Chapter Three

Cal was felt good about his rendezvous with Tansy until he was almost home. Before Bitsy’s blow-up about the car, he’d never thought about having sex elsewhere then going home to her. It wasn’t about loving any other woman. It was all the sex.

But after he’d walked out on their anniversary, he’d screwed himself sideways with her, and the uncertainty of which incarnation she’d be inhabiting when he got home was just the tiniest bit worrisome. He parked beside her car then sat a moment, staring at the front door and started psyching himself up.

“I’m the man of that house. I put food on the table, and I pay the bills. She doesn’t get to call the shots! She owes me!”

He got out of his truck and headed to the house with purpose in every step. He slammed the door behind him as he walked in.

Within seconds, she appeared in the doorway with a knife in her hand and a look of disbelief on her face, and Cal crumbled like a dry biscuit.

“Sorry. I guess the wind caught it.”

“There hasn’t been a breeze all day. Supper’s ready.”

“Uh . . . right . . . I’ll just get out of these work clothes first.”

She laughed, but somehow it didn’t feel friendly. “I swan, Calvin. You sit at a desk. Your clothes are fine. Just wash up and come eat while it’s hot.”

He bolted for the bedroom then wondered if she’d locked him out. But the knob turned, and then he was inside. He sniffed his clothes and rolled his eyes. They smelled like Tansy’s perfume.

All he could do was fight fire with fire, spritzed himself with his manly cologne, then washed up. When he went back to the table, his face was washed, his hair combed, and he was ready to take back his house.

The moment Cal took a seat, the scent of his Ralph Lauren Polo Blue became an assault on the aroma of the food Bitsy had cooked.

She said nothing, but suspected a lot, and when she passed behind his chair with the tureen of chicken and dumplings and saw the bite mark on the back of his neck, the urge to pour it in his lap was so strong, it made her shake.

But she could hear her mama’s voice. Waste not, want not, and carried it to the table instead. She smiled sweetly as she sat.

“Help yourself,” she said.

He frowned. “You don’t want to bless the food?”

“I’m taking a break from piety, right now,”

she said, and served herself from the bowl of peas and carrots, while Cal dipped into the tureen.

Their plates were filled, and they’d had their first bites. Cal was reaching for the salt when Bitsy sniffed the air like a hunting dog trying to lock onto a scent.

“Hon, I think your cologne has gone bad. It smells a little like a fifty-dollar tart waiting for her next fuck.”

Cal gasped. “Bitsy Yarbrough! I have never heard that word come out of your mouth before.”

She shrugged. “I’ve said it plenty of times. Just not while you were around. We all have our little secrets. I’ll bet you do things I don’t know about, too, but it hasn’t killed us yet. Anyway, the point being . . . your cologne is off. I can take it back to the department store next time I go to Jackson and get you a new bottle.”

“I’ll deal with it myself next time I go that way,” he said.

She picked up the bowl of veggies. “Peas and carrots?”

“What? Oh . . . yes, sure,”

he said, and served himself a helping.

It was the longest, most uncomfortable meal he’d ever eaten with her. Clearly, she wasn’t over his late-night bar stunt. It would probably be helpful if that mark was no longer in the middle of his forehead as a reminder.

“Do we have dessert?”

Cal asked.

“No. I spent half the day at the clothes closet at the church, sorting donations and mending clothes, then I had to pick up chicken feed and groceries. I was too tired and hot to think about baking. What did you do today? Did any disasters come your way?”

He shook his head. “It was all desk work today, making final reports for the home office.”

“Then while I’m cleaning up here, I would appreciate it if you would make sure the laying hens are put up for the night and have water.”

He got up from the table and went out the back door, while she began putting up the leftovers and loading the dishwasher.

By the time Calvin came back, she had the kitchen cleaned and was sweeping the floor.

“I’m going to take a shower,” he said.

She just nodded and kept sweeping, knowing he’d never see that bite mark on the back of his neck unless somebody told him, and that would likely happen tomorrow, when he went back to work.

