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THE SUN HAD RISEN TO almost the midday mark by the time we touched down on Hwy 95, just outside Vegas and right below a Sin City Zombiecon billboard. Oh, the irony.
The first thing I noticed when Boner turned off the blue shield was the air was surprisingly cooler here than in Washington, and we hadn’t seen any signs of hell the last half of our journey. Could everything be contained in the Pacific Northwest? If so, what was Lucia doing down so far south? Maybe my zombie GPS was a load of horseshit.
I gaped at the lights. I’d only been to Vegas a few times with my girlfriends, but each time the spread had grown bigger. The lights were almost as mesmerizing as a big slab of drippy, bloody beef. Speaking of beef: the meat we’d taken from the supermarket was smelling stronger. I knew it was starting to turn, so why did it smell even better?
“Where to, Ash?” Boner asked.
“I-I don’t know.” I closed my eyes, doing my best to summon an image of the witch, but I felt a little turned around, kind of like a broken magnet.
I pressed my hands over my ears, doing my best to lock out static while ignoring the relentless wind pelting my face. The images floated to me in increments. First the sound of her sadistic laughter, followed by a smoky room and a slot machine—no. A line of slot machines. Okay, now I was getting somewhere. I thought I made out a person strapped to a long table in the center of a stage. I heard the soft cries of either a frightened woman or child, but Lucia kept laughing. Where were they? What were they doing?
My eyes shot open when Boner hit a pothole, and I nearly flew out of my seat.
“Easy,” I cried, angry as the vision dispersed in a cloud of smoke. I rubbed my sore neck, sharing a look of annoyance with Aedan, who looked awfully uncomfortable sitting up front with Boner. My husband appeared to be as solid as a statue, one eye trained on Boner and the other on me.
“Sorry.” Boner chuckled. “It’s kind of hard to see without eyeballs.”
I hadn’t thought about that. How was a bag of bones able to see, hear, and talk?
“Do you want me to drive?” I asked.
“Nah. I’m just joking.”
I shrugged. “If you need any help, let me know.” I wasn’t about to try to figure out the scientific explanation for Boner’s ability to move around like a normal person, not when I had too much else on my mind. Namely, where the hell was that witch?
“Did you see anything, Ash?” Aedan asked.
“She seems to be in some sort of nightclub, but I couldn’t tell. Did you see anything?”
He shook his head. “Nothing.”
“Damn.” I bit my lip, then let go when a big chunk of skin came off in my teeth. “How are we going to find her?”
“I’m sure more zombies and demons will converge here.” Aedan waved toward the city of lights. “We can just follow the freaks.”
I couldn’t contain my eye roll. “Aedan, this is Vegas.”
He solemnly nodded. “I know.”
Aw, how cute. I kept forgetting my husband was over a century behind the times. “I don’t think following the freaks will work out so well here.” I chuckled.
Aedan threw up his hands. “Then what do you propose we do?”
“I don’t know.”
Boner held up a bony finger. “We may need to make the witch come to us.”
An icy shard of fear raced through my rotting bones. Make Lucia come to us? The woman we’d sent to hell after thwarting her satanic child sacrifice? Why would we make that psycho come to us when I didn’t even want her to know we still existed?
I could tell by the dark looks Aedan was giving me, he felt the same way. If and when we confronted Lucia, it would be on our terms and without warning.
“Uh.” I shifted uncomfortably in my seat. “I don’t freaking think so.”
* * *
WORDS COULD NOT BEGIN to describe my apprehension as we slowly made our way down the Las Vegas strip in a topless automobile. Though we garnered plenty of stares, nobody panicked. As Boner navigated bumper-to-bumper traffic, several tourists got out of their cars and insisted on taking selfies with him. They assumed he was a robot. A robot who was driving the Jeep. It didn’t make a whole lot of sense, but this was Vegas.
