So the distraction worked, as did the frilly apron, and when those disturbing noises from the mortuary woke Arthur out of a sound and well-deserved sleep, he tried to convince himself those sounds were his imagination. Finally he got up, murmured reassurance to Cynthia’s sleepy questions, pulled on his boxers, cursed his ancestor for attaching the family’s personal home to a funeral home, called 911 and went to investigate.

The noises were definitely coming from the casket display room where Mitch Nyugen had been placed prior to his transportation to Wyoming. Arthur wasn’t a superstitious man—his business precluded fearing vampires, zombies or any form of the human body after the soul had departed—so he kept the lights off as he crept through the funeral home, intending to catch the intruders by surprise. He figured it had to be a couple of teenagers on a dare, and he intended to give them a good scare.

As he got closer to the chapel, it didn’t do his nerves any good to see a faint light coming from under the closed door—it had been open earlier—and hear a low hum, like an electrical appliance.

Reaching the casket display room, he slammed open the door, flipped on all the lights and yelled, “Hey!” And reeled back in horror.

The coffin was open.

A dark-haired, young and slender woman stood over it, doing something inside—to the body.

“What are you doing?” Arthur shouted.

Right away, he realized something was off. She hadn’t jumped, and he hadn’t frightened her; it was almost as if she’d been waiting for him. She looked up at him through her veil of hair. Her blue eyes glowed with a mad obsession.

Miranda Nyugen. It was Miranda Nyugen. “Arthur,” she crooned.

He started forward.

She lifted one finger, then pointed it at the object on the top step. “Don’t step on that.”

He stopped. He looked. “Is that part of the body? His hand? My God, woman, that was your husband.”

She laughed wildly, her head thrown back, her enjoyment rich and intense. “Arthur, you vain and silly man. Don’t you know when you’ve been played?” She started toward him. She held a small circular saw in one hand. She held her other hand behind her back.

“You’ve been cutting up the body? Miranda, you need help.”

“It’s my own interesting little obsession. We all get to have our obsessions, don’t we?”

“No.” He turned to leave, to get back to Cynthia and make his report to the sheriff who was on her way, but couldn’t get there fast enough.