Life Bites A Jay Watson Mystery

By George R. Appelt, Jr

Jay Watson is in a post-college rut. Stuck in a dead-end job, he is dumped by his girlfriend for a TV celebrity and is broke after blowing through his trust fund. Now his parents want him to settle down, join the family business, and give them grandkids—in short, to say goodbye to his independence. Things couldn’t get worse for a twenty-something male, right?
Wrong. He is displaced from his design job at The Grundselton Weekly Review by the boss’s niece, a hot young student intern, and Jay is faced with a choice: become a reporter for the paper or find a new job. Traumatized by interviewing at a snooty ad agency, Jay gamely gives reporting a shot, covering school board meetings and fender-benders. But when the sleepy little college town is rocked by the gruesome murder of a vampire-fanged coed, Jay finds himself the prime suspect and is forced to investigate the college’s vampire subculture to clear his name, prove his worth to his family, and protect the girl he desires.
Harassed by the killer, stalked by a horny spinster, haunted by a past lover, taunted by a rival, and bullied by a vengeful cop, Jay is about to find out how much life really can bite!

• Language: English
• Publisher: George R. Appelt, Jr
• Release date: Oct 21, 2013
• ISBN: 9780985249052

George R. Appelt, Jr

George R. Appelt Jr. currently haunts a small town in Pennsylvania where he channels sinister, short stories, suspense novels, and quirky mysteries. He is the author of Life Bites and Shepherd's Fall.He is a member of Mid-Atlantic Horror Professionals, Greater Lehigh Valley Writers Group, and Pennwriters. He won First Place in 2002 Central Pennsylvania Writer’s Organization’s contest for short fiction. His short stories have appeared in the Mt. Zion Speculative Fiction Review and on AlienSkinMag.com. He spent three years as a syndicated cartoonist on ArtistMarket.com.George is currently at work on a paranormal suspense novel.

Book preview

CHAPTER 1: THE CLEANSING

The Crusader clutched Jamie Neven’s arm as she stumbled from the main entrance of Fangs. He scanned the side street that the club’s doorway opened on to, searching for danger. The nightclub’s neon sign, an outline of lips with two sharpened top incisors, illuminated the alley in a garish, red glow and added an air of excitement like a carnival midway. No immediate threat presented itself, but he remained alert. These creatures could attack from any of the shadows. A September breeze rustled his hair, sending a chill scurrying across his clammy flesh. He shuddered from nerves as much as the cold night air. His gaze roamed the length of Jamie’s body, and he swallowed his disgust and his desire.

Leather pants clung to her form like a coating of black oil. Her sheer red blouse revealed too much skin. The exposed flesh of her face, neck, and the top curve of her breasts glistened in the moonlight. Her pale skin almost glowed. No longer the image of virtue he had once cherished, she had transformed into a child of darkness, tempting him to succumb to his darker desires. No matter how alluring he found her new appearance, he could not yield to temptation.

She smiled. Her kohl-lined hazel eyes were soft and inviting. Those eyes had been his life at one time; they had held the promise of a happy future. Now they only held death.

If he failed to act quickly, he would lose his nerve. Tonight he had become the Crusader, the destroyer of the foul creatures of the night.

I’m cold… I forgot my coat, she said.

He remembered how the long leather jacket had embraced her body. It’s alright, I’ll keep you warm.

Taking her by the elbow, he guided her toward Main Street. Instead of continuing out to the well lit avenue, at the corner of the building, he turned down another service alley that ran along the side of the club. She stumbled and clutched his arm. He stiffened at her touch.

She smiled again. He almost missed it in the faint glow of one yellow bulb fixed in a rusted lamp over a back entrance to an old building.

His resolve faded.

He could not give in to weakness. Ratcheting up his courage, he pressed forward. They just had to go a little farther. He had to keep her moving.

The sound of a passing car a block away on Main Street echoed in the night, but the back alley was deserted. He had chosen this secluded spot for its privacy. She stumbled against him again, and her right breast brushed his side. He gasped, fighting his old impulses, struggling to force his body not to respond to her once familiar touch.

I didn’t expect to see you there tonight, She said, speaking slowly and slurring her words.

Yeah, it’s not really my kind of place.

