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but I'll help you hunt for it if you don't be mean to me," Lizzy said.
       "Okay," Tim grinned.
       Lizzy hugged Jane tightly. "You really are my friend."
       "Thank you," Jane said past the lump in her throat.
       They ran off to play and she shut her eyes again but kept her ears acutely aware of anyone else sneaking in to hide beside the recliner. The memories started again like a movie that had been put on pause.

    John had finished his speech. Before his fanny hit the chair, Ramona was on her feet with a raised glass. She began by telling how fortunate she'd been to have John look after her when their parents died and how much it meant to her to finally see him happy. She accredited Ellacyn for the glow in his eyes and hoped that she'd always be a part of their lives.
       "Yeah, right," Jane said and promptly popped her eyes open to see if there was a child right beside her. "Lousy bitch," she said when she knew the coast was clear.
       The memories went on.
       John danced with her all evening, whispering the sweetest and also the sexiest things in her ear the whole time. She wore a cotton halter sundress with big red roses on a white background and red high heeled shoes. He told her that she was the single rose in his vase of life and he would cherish her until death parted them.
       He was speaking the gospel truth and that's exactly what would have happened in Cancun if she hadn't been in the wrong place at the right time. She couldn't sleep that night. Excitement from the whole day and anxiety for the up and coming one combined to keep her wide awake. At two o'clock in the morning, she finally tiptoed to the kitchen for a glass of milk and a handful of cookies.
       Those in hand, she carefully slid open the door to the deck and slipped out to the far corner to look at the full moon. At that same time tomorrow she would be in the bridal suite of the hotel in Jackson for the first night of her life as John's bride. The next morning they'd fly to Cancun. If she didn't stop thinking about it all, she would have bags under her eyes for her wedding.
       That's when she heard the voices from the other side of the hedge surrounding the deck. Whispers, actually, with a few panting moans thrown in. Surely Celia and that groomsman who'd been flirting all day weren't actually having a midnight rendezvous on the grass. Not when Celia had a king-sized bed in the room she used at the ranch.
       "Oh, Jonathan, darling, I can't bear to think of you with her."
       That got Jane's attention in a hurry and she dropped down on her knees on the deck, pushed the hedge back enough to create a peep hole, and saw John and his sister making out, right there before her eyes.
       "I hate this as much as you do, darlin', but just remember the whole time I'm with her I'll be thinking of you and that wonderful life insurance policy. I promise I'll try to get out of it but remember, even if I do sleep with her, it's only sex and it's worth a million bucks," he said.
       She laid her head on his shoulder and sighed. "Knowing that is the only thing that keeps me sane."
       "Don't think about it. Once this job is over, what do we do next?"
       "You get to play my husband in Germany. I need a good cover to get in close to a couple. We'll get ten times what Paul is paying us to create an accident for Ellacyn. You were a genius to think of the insurance policy. We might do that again if I can get past the idea of you sleeping with another woman."
       "She is a pretty little thing and it hasn't been hard to pretend to fall in love with her. Paul has no idea that I'm the hired gun. That's the beauty of it. He knows the accident will happen in Cancun and he'll pay the other half when it does. She'll be dead before her twenty fifth birthday and that puts the oil company totally in his name. He'll own it all and he can play the heartsick stepfather. We'll console each other. And he'll never know he paid me to