Raines of Fire: The Alexa Raines Chronicles

by Masters, J. L.

  At first it didn't look like Alexa's advances were going to be reciprocated, but then the flight attendant smiled, leaned down and huskily whispered. “May I help you ma’am? My name is Katie and I would be happy to do anything at all to make your flight more…pleasurable.”

  “Yes, Katie, you can help me. Could you bring two large flutes of champagne to the rear of the cabin and open my folding bed? I’d like to lay down for a while.”

  Alexa watched as the young woman sensuously made her way down the corridor, her ass was something to marvel at, and Alexa wanted nothing more than to sink her teeth into each cheek. Katie oozed sexuality, and her intentions were very clear by the way she licked her lips with her tongue that she was prepared for an encounter with her new boss.

  Alexa waited while Katie dimmed the lights and then she made her way down to where the young woman was waiting for her. They stood looking at each other, undressing each other with their eyes, till finally Katie opened up the fold away bed and Alexa slipped into it.

  Alexa continued to gaze into the young woman’s eyes while reaching out and gently pulling her onto the bed beside her.

  There was not a great deal of room to do anything, but that only made the heat between them burn a little bit hotter. It wasn't long before they were kissing, and Alexa didn't exactly know who had initiated the first move. All she knew was that her tongue was now in this woman's mouth, and hers was curling around her own. The feeling was indescribable, as they started to use their hands to explore each other's bodies. All thoughts of work were gone, and the only thing that they were thinking about now was what kind of pleasures were in store for them.

  “I don’t normally do this, but when you touched me, there was an electricity that I could feel in the air, and it was something that I just couldn't resist.” She said this with an air of self-confidence mixed with a little bit of nervousness. Alexa could feel her trepidation in the way that her body was trembling to her touch. That didn't last very long, and she suddenly sighed, throwing back her head, as Alexa put her hand underneath her skirt. “Yes, more, please…I need this…I need you.”

  It was nice to feel wanted, to be wanted. Alexa pulled this beauty towards her while spreading her long legs. Knowing that this union wasn't going to last long, Alexa leaned forward and touched the tip of her tongue to Katie’s womanhood. Looking up at her face, Alexa saw that this young woman was now pushing her fingers into her own mouth, just so that she wouldn't scream out her joy at feeling Alexa’s tongue.

  “MMmmmmmmm.” Alexa was playing a happy tune with her tongue buried inside the woman, while at the same time rubbing herself with her thumb. The poor girl didn't really know what was happening, until she was biting down on her knuckles, as her orgasm overtook her and shot her to new heights of sexual pleasure.

  Alexa’s amorous hunger consumed her, and before long she was reaching up and ripping the flight attendant’s blouse completely open. She was a little surprised to see how well-endowed she was, as it didn't show through her uniform.

  Standing up, Alexa took Katie by the hair, forcing her tongue down her throat, while pinching her nipples and pulling them away from her body. She licked down her neck, lightly nipping at the skin, before moving down her cleavage, taking the time to circle each nipple.

  Katie couldn't believe that this was actually happening. Slipping around, she turned Alexa onto her stomach, repositioning her until her nicely formed ass was bent over the edge of the bed. Her mouth went after Alexa's ear, licking and biting the lobe, causing Alexa to thrust her ass back against her. It felt like there was a blue hot flame going back and forth between them, as Katie moved to her knees, pushing Alexa's legs out, and then raising her skirt, until it was over her ass.

  “My god, if I had an ass like yours, I would never be alone again.” Alexa giggled, but then made a slight moan as Katie kissed each of her bare cheeks, until finally spreading her open like a newborn flower. This wasn't exactly Katie's first time, but it had been awhile since she had sunk her tongue into anybody that looked as hot as Alexa. She didn't waste any time, pushing herself forward until she buried every inch of that oral digit into Alexa from behind.

