“I guess people tend to get mouthy when they have been kidnapped.”
“That’s not true. The only thing your husband said to me was that he was going to kill me. After I laughed for an hour, I realized he wasn’t joking. Too bad, good comedians keep a straight face. Back to the subject at hand. Why don’t you go back to your dwindling group of friends and wait for my next call? It will all soon be over,” the kidnapper said with an evil laugh.
Whitney wondered how she was going to explain losing Tara to her friends.
9
“Ever had a sleepover at an execution house?” the kidnapper asked Whitney.
She was about to answer when the line went dead. She didn’t know how much more she could handle. The scary stuff didn’t bother her as much as the kidnapper dangling Trent in front of her. She just wanted to see her man. Her body and mind ached from the tedious exercises.
She pulled up to the motel after another emotionally draining experience. She looked at the time. 11:34 p.m.
Whitney grabbed a few things from the passenger’s seat and walked up to the door. A steady thumping became louder as she got closer.
No. It can’t be. A swinging dragon shifter?
She pounded on the door and chipped red paint fell to the ground.
“Let’s go. Let me in,” she yelled.
The pounding sound stopped. A few moments later, Darominius opened the door in a robe. Bo finished buckling his belt and smiled at Whitney.
“You need to control yourself too.” She threw the phone on top of her open duffle bag.
Darominius asked, “Where’s Tara?”
Whitney lowered her head and felt the tightness in her neck and shoulders. “She fell in the water, got knocked in really, but she somehow was captured by this lunatic. He called on the phone and I could hear her yelling in the background.”
Bo’s jaw almost hit the ground. “Are you effing serious? So now we have to get her back too?”
Whitney exhaled audibly. “He said that both of them are together. I guess that’s good, but I don’t have a clue as to what the end game is for this nonsense. I don’t know how much more I can deal with.”
Darominius pulled her in for a hug. She felt the comfort, but it was incomplete.
The dragon shifter said, “We will help you get through this. You will be much stronger when all this is over. I promise.”
“The ghosts that called me their friend still haven’t shown up to help me out. What’s going on with them?” She rested her head on the shifter’s chest.
Darominius patted her softly on the back as he spoke. “Oh, Whitney, I’ve told you about the parameters of helping humans. You know your friends don’t normally invade your world and if they do, they don’t go very far. I don’t think Richard’s ever been outside the library.”
“I know. This is just so frustrating. I feel like this guy is playing with my heart like it’s a yo-yo.” She broke the hug and dug in her bag for a new outfit to wear.
Bo leaned forward on the end of the bed. “Hopefully, this is almost over, Whit. We’ll have both of our friends back in no time.”
She detected a crack in Bo’s voice and noticed his face had run flush when she had talked about Tara being taken. Whitney stomach was tied in knots worrying about the matter. The exhausted woman fell face first onto the bed and tried to keep talking to the guys, but quickly fell asleep.
Whitney fanned the cigarette smoke away from her face as she waited for the waitress to bring them the bill. She had barely eaten all week and the lack of cleanliness of the diner didn’t make her very hungry. She pushed her scrambled eggs around with a bent fork.
The small wooden structure with a white diner counter and dining tables only had seven people inside. However, every single person held a lit cigarette and Whitney even noticed one of the cooks with a cigarillo in his mouth when he peeked out from the back.
One old man even used the end of one cigarette to light his next. The open windows didn’t help much. She waved her hand back and forth to chase away the lingering cloud again.
The phone rang in her pocket and she pulled it out.
“Hello.”
The voice asked, “Are you ready for your next adventure?”
“Is it going to be the last?” She set down the fork and pushed her plate toward the center of the table.
The man said, “Oh no. Don’t tell me you are getting frustrated. That will just make me want to keep going forever now. Think of this from my side. I get to watch someone who wronged me and messed up my life struggle for once.”
“How did I mess you up for life? What are you even talking about?”
The kidnapper spoke in a defensive tone. “I meant people like you. Law enforcement. Those scumbags who think they are better than everyone else. Not you personally. Back to the matter at hand. You have a beautiful two-night deluxe stay coming up at Hanging House.”
“Hanging House?”
“I could be considered guilty of a great many things, but stuttering isn’t one of them. Yes, Hanging House. The place that supernatural enthusiasts can’t even spend five minutes inside without running out in madness. That Hanging House,” the kidnapper explained.
“Fine. I’m not scared. So I just have to stay there for two days?” Whitney got up from the table as Bo paid the bill.
The kidnapper answered, “You and a friend if you wish. Once inside, you both have to stay the entire time. If either person sets foot outside the building, a man will die. And I think you know who that will be. I will call you and provide instructions about how to get there when the time is right. Don’t you go anywhere.”
He hung up the phone. Bo and Darominius were already at the car as Whitney walked up.
She said, “So who wants to stay with me in a so-called haunted house for a couple of days?”
An awkward silence ensued and Darominius finally broke it. “I’ll go with you, Whitney.”
Bo spoke up. “No. I’ll go this time. It’s my turn.”
