Cadaver Lab 2, page 16
“No kissing in the garden until it’s done,” Stone said walking around the corner with a square of sod.
“Not even for the guy footing the bill?” Liam joked.
“I guess I can make an exception.” Stone grinned as he set the grass down then stood. “I’ll have the sod put down today. I’ve got all we need in the truck.”
“Sounds good.” Natalie smiled as Stone walked around the corner again, leaving her alone with Liam. Alone until Gabe and Millie sauntered over.
“Garden’s looking good, you two,” Gabe said to Natalie and Liam.
“Thank you. I think it’s coming out nicely,” Natalie agreed.
“It is lovely,” Millie said softly. “It reminds me of the gardens from my youth.”
Her youth, which she would have for eternity since she’d died so young, but Natalie understood what the girl was saying.
Millie had come out of her shell a bit over the past couple of months, thanks to Gabe’s influence. Natalie was glad of that. She and Liam could even have a normal conversation with Millie without her looking like she wanted to hide behind Gabe.
Natalie smiled and said, “Thank you, Millie. That’s exactly the look I was hoping for. I’m really happy with it.”
“Thank God for that,” Liam grumbled.
“Amen, brother.” Gabe laughed. “If Nat’s not happy, ain’t nobody happy.”
Stone came around the corner again, arms full of sod, then stopped, frowning. “Hmm.”
“What’s up?” Liam asked.
Stone shook his head. “I just thought I heard people talking.”
As Natalie’s eyes widened in panic, Liam said, “Just us.”
“Yeah, so I see. Don’t tell Harper I’m hearing voices. She’ll want to bring back that sideshow of an exorcist.” Stone rolled his eyes.
Natalie forced a laugh that sounded more manic than jovial. “Right? Madame Letisha. What a joke!”
Her outburst earned her various glances from both the ghosts and Liam as a large black bird swooping just a foot above their heads had her ducking.
As grateful as she was for the distraction after almost getting caught by Stone talking to ghosts, she still narrowed her eyes to glare as her nemesis settled on the edge of the roof.
Of course the crow couldn’t let Natalie have even one nice moment out in the garden without disturbing her.
“Stupid crow,” she mumbled as the bird started his usual deafening repertoire.
Stone glanced up. “He starts that up every time he sees the cat.”
Natalie spun around to face Stone. “The cat?”
“Yeah. The black cat that’s always hanging around here. That crow really hates him.” Stone shook his head, kneeling to lay the sod.
“The cat,” Natalie repeated. Of course. That made so much sense.
Gabe blew out a breath filled with derision. “Told you the crow wasn’t a messenger from the beyond.”
Stone’s head whipped up at Gabe’s words.
Judging by the looks on the faces of Natalie’s companions they all realized at the same time what had happened. Gabe had screwed up. He’d forgotten to drop his hold on Millie before he spoke. And Stone had heard him.
No one moved—Natalie didn’t even breathe—as they waited to see what Stone would do.
A frown settled on his face but after a few seconds and a quick glance at Natalie and Liam, he went back to single-mindedly focusing—a bit too hard actually—on the grass.
Gabe took a big step away from Millie and said, “You think he heard?”
Natalie leveled an are-you-kidding stare on him.
Liam glanced pointedly down at her. “I need to get back to the lab. Natalie, walk with me?”
“Sure. I’d love to.” She nodded.
“Stone. Good seeing you,” Liam said as he hooked his arm through Natalie’s.
“Yeah, you too,” Stone said, a whole lot less smiley than he’d been before.
As Liam pulled her away, Natalie glanced back and delivered a wide-eyed glare at Gabe.
Looking unhappy, he and Millie followed along behind.
Inside the lab, while ignoring the gross presence of any brain matter, Natalie turned on Gabe. “Oh my God, Gabe.”
“I know. I know. I screwed up,” he admitted looking miserable.
“And after all the times you made fun of me for slipping,” she accused.
“What’s done is done. We need to talk about what we do now,” Gabe said.
“It looked to me like Stone is of the mind to ignore the whole thing,” Liam said. “He made no secret that he thought Harper was hearing things and that exorcism was ridiculous. There’s no way he’s going to admit to hearing it too.”
“Spoken like a true alpha male,” she accused.
Although he might be correct. At least, she hoped he was.
“All right. So we do nothing.” She glanced at Gabe, Millie and Liam. “Agreed?”
“Or,” Gabe began. “You can tell Harper and Stone about us.”
“Or you could do that,” Liam nodded, once again in agreement with Gabe against her.
Millie lifted one shoulder and nodded too. “You could do that.”
Natalie’s cell phone buzzed in her pocket. She pulled it out and glanced at the display, her gaze whipping up as she said in a panic, “It’s Harper.”
“Now’s your chance,” Gabe said.
“Are you going to answer it?” Liam asked.