  Alexa grinded against Katie’s lips, getting Katie’s tongue as deep as possible within her folds. Katie was surprised to feel just how powerful her inner muscles were, as they tried desperately to rip her tongue out of her mouth. Holding Alexa’s hips with both hands, Katie drew her tongue away, and then plunged back in again repeatedly in rapid succession. Katie suddenly had an interesting thought, wondering what would be like to fuck this beautiful creature with a real cock. If she could somehow wish in that moment to have a large appendage between her legs, she would have been happy to slide it deep inside Alexa.

  In lieu of that, she used her tongue as a battering ram, shooting it in and out of her so fast that her juices were streaming down her chin. “Fuck, yea, I knew just from looking at you that you were the one that I was craving…ahhhhhhhhh.” She kept her orgasmic exclamation to the bare minimum, showing great restraint in not screaming out her release. This was a distraction worth taking, and something that she needed to give her the extra boost of energy to go forward into this new assignment.

  Katie got a little forceful, pulling her hair back and kissing her, letting her taste her own essence on her tongue. This only made Alexa go after her with her own mouth, licking her face and making sure that she was presentable before they both returned to work and the harsh reality it represented.

  For the remainder of the flight each time that Katie walked by, Alexa had this deep desire to take her once again, but their union was meant to be short-lived, and a bright flame that would burn within them both. Alexa was now able to concentrate on the job at hand, going over everything she had on Edgar and Wicca in general.

  Chapter Six

  When the flight landed, she received an email from Michael. Hidden amongst his discussion on whether to use the Wedgewood and cut crystal for the (nonexistent) dinner party, or to go for a more downscale, informal party was a coded message: nothing could be found on this Edgar Faust. There were a few dozen other people named Edgar Faust in the world, all of them accounted for, none of them in Indiana.

  Alexa sighed. This sonofabitch was too good at concealing his tracks. She wondered how he’d managed to get a hold of her number, since the only way to find it was to contact someone who did—and those types of people did have records. She got into the car that Michael had arranged for her and drove out into the middle of no-where-ville that was the outskirts of Indianapolis, Indiana. It was, in all honesty, quite a nice suburb, neat houses in small, trim lots. It was a pleasant enough neighborhood, if you could discount the 1970s vibe of the place.

  The address Edgar had given her was a small shop, in an old strip mall that had mostly shut down. The plate-glass windows in most of the stores were broken, or papered over in yellowing newspaper, and the only other store that was still operational was a thrift shop, whose window was cluttered with lamps and old dolls. Next to this, the “Wiccan Society” office, with its hand-painted sign, and a dreamcatcher over the door and notices for missing cats taped next to “Come to our Meet-and-Greet” signs, seemed downright cozy. And Edgar, a surprisingly young man with a surfer’s shag and enough hemp jewelry around his neck and wrists to get a horse high, looked prosperous, even though there was nobody else in what they called an office. Even so, he looked exhausted, as though he hadn’t slept in days. Alexa supposed that, if she were a member of a group who was being hunted and killed, she wouldn’t have slept, either.

  “Thank the God and Goddess you’re here,” he said, as he stood up to meet her.

  She shook his hand, but that was in spite of the feeling, which had been growing ever since she’d agreed to take this case, that there was something off about this man. His life signature—whatever it was about living things that she could sense—was off, somehow, as if he were only pretending to be alive.

  Edgar said, “We just received n
otice of another member of our coven—“Alexa had to suppress a smirk, because she knew what real witches were, and they did not form covens “—ten minutes ago. I told the police I was hiring a—“

  Alexa held up her hand. “Where’s the body?” she asked.

  Edgar brightened. “I’d heard that you were diligent,” he said. He glanced at a square of paper on his desk. “In the middle of Bryan Park,” he said. “That’s—“

  But Alexa was already back out the door. Instinct, honed over four thousand years, told her that Edgar was more than he’d seemed, and that if she stayed any longer, he’d figure her out. He watched her get into the car from the door, smiling awkwardly as he waved good-bye. She gave him her friendliest smile, but on her way to the park she called the last member of her team, Andie Greene. “I need you to be invisible,” Alexa said. Andie almost never spoke, and she didn’t confirm Alexa’s request. Nevertheless, Alexa felt the silence change over the phone, and she hung up, feeling safer already.

