Serial Read Online Free PDF Page A

much you can polish a turd.
    “Sounds perfect,” I smiled and watched her body as she leaned over to fill up my cheap white ceramic coffee mug. There must be a factory in China that pumped these out by the billions to fill the Denny’s and IHOPs of America. This particular one had a small chip on the handle and had seen better days.
    “Anything interesting?” she asked and raised her eyebrows at my paper. Her eyebrows were perfect, delicate little arches of light brown hair a shade darker than the golden hair on her head.
    “Nothing much, just looking over today’s numbers.”
    “Numbers? What do you mean? Are you a gambler? One time my uncle won eight thousand dollars on a long shot out at Portland Meadows.”
    “Oh wow,” I said and acted duly impressed, “did he invest it?” What a stupid thing to say, of course her lowbrow relative didn’t invest it. He probably bought a shitty used car and drank the rest away.
    Her face grew dark and she glanced away, “No,” she said, “he lost it again. He was robbed, shot in the parking lot. None of us ever got to see a penny of it.”
    “Oh, how tragic,” I said and affected a sympathetic tone, “but I guess the good news is that he had a chance to hold it in his hands, right? Better to have loved and lost and all that.” Or had a chance to lose everything and make up a pathetic lie to explain the disappearing money to his wife and kids. I briefly wondered where this uncle was now, how much family she had in town here. Who would miss her if she disappeared?
    “I suppose that’s one way of looking at it,” she replied and brightened up. She turned back to the front of the store and headed towards a booth of rowdy looking construction workers. She poured their coffee and let their disgusting comments roll off her thick skin. A woman as beautiful as she must be used to shit like that in this profession, in this area. She looked back my way, a slight blush on her cheeks as she brushed a strand of hair from her forehead.
    She’s embarrassed that I saw their crude reaction towards her. This pleased me. It meant she recognized that I was above her; that I was on the level she should strive towards. And it meant she was ashamed of her own low background.
    This meant she was vulnerable and I liked vulnerable women.
    I sipped my coffee black. I usually liked something a little fancier and much less like gun cleaner, but I would drink anything she put in front of me to spend a few moments longer studying her.
    My phone buzzed and I ignored it. Of course it would be my office wondering where the fuck I’d gotten off to, but I didn’t want to talk to anyone right now.
    I hadn’t meant to stop in this morning, she usually worked the night shift, but I drove by and there she was.
    I couldn’t lie, it was more than a little out of my way to drive by on my morning commute, but the thrill of possibly seeing her in daylight got the best of me.
    And there she had been.
    I had pulled in front, not giving a shit about my nine o’clock board meeting, the grubby fuckers hanging around my Range Rover, or the fact that she might recognize me from that night with my friends, even though it was so long ago. I had needed to see her, as if daring myself to find out if she was real.
    I had been half hoping for a flaw, like bad teeth or a shitty attitude, something that would let me kill her and get it over with…but there had been nothing.
    She was just as intoxicating this morning as the first night I had met her.
    “Here’s your omelet,” she said and thrust her hip out to balance as she set the platter on the tabletop. “Whole wheat toast, cut diagonally with butter on the side,” she continued and handed me the side dish with the bread.
    She remembered me from weeks ago, shit. I don’t want to be remembered, I had spent a lifetime around women just blending in.
    I knew I was handsome enough, and the money made up for any flaws I might have had, but I wasn’t used to women