“Fine. I’ll answer, but nothing more.” Her gaze moved from one to the other. “Understood?”
Liam lifted one shoulder. “Your choice.”
“Yes, it is,” she said before punching the screen to connect. “Hey, Harper.”
“Natalie! Oh, my God. You’re not going to believe what happened.”
Her gaze cut to Liam as she asked, “What happened?”
“Stone just called me. He heard it too! He believes me now. He heard the voices. In your garden!”
“Oh. Wow,” Natalie managed as her heart pounded.
“I’m coming over. We have to talk about this.”
“Uh, sure. I’m with Liam in the lab.”
“Okay. See you in a minute,” Harper promised.
“Okay.” Natalie disconnected and glanced around at the others. “She’s coming over.”
“We heard. She wasn’t quiet,” Liam said.
“Nat…” Gabe said, leaving the rest of the sentence unspoken.
She knew what he wanted her to do. But she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t tell Stone and Harper.
Could she?
“Well?” Gabe asked. “Natalie, she’ll be here in a minute. What are you going to do?”
Liam frowned. “Hey, back off. Give her time to think. It’s her choice.” His hand on her shoulder as well as his support was a comfort when she needed it most, until he said, “But just for the record, I agree with Gabe. You should tell them.”
Crap.
Harper was going to arrive and want to talk about Stone hearing people who weren’t there. Just like she had heard them in the attic. And Natalie was going to have to either lie to her and pretend she knew nothing about it. Or confess to the biggest lie she’d ever told.
The one she’d been telling for almost a year.
The knock had Natalie jumping. Liam reached for the knob and opened the door to reveal an excited Harper. He stepped back and invited her in with the sweep of one hand.
Harper strode in until she stumbled to a stop at the sight of the brain on the table. At least Liam had moved Gabe’s body to the back of the room and covered it better than he used to.
She made a wide berth around the brain and rushed forward to Natalie. “Can you believe it? Stone heard it too. Do you think the spirits left my house and moved to the train depot because of Madame Letisha?”
Unseen to Harper, Liam rolled his eyes behind her.
Natalie was the one to clear the ghosts out of the village so they’d been safe. She was the one who dealt with them on a daily basis. Yet Harper was still giving that fraud Madame Letisha credit she didn’t deserve. Not one little bit.
“I’ll have to call and tell her it worked. She asked the spirits to move on and they did.” Harper cringed. “But Natalie, I’m so sorry they chose to move to your place. I had no idea that might happen. Let me pay to have her come back and cleanse your shop and garden.”
Freaking Madame Letisha.
More than a little annoyed, Natalie drew in a breath. She hated all her options, but it was obvious what she had to do.
Clearing her throat, she said, “Harper, I have something to tell you…”
In case you missed it… See how it all began in
CADAVER LAB
A Romantic Comedy with Corpses
He's a former Army medic. She owns a book and wine shop. It's all the makings of one steamy small-town romance… except he runs a cadaver lab and she sees dead people.
Strange things are happening at the Once Upon a Vine Book & Wine Shop in Mudville, NY.
Is it the sky clad Wiccans meeting on the roof? The book club drinking "magic mushroom" tea in the meeting room? The black cat who moved uninvited into the shop? The sudden run on Tarot card sales?
Maybe it can be traced to the downed power line that rendered the bookshop owner technically dead making her the new conduit to the local ghost community. Or to the cadaver lab next door and the hot but mysteriously secretive doctor who runs it.
All Natalie knows is she can’t ignore him or them anymore now that one of the hot doctor’s cadavers insists his death was the result of foul play and she's the only one who can bring him justice.
Behind the Book
I had no plans to write Cadaver Lab 2. To be fair, I hadn’t planned on writing the first book either but here we are. It wasn’t until I first heard those two words—cadaver lab—that I became obsessed with the concept .
So what’s in this second book that was burning inside me until I had to get it out?
For one, the numbers—1-9-2-0—scratched into the woodwork of the bedroom with the balcony in the book are real. There is no murder attached to them (I hope) but the numbers are there. I discovered them shortly after moving into this house and have been waiting, wondering what to do with them—story wise—ever since.
In real life I have no idea who scratched the numbers into the doorframe, when, or why.
I’ve always imagined it happened on the New Year’s Eve that 1919 turned to 1920 to mark the beginning of a new decade. That was the kernal of the idea for the party in the book, but it grew so much larger from there.
As for the rest of the story in this book, you might remember I left Natalie, Liam, Harper, Jules and Taco with the unexplained discovery of a mysterious bone. I did that not because I planned to write a sequel, but because I wanted to show that Natalie’s life was never going to be completely normal. And she was okay with that.
But that left me starting book two with this random bone to deal with, which turned out to be a good thing. As I decided the details—how it got there, who it belonged to—the story of Millie started to take place. And I’m so happy it did. I love her and that I could give Gabe his own happy ever after.
