Love in the Time of Zombies

by Cassandra Gannon

  Love

  in the Time of

  Zombies

  Cassandra Gannon

  Text copyright © 2013 Cassandra Gannon

  Cover Image copyright © 2013 Cassandra Gannon

  All Rights Reserved

  Published by Star Turtle Publishing

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  Also by Cassandra Gannon

  The Elemental Phases Series

  Warrior from the Shadowland

  Guardian of the Earth House

  Exile in the Water Kingdom

  Treasure of the Fire Kingdom

  Queen of the Magnetland

  Coming Soon: Magic of the Wood House

  Other Books

  Not Another Vampire Book

  Wicked Ugly Bad

  Love in the Time of Zombies

  If you enjoy Cassandra’s books, you may also enjoy books by her sister, Elizabeth Gannon.

  Books by Elizabeth Gannon

  The Consortium of Chaos Series

  Yesterday’s Heroes

  The Son of Sun and Sand

  The Guy Your Friends Warned You About

  Electrical Hazard

  Coming Fall 2013: The Only Fish in the Sea

  Other Books

  The Snow Queen

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Epilogue

  To the sport of my childhood:

  Rambo Golf

  Chapter One

  Bright side to the zombie apocalypse:

  You will never have to wake up and go to your crummy job, again.

  It was the end of the world.

  “No, no, no, no, no.” Scotlyn Summerline vainly hit the reload button on the computer, trying to force the winning bid higher. That final total just couldn’t be right. It couldn’t. Not even her luck was that bad. She needed money and she needed it yesterday. Actually, by her landlord’s calculations, she needed it last Tuesday. So that terribly low number just couldn’t really be the selling price.

  It wasn’t fair.

  How could something so terrible befall a nice girl like her? She voted in every election and was polite to the elderly and donated money to a cat shelter. What kinds of karmic sins had she committed, besides shoplifting that tube of lipstick in the tenth grade? Why was this happening to her?

  What kind of loving God would allow a perfectly beautiful Louis Vuitton handbag to sell for only forty-two dollars?

  Scotlyn resisted the urge to throw the flat screen monitor like a Frisbee and settled for a slightly suppressed scream of frustration, instead. Her hands beat against the counter in a quick tantrum. Damn internet! Damn eBay! Damn…

  She squinted at the high bidder’s screen name.

  Damn VannaFan4Eva!

  Wait… VannaFan?

  Jesus.

  It really was the end. Scotlyn just gave up. Her forehead flopped forward to bang against the keyboard. What was the use of even trying when everything always went wrong?

  Her favorite purse now belonged to some Wheel of Fortune groupie. She was still dead broke. Soon-to-be homeless. Working the nightshift at an adult themed mini-golf course. In Vegas. For an evil asshole. Earning minimum wage. Selling the last of her possessions for pennies at a glorified cyber yard sale.

  Barring a meteor strike, things just couldn’t possibly get any worse.

  But, then again, Scotlyn had been telling herself that for the past year. Ever since she got downsized out of her casino job and had to hang-up her feathered headdress for the fast- paced world of putt-putt golf.

  Economic downturns hit showgirls, too. Especially the ones who were too short and wholesome looking to work anything but the Saturday morning kids shows, which were only put on so hung-over parents could have a few more hours of shuteye. After she was downsized, job hunting went nowhere. Unemployment checks dried up and her savings sure didn’t last long. Then, the credit cards got maxed out and nasty debt collector people started calling.

  Soon here she was: Scenic rock-bottom.

  Scotlyn lifted her head to look around the sleazy front office of Topless Golf World. The whole place was decorated exactly how you’d expect a business called Topless Golf World to be decorated. Only worse. No one could have pictured the lamps shaped like penises or the tassels and g-string painted onto the little ladies’ room door icon. Those subtle touches could only come from a mind like Ezekiel Macready and, thankfully, her boss was one of a kind.

  The lone bright spot to the job –and the only reason Scotlyn didn’t quit and resign herself to living in a cardboard box-- was the fact that the employees didn’t have to actually be topless here at Topless Golf World. Which was something many a disappointed bachelor party had bitched about when they arrived and saw her shirt blocking their view. Still, it kept the business juuust this side of legal. In fact, that was the company’s unofficial motto.

  Fortunately for Scotlyn, the oh-so elegant name referred to all the naked statuary out on the greens that drunken sportsmen got to knock their little balls through. In between their clumsy attempts to hit on her and the occasional drug deal out by hole fourteen, of course.

  Once upon a time, Topless Golf World had been called Little Fairytale Putt Putt. Scotlyn had worked at the kiddie course as a teen, which is how she knew to come crawling back to this particular eighteen holes-in-the-ground. Over the years, though, the neighborhood went to hell and all the sane parents started staying away. Desperate for new business, the former owner Mr. Jamison had re-themed Little Fairytale Putt Putt into an XXX-travaganza. All the fiberglass nursery book characters were retrofitted with skimpy outfits, and garishly painted so they all but glowed in the dark.

