A breeze rippled the eucalyptus trees scattered about the cemetery. The fresh scent of earth and cut grass mixed with the sweet, clinging perfume of flowers saturated the air and hinted of death.

Don drove the Mustang past the long line of cars parked behind a black hearse before he pulled to the curb and parked.

As they walked up the slight incline toward Jonah’s grave, Don reached for Mandy’s hand, and her slender fingers slipped between his in a perfect and comfortable fit.

He felt his expression stiffen into its opaque combat mask. That meant his forehead would be lined with deep, angry creases—an intimidating look that served him well in the classroom but was seldom seen at the Aphrodisiac Academe. He may have come home from Vietnam resenting how his grandfather had taught him the art of seduction as a child, but Don had still loved the old man. Jonah had always been there for him when Don needed someone to listen—something his mostly absent father and born-again, Scripture-quoting mother had never offered.

The coffin was suspended in a cradle of webbing above the freshly dug hole. Only one woman stood close to the casket—someone Don didn’t recognize. The other women, looking fearful—many with moist, red eyes—stood in silent pairs or small clusters a few yards from the grave, as if the grim reaper was waiting to pull them in if they got too close.

Don suspected their grief was more from losing their free room and board on the Aphrodite.

After walking up to the other side of the coffin, Don noticed the stranger’s hair, which reflected subtle shades of red, auburn, brown or blond, depending on how the sunlight hit it. He’d never seen any woman with hair like that before. Even the brown strands were variegated. She wore a tight, black, one-piece dress that accented a head-turning figure. The hemline ended a few inches above her knees, revealing long, lean, muscular, million-dollar legs, similar to the pair that belonged to a young Ann Margret.

The graveside service was what Jonah had wanted. He didn’t want any poetry or sermons. Instead, there was a honky-tonk piano sitting on the level ground above the crowd and grave, and, as the sun set and kissed the earth behind the dark silhouette of the piano, Lexi—dressed in black from foot to chin—started to play and sing Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance With Somebody.”

While Lexi’s rich voice filled the air, Don scanned the bereaved and spotted his mother standing next to a tree about twenty yards away. Jane Eyre Patton hovered near her with Don’s younger brother, Dion, between them. Dion was the nightclub’s assistant manager.

Squeezing Mandy’s hand, Don let go and stepped up beside the woman with the incredible hair to discover that she was stunning, with sharp features and piercing, blue-green eyes. Becoming aware of his gaze, she glanced his way and smiled. Then she looked back at Lexi and the piano as the sun’s rays surrounded the singer like a ball of fire and sent flaming beams of light skipping across the manicured grass toward Jonah’s polished, stainless steel coffin.

Lexi’s voice equaled Houston’s—she hit all the notes without flaw. When the first song ended, she moved on, without pause, to “Didn’t We Almost Have It All,” and finished with “Where Do Broken Hearts Go” as the last light of day slipped away like a thief in the night.

The silence and darkness that replaced the music was startling.

Don felt an urge to finish the evening sitting in his favorite corner booth in the D. H. Lawrence Room, sipping merlot from a tall stemmed glass. But he didn’t want to drink alone. He wanted to share that moment with the woman standing beside him. He turned to introduce himself and ask her to join him, only to discover she was gone. In her place stood his maternal, older half-brother, Ricky the Horse. It was as if the woman had been transformed into this tattooed, fifty-one-year-old man with half of his teeth missing.

His mother had given birth to Ricky while she was still in high school, before she met Don’s father. Knowing their mother, Don suspected that Ricky’s birth had been an immaculate conception, but his brother was no Christ child. He had dedicated his life to making sure he never made it to heaven.

“I heard about Jonah, little brother, and thought you might need a strong shoulder to cry on.” He grinned, exposing his surviving teeth. Don turned and held out a hand to Mandy. She knew Ricky well and joined them.

“Any time you’re ready to ditch this limp dick and spend the night with a real man, you let me know, babe,” Ricky said. She punched his shoulder, and they both laughed.

“I see Amanda made it,” Ricky said, and nodded toward a stretch limousine with smoked windows parked in another lane away from the hearse and the other cars. One of the back windows was down and—even from this distance—Don recognized his grandmother from the glowing tip of what he knew was one of her favorite, smuggled Cuban cigars reserved for special occasions. 

This is the last preview episode from the first 20% of this mystery-suspense novel. With the end of the preview, I’m offering ten complementary paperback copies to the first ten Authors Den readers who respond. This offer is only good in the United States. The reason for offering this paperback giveaway only in the United States is the cost of postage. Several years ago, I made the mistake of not limiting an offer linked to a giveaway contest and ended up mailing a paperback copy of “My Splendid Concubine” to Pakistan, and that cost more than $100. That costly giveaway also resulted in a negative 2-star review because the reader didn’t like the graphic sex scenes in my first novel even though there was a warning on the book’s website page and on its Amazon.com page.

Of course, I’m hoping that Authors Den readers, who have followed the first 15 episodes, have enjoyed the story so far, and since the novel was listed with an “R” rating guide, they will accept the real life adult material in this story instead of condemn it.