Read Work Done for Hire for Free Online

special interest in humans.
    After the news, he finished off the drink, washed the mug, and put it away. From under the sink he took a stack of newspapers and lay them down on the floor, overlapping, covering the area under and around the steel table. He lined a large trash can with a plastic bag and put it next to the table. He took cutlery out of a drawer and lined it up, just so.
    He brought in the stiff body from the van and carefully unwrapped it. There wasn’t too much blood, and he kept most of it in the bag, which he emptied into a waiting gallon jar. He labeled it with the date and set it by the freezer door.
    First things first. He put a heavy cutting board under the man’s neck and with one blow from a cleaver separated the head from the body. Holding a newspaper under it, he carried it to the meat locker, where it joined its eleven fellows on a shelf.
    He wasn’t squeamish, but it was easier to work without the head looking at you. Consulting a flowchart that he’d printed out and laminated, he started with the legs and worked his way up, carving the meat into generous but manageable steaks and chops, wrapping each with a Seal-a-Meal vacuum machine and dating it. Every now and then he carried the packages into the freezer and put each into its proper bin.
    It took little more than an hour. He cracked the long bones with the cleaver, exposing the marrow, and put them in a slow oven to cook for brown sauce. Most of the rest went into a simmering stock pot. Then he cleaned all of his implements and the table.
    He stacked up all the newspapers and set them aside to bury tomorrow; burning might attract attention. Besides, he liked to look at the pile every now and then.
    He took a bracing shower and then finished off the pizza, watching MTV.
    Time to make some money. Of course he couldn’t have a regular job, but he could work at home. He opened the rolltop desk and turned on the computer and opened the Word file
Shandor Ascendent: Book Four of the Starfound Cycle
.
    It wasn’t great literature. But you do have to eat.

Cat in the Box

1.
    I spent a couple of hours getting the damned bicycle carrier attached to the back of my old van. My own fault for buying it “as is”; it was missing a couple of bolts the previous owner probably hurled away in frustration.
    Kit didn’t mind the delay. She was going over last year’s notes in Calculus III. I asked her whether that was in preparation for Calculus IV and she said “I wish,” and told me the name of the course it was a prerequisite for. Three words, and the only one I understood was “analysis.” Though I doubted it had anything to do with Freud.
    We probably wouldn’t need the carrier anyhow, this weekend. The plan was to bike up to Cedar Rapids, twenty-four miles on MapQuest, spend the night at a motel, and come back Sunday morning. Then I’d take a longer ride during the week, maybe to Des Moines and back, get a feel for it.
    I’ve been riding a bike since I was a kid, a year-round thing in Daytona, but haven’t done a really long trip since my sophomore year, when a bunch of us spent the summer biking and staying in hostels in Holland and then England.
    Since moving to Iowa I’ve grown a little flabby. Maybe more than a little. Doesn’t take much energy to stare out the window at the snow and wish you were somewhere else. I tried skiing my first winter and fucked up both knees badly enough to need a wheelchair. Not anybody’s vehicle of choice for ice and snow. A diet of beer and potato chips, seasoned with onion dip and self-pity, set me on the road to the 200-pound mark. Hit 203 before I got up on crutches.
    Seem stuck at 190 now. Hoping to lose fifteen or twenty pounds biking, before winter sets in. Help get into the character, too.
    Scrubbed the grease off my hands but decided against a shower. We’d want one when we got to the motel, anyhow.
    Kit was hunched over her