My Boss is a Serial Killer (28 page)

There was no question out there, so I didn’t
say anything.

He smacked the table, startling everyone
except me, and I was already so high-strung I couldn’t have been
more alarmed by gunfire. “Did you not,” he demanded, “have
self-serving intentions?”

“
What are you talking
about?”

“
Did you intend to blackmail Bill
Nestor with your knowledge?”

“
I did not!”

“
Did you intend to besmirch the
reputation of this law firm in retaliation for some imagined slight
you suffered?”

“
I did not, assuming I understood what
the hell you just asked me.”

“
I don’t think this is a good time for
you to be a smartass,” Bronk told me coldly.

At this point I recalled that slavery is
illegal in the United States, and I didn’t have to put up with
this. The imminence of my unemployment seemed suddenly quite
liberating. Without Bill Nestor, I wasn’t sure I wanted to work at
this dump anyway.

I leaned back in my chair. I stopped shaking
abruptly, like a little switch turned off inside me. What were they
going to do, kill me? Ha, that I doubted. Contrary to what His
Majesty Terry Bronk had just said, it did seem like a good time to
be a smartass. I gestured at Mr. Miller, who had an Employee
Handbook with him, of all things. “Show me in that book,” I said,
“the list of instructions that explains what to do when you suspect
you’re working with a serial murderer.”

“
Obviously there’s not a specific list
of instructions for every scenario,” Junior Gestapo Brent
said.

Terry Bronk cut him off. “You’re fully aware
that there is a system in place for reporting any issue you have
with a fellow employee.”

“
What I’m fully aware of,” I said, “is
that Bill Nestor has worked here for almost two decades, and
apparently, in all that time, no one but me has had the presence of
mind to notice that every couple years one of his widowed clientele
killed herself.”

Something passed through the room, a wave of
discomfort that affected even the ruddy-faced monster Bronk.

“
Oh, so that’s it,” I said. “You’re
afraid of getting sued by the families of the clients. Do you think
they have grounds? Like, hey, someone at MBS&K should have
noticed that their firm a bad track record with retired widows, and
if they had, my mother might still be alive.”

No one said anything, probably because I was
mortifying them all. I had broken one of the unspoken rules, which,
coincidentally, has to do with how much stuff needs to remain
unspoken.

“
And so,” I continued, “if I had gone
to my immediate supervisor Donna and told her the work-related
‘problem,’ then MBS&K could have taken credit for discovering
this strange phenomenon and made itself look better in the process,
thus subverting or at least lessening possible
lawsuits.”

This came out nicely. I was glad that I
hadn’t stumbled over my logical little argument. In the back of my
mind, I was counting up how much money I had in savings and trying
to remember where the local office was for filing an unemployment
claim. Oh well, it was usually pretty easy for an experienced
secretary to find work.

Terry Bronk glared at me hard, but to no
avail. I wasn’t afraid of him. Sensing this, he took a
business-like tone. “We’re going to go through this again. We have
other issues to address before we can fully come to the conclusions
of our meeting.”

“
Oh, I can hardly wait,” I
muttered.

“
Brent?” Now Terry looked to the Junior
Gestapo agent at his side, and I understood that through a rigorous
program of back-stabbing and ass-kissing, Brent had established
himself as the teacher’s pet. Donna was too busy doing her actual
job to ingratiate herself to Terry Bronk that much, and so in a
couple years Junior Gestapo Brent would probably be her boss and
tattling on her for something, too. Not my problem. I wasn’t going
to be here, anyway, was I?

While I pondered this, Junior Gestapo Brent
returned to his checklist of “Things Carol Did Wrong.” He’d been
flustered by the little explosion of Bronk’s temper and my
smartassed-ness (if that is the word for it?), but there’s nothing
like a checklist to get a meeting back on track. His expression
returned to contented smugness as he said, “Can you shed any light
on why Suzanne Fark-arn-sha quit her job?”

