If one more person told me they were so sorry for my loss I was going to shoot myself in the face. As the new owner of the Strickland house, I had the honor of having the wake. Having the wake at a funeral home would have called for major security and press control which I was not about to try to do. The wake was private anyway. Just close friends and family—all the people that had had the displeasure of knowing my father intimately.

I wore charcoal gray because that was as somber as I was getting. The guest list was moderate, both because I wanted it to be and because Jackson Strickland didn’t have that many people who liked him very much. I looked around the room. The wake was taking place in the great room because it was the biggest and easiest to clear out of the majority of its shit. The casket was stood open near the fireplace, surrounded by flowers. Bernice had dragged a chair to the side where Dad’s head was and was squeezing a few tears out of her eyes into her handkerchief as Max consoled her.

She was laying it on thick as hell; the two of them hadn’t been married for decades. My mother looked like she’d done this before. Beautiful and graceful, patiently listening to the people who wanted to hold her hands and tell her how sorry they were the man she was not married to had died.

How long did I have to stay before I could leave? I wanted to get out of there. Not even to go anywhere. I didn’t have to because she was here—the girl from the auction house. I hadn’t invited her to the wake. She was in the house, though. I hadn’t seen her, but Vanessa had told me she’d come by. The house was big enough that she wouldn’t be in the way if she was here.

Audra Francini from the auction house. She was from New York, or at least she sounded like she was. I loved a New York accent. She’d run out of the house like we’d been chasing her. There was a part of me that was shocked when she didn’t say yes. A small part, but a part all the same because it had worked before. More than once.

Not this time though, and now I needed to find out why.

I saw it on her face. In her eyes. Hesitation. She wanted to say yes. She wanted me, or Debbie, or both of us. I wanted her. I wanted to grab a nice handful of that hair and pull it while she was underneath me. Kiss her hard enough to bruise. See whether she could swallow me down without gagging. I’d get her, as soon as I had been present at this damn wake long enough for people to know that I’d attended. People were about to start giving tributes, and there was no amount of money anyone could have paid me to stay for that.

I hadn’t seen Dad for a while. On purpose. We talked often, but that was only because I had needed to keep him posted on the business. After his illness confined him to bed, I hadn’t bothered getting in touch. I walked over to his casket and looked inside at him. Devoted father and husband. Yeah, were they letting anyone call themselves that these days? He looked like shit. He was white as a sheet. His hair was combed over badly, and he was going to be buried wearing a two-thousand-dollar watch.

I bet if he was here, he would be mad about people stepping on the carpet with their shoes on. I walked away and looked for an exit route. I watched the door. Anywhere. I would literally want to be anywhere other than here. Getting my prostate examined, the DMV, traffic. Fucking anywhere. Before I could brood any harder, I saw her walk in. She was in all black out of respect, but Givenchy and Giuseppe Zanotti weren’t exactly mourning garb.

“Sissy,” I said, seeing her. She smiled and hugged me.

“I’m deeply sorry for your loss,” she said with a serious face. “How are you coping?”

“We had a lot of time to prepare. He was surrounded by his friends and family when he went.”

“Was he in pain?” she asked making her eyes wide and concerned. I didn’t want to laugh first, but she was laying it on thick.

“Excruciating. Till his last breath.”

“The children, how did they take it?” she asked. She was so good at this.

“Broken. I don’t know how they’ll manage.”

She paused. “The widows?”

I cracked. She got me. She had a solid poker face. We could have at least waited till Dad was in the ground to start disrespecting his memory but I hadn’t felt fathered by him my entire life. I was sure Sissy would say the same thing if I asked her.

“What happened to all your hair?” she asked, “oh, did you cut it off because you’re in mourning?”

I laughed and turned, showing her my tattoo. She appreciated things like this. Her dress had long sleeves, but underneath, she was covered—her entire back and sides. It was like finding the other kid in your class who was bad at sports. Sissy and I were basically the same person. I was certain. We liked the same kind of girls, we had the same sense of humor, and we both had a pure hatred of Jackson Strickland. The year and a half between our births was just a technicality.

