Rave reviews for Diana Rowland’s White Trash Zombie novels:
“Angel continues to be a truly memorable character as she displays ample guts and determination when defending those she cares about. . . . With two stellar urban fantasy series running concurrently, Rowland expertly showcases the full range of her considerable talents. Awesome job!”
—RT Book Reviews (top pick)
“So far, this has been an incredibly fun series, and a breath of fresh air in an increasingly crowded field. While there’s no denying that the basic premise is fascinating and entertaining, the real draw here is Angel’s personal journey of growth and self-discovery. . . . Angel’s a heroine worth cheering for.”
—Tor.com
“If you haven’t discovered this series, you’re in for a treat. Angel is one of my favorite heroines in urban fantasy right now, and I can’t wait to see what she’s up to next!”
—My Bookish Ways
“This spiraling roller coaster is as full of heart as blood (and brains and guts), exploring themes of love, sacrifice, guilt, and vengeance amid splattery action. This orgy of super science, roadhouse rumbles, and slapstick supernaturalism should satisfy readers searching for blood-soaked fun.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Rowland’s delightful novel jumps genre lines with a little something for everyone—mystery, horror, humor, and even a smattering of romance. Not to be missed—all that’s required is a high tolerance for gray matter. For true zombiephiles, of course, that’s a no brainer.”
—Library Journal
“Every bit as fun and trashy as the brilliant cover. The story is gory and gorgeous with plenty of humor and a great new protagonist to root for.”
—All Things Urban Fantasy
Also by Diana Rowland:
SECRETS OF THE DEMON
SINS OF THE DEMON
TOUCH OF THE DEMON
FURY OF THE DEMON
VENGEANCE OF THE DEMON
LEGACY OF THE DEMON*
MY LIFE AS A WHITE TRASH ZOMBIE
EVEN WHITE TRASH ZOMBIES GET THE BLUES
WHITE TRASH ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE
HOW THE WHITE TRASH ZOMBIE GOT HER GROOVE BACK
WHITE TRASH ZOMBIE GONE WILD
*Coming in 2016 from DAW
Copyright © 2015 by Diana Rowland.
All Rights Reserved.
Cover art by Daniel Dos Santos.
Cover design by G-Force Design.
DAW Book Collectors No. 1709.
Published by DAW Books, Inc.
375 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014.
ISBN 978-1-101-60868-5
All characters and events in this book are fictitious.
All resemblance to persons living or dead is coincidental.
The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal, and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.
Nearly all the designs and trade names in this book are registered trademarks. All that are still in commercial use are protected by United States and international trademark law.
First Printing, October 2015
DAW TRADEMARK REGISTERED
U.S. PAT. OFF AND FOREIGN COUNTRIES
—MARCA REGISTRADA
HECHO EN U.S.A.
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Contents
Praise
Also by Diana Rowland
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
For Anna
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
For their help and assistance—whether educational, informational, emotional, or physical—I owe the following people (and countless others) enormous thanks: Scott Knight, Jodi Levine, Matt Saver, Gerard Bultman, Sherry Rowland, Kat Johnson, Myke Cole, Mary Robinette Kowal, Peter Brett, Wes Chu, Roman White, Justin Landon, Jen Volant, Debbie Roma, Charlie Watson, Dan Dos Santos, Carrie Vaughn, Daniel Abraham, Kat Abraham, Ty Franck, Howard Tayler, Sandra Tayler, Betsy Wollheim, Marylou Capes-Platt, Joshua Starr, everyone at DAW, Domino’s, Walter Jon Williams, Jack Hoffstadt, Anna Hoffstadt, Matt Bialer, Lindsay Ribar, and social media.
Chapter 1
Blood and fat greased the thick needle as I fought to work it through the slab of flesh. I’d closed up hundreds of bodies after autopsies, and could usually sew up the Y-incision in nothing flat. But of course the day I had plans for lunch, the corpse had a beer gut the size of a keg.
“Omentum,” I said through gritted teeth, pulling the string through. “That’s what all the lard in this dude’s gut is called.”
Derrel Cusimano looked up from his clipboard, wide mouth curving into a smile. “Look at you with all your college biology smarts.”
“Yeah, well, Mr. Granger’s omentum has too much momentum,” I grumbled, earning me a laugh. A linebacker for LSU turned death investigator, Derrel had been my partner for most of my time with the Coroner’s Office. We weren’t permanent partners anymore, thanks to my ever-changing work schedule, but we still made one hell of a pair—short, skinny, white girl with bleached blonde hair, and a hugely muscled, bald, black guy who was easily the most compassionate person I’d ever met.
The faint scent of Mr. Granger’s brain teased me from the bag of organs between his knees. A rush of saliva filled my mouth, and my hands trembled. The smell of baking bread was as appetizing as dog shit compared to the delicious aroma of a fresh human brain. And hoo boy, I needed that brain. Now. “I thought you were leaving for lunch ten minutes ago.”