This wasn’t a good time to giggle at this
umpteenth screwing of Suzanne’s last name, so I kept a straight
face. Strange question. I didn’t know what it had to do with me,
but I was surely about to find out. No telling what kinds of
affronts were being attributed to me and my evil plot. I shrugged
and said, “I heard she was unhappy here. Hard to imagine that.”

“
Would you postulate that there was any
connection between Suzanne’s resignation and your investigation of
Bill Nestor?”

Oh, good Lord. She had turned her resignation
in on Monday, hadn’t she? Despite its only being two days before,
Monday was all but a blur to me now. On Monday, my life and my job
had still been halfway normal. But I did recall Bill’s embarrassed
admission that Suzanne had come to his apartment and thrown herself
at him. Had that even been the truth? Probably. Just because Bill
was on the lam from the police didn’t cause me to doubt his
veracity. Still, he’d asked me to keep it quiet, and while I might
have been a lot of things, I kept my word to friends. It wasn’t the
business of any of these jerks, that’s for sure.

“
Carol?” pressed Junior Gestapo Brent,
impatiently, because I was not responding.

“
Sorry, I don’t know what ‘postulate’
means.”

Junior Gestapo Brent stammered for a moment.
“Uh, it means to propose. Er, think about, or maybe a theory you
might have.”

“
She knows what it means.” Terry Bronk
broke in again, thundering, “What did you have to do with Suzanne’s
resignation?”

“
Hell if I know. Why don’t you ask
her?”

“
Were you lobbying for Suzanne’s
paralegal position?”

“
I don’t want to be a
paralegal.”

Junior Gestapo Brent found his voice again.
He was always at his strongest when finding a way to get somebody
in trouble, after all. “Were you accepting special assignments from
Bill Nestor that would ordinarily be Suzanne’s job?”

“
I went to the library for him; that
was all.”

“
For what case?” demanded Terry
Bronk.

“
It wasn’t for a specific
case.”

“
You were out of the office for two
days,” Junior Gestapo Brent reminded me and everyone else. “What
non-specific thing can you investigate for two days?”

“
Widows and suicide,” I answered, “and
whether that’s normal.”

They stared at me.

“
Under my boss’s instructions,” I
added. I wished I hadn’t. I didn’t want to give them the
satisfaction of coaxing excuses from me.

Junior Gestapo Brent smiled with cold
significance. “And the next Monday, Suzanne just happens to turn in
her resignation.”

“
And?”

“
That’s what we’re asking
you.”

“
Well, maybe you should ask her. Did
she have one of these little meetings too? Can we call her in here
right now?”

“
This is a private meeting,” Mr. Miller
said. He was the confidentiality man.

“
Oh, well, I don’t mind,” I said.
“Let’s bring her in as a witness to my nefarious deeds.”

“
Stop it,” said Terry Bronk. “Don’t try
and distract the purpose of the meeting.”

“
Which is what, exactly? Can I have one
of those little outlines that your Nazi-in-training is
holding?”

Donna suddenly snorted into her hand,
covering her laughter badly.

“
Those kinds of remarks aren’t going to
help your case,” Terry Bronk coldly said to me. His shot a filthy
look at Donna.

“
What case? Am I on trial here? If I
were an attorney, and thank God, I’m not, I’d be focusing on the
real problems that are facing this firm and not looking for someone
to blame them on. And ask Suzanne why she quit, not me. Suzanne
doesn’t tell me anything.”

My poor supervisor Donna looked on me with
both pity and impatience and said, “Carol, Suzanne’s not even here
today.”

“
So we’re having this meeting because
I’m the one who is here.” I looked to Donna and asked, “What’s the
matter, is Suzanne sick?”

“
That’s none of your business,” Junior
Gestapo Brent said. I supposed I could call him that to his face,
now that I’d made the Nazi comment aloud. He looked at his
checklist again. “Is it your contention that you were not lobbying
to obtain Suzanne’s paralegal position?”

