The Laughing Corpse (29 page)

“How did you make it?” I had to know. It was so obviously a creation of our shared art that I had to know.

“Surely, you can animate bits and pieces of the dead,” Dominga said.

I could, but no one else I had ever met could do it. “Yes,” I said.

“I found I could take these odds and ends and meld them together.”

I stared at the shambling thing. “Meld them?” The thought was too horrible.

“I can create new creatures that have never existed before.”

“You make monsters,” I said.

“Believe what you will,
chica
, but I am here to persuade you to raise the dead for Gaynor.”

“Why don't you do it?”

Gaynor's voice came from just behind us. I whirled, putting the wall at my back so I could watch everybody. What good that would do me, I wasn't sure. “Dominga's power went wrong once. This is my last chance. The last known grave. I won't risk it on her.”

Dominga's eyes narrowed, her age-thinned hands forming fists. She didn't like being dismissed out of hand. Couldn't say I blamed her.

“She could do it, Gaynor, easier than I could.”

“If I truly believed that, I would kill you because I wouldn't need you anymore.”

Hmm, good point. “You've had Bruno rough me up. Now what?”

Gaynor shook his head. “Such a little girl to have taken both my bodyguards down.”

“I told you ordinary methods of persuasion will not work on her,” Dominga said.

I stared past her at the slathering monster. She called this ordinary?

“What do you propose?” Gaynor asked.

“A spell of compulsion. She will do as I bid, but it takes time to do such a spell for one as powerful as she. If she knew any voodoo to speak of, it would not work at all. But for all her art, she is but a baby in voodoo.”

“How long will you need?”

“Two hours, no more.”

“This had better work,” Gaynor said.

“Do not threaten me,” Dominga said.

Oh, goody, maybe the bad guys would fight and kill each other.

“I am paying you enough money to set up your own small country. I should get results for that.”

Dominga nodded her head. “You pay well, that is true. I will not fail you. If I can compel Anita to kill another person, then I can compel her to help me in my zombie business. She will help me rebuild what she forced me to destroy. It has a certain irony, no?”

Gaynor smiled like a demented elf. “I like it.”

“Well, I don't,” I said.

He frowned at me. “You will do as you are told. You have been very naughty.”

Naughty? Me?

Bruno had worked himself close to us. He was leaning heavily on the wall, but his gun was very steadily pointed at the center of my chest. “I'd like to kill you now,” he said. His voice sounded raw with pain.

“A dislocated knee hurts like hell, doesn't it?” I smiled when I said it. Better dead than a willing servant of the voodoo queen.

I think he ground his teeth. The gun wavered just a little, but I think that was rage, not pain. “I will enjoy killing you.”

“You didn't do so good last time. I think the judges would have given the match to me.”

“There are no fucking judges here. I am going to kill you.”

“Bruno,” Gaynor said, “we need her alive and whole.”

“After she raises the zombie?” Bruno asked.

“If she is a willing servant of the Señora, then you are not to hurt her. If the compulsion doesn't work, then you may kill her.”

Bruno gave a fierce flash of teeth. It was more snarl than smile. “I hope the spell fails.”

Gaynor glanced at his bodyguard. “Don't let personal feelings interfere with business, Bruno.”

Bruno swallowed hard. “Yes, sir.” It didn't sound like a title that came easily to him.

Enzo came around the corner behind Dominga. He stayed near the wall as far from her “creation” as he could get.

Antonio had finally lost his job as bodyguard. It was just as well. He was much better suited to stool pigeon.

Tommy came limping down the hall, still sort of scrunched over himself. The big Magnum was in his hands. His face was nearly purple with rage, or maybe pain. “I'm gonna kill you,” he hissed.

“Take a number,” I said.

“Enzo, you help Bruno and Tommy tie this little girl to a chair in the room. She's a lot more dangerous than she seems,” Gaynor said.

Enzo grabbed my arm. I didn't fight him. I figured I was safer in his hands than either of the other two. Tommy and Bruno both looked as if they were looking forward to me trying something. I think they wanted to hurt me.

As Enzo led me past them, I said, “Is it because I'm a woman or are you always this bad at losing?”

“I'm gonna shoot her,” Tommy grunted.

“Later,” Gaynor said, “later.”

I wondered if he really meant that. If Dominga's spell worked, I'd be like a living zombie, obeying her will. If the spell didn't work, then Tommy and Bruno would kill me, a piece at a time. I hoped there was a third choice.

T
HE THIRD CHOICE
was being tied to a chair in the room where I woke up. It was the best of the three choices, but that wasn't saying much. I don't like being tied up. It means your options have gone from few to none. Dominga had clipped some of my hair and the tips of my fingernails. Hair and nails for her compulsion spell. Shit.

The chair was old and straight-backed. My wrists were tied to the slats that made up the back of the chair. Ankles tied separately to a leg of the chair. The ropes were tight. I tugged at the ropes, hoping for some slack. There wasn't any.

I had been tied up before, and I always have this Houdini fantasy that this time I'll have enough slack to wiggle free. It never works that way. Once you're tied up, you stay tied up until someone lets you go.

