Beach Blanket Bloodbath (Amanda Feral Book 4)

by Mark Henry

  Still, you can only wallow in depression for so long before you either:

  a) Kill yourself,

  b) Shoot up a Starbucks, or

  c) Get a fucking grip.

  I chose the latter—also a little of “b)” because I was hungry—always—and “a)” seemed self-indulgent since I was already dead. If there were a “d)” in this equation I might have seriously considered it, especially if it involved a hot Italian with flexible hips, but I didn’t see it on the list, so…

  …Moving on…

  My notoriety amongst supernatural types drew the wayward undead to book events like homing pigeons, so I was certain the trip out to Las Felicitas wouldn’t be a complete washout and either way I would make money, even if I had to pry it from someone’s cold dead hands—in most cases, this was the preferable method and happened often enough to bolster my enthusiasm.

  Gil took it as a good sign that there were actual living people out there that could be lured to remote locations on the outside chance of having fun but would, of course, become our free meals. He’d turned the idea into a life strategy.

  But all that was beside the point.

  The book signing was just one stop on the road trip and the real goal was retrofitting our dilapidated friendship before it fell apart completely. But the road promised adventure. It called to me like a Louboutin trunk sale. But more than that, it would take Wendy’s mind off her troubles and Gil’s off his shitty love life and mine off my finances, for once.

  I glanced at Wendy as she talked and even the image of the thief’s baleful gaze and her slow beckoning wave seemed to be waning from Wendy’s mind…but then I started listening to her and my delusion fell apart.

  “So this bitch was a zombie, dressed as a zombie,” Wendy said, sneering. “Like a motherfucking double agent!”

  “Triple, because she was also dressed as Paula Prentiss from the original Stepford Wives,” I added. “So, that was crazy.”

  “And then we met Pinchy,” Wendy said, grinning.

  I drew my finger across my neck. It wasn't the time to bring up a man. Especially when he seemed to fall into our laps so easily and Gil couldn’t find one to save his undeath.

  “Who's Pinchy?”

  “Dinner,” I said. “He was delicious.”

  “Oh.” Gil nodded, interestedly but then turned to Wendy. “So tell me about this ship. What do we know about the timeline? Are we going to have time for Napa? I know y’all could be plied with wine.”

  Wendy opened up the webpage for the itinerary on her phone and began to read, “Seattle to Vancouver. So, that’s what it’s doing now. All day tomorrow in Vancouver and then two days at sea before it pulls into San Francisco. We're beating it there, so…maybe?”

  “Perfect,” Gil slapped his palm on his thigh. “That gives us four days, right?”

  “Three technically,” I said. “But my book signing is tomorrow evening and we can leave right after that if you want to drive all night.”

  “Abso-fucking-lutely.” He slid up between the seats again and whispered, as though Abuelita gave a shit, “How's about we stop in Olympia and chow down. I’m feeling peckish.”

  “Don’t you mean peckers?” I said.

  “If I’m lucky, that too.”

  Chapter 2

  I don't know about you, but when I go out to eat, I expect certain things, a few cocktails, scintillating conversation and a meal that doesn’t fight back too hard. What I don’t expect is for the night to end being hunted by a rabid pack of go-go boys in gold-lamé hot pants with a disturbing array of weaponry.

  A place as small as Olympia should have been a hotbed of intolerance and antagonistic sentiment around social programs, the kind of hole that plugged up around dusk so that people could apply their ointments and complain about their days and let us creatures of the night prowl without impediment. Instead we rolled in on streets crowded with drunken revelers emerging from a low-lying fog bank of pot smoke, not to mention a building-sized banner advertising an exotic dance troop called The Golden Boys—which, much to my chagrin were not octogenarian strippers with bedazzled walkers.

  Must’ve been some weird seasonal surge.

  “Holy shit,” Gil breathed from between them, mouth agape and eyes ogling the overtly bronzed and barely clothed men on the banner. “I’ve been meaning to catch these guys in Seattle.”

  “Couldn’t break away from the Hermitage?”

  “I’ve been extremely busy.” Gil flounced against his seatback.

  “Mmhm.”

