My Boss is a Serial Killer Read Online Free PDF

together through the corridors, and
he asked me how I was doing this morning. “Not bad at all. I’m
getting better and better at being a morning person.”
    “ I’ve mastered the art of being awake
at any hour of the day,” said Gus, “but that doesn’t mean I like
it. I hate mornings.”
    “ We have a brew in here that can cure
you of that.” The break room’s tower of coffee pots was already
working hard that morning, spewing and hissing, creating a vile
black potion. “Tastes like tar and cigarettes, but if you put some
sugar in, it can make you glad to be alive.”
    “ For having survived drinking it?” Gus
looked skeptically at the coffee pots.
    “ Yes, exactly.” I served him a cup with
two sugars in a black MBS&K mug. “May I, um?” I gestured to his
tie, which was a little off-center. “I’m going to straighten this
up for you.” I gave the rose-colored knot a little tug. “If your
tie isn’t straight, Bill will be distracted when he talks to
you.”
    “ Will he really?”
    “ This is valuable information I’m
passing along.” And, it hadn’t been unpleasant to fiddle with his
clothes. One good tug with my finger, and I could have removed that
tie altogether. I took him to Bill’s office and let him in
formally.
    “ Bill, this is Detective Haglund,” I
said, trying not to beam. “Call me if you need anything. Copies or
anything like that.”
    Bill, to my astonishment, took one look at my
face and at Gus and made an assessment of keen perception that I
thought most men incapable of making. “Uh, Detective,” he said,
“Would it be all right if my secretary stayed for this meeting? It
might save us some time. She’s very good at jostling my
memory.”
    “ Well sure. That would be a smart way
to do it.”
    Bill gestured toward his conference table and
gave me a look that just might have included a wink. When he did
things like that, which was almost never, his typically washed-out,
unnoticeable face became lively and appealing.
    Bill Nestor was the best boss I’d ever
had.
     

Chapter Three
     
    Detective Haglund did what he could to put us
at ease, but something about being interviewed by a detective in
any capacity unnerved me. I wouldn’t even call it a guilty
conscience but rather a wary one. I had imagined myself being
interviewed like this before. I watched so many detective shows
that it was only natural I dream myself into the plots sometimes. I
imagined trying to be helpful and to recall important details, and
then I’d realize that I’d be so eager to please the detective that
I’d likely start embellishing facts and making things up. I’m so
easily caught up in moments that I’d probably confess to murder
myself. “I wasn’t in Kansas City that night. I was on an airplane
over the Pacific Ocean with two hundred witnesses, and I’ve never
met this man before, and I don’t even know how to operate a
forklift or where to get that kind of acid, but sure, it’s possible
that I killed him.” I was particularly likely, in this case, to say
something overly helpful because the detective in question was my
new fantasy boyfriend.
    Gussie didn’t come at us confrontationally.
That’s a good thing, because a confrontational detective might have
sent Bill into a fit of ritualistic office-straightening, or worse,
as was always the case when Bill became overwhelmed. No, my Gussie
was gracious. He said the appropriate thank yous and produced the
appropriate documents that told Bill it was acceptable to discuss
the client. Attorney/client meetings are privileged, you see,
meaning that an attorney is at risk of losing his license to
practice if he violates the confidentiality of anything a client
has told him, shown him, given him, or even hinted at. Being Bill’s
secretary, I was bound under the same oath to keep Adrienne’s
privacy. The investigation of her death changed matters enough so
that warrants and releases had obviously been issued and our
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