If Looks Could Kill. BEVERLY BARTON

been her fault. After all, her husband’s younger brother had been the first mentally handicapped person she’d ever known. Wallace had the IQ of a six-year-old and the sweet innocence, too.

      Studying herself in the mirror, Veda decided she needed her hair cut. The ends were a bit frizzy and weren’t curling under the way she liked. She’d worn her hair in the same neat chin-length pageboy most of her life, not changing as her hair went from dark brown to gray. And she really should lose a few pounds before the holidays. She tended to put on at least five pounds between Thanksgiving and New Year’s every year and had to struggle half the year to shed those unwanted extra pounds. Of course on a woman who weighed in at one-ninety-five and stood barely five-three, what was five more pounds one way or the other?

      Five pounds would mean weighing two hundred, she reminded herself. She’d sworn she’d never reach that two- hundred pound mark.

      Veda made a detour into her dressing room. After running a brush through her salt-and-pepper hair, she applied a touch of blush and lipstick. There, that’s better, she thought, then a moment later wondered why she’d bothered. It wasn’t as if Farlan would notice. He hadn’t paid much attention to her in years. They shared the same bedroom, the same bed, but he had not been a real husband to her in going on two years. She could remember the exact date they’d last made love. It had been on her sixty-sixth birthday.

      If she didn’t know better, she’d think he kept a mistress. But not Farlan. Since that one woman, years ago, he’d been as faithful as an old dog. To this day she blamed Dodd for Farlan’s one and only indiscretion. But that was the past, water under the bridge. Best forgotten. After all, when she had strayed a couple of times after she hit forty, Farlan had forgiven her and they’d gone on as if nothing had happened.

      As Veda made her way down the hall, she listened to the familiar sounds of morning in her home. Although this enormous house had seemed alien to her when she’d come here as Farlan’s bride, she had soon renovated the place and made it her own. Everything in this house—from the crystal and china in the dining room to the imported soap in the bathrooms, from the landscaped grounds to the wicker furniture in the sunroom—had Veda’s personal stamp on it. She ruled this house as if she were a queen. And she was. Queen Veda. Everyone in Cherokee Pointe either respected her or feared her just a little. She was known for being a vengeful bitch, and that pleased her. Let that silly, skinny, blond Reba Upton be the social grande dame. Who cared? She certainly didn’t. She much preferred being a power to be reckoned with. No one crossed Veda Parnell MacKinnon without paying a steep price.

      When she entered the dining room, Farlan glanced up from the morning paper. The Knoxville News-Sentinel, she noted, not MacKinnon Media’s local Cherokee Pointe Herald. He made a habit of checking out other East Tennessee newspapers almost daily, such as the News- Sentinel, the Cleveland Daily Banner, the Chattanooga Times Free Press, and the Maysville Ledger Independent.

      “Good morning, my dear,” Farlan said, his gaze quickly returning to the newspaper.

      Brian rose from his chair and assisted her as she sat on the opposite end of the long dining table from her husband. Her son leaned down and kissed her cheek.

      “You’re looking lovely this morning, Mother.”

      She offered Brian a fragile smile. She loved her only child with all her heart. If only there was something she could do to make him happy. But he’d always been rather gloomy, even as a boy. Her father had been like that—a stern, gloomy man who had wandered in and out of her life after her parents’ scandalous divorce when she was an infant. Then, when she was fourteen, he’d killed himself. Veda had been the one who’d found his body, there in her mother and step-father’s library in their Atlanta home.

      “Thank you.” Veda patted Brian’s ruddy cheek. Her son resembled her a great deal, which meant he was a handsome man. But the older he became, the more he looked like her father. Sometimes when she caught a glimpse of him out of the corner of her eye, she’d shiver, somehow feeling as if she had just seen a ghost.

      “Something interesting in the News-Sentinel?” Brian asked Farlan as he returned to his seat.

      Farlan grunted. “Nothing much.”

      “You seem quite absorbed in nothing much,” Veda said, knowing her comment would evoke a reaction from her husband. It seemed the only way he’d talk to her these days was if she provoked him.

      Farlan folded the newspaper and laid it on the table beside his plate, which was empty except for biscuit crumbs. He glanced at Veda, a somber expression on his face, his faded brown eyes skimming over her quickly before his gaze settled on his coffee cup. He seldom smiled at her anymore. In fact, he seldom smiled at all.

      “The news seems to remain the same, just the people and places change,” Farlan said. “A fire in a low-rent apartment complex in Oak Ridge, two policemen accused of racial profiling in Cleveland, the mayor in Harriman fighting with the city council and a prostitute’s body fished from the river outside Loudon.”

      “Another one?” Veda said. “I seem to recall that about six or seven months ago, they found a prostitute’s body in the river south of here. I don’t remember where.”

      “Downstream from Watts Bar, I believe.” Brian picked up his fork and speared the scrambled eggs in his plate.

      “You have an excellent memory,” Farlan said. “I used to. Never forgot anything. But lately . . . I suppose it comes with growing old.”

      Veda motioned to Abra, their cook, to pour her a cup of coffee. Abra Trumbo had been with the family for the past twenty-five years and was the only servant who actually lived on the premises; all the others, even the new housekeeper, Viv Lokey, chose to come in at seven each morning and required Sundays off. Servants just weren’t what they used to be.

      “You blame everything on old age,” Veda said, her tone scolding. She didn’t mean to always be so critical, but couldn’t stop herself where Farlan was concerned. Over the past few years, it seemed they brought out the worst in each other. Perhaps they always had. She wasn’t sure.

      “Old age is—” Farlan began, but was interrupted by the rumble of thundering footsteps.

      Wallace MacKinnon, a towering bear of a man, came barreling out of the kitchen and into the dining room, his eyes bright, his fat cheeks pink from having been exposed to the cool morning air. He still wore his heavy gray sweater, the one Veda had thrown away several times only to have him drag it out of the garbage again and again. With his faded overalls, ratty sweater and scuffed leather boots, her brother-in-law looked like a bum.

      “She’s here!” Wallace clapped his huge, calloused hands together, the way an excited child might do when exclaiming he’d just seen Santa Claus.

      “Calm down,” Farlan said. “Who’s here?”

      “Miss Jazzy’s sister. I told you she was coming in from Chattanooga today, didn’t I?” Wallace grinned. “I saw her over at the restaurant. She and Miss Jazzy were eating breakfast together. They look just alike.”

      “For the life of me, I can’t understand why you go into town to eat breakfast at that restaurant so often when you could eat at home with your family.” Veda frowned dis approvingly.

      “Let him be,” Farlan said. “He enjoys the company at Jasmine’s. He’s especially fond of Miss Jazzy, who he tells me is always very nice to him. And he gets a chance to run into all sorts of interesting people.”

      “Interesting indeed. As I recall, this Jazzy person is the town trollop.” Like most other Cherokee County residents, Veda knew all about that woman’s shameful reputation. “She was accused of killing Jamie Upton a few months back, wasn’t she?”

      “Jazzy Talbot didn’t kill him. You know as well as I do that it turned out she was innocent.” Farlan stood and walked over to his brother. “Take off your sweater and have a seat. Tell us all about seeing Jazzy and her sister.” With Farlan’s assistance, Wallace removed his heavy sweater, handed