After getting my books and notes packed up, I left my borrowed study space and headed through the building to the morgue. The only body scheduled to be autopsied was head-squished guy from the movie set, and after garbing myself in scrubs, shoe covers, plastic smock, paper apron over that, hair cover, and latex gloves, I made quick work of getting him out of the cooler and into the cutting room. Sometimes it cracked me up to go through the whole rigmarole of protecting myself from biohazards. I sure as hell didn’t need to worry about Hepatitis or HIV since my parasite took care of that. There’d been plenty of times when I’d eaten brains straight from the body bag, while still protectively garbed—another one of those things that I did by-the-book, since ignoring safety protocols was a fireable offense.
Blood from Mr. Brent Stewart’s smushed head had pooled in a sticky mess inside the bag, and when I pulled him from the stretcher onto the metal table the bag slid as well and poured a gooey stream of blood onto the floor. I let out a bunch of nasty words, sopped up as much as I could with towels which then went straight into the biohazard container, then fetched the mop and bucket to get the rest of it up before Dr. Leblanc arrived. I’d barely finished emptying the bucket out and putting the cleaning stuff away when the pathologist came in.
“Shit, sorry, doc,” I said as I hurried back into the cutting room. “Had a blood spill, and I don’t have your tools set out. Gimme five minutes and I’ll be ready for you.”
“Not a problem, Angel.”
Dr. Leblanc was in his fifties with thin blond-grey hair, and sharp blue eyes that often sparkled with humor. He was unimposing physically—medium height and build with a bit of flab around the waist—but I knew he was tough as nails when it came to standing up for what he believed in. “You’ve spoiled me by usually having everything ready half an hour before I’ve even finished my morning coffee.” His eyes crinkled as he smiled at me. “In fact I don’t think I’ve ever seen you running late before. Is everything all right?”
“Yep!” I replied as I set out his implements: scalpels, scissors, saw, forceps, rib shears, syringes. “I was studying in the investigator’s office. Had another tutoring session with Nick this morning.”
“Ah, of course. Five more days.” He pulled smock and apron on, tugged on gloves. “Nick’s been helpful?”
“Oh my god, more than helpful,” I said fervently. “There’s no way I could afford to pay a tutor for the amount of time he’s worked with me. And he’s actually really good at teaching this stuff. I mean he’s not, er, his usual self.”
Dr. Leblanc’s eyes flashed with amusement. He knew exactly what I meant. There was a good reason why I used to mentally refer to Nick as “Nick the Prick.”
“You make him want to be a better person,” he said with only a trace of facetiousness.
I responded with a soft snort of derision. “Hardly. I think he simply enjoys the challenge of filling my blank slate.” I shook my head. “Anyway, it’s pretty amazing he’s willing to help. A year ago I’d never have imagined I’d have so many awesome people supporting me.”
“You were just waiting for your moment to shine,” he replied. He moved to the table and peered down at Mr. Stewart, assessing.
“Helps that I had so many people giving me a hand up along the way,” I said with a shrug.
He glanced up at me. “That only works if you have your hand up and reaching.”
“Well that’s damn near poetic,” I said with a laugh.
He gave an answering grin. “I blame the formalin fumes.” He picked up a scalpel. “Let’s find out if there was anything amiss about Mr. Stewart’s death.”
* * *
Except for the crushed nature of Mr. Stewart’s head, he seemed to have been in excellent health. The autopsy went quickly, and I drew and packaged up blood, urine, and vitreous samples for later toxicology testing. The conversation I overheard at the stadium, about the death possibly not being an accident, replayed itself in the back of my mind, and the autopsy didn’t help put it to rest. While Dr. Leblanc had no problem listing the blunt force head trauma as the cause of death due to the extent of the crushing damage, he fully admitted there was little way to determine if it had been accidental or intentional.
After he finished and left to go write up his notes, I returned Mr. Stewart to the cooler. It bothered me that we might never find out if he’d been murdered, though I knew there’d be slim chance the killer would ever be found and prosecuted, even if we knew for sure. Lots of murders went unsolved, and I had no doubt there were plenty of accidental deaths that weren’t, or overdoses that had been helped along.
I guess all we can do is the best we can, I decided.
The rest of my shift was busy enough to keep it from being boring, but I was glad to leave when it was over. Lightning flashed through the dark clouds of the late afternoon sky as I slipped out the back exit of the morgue, and I felt a bit of relief that the rain had taken a break for the moment. I started toward my car, then almost had a heart attack as a figure moved from around the corner of the building.
