Spook Lights: Southern Gothic Horror by Eden Royce Read Free Book Online Page B

comes outta your whore mouth.” He jerked on his chains as he attempted to stand up, but they held fast.
    Officer Butter stepped forward from the corner of the interrogation room where he’d slouched after bringing Nate in. “Hey, hey! None of that.”
    He turned his attention to the uniformed officer. “And why not? You boning her? I see.” Byrd looked me up and down as much as he was able to with me sitting on the other side of the metal table. “Too much woman for my taste, but the fat girls always have the big tits.” He giggled as if I’d tickled him.
    My lips pinched tight and I knew I looked like my mother had when she’d caught me talking in church. When was that, last week? I nodded at Butter and he slipped his reflective sunglasses out of his shirt pocket and put them on as I gave my final appeal. “This is your last chance to tell me what you know about the disappearance of Miss Dana Westbrook. If you continue to refuse my requests for information—”
    Byrd reached out quick as a pickpocket and snatched my pen. Before I could move, he’d brought it down with all of his might—right through my hand. He looked triumphant until he noticed Butter hadn’t attempted to stop him or help me and I hadn’t screamed.
    Also, there was no blood.
    “I’m sorry you felt the need to do that, Mr. Byrd.” My voice was calm as before, no change in volume or timbre. I wedged the pen out of my left hand by rocking it back and forth with my right until it loosened enough for me to pull out. “Truly is a shame you decided not to cooperate. It would have been easier for both of us.”
    Byrd swallowed, his eyes on my careful movements as I tugged on each finger of the leather glove, then removed it. I saw the revulsion on his face as my left hand appeared, stiff as a corpse’s. The brand new stigmata-like hole through its dry desiccated meat didn’t help matters. He tried to scoot his seat backward away from me but his gaze was fixated now. Light emanated from the hand, its gnarled digits cracking as I attempted to straighten the gray, withered flesh.
    He moaned as his body twitched almost imperceptibly. Impressive, I thought. Most people can’t move even that much when they see the hand.
    “Do you know what this does, Mr. Byrd?” His eyes moved frantically left and right—either saying no or looking in vain for an escape. “I’d hoped you wouldn’t have to find out.”
    I stood and walked around the table to stand behind him. Try as he might, he was frozen in place, gaze fixated straight ahead where my empty glove lay abandoned on the table. “If you’d revealed your secrets earlier, you may have been spared this. But you’ve kept them locked up in that little mind of yours. Shut behind a tiny little door. This,” I let the weight of my arm lay heavy on his shoulder. “Opens doors.”
    As I rounded the desk once more, I let my arm slip from his shoulder and I dragged the thick nails of the hand across the table, leaving the tooth-aching noise of scratched metal in the air. Byrd’s eyes watered.
    “You may not believe me, Mr. Byrd, but I feel sorry for you. I’m told this hurts.”
    When I heard the soft click of the officer’s tape recorder, I placed the hand on Byrd’s head.
     
     

Hag Ride
     
    Frieda stood in the kitchen’s dull light with a chopping knife clutched in one hand. The dinner on the table lay untouched, ice-cold and bathing in congealing fat. Her cinnamon coloring disguised the angry flare of heat in her cheeks. Still, she knew yelling wouldn’t get her husband’s attention, so she forced a calm tone into her voice.
    “Why aren’t you staying for dinner? I made your favorite.”
    “I told you, I got to go out.” Henry came out of their bedroom, buttoning up his good shirt and tucking it into slacks she had taken her time to iron that morning.
    “Out where? You can’t stop to eat dinner with your wife before you go? Give me some of your time?”
    “Thought I just gave you