He had choreographed their meeting at the club to seem like a chance encounter. That part had gone well, except maybe he had miscalculated the effect of the roofie he had slipped into her drink.

Ya know, she paused as if she had forgotten her next words. Jamie swayed dangerously, and stared glassy-eyed at him for a few seconds. The earlier eagerness in her eyes had faded from the increasing effect of the drug in her system. I’ve missed you, she said, the words slurred almost beyond recognition.

Jamie stepped in close, snaked her arms around him, and pressed her body against his. He trembled. She smelled of jasmine, the scent intoxicating. Her breath tickled his ear.

I should never have let you get away, she whispered.

Words he would’ve died for just a few months ago. Perhaps not so slurred, nevertheless the sentiment he had desired. Now it was too late. Once you transformed into one of the creatures, there was no path back to salvation.

No, you shouldn’t have.

He smiled, but felt no sincerity. She returned the smile and revealed sharp fangs. In the faint light they were just barely visible, but he saw them.

Jamie threw back her head and laughed giving him an even better view of the sharp teeth. Her laughter confused him. For a moment the date rape drug didn’t seem to have any effect on her. Had she been pretending to lure him into a false sense of safety? The Crusader shoved away from her. Fear twisted his insides. He had to act.

He had lost his edge by forgetting how cunning these creatures were. Of course her metabolism might handle the drug differently than a normal human. Had she only playacted at appearing intoxicated so he would drop his guard? He crouched to the ground, his fingers reaching for the handle of the long knife he wore under his pant leg on his right calf. His fingers found only hair and skin. Shit! He had forgotten the knife. The damn knife with the razor sharp blade he had spent painstaking hours sharpening. The knife that now rested uselessly on his bedroom dresser thanks to his earlier jitters.

Jamie rocked precariously, swaying back and squinting at him in the semi-darkness. What are you…

The end of her sentence was lost as he turned and fled down the alley into the darkness. He had to reach the dumpster where he had stashed the rest of his tools. Debris from construction on the back of the building that housed Ying’s Chinese restaurant littered the alleyway. Catching his ankle on a cinder block, The Crusader tripped, crashing to the macadam. Pain flared in his left leg, but he had been more surprised than injured.

Jamie shuffled after him, arms outstretched and backlit like one of the undead in a George Romero movie. She was coming at him now, taking advantage of this opportunity to finish him. The Crusader crabbed backward, his hands searching in the darkness for a rock or bottle, perhaps a length of wood. Jamie stumbled forward, coming closer. Pain shot through his shoulders as his back slammed into the metal pipe scaffolding erected alongside the building behind him. He hadn’t realized he was so close to it.

The scaffolding swayed. Something snapped and let loose above him. He cringed at the harsh metal on metal scraping sound as pipe slid against pipe.

Jamie’s silhouette looked skyward just in time to be struck squarely in the forehead by the end of a long black object, probably a plank, which had slid off the framework. The force of the blow pile-drove her down flat on her back. She lay unmoving in the darkness.

He panted, struggling to control his breathing, and choking on the bile that inched up the back of his throat. He strained to hear if she was making any sounds. Silence. Weak-kneed, he lurched to his feet.

"Oh, the humanity," a stranger wailed.

The cry launched the Crusader’s heart into his throat, rendering breath momentarily impossible.

He wheeled around to stare down a side alley that connected to Main Street. At the far end, a fool wearing a ridiculous blue, orange, and Purple Hawaiian shirt knelt on the sidewalk under a streetlamp.

The Crusader’s blood ran cold. Sure he had been spotted, he scanned the moonlit alley for the dumpster where he had stashed the rest of his gear and prepared to run.

It’s not fair. I wanted a Tastykake éclair, the flower print-clad fool lamented.

A pretty blonde stepped into view, sank to her knees next to him. Calm down.

They both broke into a fit of giggles. Let me see your watch? she said, reaching for his left wrist.

The young man struggled to steady his wavering arm with his other hand, apparently attempting to focus on his watch.

The girl in the grass skirt’s little hand is at the one and her big hand is at the two, he said.

Well, there you go. The sign says they close at midnight, the blonde said.

That’s not fair, I need pie, the fool shouted.

