Release: Out now
Publisher: Bold Strokes Books
Formats:
.mobi, .epub, .PDF
Blurb: Kyle, a young newcomer to New Orleans, is haunted by the memory of
his first lover, brutally murdered just outside the French Quarter. Marc, a
young Quarter hustler, is haunted by an eccentric spirit that shares his
dreams, and by the handsome but vicious lover who shares his bed. When the
barrier between these men comes down, it will prove thinner than the veil
between the living and the dead…or between justice and revenge.
Buy
links:
Bold
Strokes Books: https://www.boldstrokesbooks.com/books/skin-by-christian-baines-2342-b
Author
bio: Christian Baines has written on travel, theatre,
and various aspects of gay life, factual and fictional. Some of his thoughts
have spawned novels, including queer paranormal series The Arcadia Trust, and
Puppet Boy, which was a finalist for the 2016 Saints and Sinners Emerging
Writer Award. Born in Australia, he now travels the world whenever possible,
living, writing, and shivering in Toronto, Canada on those odd occasions he
can’t find his passport.
Stalking
links:
Website:
https://www.christianbaines.com
Twitter:
https://twitter.com/XtianBaines
Read
an interview with Christian by author MJ Williamz here.
Excerpt:
Kyle watched the last group of tourists
leave the museum, then checked the time on his
phone. Almost six. Just enough time to get
in and satisfy his curiosity. The tourists seemed
satisfied enough, leaving the museum with
big smiles on their faces, clutching tiny bags
probably full of books and knick-knacks,
waving hands and pointing fingers, teasing each
other with fake curses.
He touched the spot on his chest where the
woman had inked him. Why the hell was he
doing this?
The store that fronted the museum was a
little plainer than he’d expected. No explosion of
colorful tourist trinkets lined the walls.
No cheesy dolls stuck with pins. No ominous signs
cast in skeletal font forbidding photos.
Just a few African masks on the walls, a couple of
grinning skulls decorated with coins,
beads, and the occasional knife, aged wooden boxes
stocked with tiny colored bags, candles of
every shape and color, figurines of the Virgin
Mary, alongside other saints he didn’t recognize,
plus feathered figures of the Voodoo spirits
he took to be the various loa the tattoo
artist had described to him, some obviously more
pitched at tourists than others.
But more than anything else, there were
books. Books on spells and rituals, famous
practitioners, the spirits… Kyle pulled one
from the shelf, flipping directly to the index and
holding it open with his thumb. He flipped
through to the first of the five or six pages that
mentioned Ghede Nibo, patron spirit of
those taken before their time. Those whose deaths
had defied justice, or were the product of
violence. Deaths like—
“Closing in five, son. If you plan on
dog-earing that volume any more, you’d best plan on
buying it.”
He peered at the old man gingerly stubbing
a cigarette out in an ornate silver tray on the
counter. Behind him, Kyle saw a small altar
next to the doorway that led to the museum’s
entrance, a dim red light just visible
behind its black curtain. “Yeah, umm…maybe.”
“’May-be,’ he says. May-be,” the old guy
mused, his accent carrying the pure, faintly
aristocratic lilt of an educated man who,
for all his worldliness, had known no other home but
New Orleans. There was no trace of the
southern drawl that gave away the guys at Laveau’s
as transplants, nor the faint Cajun affect
that tinged Kyle’s own words. Maybe he’d lucked
out. Maybe this place, and this guy, were
the genuine article.
“Hey, umm…you know anything about this
Ghede Nibo?”
The guy nodded, slowly, pushing the ash
tray aside. “I know enough about a lot of things.
That includes the psychopomp.”
“The what?” The word sounded like something
you’d call a rave at a mad house.
“The psychopomp. An intermediary between
the living and the dead. What’s your interest
in any case?”
Kyle shrugged, carefully putting the book
back where he found it before pulling up his
shirt and showing the man his still
glistening tattoo.
The guy just stared at him, keen grey eyes
dull and immutable, until he finally spoke. “So,
which is it? Are you desperate or just
plain stupid?”
He opened his mouth to speak but choked.
What the hell was that supposed to mean? Hell,
with his white hair and six chins sticking
out under his ruddy pink face, the old guy looked
more like he should be asking snot-nosed
brats at the mall what they wanted for Christmas
than cracking wise at customers in a Voodoo
store.
