Whiskey Witches, F.J. Blooding [ap literature book list .TXT] 📗
- Author: F.J. Blooding
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“Keeping an eye on things.” His hands clenched. “As I’m supposed to. As you’re supposed to.”
“Who are you?”
His fists opened. His jaw tightened.
“Dr. Ramirez?” Who else could he be?
He closed his eyes, his body visibly relaxing.
As soon as his eyes closed, it felt as if a chokehold had been released. She took in a deep breath, though her pulse continued to race.
“If you’re withholding something that could help my investigation…” she said, her words strong, her tone barely above a whisper. She cleared her throat and tried again. “I could hold you in contempt of court.”
He stared at her, his eyes shining with familiarity and something else. Desperation. “Damn it, Peanut. Please, break through.”
She blinked at him.
“Peanut.”
“A war is coming.” Balnore stood in front of her, desperation filling his black, human eyes. “You have to be ready.”
“Bal, I am,” Paige heard herself say.
“You’re not.” He took a step forward and held her shoulders. “I’m glad you have Leah, but you have to be careful. She can be used against you. You’re a weapon and someone is going to find a way to use you. Or get you out of the game.”
Paige rolled her eyes in the bright afternoon sun. “The demons? I doubt it.”
“Paige, don’t do this.”
“Peanut,” the doctor whispered, putting his elbows on his knees.
“Stop calling me that.”
“Do you want me to help you remember? Or do you want him to break those memories open for you?”
“Who?”
“The thing possessing you.”
Her frantic heartbeat screamed at her leave. “Do I know you?”
“Yes,” he answered just as quietly.
“How?”
The doctor was still for one long, silent moment. “We worked together.”
Paige swallowed hard. Her hands trembled in her lap despite how she tried to still them.
“Ask for my help. Ask me to return your memories.”
“Why?”
“You’re vulnerable without them.”
“Then why didn’t you give them back before?”
“I am bound until you ask.” His expression folded in sincerity. “Peanut, you have to remember.”
Paige couldn’t look away. “What’s going on?”
“Something bigger than you and me. A lot bigger than a couple of murders.”
“What could be bigger than murder?” Paige demanded. “People are dying.”
“There are many things bigger than simple killing, and that’s what you need to remember.”
Paige clenched her jaw. “Where were you on March eighth at two a.m.?”
“Goddammit, Paige,” the doctor said, slamming his fist against the desk. “Don’t slide into the detective role. Not now.”
Her heart skidded to a halt as she prepared to flee.
“Don’t put up these shields. Don’t bury your head in the fucking sand. Don’t pretend you’re in the world of the real. You’re not.”
Her entire body shook.
“Ask me for help.”
“Why? Who the hell are you to me?”
“You’re in way over your head like this.” He sat forward. “You’ve been out of the game for far too long. You need me. And you need to clue the fuck in. Now. Before it’s too late.”
“What is going on, Dr. Ramirez?”
His gaze captured hers again - hard. “You used to call me Bal.”
She struggled to breathe around the invisible hand closing around her windpipe. “Who the fuck are you?”
“Remember me, Paige. Ask for my help.”
Something pushed against her mind. “I don’t—” His two eyes swam and became four. The room shifted around her.
“What was the last conversation we had, Peanut?”
“…Peanut.”
“I’ll be fine. Leah’ll be fine. Grandma’s watching her. No one can get through her.”
“Just because you can fight them with ease doesn’t mean that she can.”
“I think you underestimate my grandmother. You have met the woman, right?”
She wrapped her fingers around her head and closed her eyes. “What are you doing?”
“We were talking about the war. Remember.”
“War? I don’t under—” Paige stood, dizzy. She had to get out of there.
He was in front of her as if he’d teleported, his hands around her wrists with an iron force. “Demons.”
She’d seen his eyes shift earlier. Hadn’t she? Didn’t that make him a demon, too?
“There’s an uprising. The key is important. Find it. Do not let them open it.”
Don’t let them open the key or what it opens? “What is it for?”
“It opens the Gate.”
“The gate to what?”
“Get the key and then get the hell out of Louisiana as quick as you can until you get your memories back.”
“Why does that matter?”
“Remember, Peanut,” leaning forward to whisper his words in her ear. “You were never normal.”
She tried to pull away.
“If you stay, you will die. If you die, you’ll let them in.”
“The demons?”
“Yes.”
She tried to jerk her arm out of his grasp. “You’re insane.”
“You’re wounded and broken.” He let go of her and turned back to the papers on his desk. “You can’t win this battle. Not like this. You need my help. Please ask.”
Paige stepped away from him, walking backward to the door so he couldn’t grab at her in the last minute.
“I know you’re stronger than this, Peanut.” He refused to look at her. “I know you’re better.”
Paige fled back into the waiting darkness.
“Thanks for understanding.” Dexx opened the door to Paige’s room, dinner in a bag clenched in his teeth, his left arm full of folders.
Brian followed him into the room carrying an over-filled case box. “To be honest, the fewer people who know how many rules I’m breaking right now, the better.”
“Right.” Dexx dumped the folders on the small table and stashed supper in a chair. He pulled the round table closer to the center of the room, then wiggled the crocheted doily out from under the paperwork, setting it on the bureau. He took the bottle of sedatives out of his jacket pocket before draping it over the back of a floral canvased chair.
“How’s she doing?”
Dexx sat on the edge of the bed and checked her pulse. Not that he counted her heartbeats. Half of him checked to make sure it was still beating. the other saw to the sigil on her arm. Black ink, just the way he’d left her. Good. He popped the top off the orange drug bottle and poured two little blue diazepam pills into his palm.
“Are you sure you know what you’re doing?”
“Sure.” Dexx shoved the two pills down her throat, feeling her tongue work as she fought to swallow and vomit at the same time. “Hand me that water bottle?”
Brian touched the bottle to Dexx’s shoulder. “Tell me again why she’s not at the clinic.”
“You really want a demon-possessed person running rampage in the clinic? Trust me.” Dexx dribbled some of the water down her throat, watching her swallow. “Also, I’m fairly certain the good doctor would try to tell you that the dosage we’re giving her would kill her.”
“Will it?”
“Doubt it.”
“Doubt it?”
“Demon.”
“Right.”
Dexx stood, screwing the cap back on the water bottle. “Okay. Where do we start on the case?”
“Shouldn’t we wait for her?” Brian’s gaze stayed on Paige’s sleeping form.
“I need to see if she’s really in danger or if we have someone out there mucking with stuff they don’t understand.” God, he hoped it was just some stupid person. Either way, it isn’t good.
“You both are really on that kick, aren’t you?”
“See it more often than not.”
“Okay.” The chief turned to the table. “What do you need to see?”
“All of it.”
After an hour of studying the pictures, notes, and interviews, Dexx pushed away from the table with a flaming headache. He reached into his bag for his bottle of peppermint oil. He
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