“But how the hell would he get two right next to each other?” Derrel finished for me, eyes narrowed in thought. “Goddamn, Angel. Good eye.”
I smiled, but a sick nausea was beginning to twist in my belly. He was murdered. Someone dropped the tractor on his head, then dropped it down again to make sure he was dead and make sure the skull was crushed open. And it had to have been someone strong. Zombies were strong. I’d figured that much out. Not because of any sort of superpowers, but because we didn’t feel the same pain that normal people could. We could push harder, far beyond what the usual person could tolerate. Yeah, it burned us up faster. But a brain a day keeps the rotting away, I thought with a slight shudder.
I stood back while Derrel shared my observations with the detective. Abadie scowled and peered at the underside of the tractor, then muttered something vile. I almost felt sorry for him. Handling an accidental death was a walk in the park next to dealing with a possible homicide. The procedures didn’t change much, but the attention to detail went several notches up. And if he hadn’t been a dickwad I probably would’ve felt sorry for him. As it was, I allowed myself a perverse sense of satisfaction. Hey, I never claimed to be an angel.
I ended up cooling my heels for another half an hour while the area was processed in more depth by the crime scene tech, but eventually I got the signal from Derrel that I could start putting Mr. Harris into the bag.
Now was my chance to see how much brain was left in the skull, even though my zombie super senses were already telling me the answer. I carefully pulled aside a segment of skull while getting the body into the bag—completely unsurprised to see that there was no brain left inside. And there wasn’t that much on the ground. Certainly not enough to fill a skull.
Suddenly the short distance between Mr. Harris’s mansion and the trailer park didn’t seem so funny. And the place where I had my wreck was only about five miles from here.
There was a zombie on the hunt in this area. And I had a damn good idea who it was.
As soon as I had the body loaded up and in the van, I called Scott Funeral Home and asked for Kang, breathing a sigh of relief when he came on the line.
“It’s Angel, from the morgue,” I said. “I really need to talk to you.”
He was silent for several seconds. “Uh huh. Are you in a bind?”
“Yeah, but not the kind you’re thinking.” He probably thought I was low on brains and needed to bum some off him. “No, I need to talk to you about someone else in our, um, social club.”
I could hear him give a soft snort—whether of laughter or annoyance, I couldn’t tell. “All right. I get off at three today. Where would you like to meet?”
I thought fast. “Um, how about Double Ds?”
“I’ll see you there,” he said and hung up.
I scowled at my phone. “You’re an asshole, Kang,” I muttered. Unfortunately, he was an asshole I needed. Too bad I had way too many of those in my life already.
Chapter 22
Double Ds was actually the Double Dime Diner, but no one bothered to call it that, even though the nickname made it sound like a strip club. Or maybe because of that. I arrived at about a quarter ’til three, which not only allowed me to pick a table that was well away from the few other people there, but also gave me plenty of time to agonize and worry until Kang arrived. Not that I hadn’t already been doing plenty of that.
The waitress came by, and I ordered hot chocolate. It wasn’t cold outside or anything, but hot chocolate was one of my comfort foods. When it arrived I wrapped my hands around the mug and sipped slowly, forcing myself to relax as the warmth and chocolate worked their magic. At least comfort food was still comforting.
Kang walked in about five minutes after the hour. The smile on his face faded as he walked up to me. I guess my worry was showing, even though I was trying to be all casual.
“What’s the dish, Angel?” he asked as he pulled a chair out and plopped down into it.
Even though there was no one else anywhere near us, I leaned forward and kept my voice low. “I’ve picked up three bodies in the last week that were missing brains. Hell, one was missing his whole damn head.” I quickly explained the circumstances, somewhat gratified when his expression darkened with worry. At least I wasn’t being completely out-the-box paranoid. “Do you think maybe there’s umm . . . a rogue zombie killing people?” I asked, feeling a bit silly with the “rogue” thing.>“Wait,” I said. “She never felt bad or sick from this? She just dropped dead?”
“That’s probably what happened.”
“That’s not fair!” I blurted, then realized how dumb that sounded. But it wasn’t. The rich bitch had thrown her life away, while Sarah Jackson had been working her ass off trying to make as nice a life as possible with what she had. Then she died with no warning.
Dr. Leblanc’s eyes were shadowed as he met my gaze. He’d seen it too many times, I realized. He was used to it.
He gave me a sad smile. “Welcome to death.”
I stood in the cooler until the cold seeped into my bones, and my fingers began to grow stiff. Death wasn’t fair. Death didn’t give warning. Death hit nice people and nasty people. It didn’t give a shit.
My one-month anniversary of working here had come and gone, and nothing had happened. No one gave me a medal or certificate for good behavior. It didn’t make a difference, I realized. Nothing had changed. I was still the same thing I was a month ago.
It wasn’t until hunger began to nudge at me that I realized I was being a moron and pushing my body too far with this whole standing-in-the-cold bullshit.
After making sure I was alone in the morgue, I went through my procedure of scooping the brains into my pickle jars. I felt no qualms when I salvaged the overdose victim’s brain, but when I turned to Ms. Jackson’s bag, I hesitated. Her death had been unfair enough already. Now I was going to desecrate her by making her brain my dinner?
Hunger poked at me again. Tightening my jaw, I quickly put her brain into the jar. Yeah, death wasn’t fair. And I’m not gonna give it any more head starts.