Bo still had that spooked look on his face. Whitney debated on whether to tell him thanks, but no thanks and take Darominius up on his offer. She wasn’t sure what to do.
“Alright, Bo, we better get some snacks and meals and drinks so that we can make it for two days. He said once we are inside the house, we can’t come out. You cool with that?” Whitney jumped into the passenger seat.
Bo stopped in front of her open window and wiped some perspiration from his forehead. “Sounds pretty easy. Go stay in a house for a couple days. No big deal.” He opened the back door and got in.
“I really need to make sure you aren’t going to run out of this house.” Whitney wasn’t sure if he was trying to act tough for Darominius, but she could tell he was nervous.
Bo forced a smile. “Whit, I’ll be fine. We’ll be fine. It’ll be like an old school sleepover party.”
They spent the rest of the day picking up supplies and getting everything together. The trio found a local supermarket and returned to the motel to pack up everything for the next leg of the journey.
The phone rang.
The kidnapper told her the time was now.
Whitney and Bo said goodbye to Darominius and put all their stuff in the car. The kidnapper gave them directions and the creepy pressurized atmosphere surrounded them as they drove into Dankstone. Bo’s face turned bright burgundy and she kept peeking over to make sure he was alright.
She drove to the end of a dirt road that just stopped. They grabbed the backpacks, duffle bags, pillows and blankets and started to trek for the house as the kidnapper told them where to go. They moved into a dense forest that drowned out the summer sun and cut back on the heat.
The bugs kept biting her, but Whitney had her hands full and could only try to fend them off with the phone. The best friends kept moving through the woods until an opening appeared straight ahead. A tightness attacked Whitney’s chest like two powerful hands, choking her heart.
Bo was shaking so badly that
he looked like he was about to drop the pillows under his right arm. Whitney knew he didn’t really like the supernatural anywhere near as much as she did. He was more of an international spy hero.
The apple tree appeared on their right and Whitney wondered how many women had been hanged from those branches. It was the only tree she had seen in Dankstone that had green leaves clinging to the branches. Small green apples littered the yellow grass below the tree.
The total number of deaths involving this tree would have been around one thousand if all the reports were true. The air became harder to breathe as Whitney could almost taste the dark spirits in the area.
About thirty yards from the apple tree stood the rickety, eighteenth century one-room wooden structure that looked like it could topple over at any second. The rain had stripped the red paint away many years ago to expose the weather-beaten lumber. There were two busted out windows, one on either side of the front door. The building was extremely unimpressive; even the cross on top of the house had been broken off long ago and lay over by the apple tree.
Whitney’s knees felt like they were going to give out at any moment as she approached the door and put her sweaty palm on the clear knob. The blood circulation in her hand pulsated as she slowly turned the glass knob.
She pushed the door and the hinges creaked to create an ominous greeting. She could feel the history as she stepped through the frame and into the dusty old courtroom that looked like a capsule frozen in time.
The judge’s bench still sat at the front of the room with the jury stand next to it and the defendant’s desk in the middle. There was a waist high wooden barrier behind the desk and chairs lined up all the way to the back of the room.
“Alright, let’s find a good spot.” Whitney tried to sound encouraging.
Bo squinted and tilted his head. “Is there a good spot?”
Whitney had read many books on the subject and knew damn well that there wasn’t a good spot anywhere in Dankstone, especially in a room that had led directly to all the women’s deaths. She tried not to think about Ellen McCarron and the murdered ladies of Dankstone.
They laid out their blankets and passed an energy drink back and forth. It seemed like a good idea at first, but now it was just making Whitney shake in paranoia. Her head kept jerking around because she thought she had seen several things zip by. She looked like a confused motion detector and took a deep breath to slow down her racing heart.
The first day and night, Whitney and Bo didn’t experience any real issues.
The second day cruised by as Whitney checked the time. 5:47 p.m.
She couldn’t believe it. Whitney thought that because she had spent so much time in Dankstone already, that the ghosts respected her and would leave her alone.
The room had a creepy vibe to it and there had been some strange sounds and bursts of wind out of nowhere but nothing terrifying, like the previous experiences.
“So, when can we get the hell out of here?” Bo asked.
“I don’t know. The guy said two days but he said he was going to call when we could leave.” Whitney pulled out a pack of cheese and peanut butter crackers.
“RING. RING.”
Whitney was startled and ripped the plastic bag, sending orange fragments flying. She jumped up from the chair behind the defendant’s desk to get the phone out of her bag.
“Hello.”
The voice said, “How are we doing? Is this as much fun as you had expected?”
“It’s fine. Can we leave now?” She walked up toward the judge’s bench. She picked up the gavel and inspected it for a few moments before setting it back down.
The man laughed. “Oh, no, no, no. The fun is just about to begin. And since you will be having fun I want you to know that your husband will be having fun too. Your little female friend is frisky to say the least and she buddied up to your man posthaste. I left before I saw too much.”
“Shut up, you piece of shit. I’m so sick of you hiding behind a phone antagonizing me.”
