Carved in Bone - Jefferson Bass [48]
She shrugged. “Or not too bright. Never did like to take the safe route—usually boring.” She gave me a smile. A very tight smile, first cousin to a grimace. “Miranda’s been telling me about some of your recent doings. Sounds like you’ve got a handful of trouble yourself.” I looked at Miranda, whose eyes flashed when they met mine. My face flushed, and I turned toward the hearse. Why was that infernal driver taking so long to unload the damn coffin?
I cleared my throat. “Well, I do have an interesting, um, case right now. I’ll t-t-tell you about it later. Right now, let me go get changed so I don’t keep you waiting.” With that, I fled into the morgue, slinking into the safety of the men’s changing room. What a mess I’d made of things with Miranda. What an idiot.
When I entered the autopsy room, taking refuge behind a surgical mask, I saw only Jess, scalpel in hand and headlamp on her forehead, leaning over the body. The coffin sat in a corner by a floor drain, still oozing a bit of water, or something. “Looks like you’re my diener today,” she said.
“What’s a diener?” The word rhymed with “wiener,” which is what I felt like; it was also the way a foreigner might say “dinner,” a realization that did little to ease my apprehension as she and the scalpel turned in my direction.
“Autopsy assistant. German word. Actually means ‘servant.’ Just so you’re clear on the pecking order at the moment.” She sounded mad and looked even madder.
“Where’s Miranda?” I asked.
“She said she had a lab to teach. Does she? Or does she just not want to be here?” Her eyes glittered above her mask.
“I…I don’t know. She…I guess maybe she didn’t want to be here.”
She slammed the scalpel down onto the steel table. “Damnit, Bill, this is ridiculous and unprofessional.”
“You’re right. I’m sorry. I’m very ashamed.”
“I respect you and I like you, but that doesn’t make me any threat to her.”
“I know. I—huh?”
“She’s got no reason to dislike me.”
“You? What are you talking about?”
“That…that girl. While you were taking your sweet time about changing, she practically started a catfight with me. Like I was here to snatch away her boyfriend or something.” Again she slammed the scalpel down on the metal table—it seemed to make her feel better—and again I flinched. “Goddamnit, this is not junior high school.”
I had misunderstood utterly, had misinterpreted the tension and angry looks completely. A wave of giddy relief washed over me. I started to laugh, and found I couldn’t stop. I laughed so hard my stomach muscles began to ache; my mask grew so wet with tears that I had to rip it off just to breathe.
She stared openmouthed at me. Then, slow and bright as sunrise, a smile dawned across her face. She waggled a gloved finger at me, shook her head, and said, “And what were you talking about? Are you her boyfriend?”
“No. No!” I thought I was starting to laugh again, but I was crying. She laid a hand on my arm and left it there till I got hold of myself. “Oh, God, Jess, I’ve made a royal mess of things.”
“You screwing a student? Hey, it’s not like you’re the first professor to take a bite out of that shiny apple. Just between you and me, back in my own reckless youth…”
I stared at her. “You?!”
“Dr. Crowder. Microbiology. And talk about microscopic!” She laughed. “So you and Miss Priss got something going on? That why she bared her fangs at me?”
“No. At least, not like that. It’s complicated.” She raised her eyebrows quizzically, and so I told her everything: how I came unglued in class; how Sarah came to my office that night to return the bones; how we fell into a torrid clutch; how Miranda reacted to the sight. “Jesus, Jess. I’ve compromised myself with a student—an undergraduate, at that—and simultaneously alienated my best graduate assistant. I don’t know how to fix things.”
She fixed me with a stern, no-bullshit look. “Bill, when’s the last time you got laid?”
I flushed. “It’s been awhile. Not since Kathleen died. A few months before Kathleen