Page 90 of Hart of Darkness
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Maggie
My head lolled, or maybe my whole body was rocking like a ship on high seas. I was having an out-of-body experience. I felt light, as if I were walking on air, almost like I was drunk. I lifted my hand but found I couldn’t move it. I tried the other one with the same result.
Wherever I was, the room was warm and had a faint odor of dead earth.
I struggled to straighten in the chair I sat in as I oriented my vision, searching, scanning, and trying to make out what was around me. I saw two figures, but I wasn’t sure if they were short or tall. I swiveled my head from right to left. Dizziness, strong and sharp, almost made me throw up.
Voices buzzed in the distance.
I blinked my heavy lids several times then opened my peepers as wide as I could. I licked my bone-dry lips. Water, I needed water.
“Water.” I sounded as if I had downed a bottle of hard liquor and smoked two packs of Ted’s Pall Mall cigarettes. “I need water.” I thought I’d seen two figures, but maybe I was hallucinating.
As my head hung freely, I took a road trip back in time to see if I could remember what had happened. I had nothing. My brain was empty.
Think.
I did what I usually did when trying to locate something. I retraced my steps. My body continued to sway as I tried to get the neurons in my brain to come to life.
Think hard.
My name was Maggie Marx. I was a reporter. I was also on a date, or maybe not.Date. Yeah. Dillon Hart.I squeezed my eyes tightly shut as if that would help me remember. Tall, physically fit, broad shoulders, tatted arms, shoulder-length hair. I smiled as I continued to bring up images of my hot and virile man.Is that the reason I’m here? Where is here?The restaurant. That’s it.I was waiting for Dillon when two big gorillas grabbed me.
My eyes flew open. My heart rammed against my ribs. I began to perspire.
Heavy footfalls approached.
I shook my head, hoping to clear the fog from my vision as well as my brain.
The stench of cigarettes invaded my nostrils as the person drew closer.
I narrowed my focus to see who was before me. “Ted?”
“No, sweetheart. Ted isn’t here.”
The wordsweetheartjolted me as if the male voice had shot me. I knew that voice. The man sounded vaguely familiar, but it wasn’t Ted. And it wasn’t Dillon.
Slap.My head swung to one side.Slap.Then my head swung to the other side. “Wake up, little one.”
I was awake. I was lethargic, but my eyes were open. The problem was my vision.
Blink. Blink. Blink. Then I shook my head once again.
Slap. Slap.I barely registered the pain when he hit me again. If his hand touched me one more time, I would… A hysterical laugh broke out, loud and echoing. I couldn’t move, let alone try to fight back.
“They gave her too much of that drug when they knocked her out, boss.” A new voice, brittle and more grating than the one who had hit me, trickled in from somewhere in the room.
I blinked one more time, and a man’s face started to come into focus. Icy claws crawled down my spine, and I shivered.
Hooknose examined me intently. I’d seen Hooknose before. My head flopped back like a rag doll. Cobwebs hung from the rafters, giving me the feeling that they were reaching down to save me.
The man’s hands gripped my ears and righted my head. Then he blew his vile breath in my face. It was exactly what the doctor had ordered to clear my vision and sharpen my senses.
His hooknose stood out like a beacon in the night. Only this beacon wasn’t going to guide me to safety. I dragged my gaze slowly down and found his flat chin.
He had ice-blue eyes, a hooknose, and a flat chin.
