Witch Water by Edward Lee Read Free Book Online Page A

she’d reached up accentuated her figure and
thrust her breasts.
    He cringed and pried his gaze away.
    “So what did you do today?” she asked.
    He pulled up a stool. “Checked out the shops
on Main and Back Street, looked around, then went for a long
walk.”
    She grinned. “Witches Hill?”
    “You got it. I couldn’t resist the signs. It
was Mrs. Anstruther who recommended the trails.”
    “Oh, now there’s a character—” Abbie
leaned over and whispered, “Every now and then she comes in here
and gets crocked, drinks Boiler Makers, and she’s in her
late-eighties! You wouldn’t believe the stories she has.”
    “Somehow…I think I would. She practically
dared me to go into the wax museum, as if it’d be too much for
me.”
    “It’s plenty realistic, that’s for sure.”
Now she was restocking the reach-in coolers. “The torture chamber can be a little over the top—definitely not for kids. Some
of the sets gave me nightmares when I first saw them.”
    Fanshawe diddled with a bar napkin. It was
difficult diverting himself from her presence. “But you guys really
do pump up the witch-motif, huh?”
    She paused, a bottle in hand. The label
read: WITCH’S MOON LAGER. “Well, sure, we exaggerate it all, for
the sake of the tourists.”
    “It’s good business.
Market-identification.”
    “My father thinks it’s silly. Silly drivel, he calls it—”
    “But he owns the place, doesn’t he?”
    “Yep. My grandfather bought the inn in the
fifties, and when he died, my father inherited it. We’ve been
running it ever since.”
    “But if he thinks the witch theme is silly,
why does he push it?”
    She splayed her hands. “Because he knows it
can make a buck, but he still thinks it’s—and I
quote— silly drivel. ”
    Fanshawe asked automatically, “You
don’t?”
    Now her pause lengthened. “In a way. But
it’s also history, and that’s interesting. These things
really happened back then, when our culture was in its
infancy.”
    What is it about her? Fanshawe was
hectored by the thought. He struggled for more to talk about. She
turned her back to him for a moment, to arrange strainers and
jiggers, then was agitating something in a shaker. Her reflection
stood beside herself, while Fanshawe’s eyes had no choice but to
fall on her back and buttocks, on the figure beneath the simple
blouse and jeans: a figure of perfect curves. His eyes adjusted, to
glimpse her face in the reflection as she looked down at the
counter. For an indivisible instant, her own eyes flicked up and
caught his in the mirror—
    He gulped.
    She turned. A sound— clink! —and then a
shot glass was set before him.
    Abbie was grinning. “On the house.”
    “Thanks…” Fanshawe squinted. Some dark
scarlet liquid filled the glass.
    “It’s our drink special,” Abbie announced.
“Could you ever guess?” and then she pointed to the specials board
which read: TRY OUR WITCH-BLOOD SHOOTER!
    Fanshawe chuckled. “I barely drink at all
these days but with a name like that how can I resist?” He raised
the glass, peered more closely at it, then looked back to Abbie.
“Wow, this really does look like blood…”
    Abbie laughed and tossed her hair. “It’s
just cherry brandy mixed with a little espresso and chocolate
syrup.”
    Fanshawe downed the chilled shot neat, then
raised an approving brow.
    “Not bad at all.”
    Abbie grinned. She grinned a lot. “Just what
you need after a trip to Witches Hill.”
    Fanshawe felt, first, the liquor’s chill,
then the delayed bloom of heat spread in his belly; it seemed quite
similar to his “butterflies” when he’d first seen Abbie behind the
bar. “You know, tourist gimmick or not, it was pretty unnerving,
standing in the middle of a place where executions occurred.”
    “Oh, they occurred, all
right— wholesale. Thirteen in one day, and a over a hundred
more for decades after that. In truth, there were far more folks
executed for occult offenses than criminal offenses.