by Ann Simas
That was when Andi realized Dawna had a gun and it was trained on someone inside her vehicle. She began to yell, but whomever she was screaming at did not respond. She stepped closer and closer until she was half inside the back compartment. And then she eased away and shoved the gun into the pocket of her jacket. She tugged and shoved, clearly exerting herself, until finally a body was discernible.
“Andi?”
“Just a sec….”
Dawna wasn’t a small woman, nor was she built like an Amazon, but she must have some muscles going on underneath that crazy exterior of hers. She managed to get a man of considerable size into the wheelchair. Head slumped and lolling, he was obviously unconscious.
Andi blinked, unable to believe her eyes. The man was Jack. His hands had been restrained behind his back and his ankles were bound with duct tape. More tape had been strapped over his mouth.
“Stacy, she’s got Jack! She’s taking him inside.”
“Ah, crap! Don’t do anything heroic, Andi. I’ll have units there in a flash. Stay out of the way, okay?”
But Andi didn’t hear the LT’s parting words. She was already on her way toward the building.
CHAPTER 32
The instant she began to move across the parking lot, something flashed through Andi’s mind that she should have taken note of earlier, when she’d checked the shrine room.
Not only had Jack’s likeness replaced Vaughn’s on the Changó picture, but the Post-it had been replaced with another one. It had today’s date on it.
Whatever Dawna had planned for Jack, she was doing it right now. Her evil, demented scheme was underway.
Sherry had been right. Everything was coming to a boil.
With her hand on the door pull, Andi hesitated, forcing herself to take several deep breaths, ignoring the stitch in her side. She had to calm herself. She had to think. Clearly. Rushing in with no plan would likely get her killed. Dead, she couldn’t save anyone.
It never occurred to her to wait until the police arrived. She only knew that Dawna wasn’t rational and Jack was in terrible danger. She’d read more about Changó and Yemaya, which made her wonder why Dawna was culminating her plan in the shrine room. Changó was, above all, a sexual orisha. He was virile and fertile. Yemaya represented motherhood. She was warmth and happiness, sensible and moral. Dawna had none of those qualities, yet she fancied herself virtuous. As far as Andi could tell, the only descriptive she’d read about Yemaya that fit Dawna was wicked. The term fit her in every negative way possible.
Andi presumed Dawna wanted to be a mother and she had chosen her Changó doppelgängers to fulfill that desire. The thing was, that required artificial or natural insemination. How did Dawna plan to have sex with an unconscious man, in a wheelchair, in a room that wasn’t even as big as Andi’s bedroom at home?
The possibilities threw Andi for a moment. Could a man being forced to perform sexually actually perform?
She envisioned Dawna freeing Jack’s johnson and giving him a hand job until, against his own free will, he developed a hard-on that she immediately sat on. Then she envisioned him being forced to masturbate into a jar, with Dawna standing by with a turkey baster. And after that, she imagined Dawna closing her mouth over him, forcing an erection that way.
Other images stumbled through her brain, some of which showed Jack actively participating. Was there a drug that made men super horny? Had Spanish Fly been on Dawna’s shopping list when she purchased the azogue? Or maybe the wanna-be Yemaya planned to pump Jack full of Viagra.
Andi gritted her teeth so hard, her jaw began to ache.
Dawna, no doubt, had a plan for everything.
“Snap out of it!” Andi mumbled, before more wayward thoughts had a chance to surface. She reached for her phone and put it on vibrate. Stacy hadn’t tried to call back, but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t. And Father Riley might, too.
She jammed the phone back into her pocket and clasped the door handle, pulling on it gently. It hadn’t squeaked before, but she didn’t want it causing some kind of vacuum inside the building, either. Safe inside the double entry, she turned the knob of the inner door and eased it open.
She thanked God that Dawna had been too intent on her mission to lock either door.
And then she asked, Angel, please help me, and if you’re talking to Jack’s angel, please ask him or her to help, too. Thank you.
Andi crept through the reception area and into the hall that lead to Dawna’s office. As soon as she turned the corner, she heard Dawna’s voice. It sounded like she was chanting, but Andi couldn’t make out the words. She moved closer and peeked around the jamb.
