Jack Hagee by C.J. Henderson

Author:C.J. Henderson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: private detective, corruption, new york city, action adventure, hardboiled mystery
Publisher: Bold Venture Press

16

I woke up in the dark, wondering how that could be. I could hear my alarm clock ringing, but I had set it for eight o’clock. The room should have been flooded with light. The sun, my brain reminded me, should be up. Panic edged in, screaming that it had to be up. And even if it wasn’t, what about all the light from the next building over? Where was it? And the street lights? Why, shouted the little voice of doubt inside me, is it so goddamn dark in here?

And then I figured it out. I had my eyes closed. Why that particular fact had been so hard on my brain I couldn’t imagine. But why my eyes wouldn’t open I couldn’t figure out either. Straining with the force of will one imagines Superman puts into his planet juggling act, I pushed my eyelids apart and opened my eyes. Sunlight crashed into each of them, blinding me, making me scream.

The pain was daggers of fire. Instantly I remembered going to my office and drinking a good-sized glassful of gin, but just one glassful. One. Period. And, even on my worst days, one glass of gin was not enough to give me that kind of a hangover. Then again, I thought, there wasn’t much about the way I felt that said hangover.

Then what is it saying? asked the worried part of my brain. I didn’t know what to tell it. My mouth tasted as if a poker night ashtray had been emptied into it. My head was throbbing as if someone had shoved a sponge in between my brain and my skull. I pushed at the mattress, trying to move myself around, and found that I couldn’t. My hands were too weak, too rubbery. My muscles had turned to water, water that ached with a dull throbbing that part of me said indicated something—I just couldn’t hear what.

I made to stand up out of bed, telling myself with threats and pleas that I was going to do it and nothing was going to stop me. I found myself sprawled on the floor a moment later, flopping helplessly, unable to direct my motor functions. What the hell happened to me, I wondered, getting past annoyed and over into frightened. Anyone who has ever blacked out, or even had a severe bout of the flu knows the terror of sudden, unexplainable weakness. The only problem was—I knew I didn’t have the flu. So what was it?

Literally crawling to the bathroom, I found myself even weaker than I’d thought, and nauseous to boot. With every movement, more muscles all over my body continued to wake up and report in, all sending up the same messages. All of them were jerking and twitching, including my eyes, making focusing on anything a major chore.

As I dragged myself onto the cold tile of the bathroom floor, I knew that I was sick, sick past my stomach in some way I’d never felt before. Forcing myself up

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.