Pain etched Aedan’s brow as he turned to me. It hurt me to watch him move, because I knew he felt like me, a rotting, dried up corpse, like an old, smelly sponge that had sat beside the sink too long. Though I meant what I’d said when I repeated that ‘for better or for worse’ part at the altar, it was hard watching my handsome husband turn into a brittle shell. He’d always been so strong and capable, and seeing him turn into this monster tightened my chest with fear and desperation.
“Are you getting anything, Ash?” he asked.
I grumbled and shut my eyes, hating that my eyelids felt like sandpaper. I did my best to concentrate, but the shouting, honking, and loud music were distracting me. Plus I could still see the flashy overhead lights through my thinning eyelids.
I opened my eyes in time to see him frowning like a big, zombie baby.
“Ash, focus.”
Excuse me? Why was he expecting my zombie GPS to be better than his? Was it because I was more corpsy? How offensive. Next he’d be telling me my thighs looked fat in this skimpy dress.
I threw up my hands. “I can’t focus with all this.” I pointed floppy finger at the gaggle of tourists standing on the corner, their cameras flashing in my eyes. “Can’t you try?”
His dried up skin crackled as his scowl deepened. “You’re more of a zombie than me.”
Oh, how rude! I wanted to fold my arms and turn up my chin, but my arms were too stiff to bend all the way, so I settled for a massive eye roll. “Have you seen yourself in the mirror?”
He arched a brow. “I haven’t started decomposing yet, and I don’t have maggots.”
I sniffled, and not because he’d hurt my feelings, but because a stupid maggot took that moment to make an appearance. Aedan and the maggots must have been colluding. He’d probably offered them fresher brains in return for making me look more corpsy. “I can’t help it that bugs are crawling out of my orifices.”
I pulled a rather long worm out of my nose and flung it into the open convertible beside us. I hadn’t meant to hit them, but I might have inwardly smiled when the bleached blonde in the passenger seat screamed. When she tossed me a dirty look, I sneered. She was lucky I had self-control; she had a large, blemish-free forehead, and I just knew her brains would be tasty.
Aedan’s gaze softened, and he didn’t at all look repulsed that I’d pulled a maggot that looked like a long tendril of snot out of my nose. “I know you can’t. Can you try to focus?”
“I can’t.” I pouted as the rotting meat in the bag beside me made my mouth water. “I’m hungry.”
“How many times are you gonna eat?” Boner’s hollow eye sockets judged me from the rearview mirror.
“As many times as I damn well need to,” I spat.
Boner shook his head. “In the meantime, the world is ending.”
“Well, no shit!” My voice rose along with my ire, and I thought I even felt the maggots stirring in my brain like a nest of angry hornets. “I can’t exactly save the world if I’m a rotting corpse. I need something bloody.” I was so hungry, any piece of meat would do, though I’d prefer brains. I wasn’t about to tell Boner I’d turned into a walking cliché. He’d never let me live it down. An image popped into my mind, so powerful I couldn’t ignore it if I’d tried. I saw guts, lots and lots of succulent fish guts. Oh, sweet mercy. I had to have them!
Okay, at some point I realized I’d probably hit a new level of low in my miserable afterlife, and I’d eaten dog chow in Hell, so that was saying a lot. But damn, I was craving those fish guts like a double scoop of vanilla ice cream topped with a hard chocolate shell topping.
I placed my fingers to my temples. “Wait. I think I’m getting something.” I jutted a finger at the big red thing in front of us. “Follow that big square with wheels.”
Aedan arched back, looking at me as if I’d just sprouted a maggot farm out of my eyeballs. “The bus?”
“Yes!” I waved my floppy finger as it turned a corner in a plume of diesel smoke. “That.”
Aedan scratched the back of his head before sharing a look with Boner. “How did you forget it was a bus?”
Why was he making a big deal out of it? People forgot words all the time. I shrugged, trying not to feel too annoyed by Aedan’s question while my ravenous stomach felt like it was imploding. “I don’t know hungry.”
Aedan pointed at me as if I was my black Lab Jack, and I’d just gotten caught humping the sofa cushion. “Why’d you end with hungry?”
