“Who are you here for?” I asked, pulling the door closed behind him..

He tugged a piece of paper out of his pocket and glanced at it. “Faust, Daniel.”

I controlled my smile. Faust, Daniel was the fine gentleman whose brains I’d just chowed down on. “Got it. I’ll bring him right out.”

I retrieved the body from the cooler and brought it and the stretcher back out to the main room, then plopped into the computer chair. I was stupidly proud of myself that I’d picked up the computer system with little trouble, though my typing still sucked ass. “Okay, Faust, Daniel. . . .” I flicked a glance up to the funeral home worker. “Which home are you with?”

“Scott Funeral Home.” His tone was strangely mild, and his eyes stayed on me in a way that probably should have been unnerving, but I was high on brains and feeling too good to be down in any way.

I made the appropriate entries, then printed out the receipt. Standing, I yanked it off the printer, then handed it to him with a dorky flourish. “Sign here, and he’s all yours,” I said.

“You’re new here, aren’t you?” A slight smile played on his face as he signed the paper.

“A little over a month,” I replied.

“Is there anyone else here new?”

I shook my head. “Just me.”

He straightened, eyes raking me in a strangely appraising way. “So you’re probably the one who can tell me where all the brains have gone.”

I felt as if he’d punched me in the gut, and I know I stood there with an utterly stricken look on my face.

“I . . . uh . . . what do you mean?” I said, but I couldn’t keep my voice steady. I knew I sounded guilty as hell. Shit. I didn’t think anyone would have noticed that they were missing. Nick had told me that the funeral homes never did anything with the bag of organs.

The skin around his eyes tightened in annoyance. “What, you thought no one would notice? That’s not how this works. Didn’t anyone tell you?”

“Tell me what?” I managed, voice cracking.

“The brains come to me at the funeral home,” he said with patronizing slowness. “Then I distribute them.”

My initial shock and terror faded to be replaced by a strange relief. But I didn’t dare reveal myself yet. There was always the chance that he was with some organ donation service, and if I came out and said, “Hey, you’re a zombie too?” I’d look like a complete whacko.

“Who the hell are you?” I said instead. “And why do you need the brains? Who do you distribute them to?”

He leaned against a filing cabinet and tucked his thumbs into the top of his pockets. “You’re new, aren’t you.”

“I told you,” I said, scowling, “I started here a month ago.”

He shook his head. “That’s not what I meant. You’re a new zombie, right?”

I swear my knees shook, and I had to grab at the table behind me.

“Oh, thank god!” I exclaimed before I could think. “Shit, I swear there was a part of me that thought I was fucking crazy. I mean, I’m wanting to eat . . . well, y’know.” I realized I was babbling and forced myself to stop and take a deep breath. “Is that—really? Is that what I am?” Instead of horror at the confirmation all I could feel was overwhelming relief. I’m not crazy. There’d been that teeny tiny sliver of doubt. Okay, so I’m a monster. And, yeah, that’s more acceptable than being insane.

He cocked his head. “You really don’t know? Why did you think you were craving brains?”

My attitude slowly began to reassert itself. “Well, how the fuck was I supposed to know? I thought I was nuts!” Then I narrowed my eyes at him. “You’re one too, right?”

“That’s right.” He stuck his hand out. “I’m John Kang. Everyone calls me Kang.”

I took his hand, shook it. “Angel Crawford. Nice to meet you.” He didn’t feel dead or undead, or whatever. His skin was warm, and he looked totally alive to me. Did that mean he’d fed recently?

I inhaled sharply. “You left that note!”

He gave me a puzzled look. “Note?”

“Yeah, there was a note at the ER and on my van. . . .” I trailed off as his expression remained blank. Disappointment curled through me. Yeah, that would have been way too easy. I shook my head. “Never mind.”

He was silent for several seconds, regarding me. “Who the hell changed you?”

“Changed me? What, you mean someone made me like this on purpose?”

“Well, yeah. It’s not something that happens by accident. You have to be close to death already, then get bitten all to hell by a zombie to get the virus into you, and then you have to eat brains almost immediately to feed the virus.”