She was embarrassed to call him husband with that brand in the middle of his forehead and a hickey bite on the back of his neck. As far as Bitsy was concerned, he’d just dulled all the shine she’d ever seen in him, and there weren’t enough apologies this side of heaven to make it better.

**

The shower was steamy by the time Cal stepped in. He started with shampoo and then scrubbed himself from head to toe, removing all of the fifty-dollar tart, before getting out.

He was drying off in front of the mirror, as always, admiring his fine physique and sizeable manhood, when he saw a huge hickey just above his belly button. His heart started to pound, and there was a knot in his belly going to war with the dumplings.

If Bitsy saw this, he was done for. Now he wished he was still locked out of their bedroom. He always slept in the nude. She’d know something was up if he didn’t. How the hell was he going to get out of this?

He put on a pair of shorts and a T-shirt, stepped into a pair of flip-flops, then snagged a beer and went out onto the back porch for a little privacy.

Bitsy had carried a bowl of vegetable peelings out to the chickens and was on her way back when she saw Cal come out on the back porch with his phone and a beer. His phone began ringing as he sat, and he was laughing by the time she came up the steps. She passed him without a word and went inside. She was halfway to the kitchen when she made a U-turn and went back to the window behind him. Never in her life had she eavesdropped on her husband, but circumstances changed, and this was about the fight of her life.

She leaned in, listening to his side of the conversation.

“Not for a couple of days.”

Then there was a pause before he spoke again. “Not at your place.”

A pause. “She said what?” Pause. “Blind to the boundaries of others? What does that even mean?” Pause. “Probably nothing.”

Still clutching the empty bowl, Bitsy backed away and carried it to the kitchen, put it in the dishwasher, and started it up. Her ears were ringing. She felt faint. Finding inanimate clues was one thing. Hearing that conversation was a physical pain. She knew who he was talking to—JoJo Walker!

She needed not to be looking at him when he came back inside. She wasn’t sure she could control what she felt. Fisher told her to act as if everything was normal, but that would never include having sex with her husband again. She wasn’t sure how this was going to play out, but she needed a reason that didn’t make him suspicious.

And then fate intervened in the form of a blast so loud it rattled the windows.

Bitsy thought it was thunder, but when Cal came flying back into the house with a wild-eyed look on his face, she guessed she was wrong.

“What was that?”

she cried.

“Explosion. Somewhere between here and Lone Bridge.”

“Lord. That will set the laying hens back a week. I may be buying eggs in town for a bit,” she said.

But Cal was already playing into the escape plan that had just landed in his lap. “It looks like it’s somewhere between here and town. There’s already smoke rising. I have to change clothes and get to the site. It may involve one of our insured. Stay inside. If it’s something toxic in the air, I’ll let you know in case there’s an evacuation notice.”

“For pity’s sake, Calvin. You should wait until someone calls you. You’re already wearing a brand between your eyes from a simple trip to the bar. Lord knows what you’ll get into out there. Whatever’s happening, they won’t be needing their insurance adjustor right now.”

Cal knew she was right, but this gave him the reason he needed to be AWOL at bedtime.

“I’ll be fine. Don’t wait up, but I have my phone. Call if you get worried.”

She bit her tongue to keep from saying what she was thinking, but being worried about him was the last thing on her mind. He was flirting with danger on his dime. She shrugged and went to the living room to turn on the television as he ran to change clothes.

A few minutes later, he came hurrying back through the house. “I’m leaving now,” he said.

She looked up. “Yes, I can see that. And if you set yourself on fire, don’t blame me. I already told you what I think about this decision.”

“Yes, well . . . take care,” he said.

“Unless I fall off the sofa, I should be fine,”

she drawled, and upped the volume on the TV.

It wasn’t her usual sendoff, but then Bitsy wasn’t her usual self, so he didn’t think much about it. He bolted out the door, leaving her to get up and lock it after him. And as soon as she saw him on the blacktop, she went to their bedroom and began going through the clothes he’d just removed, looking for clues.