“Leaving for the day,” Derrel corrected as he scribbled notes. “Checking my last report now. I’m off ’til Tuesday.”
The needle slipped against the slick flesh, drove into my gloved middle finger and ripped through the side. I clamped down on a yelp of pain and yanked it free, then shot a look at Derrel. To my undying relief, he was focused on his report and hadn’t noticed a thing. Needle sticks were bad news, and no way did I want to deal with the paperwork and tests and other crap.
Especially since I had nothing to worry about. Not with my zombie parasite on internal cleanup duty. But the injury twisted my brain-hunger a notch tighter. Shit. I couldn’t forage for that particular sustenance until Derrel left. At the rate he was going, he’d still be here tomorrow.
The blood from my finger and the body mingled as I continued to wr
estle with needle and string. “You’re almost done though, right?”
Derrel gave me a knowing look over the clipboard. “You trying to get rid of me?”
I batted my eyelashes. “Would I do that?” My stomach made an obnoxious gurgle.
Derrel chuckled. “Sounds like someone skipped breakfast. I can finish sewing him up if you want to head out for lunch.”
“No!” I cleared my throat, annoyed at how nervous I sounded. “I mean, no. I’m on call tonight, so I’m taking a long lunch then cutting out of here early. Don’t let me hold you up from your days off.” I struggled to get the damn needle through for the next stitch. “I have this under control.”
Derrel hung the clipboard on its hook and tugged on gloves. “I can see that.”
Cripes. He was never going to leave. The scent of his warm, live brain wafted over me as he stepped close. Didn’t he know I was starving? I focused on the needle.
Derrel held the dead guy’s impressive belly together so I could stitch. “You going tonight?”
I didn’t have to ask what he meant. For the past month, zombies and movies had dominated conversations all over St. Edwards Parish, even crowding out the juicy scandal involving the Chief of Police and a box of ferrets back on Valentine’s Day. The movie High School Zombie Apocalypse!! had been filmed here in Tucker Point, and its nationwide release was this very weekend. A few hundred locals had made it into the movie in bit parts or as extras, and I couldn’t think of a single person who didn’t have plans to go see it, if only to watch the scene where the mayor—played by the actual mayor of Tucker Point—ended up covered in blood and zombie splatter.
And tonight Tucker Point was home to a big red carpet premiere, complete with celebrities and all sorts of other cool stuff.
“Yep, I’m going with Marcus.” Three more stitches and I’d be done. Then I could get away from Derrel and his brain before I—
“You two back together?”
In my head, I let out a primal scream of frustration at his refusal to leave. Outwardly, I faked a casual shrug. “Nah, but we’re still friends. It’s nice having someone to talk to. We’re both going through a lot of changes right now, with me starting college and him taking over his Uncle Pietro’s business.” I didn’t mention that business also involved Marcus becoming the public head of our zombie Tribe.
“Uh huh,” Derrel said with a dubious twist of his mouth. “As long as it stays ‘nice’ and he doesn’t try and run your life again because he thinks he knows what’s best for you.”
I smiled as I made the last stitch. “You have the best brain ever.”
Derrel let out a booming laugh. “Angel Crawford, I think that’s the weirdest thing anyone has ever said to me.”
Crap. So much for think before you speak. My stomach gave an almighty gurgle loud enough to wake the dead. I clamped a forearm over my belly. “Oh, jeez.”
He clapped me on the back then steadied me as I staggered. “Let’s get Mr. Granger into the cooler so you can go feed yourself.”
Sigh. The guy was a seriously nice pain in my ass. He was thinking burgers. I was thinking brains. Didn’t help one bit that all the effort to get the body bagged, on the gurney, and rolled into the cooler fired Derrel up like a brain-scented plug-in air freshener.
I breathed easier once we were out of the close confines of the cooler. “I can handle it from here,” I told him. “Go have fun.” I disposed of my gloves and protective gear, then hurried to wash my hands before Derrel could spy the blood on my finger. My parasite had done its job and stopped the bleeding, but I needed brains now for it to finish the healing.
Derrel tossed his gloves into the medical waste can. “I’ll be hiding out at home.” With that he smushed me against his massive chest in a hug—and immersed me in brain scent.
A low growl escaped before I could clamp down on it. Oh god, Derrel, please leave before I eat you!
“Call me if you need anything,” he said, releasing me.
“Will do,” I choked out and covered my dismay by pretending to push my nose back into place. He chuckled then grabbed his jacket and departed, leaving me alone in the morgue.
My hunger thrashed like a bobcat in a trap, yowling at me to chase Derrel down before my meal could escape. I tightened my hands into fists and breathed through clenched teeth until the monster within me settled. Now that Derrel was finally gone, I’d give it what it wanted.
I held my breath and listened for any hint of another living soul in the morgue.