“A messenger from the land of the unjustly
dead, most of them fair rightly pissed off, I
dare say, and you get his damn post-box
tattooed over your heart? Sounds like a real wise
idea, son. So, which is it? You desperate
or just plain stupid?”
“I…I don’t know. It’s just ink.”
“’Just ink,’ he says. ‘Just ink.’ Probably
the most dangerous substance on this here earth.
There’ve been wars started by ‘just ink.’
But don’t you worry, son. Hell, if you’re looking to
get a few extra dollars stuffed down your
jock, you probably couldn’t have picked a better
spirit to blaspheme.”
“Jesus, man. What the hell’s wrong with
you? You think you’re scaring me with that
hoodoo bullshit? Hey, you know what? Forget
it. I’m good. Sorry if I wasted your precious
time.”
The man didn’t so much as flinch at his
sarcasm. If he was offended or scared behind
those keen eyes, Kyle wasn’t seeing it. The
guy lit another cigarette, holding it in that faggy
way between his index and middle fingers,
letting the smoke gently swirl to the ceiling. The
man took one long drag and ashed the tip.
“Hoodoo,” he finally said, his tone now bone dry,
“is not what we teach here, son. It’s
another thing altogether. Folk magic.”
“Okay.” He nodded, trying to cool his tone.
“Okay, fine. It’s folk magic. Hoodoo is folk
magic, and Voodoo is…somethin’ else. I get
it. All part of the same, ain’t it?”
“Ahah, sure!” the man drawled, smiling through
a transparent mockery of Kyle’s own
accent. Why don’t you stick around a half
hour? We’ll be drinkin’ snake blood from a
‘gator’s head and askin’ my dear old Aunt
Doris, dead fifteen years this September, how it
goes. You know what? You’re right. Get
lost, son. You’re starting to bother me.”
“Hey! Will you just…?”
The man took another long drag off his
cigarette. “Just what?”
“This Ghede Nibo guy. The psychopomp. You
said he was like, an intermediary? That
was your word. So if you contact him…what?
You can talk to dead folk?”
The man scoffed. “Well, Jesus, son. Any
half decent séance will let you do that, if the
dead want to do talking. Truth is, if
they’re happy, they do not give one damn about you or
me or any other soul still living,
breathing, eating, or worrying on this earth. Now, if they’ve
got a bone to pick, a grudge against this
earth, or their time on it, or someone on it, that would
be a different story.”
“You mean if they’re like, murdered or something?”
“Hell, son. Murdered, accidental… Lots of
ways to go before your time. Or just die
unhappy or in pain. But you see, that’s
where there might be an anchor, to somebody left
behind. And if old Ghede accepts your
offering? He can make an unhappy soul feel a little
less unloved.”
The room felt hot all of a sudden. Kyle
could feel the sweat forming on his brow, the
clammy dampness of his palms. “What if he
doesn’t accept it?”
“The psychopomp’s not that choosy, boy.
You’ll always have something he wants. Have
no fear of that. Especially now you’ve seen
fit to paint his veve under your tit.” The old man
slowly rose from his chair with a series of
discordant creaks, taking a shiny black walking
stick from behind it, then staggering
toward the door. “So who’d you lose, if I’m not prying?”
“Huh? No…nobody. Just wanted to know more
about my tat, is all.”
The man turned over the sign in the
storefront window, locking the door firmly beneath it
before turning back to him. “Son, I hope
for your sake that you’re a better dancer than you
are a liar.”
“Hey, how’d you know I dance?”
The man shot him a dejected look. “New
Orleans born and raised, dear boy. I’m
acquainted with the type.” The guy stepped
closer, but he didn’t press Kyle for an answer to
his earlier question. “I’m leaving here in
ten minutes. You’ve got ‘til then. Second room on
the left, if you don’t want to waste time.”
Kyle swallowed, silently nodding his thanks
as he turned toward the black curtain.
“Hey!” The old guy stopped him. “Six fifty.
We’ve all got a jock to stuff here, kid.”
Kyle tried to force the image as far from
mind as possible, fishing what singles he could
from his shorts and dumping them on the
desk.
Satisfied, the man tilted his head at the
black curtain, lifting another cigarette to his lips.
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