Besides the reek of perfume mixed with cologne, she noticed two missing buttons on the front of his shirt.

“Tore that right off him, didn’t you, bitch?”

There was no way in hell she was sleeping with that smell and took everything he’d just put in the laundry basket straight to the washing machine. Some laundry soap would take care of the smell, and the hot water cycle should shrink up that shirt just fine.

She started it to washing, then went to get her sewing box. She was going to need two small buttons to replace the ones missing. Preferably something pink and pearly.

**

Cal drove like a madman, using the rising smoke ahead as a beacon, and the closer he got, the more certain he became that it was closer to the river than the blacktop. As he sailed past JoJo’s house, he saw her in the yard, eyeing the rising smoke, and he honked at her.

She flashed a big smile and waved.

The closer he got to the smoke, the more he noticed the increase in traffic. Probably lots of curious looky-loos, he thought, and never considered that he was one of them. It wasn’t until he got to a section line road directly north of the smoke, that he realized who lived down there.

It was the old Turner place. It had been empty for years, but gossip was that it had become a meth house. And if that was true, then it was quite likely some meth heads had just blown up their own lab. At that point, he made a knee-jerk decision to keep driving and glean gossip in Lone Bridge, instead.

As he drove down the main drag, he noticed lights on inside his office, and so, he drove around to the back and went inside.

His boss, Paul Sullivan, was at his desk with a headset on, talking on the phone at the same time he was pulling up info on his computer.

When Cal walked into his line of vision, he gave him a thumbs up and waved him over, still talking to someone on the other line.

“Yes, ma’am, we’re just learning of this. Yes, ma’am, your policy is still valid. No, ma’am, it is not our responsibility to oversee squatters. That is all in the homeowner’s realm. You’ll have to speak to the county sheriff about that. No ma’am, it would not be advisable to come to the site. It’s near nightfall. They will be trying to put out fires and remove bodies. You need to get clearance from the sheriff, like I said. When we’re cleared to photograph the scene, we will do so. But that’s not happening until we also get clearance. Yes, ma’am, you’re welcome. We’ll be in touch.”

Paul disconnected, then pulled his headset off and leaned back in his chair. “I’m a little surprised to see you, but kudos for thinking you might be needed. That was Eliza Turner, the great-granddaughter and present owner of old man Turner’s property. Somebody already called her and told her what happened.”

“I guessed that’s where the explosion happened. Do you know details?”

Cal asked.

“Not really, but I suspect a meth lab just blew up what was left of that old plantation house. In its day, it was grand low-country style architecture. Right now, they’re trying to put out the fire. Then they’ll have to dig through the debris for bodies, and you know they’ll find them. Empty houses with no functioning utilities do not blow up without some fool lighting a fuse, accident or not.”

“So, let me know when it’s cleared, and I’ll get some photos. Do we even have anything for comparison?”

Cal asked.

“That’s what I was looking for,”

Paul said. “The most recent photos were taken three years ago when the policy was renewed as a vacant home policy. It didn’t look so great then, but it has an insured value, so we’ll have to go by that. Don’t worry about it tonight. Go home. We’ll talk again tomorrow.”

“Yes, sir,”

Cal said, and left the way he’d come.

It was too soon to go home, but he wasn’t going to the bar. The last time he’d done that, he’d made it home but hadn’t got past the hall and had slept on the floor all night.

What he needed this go-round was to get close enough to the scene to get all smoky, then go home and claim to be emotionally wrought about what he’d seen, and sleep on the couch.

**

Fisher was already in for the night when he heard the explosion. It wasn’t long after that when his tracker signaled Calvin Yarbrough was on the move. He knew the man was an insurance adjustor, but Fisher’s job was to keep track of Cal, so he sat a few moments to see which way Cal went and realized he was headed into town. Fisher sat in his driveway, watching the blip until he realized Cal had had gone to the office.

