Conrad, Kelly - Rogue Preacher (Siren Publishing Ménage and More ManLove) (8 page)

Just as he stood up, Vince ran in and handed him a box. “Here it is.”

“What is it?”

“Just some things you said you needed.”

Sunset took the box and slowly opened it. When he saw what was inside, his eyes grew wide. “My God, Vince. Where…” He looked up at Vince. “There’s only one place you could have got this.”

Vince smiled. “You’re right. I dug up her grave and took these things out.”

“You…d-dug up her g-grave?”

“Hell, I had to. You said you needed ’em.”

“But why in God’s name did you do that? You could have gone and bought ’em at any general store. You bastard! You know what you’ve done? You’ve desecrated my wife’s grave!”

“Hell, Sunset, why are you gettin’ so excited? I didn’t do anything. I didn’t open the casket. I covered her back up. No one will ever know.”

“I’ll know, you…You don’t have any idea what you’ve done, do you? No idea whatsoever! You know what I ought to do? I ought to leave this place and let
you
preach the sermon!”

“Sunset, you’re gettin’ all excited over nothin’.”

Sunset didn’t know what to do. On one hand he had people he didn’t want to disappoint waiting for a sermon, and on the other he had a jerk who thought nothing of digging people up and robbing their graves. He turned and caught a look at himself in the mirror. He looked like he always looked before a sermon. With his guns on and fire in his eyes, he looked like a hellion that was gunning for the Devil. Ordinarily, he wouldn’t go out there feeling like this, but he had no choice. The people would see his anger and think it was directed toward the Devil. They would be right, but the devil in this case would be Vince Michaels. With a broad turn, he put his cross and his handbook in his pocket, grabbed his Bible, and headed for the door. Suddenly, he stopped. “This ain’t over, Vince.”

* * * *

At the beginning of a revival, Sunset always took an unconventional way of entering the tent, and tonight he came running up the aisle, jumped up on the platform, and turned to his audience, who were clapping their hands at his surprising entrance. He quickly opened up his Bible, lifted it up toward the ceiling, and shouted out, “Who out there come to hear about Jesus?”

The people all over the tent shouted. “I did, preacher!”

He lowered his Bible, leaned over his pulpit, and pointed to different ones. “Are you saved, brother? Are you saved, sister?” After several answers, he said, “God don’t have room for drunks! He don’t have room for gamblers! He don’t have room for prostitutes! And he don’t have room for those that defile the marriage bed!” His blazing eyes looked from one to the other. “Does that include you, brother? Does that include you, sister?” Coming out from behind his pulpit, he stood on the edge of the platform and held his Bible up high. “The answer is in this book.”

He paced across the platform for a few seconds, looking at the congregation with fire in his eyes. Finally, he said, “You think I’m gonna tell you about the Bible Jesus tonight?” He shook his head and put the Bible aside. “No. I’m gonna tell you about the
man,
Jesus.”

Every head in the audience turned, mumbling to each other.

Sunset’s sharp, lightning gaze jumped to each one. “I see there’s some out there who think I’m crazy.” He did a little dance and then turned to his audience. “Well, maybe I am!”

Laughter rumbled.

“I’ll tell you one thing. I’m crazy in love with Jesus!” He came off his platform and walked among the people. “He was a man like you and me,” Sunset said, almost in a whisper. “He had desires and temptations, just like you. He got hungry, and he ate. He also slept, and yes, he even wept.” He pointed at a man he knew to be the town drunk. “Jesus even took a sip of wine every now and then. He mingled with those that others hated. Tax collectors, harlots, dirty, sweaty fishermen. And you know what? He was criticized for it. But he didn’t care. He had something to give. And everyone knows when you got something to give, you go to those who need it, not to those who don’t.”

He looked over at a row of saloon girls. “The harlots needed it. Oh, they loved Him. Why was that, you might ask? It was because He treated them like ladies. No other man ever did. All anyone else wanted was their bodies. All Jesus wanted was their souls.” Suddenly, he raised his voice and shouted. “The criminals needed it, the cheaters, and the devils of that time, they all needed it. And you know what? Everyone under the sound of my voice needs it!” He ran back up the aisle and jumped on his platform.

