1 Broken Hearted Ghoul (6 page)

I’d never worked with him, but Jacob had. He’d said he was good at his job without being a jerk. In police work, that can be saying a lot. Not everyone can carry a gun, and handle authority.

Then it struck me—he was a zombie too. Abe had probably called him first.
Maybe because I was late getting out here.

He nodded. “I understand. And I’m sorry about Jacob. He was a damn fine cop.”

“Thanks.” I swallowed hard on old remorse. “What happened here?”

“Sign this.” The lead paramedic handed me a form. “We’ll leave you to it. What a mess.”

I signed for the body. At least I knew how this worked. I hadn’t done anything official for a long time.

“Where is he?” Debbie asked as she studied the old house.

“In there.” The paramedic nodded in that direction. “Where did you think?”

I was reminded that some people don’t handle any authority well, even without a gun.

Martin smiled kindly at us. His uniform was a little frayed at the cuffs and collar, but had plenty of sharp creases ironed into it. “I’ve determined that there was no sign of foul play in this death. Looks like a heart attack to me.”

I knew that was Abe talking, trying to contain what had happened.

“Okay. Thanks. We’ll get our stuff.” I grasped Debbie’s arm as we walked toward the back of the van. “They think we work with the transport team that picks up the dead around here. We’ll take a bag in, and collect Howard Welk. Lucky I threw some back here, just in case we needed them for props. You never know what you’ll run into out here.”

“I’ll walk in with you ladies,” Martin said, as the paramedics were getting ready to leave. “The first time is the hardest. You’ll get used to it.”

The house was barely a tumble of rocks and wood. The porch had holes in it, as did the roof. One side was leaning toward the edge of the river. It was easy to imagine a flood could take it away in the spring.

Avoiding the holes in the porch, we went through the front door with Martin.

There was only one room in the house. It appeared to be used for everything from a bathroom to a kitchen, bedroom, and living room combination. The walls were damp, covered in moss and mold. The ceiling didn’t look secure.

The dead man was lying on a ratty sofa. Springs were popping out of the nubby brown material that had once covered all of it. His arms were flung out across the back and side. His legs were spread-eagle, most of his lower half on the old floor.

I had touched the doorway as I entered, rubbing my gloved fingers together on the black greasy stain I’d picked up. “Soot from the chimney, I guess.”

Debbie shrugged. “It’s about to be a lot worse.”

“Poor old bastard.” Martin shook his head at the dead man. “Dying out here alone. It shouldn’t happen to anyone, you know?”

“Yeah.” I tried to remember my sensitivity training from years as a police officer. “No one should die alone.”

“Is he supposed to look like this?” Debbie whispered as she walked around the sofa to the other side.

“No.” Zombies weren’t supposed to be dead when we got them. They definitely weren’t supposed to have a huge hole in their chests where their hearts had been. It wasn’t supposed to happen this way, but sometimes things that weren’t supposed happen, did.

His chest was open, heart gone—there was no blood.

Mr. Welk didn’t look like he wasn’t much over fifty. His face was contorted in fear and pain. His clothes appeared new, as though he’d been dressed up for something. He was also in full rigor so he’d been dead awhile.

There was a wine bottle on a table that had been made from a crate. Two glasses were on the floor.

 “What do we do now?” Debbie muttered, staying clear of the body. “Is this what happens when they don’t get back in time?”

Good question.
If so, I understood why Abe was eager to get his zombies back to the mortuary right away.

“We get the body. Just focus on that for now.”

We opened the body bag, and got it ready for the corpse. All we had to do was lift him carefully, and get him to the floor without dropping him.

“Ready?” I stared intently at my partner.

Debbie took a deep breath and nodded. “Ready.”

Together, we managed to inch him from the sofa. It was a little more difficult to maneuver him into the body bag. His hands and feet didn’t want to cooperate—they kept slipping out as we tried to get the rest of him in.

Finally, he was inside, and I zipped the bag.

“Good job,” Martin said. “Looks like you haven’t forgotten your training.”

We started out the door with the body.

“Hold on there a minute.” He called us back.

Setting the man on the floor, we retraced our steps back to the sofa.

“Something wrong?” I asked.