Fisher started the car, then he drove to the same place he’d waited before and got there in time to see Cal driving away. He followed, only to end up in the traffic coming and going from the scene of the explosion.

When he saw Cal stop on the side of the highway and get out, Fisher wondered what the hell the man was doing. He glanced in the rearview mirror as he drove past and saw Cal getting into the back of his truck bed to watch the orange glow on the horizon.

Fisher parked farther down on the side of the highway to keep an eye on Cal’s next move, and after about fifteen minutes, he saw Cal get back in his truck, drive right past where Fisher had parked, and then he drove home.

Satisfied that Cal had not planned to double-dip, Fisher turned around and went home. As he walked into his house, he noticed how smokey his clothes smelled, stripped, and showered.

Later, as he was going to bed, he thought about how smokey Cal’s clothes must have been sitting out in the open like he had for so long, and guessed Bitsy would not be appreciating the scent of smoked jackass.

**

But Cal’s arrival didn’t go as planned. The lie he’d cooked up and his elaborate plan to back it had all been for nothing. The house was dark, but for a light Bitsy had left on in the hall, and she was in her nightgown, curled up asleep on the sofa. He quietly locked up and went to the laundry, stripped off his smoky clothes, left them on the floor, and went to take another shower.

Just before he came out, he turned off the bathroom light in case she’d moved herself to the bed, but it was still empty. In all the fifteen years they’d been married, except for a couple of out-of-town work trips—and sleeping passed out in the floor the other night—he’d never gone to bed without her.

As he crawled between the covers and turned over onto his side, the sight of her empty pillow tugged at his heart. He wanted their old life back. The one where he cheated on her in the day and slept with her through the night.

**

Bitsy had pretended to be sleeping, and it had worked. She’d smelled the smoke on his clothing when he came in the house and guessed he had actually done what he’d said. But it wasn’t a get-out-of-jail-free card; it just saved her from a night together in their bed.

And when morning came, she woke up to smokey clothes in the laundry room floor. She calmly dropped them in the laundry basket and reminded herself that the day was coming when she would never have to pick up after him again. She went back to the kitchen to start the coffee and then to the bedroom to get dressed.

As she opened the bedroom door, she could hear Cal in the bathroom and guessed he was shaving. It was enough time for her to change and get out before he emerged. She dressed in their walk-in closet faster than she’d ever dressed before and was back in the kitchen, standing at the kitchen counter eating a bowl of cold cereal, and watching TV when he strolled in.

“Meth lab, wasn’t it?” she said.

He blinked. “How did you know?”

She pointed at the TV airing the local news. “Coffee’s made. Help yourself to cereal.”

He frowned. She was furnishing food, but she wasn’t handing to him ready to eat like she used to. He poured himself a cup of coffee then sat down and fixed his cereal. Just a little bit of milk. He didn’t like the cereal to float. As he ate, he watched the broadcast with her.

When the show went to commercial, he spoke up. “We have that property insured. Once they’ve cleared the site, I’ll have to go take pictures.”

She glanced up. “Of what? Surely, there’s nothing left but a big hole and burned spot.”

He frowned. “Well, I still have to do it.”

“Wear old clothes when you do. If you come home smelling like a meth lab, I’ll be setting fire to those clothes.”

“Jesus, Bitsy! What’s got into you?”

She blinked, then looked up and smiled. “Bless your heart, Calvin. I’m just conversating. Oh . . . my book club is this afternoon. I’ll be gone for a couple of hours.”

He looked up. She’d said, “Bless your heart,”

and now she was giving notice she’d be absent from the house.

“Who’s hosting this time?” he asked.

“I’ll have to check our calendar, but I think it’s JoJo’s turn.”

“The JoJo Walker who lives two miles up the road?”

Bitsy laughed. “Yes, that JoJo Walker. Surely to God there aren’t two of them?”

“Well, no, that’s not what I meant, I just didn’t know she was part of your book club,” he said.

