Read Online Dead Boyfriends by David Housewright - Free Book Online Page B

were new to me. I was hooked and remain so, although I must admit that as good as its selections usually are, sometimes the Current plays music of such stunning awfulness that I figure the DJ must have lost a bet. Like now. They were playing something I could only describe as Pakistani hip-hop.
    I switched off the radio.
    Where in hell was Nina? Didn‘t she know what time it was?
    Eleven fifty-two by my watch.
    A high-end Beamer captured my attention as it turned onto the street where Nina lived. I watched as it inched forward and turned into Nina’s driveway. Its engine was switched off and its headlamps extinguished. Nothing moved for five minutes. I imagined what a couple could be doing in a parked car for five minutes and my hands tightenedon my own steering wheel. Finally, the driver’s door opened. A man slipped out of the car—Daniel the architect, if Jenness’s description held true. He moved around the car and halted. His body language told me that he was disappointed Nina didn’t wait for him to open her car door.
    Attagirl, Nina.
    He followed her to the front door and stood close to her while she worked the lock with her keys. The door opened. She turned to face him.
    Don’t kiss him!
    She didn’t. Instead, Nina took his hand and led him inside. The door closed behind them.
    I stared at it for a long time.
    You could kill him,
my inner voice told me.
It would be easy.
    Yes, it would be easy. I’d get away with it, too. Simply wait for him to get into his car, follow him out of the neighborhood, pull up next to him when he stops at a light, roll down the window, say “Hey,” and when he leans over put two rounds between his eyes and drive away. No muss, no fuss.
    Yeah, but what about the next one? Or the one after that? If I started piling up dead boyfriends, Nina was bound to get suspicious. And how long could I get away with it before Bobby Dunston carted me off to Oak Park Heights?
    I shook the idea from my head.
    You could beat him up instead.
    But what if he wasn’t as soft as Jenness thought he was? There’s nothing worse than picking a fight with a guy to impress a woman and getting your ass kicked.
    What other options do you have?
    A voodoo priestess once taught me a simple way to hex my enemies. She said I should write the evildoer’s name nine times and insert the paper into the mouth of a snake.
    Except you don’t have a snake.
    â€œNina.” I said the name out loud just to hear the sound of it. It didn’t do me any good.
    I started the Audi, flipped on the headlights, and put it in gear.
    Well, you saw Nina with another man. Are you happy now?

4
    I stood in the silent kitchen, doing a slow three-sixty, taking it all in. I loved my gadgets, and the counters and cupboards were loaded with them—pasta maker, bread maker, Cuisinart, blender, microwave oven, food dehydrator, deep fryer, rotisserie, ice cream churn, Macho Pop popcorn popper, mini-donut machine, sno-cone machine, pizza oven. Only it was my silver Vienna de Luxe coffee machine that I was searching for.
    I had poured myself another drink before I went to bed. And another. And one more. Now I had awakened with a hangover that rocked my head and sent my stomach into a whirlpool of nausea. Still, I’ve had hangovers before, and I knew I would survive. Pepto-Bismol, toast, coffee, lots and lots of coffee, and I would function fine until noon, a respectable hour when I could have a stiff drink to help take the edge off.
    Ingredients were already loaded into the machine. I pressed a button and a predetermined amount of French vanilla almond coffee beans wasreduced to a fine powder in about six seconds and sprinkled into a filter; spring water was poured, and the coffee brewed.
    I split a bagel and dropped the two halves into my toaster. While it was toasting I put on a CD,
Tosca,
by Giacomo Puccini. I don’t have a lot of opera in my collection—normally, I’m a