Corpse Suzette

been stretched over the site, and a ring of folding chairs placed
around it.
    Unfortunately, only those
seated in the chairs were sheltered by the covering. Everyone else had to stand
outside it and be pelted.
    Savannah kept repeating the
mantra, “Hot chocolate. Hot chocolate,” to herself to keep her teeth from
chattering as she studied the small, intimate gathering.
    The elderly woman sitting
nearest the head of the coffin had to be his mother. An elderly and frail
woman, dressed in black with the traditional veil over her face, she wept
softly into a lace handkerchief. The minister seemed to be addressing his
parting words to her alone. Savannah speculated that he might be her minister,
rather than Sergio’s... or Leonard, as he was being called today.
    She appeared to be the only
one genuinely, deeply distressed at Leonard’s untimely passing. Except,
perhaps, for Devon Wright.
    From her spot at the foot
of the grave, Devon was wailing, eyes heavenward in what certainly appeared to
be a display of wrenching, soulful agony. Except for the fact that there didn’t
appear to be a tear in sight.
    Directly behind her stood
her son, the little boy that Savannah and Dirk had seen that night at her
house. He was just far enough outside the canopy to receive absolutely none of
its protection and he was being soaked to the skin. Shivering violently, he was
staring at his mother in alarm.
    It took all the
self-control Savannah could muster not to go grab the boy and rescue him from
the scene. The kid didn’t need to be standing in a cold rain at the funeral of
some guy who was nothing more than his nitwit mother’s Bang of the Month. The
boy needed some hugs, a change of warm, dry clothes, and a hot fudge sundae
with a cherry on the top.
    At least, according to
Basic Savannah Reid Child-Rearing 101.
    In the crowd, someone else
was watching the interplay between Devon and her boy. It was Dr. Yasmina La Rue
who watched for a moment, then locked eyes with Savannah and shook her head
sadly.
    Savannah thought of what
Dr. La Rue had said—that Devon needed to love herself more so that she could
love those around her.
    Savannah supposed that was
true. But she also decided that Yasmina was a better person than she was. The
good doctor saw Devon as a lost soul who needed to find herself, someone who
needed to be loved, understood, and upheld.
    But Savannah was just as
quick to admit she, personally, just wasn’t that virtuous. She’d much prefer to
just push Devon Wright off the end of the San Carmelita pier and find out later
whether she could swim or not.
    She decided to pray about
it and ask the Lord to make her a better, more loving, understanding, and
tolerant person. But she’d prayed that quite a few times before and hadn’t
noticed any great changes in her personality. So she wasn’t overly optimistic
that it would take this time either.
    Jeremy Lawrence stood about
twenty feet away from them, wearing a somber, dove-gray suit and an even more
somber expression on his handsome face. He was holding an oversized umbrella,
trying to keep himself and Myrna Cooper dry. She stood stoically beside him,
clinging to his arm. And for all of the water soaking the lower halves of their
bodies, neither of them had even a hint of moisture in their eyes.
    From time to time Myrna
shot an angry, hurt look at a man who sat beside the coffin under the canopy.
The object of her disdain looked to be in his early fifties. A relatively
handsome man, he was holding the hand of a woman young enough to be his
daughter, but who bore no resemblance.
    Savannah would have bet her
detective agency’s petty cash that the guy was Myrna’s former honey who had
dumped her for a younger woman after she had paid for his face-lift.
    And she didn’t blame Myrna
for the nasty looks either. If a guy had done that to her, he wouldn’t
have been able to walk straight for months, and the last thing he’d need was
another girlfriend.
    Behind them, Nurse Bridget
stood quietly, clutching a rosary, her head bowed and eyes closed. She was
mumbling under her breath. Next to her stood a man, who had one arm around her
shoulders and held in his other arm a little girl who looked exactly like
Bridget.
    A few other faces were
vaguely familiar to Savannah, employees of Emerge, like the maid who had
discovered the deceased’s body, a young woman who had been Abigail’s hair
stylist and another who had been introduced to Savannah earlier as the