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Allen c
alled me in the next day but, instead of giving me a damn pat on the back for saving the body and the gurney, he delivered a twenty minute ass-reaming lecture on safety and awareness and unnecessary risks and other stupid crap. Even told me I’d be fired if I pulled a “stunt” like that again. Asshole.
I clung to that slim thread of righteous anger like an emotional lifeline, sank into the chair in front of his desk and tried not to squirm. “So, what’s up?” I tried for a casual tone, as if being in trouble was the furthest thing from my mind.
Allen pulled a Zombie Fest flier out of his drawer and dropped it on the desk in front of me. “You going?”
I couldn’t have been more surprised if he’d asked me if my dad was an alien. This rated a closed door meeting? “Er, yeah, tomorrow with—” I caught myself before naming Nick. Allen might count it as a date and, if dating a coworker was against the rules, he’d milk it for ammunition to give me grief. “—with a friend.”
He leaned forward, eyes fixed on me. “As zombie or hunter?”
I fought back a twitch. “Why?”
“Curious.”
The curiosity of a cat about to snatch a mouse. “Zombie.”
Allen’s expression remained inscrutable. “Why zombie?”
“Thought it might be fun to imagine what it’d be like. To be one. A zombie.” I pushed my mouth into a grin and stuck my arms out in front. “Braaains.”
Dude didn’t crack a smile. He was seriously beginning to creep me out.
“How about you?” I asked. “Are you going?”
Allen pursed his lips. “Too real for me.” He paused. “Thought it might be for you as well.”
Too real? What was that supposed to mean? I knew for a fact Allen wasn’t a zombie. I’d salivated over his very human brain many times before. And it was beyond impossible that a stick-up-the-ass like Allen would believe in zombies. “Everyone’s going.” I shrugged in the way a completely unconcerned person would shrug. “It’s all just for fun.”
A glower tugged his eyebrows down. “People get crazy.”
“Paintball and beer have that effect,” I said with a weak laugh and tried not to fidget in nervous discomfort. I couldn’t handle much more of this Allen closed-door strangeness. “Is this what you wanted to talk to me about?”
He replaced the flier in the drawer, leaned back and laced his fingers together over his stomach. “There’ve been some irregularities with the organ bags.”
My lips felt weird, as though all the blood had drained from my face. Allen regarded me as steadily as if I was under the dissecting scope in the morgue. I waited for him to elaborate. And waited.
“What kind of irregularities?” I finally blurted.
“It’s gone on long enough, and I don’t want any trouble for the department.” His left index finger tapped a slow cadence. “You have anything you want to tell me?”
“Tell you?” My mind froze so hard icicles could’ve hung off my ears. But if he knew about the missing brains, I’d be in the back of a cop car at this very moment, not having a cozy office chat. That realization thawed my brain enough to squeeze out a reasonable response instead of a confession. “I’ve, uh, caught a few with leaks. I went ahead and double-bagged them.” I bit down on the urge to add more cover-my-ass lies. My ex-boyfriend and retired-cop, Marcus, used to tell me how a lot of criminals tripped themselves up by complicating their lies with details. Good thing was, I had found a couple of leaky organ bags. Bad thing was . . . organ bags.
Allen’s glower didn’t budge. “As I said, I don’t want trouble for the department. I intend to ensure—” His phone rang. He glanced at the caller ID then muttered a curse. “I have to take this.” He snatched up the handset. “Allen Prejean.”
A brief reprieve. I scrambled to get my thoughts in order. None of this made any sense. He hadn’t called me in to talk about leaky bags. That was minor stuff and wouldn’t rate a closed-door meeting. Something else was up.
Not that it mattered. For whatever reason, Allen was paying attention to the organ bags, which meant he would eventually notice that brains were missing. Shit. What was I going to do? I liked this job, but if it dried up as a source of brains, I’d have no choice but to look for alternatives.
“Yes, sir.” Allen’s face tightened but his voice remained calm. “I’ll get the report to her this afternoon.” A pause. “No, sir. No. Let me explain. Hang on a moment.” He covered the mouthpiece with his hand. “Angel, we’ll have to finish this on Monday. Be careful out there this weekend.”
I forced a sickly smile and fled, out of the building and straight to my car. I fumbled the lunch box open and grabbed the vial of V12. The few remaining drops caught the light. It was enough to clear my head, help me stop freaking out. Brains were awesome but they couldn’t deliver this kind of chill—like the difference between a great hamburger and a Xanax.
I scrambled for a syringe and drew up the half-dose. Under the skin and . . .
Fireflies twinkled around my head. I relaxed back into the seat, felt the panic recede and my thoughts clarify. Allen didn’t know I’d stolen brains, but he was on alert about the organ bags. This was fixable. I hadn’t been caught yet, and from here on out I needed to make sure there was no chance of that happening. But how?
The V12 hummed through my system as I looked for a solution. I couldn’t afford to lie low and stop harvesting. Maybe I could take half brains? Cut the rest into chunks to make it harder to see any was missing. Except, I only had a week’s worth of surplus brains left, thanks to the V12 and the increased hunger side effect. I’d starve on half brains. Normally the Tribe would help me out, except no way could I say, “Hey, Dr. Nikas, I need extra brains because I kinda borrowed some of the V12 mod.”
