Vickie: Doctor by day. Zombie Hunter by night: Chapter 8

In the two hours that the office was opened for walk-in business I saw one sprained wrist that was acquired at an after-school sporting event and one ear infection. In between them I sat and chatted about anything and everything with Peter. I found him super easy to relax around.

Evelyn arrived around ten minutes after eight. Peter asked to assist me with her foot infection and, since Evelyn had no objections, I accepted his help. I listened and observed as Peter peppered her with a myriad of questions that I would have never thought to ask. Little by little he rooted out of her tight-lipped persona that she kicked her shoes off immediately upon getting home and didn’t put them back on until she was required to for work. There are many people who don’t wear shoes at home, so that, in itself, wasn’t the issue. The issue was the fact that she lived in a communal environment with dirt floors and an outhouse. This meant that, even though her festered sores were bandaged, the bandages were becoming soiled and contaminated because her bare feet were exposed to germs of a variety that most homes wouldn’t have. Most homes in the United States, that is. In the parts of Africa where Peter worked, it was the norm.

After explaining to our patient the perils of leaving her foot exposed while the wound was healing, we got a promise from her that she’d keep it covered and wear slippers or some other type of protective barrier between her flesh and the ground and then gave her the salve to try once more.

It was nine at night before I was able to get downstairs to begin the autopsy. Since the electrician wasn’t coming until the following day and I knew the electro-magnetic frequencies would make the place feel creepy, I was glad for Peter’s company.

I was in the middle of explaining the plans I had for improving the morgue turned medical examiner’s lab when I stopped in mid-sentence.

Peter placed his hand on my shoulder. “Is something wrong?”

“The body’s gone.”

“What do you mean?”

I pointed to the opened door of the walk-in refrigerator that now had an empty gurney in it. “I left it on that gurney. It’s gone.”

“Are body snatchers common in this area?” he asked with concern.

“This is my first corpse. I’ve never heard

tell of body snatching and Max didn’t mention it, but I can’t be sure.”

“Who’s Max?”

I looked at Peter just in time to see what I thought might be a bit of jealousy in his eyes before he turned away. When he looked back at me, he was his normal self again.

My mind screamed ‘Max is the guy I almost screwed on the ground next to the corpse I just lost’, but, instead, I said, “Max is the sheriff. He’s the one who hired me as coroner and medical examiner.” I walked into the cooler and stared at the empty gurney. “I’m not off to a very good start.”

“Who else knew you had the body down here?” he asked with concern.

I thought for a moment. “The undertaker who brought it, Max, Angela, and me.” As an afterthought I added, “Oh, and my other boarder, Evan.”

“When did you last see the body?”

“This morning when it was delivered. I put it in the cooler before I met you and Angela for lunch. It was my intention to start the autopsy this afternoon, but I got back too late. I never thought to come down and check on it,” I moaned, “Shit. Now I have to call Max and tell him I lost the body. Worse than that is what that asshole undertaker’s going to say. He came off as a real jerk.”

“I’m sure you’ll be fine where Max is concerned and who cares about the undertaker. I think I’d be most concerned about who could have come in and taken the body. We came through the house, but there has to be another entrance. Where does it take you to?”

“There’s a driveway in the back for deliveries.” I felt morbid calling the undertaker bringing a dead body to me a delivery, but what else was it?

Peter opened the door that led to the back of the house and stepped outside. He knelt to closer inspect the drive. “Sometimes you can see residue from tires if a vehicle has recently driven over it.”

“One did. The undertaker’s hearse.”

“Yes, of course.” He stood back up and slowly searched the darkness with his beautiful blue eyes “We’d better call the police.”

I already had my cell phone in my hand to call when he said that. Max answered on the second ring. He wasn’t happy to hear about the loss of Jacob’s body, but he also didn’t sound as surprised as I expected he’d be.

Peter stayed with me while I waited for Max to arrive. I’d considered calling for Angela to join us, but, then, I remembered her saying that she had to go out of town the following day. I didn’t know what preparations she needed to do before a trip, so I decided not to bother her.

Sparks of jealousy permeated the air when I introduced Max to Peter. Which man was emitting them the strongest was a mystery to me. They both came across equally put out -or possibly threatened- by the presence of the other. Their behavior was not only unsettling, but fascinating. What had I been missing all those years while studying and not dating? Did men really behave in such a caveman way? It confused me.

