Haunted Honeymoon (34 page)

Authors: Marta Acosta

Tags: #Fiction, #Humorous, #General, #Romance, #Paranormal

“Hi, Wil, Nettie,” I said, happy to see that they looked almost healthy.

Wil was about to hug me when Ian said, “Hello, Spiggott. Do keep your hands off my bride at least for the honeymoon. Then you may resume your flirting, but no more.”

Wil looked fondly at his girlfriend. “Yeah, Nettie feels the same way.”

“Hello, Nettie,” Ian said, and took her hand. “I hope your recovery is going well.”

She ducked her head shyly, and Wil said, “The shaman says that normals can take months to recover. I was different because I’m a vampire.
Was
a vampire. But Nettie will be as right as rain in a few more weeks. Meanwhile, I get to chat without interruption.”

Nettie slapped Wil’s chest, and he said, “Oh, cutie, you know what I like.”

I noticed that my friend was a slightly darker shade of greenish. “Wil, you’ve got a tan! How’s the surfing?”

“Kick-ass, great barrels on the flip side of the island, draw you in, spit you out. I’ve been teaching Matthews a few basics.”

“So you guys are getting along?”

“Yeah, now that he’s loosened up. He’s a changed man. Well, we all are,” Wil said. “I’ll take you to your hotel.”

He helped load our things into a jeep and drove us up a narrow road to a neglected but still grand white hotel among the palm trees.

When we entered the empty terra-cotta tiled lobby, Wil said, “The shaman said that the Poindexters should stay in the village. The tribe is caring for them.”

Wil suggested that we all go to the lounge for a drink. We went into a magnificent old bar with mostly bare shelves. Only a few other people were here, greenish hued and relaxed as they raised their glasses toward us and smiled as a greeting. A few were people who had “disappeared” when Ian was sent to solve an intractable problem.

Ian waved toward them and said to me, “We keep things simple here, darling. I hope you don’t mind.”

“It’s lovely,” I said. “It reminds me of a campus that’s been emptied out for the summer.”

Wil went behind the bar and pulled out a plate of sliced mangos and a pitcher of sangria, and Nellie got glasses for us. Wil said, “The local zombies are friendly, but they’re basically nocturnal. Been there, done that—now I want to spend all my time in the sun.”

When we were seated, I said, “How are the Poindexters adjusting?”

“Good.” The surfer grinned. “Anger and aggression, greed, all those things vanish when you change over. I don’t know if it’s seeing death, or because we’re more like plants than people.” He looked at Nettie and took her hand.

“We’re happy,” she said softly, gazing at Wil.

“Everyone should consider becoming a zombie,” he said.

I shook my head. “Weren’t you the one who was talking big ideas about a progressive vampire movement?”

“I was more interested in getting in your knickers,” he said. “You were the one who made the charts and action plan.”

“I thought I was helping. I’ve come to see that maybe it’s better to understand a situation before jumping right in to change things.”

Ian began laughing, stopped himself, and said, “Sorry, darling.”

I picked up the pitcher and filled our glasses. Then I lifted mine in a toast. “Well, here’s to this lovely nameless place and its people.”

“It’s not nameless,” Wil said. “The tribe calls it Isla Milagro.”

When night came, we visited the tribe, whose name meant the Caretakers, at their village of low huts. They made a feast for us of grilled fishes, vegetables, and fruits, and Ian and I watched the shaman dance around a fire with aromatic smoke from herbs that were used in the weavings.

Cricket and Ford, both wearing woven tunics had wreaths of flowers on their heads. They watched contentedly as they held hands and sat cross-legged on a mat.

Ian and I thanked our hosts and took a walk up a hill. We could hear the faint music coming from a zombie band that played in the empty hotel every night.

I stared at the bright stars above. “There are Castor and
Pollux. I know who told me that now. It was just before I was attacked by Vidalia in werewolf form.”

“Your life has had many surprises.”

“One of them is that your international bon-vivanting had a higher purpose.”

“Not all of it, darling. Some of it was so that I would meet a certain delicious and elusive young woman who also was more serious than she seemed.”

“And sillier than she should be?”

“That is what I loved about her,” he said. “Once when I was in Sozopol—”

“Which is where?”

“On the Black Sea. We’ll go there,” he said. “I met an amusing little man who said he was studying folktales and shapeshifting.”

“And was his name
Don
Pedro?”

“It was. We went to a dinner with music by a mystic, we smoked opium, and I had just met a captivating local beauty when
Don
Pedro seemed to go into a trance.”

“Let me guess. He had an eerily prescient vision.”

“Exactly. He told me I would meet a woman with hair as black as midnight, a living miracle, and that she and I would do good for the world, and she would be my partner in life and that I would love her till death and beyond death.”

“So you went in search of me.”

“Certainly not. I wasn’t going to disappoint my pretty companion because of a lunatic’s prophecy,” he said. “I forgot all about it until years later when the Council sent me to meet a girl who had miraculously survived infection.”

“And then you fell madly in love with me.”

“I wanted you for my own, but you had the audacity to reject me for Oswald Grant.”

“I had a crush on Oswald first. So then you met me again and fell madly in love with me.”

Ian smiled his dangerous smile. “It took some time to take
Don
Pedro’s visions seriously, especially when you seemed so reluctant to return my affections. I stopped counting the times you broke my heart.”

“I wasn’t sure you had one, Ian.”

He took my hand and placed it on his chest. “I do, and I entrust it entirely to you.”

“I promise to care for it.” I kissed his warm hand. “How many of
Don
Pedro’s stories are actually your own adventures?”

“We have the rest of our lives, together, and I think I shall save those stories for other nights. You and I will have so many adventures.”

Laughing, I said, “Ian, I think I can dedicate my life to going to parties in order to save the world.”

“I never doubted that you could, my own girl. Shall we go for a swim?”

“Go ahead,
mi vida, mi corazon, mi amor
,” I said, because he was all those things to me: my life, my heart, my love. “I’ll meet you on the beach.”

He kissed me and strolled off, leaving me alone but not lonely as I looked into the star-spangled sky.

Before meeting the vampires, I was a girl with dreams. I dreamed of being in love with a fabulous yet worthy man and being loved in return. I dreamed of having my stories published. I dreamed of having a home. I dreamed of being surrounded by friends and family. I dreamed of making a difference.

My stories were dreams, too, of a world that was bigger and more fantastical than what seemed prosaic reality.

And all those things had come true for me. I was loved by a fabulous, amazing man who could laugh with me. I had success
as an author, albeit under
Don
Pedro’s name. Oswald’s family had become my family, and now I also had the Ducharmes and all my friends.

I’d made a difference. I’d united couples, created gardens, and thwarted the dangerous ambitions of madmen, death merchants, and extremists, while always finding time for friends and fun.

As for my home, the earth was my home, and, like Ian, I was a citizen of the world.

Death and happy endings were only the transfer points of an amazing journey. My story had just begun.

I walked down the hill to the beach. The white sand sparkled in the bright light of the moon. I pulled my clothes off and ran into the water and into my husband’s arms.