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I turned off the lamp, relaxed back on the bed. Fireflies blinked in the darkness. Hungry lips found mine. Hands caressed. I shuddered and moaned in pleasure.
I was gonna quit. Cold turkey. No problem.
Tomorrow.
Chapter 9
The shrilling of my phone jerked me out of a dream of being chased by zombies in Mardi Gras masks as they groaned Throoww meee sooommethinggg misssterrr. Letting out my own zombie groan, I pushed aside the weird images, groped for my phone and blearily read the text message from the dispatcher. I still wasn’t used to the rudeness of people dying in the wee hours of the morning, but I’d been doing the on-call thing long enough that I knew to immediately flick on the nightstand light and get my sleepy ass moving. Now was not the time to risk falling asleep again. After screwing things up with the lab, I needed the morgue job more than ever.
Rain drummed on the roof, a hypnotic beat that made me want to dive back under the covers. Razor blades of brain-hunger sliced my belly, and my bones itched. I reached for the syringe of V12 on the nightstand.
Nothing.
I felt around then switched on the lamp. Gone. No syringe. Pulse racing, I scrambled out of bed, searched the floor—
Jesus, Angel. I forced myself to breathe. Cold turkey. Right.
I fumbled open the lock on the mini-fridge then stared at the three vials duct-taped together. Reaching for them, I froze at the sight of the mottled grey skin on my arm. No. I touched my face and let out a whimper as skin sloughed.
Trembling, I grabbed a bottle of brain slush and chugged it down. The mottling faded, but the grey persisted. I only had one bottle left, so I snatched a brain burrito, peeled the foil back, and scarfed it. I scrambled up and peered in the mirror. My skin had pinked back up—for the most part—but still had a greyish cast. It wasn’t bad, but it shouldn’t be grey at all. Not after eating a double helping of brains and chugging a bottle before bed.
Cold turkey. No more V12. Ever.
Resolved, I hurried to dress, then shoved my feet into the obnoxious Tammy boots. Trashing them in the mud would make the day better. A packet of Tribe-issued brains—labeled as ProteinGel—went into a pocket as a quick-fix if I needed brains fast and easy. Raincoat and lunch box in hand, I crept down the hall so as to not wake up my dad. His door was a few inches ajar, and I peeked in. He slept in a sprawl, face down on the bed and with one leg sticking out from beneath the blanket. His breath whistled softly, and I drank in the sound for several seconds. Spring allergies always kicked his ass, though it wasn’t as bad since he’d stopped drinking. Used to kick mine as well until I was turned.
The rain was coming down in buckets as I dashed to the van, but it slowed to a drizzle not long after I left my house. I murmured a relieved thank you to Mother Nature. Picking up bodies in pouring rain sucked. Plus, the address the dispatcher gave me was Highway 180 between Rat Tail Road and Catfish Drive, which meant this was an outdoor pickup. Good thing was that finding it would be a snap. That bit of highway wasn’t far from Randy’s place, which meant I’d driven it about a billion times and knew every cross street by heart.
By the time I passed Rat Tail Road, the rain had stopped. The rising sun merrily burned through the retreating clouds in bright and cheery slashes of color as if to say, “Isn’t spring awesome?” Unfortunately, I had a feeling the glorious display would be wasted on a bunch of people this morning. Either there was one hell of a cop party going on, or this was a murder scene. Stretched along the side of the highway were five marked police cars, four unmarked detective units, three SUVs, and two TV trucks. And a partridge in a pear tree. A flash of yellow from beyond the line of cars drew my gaze to where several knots of people worked behind crime scene tape on the opposite side of the highway. Yup, it was a murder.
I pulled in behind a TV truck at the end of the long line of vehicles. A reporter I vaguely recognized leaned against the bumper as he struggled to wipe off mud caked halfway to his knees with a handful of tattered napkins.
Wincing in sympathy, I snagged one of the towels I kept in the van for emergencies and jogged up to him. “I think this will work better.”
He accepted the towel with a grateful TV-worthy white smile. “Thank you from the very bottom of my heart.” He got to work on the mud then glanced at my footwear and chuckled. “If I thought there was any chance your boots would fit me, I’d pay top dollar.”
I cocked a gaudy boot out. “Women’s size six and a half?”
“Darn. Men’s size twelve, extra wide.” He grimaced at the now mud-covered towel. “Do you have a plastic bag to put this in?”
“It’s cool,” I said. “Just toss it by the van when you’re done. I’m betting I’ll need it once I finish up.”
“I’m sure you will. It’s a bog out there.” He glanced toward the crime scene tape. “Both the sheriff and the captain of investigations are on scene, which tells me this is a big deal. They’re being awfully tight-lipped, though.” He slanted a look at me. “Know anything?”
“Clueless as a newborn babe,” I replied with a sweet smile. “Not that I’d tell you if I did.” That would be a sure way to get fired.
He laughed. “Understood. I owe you one anyway.”
Hey, I needed all the favors I could get. With my good deed done for the day, I snagged a body bag from the van then tromped down the road. A “big deal” could be darn near anything in St. Edwards Parish. It was rare to have more than a handful of murders in a year, and most of them were of the alcohol-plus-redneck-plus-dumb-fight variety. The majority of the deaths I dealt with were from natural causes or accidents, but year before last had seen an unusual uptick in the murder rate, thanks to Ed Quinn’s zombie hunting spree.
After what felt like a half-mile hike, I made it to the scene. Yellow tape started at the edge of the highway and marked off a half-acre square of low grass and scattered brush. Within the perimeter, rubber-booted crime scene techs and uniformed officers prowled in organized search patterns. At the center of the taped-off area, orange privacy screens shielded the body from curious eyes—and cameras—while knots of detectives and other officials conferred nearby.
Nick stood slightly apart from the others as he made notes on a pad. I signed the crime scene log, ducked under the tape and made my way through the mud toward him. He turned as I approached then glanced down. A faint smile danced across his mouth. “Wow. Those are obnoxious.”
“Sure are!” Even a thick layer of mud did little to hide the tacky glitz. “Makes it easy to find me, though.” I lifted my chin toward the orange screens. “What’s the deal? Why all the attention?”
His smile vanished. “The sheriff thinks the serial killer may be back.”
My breath seized, but an instant later common sense swept in. No. There was absolutely no way he was back. First off, the killer—Ed Quinn—had been horrified to learn Dr. Charish had manipulated him into killing zombies, which meant he damn well wasn’t going to start up again. Second, and more importantly, he was tucked away in Costa Rica with a new identity, thanks to Pierce—back when he was Pietro.