I shook my head, wishing those squirmy maggots would calm down. “What?”
“You just said hungry.” Aedan sized me up as if we were on our first date after meeting on an Internet site, and I’d made myself appear thirty pounds lighter on my profile.
“I didn’t.” Did I? Hells bells, I was too hungry to think about every word that came out of my mouth.
He narrowed his eyes. “You did.”
I threw my hands in the air, or at least I tried to, but my stiff arms would only rise halfway. “I don’t remember saying I’m hungry, hungry.”
He leaned over the seat, jutting a finger at my chest. “There you go again.”
I pounded the side of my head like, I was trying to drain water out of my ear. “Maybe it’s the maggots.” They obviously didn’t like being shaken around, because they fluttered in my brain in a feeding frenzy. Stupid critters. I pounded my head again.
Aedan grabbed my wrist, a mixture of desperation and annoyance in his gaze. “Stop aggravating them. They’re eating your words.”
They’re what? But then realization dawned. Those little shits weren’t just eating my words, they were demolishing my brain. Soon, I wouldn’t have anything left to say but “hungry.”
Aedan squeezed my wrist and brought my hand to his heart. “We need to find that witch.”
The panic in his eyes was heartbreaking. As if being a rotting corpse wasn’t bad enough, I was turning into a brain-dead bride. Yeah, we needed to find that witch, and not just because of Earth’s impending doom.
I closed my eyes again, pressing my fingers to my temples. “I think I’ve got something.” I gave Boner directions. “Turn here.” I pointed to a smaller side street. After several more turns, we neared downtown. I pointed to an alley. “Then here.”
As soon as we reached the end of the alleyway, I got out of the Jeep, groaning as I walked with purpose to the dumpster.
“I don’t see anyone,” Boner grumbled behind me.
I paid him no heed. Yeah, we needed to find the witch, but I couldn’t do it on an empty stomach.
I found the bag of fish guts on top. Weird how I’d known it would be there.
“What the hell are you doing?” Boner’s bones rattled behind me like angry maracas.
“Eating garbage out of a dumpster. What’s it look like?” I dumped the contents of the bag on the dirty asphalt.
Boner backed up several steps as blood and guts splattered everywhere. “Oh, that is so nasty.”
It was, but at the moment I was more hungry than ashamed.
Though Aedan grumbled, that didn’t stop him from helping himself to my feast. We ate until there was nothing left but bones.
“That hit the spot.” I leaned back against the dumpster and let out a rancid belch, patting my tummy.
Aedan settled a bloody hand on my knee. “Are you feeling better?”
“A little.” For a zombie whose brain was rapidly decaying, I guessed I wasn’t doing too terribly bad.
“Ash.” Aedan’s sallow brow furrowed. “We need you to find Lucia.”
I heaved a groan before closing my eyes. He was right, damn him. I didn’t know how I knew, but I sensed the way to Lucia. I walked past the Jeep, dragging a leg, which felt like it was slipping out of its socket. Oh, I looked so cliché. I cringed when I thought of all the tourists who would want to take a picture with me, smiling for their camera phones while I secretly salivated over their gray matter.
And to think I should have been enjoying mind-blowing sex on my honeymoon. Instead, I was a zombie bride with bad alopecia and maggot boogers. Sadly, I knew I hadn’t even hit my final level of low. I was sure the witch who’d started this stupid apocalypse had more torture in store for me. I was crazy enough to go looking for her.
* * *
MY INTERNAL GPS LED me to a street corner with three Elvises and a screaming preacher at the edge of downtown Vegas. The Elvises posed for pictures while the preacher stood on an empty milk crate, berating them for false idolatry and telling everyone the end of the world was near.
Too bad the nutjob was right.
I spun a slow circle, looking for any signs of the witch, but all I saw were several gift shops and an ice cream parlor. Behind the line of stores was a walkway flanked by concrete walls, leading to a rundown casino. Could Lucia be inside the casino? But why did I feel her presence so strongly on the street corner? Something wasn’t right.
