Zombies! A Love Story

  Praise for the novels of

  Maggie Shayne

  “Maggie Shayne delivers romance with sweeping intensity and bewitching passion. Readers will lose themselves in her dark, enthralling brew of love, danger, and perilous fate.”

  —Jayne Ann Krentz

  “Maggie Shayne is a reader’s joy. Fast-paced, witty, delightful, and shamelessly romantic, her stories will be treasured long after the book is done. A remarkable talent.”

  —Teresa Medeiros

  "Shayne crafts a convincing world, tweaking vampire legends just enough to draw fresh blood."

  —Publishers Weekly on Demon's Kiss

  "Maggie Shayne is better than chocolate. She satisfies every wicked craving."

  —New York Times bestselling author Suzanne Forster

  "Tense . . . frightening . . . a page-turner in the best sense"

  —Romantic Times Magazine on Colder than Ice

  "A tasty, tension-packed read."

  —Publishers Weekly on Thicker Than Water

  Zombies!

  A Love Story

  * * *

  By

  MAGGIE SHAYNE

  Copyright 2013 by Margaret Benson

  www.MaggieShayne.com

  E-book and Cover Formatted by Jessica Lewis

  www.AuthorsLifeSaver.com

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your online retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Table of Contents

  * * *

  Title Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  * * *

  “CONGRATULATIONS,” I SAID, and offered the obligatory hug.

  Chuck hugged me back, pulling me so close that my head was pressed to his chest and I could feel his heart beating softly against my face. When he let me go, I couldn’t quite look him in the eye. Not yet. So I looked around instead. Midnight in the desert, encircled by red rocks.

  It wasn’t the typical way a newly minted biotech engineer would celebrate his degree. But Chuck was one of us, and we weren’t typical people. We were desert dwellers, southwest and sunshine to the roots of our hair. So we threw his welcome home-slash-congrats party the same way we’d celebrated everything from prom to graduation to summer vacation. In our hometown among the sandstone pillars, with a campfire, a tapped keg, twenty or so classmates, and an endless stack of red Solo cups.

  It was weird, to think of Chuck as a full blown scientist. Weird and sad for me. We’d been high school sweethearts, even though he was the biggest nerd in class. I liked that about him. The way he didn’t just run off at the mouth, but stopped and thought before speaking. The way I could almost see the wheels turning in that mega-brain of his during those drawn out silences, and how when he finally did answer, it was always with something brilliant.

  But I knew there was no future for us.

  I was home to stay, too. Fresh out of a series of non-accredited courses in holistic healing, organic horticulture, aroma therapy. I’d just finished an apprenticeship at a medical marijuana farm in Colorado, and I planned to open a health food and medicinal tea shop right here in Bloody Gulch, Arizona, with a loan from my mother.

  Chuck had a far different future. He was being courted by some very big corporations who were offering him huge salaries. His future was far from here, and way out of my league. He was going to end up being the Bill Gates of Biotech, while I would forever be the barefoot girl next door who doesn’t eat meat and probably leads protests outside his fancy office. I’d hold him back. And he’d drive me crazy. It would never work for us.

  And tonight was the night I was planning to tell him that.

  The fire crackled. I watched my BFF Sally munching on cheddar chips and wished I’d remembered my organic vegan ones at home. There wasn’t a snack-food here that didn’t contain dairy or GMOs. I sipped iced tea from my re-usable water bottle (made with recycled, toxin free plastic) and sat there in the dark staring at the flames between my two best friends, Sally Brown and her brother, Matthew, though I’d always called him Chuck. (Don’t worry if you don’t get the joke. Few people do, and even fewer find it funny.)

  I looked from one of them to the other, knowing the night would get more awkward. If that hug was anything to go by, Chuck seemed to be assuming we could pick up where we’d left off now that we were both home. We’d taken a break for the past year. My idea. My way of letting him down easy. But he wasn’t taking the hint. I was going to have to tell him.

  But not yet.

  “So, Chuck,” I asked across the fire, “Do you feel any different now that you’re all bonafide and whatnot?”

  Sally elbowed him. “She means now that you’re an official nerd, instead of an aspiring one.” She winked at me. “Hand me those chips, Suz.”

  I held out the nearest bag. “I can’t believe you’re eating those things. Did you even read the label?”

  “Here we go.” She rolled her eyes.

  “They’re made by Sonatta for crying out loud.” As far as I was concerned, the food industry giant was the devil. They had built a processing plant at the edge of town while I’d been away, and had leased local land for their franken-farming experiments.

  Sally looked at her brother. “So? Do you feel different?”

  Chuck shrugged, keeping his eyes lowered.

  Hell, he probably didn’t feel different at all. He was a genius. Had always been a genius. Sally was three years older, but he’d skipped two grades in elementary and one in high school, so he’d caught up to her. And me.

  “You’re awfully quiet, even for you, Chuck,” I said. “What’s going on?”

