Drop Dead Divas Read Online Free

know what I mean.”
    I knew what she meant.  “While your interest in my sex life—”
    “You don’t have a sex life,” Bitty rudely interrupted.
    “—is gratifying,” I continued as if she hadn’t spoken, “we have an agreement.”
    “I didn’t say one word about you not ever having a hallelujah moment. You’re just being sensitive.”
    “I tend to get that way when people start prying into my personal business.”
    “It’s fortunate I don’t do the same then, because you’re always prying into my personal business.”
    There wasn’t a whole lot I could say to refute that. She’s right. I have a lamentable tendency to pry into Bitty’s personal business at times. There’s no good reason for it, since she lives such a charmed life nothing ever really touches her, it seems. Apparently, despite Mama’s opinion to the contrary, not even the murder of her ex-husband affected her for long.
    “Forgive me,” I said, more to end the conversational sidebar than because I was sorry. Bitty, of course, knew what I was doing.
    “That won’t work every time, you know. I’ll let you get by with it now, but you owe me.”
    I said something rude and she smiled. “Sharita made up a batch of Mama’s pimento cheese. Want some?”
    Bitty’s late mother Sarah made unarguably the best pimento cheese in the entire world, and she’d entrusted her only daughter with the recipe. Eating one of Aunt Sarah’s pimento cheese sandwiches is like taking a bite of heaven. Rich, creamy, cheesy, with just the right amount of pimento—I began to drool just thinking about it.
    Sharita Stone owns a catering service and also cooks for a few private citizens who were lucky enough to get on her list of clients. Her family owns a diner that makes delicious muffins and other baked goods, and their jams and jellies are superb. Sharita’s brother is a Holly Springs policeman, and happened to be the one who arrested Bitty when she was thought to have murdered her ex-husband. All a terrible mistake, of course, and Bitty never held a grudge against Sharita or Marcus Stone for it. She’s very open-minded. That’s one of Bitty’s best virtues, that she holds very few grudges, which makes her hostility toward Naomi Spencer that much more intriguing.
    Of course, if my ex had flaunted his mistress right under my nose like the senator did to Bitty, my hostility would have been immediate and flammable. Perry would have been looking for what was left of his . . . well, badly bruised private parts, while I was on the way to my divorce attorney’s office. This would have occurred in private, of course, since I really do have a dread of public scenes.
    But that’s me.
    Bitty often utilizes the Southern-belle trick of being a perfect lady in public, yet still manages to convey just what she really thinks of the person or their actions. I’ve never quite figured out how she does it without looking like a complete bitch. If I ever do figure it out, I intend to practice the art until I’ve got it mastered. There must be some kind of code words belles use. I’m usually so enthralled with their absolute mastery of the art that I don’t take notes, and consequently, can never recall exactly what was said or in what tone. It’s usually not so much the words as it is the tone of voice, the smile, the tilt of the head and batting of the eyelashes that convey exactly what is really meant, despite even the most innocuous comments. As I said, it’s an art form.
    As Bitty and I converged on her gleaming kitchen like piranhas in a feeding frenzy, her phone rang. I stuck to my mission and took a bowl of pimento cheese out of the refrigerator while she answered the phone. Chen Ling—abandoned on the floor—looked up at me with a decidedly greedy gleam in her little bug-eyes. I smiled at her, rather relishing the fact that I have opposable thumbs and she—despite her charms—does not. It gave me a rare feeling of superiority, which is usually