The hot girl, talking much too loud, said, Let’s go back to your place. I’ll make you forget all about pie.

Breaking into loud drunken guffaws, they wrapped their arms around each other and staggered down Main Street. The Crusader sighed, feeling the tension flow out of his limbs. The dark shadows of the back alley must’ve cloaked him from their prying eyes.

He glanced around the area to make sure Jamie had not summoned any of her kindred. Satisfied they were still alone, he replaced his driving gloves with the latex gloves he fished from his jacket pocket, grabbed her still warm wrists, and towed her limp body over to the trash dumpster.

He cursed under his breath. Nothing had gone as planned. After another quick glance to assure his concealment, he retrieved the duffle bag from the shadows where he had stowed it earlier. Removing a knife and the bone saw from the bag, he whispered, Let the cleansing begin.

CHAPTER 2: THE MORNING AFTER

I loved the curve in the small of Kelly’s back. It’s the little things that attract us to others.

My smile from the previous night wouldn’t fade, despite the slight pounding in my skull. I slumped on the edge of my bed and watched Kelly cross the room, bend, pick up her yellow t-shirt, and slip it on. There’s something incredibly sexy about a woman’s naked back. In fairness, Kelly was exceptionally hot under any circumstances with her tanned skin, shoulder length blonde hair, and blue eyes that brimmed with mischief when she smiled.

Hell if I knew what she was doing there with me. Yeah, okay, technically I knew what we’d been doing the night before, at least the parts I could remember. The real question wasn’t what, but why?

In the looks department I was okay. My ratty brown hair stood out in all directions like the fur of a cat that had just bitten through an electrical cord. My ex-girlfriend Karen used to say that my steel-blue eyes, shrouded by long lashes, were bedroom eyes. I don’t know what that meant, but she liked it. At least until she dumped me. My thin Romanesque nose, strong jaw, and perpetual five-o-clock shadow gave me what I like to call a-day-at-the-beach face, filled with just enough boyish charm to get by. I certainly wasn’t part of the Beautiful People’s Club. At least my body still sported a somewhat athletic frame—at twenty-four the beer and junk food hadn’t caught up with me yet. If I kept up with the partying I had just indulged in that wouldn’t remain true. Still, the gods must have been smiling on me the previous night. I marveled at my good fortune and fished a cigarette from the pack on the nightstand.

She shot me a sharp glance. You smoke?

Yeah, only when I drink a lot, or after sex.

Oh, then unless you’re a closet alcoholic, a pack must last you a long time, she said with a come-and-get-me grin.

Ouch!

Were my moves that bad?

It had been four months since my last time—sex that is, not drinking. And that had been with Karen Cooper, the love of my life, just before she had ripped my heart out of my chest and used it for a hockey puck when she dumped me for up-and-coming TV news reporter Chad Charles.

Not only had I not had sex for the last four months, I also couldn’t bear to watch the local news anymore.

Was I that out of practice?

Yelling ‘yes, we have lift off’ at the exact moment might’ve been a bit much, she said.

She approached the bed, snatched the cigarette out of my mouth, and crushed it into a small metal ashtray on the nightstand.

Hey, those things are expensive.

She laughed, straddled my thighs, and pushed me back down on the bed. So I owe you a quarter. Now about that practice… let’s see what we can do about getting you back up to speed.

Her lips locked onto mine, then she pulled away. Ugh, it’s like licking an ashtray.

I’ll quit, just for you, I promised and pulled her back down on top of me. To quit for her was a no-brainer. She was the kind of woman you would go to war for, write a sonnet for, or do some other ridiculously difficult task that ordinarily would just suck too much to consider.

Her breasts crushed against my chest, and our lips met again. Her mouth was soft and tasted like cinnamon. It wasn’t going to take much to fire off another rocket. Running my fingers up and down her hips coaxed a giggle. I loved the sound of her laugh.

Breep… Breeeep… My alarm clock shattered my bliss. Oh shit, I’m going to be late for work, I said.

I rolled Kelly off and slammed the snooze button for the third time. Stumbling from bed, I retrieved my balled-up jeans from the corner and searched for a clean Hawaiian shirt by sniffing the ones in the pile of clothes scattered on the floor around my bed. I never had this problem when Karen lived here. Girls actually insist on doing the wash. I settled on my favorite dark blue one, I’d only worn it twice since laundry day, and I slipped it on.