The door to the shrine room was open about an inch. Andi tiptoed over to the desk as quietly as she could and opened the top right drawer. She hadn’t had much need for stealth since the days when she used to spy on her brother and his friends, but she managed to retrieve the keys and close the drawer without making a sound.
Keeping an eye half on the shrine room door, she edged over to the pharmacy cabinet and dropped to her knees. She picked out the correct key, restraining the others in her fist so they wouldn’t jangle. Inserting it into the bottom drawer lock sounded like an explosion to her, but the cadence of Dawna’s chanting never wavered.
Andi extricated the key from the lock and pulled opened the drawer. She withdrew the revolver and one box of shells, and considered leaving the drawer open while she left the room to load the gun. She decided not to tempt fate. If Dawna came out of the shrine room for some reason, she’d know instantly something was amiss.
Andi put down the gun and ammo and placed the keys in the drawer before she pushed it shut. She would have knee-walked out of the office, but she was afraid the toes of her shoes would scrape against the carpet, alerting Dawna to her presence. She straightened, shells and gun in-hand, and tiptoed away. Fearful that putting bullets into the barrel would be noisy, she made her way back to the reception area and loaded the gun there.
Andi’s dad had participated in competition shooting as far back as Andi could remember. Everyone in her family knew how to handle and shoot a gun. Her sister had a little revolver similar to the Ruger she’d taken out of the drawer. Andi had fired it many times at the range and she felt comfortable handling Dawna’s.
She moved back down the hall and again peeked around the door jamb. The door to the shrine stood half-way open. Andi’s eyes shot to the pharmaceutical cabinet, but the bottom drawer was still closed. Why had Dawna opened the door wider?
While Andi mulled the possibilities, Dawna’s voice rang out, clear and strong, “St. Michael, take onto you this offering of a blasphemous woman who would keep me from Changó, from taking his seed into my womb. Help protect the child I will bear who will become the ruler of the Voodoo Kingdom. Make the blasphemous woman feel the pain I inflict on her. Make her suffer and cry out. Make her beg for mercy that will never be forthcoming.”
Andi’s first thought was that Dawna was completely bonkers. Praying to St. Michael, the archangel of angels, and a saint known to all who practiced Christianity? She had a Santerían shrine set up, with likenesses of two of their guardian orishas on display on the altar. Or at least, Dawna’s version of their likenesses. She had added Voodoo to the blend, with a doll representing her new arch nemesis, whom Andi presumed to be herself, since the doll had been constructed from her scarf.
She eased closer and peered into the room. Dawna stuck what looked to be a hat pin through the red felt heart on Andi’s cloth likeness. Viciously. Several times.
Everything Andi had read over the past week clearly stated that Santería was a joining of African rituals and Catholicism. It never, ever, merged with Voodoo. Dawna seemed to be tempting fate by mixing them up and stirring the pot into something new and completely unrecognizable as any single religion.
Maybe, Andi decided somewhat wryly, that explained why she didn’t die instantly when Dawna repeatedly stabbed the heart of her voodoo effigy. Or it could be because Andi d
idn’t believe in voodoo mumbo-jumbo, either.
Dawna began to hum.
“You’re nuts,” Jack said, his words slightly slurred. His hands were now restrained with duct tape to the arms of the wheelchair.
“Silence, Changó! I do this for us. I will bear you a son of great strength, wisdom, and power. He will rule the world, with us at his side.”
“No offense, Hiawatha, but I am not handing over my sperm to you for your personal gratification.” He seemed to have found his voice.
“Silence!” an enraged Dawna screamed. She poked the pin with more force into the torso and head of the doll.
Even though she couldn’t physically feel anything except the pain in her side from her mad dash to the ground, Andi was tempted to shoot the bitch just on general principle. She also wondered which of Jack’s two jabs had irritated Dawna more—deliberately getting her Santerían alter-ego name wrong or promising she never get his sperm.
