Hour Game

A final home run. Her cell phone was in its holder. He looked up. She was still gabbing away. Had he been so inclined, he could have killed the kid, stolen all her groceries and torched the car, and the woman would never even know it until someone started screaming at the flames shooting into the sky. He glanced around. People were far too busy with their lives to notice him.

He snatched the phone, hit the main screen button and got her cell phone number. Then he accessed her phone book, took a digital camera the size of his middle finger from his pocket and snapped pictures of screen after screen until he had all the names and phone numbers on her directory. He returned the phone, waved bye-bye to baby and slipped back into his car.

He went over his list. He had her name, home address and the fact that she had at least three kids and was married. The mailing block had been addressed to both Jean and Harold Robinson. He also had her home phone number, cell phone number and the names and numbers of a host of others important to her as well as impressions of her house keys.

She and her lovely family belong to me now.

The woman came back to her van, climbed in and drove off. He watched as she sped out of the parking lot, completely unaware that he'd become one of her intimates in the span of a few short minutes. He flicked a good-bye wave to the clueless soccer mom..Maybe I'll be seeing you if you're extremely unlucky.

He checked his watch: three potentials in less than twenty minutes. He breathed in the fresh air of the prosperous town of Wrightsburg, a town that had suffered a trio of brutal killings in quick succession.

Well, they hadn't seen anything yet.

CHAPTER 9

THE WRIGHTSBURG MORGUE WAS located on a quiet treelined street about two miles from the main downtown area. It was housed in part of a small one-story building constructed of brick and glass and had builder-grade landscaping that had flourished with the recent wet weather. It could have housed any type of business. People passing by would never guess it was where dead bodies were brought to be cut open and worked on, to determine what and/ or who had killed them. In the space right next to the morgue was a sign proclaiming that Dr. Sylvia Diaz, M.D., also had her medical office there.

King's Lexus pulled into the parking lot, and he and Michelle got out. A moment later a police cruiser drove in next to them, and Todd Williams hauled out his large body. He looked very unhappy as he tucked in his shirttail and righted his pistol.

"Let's get this over with," he grunted before storming ahead.

"What's with him?" whispered Michelle.

"I'll just take a flier and guess he doesn't like looking at dead bodies."

They asked for Sylvia Diaz at the front desk. The receptionist made a phone call, and a slender bespectacled man appeared. In his late twenties or early thirties the man sported a goatee and was dressed in scrubs. He introduced himself as Kyle Montgomery, Sylvia's assistant.

"She's just finishing up," he said in a monotone voice, although his eyes widened at the sight of the statuesque Michelle. "She said to bring you back to her office."

"How long have you worked here?" asked King.

Kyle squinted at him suspiciously. "Why does that matter?"

"I was just asking," he replied.

"I'm a private guy," retorted Kyle.

"I bet you went to UVA, didn't you?" asked Michelle. "What a great school," she added, smiling at him and drawing closer.

King watched with an amused expression as his partner proceeded to use her "feminine wiles" to coax information out of Kyle. She very rarely did this, but King knew it could be very effective. Kyle probably had nothing important to divulge, but it was helpful to have information on all the persons involved in the investigation.

Kyle quickly turned all his attention toward her. "Graduated pretty high up in my class," he said pompously. "I wanted to stay in the area, so I worked at UVA Hospital for a few years and then got my P.A. certification. But I got laid off from an oncology practice, and the bills started mounting up. Then this job came open. Presto, I'm a morgue tech. Thank you, God," he added sarcastically.

Michelle said, "It takes a very special person to do that sort of work."

"Yeah, it does," Kyle said cockily. "But I'm also Dr. Diaz's physician's assistant in her medical practice next door. She's there now treating a couple of patients. She actually hired me for both positions. It's a little bit of a juggling act, going back and forth, but at least the two offices are hooked together. And we don't have many deaths here that require autopsies. Hey, but that might be changing, right? Lots of action all of a sudden. Wrightsburg is really growing up. Yeah, baby." Kyle actually smiled at this.

Michelle, Williams and King exchanged disgusted glances as they followed him back.

Sylvia's office was everything Michelle imagined it would be. Very neat and orderly, tastefully decorated, at least by morgue standards, with warm feminine touches here and there to help dispel the cold, antiseptic atmosphere that dominated elsewhere in the building. On a coat rack near the door hung a woman's jacket, oversize bag and hat. On the floor next to the rack was a pair of dress shoes.

"She's very particular."

Michelle glanced over to see Kyle smiling at her. "The medical office is the same way. And Doc doesn't like to track stuff into the autopsy room, even though it's not like the most sterile place-pretty dirty, in fact. We have a locker room where we put on scrubs and shields, but sometimes I think she'd rather change out here for fear of contaminating some piece of evidence. I say get a life."

"Actually, it's nice to hear there are still dedicated people," said King stiffly.

While Kyle hung by the doorway waiting for his boss, Michelle ran her gaze around the rest of the room. On the shelf behind Sylvia's desk were several photos of a man either alone or with Sylvia. She picked one up and showed it to King with a questioning look.

"That's George Diaz, her late husband," he explained.

"She still has his pictures displayed at work?"

"I guess she really loved the guy."

"So how come you're not still seeing each other? Were there issues?" she asked in a playful tone.

"You're my business partner, not my shrink," he shot back.

A moment after Michelle put the photo back, Sylvia appeared in the doorway.

"Thank you, Kyle," she said curtly.

"Right," he said, and he and his superior smile marched off.

"Does your assistant have a slight attitude, or is it just us?" asked King.

Sylvia slipped off her lab coat and hung it on a hook on the door. Michelle took a moment to look the other woman over. A little under medium height, she was dressed in black slacks and a white linen shirt. She wore no jewelry, presumably because of her work. An earring or ring ending up in a corpse's slit-open stomach would probably not be a good thing. Her skin was smooth and lightly freckled around the jawline. Her red hair was tied back in a bun, revealing perfectly formed ears and a long, slender neck. Her brow was furrowed, and her look was one of distraction as she sat behind her desk.

"Kyle just turned thirty and doesn't really want to be here."

"I guess it's hard to pick up women in bars with the line ‘Want to check out some great corpses?'" said Michelle.

"I think Kyle's dream is to be in a world-famous rock band," said Sylvia.

"Right, along with twenty million other guys," said King. "He needs to get over it. I did when I was seventeen."

Sylvia glanced at some papers on her desk, signed them, closed the file, stretched out her arms and yawned. "I'm sorry. I haven't done three autopsies so close together for quite some time, and there's been an outbreak of spring flu. That's what I was doing next door." She shook her head wearily. "It's a little schizophrenic. One minute I'm looking at the throat of a fifty-year-old woman, the next moment I'm cutting up someone to see how they were murdered. Usually, there are months when I don't even step foot inside the morgue. But not lately."