“Come with me. I want you to meet somebody,” I said to her. She linked her arm through mine, and we walked away through the house.

“I didn’t see Max. Where is he?” she asked me.

“He was here. Did he leave? Probably trying to get Hamish to give him the house.”

“Trust Dad to stir the pot,” she said. I had told her what had happened at the reading of the will. “Where are we going?”

“The auction house sent someone over to clean the house out. It’s all going to auction.”

“Are they here now?” she asked.

“That’s who I want you to see.”

She looked up at me.

“Is it a woman?”

“Yes,” I said casually.

“I hope you’re not trying to set me up, Lee. I’m spoken for,” she said. I smiled. She and Katherine were great together. I liked that she was so happy despite what had happened during high school and college.

“Couldn’t convince her to come here, could you?”

Sissy shook her head.

“I wanted her to. She’s pregnant.”

“Pregnant women fly all the time,” I said.

“Not into situations like this,” she said. “Since Dad’s gone, I don’t know. I’ve been thinking about maybe moving back.”

“To Marin?”

“No, just the States somewhere. Maybe LA where Mom lives. I want our kid to be close to Mom,” she said. We’d met her parents, our Argentinian grandparents, only a couple of times. Both had passed away when we were still pretty young, so if we’d met them, neither of us remembered.

She hadn’t had any siblings either—that was why she’d gone to America so readily. I understood her wanting her and Kat’s child to know their grandmother. Just because they were dykes didn’t mean they lacked all traditional family values.

“How does Kat feel about it?”

“She’s getting warmer,” Sissy said shrugging.

“You should move to New York, so your kid can be around their fun uncle,” I said to her.

“From London? I don’t think she’d go for it. At least LA has the weather going for it,” she laughed. I admired Sissy for where she was in her life. I knew how much she and Katherine wanted kids. I knew because I’d paid for the fertility treatment. Do you know how hard it is to get pregnant when both of you are chicks? Katherine was the one carrying the kid, and they had used a donor. They’d never asked me to be their donor, but if they had, I don’t think I would have said no. The wife and kids thing didn’t appeal to me, but I’d do anything for Sissy.

We finally found Audra. She was in the library. Her back was to us. Her hair cascaded down past her waist. It was long and wavy. It shone, and it was black. She must have heard us because she turned around. Her skin was olive toned and flawless. She wasn’t wearing any makeup, or if she was, it wasn’t caked on. The last time I’d seen her, she was in a pencil skirt and button-down blouse. It skimmed skin tight over her hips and ass. Under her blouse, her tits didn’t look big but sat up high. I’d put money on them being natural. This time, she was in a similar blouse—black—and pants.

She seemed to become uncomfortable seeing us. Her green eyes were round, and she looked at us like she had been caught doing something wrong. She had a notebook in one hand and a digital camera in the other. She was working, and we were interrupting her.

“Oh, I’m sorry, is the function moving here?” she asked.

“No. Sissy, this is Audra. She’s with the auction house. Audra, this is Celeste, my sister,” I said.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Celeste. I’m sorry for your loss,” Audra said politely. She held her hand out to shake Sissy’s. Sissy walked up to her and pulled her into a tight hug. She was surprised, but she hugged her back. I noted with some jealousy the way Celeste’s hands were on Audra’s waist. It was a hug, Sissy meant nothing by it, but I was still a little sore. The intimate way women could touch each other without people calling it indecent. She would always do this.

She’d always try to flirt with girls she knew I had my eye on. Audra was sort of her type. We had liked a lot of the same girls growing up. If she and Katherine weren’t together, she’d totally try to hit on her.

“Thank you,” Sissy said dramatically, I stifled a laugh. “Does everything have to go?” she asked.

“Everything that can go will, but of course you guys, the family, get to look at the stuff and keep what you’d rather see not go.”

Our eyes met, and she held my gaze before looking back at Sissy.

