The funeral home’s black Suburban pulled into the lot just as the sun cleared the tree line. Death didn’t care about beautiful mornings. Death just kept showing up, demanding attention, refusing to wait for a more appropriate hour.
Lily unfolded herself from the driver’s seat with the easy grace of a woman who’d long ago stopped apologizing for taking up space. Nearly six feet of dark hair and endless legs, curves that made the shapeless scrubs she wore look like high fashion. She’d barely closed the door before Cole was moving toward her, that lanky stride eating up the distance between them.
“Hey.” He said it soft, just for her, one hand coming up to rest on her hip like it belonged there.
“Hey yourself.” She smiled up at him. “You look like hell.”
“Dumpsters and heat aren’t a sexy combo like the TV shows make them.” He leaned down and pressed a quick kiss to the top of her head, easy and natural as breathing. “You eat anything yet?”
“Coffee.”
“That’s not food.”
“It’s a food group. Or it should be.”
He shook his head, but there was warmth in it. “I can stop by and bring you lunch once we get a break.”
“You and I both know you’re not going to get a break. But it’s the thought that counts.
“I’ll remember that next time I forget something.”
She laughed—a low, rich sound that made a couple of the deputies glance over—and pushed him gently back toward the crime scene. “Go. Detect things. I’ll handle the body.”
The passenger door of the Suburban opened, and Sheldon emerged into the sunlight like a creature who’d taken a wrong turn out of his burrow. He was pocket sized—a few inches over five feet, soft around the middle—with sandy hair going thin on top and glasses so thick they made his eyes look like something you’d find at the bottom of a pond. His army-green coveralls were already showing sweat stains under the arms, and he squinted against the glare like it had personally offended him.
“Did you know,” he announced, fumbling his glasses up his nose, “that the average American produces four point four pounds of trash per day? That’s nearly a ton and a half per year. Though interestingly, the decomposition rate varies significantly based on?—”
“Sheldon.” Lily’s voice was gentle, patient. “Maybe not right now, okay?”
He blinked at her, then at the crime-scene tape, then at the body bag on the ground. Something clicked behind those magnified eyes. “Oh. Right. Because of the…” He gestured vaguely toward the dumpster. “The situation.”
“The situation,” Lily agreed. She put a hand on his shoulder, steering him toward the gurney the way you’d guide a puppy away from traffic. “Why don’t you help me get set up?”
“I can do that. I’m very good at setting up. Mother says I have excellent organizational skills, which is apparently genetic because my father was an accountant before he left. Did you know that forty-one percent of first marriages end in divorce? The percentage goes up for second and third marriages, which seems counterintuitive, but?—”
“Sheldon.” Still gentle. Still patient. “Gurney.”
“Gurney. Yes. Focusing now.”
I watched them work—Lily directing with calm efficiency, Sheldon orbiting her like a moon that couldn’t quite find its trajectory. She never snapped at him, never let frustration creep into her voice. She just kept guiding, redirecting, channeling all that anxious energy into something useful.
It was a gift. One I didn’t have the patience for most days.
“We’re going to need help with the lift,” I said. “He’s a big guy.”
Jack nodded and turned toward the crime-scene tape. “Riley, Plank—give them a hand loading.”
The two deputies headed our way. Riley moved with the loose-limbed ease of someone comfortable in his own skin, while Plank still had that slightly green tinge around his edges from his time in the dumpster. But neither of them hesitated. Good men. The kind who did the hard work without complaint.
The gurney wheels clattered against the asphalt as Lily locked them into place beside the body bag. Sheldon hovered nearby, his hands twitching at his sides.
“Did you know,” he said to no one in particular, “that the human body loses approximately twenty-one grams of weight at the moment of death? It was measured in a 1907 experiment by Duncan MacDougall, though his methodology has been widely criticized. He only used six subjects, which is hardly a representative sample size?—”
“Sheldon.” Lily handed him a strap. “Hold this.”
He took it, clutching it to his chest like a lifeline. “Holding. I’m holding it.”
“Good. Keep holding it.”
