Read Online Caught Red-Handed by Jan Burke - Free Book Online Page A

David Blackburn. The man had cheated on me, and I didn’t want to kill him. I didn’t know anyone with a stronger motive.
    The funeral was well-attended, with or without David’s former lover. The priest didn’t know David, but did the best he could to say generically comforting words. My family tried to brace me up, and succeeded in large degree. David’s parents were long dead, but his sister sent a wreath; she had wanted to come to the funeral but couldn’t manage the airfare from Maine to California, and refused my offer to buy the ticket.
    There were neighbors and old friends, and a large contingent from Emery & Walden. David was the Vice President of Human Resources for Emery & Walden, a local manufacturing firm that employed about twenty-five hundred people. Many of the employees had contact with him, and trusted him as someone who would treat them fairly, as someone who had concern for their well-being. He often acted as a buffer between them and Mr. Winslow Emery III, the self-involved young man who was now at the helm of the company.
    Today Winslow Emery looked tired and worn. It was understandable—he had attended a lot of funerals lately. Five days earlier, an acid tank at Emery & Walden had ruptured, causing the deaths of three workers. OSHA was investigating. David had been troubled by the deaths, as he was by the suicide of the plant manager, who apparently blamed himself for not responding to worker complaints about the tank.
    I thought about David championing that troubled soul. His name, if I recalled, was Devereaux. I watched Emery walk away from David’s grave with the gait of a man twice his age. A good-looking blonde walked next to him. She had introduced herself to me as Mr. Emery’s secretary, Louise. Emery didn’t seem to notice her.
    I noticed her, as I did two other women, Lucy Osborne and Annette Mayes, who lingered longer than most of the others. Both were at least fifteen years younger than I, and gorgeous. Lucy was a brunette, Annette a redhead. I wondered if David had stayed with my type or looked for something different when he chose a lover. Something in the way Annette looked at me made me decide he had tried something different. Oddly, I didn’t feel the animosity I thought I would feel towards her. I really didn’t care. David had come back to me. Fifteen weeks was not twenty-one years.
    I sat next to the open grave longer than my sister, Lisa, thought I should, but I refused to be steered away. My father told her to let me be and then gave me a hug and said they’d be waiting for me at the car, to take my time.
    â€œI guess this is goodbye, David,” I said aloud, and was startled to feel a warm hand on my shoulder. I looked up into the eyes of the ghost.
    This time, I was angry. This was my private moment with David, and I didn’t want the living or dead intruding on it. At the time, the man seemed to be among the living. I couldn’t see through him and his hand was warm. “Can’t a person have a moment’s peace?” I said, trying to remove his hand, but only touching my own shoulder. That frightened me.
    He shook his head sadly and removed his hand.
    â€œI don’t believe in ghosts,” I said.
    He shrugged.
    â€œAre you David?” I asked, thinking maybe I was seeing him transformed somehow.
    But the ghost shook his head.
    â€œCould I please have a little time to say goodbye to my husband? Would that be too much to ask?”
    He gave a little bow and vanished.
    I was shaking. “David,” I said, when I had calmed down, “Why isn’t it you? If I’m going to go crazy and see ghosts, why isn’t it your ghost? Show up, David. Materialize, or whatever it is you do. I want you back.”
    I waited. Nothing.
    â€œGoodbye, David,” I said, giving up. “I’ll miss you. I don’t know what I’m going to do without you. Be very sad for a very long time, I