Jay, come back to bed and play.

Her blue eyes with their promise of raw sexual utopia almost melted my resolve. I must’ve been nuts. It’s not every day that I had a beautiful twenty-one-year-old co-ed, clad only in a t-shirt, pleading with me to make hot monkey love with her. In fact it hardly ever happened. Okay, actually never, this was a first. And yeah, Karen was pretty too, but in that girl-next-door way, not the hot-blonde-bikini-model way like Kelly was.

There was something else. I liked this girl. We had connected on some deep metaphysical level, or maybe I felt that we had because of the outstanding sex.

I want to, I really do, but if I’m late just one more time, my boss will terminate me with extreme prejudice. He and his wife have a totally rigid concept of the time continuum. As far as they’re concerned, my late arrival risks shattering our whole dimension’s time placement and causing a paradox, I explained as I pulled on a dark blue sock on my left foot and then a black one on my right.

Kelly nodded, but seemed distracted as she crawled to the foot of the bed and examined the gallon jar that rested on a small table against the wall a few feet away.

You don’t need that job. You’ve got your trust fund, she said.

She must’ve been listening last night when I told her how I’d had the money to purchase and renovate the old two-story brick firehouse where I lived.

My Granddad had been a self-made man. Inventing a rotating grate for coal furnaces, he had amassed a fortune. When he died, he left the majority of his vast estate to my dad, but he had set up a trust fund for me. He figured a half-million would give me a good start.

Some men are captains of industry, some are great scholars, and some are visionaries predicting the dawn of new frontiers. I happened to be none of those. Between the downturn on Wall Street and my own lack of a financial gene, I’d blown through most of the half-million Granddad had left me.

I gestured around the loft, I’m afraid you’re looking at what’s left of it.

Kelly still studied the green murky water in the jar. You said your father is the ‘Don of Johns.’

Dad owned two hundred and fifty janitorial franchises across the United States and the Dominican Republic. They specialized at cleaning corporate restrooms, and he was a Godfather fanatic, hence the nickname.

That’s right; he’s Charlie Watson, the president of Swirly Cleaners.

So you don’t need a job, you could work for him.

Afraid not. I’d rather get a prostate exam from King Kong.

Kelly rose from the bed and approached the gallon pickle jar. She bent forward and tapped it.

Don’t touch that.

My warning came too late.

An orange swell flopped at the top of the jar and liquid shot into the air like a long green tentacle, splattering Kelly’s face.

Eew! Get it off, get it off, she shouted and recoiled as if the green slime contained plutonium.

I snatched a shirt from the floor and tossed it to her. Trying to calm her down I explained, It’s only Fred, the demon goldfish from Hell.

She wiped the muck off her face, then cautiously bent forward and squinted at the jar’s contents. It looks like a jar full of algae and sludge.

Fred was the last remnant from my ex-girlfriend Karen. I couldn’t bring myself to flush him for sentimental reasons, and the little bastard wouldn’t do the normal goldfish routine and go belly-up. I’d figured he would eventually give up the ghost, but it hadn’t worked. I’d once even put a bigger fish in the jar, but Fred ate him.

Do you ever clean this thing? Kelly asked.

He likes it that way.

Kelly wrinkled her nose and backed away. I don’t see how anything can survive in there.

I opened an old pizza box on my pool table, broke off a piece of stale crust, and crumbled it into the jar. There was another flash of gold at the surface as Fred snagged the crumbs.

An old gypsy woman put a curse on him at the carnival where I won him, I said.

Running my fingers through my hair and slipping into my black sneakers using only my feet, I gave Kelly my most winning smile. Look, I have to run. Help yourself to anything you think is edible in the fridge.

So you can’t come back to bed? And you’re not rich?

I saw the disappointment in those pretty blue eyes as Kelly surveyed the loft closely, apparently for the first time. Her eyes grew wide, taking in the unwashed dishes, the empty pizza boxes, and the mountain of clothes scattered on the floor around the bed. It must’ve suddenly dawned on her what she had actually done the night before. At that moment I also understood that my fortune had just changed.

