Joy to the Wolves (Red Wolf #1) - Terry Spear Page 0,1
dark eyes, and an almost imperceptible smile as he saw Brooke watching the woman berating him. Then the woman stormed off, and Brooke continued to look over the three wolf sculptures.
Mr. Lee joined her, and she was surprised to smell that he was also a wolf. A gray wolf. She was a red wolf.
“Tibetan wolf,” he offered. “I’m Mr. Lee, and you are Brooke Cerise. You’re the daughter of the late Matt and Irene Cerise and the great-niece of the late Ivy Cerise. My heartfelt condolences for your losses. I knew your parents. Your mother located some Chinese porcelain for me to help fill in the pieces my sister owned and had lost. They were special serving dishes our parents had passed on to her, and she used them for all the holidays. You don’t know how much it meant to her to find some in the same pattern. Your parents gave me a more than reasonable price on them. I am pleased to reciprocate. I sent you the invitation, believing you might be interested in the wolf sculptures. I’m sure you have a greater appreciation for them than others who might wish to buy them.”
“I’d keep them,” she quickly said.
He inclined his head. “Offer me two fifty apiece, and they’re yours.”
“But they’re in the brochure.” At nearly ten times the price, but she didn’t want to mention it if he was willing to give them to her for so much less. What if he changed his mind?
“They should never have been placed in the brochure. They are not part of the estate but mine, so I can sell them for whatever price I see fit.”
Her smile couldn’t have stretched any bigger as they shook on it. “It’s good seeing one of my kind here. I’ll mark them as sold. You can pay at the register. I also have five boxes of stuff stacked over there. Nothing of real importance to most anyone else, but they’re special to me, and since you still own an antique and gift shop, Ms. Cerise, you could probably easily make a little bit of money off the trinkets. They’re mostly antique, but not considered valuable to the big buyer. They’re yours for free.”
“Special to you?” She frowned, not getting his meaning. This was Gulliver’s estate sale.
“Yes. Now that I will no longer be working for Mr. Gulliver, I need to get rid of some of my stuff I’d had at the estate, so I figured I’d do it here at the auction. The money will go to me, rest assured.”
“Thanks.” She was going to decline. The wolf statues were one thing. More boxes of junk? Brooke knew her aunt had plenty of those stacked in spare rooms in the shop.
“I would take them if I were you. You might find something that is valuable to you. You never know about these things until you take the time to discover the truth. I met your great-aunt when she visited. Ms. Cerise was a marvel, but she—how do I say this?—was a free spirit. I fear she might have dealt with some criminal element.”
Brooke frowned at him. “What do you mean?”
“She’s purchased things from all over the world for years, and those she dealt with… Well, she hadn’t been as careful as she used to be. I had learned your great-aunt had a Tibetan urn I might be interested in. I was in the vicinity on business and traveled to Portland to see the urn, and it was just the item I was looking for to give my sister. Ms. Cerise also showed me a couple of antique Chinese vases, but they wouldn’t have suited my sister’s decor. Ms. Cerise confided in me at the time that she’d made a mistake in dealing with some people. She wouldn’t say who for fear I could get in trouble. I was never to mention it to anyone, but since you may have inherited the trouble, I feel obligated to tell you. If anyone from Colombia contacts you to sell you pottery, don’t deal with them.”
“My great-aunt received illegal merchandise from them?”
“No. But since you’ve taken over the shop, they might try to deal with you next.”
“Do you know the names of the people involved?”
“No.”
“Thank you. I appreciate you telling me so I know what to watch out for.” She couldn’t imagine her great-aunt buying stuff from disreputable people. “What will you do after this?”
“Retire. My sister lives alone, and now that I’m no longer living at the estate