But I didn’t answer him, because my brain had
gone down a little path all its own. It certainly wasn’t interested
in anything further that was said in this blasted meeting, the
point of which seemed to be to blame everything involving the
suspicious deaths of nine women on Carol Frank, including the fact
that anyone found out about the suspicious deaths of the nine
women, which was just bad for business.

No, what my attention had turned to was the
fact that Suzanne Farkanansia was not at work that day. That Bill
Nestor was still missing. And that, before I had made an appearance
in Bill’s life, Suzanne was his most trusted associate at the
office. Did any of these idiots know that? Did any of them know
that Suzanne had proclaimed her “love” for Bill the weekend
before?

“
Carol, we’re going to need an answer
from you,” said Junior Gestapo Brent.

“
I’m going to the bathroom,” I said. I
got up from my chair.

“
Take your seat,” Terry Bronk told me.
“We’ve only been here ten minutes; no one needs a break
yet.”

“
Speak for yourself,” I said. “I just
got here after sitting in traffic for half an hour, and I had two
cups of coffee this morning.”

I headed for the door, leaving my purse on
the table, so it would look like I was coming right back.

“
Fine, we’re taking five minutes.” The
tone of Terry Bronk’s voice suggested that I was systematically
destroying any chances I might have to save my job, but I hadn’t
supposed I’d come out of this room employed anyway. Screw him.
Screw, screw, screw. I walked quickly away from the conference room
and into the main office, cubicles as far as the eye could see. I
marched to Charlene’s cubicle, as was my intention, and thanked my
ever-loving stars that she was in there.

“
I need your help,” I said over her
shoulder, as low as I could.

She didn’t bat an eye, didn’t stop typing for
a second. Out of the corner of her mouth, she said, “Whatever you
need.”

“
Back row, file room,” I said. “Bring
your car keys.”

Charlene was close behind me after I’d ducked
into the crowded back row of red-rope files. As requested, she had
her car keys in her hand. “Where are we going?” she asked, her eyes
alight.

“
Just I’m going,” I said, “if you’ll
let me use your car.”

“
Sure, that’s fine. What are they doing
to you in there?”

“
Scapegoat,” I guessed with a shrug. It
didn’t surprise me that Charlene had a good idea of what was
happening in my “meeting.” She always knew more or less what was
going on.

“
Are you okay? Where are you going? Is
it about Bill?”

“
I hate to sound melodramatic,” I said,
“but really the less you know, the better. If anybody asks, just
say that I told you I had an emergency and needed to borrow your
car. And play dumb about anything else.”

“
I don’t know how to play
dumb.”

“
Then just look angry for being
interrupted. One more favor?” I asked her. “Can you get me a copy
of the employee address list?”

“
It’ll take a second,” she said. “Wait
here, and be really quiet.”

She left me there, in the rows of red-ropes.
I was so grateful to her. One might not expect for Charlene to be
so eager to help me in my escapade, because she was such a staunch
supporter of the rigors of the law firm. However, I happened to
know that she detested Terry Bronk. He wasn’t ethical enough for
her tastes by half, and any time he sent down a mandate or said
something about the practice of law, I could see her cringe. So I
could rely on her to aid me in any way that would irritate him.

I had another problem, though. I had a car;
I’d soon have Suzanne’s address, but I was stuck in the back row of
the file room. Assuming I could walk out of the office without
Donna, Junior Gestapo Brent, Terry Bronk or any of my other
inquisitors seeing me, I’d have to stroll off the elevators into
the parking garage where half a dozen police officers would see me
leaving. At least the two who’d escorted me here that day knew
perfectly well who I was and my relationship to Kansas City’s Most
Wanted. They might be curious about where I was heading.

And maybe they should be. Should I tell them?
It was probably a better idea to have the police pay a call to
Suzanne than for me to go knocking on her door. I’d already
involved myself far too much and look at the trouble it was
causing. I was being pegged as an opportunist and a blackmailer and
lobbyist and probably a skank, too. All I had to do was suggest
that Suzanne Farkanansia might have a motive to help Bill Nestor,
and that maybe they should check with her.