Ghouls Read Online Free

bad-asses, Stokes held the number-one position, and he truly looked the part. Face pitted by an adolescent war with acne. Weasel eyes. Lumberjack shirt and shitkicker boots. He wore his hair long and slicked back, and had Elvis sideburns and a satanic goatee. He poached and dealt drugs for money, ran around with any available girl for fun, and beat his wife when he had nothing better to do.
    Kurt came around a slant in the manway and was detected at once. Two shock-white faces peered up into the beam. Lenny Stokes stood with his jeans down to his knees; what hung out began to dwindle. Kneeling before him was Joanne Sulley, a slim, vampiric brunette. Stokes had been “dating” her, behind his wife’s back, since last fall. At this particular moment, Joanne appropriately lacked blouse and bra.
    “Party’s over,” Kurt said. Stokes and the girl became glimpses of flesh and shadow. The flashlight roved over chiaroscuro faces dispossessed of color by the effect of being so grandly caught in the act. Stokes yanked up his pants, muttering in his mysterious Deep-South twang, “Goddamn son of a horse’s ass. I shouldn’ve fuckin’ known some cop’d come walkin ’ in.” Joanne groped frantically on hands and knees, in search of her blouse. To Kurt’s amusement, she didn’t seem to be having much luck.
    “Lenny,” she squealed, “who is it?” and Kurt realized they couldn’t see his face, just the bright-white circle of his baton-light. “Morris,” Stokes snarled, shielding his eyes. “It’s got to be Morris.”
    “That’s right,” Kurt said. “Good old all American love in the afternoon. Making sure her tonsils are still there, huh, Lenny?”
    Stokes grimaced in the fierce, white beam. “Goddamn candyass . Get that fuckin’ light out of my eyes.”
    Kurt did not comply with the request. “I ought to haul your tail in for chopping that chain.”
    “You ain’t haulin ’ shit, chump, ’cause that chain was down. Somebody else cut it.”
    “Sure, Stokes, and water runs uphill, too, right? One of these days I’ll catch you with those boltcutters of yours and wrap them around your thieving hillbilly neck.”
    Rage pinkened Stokes’s face. “ Them’s some pretty rough words from a pussy. Just ’cause you got a gun and a badge, that don’t mean you can go fucking people around all you please. I ain’t scared of you, Morris, and one day I’m gonna kick your ass so bad you’ll think you died and come back as a soccer ball.”
    “Talk is cheap, Stokes, and I can tell you talk a lot. Why don’t you just kick my ass right now?”
    “No, not now, pussyman . When the time is right.”
    Joanne was still groveling on the ground, her voice a shrill echo. “Oh, Lenny, I can’t find my shirt. Help me find my shirt.”
    “Ditz,” Stokes replied. “It’s in the car. You took it off ’fore we came in.”
    “I didn’t think you owned a shirt,” Kurt said to her. (Joanne was one of the more popular topless dancers at the Anvil, and commonly spent more time without a shirt than with one.) “Why bother owning things you never use?”
    Blushing hot red, she stood up, but before she could cover her breasts, Kurt’s light scanned her upper body, purely by accident, of course. In the gritty glow, her flesh gleamed fish-belly white, starkly diverse against large, pink nipples. She quickly crisscrossed her arms and shouted, “You’re doin ’ that on purpose! Stop shining that light on me, you pervert!”
    Kurt laughed out loud. “Here you are half nude and going down on a guy in a mine shaft, and you call me a pervert. That’s the best joke I’ve heard all week. Don’t worry about it, Joanne. I’ve seen your tits before. Everyone has.”
    Joanne held her arms tighter to her chest, radiating anger and embarrassment. Stokes said, “Why don’t you lay off, jack? We weren’t hurting no one.”
    “You’re trespassing, which is against the law, for your information, and I know damn well you cut that