Boneyard Rumblers Read online

  BONEYARD RUMBLERS

  Gina Ranalli

  Boneyard Rumblers copyright © 2016 by Gina Ranalli

  www. ginaranalli.com

  All rights reserved.

  Published by Bloo Skize Dark

  Seattle, Washington

  Book cover art by Daniela Owergoor

  Dani-Owergoor.deviantart.com/

  All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious and any resemblance to real people or events is purely coincidental.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means, including mechanical, electric, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher or author.

  Also by Gina Ranalli

  Unearthed

  Dark Surge

  Rumors of My Death

  Chemical Gardens

  Mother Puncher

  Wall of Kiss

  Suicide Girls in the Afterlife

  Sky Tongues

  Peppermint Twist

  House of Fallen Trees

  Praise the Dead

  Mothman Emerged

  By Telephone

  Machine Smile

  Ghost Chant

  World Revolver

  Boneyard Rumblers

  CHAPTER 1

  Opal’s eyes shot open and she gasped air into lungs that felt like dry parchment as a hard rain pummeled her ashen face. It was the rain she was aware of first, even before she realized she was breathing. It was so cold-late autumn rain-and she was immediately certain it would drown her. She would have screamed, had she been able, but the water and fresh air prevented her from doing so.

  The second thing she noticed was the night sky, heavy with cloud cover and the third thing was the man in the cowboy hat crouched beside her, rain dripping from the brim of the hat, his face split into a wide grin as he gazed down at her.

  “Welcome back, Ms. Davis. Glad you could join us.”

  He spoke in a cheerful drawl that seemed completely inappropriate for the circumstances. Opal tried to reply, wanted to ask him who he was, but only managed to cough, raising muddy hands to wipe water from her eyes.

  The man placed a hand gently on her chest.

  “Easy there, darlin’. Take a moment to adjust. You’re just back from the dead, after all.”

  He laughed and looked off to his right. Opal followed his eyes with her own and saw other people standing nearby. Two men and a woman. None of them were smiling.

  After another short bout of coughing, Opal managed to speak, the words coming out in a squeaky croak.

  “Are you…are you a paramedic?”

  The question caused the man to laugh again as he returned his attention to her.

  “No, ma’am, I am not. But I suppose you could say I’m something like a paramedic. After the fact.”

  Suddenly nauseous, Opal rolled to her side and vomited violently into the mud and grass.

  “There you go,” the man said. “Happens to everyone the first time.”

  Opal had no idea what he was talking about but her confusion took a back seat for nearly a full minute as she puked up whatever had been her last meal.

  When she was finished, she looked up again, taking in her surroundings. She was astonished to discover herself in a cemetery and even further astonished when she realized she lay beside an open grave, a casket in its gullet.

  She smeared more mud across her face in an attempt to dry it. “What…what’s going on?”

  The man smiled again, offering an extended hand, which she absently accepted.

  “I’m Gunnar Bliss and this here is my posse.” He jerked a thumb at the others. “And you’re our newest recruit, you might say.”

  Opal struggled into a sitting position, bracing her elbows on her knees and holding her head in her hands, running fingers through her drenched hair.

  “I don’t understand,” she muttered.

  “You don’t have to understand just yet, darlin’. We have all the time in the world. Just get your bearings.”

  “Uh…Gunnar.”

  It was one of the men standing nearby. His voice was gruff and impatient, a flashlight held low, next to his hip. He shined it directly at Opal’s face.

  “We don’t have all the time,” he continued. “We need to hurry this up. Dawn’s coming.”

  The first man-Gunnar-sighed.

  “I suppose that’s true,” he agreed, albeit reluctantly. To Opal, he said, “I’m afraid I misspoke, darlin’. We have got to get a wiggle on, if you catch my meaning.”

  He stood up, looking impossibly tall from where Opal sat. The rain fell harder still, its pelts almost painful where her bare skin showed.

  Gunnar reached down and pulled Opal up to her feet.

  “I am sorry about the inclement weather, Ms. Davis. And about…well, about pretty much everything.”

  Before she could register what was happening, Opal was being hustled along, Gunnar on one side of her and the woman on the other, each holding an elbow and essentially keeping her upright. The group left the cemetery, Opal and her escorts following behind the two other men.

  In her confusion, Opal didn’t know if she should be frightened or relieved. Should she be attempting to fight these people off? Who were they and what did they want with her?

  She felt drugged more than anything else.

  “Where are we going?” she asked.

  “Home,” Gunnar told her, no longer grinning.

  Opal glanced at the woman of her left. Tall and lanky, dark skin and hair, most likely Latina. The woman’s face was lovely, but grim, as though she were concentrating very hard on the task at hand while her eyes darted around, fully conscious of their surroundings. Alert for something Opal couldn’t fathom.

  When the group reached the street, they helped Opal into the back of an old, black Ford Bronco, the woman climbing in beside her while the two men sat up front. Gunnar closed the truck door and grinned at Opal from the other side of the rain streaked window before striding off on his own.