  He looked at me, then at his sister. I thought again that he’d grown better looking in the year since I’d seen him, and way better since high school. He had a decent haircut now, really short and sticking up a little. Enough to walk that line between carelessly tousled and deliberately spiky. It fit him, flattered him too. His style used to be a too long, too frizzy dirty blond school joke. He’d ditched his glasses for contacts, and from what I could tell, he’d been working out. He was wearing a jacket over his T-shirt, but his shoulders seemed wider, his waist, narrower, his butt in those jeans was not the butt I remembered. It was hardly fair for a guy as intelligent as him to have turned out to be so good looking too. I mean, come on Mother Nature. Cut someone else a break, why don’t you? “I think I’m very different,” he said at length. “But it’s happened gradually, so it doesn’t feel like a sudden change to me.” He looked me right in the eye. “Must seem that way to you, though.”

  I shrugged and looked away from the intensity in his brown eyes. That was new as well. “I’ve changed too,” I said, and it sounded a little defensive because I didn’t think I’d really changed at all. Was I supposed to? I guess I missed the memo. “I cut my hair.” I touched my short, sassy cut when I said it.

  “I like it,” Chuck said softly. “Brings out your eyes.”

  We stared at each other in the flickering orange campfire glow, and the silence stretched out until Sally cleared her throat. I yanked my head around t
o look at her instead of him. I liked looking at him better. “They’re making s’mores over there,” she said. “I’m going to get some before the chocolate’s all gone.”

  She didn’t care about the s’mores. She was just giving us privacy.

  It occurred to me that it might be time for that conversation I’d been dreading, and my stomach burned. I turned my head to look back at him again. He leaned in, slid a hand around my nape and threaded his fingers into my hair.

  “Aren’t you...going to tell me what’s wrong?” I asked. The words came out in a breathy whisper worthy of a big screen love scene. “I know something is.”

  “In a minute.” He moved closer. I gave in, let my eyes fall closed, and felt his mouth cover mine. Oh, it was good. It was sweet and long and slow and deep, and he tasted good, so good. When he lifted his head away, he said, “I’ve been waiting a long time to be with you, Suz.”

  “I know.” I was working up my nerve, reminding myself it was the right thing to do. It was never going to work with us anyway. I had to let him go. “But...we have to talk.”

  He smiled his most charming smile. Damn, he’d become good looking. He’d gone away a nerd and returned a bonafide hunk. He looked at the nearby tent, then back at me again. “Can’t we talk...after?”

  I frowned and sat back a little. “Right, you wait all this time, and then you think I’m just going to jump your bones after one kiss? What are you, sixteen?”

  “I just thought–”

  “You just thought wrong. Jeeze, Chuck, how about some dating? How about building a relationship first? Huh?” I stood up, crossed my arms over my chest. “How about a little romance for crying out loud?” I was crushingly disappointed. I’d expected so much more.

  And then I reminded myself that it didn’t matter anyway. I’d been about to let him down easy.

  He got up too, came closer. I turned my back to him, gathering my will. I had to tell him it was over. He put his hands on my shoulders from behind and I tingled in spite of myself. “I’m sorry. You know I’m no good at this. It’s just...I’m pretty sure by tomorrow you’re gonna hate my guts, so I thought at least we could have tonight.”

  I frowned and turned to face him, distracted once again. The move made his hands fall away, and I experienced a very brief, very potent stab of regret. “Why am I going to hate you tomorrow?”

  “Because I have an irresistible job offer. And you’re not gonna like it.”

  Ah, so he got it, too. That should make things easier. “I knew this was coming. It was inevitable. That’s why I–”

  “It’s Sonatta,” he said.

  My blood ran cold. The feelings for him I’d been fighting, turned into a sickening knot in my stomach. “You...you had an offer from Sonatta? The most hated company on the planet? The people who are genetically modifying our food supply without a clue about the repercussions? The people who’ve patented seeds, and sue farmers they consider in breach?” I paused long enough to take a breath, but only because I had to. “I’ve protested that company, Chuck. I’ve written to congress!”

  “I know.”

  “You can’t possibly be considering an offer from them. I’ve been planning an all out campaign to drive them out of Bloody Gulch. I–I’ve already designed the flyers.”

  He sighed. “You want to lower your voice, Suzy? Maybe give me a chance to tell you about this?”

  I looked around. The fire was crackling and pouring its light onto our faces, and several of our oldest friends were standing around looking at us. And I knew what they were thinking. Here we go, Chuck and Suzy, together again for a few hours and apparently already having a major fight. A lot they knew. I clamped my jaw, lowered my head. “There’s nothing you can say that will make it okay to work for the devil, Chuck. Not unless you’re just going undercover so you can get close enough to bring them down, that is.”

  He sighed and sat down, saying nothing. I knew his mind was composing while I ranted, and he was waiting for me to shut up long enough for him to talk.

  I was so mad I was shaking, but I took three deep breaths and sat down too. “Fine, explain if you really think you can.”

  He nodded. “In fifty years, maybe less, there’s not going to be enough meat on the planet to feed people.”

  “I know that. And we’ll all become vegetarians, and the world will be a better place.” I answered quick, didn’t think first.

