Charlaine Harris: Death's Excellent Vacation

“He smells like gunpowder, was standing in the crow’s nest watching the show, and started to leave after the second burst didn’t go off. And he’s dressed like a ninja. So I’m thinking yes.”

“Shall we see who or what it is?” He grabbed the mask and pulled it down from the guy’s face. “Son of a whore!”

“Do you know him?”

“Don’t you?”

I looked more closely but shook my head.

Dave reached for a cheap felt tricorner hat and put it on the guy, and then I recognized him.

“Oh my God, it’s Pirate Dave!”

My Pirate Dave made a sound that was suspiciously close to one of my growls.

“I mean, he’s the fake Pirate Dave.” The first time I’d seen this guy, he’d been dressed in full Captain Jack Sparrow regalia, greeting guests as they came into the park.

The ninja started to stir and opened his eyes. “Where am I?” he croaked.

Instead of answering, Dave fixed him with his gaze, and the hair on my arms stood up as the vampire spoke. “Why have you been ruining my park?”

It was like he’d flipped a switch, and the ninja—whose real name was Randy—let it all come out. “It’s your fault! If you’d let me take the night shift once in a while, I wouldn’t have done anything!” He saw me watching. “Great, another one of your Sea Queens. How many do you need, dude? Couldn’t you share? If you’d let me throw the effing doubloon once in a while, I could have gotten a piece of that.”

“As if!” I sniffed.

Randy went on. “How long does a guy have to work here to get a shot at the Sea Queens? Ever since high school, I’ve worked my ass off all summer long. When I hit college, I could have gotten a nice cushy internship, but no, I came back here to play Pirate Dave. Only you wouldn’t let me take the night shift, not once. For three summers, I’ve been sweating buckets in that damned wig while you swoop in as soon as it cools off and make off with the Sea Queens. Next year I graduate and get a real job, so this was my last chance. All I wanted was for you to switch shifts with me for one lousy season! But you wouldn’t even discuss it! Why wouldn’t you let me have a shot?”

Of course, it was obvious why once you knew Dave was a vampire, but just as obviously, Randy didn’t know.

“I thought if there were problems in the park, you’d be too busy to dress up every night, and you’d have to give me a shot.” He went on to describe how his years in the park had taught him the best ways to cause trouble and how to dodge the security guards. “But no matter what I did, you had to keep the spotlight to yourself. The park was going to close, and you didn’t care. Even when those kids got hurt, you still had to be in the parade!”

I couldn’t stop myself from blurting, “You jerk, you’re the one who hurt those kids, not—”

Dave held up a hand to stop me and said, “Go on, Randy.”

“So if I couldn’t be Pirate Dave, then I was going to fix it so you couldn’t either. I’m a chemistry major—fucking up the fireworks was easy.”

He actually smirked, and it was all I could do to keep from Changing back to a wolf and scaring it off of him. Dave had more control and got the rest of the details, including the fact that the ninja mask was just a black Captain Jack T-shirt turned inside out and tied around his head.

I think Dave really wanted to find something supernatural in the whole sordid mess. No grown-up would want to admit to being confounded by a horny college boy, and it was even worse for a three-hundred-year-old. Then again, it seemed to me that a college boy in need of sexual relief was pretty darned close to supernatural.

At any rate, Dave didn’t stop the interrogation until Randy was drained dry.

Not literally. I don’t think Dave would have had Randy for dinner if I hadn’t been there, but . . . Well, he was a pirate. At any rate, I was there and he restricted himself to glamouring Randy enough to make him forget about the wolf running loose in the park and to convince him that confession was good for the soul. Then he called the police.

In short order, the cops came, investigated, and left with Randy.

Afterward Pirate Dave showed me the captain’s quarters, and we had fireworks that night after all.

Unsurprisingly, I slept late the next day, and since I was due to check out of my cabin and head back home, most of the day was spent packing and distributing the accumulation of fruit baskets and cookie trays to the hotel staff. Then I loaded up my car before heading back to Adventure Cove.

The park was closed, temporarily according to the sign on the ticket booth, but I had my suspicions. I found a shady spot to park in, and sat and thought about the situation for the next few hours. As soon as it was dark, Pirate Dave came to me, wearing blue jeans, of all things.

“Ahoy,” I said as I got out of the car.

“Hi,” he said almost shyly. “I suppose you’ll be on your way out of town.”

“That was the plan. What’s the word?”

“Randy told the police everything.”

“And the park?”

He shrugged. “The newspaper printed the whole story, which I hope will reassure people, but there’s been a lot of damage to our reputation. People don’t want to come to an unsafe amusement park. I thought I’d close for a week, and then decide what to do.” He looked over at the concrete pirate ship. “Maybe it’s time for me to weigh anchor.”

“Bullshit!” I said. “You are not going to let some phony pirate chase you off your own ship. I mean, away from your home. Sure, you’ve had some bad publicity, but you can turn this around to your favor. Go ahead and stay closed for a week, but spend the time cleaning, freshening up the rides, brainstorming new attractions. I’ve got some ideas, too.” I pulled out the back of the envelope on which I’d been making notes. “I know this season is going to be mostly a bust, but what about staying open later in the year? A lot of parks do Halloween events—pirates are a natural for that. Not to mention vampires.”

“Pirate Dave’s Haunted Cove?”

“Why not?”

“You’ve given this a lot of thought.”

“I told you I’m in marketing. I’ve never worked with an amusement park before, but I could learn.”

“Are you asking me for a job?”

“Permission to come aboard?”

“What about the packs? Will they let you work with a vampire?”

“What I do is none of their business. This whole pack thing just doesn’t do it for me. I don’t even like fruit baskets!”

I could tell Dave was having trouble following my reasoning, but either he caught on or decided he didn’t care, because he switched from conversation to kissing.

After a wonderful few minutes, he said, “And tonight?”

“I thought we could go out for a bite. And for dessert, we can come back here for a bite.”

“Prepare to be boarded,” he said with the patented Pirate Dave gleam in his eye.

A week later, the park reopened, bright and shiny, and thanks to some hard work on my part and a little glamour on Dave’s, we had a good-sized crowd waiting to appreciate our efforts. We hadn’t had time for much more than cosmetic changes, but the employees were enthusiastic again, which made all the difference in the world.

The one big change we had made was the whole Sea Queen ritual. Pirate Dave still picked a Sea Queen during the parade, but now his selections were little girls, so naturally he’d stopped the suggestive banter. And if any of the Queens got nervous about being near the handsome pirate, they had Salty the Sea Dog right there to distract them. I still couldn’t really speak while in canine form, but I could manage to bark appropriately: “Arr-fff!”