The Undead Kama Sutra fg-3
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I told her my experience with the spider bite and that it had left me worse off.
She stuck the bottle back into her bag and slipped out pages from The Undead Kama Sutra. “And this?”
“Carmen about had it figured out.”
“So it works?”
“She was close.”
Phyllis nodded, allowing herself a fleeting expression of regret. She put the pages back in the bag. She pursed her lips and whistled. The dog perked its ears and loped back to her. She clipped the leash to its collar.
“Later, Felix. Try and stay out of trouble.” Her aura pulsed and she smiled. “For as long as you can.”
Chapter
56
I sat where my adventures usually began. In my office on the second floor of the Oriental Theater in Denver, Colorado.
I flipped from website to website on my laptop. The owners of the Grand Atlantic Resort blamed a foiled robbery for the shootout week before last. The hotel canceled all reservations and conferences, citing security concerns and structural damage. Two days later the resort was sold to Cress Tech International, and the next morning, the assault ship USS Bonhomme Richard arrived off the shore of Hilton Head Island. Helicopters ferried a battalion of marines, who formed a perimeter around the hotel complex. Landing craft shuttled Seabees and their heavy equipment from the ship to the beach. The sailors quickly demolished the hotel and surrounding buildings. They hauled the debris to the beach, where a dredging crane clawed through the piles and dumped them onto a barge guarded by patrol boats. By the time the sun had set the next day, all that remained of the Grand Atlantic was a shallow hole littered with concrete, broken glass, and twisted lengths of rebar.
The Beaufort County citizens’ coalition threatened to sue the federal government and Cress Tech for violating scores of environmental and economic impact laws. The Hilton Head Association of Retirees also threatened to sue, because the noise from the demolition had ruined their golfing “experience.”
No mention of aliens or kidnapped women. A link on one of the websites told about a helicopter from the Department of Homeland Security, recovered from a marsh inland of the Carolina coast. A spokesman from Homeland Security didn’t say if the incident was related to what happened at the Grand Atlantic.
Rizè-Blu announced that it was temporarily suspending production of its cosmetic actualizers Olympicin, NuGrumatex, Luvitmor, and Tigernene, citing problems with quality control. The price of Rizè-Blu shares fell, and a Swiss spokes-blonde stated that the drop in production had nothing to do with the sudden cancellation of all the Eden Water-Green Planet projects, Rizè-Blu’s partnership with Cress Tech.
Of course, I knew the truth. Clayborn had told me that without updating the formula, the actualizers would be useless. Without the profits of the actualizers, Rizè-Blu and Cress Tech couldn’t afford their scheme to take over the Earth’s fresh water using Eden Water-Green Planet.
I never found out the number of women kidnapped or the number of innocent people killed as “collateral damage.” Vanessa Tico and Janice Wyndersook remained listed as dead in the plane crash.
I turned off and shut my laptop.
Where did this leave me? And the aliens?
I thought about the characters I’d met during this adventure. The ones I’d killed-Goodman, Krandall, and Peltier. The one who paid the ultimate price for helping me-Karen Beck. The one who had saved me-the homeless drunk Earl in Kansas City. I still owed him. Plus the fiery Jolie and her chum Antoine. I knew I’d see them again. As I would Phyllis from the Araneum. That was a meeting I hoped would never take place, since it would mean the aliens were back.
And then there was Carmen.
I collected the pages of her unfinished manuscript for The Undead Kama Sutra. I shuffled them and pulled a page at random.
Title: “Maid Churning Butter.” The drawing showed a female vampire astride a mortal man. Her feet were on top of his face and her hands on his hips. She pumped herself by flicking her wrists. Obviously, she needed either exceptionally strong wrists or the power of levitation to make this position work.
The eroticism escaped me. I didn’t see two lovers flailing in passion. I instead saw Carmen taking notes and trying to fathom the spiritual undertow as would a hydrographer studying the ocean currents.
I slipped the page back and thumbed the manuscript. The drawings flashed by in a shifting kaleidoscope of carnal contortions.
Carmen was on to something, something deep and spiritual beyond the ken of the undead.
Where was she? How could I find her? What were they-whoever, or whatever, they were-doing to her? I fought to keep my imagination from running amok with gruesome images.
I blamed myself for what happened to Carmen. She was a victim of my hubris. We should’ve been more careful. It wasn’t the alien gangster Clayborn who had captured her, it had been his human accomplices. Fortunately, if there was an untarnished spot anywhere in this fiasco, it was that Clayborn and the humans remained convinced that we vampires were a rival alien species. For now, the secrets of the undead realm remained safe.
I could keep Gilbert Odin’s money (the original fake Odin) in good conscience. Good conscience. There I go again. What kind of a vampire was I?
As for any hope of rescuing Carmen, I could only wait until the improbable happened again.
My desk phone rang. I set the manuscript down and picked up the phone’s receiver. “Felix Gomez speaking.”
A man replied, his voice husky and eager. “Mr. Gomez, private detective?”
The timing of the call seemed too coincidental. My kundalini noir stirred. My fingertips tingled. I clumsily sketched a UFO on my desk blotter. “Yes.”
“Good. I’d like an appointment. I have uh…a delicate situation to discuss.”
It’s always a delicate situation. “Your name, sir?”
“Charles Mancinelli.”
“Does this situation involve extraterrestrials, Mr. Mancinelli?”
“Extraterrestrials? You mean like aliens? Hell, no. This is something legitimate.”
“Sorry, I had to ask.” My kundalini noir calmed. My fingertips stilled. I drew a line through the UFO, crossing it out. “Please continue.”
“Yeah, I imagine a man in your line of work gets a lot of nut jobs. Extraterrestrials. Aliens.” Mancinelli laughed. “Little green men. Go figure.”
I didn’t feel like laughing. “Let’s get to your case.”
“You’re a serious guy, aren’t you?”
“You want to hire a clown, check the Yellow Pages.”
“Okay, let me tell you about my case. Hold on. It’ll astound you.”
I doubted it.
Acknowledgments
Thanks to the crew at HarperCollins. At Eos: my publisher, Lisa Gallagher, my editor, Diana Gill, her assistant, Emily Krump, marketing manager, Michael Barrs, and publicist, Jack Womack. For their great support at Rayo: publisher, Rene Alegria, and publicist, Gretchen Crary. A special appreciation to my agent, Scott Hoffman, at Folio Literary Management, LLC, and to the Peter Miller Literary and Film Management, Inc. Thanks to CJ Lyons for the tour of Hilton Head Island and not feeding me to the alligators. I wouldn’t have gotten this far without the huzzahs from my critique group: Jeanne Stein, Sandy Maren, Jeff Shelby, and Tom and Margie Lawson. Special props to the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers, the Lighthouse Writers Workshop, LaBloga, Mystery Writers of America, and El Centro Su Teatro. I owe much to the friendship and advice of Erika Paterson and Eric Matelski. Lastly, where would I be without the crank comments from my family: Tia Angelica, Sylvia, Armando, Janet, my sons, Alex and Emil, and Uncle Sam and Tia Alma. Happy fanging everyone.
About the Author
Aformer infantry and aviation officer, Mario Acevedo lives and writes in Denver, Colorado. The bestselling author of The Nymphos of Rocky Flats and X-Rated Bloodsuckers, he has worked as a military helicopter pilot, engineer, and art teacher.
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te HarperCollins author.
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