The Revelations of Preston Black (Murder Ballads and Whiskey Book 3) Read Free

going
to look if you take out a little kid?”
    “Preston!”
    I turned as the biker swung his baton.
It hit the door with a loud crack that left a heavy dent. He’d meant to break
my arm or jaw. Definitely not a love tap.
    “You self-righteous prick.” Pauly hit
him in the face with a blast from his hose. “I’m a fucking kill you!”
    I said, “C’mon, Pauly. Get in,” as I
reached back to open the door behind me. I felt bad for squashing his fun. Like
I was the one who had to tell him he’d gotten too old for trick-or-treat or
whatever.
    “This might be a good fucking gig
after all,” Pauly climbed onto the bench seat and slid the door shut, smiling
like he’d just won free Subway for a year. He turned to the crowd and flipped
them off with both hands. He waggled his fingers back and forth and said, “Fuck
off.”
    Once Katy got out of the alley she hit
the gas. Two of the bikers followed on foot, banging the trailer with their
batons.
    I turned to watch them fall behind us.
The women and kids huddled together, shivering in the chill. One man stood
calmly apart from the crowd. A young guy with a full beard and close-cropped
blond hair. He wore a fine grey jacket and vest with jeans and a white
button-down. He maintained eye contact with me until we got to the end of the
block. I’d seen him before, in Morgantown, from a distance. Like a ghost, or a
face in the crowd. It wasn’t only the way he looked. The way he dressed and
carried himself struck a chord of familiarity with me. He knew me, too.
    “What do you think, Pres?” Pauly tried
to light a cigarette but his hands were shaking too bad. “Still got it?”
    “Yeah, Pauly. You’re not going to tell
your sponsor about this, are you?” I watched the bearded guy until he faded
into the darkness.
    “No way. What happens in the van in a
dark alley in Kentucky does not come back to the Mountain State with me.”
    “You’re going to hell for that, you
know?” Katy said with a smile. She made a right turn on red and we passed the
front of the old theater. I watched it, trying to remember every single thing
that happened behind those doors before Katy built up even more speed.
    Pauly said, “I know,” folded his hands
behind his head and lay down in the back seat.
     
     
     
    “Nobody
on earth except for Katy Stefanic ever ate at a Waffle House because they
wanted to.” Pauly’s anger came out a little at a time, like bees from a hive on
a summer morning. “Don’t act like this happened accidentally either. The way I
see it, I’m driving, doing the sound, playing bass on a few songs, and playing
security with those Westboro Baptist wannabes. How am I not getting more of a
say in where we eat?”
    “Don’t act like you cast a tiebreaker
with your one vote.” Katy tossed him the keys and bounded around the van. She
waited for me to slide out of the passenger seat. “And I drove tonight.”
    “Did we vote?” Pauly took a cigarette
out of the pack and slid it behind his ear. “Pres, did you vote for this? Just
because we’re in the South don’t mean we have to eat at every Waffle House we
see. What about a pizza? We’ll order when we get to our hotel.”
    I had my mouth open to say something,
but Katy struck fast, like a cat. “Because it’s going to be on the interstate
and we’re going to get stuck at a Krystal because you know there’s no such
thing as good pizza along an interstate.”
    “Better than white gravy,” Pauly said.
    I’d been asleep. Waking up in the
Waffle House parking lot surprised me about as much as waking up on Mick’s
floor would’ve. Which was to say it didn’t surprise me at all. My legs still
weren’t totally beneath me. I leaned against the van and yawned while Katy weaseled
a hug and a kiss out of me. Even I-65 was quiet except for a stray semi here
and there. In this part of the world people went to bed early. I said, “No,
Pauly, I didn’t vote. I wouldn’t mind if we skipped all this and found a