Too Late to Say Goodbye: A True Story of Murder and Betrayal by Ann Rule Page B

inside. Gradually, he began to present a seamless façade. Few, if any, of his new friends had known Shelly Mansfield, and he didn’t mention her, nor their breakup.
    He was still considered handsome and witty, and he made satisfactory grades in dental school in both classes and labs.
    And before too long, Bart would meet a woman who would finally put his memories of Shelly Mansfield in the background. Her name was Dorothy “Dolly” Hearn. Dolly Hearn was one of the secret things that Bart Corbin never discussed with his wife, Jenn.

C HAPTER T EN
    DECEMBER 4–10, 2004
    C HRISTMAS 2004 was three weeks away, Jenn Corbin had been dead for less than a week, and the Corbin case was constantly at the top of the news in Atlanta. While there were whispered questions about what might have led her to commit suicide, there were also a lot of suspicions about her widower, particularly behind the closed doors of the Gwinnett County Police Department and the Gwinnett County District Attorney’s Office. Bart Corbin wasn’t acting like a grief-stricken man who had just lost his wife; he was avoiding detectives and their penetrating questions.
    Bizarrely, Corbin refused to give permission to Jenn’s family—who were still caring for Dalton and Dillon—to enter the house on Bogan Gates Drive to get clothes for the boys and pick up the Christmas presents Jenn had bought and wrapped for them. Where most families would have shared their grief, that was not the case here. Lines were drawn between the Corbins and the Barbers.
    Somehow, Max and Narda Barber pulled themselves together for Dalton and Dillon’s sake, and Heather and Doug Tierney and Rajel Caldwell did their best to care for the boys, who, for all intents and purposes, were orphans. Their mother lay in a funeral parlor and their father hadn’t come to see them, nor had he consented to meet with Marcus Head and the other investigators into Jennifer’s death. It was very odd and disturbing. All of Jenn’s family, even the boys, had given statements to the detectives. Bart absolutely refused to be questioned.
    Narda and Max went to the funeral home to arrange for Jenn’s service. But when Narda started to pick out a coffin, the funeral director told her that a coffin might not be needed. “Dr. Corbin has arranged to have Mrs. Corbin cremated,” he said.
    “No!” Narda gasped. “We don’t want that. It’s difficult enough to explain to her sons that she’s gone forever. How on earth could we tell them that their mother is going to be burned up?”
    “I’m sorry,” the mortician told her, “but that isn’t for you to decide. Legally, of course, Dr. Corbin is the next of kin, and he has already made arrangements. In fact, Mrs. Corbin is about to be cremated—in less than an hour.”
    “I haven’t seen her,” Narda said faintly. “I have to see her.”
    “But you do understand that the arrangements are up to Dr. Corbin?”
    Narda Barber didn’t understand anything. Bart hadn’t come to them to share their common loss, he hadn’t come to see his sons—how could he be the one to plan what was to be done with Jenn’s body?
    “I want to see her,” Narda insisted, and finally, almost grudgingly, an attendant led her to a room where they wheeled out a gurney with her daughter’s body.
    “She was all wrapped in a plastic bag or something,” Narda recalled. “I kissed her little face and her hands and her toes. It was my only chance to say goodbye to my sweet Jennifer. There was nothing else I could do.”
    The cremation Bart Corbin had ordered was carried out an hour later.
    The Barbers were allowed to plan funeral services at the Sugar Hill Methodist Church, which would be followed by a private service at home, where, they hoped, Dalton and Dillon could participate and say goodbye to their mother. But they were told they could only “borrow” Jenn’s remains for those ceremonies; Jenn’s ashes belonged to Bart Corbin.
    Jenn’s funeral was scheduled