Homemade Sin (43 page)

“It's black magic,” Nikja said. “There are wicked things afoot, first the naked girl playing dead on the beach, then that bondage rooster. Now this.” He watched through the office window as customers hurried to their rooms and emerged with packed suitcases. He locked the door to the office and hid below the counter before anyone could check out.

As Cowpie approached a lifeguard stand, a German shepherd, which had been dozing in the shade of the stand, leapt into the arms of the lifeguard. Cowpie took a sharp right at the lifeguard stand and headed toward a large pink hotel. Glancing over his shoulder Cowpie heard the lifeguard console the trembling dog, “Chill out Adolph, it's only a clown, a werewolf and a greyhound.” That lifeguard looks a lot like David Hasselhoff, Cowpie thought as he headed for the beach entrance of the Paradise Hotel. Cowpie sprinted through the lobby, constantly looking back over his shoulder, only to see the werewolf hot on his heels. Looking back, Cowpie didn't see the fountain in the center of the lobby or ‘Bitey' the sleeping, six foot alligator in the fountain.

Too late, Cowpie looked up, tripped over the edge of the fountain and landed squarely on Bitey's back.

Awakened abruptly, Bitey twisted his neck sideways toward Cowpie and opened his jaws wide showing the clown rows of sharp, white teeth. As Cowpie clung to the 'gator's back the jaws came down in a loud snap closing on the clown's rubber nose. Cowpie's eyes followed his rubber nose upward, impaled on the alligator's incisor as Bitey opened his maw for another attempt. Cowpie screamed and launched himself from Bitey's back as the alligator lunged at the clown snapping his jaws and taking out the seat of his baggy pants. Terrified, Cowpie sprinted back toward the lobby's beach entrance, and headed straight for the startled werewolf who was halfway across the marble floor and loping toward him.

When Clint saw the screaming clown running toward him, his werewolf bravado vanished, and he was Clint again and terrified of the approaching clown. Clint the werewolf turned and ran. Seeing the werewolf bearing down on him Moreover extended his front paws and skidded to a stop on the lobby floor. The big wolf was chasing him. Reversing direction, he dashed away ahead of the pursuing werewolf through the lobby of the Paradise Hotel, and back to the beach. The trio now ran north, back up the beach toward the Santeria hotel.

Nikja peeked out from behind the registration desk and peered down the beach. Beach goers were slowly and cautiously creeping back toward the Gulf, spreading towels in the sand and tossing frisbees around. The screams rose again and Nikja beheld the new progression, a greyhound, chased by a werewolf, chased by a clown.

“Black magic!” Nikja shouted as he ducked below the desk again.

Hussey took another step toward Cutter who faked left, dodged right and bolted for the door to the alley. Just as he opened the door Moreover sprinted through, knocking Cutter to the floor. As Cutter tried to stand, he was again knocked to the floor by a large, hairy beast that loped through the door snarling and snapping its huge jaws. Moreover took a quick sniff of Cutter's scent as he ran past. He had smelled this man before at the track. Yes, he remembered now, this was the man who threw the cigar that burned his mouth, the man who kicked over his cage. Moreover put on the brakes wheeled around facing Cutter, a snarl forming on his lips.

Once again, Cutter tried to make his escape but as he reached for the door handle, Cowpie sprinted through like his ass was on fire and Cutter was again, knocked to the floor. Moreover sidestepped as the werewolf chased the clown through the kitchen and into the bar. Forgetting the werewolf, Moreover laid his ears back and with a deep, threatening growl circled back toward Cutter. Moreover leapt for Cutter's throat but Cutter dodged the dog and bolted through the door to the alley, pulling the door closed behind him before Moreover could follow. Moreover stood thwarted and barking at the door to the alley.

When Cutter entered the alley, he saw Stinky perched regally on top of the dumpster, glaring at him.

“Your time has come,” Stinky snarled as Cutter skidded to a stop in front of the dumpster. Cutter looked around and saw he was surrounded by a clowder of zombie pussies, staring at him with huge green eyes.

“Get him!” Stinky commanded his feline minions.

“Get him yourself,” meowed a grey tabby, as the effects of the Mambo powder began to wane.

“Yeah,” joined in an orange and black tortoiseshell calico, “why are we taking orders from you? I'm a cat. I don't take orders from anyone.”

“What am I doing here?” meowed a multi-colored Maltese. “I have a nice, furry mouse at home filled with catnip.”

“And I have a great patch of sunlight that falls perfectly in the late afternoon on a thick Persian carpet,” sighed a Persian. “It's a perfect place to nap.”

“And my person scratches me behind the ears and feeds me goose liver pâté once in a while,” commented a wistful Siamese.