The man said, “Well, duh, that’s what antagonists do. I haven’t seen enough misery out of you yet. I might be one of the richest men in the world, but I haven’t exacted my revenge from you.”
The man hung up the phone and Whitney threw the black rectangular piece of hard plastic at her duffle bag.
Bo joked, “I guess that wasn’t the good call?”
“No. I’m so sick and tired of this prick.”
She sat down on the ground next to Bo and as he patted her on the back, a loud banging sound came from straight ahead. The black wooden gavel kept rising and falling rhythmically on the judge’s bench as if an invisible hand was controlling it.
A voice echoed through the room. “Guilty. Guilty. Guilty. All of you witches are guilty. You are all sentenced to die. Every last one of you.”
Whitney wrapped her arms around her best friend as the soft voice grew louder.
“Witchcraft carries a penalty of instant death. Hang this woman from the apple tree.”
The stale, hot air in the room couldn’t prevent a chill from coursing through Whitney’s entire body. The gavel stopped pounding the bench and the small wooden object flew across the room, crashing into the wall and shattering into many pieces.
The next hour or so went by without any interruptions as Bo and Whitney uncomfortably snuggled on the floor of the former courtroom. They barely talked and both kept peering around nervously. The room had carried a different vibe since the gavel pounding.
A wheezing cough slowly intensified into a shrill collection of voices screaming in pain. The hoarse female voices seemed to be coming from several different directions.
“Get off our land. We will kill you if you don’t leave Dankstone.” The words bounced off the walls.
An uneven, swirling wind originated in the center of the room and knocked over some wooden chairs. Years of dust bunnies danced in the air and Whitney covered her mouth with her hoodie to avoid sucking in any of the aged filth.
Whitney and Bo jumped to their feet and stood back to back so nothing could sneak up on them. Bo was shaking uncontrollably and Whitney thought she might have been holding his taller body up.
The overpowering wind split the two friends apart and kicked some old grime into Whitney’s eyes. She rubbed her stinging right eye and tried to ignore the continuous cascade of screams.
A cold breeze hit the back of her neck. Whitney spun around and screamed.
Whitney stood face-to-face with a translucent skeleton that had grayish white hair and bright blue eyes. The skeleton’s breath hit Whitney’s face and the rank odor almost made her pass out. It was worse than the aged cheese that smelled like sweaty socks.
The skeleton’s mouth opened and a mighty scream blew Whitney’s head back and caused her to fall. Two skeleton ghosts surrounded Bo and his shaggy blond hair rippled back and forth as the ghosts appeared to be having a screaming contest with Bo stuck in the middle. Bo and Whitney were both bawling as a negative energy continued to build in the room.
The ghosts moved into the viewing area with the chairs in the back. Whitney hoped they might be safe for a few minutes.
Bo’s teeth were chattering as he spoke. “We need to get the eff out of here, girl. He’s not really going to kill Trent if we leave. That’s just crazy.”
“This guy is crazy, Bo. Don’t get any ideas. As long as they are over there, I think we’ll be alright.” She moved closer to Bo.
“Screw that. I can see crazy skeleton ghosts over there. This shit isn’t right. I don’t know how much more I can take,” Bo said, nearly out of breath.
Whitney now had to worry about Bo as well as dealing with these troubling ghosts.
The ghost with the silver hair and blue eyes picked up one of the heavy wooden chairs and launched it against the wall.
Bo yelled, “What? I mean, what the hell was that?”
“Stay calm, Bo, they are just trying to scare us.” She kept inching closer to him and he slid his feet t
o stay away.
Whitney panicked as the blood flow to her head began to slow down to a crawl. Her vision went out of focus. She almost fell back, but Bo had been standing behind her so she just bumped into him and straightened herself out.
Another witch ghost with black hair and green eyes picked up a chair and heaved it with great velocity at the judge’s bench, busting both pieces of furniture into several pieces.
The three ghosts started yelling in an unknown language and throwing chairs against the ceiling. Whitney and Bo backed away uncomfortably, trying to avoid the falling shrapnel. The circular wind kept increasing like a tornado as it pulled objects from the desks and spit them out in random directions.
Whitney didn’t know how much longer she would last if these freaky activities kept up. The black-haired ghost picked up a chair and sent it whizzing past Whitney’s face. Her heart skipped several beats and she could feel nervous blood pulsating through her body like when you narrowly avoid a major car accident.
The blue-eyed witch underhand heaved another chair over Whitney’s head. Whitney dove behind the defendant’s desk and used it as a shield against the flying objects.
“Bo, get over here. They can’t hit you from here.” She motioned with her right hand.
Bo’s frantic voice cracked like that of a pubescent boy. “Forget that. I’m sorry, I don’t want to get anyone killed, but this is too much.”
“No.” Whitney screamed and jumped up with blatant disregard for the deadly flying furniture.
Bo ran for the front door and there was no way Whitney could catch him before he made it out. Tears ran off her face as she contemplated the possibility that she would never see her husband again.
“Bo, don’t do it,” she screamed in vain.
10
The Whitney Powers Paranormal Adventure 3 Book Bundle Page 31
