One Wish (Thunder Point #7)(81)

“I live up the coast in a very small quiet town,” Grace told him. “I have someone looking for a place for Mother so I can be on hand, where I can see her every day. I don’t want her to have to go to a hospital.”

“That’s the best way. Most end-stage ALS patients require a great deal of support, but there’s no way to reverse the disease.”

The first order of business was moving a smaller bed into Winnie’s room. Virginia contacted a home health care service and since Winnie didn’t go through insurance or require approval, she arranged to pay top dollar for a couple of experienced nurse’s aides who would start helping out immediately, taking the burden of her personal care off Grace and Virginia.

And Mikhail.

“You’re still here,” Grace observed. “When do you plan to return to your team?”

“I think, much later. They’re in good hands. If they choose other coach, so be it.”

“I’m taking her to Thunder Point as soon as I can,” she reminded him.

“Thunder Point,” he said with a shrug. “Not so bad.”

“Are you planning to stay with her, then?”

“I have nothing so important right now.”

He was the perfect distraction for Winnie. He wasn’t ready to retire, but he wasn’t a young man at sixty-six. “I had no idea Mother meant so much to you,” she said. “All the years you coached me, you ran interference between Mother and me. You’re the one that kept me working and her in line. I didn’t know you loved her.”

“Love? Not the love you know, pupsik. We understand each other. It could be my life closing, not hers. She would not turn me out. Is family. There should be one person who doesn’t hate me on the other side. I’m not long behind her.”

But he was long behind her—he was strong, his health good, and this was a sacrifice for him. He was in demand as a coach, his business was still thriving. She knew he would be missed. She also knew that he could stay a few weeks and go back to his team, currently managed by coaching assistants, and pick up right where he left off. “I’m glad you’re staying awhile. Don’t get underfoot, now. Maybe teach Troy poker or something.”

There was a housekeeper who came in weekdays from eight to five. She was fifty-five, of German descent—the woman who had replaced Mamie. She wasn’t as warm and motherly as Mamie, but that might’ve had more to do with the fact that they didn’t really know each other. She seemed to have a wonderful rapport with Virginia, who was younger by only a few years.

Gretchen didn’t do much housework and only a little cooking. She was the manager of a big house—she hired and supervised a cleaning service, ordered groceries to be delivered and called local restaurants to bring in meals customized to Winnie’s needs. Virginia and Grace met with her in the kitchen and Gretchen was more than happy to stay on after Winnie was moved. After all, it was great pay for far less work.

Meeting her mother’s two lawyers was emotionally exhausting, but not because it was hard work. Just as Grace had suspected, Winnie had been prepared. She’d known for years that this was coming. Everything in the house had been cataloged, photographed and appraised, including jewelry. As for Winnie’s accounts and net worth, it had all been managed and audited—after all, the money was old. It wasn’t as though it was a new job.

Grace met briefly with a Realtor. She wouldn’t make a commitment and even suggested she wasn’t sure what she would do with this property, but she knew exactly what would happen. Whispered feelers would go out and when the time came to sell, there would be an auction. The house was a prime property.

It was all so huge to her. Even flying first-class, going to skate practices in a chauffeured car and owning her own business hadn’t really prepared her for the magnitude of her imminent inheritance.

But as Grace began to understand the full weight of it, she felt Winnie’s stress. It had been a life’s work. “Please don’t worry,” she told her mother. “I won’t let it be abused, stolen or ignored. I promise.”

“But what will you do with it?” Winnie asked.

“Just as you did, Mama. I’ll take very good care of it.”

“And the house and all these possessions?” she asked.

“I want you to be at peace about that. It’s all being guarded and cared for. And later, when you don’t need it anymore, I’ll go through it, claim those things that have sentimental value to both of us and then... Then there will be an estate sale managed by the company you suggested. If it will give you peace of mind, I can meet with them before I go home.”

“Grace, do you have to go home?”

“I have to get a place ready for us,” she said.

She wanted enough space so that when necessary she could stay the night with her mother, but she wasn’t planning to live in the house with her.

“You’ll need money. Virginia has some banking cards for you to sign for your checking account. And when you find that house, I want my bedroom rug, the Aubusson. And the antique dressing table. And the china. Not the expensive china, the Audun Fleur. And there’s silver that was my mother’s—if you don’t want to use it, I understand, but if there’s a granddaughter someday...”

Grace touched her hand. “I might not use some of my grandmother’s and great-grandmother’s treasures, but I promise to keep them in case... There could be daughters one day.”