She shrugged. “I’ve been going to book club for five years. You never asked about it before.”

“I guess I didn’t think what it meant,” he said.

“It means me and seven other women read the same book and get together and talk about it. Then the next month, we pick a different one to read and do it all over again.”

“So, what do y’all talk about at those meetings?” he asked.

Bitsy gave him a strange look. “Are you even listening to me? I just told you. We talk about the book. This meeting, we’ll be talking about a book called The Broke-Ass Women’s Club . The genre is women’s fiction, and the author’s name is Sharon Sala. She’s a writer from Oklahoma. We’ve read other books by her as well in the past few years. This story is about four women who find out after they are notified of their husband’s death, that they were all married to the same man—a bigamist who had been stealing their money and lying to all four of them. The story tells how they come together to save themselves after he destroyed their lives. There are some really great scenes in that book. One very memorable one is when all four of the women meet up for the first time at the funeral home. They’re so mad at him by this time that no one wants to claim his body, so the legal wife just tells the funeral director to nuke him and throw the ashes away.”

Calvin’s eyes went wide from shock. His mouth fell slightly agape. A Rice Krispy was hanging in the corner of it, and Bitsy wondered if it was going to fall in his lap, or if he’d finally eat it.

“Good Lord! What the hell kind of a book is that?”

he mumbled.

She laughed. “It’s very pertinent to the way life is these days. You never know who you can trust, you know? In the book, the four women become great friends and recover together from what he stole from them. It’s the perfect climax, after being screwed three ways to Sunday by a conman.”

“Well . . . I guess . . . if that’s what turns you on,”

he muttered.

Bitsy leaned forward. “I like to read, Calvin. It’s a pleasure to get lost in a story. And it’s a gift to find writers who can give that to you. When you’re out and about, other than getting drunk at the bar, what turns you on?”

His face flushed. He stood abruptly and glanced at the clock.

“I’m going to be late. Have fun at your meeting,” he said.

“Thank you ever so much. I surely will,”

she said, and watched him walk out of the house with that Rice Krispy sticking ever tighter to the corner of his mouth.

Then she waited until he was driving away before she called him.

“Hello?” he said.

“You left so abruptly I didn’t have a chance to tell you . . . you have a Rice Krispy stuck in the corner of your mouth, so check yourself. It’s my job to make you presentable to the world.”

She hung up and grinned.

Cal ran his hand over his mouth, felt the cereal hanging from his mouth, and brushed it off. He was immediately pissed off that she’d sat there talking to him, saw it, and said nothing.

She’d turned all weird. He didn’t know what was going on, but he didn’t know how to take her anymore.

**

Fisher had already showered and shaved, but he was still barefoot and sitting in the kitchen in a pair of jeans, having toast and coffee, with an eye on the TV, as well as the tracker app on his phone. He glanced down at his chest, frowning at the toast crumbs on his six-pack abs, then brushed off the crumbs before reaching for his t-shirt and pulling it over his head.

He knew Cal would be leaving for work, and when the blip on the screen began to move, he watched Cal leave his property, drive into Lone Bridge, and then park behind his office.

Satisfied with Cal’s status, he put Kielbasa with sliced onions and Bell peppers into a slow cooker on low, and he then began researching the locations of the other motels on the list of ink pens Bitsy had recovered. Next, he ran a background check on Calvin and found out he had a sealed juvie record from before he’d moved to Lone Bridge.

So, the star quarterback from high school wasn’t as squeaky clean as one might have expected. However, he had a clear record as an adult, which may or may not have proved that he had learned at least one lesson. He’d just shifted from stealing things to cheating on women.

“Class act, dude,”

Fisher muttered, and kept on working.

**

JoJo Walker had spent most of yesterday cleaning for the book club meeting this afternoon and was on her way into town this morning to pick up some goodies at the supermarket deli. Unlike most southern ladies, JoJo did not bake and was only a passable cook. She’d always considered it her own private joke that she and Bitsy shared the same man, the same charity work at the Baptist Clothes Closet, and membership in the same book club. It was the curse of living in a small town, and no small miracle that she and Cal had not been found out.

