He’s also my business partner. He kept his watch collection with me since his wife doesn’t allow him to buy watches and made me promise not to ever tell his wife about them. Not only because she doesn’t like it but also because she will definitely ask him to sell them and probably spend the money on clothes and traveling like she often does.
He lets me use the watches in the condition that I don’t cause any damage. But now that he passed away it doesn’t feel right any more.
His watch collection is worth about 200K$ in todays market. I think the lawful and ethical thing to do is to break the promise and tell his wife but I’m not sure that’s the right thing to do since he made me promise not to tell her.
If you came in here for an answer, it’s clear: give the watches to your friend’s wife. There’s absolutely zero doubt about it and keeping them would be theft and a complete insult to a woman who has already lost a lot.
If you came in here for permission to keep them: don’t. It’s not your fucking job to police how she spends her money.
But it was his money and he made it clear that he didn’t like the way she was spending his money based on OPs post.