a halt. “PsyLED should have pushed use of the null room at HQ harder.”
The anger on Gomez’ face faded. “PsyLED has a null room in Knoxville?”
I frowned. “Yes. There is a null room at PsyLED here in Knoxville, and parked outside is a portable null chamber on loan to UTMC from the North Nashville coven.”
I didn’t have to be Tandy to know that Gomez was shocked. She hadn’t known.
“Both are available,” I said, softer. “PsyLED’s room is a better null space because it’s stable. We offered for UTMC to transport patients there for treatment. That didn’t happen.”
“You offered that to us? Who did you talk to, because this is the first I’ve heard about it,” she said, redirecting her anger.
“Yes. We offered. I can find out who took the call at UTMC if necessary. We’ve been feeling our way through this, just like y’all.”
Gomez cursed and walked toward the doctor parking area.
Feeling despondent, and knowing that communication had broken down somewhere, somehow, I moved to my vehicle and began to write up my reports. Moments later, JoJo notified me that there had been a death on the paranormal floor and for me to get back to the morgue.
NINE
I was standing at the morgue doors, waiting for the paperwork to be filled out, and for family to grieve. I had been here long enough to find vending machines and eat a package of pretzels and drink a Cheerwine, both of which were wonderful snack foods.
I finally heard a ding and the elevator doors opened. A stretcher was wheeled off toward me, preceded by the stench of death and decay. The body on the stretcher was zipped into a human remains pouch, a white sheet over the HRP. The transport workers were covered head to toe in blue antispelled unis, their faces hidden behind masks and goggles. I showed my ID and requested to see the body.
They stopped. One of them pulled back the sheet. The other unzipped the pouch.
It was what I had expected. Pretty awful. Sometime in the last hour, Connelly had coded again, been pronounced, and been moved off the floor. Her eyes had probably been blue; now they were clouded over. Her lips were gray, pulled back tightly from dry, crusty teeth. A greenish slime drooled from one corner of her lips around a tube that was still in place. Her brown hair was falling out. Her skin was weeping, melting from her bones like candle wax. Her hands and feet were green. I assumed I was expected to touch and read the body to verify the presence and type of the magics in it, but I couldn’t bring myself to. I curled my hands into fists. The experience of fighting death and decay was still too fresh in my memory. My finger still ached, the skin still white and dead looking.
Before I could talk myself into it, the elevator pinged and opened. Gomez strode out, shouting, “This better be worth—” She halted, cursed, and came on. “Worth my time to come back on my day off,” she said softly. She stopped over Connelly’s body. “Astounding,” she said. “And damn it all to hell.” She looked at me. “You get a judge’s order and you can observe the PM. Otherwise get the hell out.”
I got.
And I had the perfect excuse to not touch the body.
* * *
* * *
I drove to the office. My official vehicle had come to me by way of confiscation and it was “fully tricked out inside,” according to Occam. It had every bell and whistle ever devised by car manufacturers—heated seats and steering wheel, autostart, Bluetooth, an onboard computer that I could link to my laptop if needed, electronic chargers, monitors to tell me when I had low tires . . . It had everything. I loved it. I’d never tell my mama, but the best reasons for entering the modern world were Krispy Kreme donuts and tech.
I parked close to HQ’s door, spotting JoJo’s and FireWind’s cars and a dozen rusted-out vehicles I didn’t recognize. The sound of music on the air made me look up to see the third-floor windows were open, the origination of the music. There were two ways onto the third floor: through the second floor and from the back of the building. Cigarette smoke and dust floated around the building from the back, along with multilingual shouting—English, Spanish, and something that sounded like Croatian or Russian, not that I’d heard those last languages except in movies. A