“Screw this guy, I'm going back to my person,” said a bob-tailed Manx.

Cutter looked up as the cats seemed to lose interest in him and wander away. A sigh of relief escaped his lips as he pulled himself, wobbly, to his feet.

“Help! Help!” Cowpie shrieked as he passed in front of Hussey in the bar. “Alligators, werewolves, mad dogs!” Hussey watched the werewolf chase the clown through the door to the bar and out to the pool area. “Well, now I know what happened to my Loup Garu powder,” she mused. As the clown and werewolf disappeared out the door to the pool area she heard Moreover barking in the kitchen and went to investigate.

“Something out there you want?” Hussey stepped around the barking dog and let him out into the alley.

When he heard the door open behind him and the sound of a growling dog, Cutter knew Hussey had let Moreover out and she would be right behind the homicidal hound. He lifted the lid of the dumpster, sending Stinky leaping to the ground and dove inside. Peeking out from a small slit in the lid of the dumpster, Cutter saw Moreover run past, fooled by his maneuver.

Then he saw Hussey stalk into the alley, the sun flashing off her runcible spoon.

“He's in the dumpster,” a voice said in Hussey's head.

“Who said that,” Hussey said aloud, scanning the alley for the speaker.

“Down here,” Stinky said.

Hussey stared at him.

Stinky looked back at her and shrugged his shoulders. “Yeah, I can talk. The enemy of my enemy is my friend, and I have decided you and I should be friends. Now get that asshole out of my dumpster.”

Bella, Roland and Jones stood staring for a full minute after the clown, followed by a snarling, snapping werewolf, had bolter through the bar. They had watched in disbelief as the clown turned hard right at the bar and sprinted through the door toward the pool, the werewolf nipping at his bare feet. It was one of those moments when something happens that is so patently bizarre that it appears to be happening in slow motion.

“What the hell was that?” Roland said as the door toward the pool area swung closed behind the werewolf.

“That was a clown being chased by a werewolf,” Bella said, matter-of-factly. “I can tell that werewolf was made with voodoo, looks like Mama Wati's recipe. And if the werewolf hits the pool, he's going to change back into a man. Water works as an antidote to the werewolf powder,” she said. “I've seen it happen.”

When Cowpie reached the pool, he launched himself from the edge and did a perfect belly-flop into the middle of a circle of geriatric zombies. He came up sputtering, his clown makeup running down his face, his pompons soaked and drooping on his jumpsuit.

Clint skidded to a stop, his long sharp nails digging into the tile that skirted the pool. He shied away from the water, circled the pool and growled menacingly at Cowpie.

“Do you see a huge wolf circling the pool, Myrtle?” said the old codger who looked like Wilford Brimley, blinking his eyes, coming out of his zombie trance.

“I see something,” said the painfully thin woman. “It looks kind of like Cecil,” she said nodding toward the man with the thick mat of silver hair on his back. “But Cecil has more hair.”

“But he has more hair in his ears than Clem,” piped up the bald man with caterpillar eyebrows.

“My fingers are all pruney,” said a rotund woman. “How long have we been in the pool?”

“Looks to be about a week, on and off,” Bella said. She was perched in a lounge chair by the pool, having followed the clown and the werewolf out to the pool unnoticed.

“You folks were Mambo'd,” Bella informed them. “It's zombie powder, but it's not permanent. The effects apparently wear off after a few days. How do you folks feel?”

“I don't have motion sickness anymore,” said the bald, caterpillar-browed man.

“I think my diverticulitis is better,” commented the rotund woman.

“Hey, I can breathe better,” said the man with a mat of silver hair on his back and stomach. “I think my asthma is gone.”

“I think we need another round of drinks,” said the Wilford Brimley look-alike as he climbed out of the pool, stepped around the werewolf, and headed, dripping, toward the bar.

Cowpie paced from one end of the pool to the other as the werewolf approached the water and then retreated, whining. Finally, his hatred of the clown overcame his apprehension of the water and Clint stretched out his forepaws and leaped toward Cowpie. He landed in the center of the pool sending the floaters splashing toward the sides.

When Clint hit the water he began to change. First his muzzle shrank back into a human nose, his ears reverted to man-size and his fur was left floating on the top of the water like Sargasso grass as his body submerged.

“What happened?” Clint said as he came up for air.

“Clint?” Cowpie said, stunned by the transformation. “What are you, some kind of werewolf?”

“I don't know,” Clint replied, brushing the last strands of fur from his arms, “One minute I'm in my hotel room and the next minute I wake up in the pool.”

“He's lost all his hair,” the thin woman said. “He's body is as hairless as a newborn baby. Hey mister,” the woman called to Clint, “what kind of depilatory are you using? Maybe you should try that, Cecil.”