Emmett Godwin was fairly floating into the reception area when he arrived later that day. Normally an ebullient man, he complimented everyone he saw in an outrageous manner all the way back to the suite where his office was located.
“Great to see you again, Girl Friday! I couldn’t have cinched this account without you!” He opened his briefcase and presented her with a single rose. “Now don’t go pressing harrassment charges, Lillian. This is just for a job greatly done.”
“Oh, no, Mr. Godwin....I...I don’t know what to say.”
“I think the modern thing to say is, ‘thank you’, which reminds me, is the fruit bouquet on its way?”
“Yes, sir. But I had to use Mr. Bucknell’s credit card.”
He slapped himself on the forehead. “I knew I was forgetting something. Now I’ll have to buy ol’ Gerry an extra pint of his favorite ale. No matter, I can afford it now. And the studio is mine for the night?”
“Yes, sir, taken care of.”
“Excellent. If you need me that’s where I’ll be, but only in case of emergency, okay? You know, my wife’s crashed the car, the world will end in thirty minutes, that sort of thing.” He grinned like a little boy and Lillian realized he was half-joking.
“Holding all calls, faxes and unimportant visitors, sir.”
His face turned serious suddenly. “I almost forgot. And I hate springing this on you at the last minute, but one of those messages you gave to me in Ohio...turns out it’s another potential project. I drafted a response on the plane. Could you stay late? I’ll make sure you’re paid overtime.”
Lillian was touched by his tone. As if she might have any plans on a Tuesday night. “No problem.”
He smiled with genuine warmth. “You’re a gem. How about a pizza around six? We’ll charge it to my credit card. Just kidding. I’m buying.”
“Sure.” She’d never seen a businessman giddy while sober before. It was infectious.
He walked around the desk to hand her the paperwork and a twenty dollar bill. “Anything but mushrooms or anchovies.”
She looked at the papers, “Which is the company name?”
He leaned over her and pointed at the hand-written cover sheet. “ This is our point-of-contact and this is the company name.”
Ophelia passed the doorway then came back with an odd look on her face. “Em-, I mean, Mr. Godwin...How was your trip?”
“Highly successful,” he beamed at the office manger/witch. Then he winked at her and headed for the engineering studio.
Lillian had the strangest thought. Mr. Godwin and the witch? No way. She shrugged off the impossible line of thought and got to work drafting the proposal.
At ten minutes after five, Ophelia was making her final rounds before locking up. “What are you still doing here?” she snapped at Lillian from the doorway.
“Mr. Godwin has a potential client. I’m typing up his draft proposal.”
“Where’s Mr. Godwin?” Ophelia narrowed her eyes.
“In the engineering studio.”
Ophelia pressed her lips together showing she was clearly unhappy about the situation. “Well, be sure to pull the door to hard when you leave. I’ll remind Mr. Godwin to set the alarm when he leaves.” She stalked off with a swish toward the studio.
“I will never wear silk or satin again....” Lillian said to the empty room.
The pizza arrived at six-fifteen. Lillian set out paper plates and napkins in the breakroom before disturbing her boss.
When he opened the box he was so surprised, he exlaimed, “My favorite! How did you know?”
Lillian grinned. “The mood you were in, I figured you probably forgot to call your wife. I asked her.”
“You’re priceless. You didn’t mention you were staying late, too, I hope. Wouldn’t want to give her the wrong idea.”
Lillian giggled. “No, I omitted that part.”
He nodded because he had a mouthful of pizza.
“I’m almost finished with your draft. Should be done in about another thirty minutes.”
“Good job. I’m glad you can read my scrawl. My laptop battery was dead.
While they ate they chatted about celebrity gossip and funny items seen and heard while he was away. Then Emmet Godwin went back to work. Lillian cleaned up the food things before she pulled a pair of latex gloves from her pants pocket. She couldn’t belive her good fortune. The one problem with her plan was no time alone with the coffee machine. She reached under the sink, behind the cleaning supplies where she’d hidden a small tool kit. On a cop’s salary, household repairs were a fact of life. He was great at law enforcement, but all thumbs when it came to the house. Oh, he could mow the lawn, but whenever the mower broke down, he’d call for Lillian.
