Depths: Southern Watch #2

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Book: Read Depths: Southern Watch #2 for Free Online
Authors: Robert J. Crane
beat up and got yourself whacked around like a heavy bag because you didn’t get help,” Arch said. There was a serious crackle of anger in the man’s voice, and Hendricks did not care for the sound of it.
    “I did what I could,” Hendricks said. “I got one of the demons out of the way right at the start, and that helped limit the damage. I had all three of them between me and the door, so …”
    “So pick a better seat next time,” Arch said.
    “Well, I was kind of sitting at their table,” Hendricks said, and he realized his lip was swelling, “so I pretty much had to take the last seat that was open.”
    “You, uh … you sat down at the table with them?” The deputy’s voice sounded more than a little incredulous.
    “It’s not exactly easy to make someone out as a demon an entire room away,” Hendricks replied.
    There was a seething silence in the car after that. Hendricks could tell that Arch wanted to let loose on him, but whether it was manners or a lack of a good angle of attack that prevented the deputy from battering away, Hendricks didn’t know. Didn’t care, either. The air conditioning was chilling the glass a little, and Hendricks had a bump on his forehead above his eyebrow. Pressing the bump to the glass was positively bliss for him, or as close as he could get right now without turning off all his nerve endings.
    “You want me to drop you back off at your motel?” Arch asked, his voice echoing in the cab of the Explorer.
    “Sure, why not,” Hendricks said. He snuck a sidelong glance at the deputy. The man was physically imposing, but he still had his body quartered away from Hendricks. Hendricks had been trying to keep an eye on Arch, had been watching him as they’d worked together this last week. Some words were rattling around in Hendricks’s skull, prophetic ones that had come from the lady who had told him everything since he’d gotten involved in this demon hunting gig. She hadn’t been wrong yet that he knew of.
    “Because you look like someone beat you bloody, then came back and did another round of it,” Arch said. Hendricks hadn’t looked in the mirror yet, but he suspected Arch was probably not understating it. “I’m gonna drop you off at Erin’s.”
    “What the fuck?” Hendricks’s head came off the window. “Why?”
    Arch turned his body now, taking the wheel with both hands. The deputy paused a minute before he started to speak. “You’re all manner of beat up. By all rights you ought to be in a hospital but failing that, you at least need someone to keep an eye on you. Make sure you don’t have a concussion. Unless you’d prefer I drive you to the emergency room right now? Let them give you a clean bill of health.”
    “Showing up in a police cruiser wouldn’t cause any headaches, I’m sure,” Hendricks said, putting his forehead back against the glass. “I don’t really have a lot of extra money lying around for medical bills, especially not so a doctor can tell me I’ve got a shit ton of bruises and cuts that’ll heal in a few days.”
    “You could use stitches for a few of them,” Arch said.
    “I’m fine,” Hendricks said. “I’m not even bleeding anymore, that means I don’t need stitches.”
    “Now there’s a sound medical diagnosis.” Arch turned his body away again.
    Hendricks sat there with his head against the glass. The rain started coming down hard as they drove through the hills, and he caught a glimpse of lights out his window, a strange pattern of them, like a square in a sea of darkness. “What the hell is that?” he asked, trying to make out the shape in the rainy night.
    “It’s the Tallakeet Dam,” Arch said, matter-of-factly. “TVA project. Generates power for the whole area and holds back the Caledonia River.”
    Hendricks focused, trying to see it through the blur of the rain and one of his eyes swelling shut. “Looks big. Just a bunch of lights in the dark.”
    “That’s just the top of it,” Arch

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