I looked at Aedan, unable to keep the desperation out of my voice. “Here. I swear she’s here.”
“Look! A skeleton and zombies!” A shrill voice nearly blew out my eardrums. “Are you from Zombiecon? Can I get a selfie with you?”
A girl with hair the color of cotton candy was fluttering around us like a hummingbird to a flower. She wore a tight T-shirt with Greek sorority letters and skimpy booty shorts. She nursed a tropical drink in a blue plastic cup that looked like a bong. She was flanked by two friends who looked equally skanky. My eyes crossed, and my maggots swarmed just listening to their nauseating laughter.
Pink-Haired Girl giggled when I growled at her, cocking a hand on a narrow hip. “You’re not a very scary zombie, are you?”
I answered by digging a maggot out of my ear and dropping it in her drink.
Her mouth hung open for a long moment while the maggot squirmed up her straw. She dropped the drink and ran, the bright green concoction splattering the sidewalk as her friends chased after her.
I almost felt bad for scaring her. Almost. In what world did she think it was okay to insult my zombiness, anyway? Luckily her theatrics didn’t scare away the horde of tourists who were stuffing bills in Boner’s jacket and taking selfies with him.
“Ash,” Aedan whispered in my ear. “I don’t see the witch.”
“Neither do I, but I swear I can feel her here.” My shoulders slumped. What was wrong with me that I could track down rotting fish guts but couldn’t find the sorceress who’d opened up the portal to Hell’s sixth dimension? It should have been easy. Follow the dragons, demons, and screaming.
I narrowed my eyes at the gift shop after a scary looking bald, bearded guy covered in tats walked inside. He didn’t strike me as the kind of guy to go looking for souvenir shot glasses.
This was a waste of time. Lucia obviously wasn’t here. What the heck was I doing? She could be back in Seattle for all I knew.
“Repent, sinners, before it’s too late!” The preacher, a skinny white dude with a bad combover, high-water jeans, and a crooked nose screamed, aiming his Bible at me as if it was a shield, protecting him from the smell of my formaldehyde. “The day of judgment is upon us!”
I shook my head, snickering. If he only knew.
He jumped off his crate and strode up to us. I took a step back, not minding one bit when Aedan stepped between us.
The guy pulled back his shoulders, sneering up at Aedan. “Do you not know that zombie conventions are tools for the devil to recruit his servants?”
“Really?” I gasped, pushing Aedan aside. “Do you think we could find a witch there?” Maybe my GPS had brought me here because the preacher was our key to finding Lucia.
His heavy mouth sagged in a frown. “You will find many witches there doing Satan’s bidding.” I didn’t know if he meant to sound accusatory, but the hairs on the back of my nape stood up when he looked at me with eagle-eyed shrewdness.
“I doubt it.” I waved him off as if he was no more significant than the mildew growing in my ass crack. “He’s stuck on sub-level thirteen. We just need to find the witch who started the apocalypse. Do you know where we can find her?” It was a longshot, but desperate times and all.
Aedan glowered at the preacher. “Why are you asking him?”
“Because he’s a preacher.” I scowled at the guy. Not a very good man of God, though, if his purpose was to simply pass judgment on everyone. I’d learned that after I’d first arrived in Purgatory. God didn’t like others doing his job and judging their fellow man. Still, it seemed there were many on Earth who felt it was their duty to be hypercritical turd-nuggets.
“Don’t ask him.” Aedan laughed. “He’s lost his marbles.”
The preacher sputtered before quoting from the book of Revelations, something about hellfire and brimstone.
“He might be onto something. Look at his sign.” I pointed to the cardboard sign he wore across his chest, which said Revelations Is Upon Us. I’d just seen my friends eaten by a shadow dragon. The preacher wasn’t far off the mark.
Aedan’s stiff shoulders bunched even more. “He’s probably been preaching the end of the world for the last ten years.”
“Maybe so,” I said, “but he’s finally right, and my senses tell me Lucia is near.”
