“A miracle,” I echoed. She doesn’t know we’re zombies, and Pietro’s pretending to have an injury. What the heck was he up to? Was he trying to get a congresswoman in his pocket? It certainly wasn’t out of the realm of possibility, especially for Pietro. And maybe their relationship had started out that way, but judging by the way he looked at this woman and how his voice seemed to deepen on her name, it was pretty clear he was crazy about her now.
“Pietro told me that you and Marcus are an item,” Jane said with a slightly questioning tone, as if wanting to be sure of our status before continuing.
“We’re dating,” I said, hedging on the whole “item” thing. Was “just dating” an “item”? Or did we have to actually be boyfriend and girlfriend? And if Marcus and I were dating each other exclusively, were we actually boyfriend and girlfriend no matter how hard I tried to deny it? Was I overthinking the hell out of this? “He’s a great guy,” I finished gamely.
“Hard to find those,” she said. Her gaze drifted in the direction the two men had gone before it returned to me. “Are you from this area?”
“Lived here my whole life,” I admitted. “Never been farther away than Talladega, Alabama actually,” I added.
“Anywhere you’ve ever dreamed of going?”
“Oh, wow,” I said, exhaling. “Everywhere. Anywhere. New York, L.A., D.C.…God, I’d fucking love to see the Smithsonian.” I winced. Yes, I’d just dropped an F-bomb on a congresswoman. “Sorry. I mean, I’d love to see it.”
The woman leaned forward. “Don’t tell the press,” she said quietly, then cast a furtive glance around, “but I’ve been known to say ‘fuck’ a time or two.”
I grinned weakly. “Be pretty boring if you could never cuss, I guess.”
Jane laughed. “I don’t think I’d make it through my day!”
“What’s it like being in Congress?” I asked.
“Well, I don’t actually know yet,” she answered with a kind smile. “I was elected in a special election, but I won’t be sworn in until next week. It’s a dream come true, so I’m banking on it not being a nightmare.”
“Yeah, I guess that would kinda suck if it was miserable,” I said, wrinkling my nose. “But that’s still pretty damn cool that you got to reach your dream.”
Some emotion briefly darkened her eyes but was gone before I could get a sense of what it was. “Yes, it’s very damn cool,” she said, smiling. “Do you have a dream, Angel?”
I frowned. “I don’t know.” I looked around at the soiree surrounding us. “In a way simply being right here is a dream come true. I mean, it wasn’t all that long ago that I was a real mess. Didn’t care what happened to me.” I took a deep breath. “These days I try to take it one step at a time. Right now I’m trying to pass the GED. After that…” I shrugged, “don’t really know, but whatever it is, I intend to kick its ass.”
“That’s a good start,” she replied. If she was surprised or put off by the fact that I hadn’t finished high school she hid it well. “It takes a lot of determination to do something like that,” she continued.
I was more than a little pleased that she wasn’t doing the pity or disdain thing at all. I definitely saw why Pietro was so gaga over her. Or rather, as gaga as a man like Pietro could be. “I don’t know about ‘determination,’” I said with a shrug. “I want something better for me and my dad.” I gestured at the Gala around us. “The only reason I’m here is because Pietro gave me and Marcus tickets. And don’t get me wrong—it’s awesome that he did that for us. But I’d love to someday be able to do something like this and not have to think, ‘Oh, wait, if I buy these tickets then I can’t pay the light bill or the water bill.’”
“It seems like you’re on the right track,” she said. “You said your life was a mess not long ago, but you certainly don’t show it now.” She smiled. “Are you working?”
“I work at the Coroner’s Office,” I told her, then grinned. “I wrangle dead bodies.”
Jane laughed and made the typical that’s-kinda-gross face I was accustomed to. “I’m sorry I asked. Do you…like it?”
“Y’know, it’s actually really interesting,” I replied, then paused. “It, uh, gives you a lot of perspective, that’s for sure.”
She tilted her head, eyes on mine. “How so?”
I met her gaze easily. For a Congresswoman, she was really easy to talk to. “Well, you get to see that lots of times people don’t get a chance to say goodbye. Shit can happen out of nowhere, and then you’re gone.” I shrugged and spread my hand. “And, well, it doesn’t matter how rich or powerful you are. You’re still gonna die eventually.”
