Free Too Late to Say Goodbye: A True Story of Murder and Betrayal by Ann Rule Page B

not a kid,” Narda recalled. “She’d been to college, tried nursing school, and now she was home with us and working a lot. She wasn’t a teenager—she was twenty-four when she began to date Bart. She had lived apart from us. All three of our daughters were constantly coming and going.
    “Eventually, Bart had to go on a dental seminar that was held in a ski resort in Colorado, and he invited Jenn. But she was working and couldn’t go. Still, they stayed in very close touch all the time he was gone. When he came back, they saw each other more and more. Then there was another meeting that was built around a trip to Italy. This time, Jenn went, and they were together almost all the time after that.”
    They went everywhere with another couple on the Italy trip, Mary and Gary Lands. Mary, six years older than Jenn, was a striking brunette, as friendly and warm as Jenn herself. Bart got along very well with Gary Lands. They would remain close friends after they got back to the Atlanta area.
    After they had been back from Italy a few weeks, Jenn called her mother and said she needed to talk. “She asked me ‘Was I sitting down?’ And I told her ‘yes.’”
    “Well, Bart and I have made a decision—and I’m pregnant,” Jenn said in a happy voice. “Bart and I have decided we’re going to get married and have the baby.”
    Apparently they had considered other choices, including ending the pregnancy or adoption, but Jenn hadn’t wanted either of those alternatives.
    Narda recalled being thrilled. “I had never seen—or thought of her—being a mom before. Jenn was more career oriented. But now she was asking me how quickly could we plan a wedding? Could they have a big wedding? Jenn wanted it. And somehow we did it in six weeks—an outdoor wedding at The Pottery in Commerce. Violins and all of that.”
    Max and Narda were pleased about Jenn and Bart’s marriage, and they gave her that lovely garden wedding in Commerce, Georgia, on September 1, 1996. Jenn eschewed a traditional pastel color scheme for her wedding, and chose bridesmaids’ gowns of black and white instead. They carried red roses.
    The new Mrs. Bart Corbin was radiant with happiness, and wasn’t at all disturbed when her gown swept the damp red clay of Georgia and the hem ended up smudged by the soil. Jenn and Bart made a very handsome couple. When she wore high heels—which she usually did—they were the same height, a few inches over six feet tall. When they danced cheek-to-cheek at their reception, they seemed such a perfect fit. He kissed her as they danced and they appeared to be in a world of their own. Many of the women in the crowd secretly wished they had a man like Bart in their lives.
    Jenn looked absolutely beautiful.
    They didn’t go away on a honeymoon. They spent the weekend at Max and Narda’s houseboat on Lake Lanier. As Jenn sometimes said, laughing, “We had already had our honeymoon—our trip to Italy!”
    “It was great,” Narda remembered. “And we got a baby!”

PART TWO
    Barton Thomas Corbin
    “DR. BART”

C HAPTER E IGHT
    1963–1987
    B ART C ORBIN’S FAMILY BACKGROUND was not nearly as tranquil as Jenn’s. Although Bart’s father, Gene Corbin, attended Bart and Jenn’s wedding, he and Connie were divorced by then, and he was living with another, much younger woman. While the Barbers had three daughters, Gene and Connie Corbin had three sons. Bart and his twin brother, Brad, who were born in Jacksonville, Florida, on December 22, 1963, were the oldest, with Bart arriving three minutes before Brad. They were fraternal twins. Bart was the more outgoing and popular, while Brad’s personality was quieter. Actually, Bart was often closer to his younger brother, Bobby Corbin, who was born four years after the Corbin twins.
    Eugene Adams Corbin had once been a military policeman in the service and a police officer in Jacksonville. He was twenty-six when Bart and Brad were born, and Connie was twenty-three. She