Party Crashers

both."
    "And the Dior sandals?" Jolie encouraged.
    "Sure, why not?"
    Jolie nodded with approval, scooped up the boxes, and trotted to the checkout counter before the girl could change her mind. Michael eyed the three boxes in her hands with an arched brow. "You're catching on," he murmured. "You just might last after all."
    "He says again on my last day."
    "Jolie, I understand why you're going back to your old job, but it's not going to be nearly as exciting around here without you."
    "It's not my old job," Jolie declared. "I'll be a partner." She smiled at him over her shoulder. "Someday maybe I'll be able to afford to buy a pair of shoes from you."
    But Michael's remark rankled Jolie. Returning to the Sanders Agency felt as if she were taking a step backward. Not in pay, of course, but in life experience. Still, she would be secure...and alive. That was important, considering that just a few days ago her prognosis for living had not been encouraging.
    She rang up the sale and thanked the customer, then glanced around the showroom, a little wistful about leaving after only two weeks.
    The most eventful two weeks of her life. Leann had been charged with various and sundry crimes ranging from arson to murder to trespassing, but was already enjoying a nicely padded room at a psychiatric facility just outside of Atlanta. According to her sister Rebecca, Leann had suffered a lifelong history of mental instability, and the pregnancy had only exacerbated matters. Leann had told the police that after Gary disappeared, she was sure he was going to join her in Florida. When she discovered that instead of coming to her in her hour of need, Gary had sought out Jolie, Leann was incensed, and became increasingly distraught after her conversations with Jolie that Gary was not only still alive, but was watching Jolie—protecting her—while Leann waited in Florida, pregnant with his baby.
    Suspecting that Gary would follow Jolie to Sammy's party, Leann had made the long drive to Atlanta and had disguised herself as one of the hired help for the evening. Apparently, after listening to Jolie's party-crashing stories, she had decided to give it a try. Leann had heard Jolie say on numerous occasions that Sammy carried a gun in her purse—finding it had been a cinch, Leann said. She'd skulked around until Gary had appeared. When he sneaked upstairs carrying an armful of coats to the coat check room to follow Jolie, Leann had tailed him and confronted him about the baby. She said that when Gary had refused to accept the fact that the baby was his, she'd shot him through a fur stole to silence the gun and then stuck the gun in Jolie's coat pocket—Leann said she'd have known that shabby trench anywhere.
    Ouch.
    Jolie touched her temple. Leann was insane, but she wasn't devoid of feelings. The trauma of what she'd done had led to her miscarriage when she returned to Florida. The sadness of it all was so profound, Jolie could scarcely believe it had happened. She decided she might never know why Gary hadn't told her about Leann—had he been afraid it would incite Leann even more? Had he enjoyed taunting the poor woman? Had the baby truly been his? Endless questions had plagued her over the past three days since the incident that had exposed the group of conspirators, which the papers, every bit as slogan-savvy as the Yellow Pages, had dubbed the "Buckhead Brotherhood."
    Roger LeMon was being held without bail in the murder of Janet LeMon. Russell Island had wasted no time turning state's evidence and spilling his guts about the foursome's evil plans to inherit their wives' trust funds. The story was a media sensation—part of the reason Jolie was leaving her job at Neiman's was that the security detail had to be increased to keep reporters and assorted weirdoes from dogging her.
    Strangely, Leann's appearance at the house had been a turning point for Jolie and Sammy. Sammy had admitted that she'd always been jealous of Jolie's relationship with her father. But since the agency's business had been sliding without Jolie's organizational skills to keep things moving, she'd made Jolie an attractive offer to come back. Jolie had held out for a partnership, and Sammy had finally agreed. There had been no hanky-panky between Sammy and Gary, although Sammy had admitted in a rare, sheepish moment that it wasn't for lack of trying on her part.
    Beck had called a couple of times. Once they'd talked for a few minutes until the conversation had