  “I agree. But that’s going to take more vegetables and fruits than we’re capable of producing at this point. Sonatta is doing work that will make vegetables grow faster in far less space. It’s working to make them hardier, to require less water, to make them insect and disease resistant, to increase the amount of protein and other essential nutrients they provide in each serving.”

  “Right, by adding insecticides to our corn, salmon DNA to our strawberries, and refusing to label them. Do you know how sickening that is to a vegetarian, by the way?”

  “It’s better than global famine, mass starvation.”

  “I really don’t think that’s the only alternative, Chuck.”

  “You haven’t seen the research that I have.”

  “Probably not. Who produced your so-called research? Sonatta?”

  “Yes, Sonatta. They do a lot of research, because they want to ensure that their products aren’t harmful to humans or other living things.”

  “Wait, I’m sure I read that somewhere. Oh yeah, it was in their propaganda campaign when they were trolling for local land to lease for their franken-farms!”

  “Suz, stop. You’re being stubborn. Sonatta is ready to release a potato that provides more protein in a single serving than twelve ounces of sirloin steak.”

  I closed my eyes. “How did they make the potato do that?”

  He didn’t answer. Didn’t say “I don’t know” just didn’t answer. So he did know.

  “It’s top secret, right?” Opening my eyes again, I searched his. But he couldn’t hold my gaze.

  “Something like that,” he said at length.

  “God, Chuck, don’t do this. I don’t know what they’re offering you, but just don’t do it. Say no, turn it down, do anything else. Anything. You’ve had tons of companies and research centers courting for more than a year now. You can have your choice.”

  “This is my choice.” He heaved a huge sigh that made his shoulders slump forward. “I’ve been in orientation for a month already. It’s a seven figure income, Suzy.”

  “Seven figures. For the destruction of our food supply. What a bargain.”

  He sighed. “I knew you’d be like this.”

  “And didn’t care about anything except getting me in the sack before I found out.” I closed my eyes, shook my head, picked up my bag and turned to stomp away.

  “Suzy, come on.”

  “No amount of money is worth making a deal with the devil.” I sighed heavily. “I was going to break it off tonight anyway. I guess this just validates my decision.”

  “That’s a lie. You weren’t–”

  “Ask your sister. She knew.” I sighed, but still couldn’t turn to look at him. I’d lose my will if I did. “Good bye, Chuck,” I said, and resumed walking away, moving fast before the tears could take me over.

  “Suz. Suzy, don’t go.”

  But I kept on walking.

  Chapter Two

  * * *

  I COULDN’T SLEEP for the longest time. And not just because it was kind of creepy, how my mother hadn’t changed my bedroom at all since I’d left. I hadn’t been back in six months, and only a couple of times a year for the two years before this one. And every time, my room was exactly the same. My senior class photo, framed on the wall, my soccer cleats on the closet floor, my music box on the dresser.

  Mom, though...she had changed. At first she’d been kind of lost and pathetic without me. But then, the last couple of visits home, she’d seemed, I don’t know. Younger. Stronger. She didn’t hang around waiting for me, with a sad attempt at a vegan meal on
the table. In fact, half the time when I was home, she was off on some outing or other. Something was definitely up with her.

  I kept thinking about Chuck, and the terrible decision he’d made, maybe for all the right reasons. Seven figures must have been hard as hell to turn down. I knew he’d be rich someday, but I’d expected it to take longer. I didn’t really think he cared all that much about money, though. In hindsight, I realized, he probably thought he had taken the job for me, in some twisted way. And I’d shot him down.

  He must feel like hell.

  It didn’t matter. It was up to him now. He’d have to make his decision based on something besides me. It was over. We were over.

  I lay there, drowning in useless tears and trying to envision the future without him. But I couldn’t see anything. It just looked... bleak.

  Eventually, I must have fallen asleep, because I woke up at three a.m. to something scratching on my window. It was probably Chuck. I half hoped it was. (Okay, I totally hoped it was, and that he’d say he wasn’t taking the damn job and that he’d figure out another solution and that we would make things work somehow.) Even half asleep I knew it was impossible. Rubbing my tear-tender eyes, I rolled toward the window, then I jumped a foot off the mattress and let out a truncated scream before clapping a hand over my mouth.

  Someone was standing on the other side, face and hands flattened to the glass, mouth working weirdly.

  Wait, I knew her.

  “Amy?” I asked, leaning closer, squinting. Amy Johnson, who’d been in my class all through high school, looked pretty rough. Her blond hair was all tangled with bits of weed and brush and she had what looked like mud smeared all over her face. She kept gnawing at the glass, like she was trying to chew her way through it or something.

  “Damn, girl. How much did you drink, anyway?” I took my hand off my chest, grinning at my girl-in-horror-flick reaction, and went to the window again. “What did you do, walk through a briar patch to get here?” I reached for my window, to open it, when a second face mashed up against the glass, right beside Amy’s. I jerked backward, jumping and shrieking. Amy’s boyfriend, Mark. He was as messed up as she was. The same mud on his face and smeared through his hair, eyes not meeting mine, mouth wide and gnawing at the glass.