Elaine Viets & Victoria Laurie, Nancy Martin, Denise Swanson - Drop-Dead Blonde (v5.0) (pdf) by Unknown (howl and other poems .TXT) 📕

``The last straw was when Minfreda started ordering me around like I was some kind of servant. I didn't mind pick- ing up her dry cleaning and taking her shoes in for new soles. But one day she handed me her grocery list. She wanted me to do her shopping on my lunch hour. She was one of those nitpicky shoppers, too.'I want the Smuckers grape jelly in the six-ounce size, not the eight-ounce,' she told me. That kind of stuff can make you crazy. I wasn't going to put up with it. ``I went to the store, all right. I put one brown bag on her desk and said, 'They were out of everything but this.'

``Minfreda opened the bag. Inside was a WORLD'S BEST BOSS coffee mug. A nice thick mug.

``Minfreda turned pale when she saw it.'Thank you, Mar- gery,' she said.'That will be all for today.'

``That was all, period.

``Minfreda became a lot more polite to the women in the office. She stopped flirting with the men. She no longer went for three-hour lunches with the boys. Most days, when she didn't have a lunch meeting, she brown-bagged it at her desk. She stayed later and worked harder than all of us put together.

``Her behavior became perfectly professional. All in all, she was a good boss. We all liked her.

``She started dating nice men, on her professional level. The whole office chipped in and bought her a silver chaffing dish when she married a corporate lawyer and moved to Arizona two years later. They had three children, all blondes. That's funny, when you consider Minfreda and her husband both had brown hair. I guess Mother Nature righted that wrong in the next generation. Last I heard, Minfreda was vice president of some accounting firm. She is well respected.

``Just like she was at our company, once she straightened up and started flying right. She was known to be a bit strict, but fair.

``Well, she did make one exception. I have to say, she treated me like a queen,'' Margery said.

``But then, like all good secretaries, I knew where the bodies were buried.'' Read on for an excerpt from Elaine Viets's next Drop-Dead mystery,

Just Murdered

Coming from Signet in May 2005 ``Uh-oh, here comes trouble,'' Millicent said.

If this was trouble, Helen Hawthrone wished she had it. A Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud pulled up in front of Millicent's Bridal Salon on Las Olas Boulevard.

This was a vintage Rolls, the car of new movie stars and old money. It's long, sculpted curves were the color of well- polished family silver. The shiny new Porsches, Beeners, and Ferraris on the fashionable Fort Lauderdale Street looked like cheap toys next to it.

The driver's door opened and out stepped a chauffeur in a uniform tailored to show off his broad shoulders and long legs. His pants hugged the best buns beyond the Gran Forno bakery. His hint of a beard would feel deliciously rough on bare skin.

The chauffeur jogged to the rear passenger door with an athlete's grace.

``Baby, you can drive my car,'' Helen said.

``Sorry, sweetie, Rod's taken,'' Millicent said, ``and it's battle stations. They have an appointment here.''

The chauffeur opened the door, Helen saw a candy-pink spiked heel like something from Barbie's dream closet. Was the woman wearing a size-four shoe? Did they make a size four? Helen was six feet tall and didn't know much about petite-people wear.

This woman might reach five feet. She had on a sleeve- less pink dress with a flirty pleated skirt to match her pink stilettos.

``Oh, my God,'' Helen said, as the woman slid out of the car. ``She's not wearing any panties.''

``Typical,'' Millicent said. ``Kiki can spend so much

161 162 Excerpt from Just Murdered money and still look cheap. That dress is two thousand dollars, and it's suitable for a child of fourteen.''

``On a woman of forty,'' Helen said.

``Forty!'' Millicent said. ``Kiki Shenrad is fifty if she's a day--and tucked so tight she has hospital corners.''

Kiki threw her arms around the hunky chauffeur and pulled him toward her for a deep kiss, while running her slender leg along his muscular one.

``She'd better pick out a dress quick,'' Helen said. ``I think they're going to consummate the marriage right on the sidewalk.''

Millicent didn't hear her. She was too busy pulling wed- ding gowns from the racks. Helen knew she should help her boss, but she couldn't tear herself from the show out- side the shop window.

A small, shy figure emerged from the huge Rolls and crept around the nearly copulating couple. Miss Meek was about twenty with no-color hair scraped into a messy pony- tail. Her gray sweats were baggy, but Helen guessed a slen- der figure was buried underneath the lumpy cloth.

``You'd think Kiki would give her maid a decent cast-off dress,'' Helen said.

Millicent looked up from the snowstorm of white chiffon and satin on the silver display stand. ``Maid? That's the bride--Desiree Shenrad.''

``Uh-oh,'' Helen said. ``We've got trouble.''

Kiki finally pried herself off the chauffeur, slapped his perky posterior, and sent him back to stand by the car. She flung open the salon door and yelled, ``Millie!''

Millicent winced. Only big spenders called her that. She hated it.

Miss Meek scurried in her mother's magnificent wake. The shop's pink paint was designed to flatter most complex- ions. The mirrors made double chins vanish. But they couldn't transform dreary little Desiree.

Kiki started to air-kiss Millicent, then swiveled her head so abruptly, Helen thought she'd get whiplash.

Kiki had seen the rose dress.

``I want that,'' she said. Helen had never heard a soft voice sound so hard.

Every woman who came into Millicent's wanted the rose dress. There was nothing quite like it. The strapless gown Excerpt from Just Murdered 163 had a beautifully