Her expression grew sober in thought, and I grimaced. “Sorry, I’m being a major downer here,” I said.
She chuckled. “Not at all, I—” She turned at a sudden commotion in the tent near the walkway.
The sight of another zombie actor stumbling through the tent triggered an odd oh-shit-something’s-wrong feeling in my gut. He’d been with the group earlier. I remembered his filthy, sky blue polyester suit. As I watched, he staggered drunkenly between the tables and yelled an incomprehensible word a couple of times that sure as hell wasn’t braaaaiins.
Some people drew back in alarm but, based on the grins and chatter of the crowd, it was clear that the majority thought it was part of the movie promo.
Jane winced as the zombie grabbed at a patron’s plate, snagging a chunk of cake and stuffing it in his mouth. “Oh, dear. That’s a bit much, isn’t it.”
“No kidding,” I murmured as the oh-shit feeling grew.
And then the breeze shifted. If I hadn’t been fairly well tanked up, I might not have noticed it, but right now there was no mistaking the very faint stench of zombie rot.
Alarm shot through me. That’s a real zombie. I quickly swept my gaze around, but Marcus and Pietro were nowhere to be seen. Something needed to be done before this zombie started smashing heads.
Something needed to be done. By someone.
Shit.
Why did I have the feeling that someone was going to be me?
Chapter 5
I quickly dug the bag of brain chips out of my purse and stuffed them into my jacket pocket, then did my best to put on an exasperated expression. “Well, hell, he must be drunk or something, and everyone’s frickin’ watching him,” I said. “I’m gonna try to get him the hell away from the crowd and see what’s wrong with him.”
Jane shot me a startled look, and I suddenly realized how ludicrous it no doubt seemed to her that I—all barely-one-hundred pounds of me—was planning on confronting what she assumed to be a rowdy drunk. “Angel! Are you mad? We should wait for Pietro and Marcus. You could get hurt!”
“I won’t get too close,” I hurried to reassure her, though she didn’t look at all reassured. “They aren’t far, right? Just call Pietro and tell him what’s going on.” And with that I stood and headed off through the crowd before she could make any more extremely sensible protests.
Being skinny had its advantages when it came to slipping through a crowd. I ducked between a couple of gawkers and came face to face with the zombie. Close up I smelled the undertone of rot better, but his appearance confused the hell out of me. Movie makeup…and chocolate cake. A gruesome fake eye hung out of its prosthetic socket on one side of his face, but latex gaped on the other where he’d clawed at it, exposing the real grey, peeling skin beneath. This was a hungry real zombie made up as an extra, but he sure wasn’t acting right. I’d been starving more than once and there was no way I would’ve confused cake with what I really needed.
I yanked the bag of brain chips out of my pocket and opened it. “Hey!” I waved the tasty morsels in front of him, hoping the scent of the brains would get through to his zombieness. “Here zombie zombie zombie!” In my peripheral vision I saw the crowd had stopped and was watching me. Great, they probably thought I was part of the stunt now.
The zombie swung toward me, his one clear eye focused on the bag. “Braa
aaaiins,” he rasped and reached clumsily for the bag. I pulled it out of his reach and backed away from the crowd toward the exit. He followed to the sound of scattered applause. I figured if I could get him outside, there’d be less chance he would hurt someone plus more room to take him down if it came to that, once Marcus showed up.
He staggered toward me and grabbed for the bag again, but I easily dodged. “Braaaaaaiins!” he bellowed as I backed away. Light rain spattered me as we left the shelter of the tent, but I didn’t stop. We weren’t far enough from the people yet—people who applauded and cheered their rescue from the zombie. Give me a break.
“Here!” I pulled a few chips from the bag and dropped them onto the sidewalk. I felt a little bad making him eat off the ground, but I didn’t want to get close enough for him to grab hold of me.
He didn’t seem to mind though. He crouched, snatched them up and stuffed them into his mouth, then lurched toward me again. “More…braaaaains…” He’d picked up a bit of speed, a side effect of getting some brains into him. Even at half-strength, the chips would be like the nectar of the gods for a hungry zombie. I moved away more quickly as he shuffled toward me and continued to drop chips, leading him like a cat with tuna. The rain began to pick up again, but I wasn’t about to stop now that I had his attention.
