She imagined herself sitting in one of the deck chairs, sipping a margarita, reading a trashy novel. Why she pictured herself doing this, Sara did not know. She seldom had time to sit lately, she did not like the taste of alcohol, and at the end of the day she was nearly cross-eyed from reading patient charts, pediatric journals, and forensic field manuals.

Tessa interrupted her thoughts. "I guess you didn't get much sleep last night?"

Sara shook her head as she leaned against her sisters shoulder. "How was it being around Jeffrey yesterday?"

"I wish I could take a pill and forget all about him." Tessa raised her arm, putting it around Sara's shoulders. "Is that why you couldn't sleep?"

Sara sighed, closing her eyes. "I don't know. I was just thinking about Sibyl. About Jeffrey."

"Two years is a long time to carry a torch for somebody," Tessa said. "If you really want to get over him, then you need to start dating." She stopped Sara's protest. "I mean real dates, where you don't drop the guy as soon as he gets close."

Sara sat up, pulling her knees to her chest. She knew what her sister was suggesting. "I'm not like you. I can't just sleep around." Tessa didn't take offense at this. Sara had not expected her to. That Tessa Linton enjoyed an active sex life was pretty much known to everyone in town but their father.

"I was just sixteen when Steve and I got together," Sara began, referring to her first serious boyfriend. "Then, well, you know what happened in Atlanta." Tessa nodded. "Jeffrey made me like sex. I mean, for the first time in my life, I felt like a complete person." She clenched her fists, as if she could hold on to that feeling. "You have no idea what that meant to me, to be suddenly awake after all those years of focusing on school and work and not seeing anybody or having any kind of life." Tessa was quiet, letting Sara talk.

"I remember our first date," she continued. "He was driving me back to the house in the rain and he stopped the car all of a sudden. I thought it was a joke, because we'd both been talking about how much we liked to walk in the rain just a few minutes earlier. But he left the lights on and he got out of the car." Sara closed her eyes, seeing Jeffrey standing in the rain, his coat collar turned up to the cold. "There was a cat in the road. It had been hit, and it was obviously dead."

Tessa was silent, waiting. "And?" she prompted.

"And he picked it up and moved it out of the road so that no one else would hit it."

Tessa couldn't hide her shock. "He picked it up?"

"Yeah." Sara smiled fondly at the memory. "He didn't want anyone else to hit it."

"He touched a dead cat?"

Sara laughed at her reaction. "I never told you that before?"

"I think I'd remember."

Sara sat back in the swing, using her foot to keep it steady. "The thing was, at dinner he told me how much he hates cats. And here he was, stopping in the middle of the road in the dark, in the rain, to move the cat out of the road so that no one else would hit it."

Tessa could not mask her distaste. "Then he got back in the car with dead-cat hands?"

"I drove, because he didn't want to touch anything."

Tessa wrinkled her nose. "Is this the part where it gets romantic, because I'm feeling slightly sick to my stomach."

Sara gave her a sideways glance. "I drove him back to the house, and of course he had to come in to wash his hands." Sara laughed. "His hair was all wet from the rain and he kept his hands up like he was a surgeon who didn't want to mess up his scrub." Sara held her arms in the air, palms facing back, to illustrate.

"And?"

"And I took him into the kitchen to wash his hands because that's where the antibacterial soap is, and he couldn't squeeze the bottle without contaminating it, so I squeezed it for him." She sighed heavily. "And he was leaning over the sink washing his hands, then I was lathering up his hands for him, and they felt so strong and warm and he's always so goddamn sure of himself that he just looked up and kissed me right on the lips, without any hesitation, like he knew all along that while I was touching his hands all I could think about was how it would feel to have his hands on me, touching me."

Tessa waited until she was finished, then said, "Except for the dead cat part, that's the most romantic story I've ever heard."

"Well." Sara stood, walking over to the deck railing. "I'm sure he makes all his girlfriends feel special. That's one thing he's very good at, I guess."

"Sara, you'll never understand that sex is different for some people. Sometimes it's just fucking." She paused. "Sometimes it's just a way to get some attention."

"He certainly got my attention."

"He still loves you."

Sara turned, sitting on the railing. "He only wants me back because he lost me."

"If you were really serious about getting him out of your life," Tessa began, "then you would quit your job with the county."

Sara opened her mouth to respond, but she could not think of how to tell her sister that some days her county work was the only thing that kept her sane. There were only so many sore throats and earaches Sara could take before her mind started to go numb. To give up her job as coroner would be giving up a part of her life that she really enjoyed, despite the macabre aspects.

Knowing Tessa could never understand this, Sara said, "I don't know what I'm going to do."

There was no response. Tessa was looking back at the house. Sara followed her gaze through the kitchen window. Jeffrey Tolliver was standing by the stove, talking to her mother.

The Linton home was a split level that had been constantly renovated throughout its forty-year life. When Cathy took an interest in painting, a studio with a half bath was added on to the back. When Sara became obsessed with school, a study with a half bath was built into the attic. When Tessa became interested in boys, the basement was renovated in such a way that Eddie could get from anywhere in the house to the basement in three seconds flat. A stairway was at either end of the room and the closest bathroom was one floor up.

The basement had not changed much since Tessa moved away for college. The carpet was avocado green and the sectional sofa a dark rust. A combination Ping-Pong/pool table dominated the center of the room.

Sara had broken her hand once, diving for a Ping-Pong ball and slamming into the console television instead.

Sara's two dogs, Billy and Bob, were on the couch when Sara and Jeffrey walked down the stairs. She clapped her hands, trying to get them to move. The greyhounds did not budge until Jeffrey gave a low whistle. Their tails wagged as he walked over to pet them.

Jeffrey didn't mince words as he scratched Bob's belly. "I tried to call you all night. Where were you?"

Sara didn't feel he was entitled to that kind of information. She asked, "Did you get anything on Sibyl yet?"

He shook his head. "According to Lena, she wasn't seeing anybody. That rules out an angry boyfriend."

"Anybody in her past?"

"Nobody," he answered. "I guess I'll ask her roommate some questions today. She was living with Nan Thomas. You know, the librarian?"

"Yeah," Sara said, feeling things starting to click in her head. "Did you get my report yet?"

He shook his head, not understanding. "What?"

"That's where I was last night, doing the autopsy."

"What?" he repeated. "You can't do an autopsy without someone present."

"I know that, Jeffrey," Sara snapped back, crossing her arms. One person questioning her competency in the last twelve hours was quite enough. She said, "That's why I called Brad Stephens."

"Brad Stephens?" He turned his back to her, muttering something under his breath as he stroked underneath Billy's chin.

"What did you say?"