  We pulled off the freeway and, once downtown, stowed the car in an alley close to both our semi-regular hunting grounds and the gay bar where the Golden Boys would be performing. Gil had his door open before I even powered down.

  “You girls enjoy your meals!” he shouted waving behind him and slipping into the nightclub.

  “At least he’s getting out.” I shrugged.

  Wendy merely shook her head as though Gil were a lost cause.

  “Let’s go. Pinchy was a couple of hours ago, you must be hungry again.”

  That perked her up.

  August in Olympia drew at least half of the homeless teens on the west coast. They flocked to the parks and main drag like patchouli-doused locust. I'd already hit up the lake area three times over the summer, snatching up some of the healthier ones—in my mouth, to eat of course. Nothing kinky.

  They're kids for Christ sake.

  The car tucked away in a dark alley we slipped out and clung to the shadows, except for Abuelita who lit up a cigarillo and dangled her hand from the car window.

  “Don't smoke in there!” I hissed.

  She waved, but didn't move.

  “Dammit,” I mumbled and followed Wendy.

  We lingered on a switchback of trails that led from the capital buildings down a steep slope to a jogging loop around the lake, taking up residence on a wooden bench to assess the situation. There was a near constant ripple in the distance, people ducking in and out of bushes for various nefarious purposes involving any number of orifices, I have no doubt. It’s never a good idea to pursue your prey into a potentially lube-coated situation, particularly when you’re wearing a recent season of designer fashion—I’ve loosened up on my definition of style to accommodate my financial crisis, so keep the critique to a minimum, Fashion Police!

  Besides, waiting is a valid hunting strategy, ask the closeted homosexuals on Generation Duck or Bounty Huntress.

  It’s not like we had to linger long. Before we’d drained our first flask of martinis, a shadowy pair of prospectives lit on the mouth of the trail leading directly to us. A sniff told me at least one of them was fairly grassy—though oddly enough not the one with dreadlocks. The young men were an odd couple, one’s hips swiveled like a lazy susan in very short shorts, the other slouched like the most generic stoner stereo-type and by the look of thing they were looking for a quiet place to hook up, unless I was reading their sloppy groping the wrong way.

  I set my Birkin slightly forward. If they were walking side-by-side, one of them would have to sidestep or leap over it or, if my gaydar was correct—and it always is, because, come on, fucking hot pants?

  “Is that a for real Gherkin,” Hot pants asked, glossy lips reflecting the moonlight.

  “Gherkins are pickles, hon,” I said. “This is a Birkin.”

  “Oh my God, those are like a million dollars.”

  I nodded (they’re not actually, but, whatever).

  “So are you boys looking for some comfy bushes to carry out your very important business transaction?”

  Dreads shuffled silently, but Hot pants recognized a compatriot. “Obvies. Y’all want to do the lookouts?”

  “You mean take part in a clandestine activity that is totally against the law?”

  Hot pants grinned, reapplying his gloss. “Exactly.”

  I glanced at Wendy, who shook her head, clearly bored with my patting this mouse about the floor. “Obvies. You two get to your lovin’.
We’ll make sure no one sees anything that’s about to happen.”

  “You, my love.” the hustler wound a gold scarf around his neck. “Are a peach.”

  Arms dangling in that adolescent way, careless, fearless, the two shuffled past, Dreads’ Chuck Taylor’s scuffing clouds of dust onto the Birkin’s pristine black leather, I lunged. I was hungry and more than a little horrified that the purse I’d traded a perfectly matched set of Ukrainian gymnasts for—the manager had been a particularly shrewd golem—had suffered possible damage at the expense of my banter.

  Wendy did too.

  Jaws ratcheted open, the sharp cracks of knuckles popping. Bones gnashing. Gulping.

  Moments later, I was hunched over, pulling a thick rope of dirty hair out of my throat and regretting my life choices—there was simply no reason why we couldn't have selected more clean-cut food options.

  “These don't make a lick of sense.” I tossed the dreadlock to the ground, kicked some gravel over it.

  “They're straight up disgusting. What’s worse?” Wendy said. “You only coughed up one of those shitstreaks and he must have had fifty dangling out of his head. Looked like a Goddamn Medusa.”