  “What the hell is going on?” Opal asked, the fog finally clearing a bit from her brain. “Who are you people?”

  The man in the driver’s seat regarded her in the rearview mirror. He was the one who’d been holding the flashlight, she realized.

  “Ghosts,” he told her and started the engine.

  Opal’s eyes widened and she knew she must appear quite comical, though none of them seemed amused in the slightest. Rainwater dripped from her hair and trickled down her neck. She brushed at it absently as they began to drive away from the cemetery.

  “Ghosts,” she repeated. It wasn’t a question.

  The woman beside her spoke for the first time. “My name is Melosia. This is John, my husband.” She gestured at the driver. “And Walter Hobbs.”

  Walter turned slightly in his seat to glance at Opal over his shoulder. “Welcome to the funhouse,” he said before facing front again.

  Opal didn’t know if she should thank him or not, given she had no earthly clue as to what was going on.

  John could apparently read her mind.

  “You don’t get it yet, do you?”

  She watched him in the mirror, trying to determine his meaning to no avail.

  “You were dead, sister,” he said. “Dead as dead can be. Gunnar Bliss brought you back.”

  “What?” she frowned, smiled nervously, frowned again. A strange laugh escaped her throat.

  Melosia placed a hand on her shoulder. When Opal glanced at her, all she saw was sympathy.

  “It’s true,” Melosia said. “For all of us.”

  “But…I didn’t…I mean, I’m not…�
� She trailed off, uncertain how to proceed.

  “Oh, you did,” John said. “And you are.”

  It had to be some kind of joke, she knew. This entire thing was absurd. She wracked her brain, trying to come up with who would play such a bizarre trick on her and why. She had been drugged, that much was obvious, but who the hell were these people? Why were they going along with this ridiculous prank? Who had put them up to it? They’d drugged her and chucked her into the middle of some cemetery in the middle of a rainy night only to rouse her and…and what, exactly?

  Opal looked down at herself for the first time. She was wearing a flower sundress, which was not suited to the weather at all. White flats on her feet, though they were now nearly black with mud, as was the dress. It was her favorite outfit. A summer dress. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d put it on.

  Out on the road, a motorcycle roared past the Bronco. The rider didn’t wear a helmet but a cowboy hat and Opal had a moment to wonder, how the hell was it staying on his head in the wind and rain?

  The man on the motorcycle nodded, his supernaturally white teeth gleaming brightly as he grinned at them.

  “Gunnar,” Opal said softly and watched as the motorcycle passed the truck and raced on ahead of them.

  “Yep.” John said. “Gunnar.”

  “His smile is like the moon,” Opal whispered. “Like it’s lit from within.”

  Melosia nodded and Walter reached for a cigarette pack on the dashboard.

  “But it ain’t,” he said.

  “What does that mean?”

  He lit his smoke. “It means he ain’t human. And neither are you. Not anymore.”

  Opal gaped at him but he ignored her, shooting smoke from his nostrils.

  John cleared his throat. “I bet you’ve never heard of the Boneyard Rumblers, have you?”

  Mouth suddenly very dry, Opal was beginning to feel a bit faint but did her best not to show it. She shook her head and said “It sounds like a terrible band.”

  John surprised her by laughing. “It is. In a way. Our band.”

  Walter laughed too. “Merry band of merry-makers. That’s us.”

  “It’s something Gunnar likes to call us,” John continued. “I guess he likes the sound of it.”

  “And he dug us up,” Melosia adds. Opal can’t read the woman’s emotion beyond the fact that she seems deadly serious.

  “You’re saying I was dead,” Opal says.

  “Ding dong, give that girl a prize!” Walter shouts, startling her.

  “But Gunnar brought me back.”

  “That’s right,” John replied.

  “But how…” She had too many questions, she didn’t know which to ask first. She decided to play along, at least for the moment. “How did I die?”

  “You were murdered,” John says, his eyes flickered for a split second to her hers, meeting in the rearview mirror.

  “What? By who?”

  “Not sure but Gunnar thinks it was the father of the man you killed.”

  Opal said nothing. There were no words. She looked around the car at her traveling companions. Or abductors, she supposed. Call it like it is.

  “You remember that?” John asks her. “Remember the man?”

  Slowly, she shakes her head and wonders how injured she would be if she were to fling herself from the vehicle while it was moving-what?-seventy miles an hour down this empty highway? It would almost certainly kill her, she thinks and has to bite back a laugh because, what the hell? She’s already dead, right? Or, she supposed, undead, really. A zombie. Or maybe more like Jesus. Resurrected.

  “He’ll tell you all about it when we get back,” John tells her. “Gunnar will explain everything.”

  CHAPTER 2

  Helena Rose strode through the cemetery in dawn’s gray light, her long wavy dark hair blown to one side of her face by damp gusts of wind, her black trench coat flapping behind her like a jolly roger. Her boots were sucked into the drenched earth with every step and made obscene sounds whenever she pulled a foot free.

