Bad Idea

(Book One in the "Itch" series)

Release date: 21 October 2013 (Dreamspinner Press)

• Reviews
• Excerpt

Bad Idea: Some mistakes are worth making.

Reclusive comic book artist Trip Spector spends his life doodling super-square, straitlaced superheroes, hiding from his fans, and crushing on his unattainable boss until he meets the dork of his dreams. Silas Goolsby is a rowdy FX makeup creator with a loveless love life and a secret streak of geek who yearns for unlikely rescues and a truly creative partnership.

Against their better judgment, they fall victim to chemistry, and what starts as infatuation quickly grows tender and terrifying. With Silas’s help, Trip gambles his heart and his art on a rotten plan: sketching out Scratch, a “very graphic novel” that will either make his name or wreck his career. But even a smash can't save their world if Trip retreats into his mild-mannered rut, leaving Silas to grapple with betrayal and emotions he can't escape.

What will it take for this dynamic duo to discover that heroes never play it safe?

Buy Links:

• Dreamspinner

• Amazon

• IndieBound

• Barnes & Noble

 

Scratch!

If you're curious about the homoerotic comic created by Trip and Silas in the course of Bad Idea, check out their Horn Gate, a paranormal novella available from Dreamspinner Press, for Scratch, Issue 1.

As its own series, the "Scratch" novellas relate the supernatural adventures of an incubus solving occult mysteries as he exposes an inhuman trafficking ring with the help of his mortal sidekick and lover. Fusing strong urban fantasy elements and erotic romance, these gothic noirs allow the demonic duo to do supernatural battle, hunt clues, and investigate otherworldly crimes while they explore the possibilities of a relationship that bridges morality and mortality.

Note: The Scratch and Itch series consist of two parallel narrative tracks. Thematic threads connect their characters and plots but they can be read separately or in tandem.

REVIEWS:

 

EXCERPT:

(this scene from chapter 1 takes place at a zombie run in Central Park. Trip has left his girlfriends to take a piss and/or sneak away)

 

Trip stepped into the mosh pit outside the tent and struggled upstream through the crowd. His throat burned. He should've taken a nuclear antihistamine before setting foot in the park.

At the porta-pissers, the lines stood fifteen deep. He imagined a sprint through the crisp air with a gallon of coffee sloshing around in him.

Fuck it.

He veered toward a wide clump of forsythia. A ruptured bladder trumps a public indecency ticket any day. He prayed the muggers had slept in.

“Should be in bed.” Trip grumbled. He couldn’t flee with their only camera. He’d double back and shuck the camera before the gun went off.

He fished his dick over the waistband of his scrubs and did his thing against a scraggly oak that probably wished it had sprouted a hundred miles north. He muffled his sneeze. A twig snap reminded him his privacy was imaginary, even if he was hidden under the crest of bare branches.

He would fake an asthma attack. That’s it. He’d go back, have trouble breathing, hand over the camera, and meet his friends at the finish line.

The underbrush rustled. Hmmm. For all he knew, it was pigeons humping or a rat taking a stroll. Maybe another hyperallergic wuss trying to escape.

He tucked his tool away and managed a casual glance over his shoulder.

The bubble of silence seemed exaggerated. He heard the milling crowd and the faraway rumble of Central Park West. But where he stood, the cotton-ball quiet raised the hairs on the back of his neck. Was someone watching him?

Jesus Christ, he’d end up mugged with no ID and borrowed hospital scrubs in broad daylight during a publicity stunt for his bestest fruit flies.

Thhwwwwwip.

Something ripped the seat of his pants. Trip spun to see a mangled, grayish hand holding one of his flags in its dead fingers. A beefy zombie knelt in front of him, grinning like a demented jack-o’-lantern.

Oh yeah. The run.

“Has it started?” Trip shook his head, confused.

The zombie looked gigantic down there, shoulders like a prizefighter. He shook the flag and winked. He must have taken a shortcut, seen Trip, and crept in to attack. Graveyard humor. Har de har.

Gray and olive shaded the undead face dramatically, really subtle even this close. One jagged foam latex cut stretched across his skull and up into his hairline. Bright hazel eyes. A square-square chin. Jinkies. His thick hands appeared tattered and gnawed open, but his meaty forearms glimmered a smooth silvery green that showed off the striations of muscle.

I’m cruising a corpse. Again a sneeze tried to squirm out of Trip and he choked it back.

Trip held up his hands in surrender, and the ghoul rose to his feet. Five ten and thickset under the tattered sport coat… like the Incredible Hulk in shades of grave. He had calico-colored hair, a springy dark-blond that probably went brindle in summer.

The hot zombie fanned his gory fingers. His eyes were set just a little too far apart and slightly slanted under the arched brows, which made his smile look like a rakish invitation.

