Read Picture Me Dead for Free Online

held his temper. “I think we both remember the inquest. It was a nasty, dirty affair. But it proved one thing, Brian. She wasn’t with me that night.” She’d had what the medical examiner had deemed consensual sex with someone that night. He’d volunteered to be tested, proving that it hadn’t been with him.
    â€œShe sure as hell wasn’t with me,” Brian responded bitterly. “But even if she wasn’t with you that night, she loved you.”
    â€œWe were friends, Brian.”
    â€œFriends. Yeah.” He was silent for a moment. “ You still think I was responsible.”
    â€œI never said that.”
    â€œYou never said that? Like hell. Every time you looked at me during the inquest, you fucking accused me with your eyes.”
    Brian really had been drinking heavily. Jake shook his head. He understood the feeling. Now and then, he still felt like heading out on a major bender himself.
    â€œBrian, you’re wrong. You couldn’t be more wrong.”
    â€œAccident. They said it was an accident. But you…you never believed that.”
    â€œBrian, I think you were responsible for being a real idiot now and then, but not for your wife’s death, all right?”
    â€œI didn’t make her do shit, man. I never made her do drugs, and when we were together, we never got plastered.”
    â€œBrian, you’re on a crying jag of a drunk right now. You’re not thinking straight. No one ever suggested that you made anyone do anything. You were an ass, and hell yes, she was mad at you a lot. But she loved you, got it? Jesus, Brian, it was all a long time ago now. What the hell brought this on?”
    â€œYou don’t know? Man, how could you have forgotten?”
    Jake stared at Brian. He knew. He knew every damn year. “Her birthday,” he said softly.
    â€œYeah. She’d have been thirty, Jake. Thirty. Shit. She was twenty-five.”
    Jake leaned against the counter, feeling as if hot wire were coiling in his stomach. “Twenty-five, and there’s not a damned thing either of us can do about it now. She’s been dead for nearly five years, Brian. And if I’ve heard right, you’ve been living for the past two of those years with a flight attendant.”
    â€œYeah, I’ve been living with a flight attendant,” Brian agreed. He shook his head. “Nice girl. I should marry her. But every time I get too close….” His words trailed off, and a pained expression having nothing to do with his swollen jaw crossed his features. “Well, hell, I start to wonder if Nancy will live with me forever, if I won’t keep on waking up nights and thinking she’s staring at me, thinking that if…Well, hell.”
    The coffee was ready. Jake turned away from Brian and poured him a cup. Brian had hit a nail right on the head—for the two of them, though Brian couldn’t know that.
    Jake felt the same. As if something of Nancy continued to haunt him, as well, after all these years.
    He brought Brian the coffee. “Brian, nothing is going to bring Nancy back. And get a grip. Do you know how much time has passed? No one thinks you killed her.”
    â€œNo. Not that I killed her. That I made her kill herself.”
    â€œShe didn’t kill herself. I know it, and you know it.”
    Brian lowered his head and inhaled deeply. “You know, Jake, there are people out there who think you’re one heck of a big shit and not the great distinguished powerhouse you always look like in the press.”
    â€œThere’s not a damned thing I can do about what people think, Brian,” Jake said evenly.
    â€œYeah, that’s right. You can’t arrest them for thinking you’re a shit, can you?”
    â€œBrian, drink your coffee, and please tell me you didn’t drive down here.”
    â€œWhy, you gonna arrest me for that?” Brian said belligerently, staring at him.
    â€œNo,