  My stomach twisted into knots, braiding around the tangles of hair. I sat back onto the bench and cradled the momentary expansion of my gut. Work quickly, I thought. The words sounded like begging in my head.

  Now, before you get the wrong idea, we don’t take any pleasure from taking life, not any more than you do when you gnaw into a juicy steak. It’s simply Darwinian. Predator versus prey. If you have a problem with that, I suggest a trip to another planet.

  That’s how it works here. Get used to it.

  (Footnote: No hugs will be forthcoming to ease your troubled sensibility)

  A scuffing in the gravel drew our attention to the top mouth of the path. Gil leaned casually against a railing there chatting with a young woman who was certainly under his thrall, or at least pretending to be so she could swipe his wallet. I had to look away as he clamped down on her throat, not because the violence disturbed me—obviously I’m okay with that—but because of the incoming erection that would be tenting his trousers. The sounds of struggle transitioned to branches cracking as he tossed her desiccated carcass high into an evergreen.

  When I looked again, Gil was already waiting for us, wiping a streak of crimson across his cheek and grinning. Every bit of him flush with blood, including the downstairs bit.

  “Point it the other way. You’re like a fucking adolescent with that thing.”

  “Ew.” Wendy’s nose curled.

  “Whatever.” Gil casually leapt over the railing with the grace of a paraplegic gazelle—with a hard-on—tripped and belly flopped flat onto the gravel.

  He screamed, curled into a ball and cradling his rapidly detumescing member, stubbed out on the ground like a just lit cigarette.

  “Why is that railing even there?” he shouted, glowering back over his shoulder and pouting.

  “Because without it a human might go running windmill-armed right off the steep slope.”

  “Or a vampire, even,” Wendy added.

  “Humans need to stop with all the safety bullshit,” Gil proclaimed.

  Nods, all around. Wendy dug a cache of wet naps from her purse and dabbed Gil’s cheek and for that brief moment amidst a volley of awkward smiles, they were close again. Or as close as friends can be after a complete reversal of fortune.

  “Idiocy is not a trait that is necessary for humans to survive as a species. If they plummet down the hill, they plummet...preferably right into my gut.” I leaned against the rail as Wendy continued to clean Gil’s face. “Seriously. The supernatural races that feed on humans have experienced a population growth just to keep up with the enormous amount of people that should have died in their youth from eating magnets, not getting ribbons on field day, or talking on cell phones while traversing steep switchbacks. Child safety fixation is clearly bad for society, but fantastic for zombies.”

  “You should write a fucking pamphlet,” Gil said, still rubbing his bent junk.

  “See?” Wendy called. “Writing is your calling. Even if it’s just pamphlets.”

  Bitch.

  I stomped away toward the car shaking my head. That any of us ever agreed on anything was a miracle. Wendy and I had been playing at being friends, acting, and sometimes that was enough, but not today.

  Chapter 3

  “Don't be mad, Amanda. Look, I got you something shiny.”

  Wendy whipped a gold scarf out of her purse and wrapped it around my neck before I could object on the grounds of scabies.

  “There,” she said. “Reflects highlights on that gorgeous bone structure. “

  I couldn't disagree and she did seem to be making an effort. “Fine.”

  “Plus it's like a souvenir for our trip.”

  “How so?”

  “I snatched it off the hooker before you tore into him like you were cheating on Weight Watchers.”

  “God.”

  I ripped at the scarf and set it adrift on a warm breeze whistling through the alley. Coiling and unfurling, it caught on the head of a nearly nude man who emerged from the shadows, one of a quartet of bronze hard bodies in gold lamé hot pants, matching gold shoes and nothing else. The four men posed, ala Destiny's Child, the scarf flickering flame-like around the tallest one's head as though he were a candle.

  “The Golden Boys,” Gil whispered in a tone somewhere between desire and fear.

  “You mean the strippers?”

  “Not just strippers.” Gil rubbed the side of his face, ashamedly. “Evil strippers.”

  “Oh Jesus. Is that a bruise?”

