Bloody Banquet: The Corpse-Eater Saga, #2

By Leod Fitz

It's been a while since Walter prevented a coup by a psychopathic neckbiter, and all he wants to do now is get back to life as usual. But vampires don't forget, and they never forgive, so when some monsters he's never met before think that Walter is hiding something he's never heard of before, it's a pretty safe bet that he knows who's behind it. Unfortunately for this ghoul, knowing who's responsible and being able to do something about it are two very different things.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Leod Fitz
• Release date: Oct 3, 2017
• ISBN: 9798201453428

Book preview

Chapter 2

Sherry left a few hours before sunrise. She waited until I was in the shower, probably so she wouldn't have to come up with an excuse for why she couldn't help me clean up.

Not that I minded, my preemptive measures had contained most of the mess. There was some blood on the ceiling, but I licked that off without much trouble. A foot-and-a-half long tongue comes in handy for things like that.

The rest of the carnage was captured by the plastic, which I rolled up and dumped in the back of my truck. I'd dispose of that later.

The mattress went on top of the plastic, upside down to hide the slashes and stains. A pair of straps secured my load in place. I'd take all of it back to the dump, sometime after hours and toss it over the fence. I checked the room once more for stains, then started putting the furniture back in its place, or as close as I could remember.

My mind wandered as I worked. Mostly it wandered in the same direction: Sherry. The longer I knew her the less certain I was how I felt about her.

Objectively, she was one of the least pleasant people I knew. Worse, in many ways, than Percy. She was egotistical and insulting, accepting anything I did for her as her due. She was also a neckbiter, which didn't win her any points as far as I was concerned, though it did kind of explain why she was such a sociopath. Or maybe being a sociopath was why a vampire decided to turn her. I was never really clear on that.

And it wasn’t as if we had anything in common. We didn't ever actually talk about anything, unless it was to trade insults or argue. If we weren't having sex, we were fighting. Sometimes we fought during sex.

Or she'd complain about her damned stomach ache. I was actually starting to get worried about that. As far as I knew, vampires couldn't get sick. When she wasn’t blaming the pigs’ blood for her discomfort, she claimed that the problem was my blood. Not that it stopped her from drinking it, she just liked to complain about it afterward.

Everything about the woman grated on me, but I couldn't deny that I had feelings towards her. Strong ones.

She was the first woman who'd slept with me without charging, and maybe that was all there was to it. The few teenagers I'd known growing up had believed that they were desperately in love with their first sexual partner. Perhaps I was experiencing the same thing, just a decade and change later.

The big question was whether or not she felt anything for me. It wasn't a question I could actually ask; at best, she'd mock me for it, at worst, she'd give me an honest answer.

Once the room was back to its usual shoddy condition, I grabbed the spare set of work clothes out of my truck, changed, and dropped the room key off at the office.

Thirty minutes later I pulled into the front parking lot, spotting three vehicles I didn't recognize parked next to Percy's blue Oldsmobile. Apparently, his friends had decided to come visit him early. Usually the kind of people Percy dealt with liked to get up around noon.

I pulled around to the back of the building.

As many times as I'd caught my assistant pulling a quick one on my property, I had never managed to instill in him any lasting fear or respect. If I wanted to make an impression, I'd have to go a little farther this time. After some consideration, I hopped out of the cab and grabbed a crowbar out of the truck bed. Instead of heading in through the back door, I rounded the building, running the edge of the crowbar along the side of Percy's car.

When I came even with his front door, I tucked the curved end of the crowbar under his front tire and pulled back until I heard hissing.

With a satisfied smile on my face, I twirled the crowbar around to smash one of his headlights and headed in the front door.

I was not surprised to find Percy in my lobby with five ugly bastards surrounding him. I was surprised to find Percy bleeding all over the floor of my lobby while the five ugly bastards kicked the shit out of him.

At the sound of my entrance, three of the men turned, pulling guns. The other two, it seemed, were too absorbed with working over Percy to notice me.

The first thing that occurred to me was that I could probably kill the lot of them and get away with it. After all, Percy wouldn't rat me out, and I had plenty of time to get rid of the evidence before the next viewing was scheduled.

The second thing that occurred to me was that they had probably been sent here by someone who would wonder what happened if they all just up and disappeared.

And I'd have to get rid of the cars somehow. That seemed like a lot of work.

Years of pretending to be intimidated by the baby vampires that liked to throw their newfound weight around had prepared me perfectly for this moment. I dropped the crowbar, held my hands up, making sure that they shook, opened my eyes wide, and let out a terrified squeak.

I considered shitting my pants as well, but decided that would be overkill. Besides, I wasn’t sure I had any good replacement plants on the property, and I didn’t want to have to run back home to change.

Who the hell are you?

I-I-I, this is my place. I swallowed and continued to shake my arms in faux-terror.

This guy works for you, Piss-pot? The leader of the group asked my employee, who was gasping desperately, now that the last two men had finally stopped kicking him.

H-he w-works for me, I sputtered.

The man raised an eyebrow at me. You're in charge?

I swallowed again and nodded. I w-work on the bodies and h-he deals with the customers.

The man stared at me blankly for a moment before his face broke into a grin. You work the bodies and he deals with the customers. That's priceless. That's fucking priceless. He turned toward his crew. No wonder this place made such a good front, half the people working here think it's legit!

A good front? Percy had been using my place in one of his damned schemes! Rage flooded me, but I quickly pushed it down. I'd deal with Percy later, after these jackasses had left. And after he'd had some time to recover. If I started in on him in his current condition and in my current mood, he probably wouldn't survive.

But when he did get back on his feet, we would definitely have words.

In the meantime, I needed to maintain appearances. What are you talking about? What front? What's going on here? Percy? Who are these people?

The leader of the group grinned. Me? I'm your business partner. Nicky Cullens.

Business partner? I don't have a business partner.

Oh, I beg to differ. Nicky waved his gun in Percy's general direction. I've invested a lot of time and money into your boy, here.

But what does that have to do with me?

Nicky stepped closer to me, poking me in the chest with his gun. Piss-pot Percy is running drugs out of your establishment. My drugs. Maybe you knew that, maybe you didn't. Truth is, I don't give a shit. The important thing is that he's been taking product from me, and selling it through you. Meaning you've been selling it for me. That makes you and me business partners.

But... but I didn't even know. I didn't....

You really think that matters? Nicky reached out and began adjusting my clothes. It was a power play on is part. I’d read a book on that sort of thing once. "Now, Percy was just trying to explain how he lost my product, and we were explaining to him how disappointed we were in him for being so irresponsible. Now, I was originally thinking we’d go through the place and see if there was anything here that was worth what he owed us, but looking at you, I’ve got another idea. I’m thinking I’m going to let you take over Piss-pot’s debt. You seem like the kind of guy who understands things like financial planning and general fiscal