“St. Michael, in all your wisdom and glory, silence the man who is Changó until I am ready to mount him. Make him submissive, but keep him virile and productive until I have taken his seed into my body. I beseech you to ask Beelzebub to take the selfish, deceitful enemy who is mine—” she lifted the voodoo doll high above her head with two hands, as if it were an offering “—into his Hell and burn her for all eternity, for that is the only just reward due her malevolent soul.” She gave the doll one final poke, then tossed it away.
And then she began to disrobe. For a moment, Andi wondered if she’d missed her golden opportunity to overcome the deranged woman who held Jack captive.
Do not worry, Andi. You will know when the time is right.
Andi started, unused to hearing angel voices in her head. She immediately noticed that the pistol Dawna had been carrying was on the altar, within easy reach.
Once she stood before Jack completely naked, Dawna undid the pins holding up her hair. Within seconds, it flowed like a black river down her back, touching the tops of her buttocks. She shook her head, loosening the waves before she picked up a pair of scissors from the altar and began to cut away Jack’s trousers. He squirmed and swore the entire time, earning himself several pokes with the long-bladed shears. At his crotch, Dawna slowed down and performed some interesting cuts to free the slacks from his groin area.
Jack’s expression was grim and she knew he had to be concerned about his man parts. Andi took a step forward.
Not yet….
She halted. Of course. Dawna could plunge the scissors into Jack or her. Andi reminded herself that patience was a virtue.
Dawna set the scissors aside and slid her hands into the button front of Jack’s shirt, giving it a vicious yank. Buttons went flying everywhere. She pulled his T-shirt out of his waistband and cut it up the front, spreading it wide to reveal his chest. Next, she removed his belt and unzipped his pants. She peeled them back to fully reveal his boxer shorts, which she proceeded to cut back, as well.
By then, Jack was growling at her, calling her every foul name he could think of. Dawna grabbed the piece of duct tape she must have pulled off earlier and put it back over his mouth. She straddled his bound feet and planted her hands on her hips, giving him the full frontal view of her assets, which were plentiful.
Jack’s eyes blazed, not with desire but hatred. His face reddened to the point where Andi thought he might spontaneously combust.
Dawna leaned toward him, cupping her breasts. “If only you would swear to remain silent, you could savor these with your mouth, Changó. I guarantee you would not be sorry.”
Andi moved one step closer. Jack’s head jerked, as if he’d seen her, but then his eyes were on Dawna, locking gazes with her. He nodded his head, then dropped his eyes briefly to watch her continue the fondling before he vehemently began to indicate his acquiescence by nodding his head again.
Dawna uttered a throaty laugh and said, “I knew you would see things my way, Changó. You are the orisha of sexuality. I am the orisha of motherhood. You cannot resist me.”
Andi inched forward.
Wait…the time is near.
Dawna ripped the duct tape off of Jack’s mouth and thrust her breast against it. “Taste,” she said.
Andi gritted her teeth, willing Jack to take Dawna’s tit into his mouth and bite the shit out of it.
On second thought, his hands were bound and he couldn’t fight her off when she retaliated. She took back that option, closing her eyes when Jack did as Dawna instructed. It lasted only a moment, but seemed to go on for an eternity before Jack said, “Unbind my hands so I can touch you, Yemaya.”
Again the throaty, delighted laugh of triumph. Andi’s eyes flew open. Dawna had thrown back her head, leaving her hair to hang like a dark waterfall. Her eyes were closed as she rubbed furiously at her nipples.
Jack spared a glance in Andi’s direction. Thank God, he did know she was there! He was playing Dawna.
“Please,” he pleaded, his breath suddenly coming in hard pants as he put his attention back on Dawna. “Allow me to worship you with my fingers…everywhere.”
Dawna gasped and reached for the scissors. For a moment, Andi feared Dawna had outted his fake reaction and decided to pull a Lorena Bobbitt on him, but instead, she sliced through the tape securing his wrists to the arms of the wheelchair.
“My feet,” Jack panted.
Dawna must not have felt completely secure in his transformation, for she grabbed her gun before she knelt before him to cut the duct tape around his ankles. She tossed the scissors onto the altar and transferred the gun to her right hand. “Show me that you mean what you say, Changó,” she said, using her left hand to massage his family jewels, even as her head began to lower.
