Dr. Osborn’s coroner’s van was parked on the grave tender’s path, near the crypt of Louis Trieste. The entire cemetery was taped off as a crime scene. The doctor and his assistant were in the back of the van, tending to their paperwork. The mud-caked body of Mark Kaddouri was on the rack, under a starched white sheet.
The back doors were open to the crisp winter morning. It snowed a few days ago, and since then the weather had been downright chilly. It even snowed as far south as Haiti, the first time in recorded history. They heard all about it on AM talk radio on the way in that morning. The global warming naysayers were having a field day with the news; the distinction between weather and climate still eluded them.
The CSI team was parked behind the van. Their trunks were open and they had their gear laid out on packing blankets on the hoods of their cars. They were prowling the grounds now, to see what they could see. NOPD had already found the shovel, in the bushes down the road from the cathedral. Someone had wiped it clean with a silk fabric particular to a priest’s vestments. But Nano and Simone were in Rome, and so were their vestments.
Dr. Osborn and his assistant were sitting on their stools, wrapping up their paperwork. “How long’s this guy been dead?” the assistant asked him.
Dr. Osborn shrugged as nonchalantly as he could, but he knew Kaddouri and it saddened him to have Mark’s cold, dead body in the van. Compounding his sorrow was the news about Mas. They never even found her body.
“Offhand, I’d say about three days,” he told his assistant.
Under the sheet, the corpse of Mark Kaddouri lay utterly still. The muddy remains of the photo of Christine Mas were still plastered to the front of his shirt, directly over his heart. There came a gentle voice that only he could hear.
“I love you, too.”
Mark Kaddouri took in a ragged breath, and exhaled. And then he drew another one.
Dr. Osborn heard the sound, and so did his assistant. They looked at the body, utterly dumbfounded, and the chest moved once again.
Not yet daring to believe, Dr. Osborn gently pulled the sheet from Mark’s face, bathing him in the light of the new day. He breathed deeply, and then he opened his eyes.
He was reborn.