“Angel,” the figure said, and it took me a couple of heart pounding seconds to recognize the speaker.
“Jesus Christ! Ed?”
He moved closer. “Yeah, sorry,” he said. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”
“That’s cool,” I said, taking a deep breath to get my pulse under control. “I know you can’t exactly saunter up to the front door in broad daylight.” Ed was wanted for multiple murders. Yeah, he’d killed those people—all zombies—but he’d been played and manipulated pretty heavily by the ruthless Dr. Kristi Charish. She’d convinced him that the “zombie menace” needed to be eradicated and that killing known zombies would be a good and noble thing to do. It didn’t help that he’d seen a zombie kill his dad about a decade earlier—which Charish knew all about and gleefully exploited. The truly tragic part was that she only manipulated Ed into becoming a serial killer because she wanted zombie heads for her own screwed-up research. Bitch.
I peered at him. When I first met Ed Quinn he looked like the typical boy next-door—tall and slender, reddish brown hair, scattering of freckles across his nose. After he went on the run he went goth as a disguise—dyed his hair black and spiked it, sported a variety of piercings, and dressed in skull-adorned clothing. Now he looked…ordinary. Dark brown hair in a conservative and boring style. Khaki pants. Dark blue polo-style shirt. Even the freckles were gone, either bleached away or hidden beneath a layer of makeup. I wouldn’t look at him twice, which was probably the point, I realized. “How are you doing?” I asked.
“I’m okay. I mean as okay as I can be while being hunted as a serial killer.”
I winced in sympathy. “I guess no one’s come up with some brilliant way to get you cleared of all that yet, huh?”
Ed exhaled, shook his head. “Nope. Never will be cleared legally,” he said, regret tingeing his voice. “Maybe a little redemption if the heads can be restored.”
“Yeah. That would be great, for your peace of mind and for them.” After the fiasco with Dr. Charish, I’d insisted that Pietro recover the zombie heads from her lab with the hope that the bodies could someday be regrown. Dr. Charish had done it once, though not with complete success. But I hadn’t heard squat about the heads in the past six months. I made a mental note to check on that soon.
Ed gave me a resigned shrug, and I could tell guilt ate at him. “Thankfully, Pietro has kept me well-hidden from the law.”
“But you can’t stay hidden forever,” I pointed out.
To my surprise a slight smile touched his mouth. “Actually, I can,” he said. “Not here, though. I’m leaving the country tonight. Pietro’s got me set up in Costa Rica. New identity. Fake passport and everything.”
“Oh. Wow.” A sharp pang of loss went through me. I definitely considered Ed a friend. Sure, he’d tried really hard to kill me, but he then made up for it by helping me out when I was kidnapped by Dr. Charish. “Costa Rica, huh?” I fought for a smile and struggled to be happy for him. It really was the only option that made sense, and Pietro certainly had the resources to make it happen. “That’s awesome,” I managed, then bit my lower lip, met his eyes. “Will you ever come back? I mean…will I ever see you again?”
“I don’t know,” he said, expression suddenly bleak. “Pietro and I talked about it. I’m going to have some plastic surgery.” He grimaced, rubbed his eyes. “I think I need some time away to get my head together. It’s been nothing but stress and confusion for a long time.”
“Yeah, it’s been pretty weird,” I agreed, then sighed. “I’m gonna miss you. I mean, I know I’ve barely seen you these past few months, but I’ve always known that I could see you…and now you’re going so far away.”
“I’ll miss you too,” Ed said. “That’s why I wanted to come say goodbye. I was really hoping you’d come out before I had to go.”
A warm fuzzy feeling went through me that he’d waited here. “Thanks,” I said. “I’m really glad you came by. Maybe you can write. I mean, using your new name and all.” I frowned. “What is your new name?”
He chuckled. “James Clement, and no, I’m not used to it.”
“James.” I laughed. “Yeah, that’s weird. You don’t seem like a James.”
“I know, but I can’t complain,” he said, shrugging. “Pietro really came through for me.”
I made a sour face. “Well, he kinda owed you, big time.” Pietro had been the zombie who’d killed Ed’s father. Of course that was right after Ed’s father had killed Ed’s mother because Pietro was sleeping with her. Yeah, major zombie soap opera stuff.