Michelle made it to the front door in time to see her dad climb in his car and drive off a lot faster than he should have.

"What the hell was that about?" asked Sean, who'd joined her at the door.

Michelle just shook her head. She glanced at the hall leading to the bedroom. "Come on."

The first thing that Michelle noticed when she walked into the room was that the wedding photo was not where it should have been.

Sean happened to glance in a corner. He reached over and picked it up. "Why would he have put this in the trash can?"

"I'm getting a really bad feeling about something."

Sean looked down at the photo. "Your mom's dead. On the day of her funeral he chucks their wedding photo in the trash. What would make him do that?"

"Do you think Pam Dutton ever threw her wedding photo in the trash?"

"Because Tuck was screwing around on her? You think your mom…" He obviously couldn't finish the thought in her presence.

"I'm just… I don't know."

"You sure you want to go down that road?"

"I want to get to the truth. Any way I can."

"There are usually some telltale signs." He added, "Other than wedding pictures in trash cans."

Michelle was already opening the drawers of the bureau while Sean checked through the closet. A few minutes later Michelle held up some pretty revealing lingerie with the price tags still attached while Sean had pulled from the closet three new-looking outfits and a pair of spiky boots.

They eyed each other, but left the obvious thought unspoken.

They put the clothes back and Michelle led him to the small den across from the dining room. There was a desk in one corner. She started going through the drawers. She pulled out the checkbook and handed it to Sean. "My mom handled the bills."

While Sean sorted through the check register, Michelle methodically examined the credit card statements.

A few minutes later she looked up. "There's hundreds of dollars' worth of recent charges for men's clothing from four different online retailers. I didn't see any stuff from those stores in the bedroom."

He held up the check register. "There's an entry here for a local golf tournament fee. Did your dad play golf?"

"No, but Mom did. So that's not out of whack."

Sean held up a piece of paper he'd pulled from the desk. "This is part of the entry form for the golf tournament. It's fifty bucks per person, but the check was for a hundred."

"So two people."

"Michelle, the form says it's a couples tournament."

Michelle snatched the paper from him and glanced down it before laying it aside.

Sean looked uneasily at her. "Don't you think your father could have easily found all this out? I mean, we did in about ten minutes."

"My mom didn't seem to work very hard to cover it up. Maybe she didn't care. Maybe he didn't."

"Your dad doesn't strike me as the type to meekly accept being cheated on."

"You don't really know my father, Sean." She looked down at her hands. "And maybe I don't either."

"What's going on here?"

They both looked up. Bill Maxwell was staring at them. He glanced around at the checkbook and credit card statements.

"What're you doing, Mik?"

"Going through some of the bills. I know Mom took care of that and I didn't want Dad to get messed up on something."

She shoved the items back in the drawer and rose. "Dad left."

"Where'd he go?"

"I don't know. And he didn't ask my permission."

She glanced at the beer can in his hand. "Is that what you guys plan to do all the time now? Drink beer and gab?"

"Geez, Mik, we just buried our mother. Cut us some slack."

"I'm sure she didn't mean it that way, Bill."

Michelle snapped, "Yes I did."

She grabbed her keys and headed for the door. Sean gave Bill an apologetic look and hurried after her.

Sean caught up to Michelle as she was climbing in her SUV.

"Where are we going?"

"To see Donna Rothwell again."

"Why?"

"If my mom was having an affair, she probably knows who it was with."

CHAPTER 39

SHIRLEY MEYERS stared down at the letter, not really knowing what to make of it. She'd collected the mail earlier but hadn't opened any of it. Now, as she was preparing to leave for work, she had taken a few moments to go through the small stack.

There was no return address on the letter she was holding. When she looked at the postmark, squinting a bit to see it, she shook her head in confusion. She didn't know anyone in Kentucky. She turned the envelope over. It wasn't from a business; it wasn't a solicitation. It was just a plain white envelope. And there was a small bulge inside it. Something besides paper.

She opened the letter, using her pinkie to break the seal. There was one piece of paper inside and a small key. After looking at the key that had some numbers engraved on it, she unfolded the letter. It was typed and it wasn't addressed to her. Shirley covered her mouth when she saw the name of the person the letter was actually for. She read through the words and then quickly put it back in the envelope along with the key. For a long moment she just stood there. Things like this were not supposed to happen to people like her.

But she couldn't just stand here. She pulled on her coat and left her little house. She rode the bus into the city. She checked her watch. Shirley prided herself on punctuality. She was never late for work. Yet part of her didn't want to go to work today, not with the letter in her pocket. She continued to fret as she walked to the entrance, went through security, and gained admittance to the building, nodding at people she knew as she passed by them.

She entered the kitchen, took off her coat, and hung it up. She washed her hands and turned to her job of food prep. She kept sneaking glances at her watch as other people came and went. She tried not to look at them, only nodding when they said hello. She didn't know what to do. Every thought that flitted through her head was worse than the one before. Could they put her in jail? But she hadn't done anything other than open her own mail. But would people believe her? Another terrifying possibility assailed her. What if they thought she had stolen it from here? But wait, they couldn't, she told herself. Her address was on the envelope, not this one.

At one point she looked so upset that her supervisor finally asked her what was wrong. She at first tried to resist telling him the truth, but the fact was, if she didn't tell somebody she was just going to collapse.

She slid the letter out of her pocket and showed it to the man. He read through it, looked at the key, and then glanced sharply at her.

"Damn," he said.

"It's addressed to her," Shirley said.

"All mail coming here has to be checked out first, you know that," the man said in a scolding tone.

"But it didn't come here, now did it?" Shirley shot back. "It came to my house. No law against opening my own mail," she added defiantly.

"How'd they know to send it to you?"

"How do I know? I can't stop someone from mailing me something."

The man thought of something. "There wasn't any white powder in it, was there?"

"You think I'd be here if that was the case? I'm not stupid, Steve. It was just the letter. And that key."

"But you might have messed up fingerprints and stuff like that."

"How was I to know? I didn't know what it was until I opened it."

Steve rubbed his chin. "It is addressed to her."

"The letter was, but not the envelope. But I can't take it to her. I'm not allowed. I mean, you know that, right?"

"I know. I know," he said impatiently.

"So what do I do?"

He hesitated and then said, "The police?"

"You read what the letter said. You want her to die?"