Whiskey Witches, F.J. Blooding [ap literature book list .TXT] 📗

Paige jerked awake. Dexx! Her arms and legs refused to budge. She blinked, trying to make her eyes focus. Ropes.

Something sharp stabbed her arm. The pain focused her eyes. Lieutenant Jones removed a syringe from her arm.

She tried to get up, but her sluggish mind said no. This was no time to be sluggish. She needed her mind in full working order. “What’s that?”

“Something to help you relax.” He dropped the syringe on a table behind him. “Don’t worry. You should feel it in a few minutes.”

The windowless room had rough, earthen walls. Great. “Where are we?”

“Somewhere safe.” Something clanked above her head, metal on metal. “We’ll be starting soon. Relax. Everything will be fine in a few minutes.”

She doubted that. “What are you doing? Are you really prepared to kill me too?”

“You’re really not that good a detective, are you?”

This definitely wasn’t one of her shinier moments. “You won’t get him to possess me, is what I’m saying.”

“He will and if he doesn’t then, yes, I will kill you. The end more than makes up for the means. The price—” The tone of his voice rose in pitch. “So small when compared to what’s coming.”

She had to figure out a way out of there, but her mind was drifting further and further away from her. She shook her head to clear it. “It’s not gonna work.” Her words slurred together. It felt like she’d downed a half-bottle of rum.

“You’re going to let him in because you can’t help yourself. You should have let him in the other night, but you fought back. You shouldn’t do that. We need him.”

“So you can open the Gate to Hell?” The only light came from a bare bulb on a string directly above her. It swung slightly, causing the shadows to stir. “For why? Are you insane?”

He chortled. “Oh, yes, you’re nearly ready now. Not as insane as some would have you believe, m’dear.”

“It’s nuffin.” Her eyes closed in what was supposed to be a blink, and would have been had she been able to reopen her eyes. She just had to open her eyes. Open…

“I want the power, Detective. I want the knowledge hidden behind that gate.” He leaned against the wall just inside her line of sight, and cocked a foot against the earth wall behind him, crossing his arms over his chest.

He was so gummy and fluid and…stretchy. She squeezed her eyes shut.

“I know what’s out there. Home. I don’t know why I’m here, why I was born as a human, why I was put on this path. I need to go home. I need to be where I belong.”

“You tol’ Malika…” Her thought drifted off. Paige opened her eyes, fighting to focus. “The key? You tol’ her abou’ the key?”

“Yes.”

She fingered the knots binding her wrists. Her fingers felt like they were made of rubber, like all the bones had been turned to jelly. She had to get out of there. “You started this? You? No. Seriously?”

“Yes.” A smug smile slithered across his warped face. “I was put here for a reason, Detective Whiskey. I know that. I was meant to show this meager race what true freedom really is.”

“People—” She fought to breathe. Something heavy had settled on her chest. Something she couldn’t see. Guilt? Fear? The demon set on pushing her out of her body? “People aren’ ready fer tha’.”

“That’s the point. This nation—this world—is a sue-happy, blame-everyone-else kind of place. No one knows how to handle true freedom, the responsibility that comes with it. I’m here to watch you writhe with the magnitude of the knowledge buried behind that gate.” His eyes glowed.

Paige pushed as far away from him as the ropes allowed, the glow getting brighter and brighter, the flames dancing further from his eyes.

“I want to hear your screams as you go insane after getting exactly what you wanted. Father would be proud.”

She had to keep her cool. The drug. There was a drug in her system, making her see things. “Father? Sat’n?”

“God, you stupid girl.” Disgust dripped from his posture, the flames dancing in his eyes. “He sent me here to make everyone pay.”

“Fer wha’?”

“Not believing in him. For not obeying the rules, for not following His teachings.”

“You bring Armageddon?” That was almost clear. Whatever she was doing to compartmentalize her mind, it was working.

“I’m here to bring about peace, to bring the human race to their knees as they bow before His grace.”

“You’re insane.”

“You’ll see.”

“If you’re the son of God, then why can’t you open the gate?” Her fingers worked the ropes, feeling a lot less like jelly and more like fingers. “Why depend on a demon? Aren’t you one of God’s chosen sons? Wouldn’t you be able to open it? Why would He send you down here to open the gate without giving you the power to do so?”

The serenity that had blanketed his face disappeared. He pushed off the wall and stormed toward her.

Pain exploded across her cheek where his hand connected with it. She blinked, moving her mouth to massage the pain away. He hadn’t held anything back in that swing. Her heart raced. She took in a few deep breaths to steady herself, but was unable to slow her heart’s pelting pace. “I guess that’s a sore subject.”

“Like you and your apparent lack of gifts,” Jones sneered. “And your entire family is rife with them, while you’re sitting in back as the outcast.”

“I don’t have that problem anymore and you know it, otherwise I wouldn’t be here.”

His smug smile slid back into place. “I do, don’t I? Imagine someone with a gift as powerful and rich as yours so caught up in other things you never saw any of this coming.”

“How’d you find out about me?”

“I saw you in Texas. I wanted to get closer to that case you were working, wanted to know if he was trying to raise my demon, to open my gate.” He shook his head, dismissing the subject. “He wasn’t. He was too weak. Feel okay?”

“Peachy,” she gritted out, her fingers loosening the knot. “How did you know?”

“You slipped,” he said, cockiness rolling off him. “I saw you in an alley. You conjured a demon and were talking to him. Can you imagine how wonderful you are to my cause?”

Paige lost control of her breathing, too shallow and too fast. Dizziness hit her. Her fingers shook on the knots. She couldn’t slow her heart rate. Her skin flushed with heat. The effects of the drug had been receding. Hadn’t they? “What did you give me?”

“The fancy name is psilocybe cubensis injection.” He strolled over to her. “You would know it as ‘magic mushrooms’. Malika, she’s ready for you.”

Light shined in a large square against the wall at her feet. Paige could see the shadow of a long, curvaceous woman walking down the steps, with another man following her.

A crash sounded. Could have been a cellar door, and the room was bathed in the lone light of the naked light bulb hanging above her. Paige blinked, trying to clear her mind. The smell of lilacs assaulted her nose. When Paige opened her eyes, she found herself lying in a field of the fragrant purple blooms.

“Are you still with us?” Jones asked, his face blotting out the sun.

A breeze blew, fluttering against her skin. Everything was so beautiful.

Paige’s stomach heaved. She twisted as far as the ropes would allow and hurled the contents of her stomach. Her right hand was released, allowing her to project most of her vomit onto the floor.

Done, she lay on her side and panted, the room spinning. Magic mushrooms, huh? She couldn’t say she liked them.

“Lovely.” He pushed her back onto the table and retied her hand. “She’s ready.”

“She’s bugged out of her fuckin’ mind,” the other man said as he came into view.

Paige stared at him, transfixed. He was such a beautiful man to look at with his blonde hair cropped short and spiked on top of his head. His brilliant blue eyes swam like twin glistening pools above her.

He shook his head in disgust. “How much di’ ye give her?”

“Not much,” Jones said, his voice very far away.

Paige returned her attention to the sun, relaxing into the soft earth beneath her with a dreamy sigh.

“Well,” said a woman with a silky smooth voice, “at least she won’t fight us.”