The Revelations of Preston Black (Murder Ballads and Whiskey Book 3) (15 page)

“I know you would. That’s why I ain’t
going to give it to you.” Ben shoved his hand into the bag and pulled out a can
of pop. “This is a lesson for you. That you can’t dwell on this shit. You have
to trust me.”

I nodded.

“What’s that?” Ben said, trying to
find me in the rearview mirror.

I kept my mouth shut while Pauly
pointed out our left onto County Road 97. Ben’s hazing routine got old fast. As
soon as we picked up a little speed, I said, “Yup.”

“Look, Pres. Rachael knows we’re
bringing her back. Bet you twenty bucks we’re back at Andre’s before Rachael
and Chloey and my old man come rolling in to check on their Miss Katy. And I
bet you another twenty Katy’s going to be ready to play in the ATL on Friday.”

“He’s right bro,” Pauly said. “Be
positive. I barely know this guy and I’d follow him just about anywhere.”

“You barely know him and that’s the
problem,” I said. “So what’s the plan?”

“Plan?” Ben jammed the rest of a big
slice of cornbread into his mouth. “Shoot first, that’s always step one. We’ll
figure out the rest when we get there.”

“Is that official Army protocol?”

“You ain’t going to find that in the
Army FM 21-50. That’s in my field manual. The Ben Collins 01-01.” He held his
breath like he intended to riff on the theme a little longer, but I cut him
off.

“What if shooting first isn’t the way
to go with this? What if—”

“Jesus, Preston. We got to take a look
first. You think I’m making this up as I go? Have to know what we’re dealing
with, man. Then we’ll make a plan—”

Pauly cut Ben off. “Yinz both need to
shut the fuck up. Bitching like a pair of nanas with their babushkas in a
bundle ain’t doing squat right now. You want to know how it’s going to go down
today? There’s your sign.”

Along the side of the road a small
white cross had been planted next to a row of rusted-out mailboxes. None of us
had anything to say as we passed by.

Ben said, “Tell me we ain’t dealing
with the same Westboro Baptist fucks that protested at X and Kenny’s funerals.”

All around, kudzu grew up into the
trees and around old fences. But the cross had been cleared recently.

“No, man,” I said. “Different fucks.”

Written across its white face were
four words in large black letters—
JESUS WON THE BATTLE
.

“Shit just got real,” Ben said,
rolling down his window. “Stay sharp.”

About a quarter mile ahead we saw the
next sign on the left—a junked car wrapped in barbed wire, the word
REPENT
written on the
side. A large white cross made of two-by-sixes with
Hypocrite
you will DIE!
painted
in large black letters sprung from a rusted-out hole in the roof. Across the
hood they wrote
SEX.
READ REV. 21-8.

“You shitting me?” My face got hot and
I made a fist. “Tell me this ain’t the first place cops should’ve looked.”

I almost kept going, but we rounded
the bend to the sight of thousands of crosses of various size, constructed of
different material, planted on both sides of the road for as far as any of us
could see. Ben slowed and shook his head. Barbed wire had been strung
throughout, draped over some of the crosses like a never-ending crown of
thorns. In some places they wound new galvanized wire over top of rusted wire.
Crosses went up and over red clay mounds and on rocky alcoves that looked like
they’d been bulldozed out of the hills for the very purpose of displaying
crosses. A large cross at the top had
NO ICE WATER IN HELL FIRE
painted across
it. The one next to it said
Everyone in Hell from SEX USED WRONG WAY!

Ben laughed as he read some of his
favorites out loud to us.

The crosses popped up in groups of
three and four. Big ones crowned hilltops like cross shepherds watching over
flocks of white baby crosses. Ancient washing machines and refrigerators and
cars had been incorporated into the setting. One rusty dryer sported the
message
You
will DIE!
in
hand-painted block letters. An old burn barrel next to a natural gas well had
been painted white so the artist could write
Hell is HOT HOT HOT!