“What is Jesus givin’ away, you might ask? Well, tonight he’s givin you glory in your soul! He’s givin’ away eyes to see with, limbs to walk on! He’s givin’ away His love and His salvation! He’s givin’ you a place in Heaven! Now, are you gonna take it, or are you gonna sit there like a bump on a log and say no to Jesus!”

* * * *

Vince slowly walked into the tent at the back of the congregation, getting close enough to watch their eyes. They seemed almost mesmerized. They watched every move Sunset made, from the way he paced along the platform, to when he dramatically walked among them in the aisle. Sunset wasn’t a preacher that stayed separated from the people. He liked to walk among them.
Like Jesus did,
he’d heard him say. His movements were broad and strong, his eyes sparkled, and every woman in there was in love with his handsome, rugged profile—and even some of the men.

“Do you think Jesus was a weakling?” he shouted, his bellowing voice daring anyone to disagree. “Well, he wasn’t! Who else but a real man could do battle with Satan? Could anyone but a real man go down and burst Hell wide open?” He ran to the podium where his Bible lay and flipped it open, but he almost lost it when he saw a few grains of dirt roll down the pages, reminding him of the desecration of his wife’s grave. Quickly composing himself, he shouted, “Jesus yanked them keys from Satan and set His people free!”

“Look at him,” Vince whispered to Chick when he heard the loud applause. “My God, he’s got a kind of magnetism. He’s even better than I remember. Hell, he could probably have his own religion.”

The two stood in silence as Sunset continued to preach about Jesus the man and watched as streams of people walked down the aisle. Vince thought Sunset was smart to pick such a topic for his sermon. Who in his right mind was gonna say no to Jesus? They watched as Sunset prayed the sinner’s prayer for each and every one, and how he laid hands on those who needed healing. Instead of talking to God in reverent prayer, Sunset shouted at Him, almost demanding that he heal these poor blind sinners with scales on their eyes.

“Make them see, Lord!” he shouted. “Like Saul on the road to Damascus, take the scales from their eyes, and make them see!” He looked down at the man, and slowly took his hand away from his eyes. “I command you to see, brother!”

The man’s eyes fluttered open, and suddenly his face began to shine. Sunset stepped back. He’d seen it before. It was a holy shine. A shine that showed that God had healed him. The man jumped up, a big smile stretching his lips. “I can see, preacher! I can see!” He turned and looked around, and around. “I can see the people…children…men…women!” And then he turned and looked up at Sunset. “And you, preacher. Oh, my God, I can see you! I never knew what a handsome man you were.” Suddenly, he knelt down before him. “Thank you!”

“No!” Sunset shouted, raising the man up off his knees. “Don’t bow before me. It was God that healed you. You go home, kneel before God, and thank Him! He’s the miracle worker here, not me.”

Vince could see the passion in Sunset, the faith, and…my God, was that tears he saw in Sunset’s eyes? Were these people really healed, or did someone plant them in the congregation? He looked over at Chick. “Did you plant these people in the congregation?”

“Huh? What are you talkin’ about?”

Vince didn’t answer. He just looked away, knowing it wasn’t Chick. Suddenly, Vince got scared. If this was the real thing, then it was serious. God—or someone was performing fucking miracles. Did it make good sense to fool with a god who could strike them down with a single blow?

And then he remembered he was an atheist.

* * * *

When the evening finally ended, Vince and Chick were in a back room counting out the donations while Sunset undressed and looked into a mirror that reflected his hated image. He bowed his head and began crying. What the hell had he become? He lifted his eyes and looked again at his reflection, and became so angered, he took his brush and threw it at the mirror.

Vince came bursting in at the sound of shattered glass. “What happened?”

“I don’t like what I’m doin’.”

“Sunset, don’t get cold feet now. We got almost eight hundred dollars! Can you believe it? Eight hundred!”

“The bank’s got more.”

“Fuck the bank! Why risk our lives if we don’t have to? Hell, Sunset, if we do this every night, we’ll be rich in no time!”

