A Barrel of Whiskey - (An Urban Fantasy Whiskey Witches Novel) by SM Blooding Page A

you missing, I was covering those cases on my own.”
    “I’ve never seen you in the field.”
    “You left me no choice.”
    “Sorry.”
    He waved her apology away. “I don’t blame you, but if you’re really sorry, prove it by staying.”
    She wasn’t ready for that yet. “Tell me what happened.”
    “Well, like I said, a few police officers and detectives started working these cases on their own. They weren’t doing too bad, but they didn’t have the information.”
    “ You didn’t have the information.”
    “I did, however, have Balnore for the first three years. He was a wealth of information.”
    She remembered how he’d helped her as her gifts were growing, but he was a demon and had other priorities, so he couldn’t really be counted on. “Yes. He is. Okay. What next?”
    “Well, I met with them, got their backgrounds. Most of them are here because they saw something they couldn’t explain or lost someone due to circumstances that didn’t make sense.”
    Dexx shrugged and glanced at Paige. “That’s how I’m here.”
    “Demon hunter.” Henry frowned. “I read your file.”
    “You haven’t read the right one.” Dexx sat up straighter in his chair, then leaned down on his elbow resting on the metal armrest. “I’ll get it to you. The list of demons and other paranormals I’ve taken down is pretty impressive.”
    “Paranormals.” Paige turned in her seat. “And no mention of shape shifters or vampires?”
    He rolled his eyes. “Mentioned? Sure. But I didn’t believe it. I treated them like anything else, and dealt with them.”
    “And that’s not going to come up and bite you in the ass?”
    His face screwed up in “how the fuck should I know” as he shrugged.
    Henry frowned at them both. “I’ve put together a special unit that only deals with these types of cases.”
    “An entire unit?”
    “We cover more than just Dallas. Our jurisdiction covers all of Texas.”
    “How did you manage that?”
    “Demons like to possess some pretty powerful people, Paige. I thought you would have figured that out already.”
    She had. But that wasn’t the point at the moment. “Okay. Let’s see what you’ve got.”

H enry led them through the desks to another room surrounded by glass on the far end. “My bosses don’t know everything. They only know that I’m in charge of the normal units and a special task unit that handles some of the harder to catch killers.”
    Paige nodded. “And the other detectives? Do they know?”
    “They’ve all seen stuff, Paige. It’s hard to hide anymore.”
    What a strange world she’d just fallen into. She’d come from Denver where she had to hide everything, where there were only two of them working the paranormal, to this? Where all the detectives on the floor knew about her kind of cases? Even if only just a little.
    The room on the far end was a lot bigger than it appeared. Four desks sat along the exterior wall and four against the interior glass wall. A long couch took the remaining cement wall space. A door led into another room, this one not made of glass. A round table stood in front of the couch and on the far end was another door, this one open enough to show a desk, though not much more.
    A woman, tall, Hispanic, and muscular, perched on the corner of the desk of a shorter man, wide at the shoulders.
    He was black—though, why she was supposed to call him black when his skin was brown was beyond her. His features were strong and he had pale, grey-blue eyes. Wow. Striking.
    Another man, this one slightly frumpy, white with a full head of brown hair, talked on a landline, typing something onto his computer.
    And another woman, tall, her blonde hair swept up into a severe ponytail, worked feverishly on her computer.
    “Hey, guys.” Henry cleared his throat and rapped his knuckles against the closest desk.
    A few of the people outside their office area looked up from their tasks to see what was going on.
    Wow. This was definitely a new