I found it interesting that the only two men who’d managed to turn me on were so opposite in looks. Peter had rich, deep blue eyes and dark hair. He was tall and muscular, but his build was a lean muscular build of an athlete who runs or swims. Max, on the other hand was blonde with pale blue eyes that darkened just a bit when things got intense. He was an inch or two taller than Peter with that body builder look.

Two such very different looks that got the exact same reaction from me.

I couldn’t help wondering if there was something more going on than just the battle for the woman. With Max not reacting to the loss of our corpse as severely as I would have expected, and Peter peppering both him and me with questions that only someone with a vested interest would be expected to ask, I had to wonder what lay beneath the superficial layer of it all.

Peter was the aggressor in the situation. He pounded Max with questions about the deaths over the last year or so. It was through his questions that I learned that, not only were there at least a dozen mysterious deaths over the last few years, but almost all the corpses disappeared before they reached the undertaker for embalming. This bit of news was unsettling, but also a relief. I no longer felt horrid about losing Jacob Tripp.

“I didn’t want to tell you about the bodies disappearing,” Max said as he looked directly at me. “It’s nothing I’m proud of. I was hoping that changing where we took them would stop the thievery.”

“Are you sure it’s thievery?” Peter asked.

Max took a deep breath while rolling his eyes. “Okay, doc. I realize that you’ve spent at least a decade removed from civilization while living in third world countries amidst people who believed in and practiced voo doo or hoo doo or some kind of doo doo that would make them believe a dead body can just get up and walk away, but you’re back in the states now. We maintain a more scientific approach to things.”

Peter shrugged and turned away. “I’m sure you’re right.”

Max puffed out his chest as if to indicate he’d won that round. “I am.”

“So, what do we do now?” I asked. “How have you been handling the disappearances?”

“The hospital in Mechanicsburg has a fairly tight-lipped crew. They’ve managed to keep things quiet.”

“What about the relatives?” Peter asked with surprise. “Don’t they make some kind of a stink?”

“It’s a bit crazy, but the body snatcher seems to pick bodies where there is no living relative to claim it. All of them were being buried by the county.”

“Well, that’s damned convenient,” I mused. When I looked up and saw both Peter and Max staring at me after my remark, I blushed. “I mean, it’s weird, right? How would the snatcher know these things? Whoever it is, must work in a place

that gives access to the records.”

Max scowled in thought. “The county, the funeral home, the sheriff’s office, or the hospital. My crew are few and dedicated, but I investigated them just the same. It makes no sense that the funeral home would steal a body since it was destined to go to them anyway. That left the county and the hospital. I came up empty with the county workers who live in the area, so I’d settled on it being someone in the hospital. Since I didn’t take Jacob to the hospital morgue, there was no reason to tell them about him.” He shook his head. “If it is a hospital worker, they’ve got to be keeping abnormally close tabs on Wolf Junction; which I doubt. That brings me back to county workers.”

Before I could filter my words, I said, “Angela is a county worker.” A look of horror consumed my face as I looked at Peter’s shocked reaction to my words and then at Max’s intense and thoughtful look. I scrambled to redeem myself. “Maybe she can help us figure out who’d have access to such records.”

“Besides her?” Max asked matter-of-factly.

“I don’t think she sees that kind of information,” I said defensively. “She’s a traveling case worker.”

“If she has access to the internet and has permission and the knowledge to maneuver their employee website, she does,” Max pointed out.

Peter scowled and scratched his chin.

“Angela is my long-time friend, but I have to agree with Max. She could have access to the information. She also knew the corpse was down here.”

I gasped with surprise and disappointment that Peter would and could turn on an old friend that easily. Once again, I questioned what was really going on.

“Well, since she spent yesterday afternoon at lunch with you and me and then sat on the porch talking to me and Evan after that, I’d like to know when she had the opportunity to whisk away a dead body that weighed twice as much as she did. I would have seen a car coming up to take it away as well. This happened when I was at the café with you and Angela, Peter, so I believe that leaves your good friend in the clear.” I was sure to emphasize the words ‘good friend’.

The pedestal I’d placed Dr. Peter Thomason on just lowered a few inches.