“Well, I don’t know these things,” I nearly snarled as the frustration threatened to boil over. “I figured I’d been bit or whatever by accident. Hell, I had no idea what happened.” Did that mean that whoever left the notes for me was the one who changed me? But why? And if it was a virus, was there some sort of treatment for it? “Why don’t you tell me what the hell’s going on!”

“Sure,” Kang said. “But first, you need to ante up the brains.”

I could only stare at him for several seconds. “Wait . . . you mean I have to turn all the brains over to you? Why?”

Kang’s expression tightened. “Because that’s how things work. I get the brains, and then I distribute them.”

“To who?”

“Other zombies. Who the hell do you think?”

I narrowed my eyes. “Uh huh. And when you say distribute, do you mean you have a soup kitchen sort of thing set up for local zombies looking for a meal? Or do you sell them?” I had a feeling I already knew the answer. Zeke, the zombie who’d ambushed me with a tree, wouldn’t have been so desperate if there’d been a place to get free brains.

“I sell them,” he replied, practically spitting the words out. I could see that my failure to instantly buckle under was annoying him.

“Do you get them from the other funeral homes too?”

He lifted a shoulder in a shrug. He was working really hard to keep his cool, I had to give him that. “I get as much as I can. Look, this is an efficient system we have going on here. I don’t need you coming in and screwing everything up.”

I folded my arms across my chest. “So you’re telling me that you’re the only zombie who works in a funeral home?”

“I’m the only one in a position to take care of all the others,” he retorted. “If you think you’re going to come in here and cut into my business, you’re deluded.”

“Yeah, well, let’s get one thing straight, asshole. I have no intention of cutting into your business, okay? But I’m also not gonna let you screw me over.” I found myself smiling. I’d been in scenarios like this before, though they hadn’t been about brains. Maybe my less-than-pleasant history would come in handy after all. “See, I think what you want is for me to give you all the brains from bodies that don’t normally go to your funeral home. ’Cause right now you only get, what, maybe a fifth of the ones that come through the morgue?” His scowl told me I was on the right track. “But it’s not like you could be short of brains. I mean, you also get all the ones from the people who y’all pick up who don’t come through here. Nursing homes, hospitals, hospice deaths. . . .”

I watched a muscle in his jaw leap. “You have no idea how this works.”

I shrugged. “Yeah, maybe not. But I’ve dealt with your type before. I know you’re not the only zombie in this business.” I didn’t know for sure—there was always the chance that Zeke was the only other one, but the more I thought about it, the more it made sense that zombies would automatically gravitate toward jobs where they could get a hold of brains with a minimum of hassle. “And I think that right now you’re just being a dick, trying to pressure me into handing everything over to you and cutting everyone else out—including myself.” I threw my hands up. “Do I really look that stupid?”

Kang’s lip curled into a sneer. “You didn’t even know you were a zombie.”

“Yeah, so? I was ignorant, but I’m not a fucking moron. Why would I give the shit to you just so I could buy it back from you later?” I leaned back against the counter. “Hon, you’re fucking with the wrong chick. I’ve been around too many drug dealers to buy into a scheme like that.”

He shocked me by bursting out laughing. “Drug dealers? Well, that’s an interesting analogy.” He shook his head but a sardonic smile stayed on his face. “All right, clearly I underestimated you. You’re serious about not wanting a cut of the action?”

I hesitated. I was already risking enough by taking the brains for my own use. If I was somehow caught profiting from it. . . . It felt skeevy, even though I could logically see that it was no more skeevy than a restaurant charging for food. “Yeah. I don’t need to do that.”

“But you’re still cutting into my supply,” he pointed out.

“Okay, well, how ’bout I leave the brains in the bags that are going to Scott Funeral Home. So nothing changes for you. And, if I get into a bind or something, you help me out, and vice versa.”

“And you’re going to keep all the rest?” He raised an eyebrow.

“That’s right,” I replied, putting as much defiance as I could into my tone. “We don’t get that many bodies through here. Y’all get a buttload more through the funeral homes.”

He grimaced. “Sure, but most of them are old. Taste old too.”

I resisted the urge to say something obnoxious like, “Suck it up and deal with it.” It was clear he wasn’t thrilled, but he also seemed to realize that this was as good a deal as he was going to get. “So, are you gonna tell me about zombies and how all this works?” I asked instead.