Cemetery Club (26 page)

“All right. But hurry. This whole breaking and entering thing is making me nervous.” Todd turned to go back to the door and then froze as the lights came on.

“You should be more than nervous.”

Marisol gasped at the sound of her ex-husband’s voice. Looking up, she saw Smith standing in the doorway, Chief Travers and Edwin Corish behind him.

“I had a feeling I’d catch you sooner or later,” Smith said, walking to where Marisol sat. “You and your friends have gone too far this time.”

“We’re not doing anything wrong Ed,” she said, ignoring Smith and looking at the Medical Examiner. “We just wanted to examine the files and see if we could find a pattern or a clue the police missed.”

Travers scowled. “You’re using someone else’s pass codes to access restricted information. That doesn’t seem on the up and up to me.”

“Why else would we need it?” asked Todd. “We have no intention of going to the press. This was just for our own investigation. The more information we have, the more we can help. We’re on your side.”

“On our side?” Jack Smith let out a sarcastic chuckle. “I don’t think our fine police force needs criminals on their side.”

“It isn’t like that,” Marisol insisted, still speaking to her boss and the Police Chief.

Before either of them could speak, the Deputy Mayor continued. “Let me tell you how I see it. Mister Randolph here managed to rope you and your so-called friends into his delusions, delusions either brought on or compounded by the psychotropic drugs and brain zapping he received in the mental hospital. Now he’s got you all believing his crazy tales, to the point where you’re attempting to falsify evidence just to support his theories.”

“No!” Marisol stood up. “All we were doing was—”

“Chief, were these two caught trespassing and stealing?”

“Absolutely.” Travers nodded his head, a stern expression on his face. “Should I take them in now?”

Looking right at Marisol and smiling, Smith said, “No. We got here before they could do any harm. I’m willing to be lenient. If Doctor Corish suspends her without pay until this whole case is settled, no arrests will be necessary. And, of course, this building and all other public and government buildings are off-limits for these two, along with Cory Miles and John Boyd.”

“You can’t do that!” Marisol stomped her foot, hating herself for resorting to a childish gesture but unable to stop it.

“Actually, I can. Or would you prefer jail time?”

Marisol looked at Corish, who shook his head. “I’m sorry, Marisol. My hands are tied.”

She could see in his eyes that he meant it, that he knew she was innocent but couldn’t help her.

“All right.” She motioned to Todd. “Let’s go.”

Travers and Corish stepped aside so they could pass. They were halfway down the hall to the exit when Smith called out to them.

“Marisol, give your friends a message. Next time any of you screw up, you’re all going to jail.”

*  *  *

Jack Smith watched the bitch and the nutcase trudging down the hall and had to bite his lip to keep from laughing. In his wildest dreams he couldn’t have imagined things working out so perfectly. After the attack in the morgue, he’d authorized putting alarms on all the civil servants’ swipe cards, ostensibly for protection and - God forbid - body identification purposes, if need be. Of course, his real reason had been to keep tabs on Marisol’s comings and goings. He’d assumed he’d catch her and her new boyfriend up to shenanigans in the lab. Something mildly embarrassing, like getting caught with her pants down, but still enough to ruin her reputation.

But this? It was as if God had decided to hand him an early Christmas gift. Caught red-handed breaking into police files? Once it became public, she’d be lucky to get a job flipping burgers. And Mister High-and-Mighty Lawyer might find himself chasing ambulances, if he didn’t end up disbarred.

As for the other two, the drunk and nutcase, well, neither one of them mattered in the least. They could go back to their ridiculous fantasies. Who was going to listen to them?

And maybe when I’m mayor I’ll pass a referendum to send all the homeless scum packing. Clean up this town, finally.

This time his smile managed to creep through and he quickly covered his mouth and pretended to cough.

All in all, a damn fine night.

*  *  *

Marisol could feel Jack’s gaze on her neck as she walked down the hall, purposely keeping her pace fast to get them out of the building quickly but not so fast as to seem suspicious.

“I can’t believe you just gave in like that.” It was the second time Todd had said it and for the second time Marisol answered, “Just keep walking. Don’t stop. Don’t look back.”

