“We’ve met?” I said, flummoxed by the surreal ex-change.

“Don’t you remember holding me in your arms, Carson? Or the time we kissed?”

“Uh…”

Her radio crackled with a dispatcher’s voice. She canted her head to listen, then looked at me with a sigh. “Lightning blasted out a string of traffic lights along Airport Road,” she said. “I’ve got to go. But I expect I’ll see you soon enough.”

She winked and did a little finger-wavy thing, chirped, “Bye-bye, Carson.” Her window rolled up and she disappeared into the gray as if never existing. I stared into the rain before recalling the building at my back and the reason for the wild ride that had started my day.

Get to the morgue pronto, Harry had said. There’s a strange situation …

Giving a final glance to the space where the woman’s cruiser had resided, as if the drenched asphalt held a clue to her identity, I turned and pushed through the door to the morgue, finding - as always - a dry and cold atmosphere spun through with molecules of violent death and human despair.

Copyright

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

Harper

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1

First published in Great Britain by Harper, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 2010

Copyright © Jack Kerley 2010

Jack Kerley asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN-978-0-00-735001-8

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EPub Edition © AUGUST 2010 ISBN: 978-0-007-32815-4

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