  He nodded, wincing in my direction, begging me not to press the issue.

  “From the fall?” Wendy asked, confused.

  Sighing, he pointed toward the gaggle of gays. “That one on the right was doing some hip-thrusting a little too close to my face and, well, there might have been some ball swinging involved and—”

  “Stop,” I said, turning away. “I don't want to hear any more.”

  I also didn't want to hear the big stripper's delayed scream, but as is so often the case, you can't get between a gay and his drama.

  The tall stripper bellowed, hunched over, his fists shaking. He stood whip-straight and tore the scarf from his head, revealing a startlingly handsome face, bronze and bony, and a shock of platinum hair that screamed for attention.

  “What the fuck?” he yelled.

  The four of them glared from the flapping drape of fabric in his palm, then across to where we stood. At me, in particular. As if I'd swiped the ugly thing. I nudged Wendy in front of me, making it clear who was to blame.

  I shot a thumb at Wendy. “There might be a little of your friend on her teeth.”

  Wendy shook her head. “Nope.”

  The one to Boyoncé’s left, an Asian guy with a torso so fat free it could have been die-cut, leaned over and without taking his eyes off me said, in his most insouciant bitch-voice, “Oh hell no. That’s André's scarf. I bet that bitch jacked him for his tips.”

  Tips?

  Oh hell no. He had tips?

  “Like hell!” I shouted. “And I'd have to be paid to wear that tacky shit.”

  Boyoncé, their leader, presumably, took a dramatic breath—if go-go boys required leadership, someone needed to cue the grinding and tea bagging, I guess. “Are you calling our outfits...tacky?”

  Gil could mewl and complain about his injury-by-ball-sac until his mama came to tuck him in, but I had no intention of letting a gang of exotic dancers intimidate me. “Not so much tacky as fucking hideous. That fabric could blind someone.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I said, yeah. Y'all look tacky as fuck.”

  “Brad,” the Asian stripper said, his face scrunched up tighter than cat butt. He shook the cloth in front of Boyoncé. “There's blood on this scarf. André's blood!”

  In unison, they drew an odd—and s
lightly to moderately gay—assortment of weapons. A cat-o-nine tails. A metal-heeled stiletto. A white tube sock from the seventies filled with pennies.

  And that's all it took, I glanced around me for a little back up, only to find Gil and Wendy had long since bolted for the car, their footfalls echoing around me proving without a doubt that my friends sucked gigantic dog balls.

  My stomach lurched. What do you say at that point? When it’s become clear to humans you’ve been involved in something nefarious? I’m sorry? No. I thought he was merely a down on his luck homeless teen, how was I to know he was a moderately employed dancer who earned tips dunking balls into elderly gays’ mouths?

  No offense, Gil.

  Zombie or no, four pissed off queens with weapons was not a great bet against a single set of unhinged jaws. I did what any sensible supernatural creature would, turned and ran. They howled behind me like the giddy beasts they were—or wanted to be when they weren't grinding for cash—and scrambled down the alley after me, gold shoes slapping the pavement.

  I slammed the door and stood on the gas pedal to know avail.

  “You didn’t even crank it up?” I screamed as the first stripper dove on the tailgate of the SUV, pounded a shiny dildo on the back window, in between wild bucking gyrations—a hazard of the profession, apparently, they just can’t turn that shit off…or maybe they’ve loosened up the muscles to the degree that they wiggle like bobbleheads as a matter of course.

  Cranking the key and slamming the car into drive, I barely noticed the fragrance of Drakkar Noir waft in from my left. The window was open and Boyoncé or Brad or whatever the fuck their leader's name was reached in to claw at my face.

  I couldn't resist, maybe I was still that rash little girl.

  What would Mrs. Montclair say about this?

  Let this be a cautionary tale for any of you that think it's okay to wave your extremities under the nose of a fleeing zombie or a first grader. Ratcheting open my jaw with a few quick clack-clack-clacks, I brought jaws of steel down on his hand, taking it clean off at the wrist, then hit the gas, rocketing the car out of the alley as the strippers gathered around their fallen comrade and wailed, seven fists and one bloody stub raised in defiance.