Graham made a thoughtful sound. “Julie, I want you to do something for me. I want you to think about how you feel when he says these things. Then, I’d like you to close your eyes…Got them closed?”

It was the intimate older-brother tone that listeners seemed to love. Knowing how little relation it bore to the real Graham Corbett, Mary Anne found it pretty hard to take.

“Yes,” said the girl who was engaged to a jerk.

Beside Mary Anne, Cameron had her eyes closed.

“Just imagine spending the rest of your life with someone who says things that make you feel that way.”

The poor girl made a slightly distraught sound. Cameron echoed it.

Mary Anne said, “I can’t believe you buy in to his act.”

“Shh!”

“Now, let’s try a different experiment,” Graham said. “Imagine how you would feel with someone who loves you so much that he wouldn’t dream of saying anything that could hurt your feelings. This is going to be a self-confident guy, so he doesn’t need to make himself feel strong by making you feel rotten. He’s going to say things like, ‘I can just imagine you in that dress. You will look so beautiful. But you’re always beautiful to me. I love you so much. I cannot wait till you’re my wife.’”

Mary Anne was not sentimental, but she had to admit that Graham was on the money with this one, and he certainly had a gift for conveying such sentiments in a way that sucked in the female audience.

Beside her, Cameron sighed.

“It’s all lies, Cam. That’s not what he’s really like. Trust me.”

“Shh! This is therapeutic for me. It keeps me from being a godless man-hater.”

“Yeah,” Julie said softly. “Okay. I see.”

“Julie, you don’t seem oversensitive to me, but this clown does seem under sensitive. He has some growing up to do, and I’d make sure he does it before you get to the altar.”

“Amen,” Mary Anne said. “Or else you’ll end up with someone who says you’ve got an ass made for radio.”

“Who said that?” Cameron asked, eyes suddenly wide and vigilant, turning in her seat.

Mary Anne’s cell phone rang. Knowing that up in Myrtle Hollow she might not have reception, she pulled over near the historic Henlawson Bridge and answered.

“Mary Anne Drew.”

“Hi, Mary Anne, this is Jonathan.”

“Jonathan.” Why was he calling? She wouldn’t be recording her next essay until the following Tuesday. This was Thursday.

“Hey, Angie and I are engaged, and we’re having a little party upstairs at the station Saturday night. I wanted to make sure you’re there. Angie wants to meet you.”

His words jolted her. Thinking she might throw up from the emotional impact of hearing him say he was engaged, Mary Anne managed to answer, “Thanks, Jona than. I’ll be there.”

“Great. See you then.”

She shut the phone, closing her eyes and trying to imagine Jonathan Hale telling her that she was always beautiful to him.

Cameron lifted her eyebrows.

Mary Anne repeated what he said.

“A party?” Cameron echoed. “People drink things at parties.”

Mary Anne followed her thought and her mischievous tone to its obvious conclusion. Grimly she put the car in gear, heading for her last hope, for the thing that couldn’t possibly work.

Myrtle Hollow

THE HOUSE WAS in fact a cabin. When Mary Anne parked her RAV4 outside, a bearded white-haired man was loading heavy cardboard boxes into a pickup truck. He glanced at the women in the vehicle and she saw a flash of turquoise-blue eyes.

“That’s Paul’s dad,” Cameron said. “He used to be an obstetrician. He lives in your neighborhood.”

“David Cureux,” Mary Anne replied, thinking with annoyance of the man she knew to be David Cureux’s next-door neighbor—Graham Corbett. “City councilman, possibly implicated in the misuse of city funds.”

“He absolutely wasn’t,” Cameron said. “Anyhow, he and Clare are divorced, but they’re still good friends. Well—at least he’s always helping her with projects. Paul,” she pronounced, “has mother issues. He needs therapy.”

“Of course, he does,” Mary Anne retorted. “His mother brews love potions in her spare time.”

The woman who came out onto the porch wore her still dark but white-threaded hair in a long braid. The years had etched a map of grooves on her olive-toned skin. The dark eyes seemed only briefly interested in Mary Anne and turned fiercely on the white-haired man, as though supervising him at his task. She wore a flannel shirt and blue jeans, and her feet were bare.

Cameron said, “She never wears shoes unless she’s forced to go somewhere they’re required. Paul finds that mortifying, too. Myself, I like her.”