Punishment With Kisses by Diane Anderson-Minshall

Author:Diane Anderson-Minshall [Anderson-Minshall, Diane]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Mystery & Detective, Fiction, General
ISBN: 9781602820814
Google: ouYKOQAACAAJ
Amazon: 1602820813
Publisher: Bold Strokes Books
Published: 2009-06-16T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Nine

There was a new girl at the office, a reporter named Paula, with hair so curly it seemed like it had been transplanted from another part of her body. Hello, Hair Club for Men. She called it a jewfro, though she was Irish, so I was not really sure if it was okay to repeat her colorful language. Was it racist?

I nicknamed her Curly Q because she was bubbly and quirky with perfect little features—the upturned nose, the sparkling violet eyes, the puckered lips, and perpetually rosy cheeks. Paula seemed like she liked me. She’d been hanging around my cubicle every day at work, bringing me Twizzlers and mocha and asking me out to lunch or drinks. I assumed she was hitting on me, and I was enjoying it, playing various kinky scenarios in my mind like a series of short porno trailers for a best of compilation, until we went out to dinner and I discovered her true motive.

“I know about Shane and Ashley,” Paula revealed almost innocently. I was immediately appalled to hear anyone mention their names together. I was particularly perturbed that a colleague from work would bring them up.

“I’m sorry, what?” I honestly didn’t know where this was going.

“Look, I’ll be honest with you, Megan. I have an ulterior motive in befriending you,” Paula confessed. “I want to write a book about your sister’s murder and I’d like your cooperation.”

Apparently Paula had true crime aspirations from her time on the police beat at the Oregonian, and when she discovered she could be working alongside me at the Willamette Week, she was determined to use that connection to write and sell her own based on real life In Cold Blood –style thriller. Paula said she’d already had interest from a publisher, particularly regarding the love triangle angle.

“Love triangle?” I could feel my cheeks burn. Ash. Cynthia. Shane. I couldn’t help but picture their naked bodies entwined. I tried to push the image away, replacing it with Shane holding me, explaining what happened that day. I told myself eyewitnesses were unreliable, even when they were me.

“I know you and your sister were fighting over your girlfriend, Shane—”

“So you think I killed her? My own sister? Jesus.” I shook my head until my teeth rattled. How could anyone think I was capable of murder?

“I didn’t say that,” Paula protested. “I just think it’s an intriguing element to the story. You don’t think your love triangle played a part in her death.”

It wasn’t a question, but I answered as though it was. “Look, Paula, I don’t know what the fuck you think you know, but you’ve got it all wrong.” In the eighteen months since Ash’s death I’d become familiar with many of the local reporters, their style and techniques, and I had developed a way of dealing with them all. But Paula’s insinuations—her straightforward accusations—threw me. “Get this straight, I did not kill my sister!”

“Hey, Megan, I’m on your side, I’m not saying—”

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