Truly Madly Yours Read Free Page A

Old Mrs. Van Damme. The woman was so ancient now, her back bowed with age and osteoporosis, she was turning into a human fossil.
    “Can I help you get something to eat?” Delaney offered, standing a little straighter while counting back to the last time she’d had a glass of milk, or at the very least a calcium-enriched Tums.
    Mrs. Van Damme snagged an egg, then handed Delaney her plate. “Some of that and that,” she directed, pointing to several different dishes.
    “Would you like salad?”
    “Makes me gassy,” Mrs. Van Damme whispered, then pointed at a bowl of ambrosia. “That looks good, and some of those chicken wings, too. They’re hot, but I brought my Pepto.”
    For such a frail little thing, Old Mrs. Van Damme ate like a lumberjack. “Are you related to Jean-Claude?” Delaney joked, attempting to interject a little levity in the otherwise somber occasion.
    “Who?”
    “Jean-Claude Van Damme, the kickboxer.”
    “No, I don’t know any Jean-Claude, but maybe they got one living in Emmett. Those Emmett Van Dammes are always in trouble, always kicking up about something or another. Last year Teddy—my late brother’s middle grandchild—got arrested for stealing that big Smokey the Bear they had standing in front of the forest service building. Why’d he want something like that, anyway?”
    “Maybe because his name is Teddy.”
    “Huh?”
    Delaney frowned. “Never mind.” She shouldn’t have tried. She’d forgotten that her sense of humor wasn’t appreciated in redneck towns where men tended to use their shirt pockets for ashtrays. She sat Mrs. Van Damme at a table near the buffet, then she headed for the bar.
    She’d often thought the whole after-the-funeral ritual of gathering to eat like hogs and get drunk was a bit odd, but she supposed it existed to give the family comfort. Delaney didn’t feel comforted in the least. She felt on display, but she’d always felt that way living in Truly. She’d grown up as the daughter of the mayor and his very beautiful wife. Delaney had always fallen a little short somehow. She’d never been outgoing or boisterous like Henry, and she’d never been beautiful like Gwen.
    She walked into the parlor where Henry’s cronies from the Moose Lodge were holding down the bar and reeking of Johnnie Walker. They paid her little attention as she poured herself a glass of wine and stepped out of the low heels her mother had insisted she borrow.
    Even though Delaney knew that she was sometimes compulsive, she really had only one addiction. She was a shoe-aholic. She thought Imelda Marcos got a bad rap. Delaney loved shoes. All shoes. Except little pumps with stubby heels. Too boring. Her tastes leaned toward stilettoes, funky boots, or Hercules sandals. Her clothes weren’t exactly conventional, either. For the last few years she’d worked at Valentina, an upscale salon where customers paid a hundred dollars to get their hair cut and expected to see their stylist in trendsetting clothes. For their money, Delaney’s customers wanted to see short vinyl skirts, leather pants, or sheer blouses with black bras. Not exactly proper funeral attire for the stepdaughter of a man who’d ruled the small town for many years.
    Delaney was just about to exit the room when the conversation stopped her.
    “Don says he looked like a charcoal briquette by the time they got him out.”
    “Hellva way to die.”
    The men shook their collective heads and drank their scotch. Delaney knew the fire had occurred in a shed Henry had built across town. According to Gwen, he’d taken a recent interest in breeding Appaloosas, but he hadn’t cared for the smell of manure near his house.
    “Henry loved those horses,” said a Moose in a cowboy-cut leisure suit. “I heard tell a spark caught the barn on fire, too. There wasn’t much left of those Appaloosas, just some femur bones and a hoof or two.”
    “Do you think it was arson?”
    Delaney rolled her eyes. Arson . In a town that had