by Gary Jonas
“Shit,” I said. “Sorry, Olivia, I have to part company with you for a bit, but I’ll remain in your eyes and ears the whole time I’m gone. Cool?”
She wrinkled her nose. “Huh?”
“Grab a seat. I’ll be back.”
I left her and hopped back on stage. I lifted my guitar, leaned toward the microphone and said, “Sabrina Tenn, please report to the stage.”
I started playing the opening to the Eagles’ “Hotel California” and the crowd went wild. Olivia smiled at me as she leaned against the wall at stage left. She raised her margarita to me and I gave her an air kiss.
Sabrina hopped onto the stage and grabbed the microphone to start singing.
Once we got to the guitar riffs at the end of the song, Clyde Gentry stepped into the bar. He gave me a salute then disappeared into the crowd.
Shit.
My playing remained professional as I moved around the stage trying to catch sight of him again. But he was nowhere to be seen. I finished up the song and we launched into a crazy version of “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” because Sabrina loved Cyndi Lauper. We’d only played it once at rehearsal, but it sounded great live. Sabrina danced all around the stage.
I kept trying to spot Clyde. What if he stepped out of the crowd at the front of the stage and shot me?
As I scanned the crowd, a man smiled and I saw sharp, jagged teeth in his mouth. I tried to focus on him and then he looked normal. Another Mako Clansman? It could have been my imagination. The man put his arm around a woman and wasn’t paying any attention to us. He leaned down to say something in her ear.
Sabrina danced around me, singing. I kept playing. Chuck kept the beat on the skins. Teddy had switched to a keyboard and had his guitar hanging on his back. A shadow went over the mood lights, and while I didn’t miss a note because the guitar pick’s magic wouldn’t allow such a thing, my heart pounded in my chest and I moved backward to look up. Something dark crawled across the ceiling.
I staggered back into the drum kit and fell down, knocking the cymbal stand over. I smacked my head on the floor tom and my guitar howled in crazy feedback.
“What the hell, man?” Chuck said.
Everyone stopped playing.
The crowd stared at us.
I looked up at the ceiling and it was normal. The ceiling was black, but there wasn’t anything crawling on it. The crowd looked befuddled. It clearly wasn’t part of the show.
“Gotta lay off the drugs, Brett!” Poe yelled from the far side of the bar.
I rubbed my head as Chuck righted the tom then picked up the cymbal stand and repositioned it.
“Sorry about that,” I said as I stood.
I moved to start playing again, but the guitar pick was gone.
Shit.
I looked around, but it was too dark to see the pick. It had to be on the stage somewhere.
“Can we get back to the show?” Chuck asked.
“Do you see my pick?” I moved the cymbal stand.
“Leave that alone,” Chuck said. “Jesus!”
Sabrina moved over to me and the crowd grew antsy. I was making one hell of an impression on Olivia. Stud to mud in three seconds flat. Might be a new world record. At least I didn’t shit my pants.
“What’s wrong?” Sabrina asked.
“I can’t find the pick.”
Teddy reached into his pocket and pulled out a fresh pick. “Use this one.”
“Uh, not a good plan.”
“Music!” someone up front shouted.
“Free Bird!”
“We need to start another song, dude,” Teddy said.
“I can’t play without that pick.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean I know three decent songs without that pick.”
“What the fuck do you mean? A pick is a pick.”
“Not in my case.”
Chuck shook his head. “Then let’s do the three songs you know.”
“Teddy, you’ll need to play lead.”
He looked at me like I was a moron.
Sabrina saved me. “Did you hurt your left hand?”
“Yeah,” I said. “I think I can do some chords, but I can’t riff. My fingers are jacked.”
“What songs can you play?” Sabrina asked.
“The first one will be fine. I’ll sing it.”
“Be my guest.”
I moved to the microphone stand. “Uh, sorry about that,” I said. “This one goes out to Olivia.” And I strummed the opening chords to Poison’s “Every Rose Has Its Thorn.”
That went fine, so I led us into “A Horse with No Name” by America because it had only two chords. Finally, I closed us out with Deep Purple because if you drop a guitar on the stage it will automatically play “Smoke on the Water.”
So I went from being a master guitarist to a beginner.
“We need to do more songs for the set,” Teddy said.
“Unless you want to do ‘Row, Row, Row Your Boat,’ I’m done until we find that pick,” I said.
I set the guitar on its stand, and turned to look for Olivia. She wasn’t there.
I stepped off the stage and a guy with a ZZ Top beard shook his head. “You suck, man.”
“Titties and beer bottles,” I said as I moved past him.
“More like donkey dicks.”
I moved through the crowd searching for Olivia, but she was gone. I stepped outside onto the Strand, and Clyde Gentry smiled at me. “Hello, Brett,” he said as he drew his pistol.