“I just saw this ring.” He put on a glove, and picked up the plain gold wedding band. “Wonder how he lost this?”

Debbie shrugged. “Maybe he took it off when he wasn’t feeling good. I hate having any jewelry on when I’m sick.”

“You’re probably right.” Martin handed the ring to her. “Let’s put it back on his finger—in case he wanted to be buried with it. I want to be buried with my wedding band, even though my wife passed years ago.”

I glanced at Debbie. “I guess that’s okay.” At this point, I wasn’t sure it mattered. What was Abe going to make of this? Maybe Debbie was right and he’d seen it before. I hoped so. And I hoped it wasn’t my fault for being a few hours late.

“Out here in the field,” Martin said, “not everything that’s right is protocol. You get me?”

Debbie nodded. “I think that may be a more reverent way to look at this man’s death.”

“Skye knows what I’m talkin’ about.”

I agreed. “I know. It’s been a while since I was out here, but I guess it never changes.”

We re-opened the black bag. Martin couldn’t find a white circle on the dead man’s finger where the ring had been. I put the ring on anyway. It wasn’t easy. The ring was almost too small for him.

“He’s a trifle bloated probably.” Martin shrugged. “It will pass. In the meantime, they’ll put this with his belongings. He might have next of kin who will want it, or want him to be laid to rest with it.”

When that was over, and the bag was closed again, we took the stretcher to the back of the van. Martin opened the back door, and we pushed it inside.

“Thanks for your help.” I took off my gloves and shook his hand.

“I’m surprised we haven’t run into each other before, Skye. It’s a small place. Probably that old rascal, Abe, putting his pieces on the chess board where he wants them.” He chuckled as he glanced at Debbie. “You live around here too?”

“I live near Skye. My husband is a Highway Patrol officer. Terry Hernandez.”

“Oh yeah.” Martin nodded. “He got shot a few months back, right? How’s he doing?”

“He’s been better,” she admitted. “At least he’s home now. I hope he’ll be back on his feet early next year.”

He rotated his right shoulder. “I got shot once. It still gives me some pain even years later.”

“I know it’s going to be a long recovery.”

“Good luck to you.” He clasped her hand with both of his. “You two take care.”

I closed and locked the back door to the van. Debbie got inside to log the day and time of pickup in the book. It was something normal that I thought might reassure her. She looked more than a little uneasy when we first started.

Martin put his hand on my shoulder when we were alone. “I know what happened to
you
, Skye. It happened to me too—only it was cancer instead of a wreck.”

“That’s what I thought.”

“The blue tattoo on my heel would tell the story, but I’m not taking off my boot to show you.”

“Cancer, huh?” I peered into his eyes. “But Abe let you stay with the sheriff’s department. I wanted to keep working with the police department too. He said he needed a pickup person for his taxi for the dead.”

Martin laughed. “Taxi for the dead, huh? I get it. Yeah. Abe left me here. I knew as soon as I found Mr. Welk that something bad was wrong. We aren’t supposed to die that way. The paramedics were already here. I had to play along, like you did.”

I glanced at the van. “Did Abe call you?”

“Nope. I called him. He said he’ll meet you at the mortuary.”

“Okay. Thanks.” I shook his hand again. “Funny us meeting like this. Good to see you, Martin.”

“You too, Skye. Take care.”

I got in the van, started it up, and followed Martin across the bridge.

“Abe isn’t going to blame us for this, is he?” Debbie nervously twisted her wedding ring on her finger.

“No. We didn’t have anything to do with it. Mr. Welk died a long time before Abe sent us after him. That’s why Martin was here first. This is something else. We don’t have to figure it out.”

I knew what I told her was true, but it was part of my nature to want resolution to problems. I always thought that had made me a better police officer. It didn’t really make me a better taxi driver.

Abe wouldn’t thank me for trying to figure out his problems. Even if I had some thoughts on the matter, I planned to
try
to keep them to myself. Abe had been doing this for more than two-hundred years. He had to know what he was doing, right?