We’d made it about a hundred yards from the tents when he abruptly swiveled his head to the right, head lifting as if he scented something. I shot a quick glance that way, and cold knifed through me at the sight of a bus stop and a woman waiting there. The zombie took a staggering step in that direction, a tortured moan coming from his throat as if he was fighting an inner battle to keep from going after the woman. I knew what that battle was like. I’d been hungry before, ready to club down the first person with a non-zombified brain to cross my path.
“No!” I waved the bag at him. “This way. C’mon. Don’t go over there. I’ll get you more brains, I promise.”
He stopped in the glow of a streetlamp, swaying as he looked back at me. His lips curled back in a snarl, but I got the sense it was more pain and confusion than menace.
“Here,” I said, making a quick decision. “Have the rest of these.” I held the bag out, hoping that there was enough brain power in them to counter his desire for fresh brains.
The zombie looked to the bus shelter, then back to me. His breath rasped as he turned and made a sluggish grope for the bag. I let it drop to the sidewalk, but to my shock he ignored the bag and made a lightning-fast grab of my wrist.
Shit! I sucked in a gasp. He was way stronger than I expected a zombie that shambly to be.
A menacing growl shuddered from him as his lips twisted back in a wicked tooth-baring snarl. “Aaannngggellll.” The word—my freaking name—came out in an ugly wet croak.
“What the hell?” The initial shock of getting grabbed melted into get-the-fuck-away-from-me. I made a strong twist of my arm in an attempt to free it and landed a solid kick in the bastard’s zombie balls.
To my dismay, he only grunted and snarled with the impact, then clamped harder on my wrist with bone-breaking strength. Excruciating pain shot up my arm, while his other hand swung slow and wide, arcing for my throat.
Okay. I’m in deep, deep shit. Yeah, I was a little slow getting a clue. But with that extra jolt of fear I turned into a punching, struggling, kicking, psycho redneck zombie bitch.
Bad Zombie clamped his free hand on my shoulder and lunged in for a bite. I threw myself backward enough to shake the shoulder hold and avoid anything to do with teeth. A sickening wave of zombie rot stench struck me, and his grip on my wrist slipped as skin sloughed from his fingers. This was Not Good on a whole bunch of levels. No way should he be rotting this fast. And now I had zombie ooze on my jacket on top of everything else.
“Let GO!” I snarled. I made a savage punch at the arm that held me, heart pounding from the desperate cocktail of anger and fear.
With the force of the blow, flesh slid from his fingers and my wrist slipped free. But I didn’t even get a fraction of a second to celebrate that victory as his other hand knotted into the sleeve of my jacket and yanked my arm up to his open mouth.
I let out a yelp of pain and dismay as he bit down hard on my forearm. “You fucker!” I shouted and punched his eye—well, I punched where his eye was under the dangling eyeball prosthetic.
To my total surprise, he let out a near airless moan and let go, latex dangling from his face and his real eyelid and upper cheek knocked away.
I wanted to allow myself a brief moment of self-congratulation at my badassery, but the abrupt release of my arm sent me staggering backward, and I barely managed to keep my footing. Plus, now another zombie dude loomed a couple of yards behind Bad Zombie.
Time to get the hell out of here. I turned and ran—
—and barreled straight into a wall. A wall that threw an arm around me and pinned me to it. Okay, not a wall, but another goddamn zombie pretending to be a zombie. Within about a half a second, Wall Zombie had my back to his chest and his arm locked hard around me. Shit.
Bad Zombie shambled toward us with the unsavory declaration of, “Miiiiinnnnne.”
Wall Zombie kept an unshakable hold on me and leveled a gun at the advancing zombie. “Tim, NO!” he commanded in a low, raspy voice.
It looked like Wall Zombie intended to shoot Bad Zombie, which meant maybe he was a Good Zombie, but I didn’t care. I went right back to struggling like a psycho. All I wanted was to get the hell away. “Let me go!”
