Undeniable (A Country Roads Novel) by Shannon Richard Page B

funeral director at Adams and Family Funeral Home, but that was just her day job. Her real profession was gold digger. At the age of forty-eight, the woman had been married five times and engaged seven. For a while Missy had found her conquests around town, but with the Internet now at her fingertips, she’d turned to the world wide web to find her new victims.
    Three months ago Missy had married Clive Burdgen. He was a furniture salesman in Montgomery, Alabama, with a beamer and a full head of hair. Missy and Clive had known each other for all of about five minutes before they’d gotten hitched. But a month into their marriage, Missy discovered that Clive Burdgen was really Gill Seamore. Gill Seamore had a wife and kids in Atlanta and had fled with the beamer when his Laundromat had gone belly-up. Oh, and also, that head of hair was all hair plugs.
    So the conner became the conned, and Missy hadn’t taken it very well at all. As the great, great, great niece of Robert E. Lee, she didn’t deal very well with defeat. After Missy’s heartbreak she’d gone on a full-out rampage. The woman had always been crazy, but now she was crazy with a vendetta, and it wasn’t just against her most recent ex-husband, or whatever he was, as technically they’d never really been married.
    For a while Missy had targeted Mr. Adams for a merger, so that she could liquidate his assets. Burley Adams wasn’t hurting for money. As the owner of the only funeral home in Atticus County, he was making a pretty penny. Missy had known it, and she’d wanted all of that money for herself. Interestingly enough, Missy had married Clive/Gill exactly a month after Burley and Panky had tied the knot. Coincidence? Most likely not.
    “What if we start using silks?” Missy asked, coming back into the kitchen. “Then we could reuse the flowers. No one ever pays enough attention to know the difference anyway.”
    “Excuse me?” Panky asked, looking up. Her eyes narrowed on Missy and her cheeks started to turn red.
    “I’m just saying, they aren’t that important.”
    “Excuse me?” Panky repeated.
    “We can charge the families the same price for less flowers.”
    “That’s it,” Panky said, slamming her scissors down on the counter. “I’m going to talk to my husband.” With that she stormed out of the kitchen. Missy followed, the two of them arguing as they went down the hallway.
    “What was that all about?”
    Grace looked up to find Paige waddling into the kitchen.
    “Missy is being a pain in Panky’s ass.”
    “Well, that’s new and different.” Paige grinned.
    Grace didn’t return the smile.
    “What’s going on?” Paige asked, a frown now pulling down her lips.
    “I’m fine,” Grace said.
    “Grace, fess up. You look worse than you did after Jax kissed you.”
    Grace’s face fell more. She wasn’t even sure how that was possible at this point.
    “Come on,” Paige said, grabbing Grace’s hand. She led her out the back door of the kitchen and onto the porch.
    “All right,” Paige said, letting go of Grace’s hand and rounding on her. “Did the two of you…” Paige trailed off, not finishing the question.
    “No, we didn’t have sex,” Grace whispered.
    But oh, they’d been so freaking close.
    “Almost though,” Paige said, giving a small nod of her head.
    “What are you? A mind reader these days?”
    “No, you just look really upset. What happened?” Paige reached out, running her hand up Grace’s arm.
    “You can’t tell Brendan. Promise?” Grace asked.
    “I won’t tell him,” Paige said seriously.
    “Last night, Jax came over to my apartment to apologize about the kiss at the café and the incident at the bar on Saturday.”
    “What incident at the bar?”
    “We got into an argument,” Grace said.
    “Why am I not surprised?”
    “He said some stuff. I threw a beer in his face and slapped him.”
     “I told you he was going to get a cold drink thrown in his face. But what did he do?”
    Grace