The preacher waved his Bible in our faces. “Who are you?”
“We’re from Purgatory.” I nodded at Aedan, then searched the growing crowd of tourists for Boner. He was in the center of the throng somewhere, laughing while flashes went off. “We were accidentally turned into zombies. We’re trying to stop the apocalypse.”
The preacher frowned, his gaze sharpening to fine points. “There is no Purgatory. There’s heaven for those who accept salvation, and there’s damnation for those who don’t.”
Aw jeez. Aedan was right. He had lost his marbles.
“You’re wrong,” I said on a sigh, “but I don’t have time to argue. Can you point me in the direction of the witch?” I was still hoping he knew where to find her, or at the very least, the general direction of the nearest demon hangout.
He let out a laugh so shrill, my maggots revolted, causing a tiny tsunami in my brain. “So you can practice your satanic rituals?”
“No,” I growled, covering my ears with my palms. “So I can send her back to Hell.”
The preacher stepped back, looking as if I’d slapped him, or maybe he was offended by my fish-gut breath. “You think this is a joke?”
Oh, this guy was pissing me off. “No, actually.”
“You and your friend dress up like Lucifer’s lackeys and you think you can make me look like a fool?” The preacher pounded his chest like an ape.
“Sir.” Aedan raked fingers through his hair. “I don’t think you need any help looking like a fool.”
The preacher stumbled, flashing a look of indignation that was so staged, it was comical.
I couldn’t help but laugh at his antics, but my laughter must have upset the maggots, because I suddenly had this intense itching from the inside of my nose all the way into my brain. Rubbing my nose didn’t help. It only made the maggots revolt more. The sneeze struck me so hard and so fast, I had no time to shield my nose or the junk that flew out of it.
The preacher looked like he’d just stepped in a big crap sandwich, breathing through a wheeze as he gaped down at the dozens of tiny worms crawling across his chest and down his neck.
“Sorry.” I wiped slime and blood off my nose with the back of my hand. “No wonder my brain was itching. That feels much better.” Maybe I’d get to keep the rest of my words now. I frowned at a gray chunk of my brain hanging off the preacher’s collar. “Hang on.” I grabbed the clump off him and slurped it down like an Asian noodle. “Don’t want to let good brain go to waste,” I said with a wink.
The preacher continued to gape at me, not a sound coming from his mouth other than the occasional wheeze. I waved in front of his eyes. “You okay?”
He blinked hard but didn’t answer.
“Wait for it,” Aedan whispered. “On three, two, one....”
The preacher screamed like a rabid cat, backing up with the Bible held in front of him. “Get thee behind me, demon!”
“Not a demon,” I said with a huff. “Zombie.”
Boner managed to escape the throng of curious tourists. “Someone stole my clavicle!”
I wasn’t sure where the clavicle was located, but one arm hung limply by his side as if his shoulder had been broken. Boner stumbled toward us, plowing into the preacher’s backside.
The preacher hollered and spun around, thrusting the Bible in Boner’s face. “Now judgment is upon this world!”
“Um... okay?” Boner scratched the back of his neck and slowly backed away.
I frowned at Boner’s sloped shoulder. “Maybe you should stop projecting yourself.”
“But I’m having so much fun,” Boner whined.
The preacher jumped up on his milk crate, swatting maggots off his clothes while the throng of tourists gaped at him. I could see realization dawning in some of their eyes.
“Uh-oh,” I whispered to Aedan. “We’d better split before they break out the pitchforks.”
The preacher jutted an accusatory finger at us. “These will wage war against the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them, because He is Lord of lords and King of kings.” He jabbed his soiled collar with a thumb. “And those who are with Him are the called and chosen and faithful.”
But we were with Him. No use trying to convince the preacher, though. He already had his preconceived prejudice, and I knew it would do no good to argue.
I casually whistled the tune of Mary had a Little Lamb and followed Aedan back to the Jeep.
Boner’s bones clacked as he followed us. “Hurry up, before I lose any more bones,” he hissed.
So much for finding that witch.