“Hold still!” he ordered me through clenched teeth, then fired the gun. Except it wasn’t a normal gun, and it made a whuuuush instead of a normal bang.
His voice abruptly registered. I craned my head around in shock. “Oh my god,” I breathed. Though I couldn’t see his face under the makeup, I knew his eyes. Philip.
Bad Zombie staggered back with a sound between a growl and a sob. He pawed at a yellow tufted thing in his shoulder, and I realized Philip had shot him with a tranquilizer dart.
Looming Zombie moved in close behind Bad Zombie, got a hand on his arm as he swayed. I didn’t have a clue what was going on, but I knew it would be a lot better if I wasn’t right in the middle of it. I ramped my crazy-chick struggles up another notch, but Philip easily kept a solid hold on my scrawny ass. Even through my thrashing, I could feel his whole body tremoring against my back, as if he was shivering from cold or fear. But neither of those reasons made sense. Sure, we were all soaking wet from the rain, but it was the middle of summer. Something else was up.
“Roland, get him out of here. Now,” Philip ordered. He produced what looked like a candy bar with a white wrapper and tossed it to Looming Zombie, who ripped it open and scarfed it down. The whole thing reminded me of a dog getting a treat.
Bad Zombie collapsed on his back in the pool of light from the streetlamp, thrashed for a moment before subsiding into twitches. Wrecked latex and makeup left what remained of his face exposed, and it only took me a second to recognize him. Square jaw. A nose that had been repeatedly broken. Horror backed by anger slammed through me. I’d carefully memorized the features of the men who’d been my jailers when I was Dr. Charish’s unwilling test subject. This guy was one of the assholes who had callously watched me get strip searched.
Which means that he’s probably one of the two men who got turned into zombies by Philip right before I escaped Dr. Charish’s lab. My gaze snapped up to Looming Zombie—the one Philip called Roland—and met his eyes. Gorgeous blue. And that’s probably the other one. One of Charish’s guards had eyes like that. The makeup couldn’t hide those.
Oh, this was all kinds of bad. Philip and his freakin’ zombie-spawn. He’d been in bad shape when he made them—mean, near berserk, and rotting too soon—damaged by some experimental shit Charish had done to him. Who the hell knew how screwed up the two he’d turned were.
I landed a hard kick to Philip’s shin, but he seemed unfazed by my struggles. I got in a few more solid kicks and foot stomps,
and then he tucked away the tranq gun and pulled a knife.
I made a strangled sound pushed out by panic. “No…no! Let me go,” I managed. “Oh god.” It was hard as hell to kill a zombie, but I had no doubt he knew how to do it.
“Shut up, Angel,” he said, voice deep and hoarse. He wrestled my bitten arm up and sliced the jacket sleeve. “Have to make sure the goods aren’t damaged.”
A stupid pang of grief went through me, and I stared in horror at the long rent in the lovely fabric. “You cut my jacket!” Yeah, I was captured by a couple of Evil Zombies, but a girl has her priorities. “You fucking dick!” I slammed my boot heel down into the top of his foot. “Get off me!”
Philip hissed and shifted. “God damn it, Angel.”
“Let her go,” a clear, strong voice commanded from off to my right.
Philip hauled me around with him as he turned to face the approaching man—who, unnervingly, had a very real gun drawn and pointed at us. Fortyish with close-cropped brown hair, the newcomer bore a serious-as-all-hell expression perfectly complemented by a dark suit. I had no clue who the hell he was, but I was pissed and scared and desperate. I thrashed and kicked back hard into Philip’s shin. “Yeah. Let me GO!”
Philip tightened his arm around me and looked to the left where Looming Zombie moved away with the tranquilized Bad Zombie slung over his shoulder, then dragged me backward with him into the shadows. “No problem,” he snarled, and shoved me roughly forward.
Totally off balance, I went sprawling to the sidewalk. The palm of my right hand grated against the concrete, and white hot agony shot through me as my already broken wrist impacted and shattered.
“Asshole!” I shouted as I soon as I could get a full breath, though it came out as more of a pained wheeze. I shifted to sit heavily, cradling my arm to my chest, and caught a glimpse of Philip sprinting away before he was lost to the darkness.
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