Sex, Lies, and Online Dating Read Free Page A

about the process. Each wrote in a different genre, so they didn’t really get into specifics. Well, except for Maddie. She’d get into the gruesome specifics, usually over lunch, and they’d all have to tell her to stop. It was kinda nice talking murder with someone who didn’t look like he was going to get excited about liver temperature.
    “Did you catch the show the other night about that woman who poisoned five husbands?” Quinn asked.
    “Bonnie Sweet? Yeah, I saw it.” Bonnie had been the inspiration for Lucy’s fourth book, Tea By Proxy . Like Lucy’s murdering protagonist, Bonnie had boiled lilies of the valley into a toxic tea and served it in Wedgwood. “That woman just loved to garden.” The fact that Lucy was having this conversation on a coffee date might seem strange, but it beat the hell out of listening to him bitch about an ex, talk about his motorcycle, or relive his hunting trip to Alaska. She was never going to see Quinn after she left Starbucks, so what did it matter what they discussed? “You gotta give Bonnie points for style.”
    Quinn gazed into her eyes as if he were trying to determine whether she was a psycho nutcase or spent too much time alone with her television. The truth was that she was a writer with page upon page of research in her head. Everything from lace to lividity.
    He straightened and leaned forward to place his arms on the table. “It takes one coldhearted woman to slowly poison someone she supposedly loves. Or did at one time.”
    Which was absolutely the truth. Female serial killers were coldhearted bitches. Every last one of them. They were also neater. Smarter. Cleaner and, as far as Lucy was concerned, far more interesting than their male counterparts. “Yes, but that’s what makes them ultimately fascinating.”
    “Fascinating?” He shook his head and laughed without humor. “Thank God there aren’t many of those ‘fascinating’ women around.”
    “Maybe they are around and we just don’t know it?” Lucy smiled and tilted her head to one side. “Maybe female killers are just smarter than men and don’t get caught.”
    “Maybe.” His intense gaze stared into hers, and she got the feeling that he was watching for something. For what, she had no idea. Quinn opened his mouth to say more, but a gagging sound caught his attention. Lucy looked to her left at Mike and his blonde date. Mike’s hands clutched the sides of the table and his face and neck were turning a deep red.
    “Oh my God!” Lucy stood so fast her chair fell backward. “Klondikemike is choking. Somebody do something.”
    “Shouldn’t you do something?”
    She looked at Quinn as he rose also. “Me?”
    “Aren’t you a nurse?”
    Nurse? “What?” Oh crap. That’s right. She’d lied about that in her bio. Since no one else seemed to be doing anything, she quickly moved the short distance. She didn’t know the Heimlich maneuver, so she did the next best thing: She thumped Mike between the shoulder blades. Nothing happened, and she thumped him harder.
    Mike’s date screamed. Someone across the coffee shop yelled, “Call 911! A man’s choking to death.”
    The noise inside Starbucks went from a low steady hum to a wave of shouting and scraping chairs.
    “Jesus H. Macy,” Quinn swore. He grabbed Lucy by the arms, picked her up, and moved her out of the way. He hauled Mike up from behind, and with one abrupt squeeze, a coffee bean flew out and hit Mike’s date between her stunned eyes. Mike took a deep, gasping breath. “Thanks,” he wheezed.
    Quinn nodded. “No problem.”
    The cacophony of raised voices grew even louder as people crowded around Mike to make sure he was all right. Quinn stood with his weight on one leg and his hands on his hips. A frown pulled at the corners of his lips as he watched the commotion in front of him. The gap between the zipper of his jacket widened across his hard chest, and Lucy thought she heard him mutter something that sounded a lot like