Chapter 1

James (Jimmy) Spencer---It was 10pm on a Tuesday night. I had put the boys to bed about an hour ago and I was cutting the television off and preparing to go to bed myself when I saw the lights of a Sheriff’s car out the front window. I walked casually to the front door. There stood Sheriff Emily Washington, the first black, woman Sheriff in the state. I know her well because I had supported her campaign.

“Jimmy, can I come in?”

“Of course, Emily. Is there a problem?”

“Let’s talk in the kitchen.”

I led the way to the back of the house and offered her a seat at the kitchen table.

“Jimmy, I hate to inform you but there’s been an accident. Sue is dead.” Sue is my wife, she was spending a couple of nights with her sister.

“Oh My God! Was anyone else hurt? She is visiting her sister down in Hattiesburg, was anyone else in the car with her?”

Emily looks down.

“Jimmy, there was no car crash. Sue died when the crop-duster plane she was riding in hit a power line and crashed. It happened south of Clarksdale, on a farm near the river.”

“Then it’s not Sue. Like I said she is in Hattiesburg with her sister. Wait, I’ll call her.”

I picked up my phone and dialed my wife’s number. It went immediately to voice mail. Not to be discouraged, I thumbed through my contacts and found Gloria’s number and called her. Paul answered.

“Hey brother-in-law. What’s up?”

“Paul, can I speak to Sue, it’s important.”

“Jimmy, why do you think Sue is here? We haven’t seen either of you since Mom’s birthday party last month.” (‘Mom’ being Sue and Gloria’s mother).

“Paul, I’m sitting here with Sheriff Washington, she is telling me Sue died this afternoon in a plane crash over in the delta. I...”

“Hold on let me get Gloria.”

I waited a minute. I could hear him explaining what was going on to his wife, my sister-in-law. Gloria came on the phone.

“Jimmy, I have not talked to Sue since Saturday afternoon. Why was she on a plane? Where was she going?”

“It was a crop-duster, and I have no idea.”

“A crop-duster! What the hell? Are you sure it is Sue?”

“The Sheriff seems pretty certain it is her.”

We’ll leave first thing in the morning. We should be at your house before noon.” I could hear her start to cry as she cut the call.

I looked over at the Sheriff with tears starting to form in my eyes.

“It’s none of my business Jimmy, but the Sheriff down there thinks Sue and the pilot were having an affair.”

“What! No! What makes him think that?”

“They spent the night last night in the same hotel room. He found Sue’s open suitcase and clothes in a room rented by the pilot. A man named Jack Zent. Ever hear of him?”

“Never.”

“Come by my office in the morning and I’ll help you with the arrangements.”

I thanked her as we got up and walked to the door. At the door she hugged me and said, “Sorry for your loss.” I would hear that phrase so many times over the next week that I became sick of hearing it!

Chapter 2: The Funeral

It took 3 days to get her body shipped to a funeral home here in town. After the ‘director’ or ‘embalmer’ viewed Sue, he recommended that we go with a closed casket. I did not want a ‘last look’. My emotions were all over the place. First, I was so sad. When I told the boys their mother was dead, we cried for hours. I did not tell them she died while flying with her lover!

That thought pissed me off! The bitch was cheating on me! She better be glad I had not caught her! But then, fuck! I love her! I need answers to questions I never thought I would ask.

I started at the funeral.

I asked her sister, Gloria, if she knew about Sue and this ‘Jack Zent’. She vehemently denied any knowledge of her sister with the pilot or any other man. Paul stepped in when we got loud.

“Jimmy, I know you are hurting, but now is not the time. I swear we did not know of Sue ever having an affair. She always talked about how great a marriage you two had.”

I believed him. But I turned my anger to a couple of her friends from college. They denied any knowledge and told me that since our first date all Sue ever talked about was me.

But my thoughts were running wild. Her and this ‘Jack Zent’ had spent the night in a hotel room together! I decided to investigate.

Chapter 3: The Motel and Bar

Two days after the funeral, I drove over to the delta with Virgil, a man who works for me, in the passenger seat of my truck. I had to pick Sue’s car up at the Sheriff’s office and he was going to drive my truck back. The Sheriff was nice, and had the car parked in a lot behind his office. I signed some paperwork then asked directions to the motel.

I drove over to the motel as Virgil headed home. It is a mom-and-pop type place that is now run by some guy from India or Pakistan. After I introduced myself and told him who I was his face broke into a smile. “The husband ... of course!”

“Did my wife and this Jack Zent stay here often?”

“Him, two or three times, I only saw her the day before the accident. She was a nice, pretty lady. I helped her find the ice machine. Who would think she would be dead the next day. So sad. People never know...”

“Yeah, you never know. Can I see the room they stayed in?”

“Of course, no problem.”

As we walked down to room 120, he told me the Sheriff had packed up her and the man’s ‘things’ and sent them with the bodies. I had received her overnight bag at the funeral home and gone through it. There was nothing unusual in it; no fancy underwear or negligee, no garters or stockings, see-thru baby doll nightwear or anything sexy.

But when he opened the door. Wow! There was a king-size four poster bed with a mirror over it! Two of the walls were also mirrored!

“Our special room! I get $10 over the normal room rate. It has a waterbed!”

The room had been cleaned probably three or four times since Jack and Sue were here, so I did not go in. I turned and left after thanking him for his time. As I started to walk away, he spoke.

“You should ask the lady that runs the restaurant and bar. They had supper and breakfast there. She might can tell you something.”

He walked back to his office, as I walked across the parking lot to the restaurant. A woman in her sixties welcomed me inside. I was her only customer at that time of the day.

I sat at the bar and she walked over and asked what I was having.

“Just a coke and some information, if possible.” She filled a glass with ice then poured it full of coke. She sat it in front of me, looking me directly in the eyes she said, “You’re not a cop, so who are you?”

“I’m the husband of the woman who was killed in the plane crash a week ago.”

“I thought you might stop by. Sorry for your loss” she said as she wiped the counter with a rag. She did not act like she wanted to talk to me.