Diana Rowland - Even White Trash Zombies Get the Blues

I finally found my voice. “Sean, you have the pics you took out there, right?” At his nod I continued. “Can you pull those up and see if it’s the same watch?”

Sean switched screens and a few minutes later pulled up a file containing all of the crime scene pictures he’d taken. Ben and I watched silently while Sean scrolled through, finally clicking on one that showed the watch on the victim’s wrist. He zoomed in.

“It looks like the same watch,” Ben admitted. “But that could still be coincidence.”

“Sean, can you pull up one you took of his face?” I asked.

Sean flicked a glance over his shoulder. “I can…and I can also pull up a driver’s license pic of Zeke Lyons.”

“This doesn’t make any sense,” I breathed as I looked at the side by side pictures.

“It must be the guy’s dad or something,” Ben said, deep frown on his face.

My throat was dry as I pointed to the screen. “Look at that thin scar on the side of his chin. Same on both. And the mole on his temple. It’s the same guy…but a lot older.”

Ben sat back heavily. “Angel. I take back what I said about being glad I humored you. How the hell do I explain this to my rank? How can this guy be dead…twice?”

I spread my hands in helpless defeat. My thoughts whirled madly as I tried to make sense of it. I was right about him being a zombie, but…how could he have survived having his head chopped off? And why did he look so much older? And why did he seem to be dead after falling down the stairs?

What the fuck was going on?

I drove straight from the crime lab over to Marcus’s house, pushing my poor little Honda to the limits of its endurance and risking more than a few tickets. His truck was in his driveway when I pulled in, but there was another vehicle beside it—a dark blue Mazda with a long yellow scratch on the driver’s side near the back, as if the driver had misjudged the turn around one of those stupid posts at the drive-thru. Not that I’d ever done that or anything. But I didn’t recognize the car, so even though I was dying to talk to him I figured it would probably be best if I actually knocked on the door and waited, instead of the usual barge-right-in method that I’d developed over the past couple of weeks. Hell, I was practically living there most of the time anyway. About the only times I stayed at my own house was when Marcus worked night shift, since it felt sort of weird and creepy to be sleeping in his house when he wasn’t there.

I shifted impatiently from foot to foot while I listened for noise inside. A few seconds later I was rewarded with the sound of footsteps and then Marcus opened the door. He gave me a puzzled look and stepped back. “Hi, Angel. Why didn’t you just come on in?”

“I saw the car,” I explained as I entered. “I wasn’t sure who it was, and I didn’t want to—” I stepped around the corner to the living room and stopped at the sight of Sofia sitting on the couch. “—barge in,” I finished, briefly flustered. But it only took an instant to see that if they’d been up to something they’d have had to be ultra-fast dressers. Plus, Sofia looked stressed and upset, and I realized Marcus had lines of tension around his eyes.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Marcus said with a quick kiss. “There’s some weird stuff going on.”

“No shit,” I said as I moved to the couch and dropped down onto it. “But, um, I need to talk to you about…” I fumbled for some euphemism I could use for zombie stuff and failed. “About pudding,” I finally blurted, then mentally cringed. Pudding ? That was the best I could do?

A smile twitched across Marcus’s face. “It’s all right, Angel. Sofia knows we’re zombies.”

“Oh.” A weird ache of disappointment swam through me. This was the one thing that I shared with Marcus that I’d figured someone like Sofia couldn’t, since she wasn’t one of us. And yet…she did share it—and clearly accepted Marcus just fine as a zombie. What does that leave for me?

I did my best to swallow back the ache and put on a nonchalant smile. “Okay, well, that makes things easier,” I said. “I just found out that the guy who died at your lab really was a zombie.” I shot Marcus a quick I told you so! look.

Sofia let out a small gasp. “Are you certain?”

“Then how could he have appeared so dead?” Marcus asked, frowning. “Angel, how can you be so sure?”

I perched on the edge of the sofa. “Because the weirdness isn’t just that he was a zombie. It’s that this was one of the zombies that Ed killed.”

He blinked. “That doesn’t make sense. What do you mean?”

I quickly told them about the fingerprint on the watch and getting the ID, as well as the comparison of pictures and the matching scar and mole. Marcus still looked dubious, but Sofia clenched her hands together and hunched her shoulders.

“This explains so much,” she said, voice unsteady. “He must have been after my research.” She lifted her eyes to Marcus. “Pietro needs to know this. I know someone’s been looking through my files. Somehow one of the other zombie factions found out. I…I need protection.”

He moved to her side. “We’ll keep you safe, Sofia. Don’t worry.”

I frowned and held up a hand. “Hang on a sec. Could someone please explain to me what the hell is going on? What research? What ‘zombie factions’?”

Sofia took a deep breath and straightened. “I’ve known about the zombies for several years, since shortly after Marcus was turned. Pietro came to me with the offer to fund research in the hopes that I could either find a cure for it or find a way to manufacture a food substitute that would remove the need to consume human brains.”

“Is there a cure?” I asked, though I immediately wondered if I’d want it. As weird and gross as the whole zombie thing was, there were definitely some advantages.

She gave a sad shake of her head. “There’s no way to remove the parasite without killing the host.”

“Wait,” I said. “It’s not some sort of virus?”

“No, and I’ll explain why,” she said, her face abruptly growing more animated. Clearly this was a subject that excited her. “You see, viruses infect to reproduce, whereas parasites infect to get a home, freeload, and live out their lives. For the zombies that you see in the movies, yes, a virus makes sense, because they’re mindlessly going around trying to bite more people to propagate the infection. But with you—the real zombies—the goal seems to be the host’s survival, and it’s pretty much hijacked your entire body to make sure of it.”

“Okay,” I said weakly. Then I grimaced. “No, wait. I’m still confused. A parasite…like tapeworms? How is that different from a virus?”

She grinned but it wasn’t amusement at my ignorance. This was obviously her turf and a topic she relished. “Here’s the thing,” she said. “Parasites and viruses share some basic traits—they both need to infect a host and use its resources to survive and reproduce, but their global outlook is very different. A virus’s business model is based around hijacking your cellular machinery and completely depleting any and all resources it can get its grubby hands on, until the host is either dead or its immune system manages to kick the infecting virus out.” She paused, tilted her head. “Or into hibernation. A lot of viral infections are actually permanent; our immune system just gets used to them and forces them into retirement or hibernation, like chicken pox, herpes, warts, and hepatitis.”

I shuddered. “Seriously? I had chicken pox when I was a kid. You’re saying I still have it?”