Party Crashers

sigh. "Trust me—it's 'Hagan.'"
    "Okay." He cleared his throat, then started again. "Gary Hagan was on this earth thirty-six short years. Born in Germany to a U.S. airman, Gary lived the life of a soldier's son."
    Another cell phone rang and Jolie turned to frown at Carlotta, who mouthed, "I'm sorry, I have to get this," and ran out of the room.
    The funeral director looked around the room, then looked back to Jolie. "Do you want me to finish?"
    "Yes." She'd spent hours on that obituary, hoping to come up with seventy-five words that would have pleased Gary, if he were within earshot. She wanted them to be heard. "And then I'd like another song, please."
    He looked over his glasses at her. "You only paid for two songs."
    "Bill me."
    "Okay." He looked back to the sheet of paper. "Where did I leave off? Let's see, Gary Hagan, blah, blah, blah, soldier's son. Ah, here we are: More than anything, Gary liked to make people laugh. He was known as a person who could make things happen. He loved sports, especially the Braves. He was preceded in death by his beloved parents, Alvin and Polly Hagan. He is succeeded by an army of friends." The man glanced over his glasses at the empty chapel, then looked back down. "Then it says here 'Magic of thinking big.'" He squinted at Jolie. "Is that supposed to mean something?"
    "It was his favorite book," she said wistfully. "And I only had four words left."
    The man looked at her as if she were a kook. "Here's your extra song." He flipped the switch, then lumbered back down the aisle.
    Jolie sat perfectly still while the song played—it was the first song again, but she didn't care. She sat unmoving until the vibrations of the last note had died, then pushed to her feet and walked to Gary's casket. She broke off one of the white roses from the casket spray and tucked it inside his jacket pocket.
    "Gary," she murmured, "I'll bet when you got to the Pearly Gates, you had Braves tickets for St. Peter." She smiled, then bit into her lip. "I want you to know that I'm going to try to figure all this out. I don't know what's going to happen, but I know I was never this brave before, so thank you." She inhaled deeply, bringing the scent of live flowers into her lungs, then exhaled and turned to leave.
    A movement in the empty chapel caught her attention. Beck. He was sitting on a rear pew, wearing a suit and tie and a solemn expression.
    She stopped, shot through with anger, remorse, shame. Her only solace was in the fact that he didn't know how much he'd trampled her heart—and why would he even guess that he had in such a few short days? It wouldn't make sense, so she was safe from that ultimate humiliation at least.
    He stood, shoving his hands in his pockets, and Jolie realized that eventually, she was going to have to move forward. She walked toward him and he stepped out into the aisle.
    "I got here a little late," he said, his tone apologetic.
    "Thank you for coming anyway," she said. "Detective Salyers was here, and Carlotta and Hannah. Oh, and Sammy."
    "She left a stack of business cards by the guest book."
    "Sounds like Sammy."
    An awkward pause followed. Beck scratched his temple. "I, uh, was hoping we could talk."
    She angled her head. "About the fact that your sister is in the photo I showed to you? And that you deliberately concealed information that might have helped me in some way?"
    He nodded, pressing his lips together. "You're right, I did conceal that information from you, and I hope you can forgive me for wanting to protect my sister. But I didn't keep the information from the police."
    She blinked. "You didn't?"
    He shook his head. "When I left your place Sunday morning, I picked up Della and we went to talk to Detective Salyers. I convinced Della it would be better if the police knew everything."
    "What's everything?"
    He sighed. "My sister has been in love with Roger LeMon most of her adult life. I don't understand it, but she's blind to the fact that he's not a good guy. They were on and off, on and off. Even after he married Janet, LeMon still called Della. She wouldn't have anything to do with him, but I knew she was still crazy about him."
    "I feel for your sister," Jolie said, "but wouldn't that make her a suspect in Janet LeMon's murder?"
    "It might," he admitted. "Except Della was in a psychiatric clinic in Vermont all summer, up until I got back in town a couple of weeks ago."
    "Oh."
    "Yeah," he said. "As you can imagine, that's not the kind of thing Della