backward and fell into the grave. Shawn leaned into the Honda.
“Now why would you be wanting to know such a thing?” Shawn said in the brogue he’d learned through careful study of Tom Cruise’s accent in Far and Away.
“I’m supposed to be performing the memorial service,” the priest said, reddening even further. “I’m afraid I’m running a little late.”
“Sure and the service doesn’t start until ten,” Shawn said.
“That was the public announcement to fool any reporters who might want to crash the ceremony,” the priest said. “The real service begins, well, almost immediately.”
Gus glanced down the road and saw the main gates swinging open to admit an immaculately polished hearse. Right behind it was a familiar black Bentley. Shawn knew that car well, having ridden in it up to Eagle’s View. Suddenly the middle step in his three-step plan became clear.
“Sorry, Father, but your services won’t be required. I’ve been sent to replace you.”
The priest goggled at him. “Sent by whom?”
Shawn reviewed everything he knew about the hierarchy of the Catholic Church. Since the vast majority of his knowledge came from repeated viewings of Britney Spears removing her Catholic schoolgirl uniform in the “Baby One More Time” video, that left him plenty of time for staring blankly at the priest.
“Begorrah,” Shawn said.
“Excuse me?”
“Erin go bragh?” Shawn tried. “Shillelagh?”
A voice floated up from the grave behind him. “Tell him it was the cardinal.”
“The cardinal,” Shawn said.
“Which cardinal?”
Shawn thought. “Excuse me for one moment.” He took two steps backward to the grave and whispered down into it, “He wants to know which cardinal.”
“There’s more than one?” Gus said.
Shawn stepped back to the car and leaned in. “Stan Musial?”
The priest glared at him, then shoved the gearshift into reverse. “I’ll be speaking to the archdiocese about this.”
The Honda executed a neat three-point turn and sputtered back the way it had come. Shawn reached a hand into the grave and pulled Gus out.
“I appreciate your help,” Shawn said, “especially after the whole ‘knocking you into an open grave’ thing.”
“I didn’t do it for you. I did it so I wouldn’t be sent to the gas chamber,” Gus said. “But if I’m called to testify against you, you’re on your own.”
The gate had finally opened wide enough to admit the Bentley. “Let’s go,” Shawn said.
Shawn and Gus sprinted down the hill to the site of Steele’s memorial. Gasping for breath, Shawn positioned himself between the open grave and the sole folding chair. “Quick, get in the grave,” he said.
“They’re going to put the coffin in there.”
“Hey, you were the one who wanted to get close to that phony.”
“Not close enough to spend eternity with him,” Gus said.
“Fine,” Shawn said. “Go maintain something.”
That was harder to do than it sounded. The section of the cemetery Steele’s widow had chosen for his burial was reserved for the richest of the rich. Service fees were double here what they were everywhere else, and the grounds were immaculate. There were no weeds to pluck, no grass that needed reseeding, no trash to pick up. As the hearse led the Bentley up to the grave site, Gus turned his back to the cars and started polishing the chain that surrounded the plot.
Gus heard the hearse pull to a stop. After a moment, doors opened, followed by the rear gate. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched two men dressed in black carry an elaborate mahogany coffin to the grave site and lay it across bands of nylon attached to a metal frame fitted over the hole. The two men got back into the hearse and drove slowly away. A minute passed, and then Gus heard the driver’s door of the Bentley open.
Gus risked a glance over his shoulder and saw Shepler, his gray pinstripes traded for simple black, go around and open the passenger door. After a moment, a woman’s legs emerged.
They were probably not the most attractive female legs Gus had ever seen. That honor still went to Tara. But they were close enough that Gus started formulating a theory on the relation between a woman’s appendages and her propensity toward homicide.
Gus glanced toward the grave and saw that Shawn was also watching as the widow emerged from what was now her car. Her hair and face were covered by a black hat and veil, her hands and arms by long gloves. Her black dress was simple and classically elegant, except for the neckline, which plunged almost to her shoes. Gus kneeled down, picking an imaginary flake of paint off the ground, and tried to get a glimpse under her veil, but all he could see was her tight, firm jawline.
The widow seemed to be lost in a fog of grieving. Paying no attention to Shawn or Gus, she walked directly to the coffin that rode astride the empty grave and draped herself over it.
Gus ordered himself not to look. It was bad enough to find his eyes moving involuntarily toward any cleavage, no matter how slight the exposure. This was much worse. The poor woman was here to mourn. It was positively indecent for Gus to be taking advantage of her.
But the part of the male brain that ordered eyes to cleavage had been around far longer than the notion of decency, and Gus could no more keep himself from looking than a dog could choose to ignore a steak someone had dropped on the floor.
At least he was enough of a gentleman to feel guilty about it. Apparently wearing a priest’s garb didn’t have any effect on Shawn’s behavior, because he was not only staring straight into Mrs. Steele’s cleavage-he was waving at Gus with one hand and pointing with the other. If his own sense of propriety wasn’t enough to keep Gus from sneaking a peek, Shawn’s schoolboy behavior certainly was. He crossed his arms, lifted his head, and conspicuously refused to look where Shawn was pointing.
Shawn grabbed a dirt clod from the lip of the grave and chucked it at him, then pointed again, this time even more urgently. Silently he mouthed a word. Gus tried to read his lips.
“Stag party?” Gus guessed. “This is a funeral!”
“Strawberry!” Shawn said.
Stunned, the widow straightened to stare at him. But not before Gus caught a glimpse of the familiar birthmark, and the freckle on top that looked like a stem. She whipped off her veil, revealing the red hair and green eyes they’d last seen in the Santa Barbara courthouse.
“Veronica?” Shawn said.
Chapter Twenty
“I knew I couldn’t hide from your psychic powers forever,” Veronica Mason Steele said, sinking into the one folding chair that had been set up for her. “I never should have tried.”
“No, you shouldn’t,” Gus said.
If she heard him, she didn’t show any sign of it. Those deep green eyes never left Shawn. “Can you ever forgive me?”
Gus had so many responses to that. He struggled to pick the right one. He was trying to decide between “As soon as you pay us” and “Not until you confess” when he noticed that Shawn had gone over to her, knelt at her feet, and taken her hand.
“There’s nothing to forgive,” he said, “although I don’t think I’m supposed to say that when I’m wearing this suit.”
She seemed to notice for the first time that he was dressed as a priest. “Is this what I drove you to? Subterfuge, disguises, lies, all because I couldn’t trust anyone with the truth.”
She spoke in the same desperate, breathless tone Gus had found so much more convincing when she was