The trouble was when they let me go, they were going to try a nasty little spell on me. I had to get away before then. Somehow, I had to get away. Dear God, please let me get away.

The door opened as if on cue, but it wasn't help.

Bruno entered, carrying Wanda in his arms. Blood had dried down the right side of her face from a cut above the eye. Her left cheek was ripe with a huge bruise. The lower lip had burst in a still bleeding cut. Her eyes were shut. I wasn't even sure she was conscious.

I had an aching line on the left side of my face where Bruno had kicked me, but it was nothing to Wanda's injuries.

“Now what?” I asked Bruno.

“Some company for you. When she wakes up, ask her what else Tommy did to her. See if that will persuade you to raise the zombie.”

“I thought Dominga was going to bespell me into helping you.”

He shrugged. “Gaynor doesn't put much faith in her since she screwed up so badly.”

“He doesn't give second chances, I guess,” I said.

“No, he doesn't.” He laid Wanda on the floor near me. “You best take his offer, girl. One dead whore and you get a million dollars. Take it.”

“You're going to use Wanda for the sacrifice,” I said. My voice sounded tired even to me.

“Gaynor don't give second chances.”

I nodded. “How's your knee?”

He grimaced. “I put it back in place.”

“That must have hurt like hell,” I said.

“It did. If you don't help Gaynor, you're going to find out exactly how much it hurt.”

“An eye for an eye,” I said.

He nodded and stood. He favored his right leg. He caught me looking at the leg.

“Talk to Wanda. Decide what you want to end up as. Gaynor's talking about making you a cripple, then keeping you around as his toy. You don't want that.”

“How can you work for him?”

He shrugged. “Pays real well.”

“Money isn't everything.”

“Spoken by somebody who's never gone hungry.”

He had me there. I just looked at him. We stared at each other for a few minutes. There was something human in his eyes at last. I couldn't read it though. Whatever emotion it was, it was nothing I understood.

He turned and left the room.

I stared down at Wanda. She lay on her side without moving. She
was wearing another long multicolored skirt. A white blouse with a wide lace collar was half-ripped from one shoulder. The bra she wore was the color of plums. I bet there had been panties to match before Tommy got hold of her.

“Wanda,” I said it softly. “Wanda, can you hear me?”

Her head moved slowly, painfully. One eye opened wide and panic-stricken. The other eye was glued shut with dried blood. Wanda pawed at the eye, frantic for a moment. When she could open both eyes, she blinked at me. Her eyes took a moment to focus and really see who it was. What had she expected to see in those first few panicked moments? I didn't want to know.

“Wanda, can you speak?”

“Yes.” The voice was soft, but clear.

I wanted to ask if she was alright, but I knew the answer to that. “If you can get over here and free me, I'll get us out of here.”

She looked at me like I'd lost my mind. “We can't get out. Harold's gonna kill us.” She made that last sound like a statement of pure fact.

“I don't believe in giving up, Wanda. Untie me and I'll think of something.”

“He'll hurt me if I help you,” she said.

“He's planning on you being the human sacrifice to raise his ancestor. How much more hurt can you get?”

She blinked at me, but her eyes were clearing. It was almost as if panic were a drug, and Wanda was fighting off the influence. Or maybe it was Harold Gaynor who was the drug. Yeah, that made sense. She was a junkie. A Harold Gaynor junkie. Every junkie is willing to die for one more fix. But I wasn't.

“Untie me, Wanda, please. I can get us out of this.”

“And if you can't?”

“Then we're no worse off,” I said.

She seemed to think about that for a minute. I strained for sounds from the hallway. If Bruno came back while we were in the middle of escaping, it would be very bad.

Wanda propped herself up on her arms. Her legs trailed out behind her under the skirt, dead, no movement at all. She began dragging herself towards me. I thought it would be slow work, but she moved
quickly. The muscles in her arms bunched and pushed, working well. She was by the chair in a matter of minutes.

I smiled. “You're very strong.”

“My arms are all I have. They have to be strong,” Wanda said.

She started picking at the ropes that bound my right wrist. “It's too tight.”

“You can do it, Wanda.”

She picked at the knot with her fingers, until after what seemed hours, but was probably about five minutes, I felt the rope give. Slack, I had slack. Yea!

“You've almost got it, Wanda.” I felt like a cheerleader.

The sound of footsteps clattered down the hall towards us. Wanda's battered face stared up at me, terror in her eyes. “There's not time,” she whispered.

“Go back where you were. Do it. We'll finish later,” I said.

Wanda hand-walked back to where Bruno had laid her. She had just arranged herself into nearly the same position when the door opened. Wanda was pretending to be unconscious, not a bad idea.

Tommy stood in the doorway. He'd taken off his jacket and the black webbing of the shoulder rig stood out on his white polo shirt. Black jeans emphasized his pinched-in waist. He looked top-heavy from lifting so many weights.

He'd added one new thing to the outfit. A knife. He twirled it in his hand like a baton. It was almost a perfect sheen of light. Manual dexterity. Wowee.