What JoJo didn’t know was that she wasn’t the only one. She didn’t know about Cal and Tansy, and Tansy didn’t know about Cal and JoJo, and Sue Ritter, the local librarian, didn’t know about either of them.

As JoJo drove into Lone Bridge, she eyed the door into the insurance agency and sighed knowing Cal was so close, and yet for her, so far away. That man was her sin to live down, but she wasn’t doing much to stop it. He was too good at sex, and it was too hard to say no to heaven on a mattress.

She parked at the supermarket and hurried inside. The day was getting hotter, and she needed to get home where it was cool before her hair fell flat. She needed height in her hair to draw attention from the unfortunate shape of her face. On a good hair day, her chin didn’t look so square. On a bad hair day, her whole face looked a little squished, like the last burger bun in the bag.

She went straight to the bakery, picked out tartlets and cookies as well as a small tray of fresh fruits, then she checked out and hurried home. She had a new summer outfit she’d been dying to wear. Bitsy Yarbrough always looked so cute and put together without even trying, but just once, JoJo wanted to outshine her. Today might just be the day.

**

Bitsy had an early lunch before the book club. JoJo always served sweets, and Bitsy wanted a bit of something substantial first and had chosen leftover pasta salad, with a piece of fried ham from their supper a couple of nights ago.

As she forked a piece of ham, it dawned on her that when she’d cooked and served this, she’d been the happiest little wife ever. Clearly, her leftovers were better than her marriage.

She kept reminding herself it wasn’t the end of the world. It wasn’t even the end of her. She had a wrong to make right, and there was justice to be had. She’d cry when it was over.

After she ate, she went to the bedroom, took off her housedress, and stood in their closet eyeing her wardrobe, trying to decide what to wear, and thinking, How does one dress to outshine a whore?

Flashier? Classier?

Wearing the family pearls?

Or letting the diamonds on her left hand speak for themselves?

Hair up? Hair loose and sexy?

Décolletage prim or trashy?

Then she spied the perfect outfit and reached for her pink denim shorts, the ones in a bib overall style, and chose a white camisole to wear under them. She dressed where she stood, then reached for her white sneakers and carried them into the bedroom, got a pair of white anklets with a lacy edge from the chest of drawers, and turned to face the full-length mirror.

Almost there.

She went to the bathroom, brushed her hair to a shine, and then put it up in a ponytail on the top of her head, dabbed on a tiny bit of mascara to her already thick lashes and a lipstick called Pretty in Pink, then went back to the mirror and saw herself as she’d looked ten years ago—still fit and tan, boobs still standing at attention, and not a wiggle of flab on her arms or legs.

She traded her usual purse for a little white shoulder bag and called it done.

Now she was ready to go to the book club meeting. She picked up her copy of The Broke-Ass Women’s Club as she passed through the living room and locked the door behind her as she left, but it wasn’t until she thought about where she was going that her heart skipped a beat. She was heading for enemy territory unarmed, with nothing but her tongue and wit. She had to make this count for something without giving herself away.

Then a calm washed over her, and for a heartbeat, she felt as if her mama was riding shotgun beside her.

“Yes, Mama, I know. Never let them see you cry.”

**

JoJo was playing hostess to the hilt, keeping the snacks and conversation lively, while waiting for their last member to arrive. She’d spent a lot of time on the preparation, and had chosen to wear her new floral turquoise and yellow silk lounging pajamas to make a statement. Even her sprayed-to-helmet-worthy hair was cooperating.

“I swear, I don’t know what’s keeping Bitsy,”

she said, and then Connie Parmeter looked out the window and pointed.

“Oh, there she comes now, and I just love her new car, don’t you?” she said.