No—sorry, I apologized, feeling worse for Kelly than for myself. It hadn’t occurred to me that she thought I was rich. I thought she understood I had blown all my money. How disappointing for her.

As for me, I was used to disappointment.

I walked over and gave her a quick peck on the cheek. I have to go. I’ll call.

Sure, she said flatly.

I gave her a small wave, grabbed the fire pole, and slid to the first floor garage bay. What a rush. That weightless feeling of suddenly plunging two stories really gets the blood racing first thing in the morning.

My yellow 1966 MG Midget Mark 2’s engine turned over on the first try. I glanced at my watch. Eight-o-clock. Margie Sulze was going to skin me alive.

I hit the garage button, threw the car into first, and stomped the accelerator.

CHAPTER 3: THE ETERNAL DANCE

I’m not sure what it was about being on time. I seemed to have this mental block, some sort of passive-aggression toward surrendering to the confines of the clock. My whole life I always wanted to be somewhere else, but not at an appointed time. My best friend Dave Neally always said if I wasn’t going to show up late, I wasn’t going to show up at all. Best buds since my freshman year of college, my punctuality-challenged lifestyle drove him crazy.

Dave was a lot of things: a rock ‘n’ roll loving, long-haired ambulance driver, and a gun toting NRA member, but he was never late.

My ex-girlfriend Karen had her own thoughts. She said I harbored deep psychological rebellion manifested by my disregard for punctuality. Of course the ex-love-of-my-life also claimed that at twenty-four I needed to gain confidence and grow up.

Jay, I’m only telling you this for your own good.

She issued this proclamation four months ago, just before she started screwing that smug asshole, Chad, so my own good probably wasn’t her priority.

Besides, I’d slept through my psychology class in college, so I had no idea if I had rebellious manifestations or not.

All I knew was while getting dumped for a semi-famous TV personality really hurt the old self-esteem, it hadn’t affected my punctuality in the least.

The Grundselton Weekly Review offices were located six blocks from my place. Fueled by a desire to avoid my boss Margie’s wrath, I arrived in record time. I scanned my Hawaiian dancing girl watch and sighed. Her longer arm pointed to six.

I pounded the steering wheel. Shit.

Desperate for a parking spot, I studied the street in front of the one-story brick building that housed the paper’s offices. Before current owner Frank Sulze’s great-grandfather had started the paper, the building had been a warehouse about a hundred years ago.

Bell’s Funeral Home across the street dominated the block. On a typical weekday morning a long line of blue-hairs queued up on its wrap-around-porch and down a ramp, waiting to bid fond farewells to their dearly departed contemporaries. Today was no exception. Their Cadillacs congested the surrounding blocks and from the honking coming behind me, it looked like more were arriving. Time to get off the road and out of their failing line of sight.

I eased my Midget into the loading zone along the sidewalk near the paper’s side entrance and climbed from the car. I fished the white magnetic ‘Clergy’ sign from behind my driver’s seat and slapped it on the rear bumper. I had created it in the paper’s art department when I realized that the police wouldn’t ticket or tow a reverend’s car while he was on official funeral business.

Parking problem solved, I slipped in the side entrance and began my morning dance of darkness and light with Margie. We were caught in an eternal struggle—my yin to her yang. The object of the dance was for me to get to my workstation in the back of the building without drawing her attention from the front counter in the outer room where she perched like a bird of prey, waiting to strike.

It should’ve been easy enough to go unnoticed.

Frank, her husband, had a passion for all items related to World War II. He had been collecting memorabilia since his uncle gave him a military mess kit when he was fourteen. Now in his late fifties, Frank had amassed a veritable smorgasbord of military paraphernalia. He had filled the large open room that once housed the printing press with mountains of army equipment, uniforms and helmets. I think I even saw a bazooka mixed in the collection. I wouldn’t have been surprised if there were a few grenades. Frank’s dream—much to Margie’s irritation—was to open a World War II museum.

Dim bare bulbs hung from the open rafters and made it hard to see. I paused for a moment to allow my eyes to adjust. On tiptoes, the hair on the back of my neck standing at attention, I navigated the obstacle course to my desk at the back wall of the room. The scent of antiquity hung in the air. It smelled like old sweat socks and mildewed canvas. Creeping along with caution, I tried my best not to knock over any of the piles of old uniforms or dusty footlockers stacked floor to ceiling. Who knew what the hell Frank had in them, and I didn’t relish the idea of being blown to bits before breakfast by a rusty landmine or an unstable hand grenade.

