Page 4 of Of Flames and Crows

Brimstone’s voice was hard when he spoke.He won’t be easy to take down.

One of the other pathologists came down the corridor and greeted her and Hodge, her expression tired.

Two weeks had passed since Mae had resumed her job as a mortuary assistant at Grandview. Everyone was doing overtime to catch up with the backlog of autopsy requests that had accrued after the hospital was attacked a couple of months ago. Not only had half the place been put out of service due to the physical damage caused to the buildings by the Dark Council, the entire site had been declared a crime scene. Though construction work was still ongoing in other parts of the complex, the basement of the main block had been totally refurbished, complete with brand-new pathology labs.

Mae was glad to be back at work. Nikolai had left for Prague a few weeks ago and the apartment had been depressingly quiet without him. There had been no activity from the Dark Council since their return from the annual covenstead in Philadelphia, something she’d found highly suspicious considering what her explosive encounter there with Vedran Borojevic and Barquiel had revealed. She knew the peaceful lull would only last so long. Bar a few meetings at the coven headquarters, she hadn’t had much to do with regard to magic and her role as the Witch Queen.

She’d kept herself busy helping out at her family’s funeral home at first, but with her sister Ryu finally appointing a new funeral director to assist her at Fairhill, Mae’s role had become defunct. Though the guy was still on probation, he was the best candidate Ryu had found in the last two years of searching. So far, she’d had nothing but positive things to say about him. Even Bianca Rhys, their primary mortician, had given the man her seal of approval. It helped that he knew the traditional death rites for which Fairhill Funeral Home was famed. From Ryu’s feedback, he’d fitted into the local Koreatown community like he’d been born and raised there.

Ryu had told her he’d even been over to dinner at their home a few times now.

I really should meet this guy soon.

CHAPTER3

Hodge pushedthrough the doors to his lab. A woman lay on the autopsy table in the inner room. He’d already opened her up and dissected out her internal organs.

Samantha Bale, Hodge’s assistant, stepped out of the clean-up room. Her face brightened. “Oh, hey, Mae.”

“Hi, Sam.”

Even though Mae was an assistant like Samantha, she was allowed to perform autopsies on her own. She had been a surgeon after all, before she’d been forced to quit her residency following her father’s death. She and Rose had even been planning to open a clinic together after they completed their training.

Samantha studied Hodge worriedly. “You sure you don’t want me to stay and clean up?”

Hodge shook his head and smiled tiredly. “You shouldn’t miss your appointment with your ob-gyn. It’s an important day.”

Mae brightened. “Oh. Is your scan today?”

Samantha nodded and patted her belly. “Yup. We find out whether we’re having a Bob or a Bobelina today.”

Mae and Hodge stared.

Samantha chuckled at their aghast expressions. “I’m kidding. If it’s a boy, we’ll name him Michael. And if it’s a girl, it’ll be Rose.”

Mae’s heart clenched.

Samantha blinked when she realized what she’d said.

“I’m sorry, Mae,” she blurted out. “I didn’t mean to—”

“It’s okay,” Mae said with a sad smile. “Rose is a great name.”

They bade the assistant goodbye and crossed the floor to the autopsy table.

“She was found in Central Park forty-two hours ago,” Hodge said. “From the general state of the body, I estimate time of death to be five to six days preceding the discovery. There are no external signs of injury except for what looks like a superficial burn on her abdomen. Cause of death was ultimately…a heart attack.”

Mae noted his pause with a faint frown.

The bloated appearance of the corpse and the greenish discoloration of the abdominal wall indicated it was in the early stages of decomposition. Hodge’s midline incision had carved neatly through an irregular, three-inch-wide ring of reddened skin encircling the woman’s belly button.

Mae stared. “That doesn’t look like it was caused by a physical object.”

Hodge dipped his chin. “I agree. But that’s not the weirdest thing. Do you notice anything strange about the body?”

Unease filtered through Mae when she registered what had perturbed Hodge.

“There’s no fixed livor mortis or marbling,” she said slowly. She put on some gloves and carefully turned the cadaver on its side to examine the back. Her brow wrinkled. “There are no signs of lividity at all. How is that possible?”

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