“Yes. I saw it the other day when we were doing Clothes Closet stuff at church,”

JoJo said, and went to the door. She opened it just as Bitsy was coming up the steps with the book clutched to her chest and her little white purse swinging at her hip.

“Oh gosh! Looks like I’m the last hen in the pen,”

Bitsy said. “Thank you, JoJo. It’s like a sauna outside today. Feels good to be inside where it’s cool.”

And just like that, JoJo felt like the guest at the party who hadn’t gotten the notice about casual dress. Damn Bitsy Yarbrough forever for still looking like she’s twenty-five! And then JoJo flashed her best smile and waved her arm toward the buffet.

“You know the drill, Bitsy. Help yourself and find a seat,”

JoJo said, while every other woman in the room began exclaiming over what the little bitch was wearing.

Bitsy had not missed seeing the same kind and color of blue pop-off nails on JoJo’s fingers that she’d plucked off Calvin’s tighty-whities, and was, at the moment, resisting the urge to bitch-slap her into the next county. Instead, Bitsy smiled her sweetest. “Is this chair taken?”

“All yours,”

JoJo said.

Bitsy dropped her purse and book beside the chair and then headed for the buffet with her ponytail swinging, chatting with the others as she chose fruit and a cookie. Instead of the punch in the elaborate punch bowl, she chose bottled water and went back to her seat, while JoJo watched from across the room.

She wanted to hate Bitsy, but there was no basis for it other than she wanted Bitsy’s man—all of him. Not just the hit and miss sex they had in secret. She needed a reason to justify what she was doing, but there wasn’t one. Her mama always told her she wouldn’t amount to a hill of beans. So, she sighed, grabbed a cookie and napkin to add to her little plate of fruit, and found herself a place to sit.

Rita Dubois, their book club leader, clapped her hands to get everyone’s attention. “Ladies, this meeting of the Lone Bridge Book Club is called to order. Has everyone read our book of the month?”

“Yes,”

they echoed.

“Wonderful,”

Rita said. “The floor is open for comments. Did you like it, and if so, what did you like about it? Were there scenes in the story you identified with? What was your takeaway? Anyone?”

The first comment came from JoJo, and it was about the bigamist.

“I will say, it’s the first time I’ve read a book where one of the lead characters was killed in the first few pages and yet stayed a main protagonist throughout the story,”

JoJo said. “I couldn’t decide if he was a horrible conman, or a lonely man who created the family for himself he never had.”

“He wasn’t too lonely to lie to them and steal their money,”

Bitsy said. “I had a lot of favorite scenes in that book, but the four widows meeting at the funeral home almost felt real. I forgot it was just a story, and I was already worrying about their situation when they met. The surprise was how Janie opened her heart and her home to them. When she told the funeral director to nuke his body and throw away the ashes, I thought, that’s my kind of woman!”

“I loved that scene on the Fourth of July, when they were all on the back porch singing along with the music, and how the author kept giving us moments with each woman, showing how they struggled with the hate they felt for someone they’d loved. It was real, y’all,”

Sandy Loveless said.

“I’d never forgive that,”

Bitsy said. “I wouldn’t waste my tears. I’d be out for revenge. In the book, their revenge was surviving in spite of what he’d done, and with Janie giving them a place to live, they found their footing and thrived.”

“What about when they discovered all those boxes in the attic? One for each woman he’d scammed. I never saw that coming,”

Lilah Marshall said. “And what Gretchen found out when she went through hers! Now that was revenge on a whole other level with her first husband . . . the one who basically sold her to the bigamist to get out of paying alimony.”

They all had opinions and weren’t shy about sharing them, but JoJo had seen a side of Bitsy she wouldn’t have known existed. Bitsy’s world was black and white. A kind of “betray me and you pay”

mindset, which was a revelation for JoJo.

Every time she and Cal had their little rendezvous, they were playing Russian Roulette with their own welfare. Bitsy Yarbrough wasn’t all sweet smiles and fluff. One might even consider messing with that woman could be dangerous.