The lab looked like any other—rows of cabinets, sinks lining the counters, surgical tools laid out on trays like props in a horror film. Except this wasn’t a movie set. It was real. And unlike horror movies, my work taught me long ago that the human brain could imagine far worse than Hollywood ever dared.
In the back, an entire refrigerated wall. One storage block for every body.
The room was dim, lit by two fluorescent bars casting pools of light over a pair of silver tables. Each one held a body. At least the one on Jessica’s table was covered.
For a minute, I thought I might be sick. It was too early for corpses.
Andrew glanced up from his work, blue eyes flashing over the rim of wide-rimmed hipster glasses that had slid to the tip of his nose. A white surgical mask covered the lower half of his face. He wore a stained lab coat over a vintage Beatles tee, which I’d bet was paired with jeans and slip-on loafers. No socks.
Fresh out of college, Andrew had landed an internshipwith Jessica—a crash course in pathology that probably counted as grad school and trauma therapy combined. Word around town was he was a math genius who spent his nights gaming while drinking imported wine. After enough awkward run-ins, we’d moved from polite nods to casual small talk... to him asking me out.
Despite every reason to say no, I’d accepted. We went for coffee. I talked about work the entire time and left early under the guise of a meeting. When he asked again, I turned him down.
A decision I was currently regretting. Because now, I needed a favor. Not from him, exactly—but from his brother. The head of forensics at the state crime lab.
Andrew set down his scalpel and pushed up his glasses as Jessica and I crossed the room.
“Lost, Doctor?”
Well then. Apparently, Andrew didn’t take rejection gracefully. Fantastic.
Jessica led me to his table, and I forced my eyes to stay fixed on her andnoton the gray, waxy body beneath the sheet—already marked with a Y-incision. My stomach clenched.
What a day this was shaping up to be.
“Dr. Floris needs something from you,” Jessica said, casual as ever.
Andrew straightened, his gaze sharpening. Whatever trace of sarcasm had been in his voice was gone.
He was all ears now.
“Mad that I took the last bottle of Bordeaux from Banshee’s Brew?” He asked.
“No, I’m mad that you’re not covering up the body on your table. I only need five minutes.” I raised the coffee I’dbrought for him. “And I have something better than Bordeaux.”
“Nothing is better than Bordeaux.”
“True, but this probably pairs better with wielding a knife at seven-thirty in the morning.”
Jessica grinned at my side. “She’s right. No drinking in the lab…. until after noon.” She winked. “I’ll leave you two to it, then.”
Andrew popped off his gloves and took the coffee as Jessica disappeared to her own dead body.
“Butterscotch caramel with whipped cream.”
His brows raised. “You know my drink.” He eyed me over the rim as he sipped, then set the coffee dangerously close to a pair of tweezers with a flap of skin dangling off the end. After pulling on a new pair of gloves, he repositioned his mask, picked up a scalpel and leaned over the body.
ThankGodI hadn’t had breakfast.
“You’ll have to talk while I work. Jessica cracks the whip around here.”
“Wouldn’t have to if you’d stay past five o’clock in the evening every now and then,” Jessica hollered from across the room. Selective hearing or eavesdropping, I wasn’t sure which.
His eyes crinkled with a grin beneath the mask, then he repositioned the scalpel and sank the blade back into the body.
My mouth flooded with saliva. Nausea rolled up like a tide.
Exactly the reaction he was aiming for.
