You’re a millionaire.”

            “Woot!” PJ gave a jump and high-fived the air.

            “Oh, yes, and to her beloved Millbury Historical Society, Sophie gave the commercial building on Main Street that currently houses a sewing notions shop,” Serrano said.

            Martha swept me up into a bone-crushing hug. I grinned over her shoulder at my good friend and new landlord.

            Eleanor Reid, president of the Historical Society.





            Turn the page for a sneak peek at Cate Price’s next Deadly Notions Mystery

            Lie of the Needle

            Coming soon from Berkley Prime Crime!





It wasn’t every day you had the opportunity to see the best-looking men of your acquaintance naked. Almost never, in fact. And after tonight, I doubted I ever would again.

            The shooting for the ‘Men of Millbury’ calendar had been going on all week in the carriage house of Ruth Bornstein’s estate. The gorgeous fieldstone building was serving as both a studio and temporary living quarters for the high-fashion photographer she’d lured from California.

            The Millbury Historical Society, of which I was a member, was desperately trying to save an old farmhouse once inhabited by one of the founders of our quaint nineteenth-century village. The current owner was entertaining bids for the property and accompanying twenty acres situated in bucolic Bucks County, Pennsylvania, and the Society was up against a local builder who was intent on putting up a slew of cookie-cutter housing unless we could stop him.