The drip of the sink in the cutting room. The low hum of the cooler behind me. But no voices or footsteps. Not even the tiniest fart. I relaxed and exhaled, slipped back inside the cooler and tugged the heavy door closed. The cold air lifted goosebumps along my arms, and an underlying stench tickled the back of my throat—blood and rot and antiseptic. The morgue cooler had shelf space for ten bodies, but at the moment the only resident was the one on the gurney Derrel and I had rolled in here a few minutes ago.
Blood pounded in my ears, and a chill swept through me that had nothing to do with temperature. Even though I’d raided corpses more times than I could count, the fear-of-discovery adrenaline rush still hit me every single time.
“Get it done and get out, Angel,” I muttered as I gave the zipper a tug. It slithered open to once again reveal Noah Granger, dull eyes half-closed and lips parted. White male, fifty-nine years old, dead of a heart attack—confirmed by the clot that Dr. Leblanc had found in his left anterior descending coronary artery.
Sucked for Noah, but good for me. The faulty heart rested in the clear plastic bag between his knees along with his kidneys, liver, lungs—and the brain I was after.
My mouth watered as I unknotted the bag. I snatched a chunk of frontal lobe and shoved it into my mouth. It slid down my throat with the consistency of a raw oyster but tasted a thousand times better. A warm tingle like life itself rippled through me. The tear in my finger closed, healing without a trace, and I breathed a sigh of deep pleasure. A second brain chunk settled the hunger enough that I wouldn’t try to eat the next person I ran into.
It used to freak me out that human brains tasted so damn good, but I got over that in no time. The guilt was harder to shrug off, but the unpleasant truth was that I needed to eat human brains to stay alive and in one piece. Moping about it was nothing more than a waste of time and energy. At least I wasn’t killing people for brains.
Not unless they tried to kill me first.
I scooped the rest of the brain pieces into a plastic freezer baggie then retied the organ bag and tucked it back between Mr. Granger’s knees. Hunger urged me to scarf down another chunk, but my tattered self-control told the hunger to sit its ass down and wait until I was in a safer place. That settled, I sealed the baggie nice and tight then wiped a dribble of bloody yuck off its side.
The clunk of the cooler door handle sent my heart spasming like an electrified frog. I whirled to face the doorway, jerked the baggie behind me and shoved it into the back of my pants even as the Chief Investigator—my supervisor—stepped in.
“Allen!” I forced out a laugh and put on my best I’m-so-innocent face. “You, uh, scared the crap out of me.”
He regarded me for an endless second then frowned at the body. Holy shit, was I ever glad I’d already closed the organ bag.
Allen flicked his eyes back to me. “What are you doing, Angel?”
“I was double-checking that all the property had been logged.” I tried for an easy smile but it felt more like a freaked-out grimace. I’d rehearsed clever lies for this sort of thing a hundred times, and here I’d managed to blurt out the worst one to use on Allen. Ever since an incident last year involving missing property, Allen checked and logged each case personally. Shitfuckgoddamn.
Mouth tightening, Allen stepped to the gurney. I shifted away to give him space, and the baggie slipped down the back of my pants to t
he bottom of my scrawny butt. I froze as I envisioned the baggie sliding down my pant leg to flop onto the floor. That would be epic.
Allen pulled the zipper open all the way to Mr. Granger’s feet. With his attention off me, I arched my lower back to stick my butt out, trapping the baggie between my pants and the crack of my ass, then edged back against a steel cadaver shelf until the baggie squished, pinned in place. Except now I was equally trapped, since I couldn’t move without risking the baggie going plop. I also couldn’t lean back and chill, since all I needed to make the day perfect would be for the bag to bust open and spill brain splooge down my legs. I doubted Allen would believe I was having the Worst Period Ever.
“Did you find anything amiss?” Allen asked.
My pulse stumbled. “With the, uh, property?”
“That’s what we’re talking about, isn’t it?”
“Yeah,” I said. “I mean, no, I didn’t find anything. Looks like everything got inventoried.” God almighty, I hoped nothing had been left on the body. I’d been so focused on the brains, Mr. Granger could’ve been wearing the Hope Diamond as a nose ring, and I wouldn’t have noticed.
Allen’s eyes lingered on the organ bag, and my gut did a somersault. If he noticed the missing brains, I’d be fired and charged with . . . hell, I didn’t know what I’d be charged with, but I had no doubt that stealing organs was illegal. And I knew that Chief Asshole Allen Prejean would demand full prosecution. The pathologist, Dr. Leblanc, had my back for most on-the-job issues, but I couldn’t see him stepping in to save me on this one. What was the punishment for corpse desecration anyway?
Damn it, why hadn’t I made absolutely sure everyone was gone from the whole back of the building before doing something so risky? Hey, maybe for my next trick I could munch on a brain in the break room and hope no one noticed. Moron.
Allen zipped the body bag without checking the organs. My heart finally descended from my throat.
“I need to see you in my office after lunch,” he said, words crashing over me like a wave of ice water.