And nobody said anything because none
of us knew quite what to say.

Ben said, “Look here—
The
devil will put your soul in hell, burn it forever
.”

“Well…” I said. “Better the devil you
know.”

Ben laughed even though he couldn’t
ever have known why I found this so ironic.

Pauly said, “In a hundred years I
could never come up with something like this in my head.”

“Look!” Ben said, totally cutting Pauly
off. He pointed to a small square sign propped against a pair of whitewashed
cinder blocks that read
All FOR SALE! Five million CASH or best
offer!

“What the fuck?”

“‘What the fuck’ is right.” He slowed
down as we approached a big gate made out of chain-link fence and barbed wire.
Hand-painted signs—one on each gate—said,
DON’T BRING THE DEVIL IN
THIS HOUSE
and
LEAVE
THE DEVIL OUTSIDE.

Without warning he sped up. The
crosses disappeared behind us. Trees crowded the road, casting us once again in
shadow. After a few minutes we were back in unspoiled woodlands. Ben spotted a
small turnoff littered with beer cans and rubbers.

“Listen,” Ben said as he turned the
key. Without the engine noise we could hear birds in the trees and wind washing
through the leaves. He rolled his window down. “I’m going to turkey peek around
and find a way in.”

“Why’d you drag us out here if you’re
just going to go in yourself?”

“Calm down and listen. I’m going to
get the lay of the land. The three of us are going to be too slow. C’mon back
here.” He got out of the Jeep and stretched.

“Yeah.” I got out, stretched and
followed him around back.

Ben had the hatch up and his Army
duffle sitting on the bumper. “I know this ain’t easy for you, but you got to
trust me. This is going to go one of two ways. Either how we planned it, or to
shit. I’m trying to make sure this don’t go to shit. Here…”

He lifted a tarp and showed me a big
pile of heavy chains. “When I need you in there you to have to pull that gate
off. Keep it in the granny gear and get it clean off its hinges the second I
say ‘go.’ I’m going to call every fifteen or twenty minutes with updates. I’ll
let you all know how the road looks and what to expect once we get in. I’m not
excluding you, man. And I know you love her and I know she loves you. This is
the best way to get her back.” He put his hand on my shoulder. “We can’t all be
bogged down together in there if things get bad.”

“I know.” I rubbed my forehead.
“You’re totally right. I’m a guitar player. Just had visions of my face being
the first one she saw, I guess.”

“Yeah,” he said, like I should prepare
myself for some sort of big speech or something. But that was it. All he said.

Stripping the cellophane off a new
pack of Newport Lights, Pauly said, “So just wait for you to call? That’s it?”

“Well, that’s the dynamic truth,” Ben
said. “I’ll keep you updated. Let you know what’s going on. And the second I
see that she’s okay I’ll call and let you know. I promise. Grab me one of those
Klonopins out of the glove box, please.”

I sat in the driver’s seat and found
the bottle, then tapped one of the little blue pills into my hand. While I
waited he jammed his pistol into a shoulder holster. He slid his compound bow
and a quiver of arrows out from beneath the tarp. He put his phone into his
front pocket, tucked a Bowie knife into his belt, and shut the hatch.

“Every fifteen minutes, right?” I said
and dropped his Klonopin into his upturned palm.

“Or twenty.” He popped the pill into
his mouth then squeezed my shoulder a few times. “Don’t get too agitated if I
ain’t checking in like I’m taking your baby girl out on a first date. Okay?”

“Yeah, I get it.”

He put a pair of ammunition clips into
his front pocket, a Leatherman multi-tool into his back, then bent over to
tighten his bootlaces. “You’ll be sharing a bed tonight. Maybe even eating a
little barbeque or whatever the hell the neighbor’s got cooking.”

Ben banged on the hood with his fist
and gave Pauly a wave. When Pauly nodded back, Ben blew him a little kiss. “
Marsalama
, boys.”

