Genesis by Karin Slaughter Page B

but it was Pauline's own fault for not already buying the
cupcakes for Felix's class. She'd gotten the notice a week ago, but she
hadn't anticipated all hell breaking loose at work in between. One of
the interior design agency's biggest clients had ordered a custom-made
sixty-thousand-dollar Italian brown leather couch that wouldn't
fit in the damn elevator, and the only way to get it up to his penthouse
was with a ten-thousand-dollar-an-hour crane.
    The client was blaming Pauline's agency for not catching the
error, the agency was blaming Pauline for designing the couch too
big, and Pauline was blaming the dipshit upholsterer whom she had
specifically told to go to the building on Peachtree Street to measure
the elevator before making the damn couch. Faced with a ten-thousand-dollar-an-hour crane bill or rebuilding a sixty-thousand-dollar couch,
the upholsterer was, of course, conveniently forgetting this conversation,
but Pauline was damned if she was going to let him get away
with it.
    There was a meeting of all concerned at seven o'clock sharp, and
she was going to be the first one there to get in her side of the story.
As her father always said, shit rolls downhill. Pauline McGhee wasn't
going to be the one smelling like a sewer when the day was over. She
had evidence on her side—a copy of an email exchange with her boss
asking him to remind the upholsterer about taking measurements.
The critical part was Morgan's response: I'll take care of it. Her boss
was pretending like the emails hadn't happened, but Pauline wasn't
going to take the fall. Someone was going to lose their job today, and
it sure as hell wasn't going to be her.
    "No, baby," she said, pulling Felix's hand away from a package of
Gummi Bears dangling from the shelf. Pauline swore they put those
things at kid level just so their parents would be bullied into buying
them. She had seen more than one mother relent to a screaming kid
just so he'd shut up. Pauline didn't play that game, and Felix knew it.
If he tried anything, she would snatch him up and leave the store,
even if that meant abandoning a half-filled shopping cart.
    She turned down the bakery aisle, nearly smacking into a grocery
cart. The man behind the buggy laughed good-naturedly, and
Pauline managed a smile.
    "Have a good day," he said.
    "You too," she returned.
    That, she thought, was the last time she was going to be nice to
anybody this morning. She'd tossed and turned all night, then gotten
up at three so she could run on the treadmill, put her face on, fix
breakfast for Felix and get him ready for school. Long gone were her
single days when she could spend all night partying, go home with
whoever looked good, then roll out of bed the next morning twenty
minutes before it was time to get to work.
    Pauline ruffled Felix's hair, thinking she didn't miss it a bit.
Though getting laid every now and then would've been a damn gift
from heaven.
    "Cupcakes," she said, relieved to find several stacks lined up along
the front of the bakery counter. Her relief quickly left when she saw
that every single one was pastel with Easter bunnies and multicolored
eggs on top. The note she'd gotten from the school had specified
nondenominational cupcakes, but Pauline wasn't sure what that meant,
other than Felix's extremely expensive private school was brimming
with politically correct bullshit. They wouldn't even call it an Easter
Party—it was a Spring Party that just happened to fall a few days before
Easter Sunday. What religion didn't celebrate Easter? She knew
the Jews didn't get Christmas, but for the love of God, Easter was all
about them. Even the Pagans got the bunny.
    "All right," Pauline said, handing Felix her purse. He slung it over
his shoulder the same way she did, and Pauline felt a pang of angst.
She worked in interior design. Just about every man in her life was a
flaming mo. She'd have to make an effort to meet some straight men
soon for