Four Scarpetta Novels by Patricia Cornwell Page A

corner of the screen, Marino and some young, sexy but cheap-looking woman in motorcycle leather are in the upstairs hallway of Scarpetta’s office, and he’s saying to her, “You stay right here until she gets signed in.”
    â€œWhy can’t I go with you? I’m not afraid.” Her voice—husky, a heavy southern accent—is transmitted clearly through the speakers on Benton’s desk.
    â€œWhat the hell?” Benton says to Lucy over the phone.
    â€œJust watch,” she comes back. “His latest girl wonder.”
    â€œSince when?”
    â€œOh, let’s see. I think they started sleeping together this past Monday night. The same night they met and got drunk together.”
    Marino and Shandy board the elevator, and another camera picks them up as he says to her, “Okay. But if he tells the Doc, I’m cooked.”
    â€œHickory-dick-or-y-Doc, she’s got you by the cock,” she says in a mocking singsong.
    â€œWe’ll get a gown to hide all your leather, but keep your mouth shut and don’t do nothing. Don’t freak out or do nothing, and I mean it.”
    â€œIt’s not like I’ve never seen a dead body before,” she says.
    The elevator doors open and they step out.
    â€œMy father choked on a piece of steak right in front of me and my family,” Shandy says.
    â€œThe locker room’s back there. The one on the left.” Marino points.
    â€œLeft? Like when I’m facing which way?”
    â€œThe first one when you go around the corner. Grab a gown and do it quick!”
    Shandy runs. In one section of the screen, Benton can see her inside the locker room—Scarpetta’s locker room—grabbing a blue gown out of a locker—Scarpetta’s gown and locker—and hastily putting the gown on—backward. Marino waits down the hall. She runs back to him, the gown untied and flapping.
    Another door. This leading into the bay where Marino’s and Shandy’s motorcycles are parked in a corner, barricaded by traffic cones. A hearse is inside, the engine’s rumbling echoing off old brick walls. A funeral home attendant climbs out, lanky and gawky in a suit and tie as black and shiny as his hearse. He unfolds his skinny self like a stretcher, as if he’s turning into what he does for a living. Benton notices something weird about his hands, the way they’re clenched like claws.
    â€œI’m Lucious Meddick.” He opens the tailgate. “We met the other day when they fished that dead little boy out of the marsh.” He pulls on a pair of latex gloves, and Lucy zooms in on him. Benton notices a plastic orthodontic retainer on his teeth, and a rubber band around his right wrist.
    â€œCloser on his hands,” Benton tells Lucy.
    She zooms in more as Marino says, as if he can’t stand the man, “Yeah, I remember.”
    Benton notices Lucious Meddick’s raw fingertips, says to Lucy, “Severe nail biting. A form of self-mutilation.”
    â€œAnything new on that one?” Lucious is asking about the murdered little boy who Benton knows is still unidentified in the morgue.
    â€œNone of your business,” Marino says. “If it was for public semination, it would be in the news.”
    â€œJesus,” Lucy says in Benton’s ear. “He sounds like Tony Soprano.”
    â€œLooks like you lost a hubcap.” Marino points to the back left tire of the hearse.
    â€œIt’s a spare.” Lucious is snippy about it.
    â€œKinda ruins the effect, don’t it,” Marino says. “Tricked out with all that shine, then a wheel with ugly lug nuts.”
    Lucious huffily opens the tailgate and slides the stretcher over rollers in back of the hearse. Collapsible aluminum legs clack open and lock in place. Marino doesn’t offer assistance as Lucious rolls the stretcher and its black-pouched body up the ramp, bangs it against the door frame,