We’re thrilled to share an excerpt from American Ghoul, a new horror novel by Michelle McGill-Vargas, out from Blackstone Publishing on September 3rd.
That’s what Lavinia keeps telling her jailer after—allegedly—killing her mistress, Simone Arceneau. But how could Simone be dead when she was taking callers just a few minutes before? And why was her house always so dark?
Lavinia, a recently freed slave, met Simone, a recently undead vampire, by chance on a plantation in post–Civil War Georgia. With nothing remaining for either woman in the South, the two form a fast friendship and head north. However, Lavinia quickly learns that teaming up with this white woman may be more than she bargained for.
Simone is reckless and impulsive—which would’ve been bad enough on its own, but when combined with her particular diet, Lavinia finds herself in way over her head. As she is forced to repeatedly compromise her morals and struggles to make lasting human connections, Lavinia begins to wonder, is she truly free or has she merely exchanged one form of enslavement for another? As bodies start to pile up in the small Indiana town they’ve settled in, people start to take a second look at the two newcomers, and Simone and Lavinia’s relationship is stretched to its breaking point…
I can’t kill somebody who’s already dead.
That’s what I told them white folks sitting out there, judging me. Of course, they didn’t believe me. For months, they saw Simone walking and talking like a real living person. But she wasn’t. Wasn’t living at all. Her heart didn’t beat none, and if they paid close attention, they’d notice she never took a breath and rarely blinked them baby blues of hers. No, Simone wasn’t one of us, but none of that mattered now. All they saw was me, some colored woman, standing over what they thought was Simone’s freshly dead body.
Hell, ain’t been three years since old Uncle Abe freed me and my ilk. But here I am, shackled again, except this time I’m in an Indiana jail, waiting for my date with the hangman’s noose for supposedly killing a dead woman.
“What are you going on about, Lavinia?”
I flinch at the jailer’s familiar use of my name. Like he knows me. I fought hard for my name, but hearing it come out of his mouth is like sticker bugs scraping against my legs. Reminds me how getting familiar with the wrong folks got me into this mess.
Martin, the jailer, makes his way to my cell. Doubt he can hear me over all the shouting outside. I can’t make out the words, but I ain’t gotta guess the whole town’s out there demanding my head. Martin turns his ear toward the noise, snorts quietly, then smiles. Even though it’s late in the afternoon, the July heat has him sweating like a fool and I can smell the tobacco plug steeping in his mouth. The whole jail isn’t that big. Just two side-by-side cells, each barely large enough to hold a cot and a pot. Takes Martin only a few strides across the wooden floor to get to me from his desk. His hand grips a battered tin cup for collecting shots of muddy juice from his stained mouth. He shifts the mound around in his jaws before settling on a comfortable corner in his cheek. Then he leans against the bars of my cell, spits a glob into the cup, and licks brown dribble from his bottom lip.
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American Ghoul
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“What did you think was going to happen? You killed a white woman.”
“She was dead,” I say loud enough for him to hear despite the noise.
“Of course, she’s dead. You killed her.” Martin removes his hat and scratches his thinning gray hair. He spits into his cup again.
I regard my hastily bandaged forearm and cover the bindings with my hand. “I ain’t killed nobody,” I say, knowing it’s only technically true. “Don’t matter. Y’all gon’ hang me no matter how many times I say it.”
“We found you with the body.”
“You act like I was the only one out there.” I place a finger to my lips and glance at the corrugated tin ceiling. “Oh wait. I was the only one out there.”
“This has nothing to do with you being colored,” Martin says, shocked that the accusation came from my mouth.
“Doesn’t it? The whole neighborhood was outside. And there wasn’t a mark on Simone. Yet everybody somehow came to the conclusion that, outta all them people out there, I was the one who killed her. But sure, it ain’t got nothin’ to do with my being colored.”
“It doesn’t. I got no ill will toward you people. And Miss Arceneau treated you just fine. Why you would go and do such a thing—”
“I told you, I didn’t—”
“Kill her. Right. Because she was already dead.”
“She was!” Then under my breath, I add, “You’ll see. Don’t be surprised when she shows up tonight and busts me outta here.”
Loud thumps rain against the jail from all sides, causing both of us to jump. Martin hurries to the door and cracks it just enough for several stones, clumps of dirt, and louder threats to make their way inside. I test the strength of the metal bars of my cell with my body. They oughta keep me safe, for a time. As fast as this town turned on me, I wouldn’t put it past Martin to hand them the keys.