She could imagine what was going through Jack’s mind. How he’d gotten the best of his ex-wife, disgraced her, showed the town her true colors. That was good. Let him keep thinking that way, at least until they were out of the building and on the way back to Todd’s.

Fingering the memory stick she’d slipped into her pocket, she added
Then we’ll see who’s gotten the best of who.

“Marisol?”

She stopped as Freddy Alou rounded the corner.

“Freddy? What the hell are you doing here?”

“I actually came to see you. I thought you were still working nights.” He frowned. “Chica, what’s the matter?”

“Nothing. Well, something, but it’s too late to worry about it now. I won’t be around for a few days though. Maybe longer, if our Deputy Mayor has his way.”

“Oh no. What’s that
idiota
done now?”

She shook her head. “Nothing you should get involved in.”

Todd cleared his throat. “You said you were coming here to see Marisol?”

“Huh? Oh, yes. We need to talk
chica
.
Muy importante
.”

“Now is not the best time,” she said, risking a glance back down the hall. Jack and others were still looking their way. “I - we - need to go. But I’ll call you tomorrow. I promise.”

Without waiting for an answer, she grabbed Todd’s arm and pulled him towards the door. Only when they were back in her car and heading down the road did she relax.

“Can you please tell me what’s going on?”

“This.” She handed him the memory stick. “I managed to palm it while Jack was pontificating. I don’t know how much got copied onto it but it’s more than we had before.”

Todd smiled and shook his head.

“I hope it was worth losing your job over.”

Before going to bed, Abigail Clinton had laid out her clothes for the next day. In the entryway, her purse and keys sat in their regular places, the only deviation from the norm being the bag of prescriptions for Mrs. Randolph that stood next to her purse. She’d noticed when leaving the Randolph’s that Todd had forgotten to refill them, even though he’d promised to do it. Of course, she’d half-expected him to forget. After what they’d done to his brain in the asylum, it was a wonder he could walk and talk, let along think. So she always made sure to check the medicines and food each day.

Abigail believed in being neat and orderly. Before she left her house each morning, Abigail took ten minutes to go through each room of her small, two-bedroom home on the outskirts of the Lowlands, checking that everything was in its place and all dirty dishes, clothes and food containers were cleaned and put away. Unlike most of her neighbors, Abigail was proud of her modest home. She still remembered the house she’d grown up in back in Trinidad, a three-room shack filled with screaming children, dirty clothes and the crumbs from a thousand meals taken in a kitchen so small the children ate in shifts while Mother cooked a seemingly endless supply of fried chicken or goat, supplemented by rice or potatoes or plantains.

So when Abigail arrived in New York with one suitcase and forty dollars to her name, she’d vowed that no matter where she lived, she would create the type of home she’d only seen in magazines.

Which was why she knew something was amiss the moment the sound of glass breaking in the kitchen woke her from a sound sleep. With nothing on her counters for her cats to break, there could only be one explanation for the noise.

Someone was in the house!

Twenty-three years in the United States hadn’t eroded instincts for self-preservation honed by growing up in a city - and country - filled with social unrest. Abigail had learned at an early age how to defend herself; living in the Lowlands the past seven years had only reinforced those lessons. Rising quietly from her bed, she reached out and felt for the short aluminum bat she kept behind the nightstand. There was no need to turn on a light, another benefit of always having everything in its place.

A nervous tingle ran through Abigail’s body as she moved towards the bedroom door, her feet sliding silently across the carpet. The last time she’d had to resort to physical violence was when she was eighteen and two boys had grabbed her behind the school. When the police arrived, they’d found Abigail sitting on the steps, two fingers broken and a tooth missing. Her attackers had been lying on the ground, one screaming and holding his hands over his damaged eyes, the other clutching the bloody mess between his legs.

Something else shattered in the kitchen and Abigail felt her anger rise. How dare someone break into her home and destroy her things? Stepping into the short hallway, she hit the light switch and hefted the bat, calling out a warning at the same time.

“Whoever you are, you get yourselves out of my house!”