“Sure,” Sunset shouted. “It’s not you out there on that platform night after night cheatin’ them people out of their life savings!”

“How the hell is now different from then? Weren’t you doin’ the same thing then?”

“After I sent a portion of it to the Association, the rest was mine to use as I saw fit. Maybe I did use some of it for—” He couldn’t say it. “—but most went to pay expenses. When those people gave, they knew it was to further the gospel of Jesus Christ!”

“Jesus Christ, my ass! Those people out there wouldn’t know Jesus Christ if he came in and danced a jig on the pulpit! Hell, Sunset, they probably think you’re Jesus Christ! You saw that blind man tonight! He worshipped you with his eyes!”

Suddenly, Sunset blew up and hit Vince, sending him crashing into the furniture.

Vince sat up, working his jaw back and forth. “You bastard!” he shouted. “You ain’t turned your back on God at all. Your faith is just as strong as it ever was. You just took a little vacation, that’s all.”

“I guess that means the frontier preacher is back!” Sunset shouted.

“Somethin’ tells me he never left.”

“Look,” Sunset began, “I don’t know what happened to me that day at my wife’s grave, but I know one thing. You ain’t turnin’ me into a drawing card for your greed.” He pointed toward the empty tent. “I saw miracles out there tonight! I saw salvation enter men’s souls! I saw Jesus use me just like he did before, and if you think I’m throwin’ all that away just so you can line your pockets with their life’s blood, you’re as crazy as you look!”

“You all right?” Chick said, running in.

“Yeah,” Vince answered. “I guess I just shouldn’t have let myself get mixed up with a…Christian!” He turned back to Sunset. “Do you know where you’d be right now if it wasn’t for me?”

“Somewhere preachin’ the gospel!”

“Yeah, you’re right. And after that you’d be out in back of the tent fuckin’ some cowboy’s ass.”

“At least I wouldn’t hate myself.”

“Oh, yeah, you’d hate yourself all right because you’d still be carrying around a load of guilt that would kill a lesser man. But you are what you are, Sunset! Don’t you understand that? When I came along, I picked you up off the ground, fucked you with a ten-inch rod, and showed you what it was like to be with a man.”

“You also got me here! Cheatin’, swindlin’, and lookin’ like a fool! Well, I ain’t a fool no more. This is where it ends, Vince. You go your way, I go mine!”

“Yeah? Who you gonna get to fuck your ass, Sunset?”

Sunset turned his back on Vince and lowered his head in his hands. He had no answer, and the pain inside him felt like a knife piercing his heart. He wanted Vince. He even thought he might love him. He didn’t want him to leave, but God was pulling at him on one side, and Vince was pulling at him on the other. He knew that sometime tonight he would be burning up with need, and only a cowboy’s ass could make it go away. But what could he do? He couldn’t stand the thought of cheating those people. Hell, maybe he had been a little dishonest with their donations in the past, but it wasn’t for his profit. It was for his pleasure. And he couldn’t help it. He had a need inside him—a drive. And it was still there. No man was perfect. He knew that. Everyone sinned a little in his life. You couldn’t live on this earth without sinning.

God knew that—but Sunset knew it most of all.

Chapter Eight

The next night when Sunset was in the pulpit, he noticed a man sitting off to the side writing something in a notebook. He tried to ignore him, but he became curious about what he was writing. He didn’t look like the usual reporter that was constantly dogging him. They dressed more like easterners with bowler hats and wire-rimmed glasses. This man dressed like a gambler you might see on a riverboat. He had dark hair and skin, and long sideburns that met his light beard and continued along his jawline. He wore a vest, coat, and a cravat instead of a tie, and didn’t have a speck of dust on him. His clothes were expensive and totally out of place among the dirty cowpokes, drifters, and poor farmers that filled the tent. Since he’d never seen anyone like him before, Sunset wondered if he might be from New Orleans.

That night Sunset preached with his usual passion, looking into the faces of men and women who thought he was a god. “We talked about Jesus, now let me tell you about his forgiveness…”

His words faded when he looked up and saw a cowboy with a heavy scowl on his face walking down the aisle. He immediately stopped preaching. “What do you want, cowboy?”