Before she removed the machine’s casing, she reached behind it to unplug it, but the cord was already dangling free from the outlet. It had been plugged in this morning before she made coffee. No matter. She made quick work of the casing and crossing the wires then putting the machine back together. She pocketed the gloves and went back to her desk. Typing the last two lines of the draft, she saved the file, printed it out and laid the still-warm papers on Mr. Godwin’s desk. Like an obedient employee, she pulled the door shut very hard behind her.
For the first night in three weeks, she slept soundly. No snooze alarm today. Lillian was up and out of the house in record time. Much to her surprise, there were police cars and an ambulance in front of the building when she pulled into the parking lot. She leapt from the car and hurried to the office as fast as her arthritic ankles would allow.
Kalindi was at her desk, her eyeliner and mascara making black rivers down her cheeks. When she saw Lillian, she mumbled, “Mr. Godwin’s dead...”
All the color drained out of Lillian’s face. “Oh, my God! What happened?”
“The coffeemaker...something went wrong. It shocked him...and he had a heart attack. His pacemaker just-- oh, it’s horrible.” She dissolved into tears again.
Lillian moved through the office like a sleepwalker. Her plan had gone horribly wrong. She just wanted to shock Ophelia...not kill anyone... She heard the other secretaries quietly sobbing and saw them hanging on each other’s shoulders. Then she heard a familiar voice reading the Miranda. It couldn’t be...Sam, her late husband’s partner.
“You’ll have to come with me, Miss Manning,” he said to Ophelia.
“But I haven’t done anything! I loved him!”
The situation became even more surreal when Sam walked into her field of vision, pulling Ophelia by one handcuffed arm.
Spotting Lillian, the plain clothes dectective said, “Lil, what are you doing here?”
“I-I work here. Sam, is it true? Mr. Godwin is dead?”
“Yeah. Done in by his ladylove here.”
“How dare you!” Ophelia hissed. “I didn’t kill him!”
“The staff already told me that you unplug the coffeemaker every night. Then you come in extra early to plug it back in again so it has time to heat the water for your coffee.”
“I was supposed to make the coffee...” Lillian murmurred without realizing it.
“Oh, yeah, the receptionist told me all about it. How she chased away every other secretary the temp agency sent over. Everyone who might be competition. No offense, Lil.”
“None taken. I’m still in mourning. I wouldn’t...”
“I know, I know,” Sam nodded respectfully.
“My lawyer will prove I didn’t do it. I don’t even know how a coffeemaker works! Only that they’re a fire hazard if left plugged in overnight!”
“Yeah, yeah. Here, McMurphy, drive her downtown and book her on suspicion of murder one.” Sam handed Ophelia off to a uniformed officer. “Lil, I need to take your statement. Where’s a place we can talk?”
They went to her desk and she told him about the previous day. “Guess I’m out of a job now.”
“Something will turn up,” Sam said consolingly. “I still have your home number, if I need anything else, I’ll call. Take care of yourself, Lil.”
A few weeks later, Kalindi called her. “Lillian! You’re not going to believe this!” Before Lil could ask what, Kalindi rushed on. “Mr. Godwin was not only having an affair with the dragonlady, he shaved three million dollars off the last five projects he worked on and put the whole bundle in an off-shore account!”
“No!” Lillian exclaimed despite herself. Sweet Mr. Godwin not only an adulterer, but an embezzler besides.
“Yes! And the police found brochures on several foreign countries in Ophelia’s condo! He really was going to run away with that horrible woman!”
“Great scot!”
“They think that last night, when you worked late for Mr. Godwin, it sent her over the edge. She got tired of waiting and did him in!”
“Scandalous!”
“Isn’t it though. Mr. Bucknell and Mr. Radford are beside themselves. They think the company will never recover.”
“Oh, nonsense. As my late husband used to say, ‘Any publicity, even bad publicity, is still free advertising. And you know what, he was usually right.”
End