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sixteen. “This really isn’t a good time, Aunt Ginny.”
    “No,” she agreed, yanking out a crumpled tissue and swiping her nose. “It’s not.”
    She hiccoughed and the tears escaped, streaking her rouged cheeks.
    “Oh, Virginia,” Leslie patted her arm. “I know.” She lowered her voice to a
    sympathy pitch. “I know.”
    Audra glanced at him one last time before he moved toward the casket. He didn’t
    want to look at his brother. He’d just faced Christian’s wife and he’d certainly not wanted to do that. But this? He swallowed and cleared his throat. This was his little brother, shrouded in cream silk and roses, his lips an unnatural pink, his skin drenched in pancake makeup. It wasn’t right, and it wasn’t fair and it didn’t matter that Jack was a doctor and knew life and death had nothing to do with right and fair.
    Two days ago he’d stood beside his mother as she stroked Christian’s cold cheek
    and told him about the cherry pie she’d baked for him and how she’d bought his favorite horseradish cheese at the deli. Jack’s father grew pastier with each recount and by the time his wife started on about the stuffed pork chops she’d planned for Christian’s welcome home dinner, the old man let out a groan and half limped, half ran from the room.
    Jack stood before the casket now but refused to look at his brother’s face. His
    gaze fell to the hands, clasped together, graceful fingers laced over one another, the gold wedding band glinting love and commitment. Jack squeezed his eyes shut . I’m sorry, Christian. Sorry I ever touched her. Forgive me. God, forgive me.

    ***
Audra slipped through the side door of Gilcrest Funeral Home and leaned against
    the white-washed brick building, heaving in gulps of humid air. The summer heat
    swallowed her with its hot breath making her half wish she’d stayed inside the air conditioned building. But Christian was in there. Her beautiful, dead, husband. And he was in there, too. She’d face hell before she’d spend one extra second in the same room with Jack Wheyton.
    “My heavens, you look like your mother!”
    Audra jumped and swung around. A smallish woman with dark hair stacked six
    inches high peered back at her from pale, gray eyes. Her lips were painted red, her cheeks a fainter rose which matched the shirtwaist dress hanging from her tiny frame. The dress appeared two sizes too big, and gaped at the neck, as though she’d lost weight. Or borrowed the dress. Audra decided on the latter, judging from the white tennis shoes and ankle socks.
    “You’re Corrine’s daughter,” the woman said. “You look just like her.”
    It was not a compliment to look like the town whore. “I’m her daughter.”
    “I know you are.” The woman’s lips slipped into a wide smile. “Audra
    Valentine,” she said, nodding her bird’s-nest head.
    “Actually, it’s Audra Wheyton.”
    “’course it is.” She eyed Audra closely. “Damn awful shame about your husband.
    He was a good boy.”
    “Thank you.”
    “But I always had a soft spot for the other one. He’d make your blood boil up,
    don’t you think?”
    “No,” she blurted out, and then, “I wouldn’t know.”
    “Personal tastes, I guess.” The woman tapped a mauve-chipped nail against her
    chin. “Smoke?” She reached into a side pocket and pulled out a pack of Salems.
    “No thanks.”
    The woman tapped out a cigarette, filched a lighter from her other pocket and
    cupped her hands in a way that reminded Audra of a bird pecking at dinner. She drew a few puffs, blew the smoke in the air and nodded. This went on another thirty seconds or so, puffing, nodding, puffing, nodding.
    “You were a friend of my mother’s?”
    A nod. A puff. Another nod. “You look just like her.” The woman squinted and
    added, “She used to have the same brown hair, too, before she went and peroxided it like Marilyn Monroe.”
    Before she became the town whore. “I see.”
    “I don’t think so, Audra