Page 27 of Abraxas

“You seem to be gone a lot," Gloria pointed out.

“Not that often. We need to set up a girls’ night with Steph and the others. There are more girls here now than there were," Dori said.

Abe was quiet and continued to work, but she was sure he was listening. It was true they were getting more girls added regularly. That's because the demons are looking for dates. Some men would be coming in to work at the restaurant and the hotel, but at least seventy percent of the employees would be women.Not all of them were single, and of the single ones, she was sure not all of them were looking. It was a great way to bring females in hoping the demons would find their perfect female.

That made her think about Abe and wonder if he was her perfect one. He certainly seemed to like it, and there was no doubt that he cared for her, and she cared for him. Was it enough to commit to letting him mate her? That was permanent and could not be undone. They had turned and were now heading back the way they had come but a little closer to the water. This time, what they found was unusual and horrific.

“Is that a real hand?” Dori wondered.

“I don't know because I'm not going to touch it. All I can say is it looks real or like one of those you buy at Halloween to scare people with," Gloria observed.

Abe pulled a sack out of his pocket, used it to pick up the hand, and dropped it in. “We'll find out soon enough. My bet is this thing is real. There is also probably a real body to go with it because it looks like something chewed it off," Abe concluded.

“What the hell is going on around here?” Dori asked.

“Maybe someone used this island for illegal activities, and now they want it back?” Gloria knew that was pretty close to the truth and as close as she could come without giving something away.

“Maybe we should hurry back now that we have body parts for the doctors to look at," Dori suggested.

Gloria felt better than ever that the two people she was with had guns and knew how to use them. She wanted to learn about using guns more than she had before. If she was honest, she'd always been a little afraid of them, especially since she heard there was a kickback when you pulled the trigger. With all the danger surrounding her, she didn't care anymore and wanted to learn. Abe had the hand in one bag and his shells in another as they headed back a lot faster than they had headed down.

She was surprised he didn't say a word when they entered the cafeteria door. Dori headed to her room, probably wondering what she had gotten into. Not that things like this couldn't happen anywhere, just that nothing like this had ever happened to her or Dori. Gloria stuck with Abe as he headed to the medical area. They went straight to Louis's office and were lucky to catch him sitting at his desk doing paperwork. He looked up questioningly.

“What can I help you with?”

Abe carefully laid the hand on his desk. “We were looking for shells when we came across a hand.”

“I wondered what happened to that. One of the hands of the body that was located previously was missing. It looked like it had been chewed off, and I'm surprised that you found it in such good condition. It's good that you did because it can be alarming to people to just find hands lying around," Louis observed.

“So, you already have a dead body to go with this hand?” Abe said.

“Yes, it's the one that was discovered. It belongs to Smith.”

Gloria had to admit that she was relieved. All they needed was body parts and bodies to start washing up on the beach in large numbers.

“I'm glad to hear that because I didn't know what to think," Abe admitted.

“I heard a demon was found alive on the beach," Louis stated.

“Yes, apparently, they intended to use him as a distraction, but they never got to that point," Abe explained.

“Are you worried that they're going to send more agents after us?” Louis wondered.

“I never thought they would send the first ones. Now I wonder if they'll send more, yes. Maybe we need to keep them busy, so they don't have time to come up with all these plots and plans," Abe declared.

They said goodbye and left the office. This time, they headed to Gloria's room. After they entered and he closed the door he turned to look at her. “Did that scare you?”

“It was pretty gruesome. You hear about the mob sending body parts to scare people. In some ways, Origin acts like a mob. I thought that they were dismantled, at least mostly. They seemed to have a lot of power left to take the actions they've been taking. What do you think you guys are going to do?” Gloria asked.

“Whatever it takes to get them to leave us alone.”

Any possibility of romance seemed to have gone out the window. Abe said his goodbyes and headed back to work after making plans for them to meet for supper. Some gods had said that females liked excitement, but Gloria only seemed scared. It was probably true that she had not been around these kinds of situations before, and it might even be true that she never wanted to be again. Abe hoped it wasn't so serious that she didn't want to stay. He headed to the office, where he found Lu.

“We found a hand on the beach.”

“I already know. Louis called and gave me information on it. It looks like a wild dog, or some similar animal chewed it off and buried it for later. The storm last night was not much, but it was enough to pull the sand off the hand. He tested it just to verify, and it is Smith's," Lu informed.

“That's good, right?”

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