The Secret Lives of Doctors' Wives

“Go to work as usual. Since you weren’t in his life on a regular basis before his death, I wouldn’t go to the service. Oh, and watch your mouth from now on. And I’d avoid reading the papers.”

How could she act like she wasn’t involved, when she was? Pierce had deliberately drawn her into his life again. Why? Had he been afraid? Had he known who was in the next bedroom? Had he known he was in danger? Had he been protecting her? Himself? Or had he really wanted her? Was that why he’d been so angry when she’d accused him of using her in his marriage battles?

When Joe pushed back his chair, she got up silently.

He came around the desk and took her hand. She felt lighter, somehow, after talking to him. It was as if she’d seen a priest and confessed.

Her relief was unwarranted. So far, he’d done nothing but listen. But then the most important emotions in people’s lives were often based on illusions, like her messy relationship with Pierce.

She let Joe pat her hand even though she wanted to yank it away. “You tell Yolie I said hello, you hear? And call me first thing when Detective Nash contacts you.”

“You really think he’ll—”

“With any luck he’s got the murder weapon and the murderer behind bars as we speak.”

“But if he doesn’t—”

“Sooner or later he’ll send a man with a badge to knock on your door. When he does—”

“Rule number one,” she replied meekly, even as she wondered if she should wear gold beads to Pierce’s memorial service.

No, severe white cuffs against black would have just the right stark touch; as would her two-carat, fake-diamond ring. No way could she appear ringless around all his ex-wives, who had so many carats they could barely lift their hands.

“If only all the rest of my clients were as obedient as you,” Joe said.

She smiled, and he grinned as if he was very pleased with himself.

No sooner had Rosie stepped out of the firm’s offices than she was rethinking Benson’s advice.

Not go? She’d never forgive herself if she didn’t go to Pierce’s service.

Rosie was shaking her head back and forth as she observed Yolie’s reflection.

“Okay, sweetie. You win.” Yolie looked glum as she replaced her red frilly dress in the closet and pulled out a sober black one.

“Good decision,” Rosie said. “You did say that, in situations like this, appearances are everything.”

Yolie’s scowl deepened at being bested with her own words. She looked very cross indeed as she unzipped the more conservative choice and stepped into it.

“Happy? I look like a nun now,” she growled as she turned toward Rosie. “A F-A-T nun. I wish you’d be as smart as me and do what Joe told you to do.”

“I don’t see why I shouldn’t go to Pierce’s memorial service. I was engaged to him!”

“Not something to brag about, sweetie! And it’s just too damn bad for you everybody in this burg knows it.”

“And I was there at his house right before—”

“That’s the point! Nobody is supposed to suspect that, you obsessed idiot! You need to lie low. Book a session with Nan or maybe catch a movie.”

Rosie guessed now wasn’t the time to confess she’d just canceled her session with Nan because it conflicted with Pierce’s service. And she didn’t plan to make any more appointments, either.

Where had therapy gotten her, anyway? She was forty, single, a slumlord, and now possibly a murder suspect. It was time she realized she was a grown-up in the big, bad world, time to come to grips with the fact she had to fly solo.

“I want to know who killed him. I feel…like since I was there, I’m somehow responsible. Maybe I should have looked around downstairs. Maybe I could have prevented—”

“And what if you had? Then you’d be in a cardboard box today, about to be sprinkled on your favorite mountaintop, too.”

“You could have a small point,” Rosie conceded.

“So, let’s look at this from the bright side. You got what you wanted. He’s dead. So, forget about him. And quit reading all those newspaper stories.”

“I have this feeling I’ve missed something, and that I should make it right.”

“Let it go. Let him go. Use that overdose of compassion and curiosity you were born with on your patients. Folks who stick long noses into hot flames get nose hairs singed.”

“Right,” Rosie said, looking down at her watch. “But if you don’t hurry, we’ll be late.”

“You’re still going? Did you hear anything I said?”

When she straightened and began buttoning the white cuffs of her black dress, Yolie let out a howl. “Lady Long-nose, you bought a new dress! You did!”

Fortunately, Darius and Todd honked from the drive just then, distracting her. Yolie raised the window and hollered down to them to hold their horses, she’d come when she was damn well ready.

“So, you finally convinced them to go,” Rosie said.

“Not easy, let me tell you. They’re as hardheaded as their father. Would you button my neck?” As she turned her back to Rosie, Yolie began spritzing her golden hair so that it stood on end. “Pierce was hardly the saintly father the papers made him out to be. But how would it look if his sons didn’t go?”

She picked up her purse and scooted out the door. “There’s nothing like death to turn us into hypocrites, is there? I’ll be so glad when this is over and I can quit pretending I’m a grieving ex-wife. Weird role, isn’t it?”

Over? Rosie’s temples grew hot as a weird sensation of panic swamped her. Feeling hopeless, she trailed Yolie down the stairs.

When would it be over—for her?

Seven

The chapel was a grandiose, high-ceilinged room with tall stained-glass windows on all the walls. A floodlight shone down on the altar and the golden urn that contained Pierce’s ashes.

Oh, my God! Was that Mirabella Camrett, her next-door neighbor, in the very front row? Had she even known Pierce?

Oh, no. She was turning around!

Zippy lyrics of a contemporary Christian song seemed to roar in the sanctuary as Rosie ducked behind Todd and Yolie, who were threading their way down the aisle, through the throngs of people and extra chairs that had been crammed at the ends of each pew.

A little more than a year ago Rosie had attended this church with Pierce on the Sundays he hadn’t been on call. They were to have been married here. Instead she’d hacked her wedding cake to pieces and had chased him around with fistfuls of icing and a knife.

She’d forgotten all about that until now.

A knife. The memory brought a shudder.