The long forsythia stems screened the rest of the runners, hiding the two of them in their little bubble under the oak in the cold, bright air: fake doctor and fake zombie, ready to hit the Organ Trail.

Mr. Monster scuffed closer and offered him the flag. A reminder to be vigilant during the run?  His filthy split shirt exposed a rugged torso and some unbelievably realistic ribs with guts glistening behind.

“Amazing.” Without thinking, Trip reached out and touched the painted wounds. “So beautiful.” He traced the trompe l’oeil heart with his fingers. The zombie flinched. Ticklish, apparently.

“Oh!” Trip yanked his hand back and shook it as if he’d scorched his skin.

“Thanks. Sorry.” Deep hoarse twang. Saw-ry. The zombie grimaced. His nipples had risen hard and small under the paint.

Trip had almost forgotten he was touching a person. “I—that was rude. Airbrush?”

The zombie smiled then and wagged his head. “We’re not supposed to speak. But I’m bad at rules.”

Was he flirting? Trip squinted in confusion and struggled not to sneeze all over the most attractive man he’d spoken to in a year. Trip prayed his itchy eyes hadn’t gone bloodshot just yet. “Not airbrush? Are you sure?”

“No, it is. I painted it. I was just… I saw you sneak off.”

Trip twisted back toward the tents where Jillian and Rina counted on him to return. He felt like he’d forgotten his lines. What was the plan again?

“Shortcut to the holding area.” The zombie jerked his dimpled chin toward the white tents but didn’t leave. That raspy drawl made every word sound like mischief.

“My name's Silas.” He offered his hand.

“Hey.” Trip shook it, afraid to look up until he did. If I’m bailing, I need to do it now. He tried and failed to stop ogling the brawn under the wounds. “Texture’s beautiful. Even this close, I can’t tell it’s fake.”

A big proud smile, teeth blinding white against the painted skin, made the undead face eerily handsome under the latex. “I’m part of the makeup crew today, but one of the star creepers didn’t show up.”

“I’m here by accident too.” Trip thanked all the gods Jillian’s husband was beefier than him; the scrubs were roomy enough that no embarrassing bulges would advertise his interest. He was supposed to escape, wasn’t he?

Silas leaned in as if confessing a terrible secret. “The zombie actors tend to be pretty flaky.” A drowsy blink followed, and the deep dimple of his grin punctuated his scrutiny of Trip’s body.

Without warning, Trip's breath caught and his eyes widened, widened, as a massive sneeze battled its way out of him.

Silas widened his eyes, too, and seemed confused, as if he expected Trip to burst into song or vomit.

“Agh-ka-chooo!” At the last minute, Trip twisted away. “Ugh.”

“Bless you!” Silas whistled. “Wow.”

“Sorry. Allergies.” Trip wiped his nose with a tissue from his breast pocket and ignored the heat of his blush and his sinuses. “I should get back to my friends.” Why did I say that? “I’m filming for their site.”

Silas’s painted face shone with questions. “You make movies!”

“No. Oh no.” Trip wanted to stay here talking all day, costume or no costume.

“I do gore on a cop show out at Silvercup. In Queens?” A phone buzzed somewhere, and Silas wrinkled his nose.

That got a smile out of Trip. Once a fanboy, always a fanboy. “Monster gore?”

“TV thing. Gunshot wounds and scars mostly.” He mock-snored and stuck out his very pink tongue.

Trip dried his palms on the scrubs. Heaven knows what the hell kind of pollen he’d aspirated out here. He didn’t know how to offer his number or ask for one. That dimple. Where was he going again?

“Well, sir, I’ll be your zombie this afternoon.” A chuckle. “I look forward to hunting you down and eating your brain later.”

Trip laughed finally. Hot, talented, and funny. “Trip. I’m Trip.”

“Figures.” That dimple took no prisoners. “I bet plenty of people fall for you.”

Full-frontal deep-fried zombie attack. That was on purpose.

Their eyes met.

“Not really.” First response Trip thought of that didn’t sound like a slutty come-on. His brain had short-circuited.

An air-raid siren cranked into a protracted wail. At first he thought he was imagining it until Silas sighed and grinned. Oh. Yeah. The OutRun.

Silas regarded Trip’s flag in his hand, then reattached it to the strap on Trip’s waist, his knuckles firm against the hipbone. He smelled like vanilla and magic markers.

Trip stood frozen under the big digits, really boned now and curious what came next.

A breath. Another breath as they stood a little closer than necessary.

“C’mon. Anybody who had a pulse….” Silas swallowed, as if he was about to confess something and then thought better of it. “I mean, I’m not really a zombie….”

“Well, I’m not really brainy, so that’s okay.”

 

Excerpted from Bad Idea by Damon Suede

published by Dreamspinner Press

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