“I’ve had my eye on some of these first editions for years,” Sissy said, motioning to the shelves and shelves of books. Had Dad actually read them? Who could say? I used to see him read, but it was never the leather-bound tomes on these shelves. These he didn’t let anyone touch. We totally did, though, or at least Sissy did. She had read most of them, I guessed. There was probably the original manuscript of Robinson Crusoe up there somewhere.

I watched them talk. Actually, I just watched Audra talk. She never looked at me again; I was waiting to see if she would. I didn’t catch much of whatever they were talking about. I didn’t care about old books. Audra seemed to. She was eager and expressive looking over the shelves with Sissy.

Why was I just letting them chat? Sissy was a girl; girls told each other things they never said in front of men. I didn’t need a wingman but having her occupied let me drink my fill in peace. Her hair was long; I loved that. She wasn’t tall like Debbie. She was shorter than Sissy, but both of them were wearing heels. She was probably around average height—most women were. I told Sissy we had better be getting back. She’d somehow managed to take her card during their conversation. Once Audra said bye to Sissy, she turned her attention back to the books, just like she was avoiding something. I smirked. I wonder what.

“So, what do you think?” I asked Sissy, on our way back to the great room.

“About what? She’s cute, but you obviously think so too.”

“You know about what,” I chided. She stopped and looked at me.

“You’re not.”

“What if I am?”

“I thought you’d worked through your doe-eyed brunette stage,” she said teasing me. The women who put themselves near me didn’t really look like Audra. A lot more silicone, a lot taller, a lot meaner. They were available when I needed them, and that was all I needed them to be.

“I’m going back to basics. Cute and innocent. Haven’t tried anything organic in a while,” I said. Organic, like free of additives. Untouched by plastic surgeons, all her original parts.

“Don’t be gross. She seems like a nice girl; don’t fuck with her.”

I knew what she meant, but that was exactly what I wanted to do with her. If she’d just have said yes, we wouldn’t have to do this now.

“I think she’d be good for me,” I tried. That was saying a lot about a girl I hadn’t talked to, but I did know that she would at the very least look good on my bed, in the back of my car, on the kitchen island, the floor—I wasn’t picky. She had the sort of pink, pouty lips that looked best wrapped around a cock. Debbie had said she was uptight, but that just made it better. You could see how much it took for them to lose it, how hard, how dirty, I wanted to know how much before she started to beg.

“She might be the one to stop your modelizing, but I don’t think you really want to stop,” Sissy said matter-of-factly. I rolled my eyes. “Besides, who told you you’re her type?”

I’m every woman’s type I didn’t say.

“Who said I wasn’t?”

“So, what are you going to do? Ask her out on a date? In a month and a half are you going to introduce her to Mom? Get a puppy together?”

“What? I didn’t say I wanted to marry her.”

“Then why’d you introduce her to me?” she challenged. She didn’t need the satisfaction of being a little bit right, so I didn’t give it to her. Why did I introduce them? She was handling part of Dad’s estate; it made sense that she knew all the members of the family, but even Celeste would have some reservations linking herself to Jackson Strickland. She didn’t even use his last name anymore. If I was honest, I wanted to share her. Sort of. Not share her; show her off. Claim her, in public. That usually came after you had established some sort of relationship, but it was her fault we hadn’t yet, not mine.

“You heard her. If you want to get your hands on any of Dad’s junk, the time to act is now.”

“Mm-hmm,” she said, unconvinced. “How long before this circus is over?”

“People should start to clear out in about an hour. The funeral’s in a couple of days.”

“Did you see him? Do you feel anything yet?”

“Yes and no,” I said. “Have you cried?”

“Nope. I said I was done crying over him years ago,” she said.

Same. Mom too. Who was actually moved by his passing? His first wife had been crying, but I wanted to guess it was because Mom had gotten more out of Dad’s death than she had. Max wanted to be him, so now that he was gone, this was his big chance.

I tried to feel something. Sadness or regret. Nothing. The man was dead, and I felt nothing. No, that was a lie. I felt something. Relief.

Good riddance.