To his credit, Grant made no mention of what had transpired. He reintroduced both himself and the concept of a police interview and went straight to the questions. "Can you describe your relationship to the deceased?"

"Fred was the senior copy editor. I write blurb copy and headlines for the Web site. He wasn't my boss, exactly, but he reviewed my material before it went live."

He nodded and openly surveyed her cube space. Hayley flushed. Had she known a handsome police detective would be questioning her about the corpse next door, she certainly would have made an effort to clean up. The layers upon layers of paperwork, candy-bar wrappers, and office supplies made the desk resemble an archeological dig. Well, they say you take pride in what you care about, ha-ha. Heh.

"And you worked with him on a weekly...daily basis?"

"Daily."

"Daily?" The eyebrow-the one Hayley had previously misinterpreted-shot up. Hayley stared at the eyebrow and sat back in her chair. Dubious, criticizing, evil eyebrow. Cocky bastard. Hayley narrowed her eyes in anticipation of his next question.

Grant opened his mouth to speak but was interrupted by a bead of sweat that rolled down the side of his chiseled face. Hayley forgot to be annoyed.

She watched, fascinated, as in what seemed like slow motion, he brought his blue oxford-clad upper arm to his face and swiped from one side to the other. It was the equivalent of a Pamela Anderson Baywatch hair flip. Hayley's mouth slowly dropped open as his arm fell away and he actually licked his lower lip....

"Miss Smith?" He leaned down, picked up Hayley's trash can, and peered down into her face. "Do you need to vomit?" Hardly. She shook her head.

He nodded and put the trash can down. Then he put his hand on her shoulder. Hayley turned her head and stared at his hand as he said, "I know this must be very difficult for you."

"I bet you say that to all the girls who find corpses."

He pulled his hand back. "Excuse me?"

Hayley cringed back into her chair. "Oh. That was out loud." She could have sworn the tiniest hint of a smile flashed across his face for a second. But she'd certainly been wrong before.

"Why don't we continue?" He picked up his notebook and cleared his throat. "So, let's see. It seems that Fred Leary has been deceased for at least a day and you didn't notice until approximately thirty minutes ago."

Hence the saying, "going for the jugular." "I don't think you understand. What with e-mail, instant messaging, and all that stuff, it's not like people here talk to each other face-to-face a lot."

Grant gave her a skeptical look and Hayley rushed to explain. "It's completely normal for entire weeks to go by without seeing certain people in the office. In fact, there are people here I work with I've never actually seen."