Books by Mary Wilbon
NAUGHTY LITTLE SECRETS
ONE LAST KISS
Published by Kensington Publishing Corporation
One Last Kiss
Mary Wilbon
KENSINGTON BOOKS
Http://www.kensingtonbooks.com
For G,
I can still hear your song
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Acknowledgments
Thanks to my editor at Kensington Books, John Scognamiglio, for giving me another opportunity. He makes me want to do better and reach higher.
Thanks to all the other folks I leaned on to get this book done:
Joseph Petrecca, Raymond Martoccia, and Dr. Jonathan Coleman for answering my questions.
Samuel Billings, Catherine F. Sutherland, Maria Pires, Nancy Vazquez, and Paula Ruffin—my work family.
John Warner for giving me a new enthusiasm for my old job.
Kate Daly, Lisa Alford, and all the STOP KISS-ers for calling me out to play.
Thanks to Deliah Clarke for showing me Paradise.
Thanks to Ethel DiMicele. Some things were meant to last.
A very special thanks to my forever friends Maureen and Joanne and their families. I met Mo and Jo in high school, and there hasn’t been a day since that I couldn’t depend on them to share their time or their hearts when I’ve needed them.
Cynthia S. Ross and Rob Pape were so kind for giving their talents and time, and they took turns holding my hand whenever I stopped writing. Thank you.
Thanks to Doug Mendini for slapping my hand when I stopped writing and for pushing me and inspiring me to start writing again.
Prologue
The men in the room looked at each other, wondering how they were going to handle the problem that loomed before them. Collectively, these men had hundreds of secrets, but this evening they were concentrating on only one.
It was a delicate matter that only men of culture and importance could discuss and resolve tactfully. Earlier they had ordered and enjoyed their thick steaks, prepared blood-rare and sipped three rounds of Glenfiddich thirty-year-old scotch while discussing business deals, politics, and the next promising stocks that were about to explode big-time in the market.
The small talk had died down, and they were now smoking cigars and blowing smoke rings at each other. The gentlemen glanced around at one another nervously. The unpleasant business they had to address left many of them sitting in silence.
But they all agreed on one thing: They had to get their hands on the journal. It was the only thing that linked them together outside of this private club. Inside these walls, they knew the prevailing rule: survival at all costs.
The whore had to be dealt with, and her journal had to be destroyed. It all sounded so sensible and reasonable. They all enjoyed the whore, but who knew she had kept the journal? It was a worrisome development. They thought their power and position had made them untouchable in such matters. Those things had always worked in the past.
The senator, the most powerful of them, tapped on his glass of port until he had their attention. He was a fleshy red-faced man, the eldest in the group, with a thick shock of white hair and caterpillar-sized eyebrows. He had the look of a man who had been handsome once, long ago, but whose looks were now fading fast.
“Gentlemen, do we all agree that we have a problem?” he asked.
Rumblings of agreement rippled through the room.
The senator knew they were all listening now, so he continued. “Of course. We’ve all…shall we say…taken our pleasure with her. But now the whore has become a threat to all of us, and she must be eliminated. Swiftly.”
More affirmative chatter.
“This can’t come back to bite any of us. Whatever it takes, this whole thing gets buried.”
And there it was. They were talking about murder. They all knew it, even while they were still skirting around the edges of the subject.
Only one man voiced an objection. All eyes turned to where he sat at the end of the table.
He rose to address them. He was the youngest man in the room, but he had earned their respect.
“Why are you doing this?” he asked. “What gives you the right?”
The senator shot the young man a disappointed look.
“We have no choice,” someone answered.
“You’re all afraid of some journal or diary she may be keeping. You don’t know for sure that she is,” he argued.
“She has a record of all our names and phone numbers. That’s dangerous,” said the senator.
“Isn’t