  Zeke had won the golf course from Mr. Jamison in a card game about two weeks after Scotlyn returned to work. When he took over, he’d kept her on as the secretary and she’d tried to convince him restore the fairytale motif. He seemed to find that hilarious. Zeke called the nude statuary and all the new nightmarish décor he added “catering to the audience.”

  Scotlyn called it perverted.

  Her entire life had become a nightmare of flashing neon, golf clubs, and gigantic statues with plastic breasts. This Debbie Does Vegas vision has completely usurped her happy girlhood memories of princesses, and unicorns, and reading fairytales to little golfers. Now, it was all nudity and squalor.

  Scotlyn should have turned around the second she pulled into the parking lot and saw the course had changed its name. She’d been lured in by that “Help Wanted” sign in the window, though, and now she was stuck here in Playboy Bunny purgatory.

  She had to get out of this dump before she actually got used to the horror of it. The only thing that could be worse than the sickening sensation of embarrassment and self-pity she got when she manned the counter every evening… would be manning the counter and not feeling that sickening sensation of embarrassment and self-pity. Of growing
resigned, giving up, and making this place her tacky, glittery coffin.

  Scotlyn had to escape, before she grew immune.

  To do that, she needed money.

  Prince Charming was twenty-eight years late to the rescue, so it didn’t look like any help was coming on the handsome-stranger-saves-Scotlyn-and-whisks-her-away-on-his-enchanted-yacht front. And, on the other end of the feminist spectrum, no Fortune 500 companies seemed eager to hire her, either. Even Pizza Hut had turned her down. Her thousands of resumes were no doubt lining birdcages all over Nevada. She should totally ask for a refund on that year of business school.

  Likewise, a life of crime seemed pointless because she’d just get caught. Scotlyn always got caught when she did something wrong. She was doomed to be a moral citizen. Even the Great Lipstick Caper when she was sixteen had landed her in front of the store detective. Plus, she’d gotten nervous and pilfered the wrong color for her skin tone, so the whole thing had been pointless. She sucked at crime. If she tried to knock over a bank or something, she’d land in jail before she could get her Ronald Regan mask on.

  Her options were getting limited.

  Clearly, her road out of hell was not paved with designer handbags, but maybe she could sell something else. What else did she even own? Lingerie? Scotlyn cringed at bit at the thought. Pretty, fancy, lacy underwear was her greatest weakness. But, at least half of everything she owned had never been worn, so she could sell a few embroidered bras with their tags still attached if it meant eating this week.

  Maybe.

  Or maybe not.

  After all, she did need to lose a few pounds. More than a few. No longer wearing a bedazzled bikini costume to work had some perks, after all. Like relatively guilt-free “Ben and Jerry’s for dinner” night when she was feeling particularly depressed. And Scotlyn was depressed a lot these days. Maybe she could just go hungry, keep her handmade undergarments, and consider extreme poverty --like-- a default diet.

  Or maybe she could sell a kidney.

  “’Bout time you got here.” Zeke strolled out of his office, running a hand through his dark hair and stifling a yawn. “You make coffee, yet?”

  Or maybe she could sell Zeke’s kidney and leave him in a hotel bathtub full of ice.

  “I’ve been here for four hours. You were just busy napping and missed my arrival.”

  “Uh-huh… So, you made coffee, then?”

  “It’s all gone.” She bit off testily.

  Like she did every day when she first saw Zeke, Scotlyn found herself resisting the urge to just stare at him in frustrated amazement for a minute or two. He was just so astoundingly, effortlessly, strikingly handsome. It didn’t seem possible for an ordinary human to be that stunning. Or fair that someone so annoying should have such an undeserved genetic gift.

  Oh, Zeke did his best to disguise his looks with general sordidness. As usual, he covered his very impressive chest with some loud Hawaiian top, worn over a t-shirt with a comic book logo. The guy didn’t seem to own a pair of shoes that weren’t rubber flip-flops. His unevenly cut dark hair fell forward over his face, showing off the perfect angles of his unshaven jaw. He had three piercings that she could see, two in his ear and one in his eyebrow, plus a zigzagging tattoo of sharp angles around his wrist.

  No matter how hard he tried, though, Zeke still looked like Sir Lancelot on a bender. Perfect face, perfect body, perfect voice, perfect Central Casting choice for the gallant hero of a nice girl’s daydream.

  Except, of course, for the fact that Zeke wasn’t going to rescue anyone, ever. If a fire breathing dragon showed up, he’d probably just start taking odds on the numbers of villagers slaughtered. They guy was nobody’s hero. He’d told her so himself the last time a mouse skittered across the floor and she shrieked at him to kill it.

  “Make more coffee, then. Christ, it’s in your job description, right?” He opened the cash register, no doubt to reimburse himself the twenty dollars he planned to spend on Tanna, the neighborhood’s most popular hooker.

  Scotlyn might’ve considered some strategic pilfering too, if there was anything at Topless Golf worth taking. Sadly, unless you shared Zeke’s interest in real cheap dates, it was a pretty hopeless place for white-collar crime. Well, honestly, she wouldn’t have stolen, anyway. Not only was she terrible at theft, but that damn “nice girl” thing wouldn’t let rip off her boss.

  Even if he deserved it.

