A low splash cracked through the air like a cannon. I bit back a yelp, hands spasming on the rifle. An animal going into the water. That’s all it was. A goddamn bullfrog.
The moon slipped behind a cloud, plunging everything into a deep gloom. Another splash, and every hair on my body lifted as a weird choking-gurgle followed it. That was no frog.
Okay, I was officially freaked out. I peered in the direction of the splashes, breath catching as the water rippled twenty feet away from where I crouched. Nutria, I prayed. Please let it be a nutria.
As if in slow motion, a dark figure broke the surface, water dripping as it straightened into an unmistakably human shape.
Anger and dismay battled it out in my gut. Rosario. Or, more likely, one of his Saberton buddies since gunshot wounds and swamp water didn’t play well together. I couldn’t catch a fucking break.
Or maybe I had caught a break. I didn’t know how this guy had found me, but any plans to catch me off guard were toast. I was awake, ready, and armed.
I shifted to one knee and lifted the rifle to my shoulder, but a tremble went through me as I took aim. I was about to kill this guy, and he had no idea it was coming. It didn’t matter that I knew with horrifying certainty what sort of hell awaited me in Saberton’s tender care. I’d killed before, but always face-to-face, in the heat of battle. This was cold-blooded murder.
Damn it. I blinked tears away and took careful aim at the center of my intruder’s torso. And now I really am a monster.
Fire leaped from the muzzle as the shot shattered the air. The dark shape fell back with a heavy splash, barely audible
beneath the chaos of cries and shrieks as thousands of creatures dashed into hiding. Ears ringing, I lowered the rifle, watched as the water closed over him and went smooth again. “Shit. Shit.” I scrubbed at my face with a grimy hand as a stupid ache squeezed my chest. I had no choice, but hunting me—a zombie—was his choice. I knew that, and I also knew it didn’t change a thing.
I startled at a loud splash and watery gasp, yanked the rifle up again as the man surged upright. I hadn’t killed him, but I wasn’t sure whether to be pissed or relieved about it. He staggered a step closer, less than ten feet from the edge of my island. Pissed, I decided. That was the better choice.
“Get the fuck back!” I yelled. “I don’t care if you’re wounded. You’re not going to—”
“Annnnnnggeellll.”
I knew that voice. My blood turned to ice as the impossible figure lurched forward. The moon broke through the clouds to shine down like a spotlight from hell, illuminating the lopsided and ragged half bowl of remaining skull. His mouth gaped open as glistening drops of water fell in lazy slow motion from a stained gauze bandage on his right forearm.
No. This couldn’t be Judd. I was having a nightmare. That was the only explanation. A really horrible, terrifying, vivid nightmare. There was no way in hell my bite had made this open-skulled thing. Making a zombie was hard. It couldn’t happen from one bite.
Or could it? Horror crawled through my veins as I remembered Philip turning two Saberton guards with only a bite. But that was only possible because he had a damaged parasite. And those two had been messed up, unstable. Not real zombies.
So what the hell was this thing?
The Undead Judd sloshed closer, snapping me out of my shock. With every movement, water spilled from the jagged edges of his skull, like a kid carrying a bowl of soup.
He found me, I realized in stunned amazement. Apparently the bullshit I’d fed him hadn’t been all bullshit. Whatever kind of zombie he was, he’d glommed onto the weird zombie mama-baby connection and found me, deep in the swamp. It would be amazing and sweet except for the part where he was a godawful walking nightmare who’d been a murdering piece of shit before he died.
I fired twice in quick succession, hissing in frustration as he stayed on his feet.
“Annnnnggelll.” His arms extended toward me, hands crooked like claws as he continued to close the distance. Mouth dry, I fired three more times, cursing when the gun clicked on the fourth try. I was out of ammo, and I’d only managed to blow a fist-sized hole in his chest. Damn it, the dude was missing most of his fucking brain. How was this possible?
The answer appeared as moonlight shone down on the pink and grey lumps in his shattered skull. Those lumps included a completely intact cerebellum—a seriously vital region of the brain that handled all sorts of important shit like motor control and coordination. That explained how he could move—sort of. But talk? I’d eaten his cerebrum! Whatever godawful zombie parasite or infection he had inside him was helping him out in ways I couldn’t imagine.
Now I had to figure out how to shut him down.
I scrambled to my feet and backed away as he lurched onto the island. “Judd!” I shouted, hoping he still had a few neurons that would listen to reason. “You need to stop!” Oh, who the hell was I kidding. He’d never had any listen-to-reason neurons, even before I ate most of his brain.
Judd’s lips pulled back from his teeth as he swung at me in a clumsy blow. I ducked it with ease, then smacked him across the jaw with the butt of the rifle. His head jerked to the side then swiveled back to face me. His eyes skittered in every direction in a creepy, unfocused dance, yet I couldn’t shake the feeling he had no trouble seeing everything around him. He made another swing at me, a bit faster this time. Things were getting rewired deep in that brain chunk, and I didn’t like it one bit. Especially since I’d obviously left the part that wanted me dead.
I pivoted away then whacked him again with the rifle with the same lack of effect as before. His next swing brushed my shoulder, but when I moved in to whack him again he snapped his arm back with a gut punch that sent me sprawling.
He flopped on top of me, pinning me down as I gasped for breath. I struggled to buck him off, fear climbing as he closed a hand over my throat. He growled like a purr, and a trickle of brain-tinged swamp water poured over the edge of his open skull to spatter onto my face as he shifted to tighten his grip.
Brains in a bowl.
A predator’s snarl pulled at my mouth. Time to scrub the dishes.
I ignored the squeeze of his fingers on my throat and reached up with both hands to grab that goddamn cerebellum. I was at a lousy angle and couldn’t pull it out, but when I dug my fingers in, it sure as shit got his attention. He spasmed hard and released my throat, which gave me enough wiggle room to jam my knee into his side and shift him off me. He let out a weird howl as I dug my fingers into his brain stem, as if he knew what was coming. In the next instant the howl cut off, and Judd’s body collapsed, finally lifeless.