Funeral home owner and undertaker Dual Hood knows a good thing when he sees it, so when Charlie Soder applies for the job of embalmer, he snatches up the young man in a heartbeat. Charlie, fresh-faced and just out of college, also knows a good thing when he sees it, and immediately sets his sights on his new sexy boss.<br><br>It doesn’t take long for sparks to fly and romance to blossom. But Dual worries what folks in his small Mississippi town will say, and whether his family-owned business will suffer if word goes round about his new love interest. He isn’t at all certain he has the courage to do the right thing and grab love before it slips through his fingers.

The Undertaker's Secret

I wanted Charlie to be sitting in the passenger seat next to me. Of course I did. It was the only thing I could think of that would make any of this feel better. But I couldn’t do that to him. Use him like that. Lean on him at a time like this. It wouldn’t be fair. Wouldn’t be proper. I was, after all, his boss. If anyone should know how to deal with death, it should be me.


Anyway, he was probably still mad at me, and I wouldn’t blame him.


As I neared Southaven, not far outside of Memphis, I looked down and realized my gas gauge was almost on empty. I hadn’t bothered to check. I took the first exit I could find and pulled over at an all-nite gas station to fill up.


The air was biting and cold. My fingers trembled from the cold.


What was I doing, driving to Memphis? How was this helping anything?


My brain couldn’t seem to focus, to think, to reason things out.


I got back in the truck, pulled out my phone, called Gracie.


Chapter 28