Engaged in Death (A Wedding Planner Mystery) Read Online Free Page B

front of the church. I squinted and sat up a bit straighter, slipping my bug-eye sunglasses down my nose. As it turned out, I was grateful Rachel had overpacked. The hatbox had contained a pretty, wide-brimmed straw number, more appropriate for the Kentucky Derby than anything in western Pennsylvania. I’d pondered whether it would draw unwanted attention or help me shield my face. After the hair-ruining car ride, I was more than happy to hide under the hat.
    “Sylvia McGavitt Smoot Pierce was a special woman. She touched the lives of everyone in this room. She was a daughter, a wife, a mother, a grandmother and a pillar in this community.” The minister droned on with generic platitudes, doing little to convey what a remarkable woman Sylvia had been. I tried to pay attention to the bland eulogy but began to scan the room for my mortal enemies. I needed to plan a drama-free exit.
    Bingo. Helene and Keith were ensconced in the front row. Helene sat ramrod straight in what looked like her impeccable, if ancient, black Halston suit and also a hat, but hers didn’t seem silly like mine. Keith turned to listen to the minister, and I caught his profile. He looked awful. My heart twisted, and I gasped as a physical stab of pain radiated through my abdomen.
    “You okay?”
    I blinked madly to stave away the start of tears. Rachel put her arm around me and gave my shoulders a squeeze. Momentarily restored, I looked back at the man I had been ready to pledge my life to.
    At this distance, Keith looked almost as ruined as I did. His usually handsome face was drawn and pale, the bags underneath his eyes puffy and purple-tinged. He looked all of his thirty-five years and then some. His shoulders were rounded, his usual bravado gone. It was hot in the packed church, and his thinning hair was pasted to his head in sticky strands. He was wilting.
    He’d changed so much in the years I’d known him, but I hadn’t noticed. I’d devoted all of my energy into my work at the law firm, days and nights and more days and nights, and I hadn’t seen the embers of our love changing, cooling, and dying. It wasn’t the same as it had been when I’d first met Keith. He’d been my mentor, a dashing young associate who’d made me laugh hysterically as we sat up all night going over depositions. We’d worked well as a team until he’d left for a neighboring law firm and a better chance at making partner. He had once been passionate and self-deprecating, and I realized, with a start, I hadn’t seen that side of him in eons. These days, he was obsessed with making more money and took his mother’s advice as gospel.
    Keith had pursued partnership with zealous dedication and had been gone many evenings, driving me home and going back to his firm, returning in the morning for a quick shower. I hadn’t suspected anything. It last snowed in March, so Keith’s affair with Becca Cunningham had to have been going on for at least five months. Yet I had planned to marry this man in a few weeks.
    The church had gone silent, and I looked up to see why. A mousy woman in her mid-forties, clad in a faded floral dress, had walked up to the pulpit. She removed the microphone and set it behind her. She extracted a pitch pipe from her pocket, blew a clear note, parted her thin lips, and began to sing “Ave Maria” a cappella. What emanated from her mouth was divine, ethereal, and transcendent. Her sweet soprano cut through my stupor, so strong it seemed to roll in waves to fill the immense church better than any organ ever could.
    I began to sob. All of the emotion I’d been holding back bubbled over. I cried for my lost engagement, for Keith’s betrayal, and for dear Sylvia. Rachel rubbed my back, and I didn’t even blanch when she pulled a warm tissue, reeking of Britney Spears Fantasy, out of her bra and handed it to me.
    I thought of how lovely Sylvia had been. She’d immediately taken me under her wing. She’d been a funny old battle ax, who’d