was trying to tell him something.
Curran ignored it.
He knew a lot of cops who went out of their way to trust their instincts. Curran preferred hard facts and cold figures. The more he could rely on science and logic, the better he felt.
He lit a fresh cigarette. The hair on the back of his neck stood up. He felt a presence. Curran wheeled around, expecting to see someone.
He saw no one.
Curran stood there, cigarette dangling out of the side of his mouth. His eyes searched the passers-by, looking. For what, he didn’t know. But something felt oddly familiar.
Deja vu?
He frowned. Please no, he thought. Not here in my town.
My new town.
He slid inside the Toyota and shut the flashing blue strobe off. He tucked it back under his seat and sat there for a second, inhaling hard on the filter. After so many medical warnings, Curran may as well have been suckling at the breast of death.
It didn’t bother him much.
What did bother him was this body.
He gunned the engine and backed the car up the street, u-turning and jumping down into Kenmore Square. He took Commonwealth Avenue until it ended near the Public Gardens, swung around and over the backside of Beacon Hill, dropping into Albany Street and parking in an ‘authorized vehicles’ only slot.
He grabbed two black coffees at the twenty-four hour donut stand by Government Center and then cut back toward the Medical Examiner’s office.
At one-thirty in the morning, most security guards would have been fighting sleep, but the old fellow manning the checkpoint at the entrance to the City Morgue looked chipper enough.
“Dr. Kwon says you should go straight on in there,” he said after checking Curran’s identification.
Curran walked down the linoleum floor toward the heavy blue swinging doors. He sighed. The air around him felt cold. Like the death that hung over this entire section of the building. He hated coming here. Hated being surrounded by the dead.
But he knew the answers lay beyond the swing doors. He pushed through.
The outer office consisted of a few small desks, file cabinets and computer terminals. Curran noticed a set of coveralls, an apron, face shield, two pairs of gloves and shoe covers laid out for him. He glanced through the window separating the examination room from the outer office and saw Kwon looking up. His voice spilled out of a metal speaker by Curran’s right side.
“Hurry up. I’d like to get at least two hours sleep tonight.”
“You want the coffee?”
“Leave it for right now.”
Curran slid off his jacket and stepped into the coveralls. “Aren’t these gloves supposed to kept in a sanitary dispenser?”
Kwon smirked behind his plastic shield. “You aren’t going to make this guy any sicker, Steve. Get in here already.”
“You got any of that…stuff?”
Kwon sighed. “Second drawer in my desk.”
Curran opened it and found the small vial of eucalyptus oil. He dabbed it under each nostril, slid on his shield and gloves and then walked through the door.
Kwon waved him over. “You made good time.”
“You made better. I wouldn’t have thought you’d have him unloaded already.”
“I have help,” said Kwon. “Couple of heavies who can haul bags like nothing make all the difference in the world.”
Curran glanced around and saw they were alone. “Where’s the diener?”
“Gone for the night. I don’t need to remind you we normally perform our autopsies between 8 in the morning and four in the afternoon. This is a bit unorthodox.”
“The death could well be as well.”
“Well, since you insisted on this, you’ll be my assistant tonight.”
“Me?”
Kwon smiled. “No one else is here, pal.”
“You know I don’t do well at these things.”
“Then tonight’s your lucky night.” He smiled. “Are you ready?”
Curran noticed his breathing had increased. Keep it together, Steve. He clenched and unclenched his hands.
“Yeah.”
Kwon switched on the recorder with his other hand. Curran heard him clear his voice and begin speaking the particulars into the tape.
Curran looked down at the corpse. Nude. Limp. Completely devoid of life. But how had he died?
Kwon measured the body and called out the numbers to the recorder. He looked at Curran. “Help me with the body block, would you?”
“The what?”
Kwon held up a small rectangle of plastic. “Got to slide this under his back so I can get to the chest cavity better. You lift and I’ll slide it under.”
Curran frowned. “Wonderful.” He slid his arms under the small of the back and the neck and lifted. Kwon slid the block under and Curran let it down. The corpse’s arms dangled back slightly, making the chest protrude upwards more.
“Good,” said Kwon. “Preparation for the initial cut. Begin making a Y incision from the pubic bone up and branching off toward each deltoid…”
Curran listened to the running commentary. He saw Kwon’s scalpel cut deep into the skin. A red line broke in the scalpel’s wake, but not as much blood appeared as Curran would have thought.
“It’s pooled,” said Kwon. “Only a bit presents at the initial cut if the corpse has been this way for a while.” He glanced at Curran. “Ready to pull the flaps back?”
Curran took a deep breath. “Guess so.”
Kwon nodded. “Let me cut the muscles and soft tissue off the chest wall.” He stooped lower and Curran heard him make some quick cuts. He leaned back, bloody blade in one hand. “Okay. Pull the chest flap up and over his face.”
Curran grasped the angled sides of the initial cut and felt the skin give easily. It flopped up over the face. The underside reminded him of a pizza without the cheese on it. The smell hit him a second later. “Christ.”
Kwon frowned. “You know, to me this smells like raw lamb meat.”
“Wonderful.”
“What — you never had a gyro before?”
“Only one I ever ate gave me food poisoning back in high school.”
“You never had another one ever again?”
“Do we need to discuss food right now?”
“Sorry.” He hefted a small electric saw. “Let’s open the rib cage.” The saw switched on with a high-pitched whine that sounded a bit lower in octave than the drill at the dentist. Kwon leaned over the chest cavity and Curran heard the blade bite into bone. A small amount of smoke crept out. Small bits of white bone leapt out of the cavity. Curran thanked God he hadn’t eaten in a while. Most of the autopsies he’d seen before were after all the dissection had occurred. Going through the process bit by bit was something new to him.
Curran wasn’t sure he wanted to repeat the experience any time soon.
Kwon lifted off the plate of ribs and handed it to Curran. “Put it down there in that tray.” Curran did so and looked back to see Kwon examining what he thought looked like the heart.
“What are you doing now?”
Kwon began probing with his finger and then made a cut. “Opening the pericardial sac. I need to find the