Two figures, a man and a woman, emerged from the kitchen. The moment she saw them, Abigail’s rage metamorphosed into heart-pounding dread. Pale faces covered in gray, dead-looking spots. Wet blood covering their shirts. The vacant look of their eyes. It all shouted one thing to Abigail: Zombies!

Abigail didn’t hesitate. She dropped the bat and ran for the basement door at the other end of the hall. She took the steps two at a time, dashed across the small space, and then hurried up the three stairs to the steel hurricane door that exited into her backyard. The bang of metal on metal sounded like an explosion as Abigail slammed the door open and emerged into the darkness of the summer night.

Right into the arms of four more strangers.

They attacked before she knew what was happening, forcing her to the ground and easily tearing away her cheap nightdress. Abigail screamed as she thrashed on the dew-wet grass of her neatly-trimmed lawn. In the midst of her struggles, ice-cold fingers grabbed her face and she opened her eyes to see a demon from Hell hovering over her body. Abigail cried out again, providing a perfect entry for the twisting, roiling gray mass that poured into her mouth. Abigail found herself choking and gagging as the spectral intruder violated her from the inside, forcing its frigid way down her throat and into her very essence.

They’re turning me into one of them
! she had time to think and then everything disappeared as her mind and soul exploded into icy fragments. When Abigail sat up a moment later, many more thoughts filled her head.

But none were her own.

*  *  *

After a few hours of sleep, the four members of the Cemetery Club had gathered again at Todd’s house.

“You two look as exhausted as I feel,” Cory said, taking in his friends’ sallow complexions, shadowed eyes and slow movements.

“Between the hours of research and the constant fire and police sirens, who the hell can sleep in this town?” John groused, pouring himself a cup of coffee.

“Things are getting bad. We need to do something,” Todd said, putting a plate of bagels on the table. Cream cheese and butter followed.

“But what?” Cory sat down with a sigh. “We know more about the history of the town. We know more about the zombie-things, how to kill them at least. But we don’t know where the Grays come from or how to stop them.”

“Todd does,” John said. He pointed his bagel at Todd. “He did it once and they didn’t come back for twenty years. I say all four of us go down there. If we can’t kill ‘em, maybe we can put enough of a hurting on them to knock ‘em out for eighty years this time. Who the hell cares what happens after that? We’ll all be long dead.”

“Going into the tunnels and facing those things again?” Marisol shuddered. “I don’t know if I can.”

“You think I want to?” John asked. “I’m scared shitless. But better to do it our own terms, armed to the teeth, than get a surprise visit in the middle of the night. Besides, before long the whole town will be either dead or possessed. Then we won’t stand a chance. We have to do it now.”

Todd nodded. “I’m with John.”

Cory took a deep breath. “Okay, so we do this. How and when?”

“Tonight,” Marisol said. “We can’t wait any longer.”

“We’ll need Holy water, Bibles and Eucharistic wafers,” Todd said. “That’s what I used the last time.”

“And flashlights,” John added. “I’m not going down there without a lot of light.”

Todd glanced at Cory. “If you can get the flashlights and anything else that might help us in the tunnels, we’ll take care of the religious supplies.”

“We’re on it,” Cory said. “Flashlights, batteries and squirt guns.”

“Squirt guns?” John asked.

“Yeah. We can put the Holy water in them. Better than just tossing it around.”

“Speaking of guns, does anyone have a real one?” Marisol asked. “We know bullets stop the zombies.”

They all shook their heads.

“Bring whatever other weapons you can scrounge up,” Cory told them. “We’ll meet at Marisol’s in four hours, go over our strategy, eat something and then drive to the cemetery at midnight.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Todd said.

John poured more coffee. “No, it sounds like suicide. But it’s all we’ve got.”

*  *  *

After Cory and Marisol left, Todd checked on his mother and then left a note for Abigail, who wasn’t due for another hour.

Their first stop was St. Anthony’s church. While John filled several jars with Holy water, Todd went to the rectory and located Father Ramirez, who’d been a good friend of his parents. He’d expected Ramirez to put up an argument about handing over some of the blessed wafers but Ramirez surprised him.