As for more fact versus fiction…
The CTE research Liam speaks about is real, though the grant he applied for is fiction.
The historical aspects—Prohibition, and the Boston North End anarchists and bombings—are fact. The big party the anarchists attend is fiction.
And finally, the evil Blue Jay nesting over the back door that Harper described attacking her and Stone was real. The nesting pair terrorized me and my husband last Spring. There was bloodshed (they hit my husband in the head pretty hard more than once) but we waited it out. Finally mother, father and baby birds left and peace returned to the backyard. The umbrella remains by the back door for defensive purposes. We are now vigilant to nip any future nest building in that area in the bud immediately.
I hope you loved my second attempt at bringing romance to the cadaver world. Will there be a book three? I honestly don’t know so I’ll leave you with a solid maybe.
Cat
Spend more time with Harper and the quirky townspeople of Mudville
KISSING BOOKS
Things heat up when misplaced author Harper clashes with grumpy small town farmer Stone Morgan.
RED HOT
Will Cash Morgan get out of the friend zone with shop owner Red? And will these friends become casual lovers or much more?
HONEY BUNS
Opposites attract between small town baker Bethany and the man trying to ruin her town and her business, big city billionaire Brendan.
ZERO FORKS
Sparks fly between the youngest Morgan brother, the always optimistic Boone, and his boss, the older workaholic, down-on-love woman who hired him as her male nanny.
UNDERCOVER SANTA
Local girl Elizabeth gets a second chance at love when her teenage crush, city-boy Christopher, returns to Mudville decades later. But why is he pretending to be someone else?
MISTER NAUGHTY
Is Stone ready to step up and tie the knot? More, will Harper say yes once she learns he’s actually Mr. Naughty, her hated anonymous writing nemesis?
DOG DAYS
Mudville’s own wounded warrior Michael returns home and wants nothing to do with do-gooder Stephanie who’s determined to save both him and the shelter dog in her care.
BAD DECISIONS
Deputy Carson Bekker finds love, but is she the criminal he should be arresting instead of kissing?
THE MUDVILLE COLLECTION
Get the series compilations.
Want more Small Town Rom Com?
MR. GRUMPY’S CHRISTMAS DATE
Can a New York City guy and a small town girl turn a fake relationship into more in this grumpy-sunshine, opposites attract, romantic comedy?
From a naval base in Coronado CA to their small upstate New York towns, follow the adventures of these misplaced Navy SEALs…
Home Coming
She needs a fake boyfriend, not a bodyguard. Luckily there's one unsuspecting Navy SEAL who will be perfect to step into the role of both.
Home Fires
He was her best friend's older brother. She's the orphan his family took in years ago. Now, he's a SEAL home on leave and she's not a kid anymore, but when she's kidnapped he's the only one who can save her.
Home Front
A superstar in danger. The injured SEAL who’s agreed to be her bodyguard…but the job as close personal protection was never supposed to be this close or this personal.
Home Town
She was the good girl next door. He was the bad boy who proved too tempting to resist. Years have passed but old feelings die hard proving time can't heal all wounds.
If small town rom com is your thing, then the Wilders are for you!
City Girl Seeks Cowboy
A grumpy rich single dad is forced to hire as his nanny the much too sunshiny stranger who just crashed, literally, into his town with her two besties. But Olivia has a secret. One that Wyatt Wilder fears could affect his entire family.
Her Playboy Cowboy Lover
Ethan Wilder is a charmer, rodeo champion and a player not looking to commit for more than one night. But rich New York socialite Poppy makes him want to change that. Now he just has to get her to give him a chance.
Between a Rock and a Hard Cowboy
Opposites combust between Army veteran Linc Wilder and Eva, the grumpy computer hacker when a storm traps them together with a dangerous family secret.
Wilder Brothers of Bitter End
A collection of the three Wilder Brothers titles above: City Girl Seeks Cowboy, Her Playboy Cowboy Lover, Between a Rock & a Hard Cowboy
The Thief and the Agent
When he discovers a con man has been using his name to commit crimes across the country, Emmett Wilder must find the imposter before one sexy FBI agent discovers his secrets.
Find a complete list of eBooks, Audiobooks & Paperbacks at
CatJohnson.net/books
About the Author
A top 10 New York Times and nine-time USA Today bestselling contemporary romance author, Cat Johnson writes hot alpha heroes (who often wear cowboy or combat boots) and the sassy heroines brave enough to love them.
Known for her creative marketing, Cat has sponsored bull riding cowboys, promoted romance using bologna and owns a collection of cowboy boots and camouflage for book signings.
She writes full time from a Queen Anne Victorian in a small town in upstate New York suspiciously like Mudville where she tends to her backyard chickens and too many cats. Learn more at catjohnson.net.
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Cat Johnson, Cadaver Lab 2
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