  Chapter Seven

  “You’re sure of it?”

  “Yes. She’s—not like the others.”

  “I say you’re seeing things. You promised us things from these Wiccans. You failed to deliver.”

  “I know. I’m sorry. But they were the ones who said they had real magic.”

  “We know you tried. And maybe one of them has some potential to learn The Craft, but we should move on before they suspect too much.”

  “They won’t suspect anything. I’ve got it under control. And she is the real deal.”

  The two—one dark as night, the other white as snow, both with jade-green eyes—looked at each other. “You’re sure of it? They only made three before they were wiped out.”

  “I know it. The question is whether she knows it. And I don’t think so.”

  The two exchanged shrugs. “All right,” said the white one. “But it has to happen soon. Otherwise we must leave to protect our anonymity.”

  “Don’t worry. I think I know how to get her.”

  Chapter Eight

  The park wasn’t hard to find—a swath of wide-open field crisscrossed with running and walking paths, and an impressive playground at one end. This was ablaze with flashing red and blue lights. Alexa got out of the car and sauntered over to the police cars. “What’s going on?” she asked, flashing her badge. It was just a cheap trinket she’d picked up from a thrift store, but she found that it helped when dealing with law enforcement. “I’m the private investigator that Edgar Faust hired,” she added, before the officer—a chubby, baby-faced twenty five year-old man who looked as fit as a package of Oreos—could ask.

  “Oh,” he said. “Uh, well—“He stepped aside, or rather she stepped forward and he made room for her. The body was covered with a canvas sheet, but even that couldn’t hide the fact that the ground around it was drenched with blood.

  “Who is it?” Alexa asked. The officer--“Doyle” was printed on his nametag—stammered something incomprehensible, but Alexa wasn’t listening any more. She went up to the body and lifted the corner of the tarp. And, for the first time in a very long time, nearly threw up. For thousands of years Alexa had witnessed the ravages of war and the horrible atrocities that man was capable of. What she witnessed now was a new low and threatened to overwhelm even her jaded senses.

  The body had been skinned, the muscles sliced from their tendons. The hair and face were separated from the skull, but had been carelessly slapped back onto the bones, so that she—at least, from what Alexa could tell of the body, it was a woman—looked like she was wearing a rubber mask the wrong way. The woman had been strangled with her own intestines. Alexa replaced the tarp before the scowling coroner could tell her to. There was nothing she could get from this, except feeling ill.

  Whoever had done this was one sick puppy, Alexa thought. She stood up and went over to Doyle. “Do you have any suspects?” she asked.

  “Well, I’m not supposed—“

  A sign behind Doyle caught her eye, as did the man wielding it: “REPENT YE HEATHENS”, painted in blood-red letters on a sheet of poster board tacked onto a stick, and a man dressed in a cheap suit howling something about the vengeance of the Lords. Alexa turned back to Doyle. The stiff smile on his face told her that yes, this strange man was a suspect. “Who’s he?” she asked.

  “I told you—“

  The crowd that had gathered around the official perimeter had, up until now, been quiet, rubbernecking politely the way people in small towns did. But now there was a screech of pure rage, and a woman came running at the man in the cheap suit, and she tackled him, breaking the stick and tearing the poster. She gouged at his eyes, while he had his hands around her throat—but by this time the police and Alexa had descended upon the pair and while two officers pinned the man to the ground, Alexa pulled the woman off. “What’re you—“Alexa began, before she realized who it was. “Felicia?” she sputtered.

  The woman—olive-skinned, raven-hair, gold eyes—was shocked into stopping. “Alexa,” she gasped. Then she slapped Alexa across the face and stormed off. The shock of seeing Felicia Grant after ten years hurt Alexa more than the slap. The surprising thing was, she found herself running after Felicia anyway.