  At her side was her partner Sam Cotton, a grizzled man nearing fifty, roughly the size of a mountain, his salt and pepper beard still holding onto the dark the hair his head had seen the last of years ago.

  They walked in silence to the open grave, standing on either side of it and peering down at the open, water-logged casket.

  “We’re too late,” Sam said, and turned away, studying the landscape.

  Helena shook her head, clearly angry. “Son of a dick,” she grumbled, pressing a hand to her forehead. “What the hell?”

  Sam shrugged. “It happens.”

  “Yeah, too often. Especially lately. I mean, what the fuck? Am I crazy? How the hell is he getting the jump on us every damn time?”

  “Your guess is as good as mine.” Sam sighed. “But I can make a pretty good guess.”

  “They’re growing,” she said, dropping her hand to her side once more. “If we don’t get a handle on this, and quick, we might never be able to.”

  “Oh, I know. You don’t have to tell me.”

  Helena stood silent, thinking. A moment later, she threw her hands into the air with frustration and turned, walking away from the grave. “Come on. We need to be gone before anyone sees us.”

  “Maybe we should ask around and find out if anyone saw anything.”

  “You know better than that. Bliss knows better than that. He’s been doing this a long time, remember. And besides, the last thing we need is to be answering questions about a grave robbing.”

  “Well, we know who she was, so-”

  “Is, Sam. We know who she is.”

  “Right. That’s what I meant.”

  “I’m just debating talking to her family or friends. You know damn well they won’t have any answers for us. Opal probably doesn’t even know what’s happened to her yet. If she contacts anyone, it won’t be for at least a day or two.”

  “Bliss will make sure that doesn’t happen.”

  Helena nodded. “He’ll try. But he’s failed in that department before.”

  They reached the street and Helena got behind the wheel of her white, 1976 Jeep Cherokee while Sam climbed into the passenger seat. The vehicle had belonged to her parents and though it was a decade older than she was herself, she kept it in pristine condition.

  “So, what now?” Sam asked as Helena drove away from the cemetery.

  The windshield wipers thumped back and forth in the silence that followed.

  “Keep an eye out?” he suggested. “Wait for the next one?”

  Helena cursed under her breath. That was a path she was loath to take but she was beginning to wonder what choice they had. If something didn’t break for them soon, they were not only going to lose the battle but the entire war and she would rather die than allow that to happen.

  “Back to my place,” she said. “We’ll see what we can dig up on the web, if anything. Find any other activity in the area. Regroup.”

  They rode the rest of the way in silence, all three hundred miles of it. When they finally pulled into the driveway of Helena’s family home, they were both bleary eyed and road weary, each thinking their own thoughts.

  Quincy Cochran met them at the front door, his greasy black hair in disarray as he pushed his Buddy Holly glasses up his nose with a slender forefinger.

  “I didn’t think you’d be back today,” he said as Helena and Sam pulled their duffle bags from the back of the Jeep.

  “Did you find them?”

  “Does it look like we found them?” Helena said testily. She slammed the back of the Jeep closed harder than was necessary.

  “Oh,” Quinn replied. Sam gave him a sympathetic glance before pushing past him and entering the house.

  Helena paused at the threshold. “I’m sorry. I’m just cranky. We almost had him. We probably missed him by less than an hour and we have no idea where he’s headed next.”

  Quinn held up his lanky finger. “I might be able to help with that.”r />
  She raised an eyebrow. “Something came in?”

  “Well, not exactly, but…”

  “But what?”

  “A suicide.” Helena started to question him but he held up a hand in a stop gesture. “Not a murderer but a pedo. Came in over the scanner so I checked it out. Nine accusations and judging by the bullet he put in his brain, I’m guessing he was guilty.”

  Helena looked skeptical. “Doesn’t really sound like Bliss’s type.”

  “Maybe not, but it happened a few towns over. At least it’s our neck of the woods, right?”

  She pondered this briefly before finally entering the house, Quinn on her heels.

  Sam was already seated behind the desk in the dark living room, his feet propped up, a glass of bourbon, straight up, held loosely in one hand. He’d tossed his duffle bag into a corner of the room next to a tall bookcase.

  “Bar’s open,” he told them and took a swig of his drink.

  Helena consulted her watch but said nothing, putting her own duffle bag on the ragged red velvet couch. A single light burned in the room, an old wall sconce, the only one without a blown bulb within, and with the heavy drapes drawn, they could very well have been in Victorian times, seeing only by dim candlelight. The house itself was indeed built in that bygone era and was in vast need of repair in many places but Helena couldn’t be bothered. There were more pressing issues at hand.

  Quinn scowled at Sam and pointed at the computer on the desk. “Can I have my seat back, please?”

  Sam grunted and stood up, offering the chair with a grand flourish. “As you wish, princess.”

  He moved to one of the armchairs, ignoring the dirty look Quinn shot him before taking his place behind the desk.

  “Let’s not argue, girls,” Helena said absently as she stripped off her damp coat and hung it on a hanger by the front door. “Tell me about the pedophile, Quinn.”