October 6, 2020

Eugeena and Amos are married, but the happy couple may see their new life fall apart when Amos’ daughter moves in next door. Briana Jones is cooking up mayhem when she hooks up with old friends.  When Amos receives a call in the middle of the night, he jumps into action to help his daughter who has found a dead body. Eugeena doesn’t want to rock the boat between Amos and his daughter, but she can tell Briana is keeping secrets.  Can Eugeena find the real murderer and keep her new marriage together?

Read an Excerpt

One of my favorite proverbs states, “A happy heart makes the face cheerful.” I could truly say I’ve never been happier in all my life. It’s been five months since I officially became Eugeena Patterson-Jones. I married my next door neighbor on a Saturday in February, and I know other newlyweds could relate to my joy. But, I’m no ordinary newlywed. I’m sixty-one years old, and I enjoy taking advantage of my AARP and other senior citizens’ discounts. Pending social security, my world consists of retirement activities, and oh yeah, sharing my home with a man again. I’d been a widow for five years.

A few years ago, I couldn’t have imagined that, at my age, the man I’d secretly had a crush on would become my second husband. The Lord does work in mysterious ways. He could surprise even an old bird like me.

After much discussion, Amos officially moved into the home where I’d raised my three children. His home where he’d resided alone after his wife’s death remained empty, and Amos pondered putting the house on the market after he moved in with me.

Until three months ago.

After living in California, trying to make it as a singer, Amos’s youngest daughter moved back home. She’d showed up to surprise her father for Easter Sunday. Next thing we knew, she seemed to remain in Charleston long after her impromptu visit. Amos hadn’t turned off the utilities yet, so Briana embraced her parents’ former home and appeared to have placed her life in California behind her. This all happened pretty fast and I can’t say I was completely comfortable with our new neighbor.

Briana had a rough few years during and after her mom’s battle with breast cancer. Perhaps being in the house where her mother last lived provided some comfort. Amos kept many reminders of Francine Jones in the house. After a lengthy estrangement from her father, I recognized that Briana needed him in her life. Just because our children grow up and get their own lives doesn’t mean they stop needing us.

Right now, I wasn’t sure how well I could remain supportive. For the second night in a row, music blasted from next door into our bedroom. With no cares of this being a Sunday evening, the heavy bass and thumping penetrated right through the window. I thought the windows would shatter at some point.

Next to me, Amos wrestled with the covers on the bed. I knew he was restraining himself from going over to visit his baby girl. In not so many words, before we retired for the night, he’d expressed that he didn’t miss the drama that came with facing his youngest daughter.

I knew about drama, having birthed a drama queen myself. The difference was my youngest child and daughter lived across town and showed up occasionally when she needed free babysitting. Leesa was a twenty-three year-old single mom with two young children. Thank goodness her party days ended the moment she delivered her first child at age seventeen.

Briana was twenty-six with no children and clearly had no intentions of settling down.

“I need to go over there.” Amos’s voice was gruff, concealing more anger than I knew he had.

I propped myself on my elbow. “Is that really a good idea? Last time didn’t go so well.”

Last time was the previous night. I wanted to march over to the house myself, but knew I needed to let Amos handle it. Amos tried, but that’s not what happened. All I heard was yelling and screaming. Not from Amos. Amos was the silent type who kept his thoughts inside and his face grim. Briana, on the other hand, was livid. And despite the fact she was living in her parents’ home rent-free, she insisted Amos had no right to tell her what to do.

There was so much on my mind, but I held my tongue. Besides, this was my fault. Last Christmas, I’d encouraged Amos to reach out to his daughters. After Amos’s first wife died, his precarious relationship with both daughters had faded to almost nonexistent. I wanted both of our families to come together before Amos and I officially married. It seemed like the right thing to do.

His oldest daughter, Alexa still lived across the country in Seattle, but kept in touch a lot more. This summer, we were promised time with Douglas, Amos’s grandson. All appeared to be healed and improving with his oldest daughter.

Amos’s youngest daughter was another whole situation.

The mattress sprang as Amos jumped up from the bed. He turned the lamp on, illuminating the side of the bedroom with the window. “I can’t take this anymore, Eugeena. I’m about to think the girl is doing this on purpose.”

I didn’t want to agree with him, but I was thinking the same thing.

As soon as Amos had pulled on his pants, the music stopped. We peered at each other. Loud voices drifted up to our window, and then we heard the sounds of car doors slamming and engines revving.

I blinked, “Maybe the party is over.” Not that there should have been one at all. Didn’t any of the people over there work? It was a Sunday night for crying out loud. Sundays were supposed to be for rest, so people could ease into the work week.

Amos grunted. “I guess there’s hope for that girl after all.”

I was feeling even more suspicious. Kind of weird how everything stopped when Amos turned on the light. I kept that to myself, though I really wanted to blurt it out loud.

With a swiftness that defied his age, Amos undressed and returned to bed. With the lights out, I edged closer to his warm body as he wrapped his arm around me. I have to say this was one of my favorite parts about being married and something I missed.

I’m not sure how long after we both drifted back to sleep, but noise shrilled from the bedside next to Amos. It was his phone.

He reached over to grab it.

I listened, my eyes slipping back closed, desperately wanting my sleep that had been snatched away. As Amos’s conversation started to penetrate my ears, my eyes popped open again.

He’d sat up, raising his voice in a panic. “You found what, Briana?”

Thinking this couldn’t be good I sat up and clutched the covers to my chest, while listening intently for more information.

Amos stood from the bed, gripping the phone in his hands. “Don’t touch anything. Give me a few minutes to get dressed.” He threw the phone down on the bed in a huff. “Briana said someone was killed.”

I sucked in a breath and choked out, “Killed?” I turned to climb out of bed. “In the house? Who? How?”

Amos reached for the same pair of pants that he’d climbed into earlier. “She found a body in the shed.”

“In the shed? I’m going with you.”

He blew out a breath. “Eugeena, I can handle this. You don’t need to go over there.”

“Of course I do. When Leesa was in trouble, you helped me. Don’t forget about Carmen and her friend, Jocelyn.”

He rubbed his hand across his bald head.

I held up my hands to ward off his protests. “I’m just going to support you. And Briana must be scared out of her mind.”

It was the least I could do. Plus, I was feeling really bad about my feelings towards Briana. Lord, I’m sorry for not being more understanding about Briana. The girl is begging for help in her own way.

I couldn’t replace her mother, but it was obvious that Briana had been on a downward destructive spiral since her mother died.

I prayed that she hadn’t gone off the deep end.