  “Actually no, making coffee is not in my job description.” Her mouth tightened as he shoved the bill he’d swiped into the pocket of his jeans. “And FYI for tax day: I don’t think the IRS actually lets you hang out with prostitutes in your Jacuzzi and then write it off as a ‘business expense.’”

  “Hey, it’s the company Jacuzzi and I’m only gonna consult with Tanna about marketing strategies.” Zeke arched a brow. “The girl’s got some special skills that you could really learn from, by the way. Very accommodating lady, unlike some puritanical blonde killjoys, I was misled into hiring.”

  “How did I mislead you? I told you I didn’t do shorthand or accounting or anything when you took over. And I set up the computer system, so…”

  “Like I give a shit about your office skills. Hell, I only got the damn computer to watch porn.” Zeke leaned across the counter, closer to her. He smelled like he’d just finished showering under an Alpine waterfall, the bastard. “I thought you’d be a lot more fun around here, Trix, that’s all. For instance, I don’t know how they did casual day, back when you were a stripper. But here at Topless Golf World, we are fine with some tasteful nudity, if…”

  “I was a showgirl, not a stripper. I’ve told you that a thousand times!”

  And honestly, she’d only been a showgirl in the technical sense. Scotlyn had never done any perfectly choreographed kick lines or anything even pseudo-glamorous. The Coney Island Casino, where she’d worked, catered to families. The whole resort was themed as a boardwalk midway. Mainly, she’d just posed for tourist photos with hyper kids and sang Disney songs to her pintsized audience. Her career in showbiz had been kinda pathetic.

  No. Not “kinda,” come to think of it. Just plain old, straight up pathetic.

  It also hadn’t paid well.

  Zeke’s lavender eyes sparkled at her indignation. He seemed constantly amused by the image of Scotlyn in fishnets and sequins. Now a days, she wore the vestiges of her old weekend wardrobe to work. All the lovely, stylish, designer clothes that had briefly made her very happy… Until she got the bills.

  He looked over her vintage inspired blue and white sundress, with a wicked smile. “It’s a wonder you didn’t starve, in that line of work. You don’t have a natural inclination to seduce a guy, that’s for sure.”

  Whenever he started in on her former career, Scotlyn expected him to mention that she didn’t look like a showgirl. She wasn’t particular tall. Or graceful. Or beautiful. Scotlyn was pretty, in the all-American-kindergarten-teacher sense of the word. Ideally, a showgirl should look more like a Barbie doll and less like the girl someone’s parents invited over for a 4th of July picnic, circa 1942. The casino had only hired her because she’d gone to high school with the HR person and called in a favor.

  Zeke never bothered to belittle any of her physical shortcomings, though. Instead, he seemed fixated on her personality defects. Usually, he started with her tendency to be bossy and then moved onto her supposed good girly-ness. He was obsessed with the idea that she was some kind of Pollyanna.

  Right on schedule, he made a sad ‘tsk’ of a sound. “And all the nagging probably didn’t help much with the tips back at the casino, huh, Trixie?”

  “For the two thousandth time, I never went by ‘Trixie.’ My stage name was always just ‘Scotlyn.’ And I don’t nag.”

  He kept talking like he hadn’t even heard her. “Ya know, I shoulda fired you when you refused to put on that same glittery costume here at this job. It showed insubordination.”

  Scotlyn snorted at that statement. “Oh please. You�
��d fire yourself, before you fired me.”

  No matter what he threatened, Zeke wasn’t going to give her a pink slip. For some perverse reason, he enjoyed having Scotlyn around to torment. Besides, she was the only one who even tried to run Topless Golf World like an actual business. Without her to oversee it, the place would be closed within days. When she finally left it to flounder, it would be an act of mercy on the world.

  Zeke headed over to make his own coffee, apparently resigning himself to the fact that she had no intention of getting it for him… Just like he did every day. “I can’t fire me. I’m not sure I even work here.”

  Scotlyn arched a brow. “I’m not sure, either. Anyway, when I do escape this dead end job, it’ll be because I’m quitting. And, on that happy day, I will abandon you here on skid row, utterly lost without me.”

  Zeke’s head snapped around. “You’re leaving?”

  Scotlyn’s blinked. She expected a typical, snarky retort, but Zeke looked strangely intense. “No.” She regarded him in confusion. “Not yet. Soon, though.”

  She’d been telling him that for the months. When he took over, Zeke had been pretty clear on the fact he couldn’t stand anyone being around him for more than a week at a time. He probably really did want her gone, but she couldn’t afford to leave yet, so too bad.

  Zeke watched Scotlyn silently, as if trying to get a mental ETA on her defection.

  Through some unfair twist of fate, Zeke also had the most beautiful eyes she’d ever seen. Endless pools of lavender, surrounded by thick lashes. Every color of purple and blue was somehow swirled together in his irises. Scotlyn could’ve spent hours counting all the subtle shades of indigo…

  If she wasn’t immune to Zeke’s dubious charms.

  Which –the occasional sex dream about him notwithstanding-- she totally was. Really. But, she still couldn’t breathe properly until he glanced away from her.