Page 30 of Girl, Unseen

‘You coming, Hawkins?’

Luca jumped to his feet. 'No, it's just the way I'm sitting. Are you sure you want to see the coroner now? When we're close to finding Blackwood?'

‘Yeah. I can’t sit here looking at symbols much longer.’

‘I’ll message you as soon as I’ve got Blackwood’s location, alright?’

‘Yeah, do that.’ Ella gave the symbols one last look. Five patterns, no answers. They'd find Felix Blackwood eventually, but something told her that wouldn't be the end of it. Not even close.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

The Manhattan Office of the Chief Medical Examiner looked exactly like what it was – a building designed to warehouse the dead. Ella sat in the reception area and watched Luca tap out the baseline to 'Another One Bites The Dust' on his thighs. Once upon a time, she'd found his musical interludes endearing. Now, she wanted to break his fingers.

‘You going to do that all day?’

‘Do what?’

‘The… tapping.’

The waiting room smelled of industrial cleaner and something underneath that no amount of bleach could mask. Ancient magazines littered the coffee table – issues of National Geographic from when people still thought the millennium bug would end civilization.

‘Oh. Sorry.’ Luca switched to humming Sweet Caroline instead.

‘That’s not better.’

‘Well, what do you want me to do? Humming helps me think.’

‘About what? The Red Sox?’ Ella had recently undergone a crash course in NASCAR and baseball, but everything she’d learned about them had been against her will.

'About what we're going to see.' His legs began jittering. Another nervous tic that had gone from cute to criminal. 'Two bodies. Both killed in completely different ways. Both connected by symbols older than America.'

Ella had to admire how his mind worked even while she wanted to tape his hands to the chair. 'You're taking this pretty well.'

'Am I? You know why I’m nervous.’

'Because you hate seeing bodies?'

'No. Because I hate morgues.' He finally stopped jittering. 'You do, too.'

He wasn't wrong. Ella had grown accustomed to morgues over the years, but that didn't mean she had to like them. The fluorescent lights that made everything look like a bad TV show. The hum of refrigeration units keeping flesh from returning to the earth too quickly. The way sound seemed to die in these halls, like the dead absorbed noise along with heat.

The receptionist's phone buzzed. She was about eighty, with cat-eye glasses and enough rouge to supply a circus. Her nameplate read 'Gladys' and she had photos of twelve cats arranged around her monitor.

'Agents? Dr. Zhao will see you now. Room 3.'

Ella nodded her thanks then made her way down a corridor that seemed designed to make people uncomfortable. No pictures on the walls, no plants, nothing to remind you that life existed outside these halls. She and Luca found the set of steel double doors marked AUTOPSY ROOM 3 and knocked twice. A muffled voice called them in.

Dr. Zhao turned out to be a tiny Mexican woman who looked about twelve years old until you noticed the lines around her eyes. She wore purple scrubs under her lab coat and had dyed streaks of electric blue through her black hair. Two examination tables dominated the room, both occupied by sheet-covered shapes that were trying very hard not to look like bodies.

'Agents Dark and Hawkins? Sorry about the wait. Budget cuts mean we're running a skeleton crew.' She caught herself. 'Poor choice of words.'

'No problem.' The medical profession always had the weirdest sense of humor. ‘Where do you suggest we start?’

'Ladies' choice.' Dr. Zhao moved to the first table. 'Though I'd recommend starting with Mr. Thornton. He's been with us longer.'

‘Alright. What do we have?’

The sheet came away with a whisper of fabric on flesh. Marcus Thornton lay exactly as nature intended, minus a few basic dignities like a heartbeat. Four days of death had started their work, but the refrigeration had slowed the process. His skin had taken on that specific shade of gray that meant the blood had settled, pulled down by the same gravity that had killed him.

---