He looked both ways, crossed the road,
then disappeared over a small knuckle into the forest. I stood by the door and
stretched. Pauly opened his door, spit into the sandy earth, and lit a
cigarette.

“What do you think, bro?” I asked.

“It’s all good. That’s what I think.
Have faith.” Pauly stood up and walked out to the road. “Look at what you’ve
been doing for the last seven months—getting paid to make music. I’ll admit,
shit like this with Katy ain’t typical, and it’s probably a result of your
music that we’re even out here right now. Like, maybe being in the spotlight
put a target on your back?”

He took a long drag on his cigarette
and held it. “But don’t go thinking the universe is out to get you. There are
guys we went to school with digging coal right now. Collecting disability
because their backs are shot. This ain’t the universe out to get you. This is
people. Maybe it ain’t even personal, I don’t know. But they don’t represent
Christians everywhere. They don’t represent the South and they sure as hell don’t
represent what I believe.”

“I’ll let you in on a little secret.
What if I said it was personal?” I scratched the stubble on my chin. “I know
Hicks too. Saw him in Morgantown twice. The first time was the night Mikey
asked me to play the show at The Stink on Valentine’s Day. He was at The Met
with her. The second time was at The Stink. She brought him with her.”

“Her?” Pauly just watched me from the
road.

“Yep.” I took my phone out of my
pocket, made sure to turn the ringer on, and set it on the dashboard.

Pauly turned his back while he
finished his cigarette. He widened his stance like he was on a surfboard, and
stuck his hands into his back pockets. Every so often a small cloud of white
smoke rose over his head. He calmly crushed his first cigarette out and lit
another.

The phone rang. Pauly turned as soon
as he heard it.

“Hello?” I answered. I put it on
speaker so Pauly could hear. He leaned into the Jeep’s open window.

“Told you I’d call, right? Real
quick,” Ben said, “The whole place is surrounded by electric fence—barbed wire
and chain-link. Had to crawl up a stream bed to get under it. Lots of
buildings—like an old church camp. Two rows of little white cabins facing a big
building. Showers and shitters I’m guessing. Then there’s a huge tent like a mess
tent in the middle of a field. A bunch of guys packing it up now. Lots of
pickup trucks. Long buildings with shit painted on the sides just like those
crosses out front. Wooden shutters over all the windows. No motorcycles. Don’t
see any guns yet either. So far so good.”

“Yeah.”

“Check this out—they got this altar at
the end of a field. A low mound with three big—tall—crosses on it. Like,
crucifixion crosses or some shit. These are some sick bastards. Lots of natural
cover, though, natural gas wells all over. Somebody’s getting rich off this
little patch of ground. The road is rutted out real bad. Your best bet is going
to be to stay high in the right side and plow through the weeds. The road ends
right at the field. They got pickup trucks and a bunch of vans out front. I’m
going to try to slash tires.”

“You saying we should head on down?”
Adrenaline pumped through my arms and legs. I got real jumpy all of a sudden.

“No, you hold tight for a while.”

“So, no sign of Katy?”

“Not yet. I’ll call back in a few.”

I hung up and set the phone back on
the dash. I looked over at Pauly and shook my head. He turned to get back into
the Jeep, but his eyes spotted something down the lane. “Shit,” he said, and
stood up real straight.

My phone vibrated again. I had a text.

From John Lennon.

“No shit,” I said.

A dingy white police cruiser with
black doors and bald tires crept through the little patches of sunlight like a
snake toward a birdhouse. An outline of the old department’s emblem remained on
the door. Black stick-on letters like the ones you put on mailboxes spelled out
New
Zion Tabernacle
on
the front quarter panel. The cruiser’s light bar flashed at almost the exact
moment the voice came through the PA. “Step out of the car. Place your hands on
the hood.”

Pauly looked at me, his eyes opened
wide with disbelief. “Have to be shitting me.”

I stepped out, jumpier than a
long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs. The air suddenly got hot. I
reached for my ID.