“I didn't know you used a knife, Tommy.” My voice sounded calm, normal, amazing.

He grinned. “I have a lot of talents. Gaynor wants to know if you've changed your mind about the zombie raising.”

It wasn't exactly a question, but I answered it. “I won't do it.”

His grin widened. “I was hoping you'd say that.”

“Why?” I was afraid I knew the answer.

“Because he sent me in here to persuade you.”

I stared at the glittering knife, I couldn't help myself. “With a knife?”

“With something else long and hard, but not so cold,” he said.

“Rape?” I asked. The word sort of hung there in the hot, still air.

He nodded, grinning like a damn Cheshire cat. I wished I could make him disappear except for his smile. I wasn't afraid of his smile. It was the other end I was worried about.

I jerked at the ropes helplessly. The right wrist gave a little more. Had Wanda loosened the rope enough? Had she? Please God, let it be.

Tommy stood over me. I stared up the length of his body and what I saw in his eyes was nothing human. There were all sorts of ways to become a monster. Tommy had found one. There was nothing but an animal hunger in his gaze. Nothing human left.

He put a leg on either side of the chair, straddling me without sitting down. His flat stomach was pressed against my face. His shirt smelled of expensive after-shave. I jerked my head back, trying not to touch him.

He laughed and ran fingers through the tight waves of my hair. I tried to jerk my head out of his reach, but he grabbed a handful of hair and forced my head back.

“I'm going to enjoy this,” he said.

I didn't dare jerk at the ropes. If my wrist came free he'd see it. I had to wait, wait until he was distracted enough not to notice. The thought of what I might have to do to distract him, allow him to do to me, made my stomach hurt. But staying alive was the goal. Everything else was gravy. I didn't really believe that, but I tried.

He sat down on me, his weight settling on my legs. His chest was pressed against my face, and there was nothing I could do about it.

He rubbed the flat of the knife across my cheek. “You can stop this anytime. Just say yes, and I'll tell Gaynor.” His voice was already growing thick. I could feel him growing hard where he was pressed against my belly.

The thought of Tommy using me like that was almost enough to make me say yes. Almost. I jerked on the ropes and the right one gave a little more. One more hard tug and I could get free. But I'd have just one hand to Tommy's two, and he had a gun and a knife. Not good odds, but it was the best I was going to get tonight.

He kissed me, forcing his tongue in my mouth. I didn't respond, because he wouldn't have believed that. I didn't bite his tongue either because I wanted him close. With only one hand free, I needed him
close. I needed to do major damage with one hand. What? What could I do?

He nuzzled my neck, face buried in my hair on the left side. Now or never. I pulled with everything I had and the right wrist popped free. I froze. Surely he'd felt it, but he was too busy sucking on my neck to notice. His free hand massaged my breast.

He had his eyes closed as he kissed to the right side of my neck. His eyes were closed. The knife was loose in his other hand. Nothing I could do about the knife. Had to take the chance. Had to do it.

I caressed the side of his face, and he nuzzled my hand. Then his eyes opened. It had occurred to him that I was supposed to be tied. I plunged my thumb into his open eye. I dug it in, feeling the wet pop as his eye exploded.

He shrieked, rearing back, hand to his eye. I grabbed the wrist with the knife and held on. The screams were going to bring reinforcements. Dammit.

Strong arms wrapped around Tommy's waist and pulled him backwards. I grabbed the knife as he slid to the floor. Wanda was struggling to hold him. The pain was so severe, it hadn't occurred to him to go for his gun. Putting out an eye hurts and panics a lot more than a kick to the groin.

I cut my other hand free and knicked my arm doing it. If I hurried too much, I'd end up slitting my own wrist. I forced myself to be more careful slicing my ankles free.

Tommy had managed to get free of Wanda. He staggered to his feet, one hand still over the eye. Blood and clear liquid trailed down his face. “I'll kill you!” He reached for his gun.

I reversed my grip on the knife and threw it. It thunked into his arm. I'd been aiming for his chest. He screamed again. I picked up the chair and smashed it into his face. Wanda grabbed his ankles, and Tommy went down.

I pounded at his face with the chair until the chair broke apart in my hands. Then I beat him with a chair leg until his face was nothing but a bloody mess.

“He's dead,” Wanda said. She was tugging at my pants leg. “He's dead. Let's get out of here.”

I dropped the blood-coated chair leg and collapsed to my knees. I couldn't swallow. I couldn't breathe. I was splattered with blood. I'd never beaten someone to death before. It had felt good. I shook my head. Later, I'd worry about it later.

Wanda put an arm over my shoulders. I grabbed her around the waist, and we stood. She weighed a lot less than she should have. I didn't want to see what was under the pretty skirt. It wasn't a full set of legs, but for once that was good. She was easier to move.

I had Tommy's gun in my right hand. “I need this hand free, so hold on tight.”

Wanda nodded. Her face was very pale. I could feel her heart pounding against her ribs. “We're going to get out of this,” I said.

“Sure,” but her voice was shaky. I don't think she believed me. I wasn't sure I believed me.

Wanda opened the door, and out we went.