He finally gets enough sense to shut the door once a few of those rocks knock him back. “And here we thought you were different.” Martin closes his eyes and shakes his head.
“If you only knew how different I really was,” I mutter, noticing a thin red line emerging on the bandage around my arm. All that jostling getting me here from the courthouse must’ve got it bleeding again.
Martin sighs and tilts his head as if he’s tired of hearing me talk. “If you only knew how different I really was? Now what’s that supposed to mean, Lavinia?”
“I’m a ghoul. Or at least I was one.”
“A what now?”
“A ghoul,” I say, surprised by the wave of sadness that hits me. I stroke my injured arm, remembering how, at first, I hated being a ghoul. But now, with only Martin standing between me and that mob, I’d give anything to be one again.
The constable bursts in and for the first time, I hear only a few voices shouting my name. “Damn fools,” he says as he slaps a set of keys onto his desk. “All that hollering, for what? As if I understand anything they’re saying. You’d think if folks want something that bad, they’d tell you in English!”
“These Germans sure love a hanging,” Martin says with a smile. “You get ’em calm, boss?”
“For now. And let’s keep it that way. No drinking tonight. You think you can handle that this time?”
Martin’s face falls. Then he notices that I notice. He adjusts his pants and then sidles over to the constable. “Ain’t nothing but the grace of God gonna keep her safe.” He lowers his voice while staring at me. “She killed a white woman.”
“I didn’t kill nobody!” I remind them.
“Had you not gotten so stinking drunk,” the constable continues as he reaches for the door handle, “they wouldn’t have gotten inside and strung up the last fella we had in here. And he turned out to be innocent!”
“What do you want me to do, boss? I’m one man against a whole town.”
“You’ve got a badge and a gun. Use ’em.” He listens at the door before opening it, then swears. “Look, Martin, mind the door this time, will ya? Somebody’s going to Hammond in chains tomorrow morning. If I come back and find her dead ’cause you couldn’t keep your eyes open, I’ll settle for you.”
And with that, he leaves me at the mercy of an armed drunk and a town itching for a necktie party. Martin mumbles something as he wears a path in the middle of the floor. Then he finds his way back to my cell.
“What were you saying earlier?” he spits out, brows all crinkled together as if I’m the reason he’s mad.
“I didn’t kill—”
“No, not that. Ghoul. What the hell is a ghoul? Some fancy French word Miss Arceneau taught you?”
I raise an eyebrow. If he’s talking, he ain’t drinking. And if he ain’t drinking, I just might survive long enough for the constable to get me on the train outta this town. Not like the law in Hammond will believe me any more than these two. But swinging from a tree for something I didn’t even do ain’t how I want my story to end. And even though I owe Simone a good skinning for what she did to me in the end, I sure hope she ain’t dead-dead. Could use a little help getting outta here when night falls.
I gently press down on my bandage; more crimson blooms. “You really wanna know?”
He shrugs. “Nobody here but me and you.” He takes out a pocket watch and checks the time. “Be a couple of hours before the constable gets back from the post office to send that wire. And the Michigan Central won’t be by ’til the morning to carry you to Hammond. A story’ll keep me occupied.” He spits the entire wad of tobacco in the tin cup and wipes his mouth on his sleeve.
I sigh and sink down to the earthen floor of my cell. This jail reminds me of the sod dugout me and Simone lived in when we first arrived here last fall. The cave, as we called it, was dark—had to be for Simone’s sake—with only a door to let in a few rays of sunlight. This jail got one door and a tiny window in each of the two cells. The wood along the bottom of the walls is worn away—or has been chewed by vermin. I quickly climb onto the thin, straw-filled mattress on the cot.
“You gonna tell me the story or what?” Martin opens the drawer of his desk and takes out an oval pewter flask. He shakes it and I can hear liquid sloshing around.
Shit.
But he approaches the cell and hands it to me. I narrow my eyes at him before taking the flask. I unscrew the lid and sniff. Not that it matters much if it’s poisoned… or that it smells like tobacco and stale breath. I pour a swig in my mouth without letting the rim touch my lips. Martin’s always jawing on tobacco, so I don’t doubt the stuff is crusted all over the top of it. The whiskey warms my innards and my shoulders lower. For a second, I don’t even feel the throbbing pain in my arm. Didn’t know I was that tense.
“You really wanna hear it?” I ask.
“Already said yes, didn’t I?”
A smile crawls across my face. He ain’t ready for this story. But I got nothing else to do. “You ever heard of vampires?”
Excerpted from American Ghoul, copyright © 2024 by Michelle McGill-Vargas.
