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

hotel
to be totally honest. Don’t put me in the middle.”
    “Driver votes twice anyway. You know
the rules by now, Pallini. Took me two cheese steaks to figure out your system.
You’ll eat good in Nashville.” She grabbed my hand and pulled me toward the
yellow-and-black-checked interior of the only thing keeping me from getting a
full seven hours tonight. “I promise.”
    “Hear that, Pallini?” As I held the
door for him, I caught a whiff of bacon, maple syrup and floor cleaner.
“Besides, you got a week off while we hit the studio. Then when we see you in
Atlanta you’re going to be hugging all over us, like, ‘Man, I missed you guys
so much… What would I ever do without you in my life?’ So savor the moment,
brother. Enjoy your waffles.”
    While Pauly followed Katy to an
ice-cold, rock hard booth, the jukebox sucked me over like some kind of musical
black hole. By now I knew to totally disregard the Waffle House songs in the
first row, like Mary Welch Rogers’s “Waffle House Thank You.”
    From the booth Katy asked if I wanted
‘savory’ or ‘sweet.’
    “Savory. Thanks, chicita ,” I said
without thinking. I ran through the rows of songs, putting together a little
playlist in my head. Most people didn’t realize it, but song order played as
important a role as song choice. “No Beatles?”
    “Pres, give it a break, will you?
There’s a whole ’nother world of music out there waiting to be discovered.”
Pauly’s head swiveled, looking for the young waitress while he mentally
subtracted dimes off her potential tip for making him wait.
    “Jackson” came through the shitty speakers
first. I looked at Katy and smiled but she rolled her eyes. I said, “You’re
hotter than a pepper sprout, you know that, my love?”
    She smiled an acknowledgement.
“Haven’t heard that one yet.”
    “Any requests?”
    “Yeah,” Pauly said. “Sit down so we
can eat.”
    So I spent the rest of my quarters
playing “In Memory of Elizabeth Reed,” some Hank Williams, Kris Kristofferson,
and Deana Carter. Then to throw everybody off I played two more from ‘back in
the day’ for Katy—Reba’s “The Night the Lights Went Out In Georgia” and No
Doubt’s version of “It’s My Life.”
    I spun, looking for the restroom. The
night manager pointed off to the right and I had to shuffle all the way to the
end of the counter before I could see the door. The thing I loved most about
Waffle Houses was how they crammed two thousand square feet of interior into a
thousand square foot exterior. I knocked on the door twice then pushed it open
with my foot.
    The condom dispenser had Bible verses
written on it. I read them while the hot water ran. When I saw steam I lowered
my face to the sink and sucked up as much as I could. Going from the warm stage
to the cold street played havoc with my sinuses.
    I tried to blow mucus out of my throat
and ears, then squirted soap onto my hands, lathered up real good and scrubbed
my face. It felt so nice to get rid of the funk in my eyes and the little bit
of old sweat that clung to my hairline.
    I pulled a long strip of paper towels
out of the dispenser and patted my skin and hair dry, then used it to pull the
door open. Before stepping out of the bathroom I checked my phone. Nothing
except Twitter updates and mentions.
    As soon as I came around the corner I
saw my Arnold Palmer waiting for me. Katy and Pauly had been fighting about
something. Probably money.
    Pauly pointed at my crotch and said,
“Kennywood’s open.”
    I checked my zipper and gave him the
classic, “So funny I forgot to laugh,” then sat down and said, “What’s going on
here?”
    “Nothing,” Pauly said. “Nothing at
all.”
    Katy bit her lip. I knew a lie when I
heard one.
    I said, “Well, somebody had better
start talking.”
    She said, “The theater had all kinds
of returns when these Holy Roller nutjobs showed up in town this week. And they
refunded a bunch of tickets