Starting down a narrow aisle, I noticed Lois Miller at her desk. She kept the paper’s books and answered the phone. No matter what time I arrived at the office, she always beat me in, apparently having my opposite compulsion with keeping to a schedule. Lois shifted in her chair. She cut her eyes to the left, a warning signal, or so I thought.

Margie, using her uncanny internal radar, already prowled the floor. I changed course and rounded a stack of footlockers piled higher than me. Bad move. Margie’s radar steered her on an intercept course, and I almost collided with the woman. Woman, who am I kidding? She reminded me of a four foot tall fireplug. Thick glasses magnified her fierce eyes, and a heavy unibrow and frizzy brown mop of hair intensified her resemblance to a Tasmanian devil in drag.

Ahhh! I shouted.

Got you! You’re late again. I’m docking you an hour, she said past the lit cigarette dangling from the corner of her mouth.

I prayed we were not standing near any live ammunition as I protested, Ah come on, that’s way harsh. Traffic’s murder out there, and I was only five minutes late.

Don’t try to con me, you were a half-hour late, and this town’s never seen traffic.

She narrowed her eyes. Are you pushing me, Watson? So help me, I’ll fire you, I swear I will.

She had me. Other than the constant funeral procession next door, there was no traffic. Grundselton was a small sleepy college town located in rural central Pennsylvania. It was about as far away from congested as one could get.

When we got to my desk, Margie tossed a stack of weekly ad orders into a black plastic tray that served as my inbox. If this happens again, I’ll have to take stronger disciplinary action.

Don’t do me any favors, I said.

Just because you’ve worked here since you were a junior in college, don’t think I won’t fire you.

She glanced toward the front of the building. I’d fire you in a minute if it were up to me alone.

Where else would you find someone with a degree in Communication Design that would work for peanuts, I countered; emboldened by the fact she obviously wasn’t going to fire me today.

Probably the zoo. I hear they have trained monkeys.

Then she did something I’d rarely seen in the last five years. She smiled, menacingly of course, but a smile nonetheless. On her it could only mean trouble. Frank wants to see you in his office.

Her expression sent a chill scurrying up my spine. An ill wind was heading my way. I had a feeling it contained something worse than the scent of unwashed sweat socks.

Margie stomped off in the direction of the front office, but I paused at Lois’ desk.

I’m sorry. I tried to warn you. I glanced to the left to let you know she was over there.

Oh, I thought you meant I should go to the left, I said.

Lois grimaced and glanced down at the financial planner on her desk. She studied it for a minute like she was trying to decide if she should say something.

She’s very unkind to you, She finally said.

It’s nothing personal. She treats everyone bad. Tasmanian Devils can’t help it, I said.

Lois grinned. She reminded me of my mom, minus the nagging. Of course that was no surprise, Lois had four grown children of her own, so I’m sure she had the mother thing down pat. She fidgeted with the silver cross on the necklace she always wore.

Can’t you at least try to be on time?

I sighed. So maybe Lois nagged a little. But her kind eyes held such concern, I could only shrug and give her small grin.

I get her blood going. It keeps her young, I said.

Maybe. It seems like you’re tap dancing around a mine field. You better not keep Frank waiting.

I nodded and headed toward the front of the building, wondering what was so urgent on a Monday morning. Our galleys were sent out late Wednesday night to a printer in Harrisburg that actually printed the paper. Frank found it cheaper to subcontract the printing than to keep a fully journeyed printer on staff. Plus, he saved on the printing press maintenance and he didn’t need a functioning press, which allowed more space for his memorabilia collecting.

Entering Frank’s office, I felt like a peasant summoned by the king. Margie shouted from her counter in the front room, He’s finally graced us with his presence.

I would’ve taken a seat, but there wasn’t a blank surface in Frank’s office. Stacks of paper, assorted notes, photos, etc. covered every inch. More post-it notes, photos, and printed stories were tacked to the walls. Stacks of previous issues of the Review were piled against the walls. It looked like an