hurricane.
Several of the hotels had started encouraging guests to check out, but the beach was still packed with tourists. Other than the waves there was no indication of a storm, the sky still cloudless and blue, the sun baking the white sand. The last August days before vacations ended for another year. Why would anyone believe they needed to leave this paradise and go home early?
The rest of Liz's aircrew were down the beach a mile at the heliport, crawling over their helicopter, doing their own preflight assessments, checks, and rechecks. She usually enjoyed the alone time. Today it added to her restlessness. They had been instructed to sit tight and wait. All they were told was that the deputy director of Homeland Security and an FBI investigator were on their way. It sounded like they would be taking over the case. Liz thought it a waste of time for them to be grilled all over again. What new questions could they ask? What more information could their aircrew provide?
She remembered what her dad had said about body parts and felt a bit sick to her stomach. How stupid could Tommy Ellis be? But then how stupid had all four of them been? Sure, Wilson prodded them to open the cooler, but Kesnick should never have gone any further once they realized what they had found. It was Kesnick who pulled out each piece. Except the large one, the one they agreed looked like a torso. The plastic had been wrapped tight but it yielded enough that they could see the parts had been sliced clean. No rips or tears. Whoever had done this knew exactly where to cut and had the tools to do an efficient job.
Now Liz wondered if Kesnick confessed to the authorities yesterday how much he had handled the wrapped pieces. Liz certainly hadn't said a word. She didn't lie. But for all the questions, no one thought about asking, 'Did you handle the contents? Do you know what you found?'
Instead, the authorities were more concerned with where the cooler had been discovered and whether or not they had talked to anyone on the ground about it. Anyone outside their aircrew. Even later, when the four of them went out for drinks and hot dogs, they stayed away from the topic. Or at least, Liz thought they had. When was it that Tommy Ellis had slipped and told her dad? Had Ellis told anyone else?
She suspected that the deputy director of Homeland Security and the FBI agent would ask more pointed questions. Ones that couldn't be evaded as easily. Would they dare suspend them all with a hurricane coming?
Liz saw a sleek, black SUV loop around the parking lot, an Escalade with Louisiana license plates. It didn't park though there were plenty of empty spaces in front of the building. Instead, it headed back onto Via De Luna Drive. She watched until it turned off into the Hilton Hotel.
They were here.
Her nerves tensed, and she wished she hadn't had that second Red Bull.
CHAPTER 14
Scott Larsen hadn't taken time to change out of his suit from Sunday-morning service at First United Christ. Trish was used to him dropping her off at home before he headed over to the funeral home, but this morning she had been on edge about the hurricane.
'We need to start thinking about what we're going to do,' she nagged at him all the way home. 'We probably need some plywood to board up the patio doors.'
'The thing hasn't even gotten into the Gulf yet,' Scott had countered.
He was impatient with all this worry over something that might not even come their way. Besides, he hated leaving Joe Black the run of his embalming room. The guy insisted Scott give him a key and security code so he could start work. Other than accepting delivery and providing temporary cold storage of a few specimens for Black to pick up en route to one of his doctors' conferences, this was their first real business dealing.
After months of listening to Joe Black talk--actually there was more insinuation than talk--about the impressive network, the major connections to doctors and medical equipment companies, and all the 'big money' there was waiting to be made, Scott had jumped at the chance when Black finally invited him to be a major player. And Scott had already been paid handsomely for the storage fees. It was Joe who told him how to contract with the county to handle indigents. That little tip would bring in five hundred dollars a shot, just for accepting and processing the bodies. Plus, Joe Black was going to pay him another five hundred each. Scott didn't have to lift a finger.
It was a win-win situation. He couldn't believe his good fortune. And it came at just the right time. Trish had long ago overspent their budget on the house they were building. He hadn't told her that he decided to forgo buying hurricane insurance for it. How was he supposed to afford it when they were still paying renter's insurance on their condo plus the insurance on the funeral home? Now it was too late. He couldn't buy insurance after the first of June, when hurricane season started. This one sure as hell better take a turn and stay far away. Then he reminded himself that it wasn't even in the Gulf.
Some days he truly felt like a transplant down here in Florida. Just last week someone at one of his memorial services called him 'a Yankee' and jokingly told him, 'But maybe you won't become a 'damn Yankee.''
'What's a damn Yankee?' Scott wanted to know.
'One that stays.'
Days like this, Scott wondered why he hadn't insisted they live in Michigan. He'd been lured by those emerald-green waters and sandy beaches. And Trish in a bikini, though she hardly ever wore one now that they were married, even though they lived right on the bay.
Scott drove around the one-story funeral home that looked remarkably like an oversize ranch house. Every time he pulled into the parking lot he felt a swell of pride. It was all his ... his and the bank's: three viewing rooms, chapel, visitors' lounge, and corner office. The embalming room and storage facility were in a separate building that connected to the back of the funeral home via an air-conditioned walkway.
He'd added the twenty-five-foot walkway. It was crazy going even that short distance in a suit and tie and getting sweaty from the humidity or drenched from a downpour. He insisted on presenting a clean, crisply pressed appearance. Likewise, his entire place was kept meticulously.
The public areas--the viewing rooms and visitors' lounge--were vacuumed daily, stocked with fresh flowers, furniture aligned at straight angles with ample room for foot traffic as well as coffin traffic. Even the back area that included the embalming room and walk-in refrigerator was spotless. The stainless-steel tables and shelves gleamed. The white linoleum floors and porcelain basins always had a glossy finish. The state inspectors constantly praised Scott and told him they wished all the places they had to inspect looked this good.
Now as he pulled up to the back door his eyes darted around, looking for a vehicle. Joe Black had been driving something different every time they'd met. Scott figured he must use various leased cars or perhaps rentals. Last night Joe had walked up the beach so Scott hadn't even seen what he was driving. But there wasn't a vehicle anywhere in sight. Could he have finished already? Or maybe he hadn't started yet.
Scott disarmed the alarm system and had his key in the door when he heard something rattling against the back of the building. He stopped and leaned around the corner. A rusted old shopping cart had been wedged between the trunk of a magnolia tree and his Dumpster.
Damn! He hated people snooping around his property, leaving trash. It cost money to empty that frickin' Dumpster.
He was shaking his head, still cursing under his breath, when he went inside. He immediately reset the alarm.
Scott understood that there were specific reasons why he had become a mortician. He didn't really like working with people. Sure, he had to advise and guide the bereaved, but it was easier to work with people when they were at their most vulnerable. They automatically looked to him as the expert. There was a built-in respect that came with the job title.
He actually didn't mind working with dead people. Trish insisted that much of what he did was creepy and gross: the makeup, hairstyling, and clothes. Sometimes he had to paint the skin or sew up leaking orifices. And there were the plastic lenses he inserted beneath the eyelids to keep the eyes from popping open in the middle of a memorial.
Even the blood didn't bother him. You drained it out and replaced it with embalming fluid. Oh sure, you couldn't avoid blood leaking out sometimes, but it never sprayed or splattered like it did from a live, pumping heart.