  Chapter Eight

  “I’m sorry—“

  “I fucking thought you were dead!” Felicia shouted. “I mourned you for years. Every time I saw someone with your hair, I had to make sure it wasn’t you. And I still see you reflected in mirrors—I still smell your perfume—I still hear your fucking voice in my head—and I keep telling myself, ‘No, she’s dead, move on,’ and every time I think I might finally be over you, it’s bam, another reminder of what we had. And now you’re here?”

  Alexa was half-running after Felicia, who never broke out of an angry, stiff-legged walk. They were headed away from the houses, towards the other end of the park, where there was a row of shops. Alexa felt a few stares following them as they left the crime scene, but most of the onlookers were still more curious about the dead body, which was fine by her. This part of the country, in her experience, didn’t look too kindly on girls who liked girls.

  “Look, Felicia, I wanted to let you know, but—well, it’s. Um. Complicated.”

  Felicia rolled her eyes. The years had been kind to her—she was still the lithe, sensuous beauty that Alexa had fallen in love with, back when knowing another woman was something that only happened on VHS video tapes with soft lighting and bad music. Alexa wanted nothing more than to kiss her, to take her to the nearest hotel room, to touch her and fuck her and make the ten years disappear and wash away her sorrow with pure ecstasy. She settled, instead, for, “Can I buy you a drink so I can explain what happened, at least?”

  Ten years ago, Alexa’s work took her to a little town called Westpark, in Texas. She’d been tasked with assassinating Big Jim Campo, one of the bigger dealers of the area who’d been expanding his operations to include prostitution and racketeering. Felicia had been a stripper at the club he frequented when he was in Westpark. She’d just started—that much was obvious when Alexa walked in, and saw her giving Big Jim a lap dance. Or trying to—she hadn’t yet mastered the art of moving about in six-inch stiletto heels. Still, she could tell that Big Jim liked this girl, perhaps because she was so new and sweet. Alexa befriended Felicia, and asked her for a favor. “Could you, y’know, maybe get me onto Jim’s good side?” she’d asked. “I’m kinda hard up for money, too.”

  After Big Jim had been disposed of, Alexa called Michael Rollins and told him she was getting out of the business. Michael, as expected, only said, “Very well, Miss Raines.”

  They rented a house together, barbecuing and sipping vodka spritzers and learning how the other liked to be touched, how to kiss, where to brush and where to press and where to pinch. The local fertilizer plant was a good place to work—there was steady money, so Alexa got a job there, to blend in better with the locals—someone who always had money but no job would be too conspicuous in a town where the r
ichest person had to shop at Piggly Wiggly’s. And life was good, for a few years. Felicia went to school and worked at a diner, they bought a car, and then everything blew up—literally.

  There was an accident at the plant. A stray spark, a plume of gas, whatever it was that exploded, was bad—Alexa took three weeks to resurrect from this. Michael had driven out to Texas in a marathon seventy-two hour drive to creep into the wreckage and steal her body from the ashes before the officials could begin their body count. He kept her safe, in a converted shipping container outside Los Angeles, for three weeks, while her body reassembled itself, regenerated what parts had been lost, and finally, became alive again. But by then, Felicia had already thought she had buried her lover.

  “You wouldn’t do her any good going back to her, now,” Michael had said. And Alexa had agreed. Life went on for her. She restarted Raines Adjustments, and Felicia passed from her mind like all of the other lovers she’d had over the centuries.

  Now, sitting next to her former lover at the bar, Alexa didn’t tell her that, of course. “I couldn’t do that to you after three weeks of being presumed dead,” she said.

  “It never occurred to you that I might have needed you?” Felicia said. “I lost you, two friends, and my brother in that accident. I would’ve been ecstatic to see you.”

  “I—I couldn’t know that,” Alexa said, feeling guilty for the first time in a long time. She tilted the rest of her drink—scotch, neat—down her throat, hoping that the burn would take some of it away. It didn’t. If anything, the guilt was more intense. “So what are you doing now? Into Wicca?” She hoped Felicia wouldn’t take the sudden shift of topic amiss.