Chapter Eight

The sun had melted away all the ice from last night as we rolled into Nashville. Cars whizzed by on the city streets. Everything was normal. The sun glinted off the spires of the newer buildings as they thrust into the blue sky. A young man was bundled up on the side of the street, playing his guitar, with a cowboy hat on the sidewalk for tips.

To keep my mind off Mr. Welk and his mangled corpse—I thought about Debbie and Abe. Would Abe make his move on her at the mortuary today? How would she take it? She didn’t seem like the kind of woman who would simply fall into another man’s arms. On the other hand, she was very grateful for Abe’s help.

Debbie was singing along to a song on the radio. She seemed more naive than I’d ever been. Maybe it was part of how I’d been raised. It had been hard to learn to trust Jacob. If we hadn’t been partners, I wasn’t sure I would have.

It bothered me that Abe had lied to Debbie about Terry—or at least hadn’t told her the whole truth. Not that I thought he was a fount of truth and righteousness. I knew no one like Abe got where he was without a few dark lies, and other things I’d rather not think about.

Still, I had a contract with him too. Had he lied to me about some fine detail that would have me facing an early pickup by some other zombie with a van? The situations were different since I actually had the contract with him. Maybe Debbie had been too gullible and desperate to ask the right questions.

All of us, at the moment of our deaths, weren’t too worried about being cheated by a man who promised us more time. We were willing to overlook the details.

We parked in the back of the mortuary again. This time Brandon was on his toes. He and Abe met us, and took Mr. Welk’s body inside.

“You should have gone to fetch him when I first gave you the assignment, Skye.”

Abe was angry. I could tell by the tight muscle that moved in his cheek. His lips were stretched thin too. I didn’t think he was really angry at me—it was more that the death had happened this way.

His voice never rose above his usual muted tone, even when he was scolding. “When I give you something to do, it should be done as quickly as possible. I expected you back hours ago.”

Since when is there a time limit?

“It wouldn’t have mattered. Mr. Welk had been dead for a long time.” I defended my actions, keeping the cause of my late arrival—Lucas—to myself. Abe was never interested in the details, just the results. 

“You wouldn’t have been able to change what happened to Howard,” Abe amended. “But you could have prevented his death from being officially logged with the county.”

“Sorry. I did the best I could.”

Brandon and Abe put the body bag containing Mr. Welk on the empty slab.

“You can make amends by finding out who reported his death. Someone called it in. I want to know who that was.”

“What would you like
me
to do, Abe?” Debbie’s soft voice was laced with trepidation.

Brandon and I exchanged glances behind Abe’s back. Brandon waggled his almost invisible blond brows.

Abe put his hand on Debbie’s shoulder. “You should accompany Skye on her task. I’m sure this can be a learning experience for you. All right?”

She nodded. “Thank you again for sparing my husband.”

“You are so welcome, my dear.” Abe graciously inclined his head.

Brandon mouthed something to me silently that I didn’t understand—no doubt proclaiming that he’d pegged that relationship correctly.

“I’ll find out what happened,” I promised.

Abe’s face swiveled toward me, his sunglasses intact over his dead eyes. “See that you do, Skye. And be careful. There may be more to this than it seems.”

“What happened to him?” I asked, even though I’d sworn that I wouldn’t. Well, maybe I didn’t swear it so much as think I wouldn’t if I was smart. “I’ve picked up a lot of zombies. They never look like this.”

Brandon shook his head as he prepared to help Abe with the body bag.

“I know what he looks like.” Abe rolled up his sleeves, his huge arm muscles bulging. “You’ve done your job. Thank you. Please finish the task I’ve assigned you.”

I started to try to pin him down on it, but Debbie was looking green, as the body bag was re-opened. She swayed, and I dragged her out of the room.

Outside, she vomited in the parking lot. “I’m so sorry. You’re so strong and capable, Skye. I know I must be a terrible burden on you.”

She took a tissue out of her pocket and wiped her eyes and mouth.

I stood there with my hands in my pockets, staring at the old buildings around us. I could hear two men arguing close by, and the sound of scuffling in the street. It wasn’t unusual to hear gunfire in this part of town. As places went to stay off the radar, it was good.

“We both do what Abe wants,” I finally told her. “You’re not a burden. Let’s go check this out. I’ll give Martin a call.”