Page 118 of Serial Killer Games

I think I see the slightest flicker of a smile.

The opposite door opens and Dodi tumbles in like a rag doll.

“We need a lawyer,” Dodi grunts into the seat. She rolls over and looks up at me, panting.

“We’ve got the best one in town, and he’s taking us on pro bono.”

She frowns in confusion and then gasps. “Shit!”

I follow her line of sight through my window to Laura perched on Dodi’s balcony on the third floor, Cat’s little face peeking up over the railing.

“Shit, shit,shit!” Dodi snarls. This affectsCat.

But for the first time in years, I’m not afraid of anything. No background noise of anxiety and dread. Nothing.

“Trust me,” I tell her.

By now she’s learned to. She falls still and waits patiently for my lead.

I peer out the window and mouth,We’ll call!I don’t know if Laura sees that, but she waves and takes Cat by the shoulders, doting grandma on babysitting duty for the night while Mom and Dad go on a proper date. It’s so hard to make time for date night, butsoimportant.

Dodi catches my eye.

I lean forward and whisper in her ear. “You wanted to play serial killer games with me,” I remind her.

She bites her lip. “I don’t mind the handcuffs,” she says in a low voice, slipping into the fantasy with me. “I prefer zip ties, but in a pinch…” She’s…turned on, the little freak. Her lipstick is smudged, her eyeliner smeared, her hair tousled, spilling all over the seat where she lies.

I still haven’t explained everything to her. I haven’t told her about the house with the built-in grandparents, or the school down the street, or the fact that she gets to keep our Las Vegas winnings for our consulting business seed money—I’ve got twelve clients lined up for us out of the gate, all of whom haveHR departments that will be interested to learn how my spreadsheets can help them remove expensive assholes from payroll. There’s so much to tell her. We’re set.

It’s time for that kiss.

Officer Stubbs climbs in behind the wheel and, after one long look in the rearview mirror at me, presses a button on the dash. “Jailhouse Rock” fills the cruiser at full blast. We round a corner and Dodi slides across the slippery seat and into me. We can’t hold each other, but we don’t need to. She wriggles up and latches her mouth onto mine in a wet slide, a warm twist—and another sudden corner topples us into an even better position. Baby Cop can slap the fucking shatterproof plastic window between us all he fucking wants, I’m never coming up for air.

This is it: happily ever fucking after.

Epilogue

Serial Killers Ever After

Dodi

I have a top-floor meeting.

The executive worries her pen elegantly with the blunt tips of her white manicure as she considers the papers spread out in front of her.

“I can’t argue with the bottom line,” she says thoughtfully. She leans back in her chair and considers me with an expensive, veneered smile. “And who would say no to the offer oftransformational change.”

Next to her a woman who could be her clone, but several decades younger, nods her head and flashes an identical smile at me. The executive bows her blond head over the contract, slashes her signature in four places, and engages me to cut problem employees from payroll and transform her organization into a healthier and more productive workplace. My consulting business has a growing reputation. No one knows quite how I get the numbers.

She has no idea her name is going to be at the top of the listwhen I hand it over to the company’s directors. She’s the biggest psycho here.

A door swings open, and both blond heads swivel to take in the new arrival: a man in standard-issue office attire, gray slacks, white shirt, thick-framed glasses. I narrow my eyes at him. IthinkI recognize him. A temp I run into from time to time as I circulate through the downtown office core. Funny how we keep crossing paths. He’s three steps in before he stops in his tracks and adopts a rueful smile.

“I’m interrupting.”

“Never, Jonathan,” the executive says, extending her hand to take her coffee from him. He passes a tea to the younger woman, and then he holds out the tray with the last coffee to me.

“I always get an extra,” he says. “Black, no sugar.” He shrugs apologetically.

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