Now.
In that split second, Jack looked at Andi. Somehow, she knew he was going for the gun. In a choreography so perfect they might have practiced it a hundred times, he did just what she expected. He grabbed Dawna’s right wrist with both his hands. The resulting shot in the small space was a deafening explosion, but it stopped neither Jack nor Andi.
Dawna began to scream obscenities at him, not yet aware that Andi stood a foot away, leveling the revolver at Dawna’s head.
“Make one more sound and my finger is going to pull the trigger,” Andi said.
Dawna’s adrenalin must have really kicked in then. She broke away from Jack and spun on Andi, firing as she moved. Jack was up and out of the chair, tackling Dawna from behind. Andi wanted to fire, but she didn’t want to risk hitting Jack.
The decision was taken out of her hands a moment later. She felt a blazing pain in her side as she twisted to get out of the way of the struggling tornado that, in Dawna’s eyes, was Changó and Yemaya, as they tumbled out of the shrine room.
Andi went down like a rock thrown into a pool of water. She passed out, but not before she managed to take aim and fire a shot that caught Dawna in her right shoulder.
CHAPTER 33
“I’m glad you’re finally awake,” the nurse said. “Your boyfriend has been pacing the hall like a madman, threatening dire consequences for everyone in the ER if anything happens to you.”
“Poor Jack,” Andi mumbled, feeling muzzy. “He doesn’t realize something’s already happened to me.” She frowned. “What did happen, anyway? Did I get shot?”
“No, but we’re still trying to figure out how you got a piece of glass in your side.”
“Glass…in my side?”
The nurse nodded. “A big piece, probably from a wine bottle, because it was green.”
From a distance, someone screamed, “Where’s the bitch who shot me? I’m going to fucking kill her!”
Andi grunted.
“Sorry, the nurse said. “Sometimes we get lunatics in the ER. This is one of those times. Now, do you know—”
Before the nurse could finish her question, Jack burst past the curtain divider, looking like the wild man the nurse had described. “Jesus, Andi, are you okay? They won’t tell me anything.”
&nbs
p; The nurse glared at him. “We have protocol here, Detective.”
“Screw protocol,” Jack snarled back at her. “Get security if you think they have a chance of hauling my ass out of here.”
The nurse looked taken aback for a moment, then she grinned. “You two lovebirds have a nice chat while I go see if I can help someone who needs it.”
“Glad to see you put some clothes on.”
Jack ignored Andi’s amused comment as he towered over her bed, his eyes red, his expression grim. “I shouldn’t have tried to disarm Dawna while you were there. I’m so sorry, babe.”
“Jack—”
“Does it hurt bad? Do they have to take you into surgery?”
“Jack—”
“Oh, God, Andi, I thought she’d killed you.”
“Jack, shut up!” She put her hand up and he grasped it gently, rubbing his thumb over the knuckles as he stayed clear of the IV attached to the back of her hand. “I wasn’t shot.”
“Are you sure? She fired and you went down so hard before you shot her.”
Andi worried her lower lip. “Am I in trouble for shooting her in the back?”
“No. In fact, they may give you a medal for getting that bitch off the streets.” He lowered his head and kissed her.
Andi tried to raise up, to put her arm around him, but pain shot through her side.
Jack jumped back. “What’d I do?”
“My side…hurts,” she said. “The nurse said there was glass.”
“Glass? You were bleeding all over everything, but there wasn’t any glass there. Are you sure you weren’t shot?”
“The nurse said they took a piece of glass out of me. Do you mind helping me look at my side?”
Jack peeled back the sheet and light-weight blanket. Andi lifted her hip so he could pull away the hospital gown. He stared down at her side in horror.
“What? How bad is it?”
“Bad enough,” came a new voice as the curtain was pushed aside. “I’m Dr. Bower, Andi. I took a piece of glass out of your side and stitched you up.” From an instrument tray on rollers, he picked up an triangular, slightly curved piece of glass about three inches long.