CHAPTER NINE
When someone points a gun at me, the first thing I do is raise my hands.
“Put your hands down,” Gentry said.
“But you’re pointing a gun at me,” I said.
“Yeah, but I’m not robbing you.”
“Still, there’s the whole reach for the sky, varmint thing going on.”
“No, there’s not. Put your hands down or I’ll shoot you.”
“Busy place for a murder,” I said, but I did lower my hands because getting shot ranked high on my list of things never to try under any circumstances.
“I’m not gonna kill you.”
“You don’t know that. If you shoot me, you might hit something vital.”
“I’m a good shot.”
“I could still fall down and crack my head on the pavement.”
He rolled his eyes then gestured with the gun. “Walk.”
I walked in the direction indicated. In self-defense classes, they teach you to never go to what’s called a secondary location. That would be any private place where the bad guy controls the surroundings. It pretty much guarantees death. The standard refrain is to run away because even if you get shot, most people survive a gunshot wound.
That may be true, but I didn’t want to get shot.
I didn’t want to die either.
And I especially didn’t want to get tortured.
“You still pissed about last night?” I asked.
“Just walk.”
“I mean, it matters that I’m not the one who lit you up. Right? That’s a point in my favor.”
“Shut up.”
“I didn’t do anything to you,” I said.
The ghost tour group crossed the street in front of me, the sound of hard rock music leading the way. The guide’s speaker was all crackly, but it was a cool tune, so I didn’t want to dock him any points. Besides, his group was exactly what I needed.
I waited for the opportune moment, which was as soon as I reached the oncoming group. I darted between a fat guy and a teenage girl staring at her phone. I ducked low, darted to the right and slipped into a tourist shop. I did a baseball slide behind a rack of T-shirts with a steel top covered with crazy looking horny toad banks. The T-shirt closest to me read, “Keep Calm and Party On.”
Clyde Gentry pushed through the crowd of ghost hunters and looked around. I kept low.
He moved on.
“Excuse me,” a woman said behind me.
I look
ed up. The woman wore shorts and an oversized T-shirt. Her thick glasses made her eyes seem like mutant aliens and her curly hair looked like it had never met a hairbrush.
“I need to get through here,” she said. “You’re blocking the aisle.”
“You could go around,” I said.
“Kids playing with toys there.”
I stood and moved out of her way. She was a big woman, so I followed her out of the store. She grabbed a shot glass from a counter and dropped it into her purse without paying as she moved.
I shook my head. I would never have taken her as a thief. In any case, I followed her out, using her as cover. The ghost guy was talking about some woman who sometimes showed up in pictures at the top of the stairs inside the building they stood before, and I eased my way through his crowd to return to the bar.
Inside The Hideaway, I hurried over to Sabrina.
“Where the hell have you been? We were supposed to be on stage five minutes ago.”
“Trying to avoid being kidnapped.”
Sabrina rolled her eyes.
I started to tell her about Clyde, but she cut me off. “Chuck found this under the cymbal stand.” She handed me the guitar pick. “Let’s get this show on the road. I want to sing a Pretenders song.”
“We didn’t practice any Pretenders songs.”
“I don’t care. I want to sing ‘Back on the Chain Gang,’ so you get your ass up there and start playing.”
Fortunately, I knew the song.
I hopped on stage and we started playing. As my fingers danced along the fretboard, it seemed like the kidnapping attempt was a figment of my imagination.
And then Clyde Gentry walked back into the bar.
He pulled his gun, and I lost sight of him as he moved into the crowd. Dammit. Didn’t this guy ever give up?
Fortunately, the guitar pick handled the playing because without the magic, the song would have been a disaster. I kept scanning the crowd as I stepped close to Sabrina. I tried to nudge her, but she stepped away and kept singing.
Moving closer to her might not have been the smartest move because Gentry was after me, not Sabrina. My heart pounded like Chuck’s bass drum. Then it occurred to me that if I wasn’t on stage, Gentry wouldn’t have a clear target.
I had a wireless amp, so I didn’t have to worry about yanking a cord. I kept playing as I moved to the side of the stage. I stepped down, out of the spotlight, and bolted down the hallway, the amp still picking up my guitar. If Gentry saw me, he’d follow. If he didn’t see me, he’d keep looking. The men’s room was on the right. Would he check the restroom? Probably. The women’s room was across the hall on the left, but that was off limits. A line of women stood waiting to get in and applauded me as I scooted past them.
“Screw it,” I said and rushed down the hallway to push through the emergency exit. The sign on the door insisted that an alarm would sound, but that didn’t happen.
I stepped into the alley behind the bar, fingers still dancing on the frets. I’d be out of range soon, but for now the music continued.
The alley held a Dumpster and an old white van.
Could I hide in the Dumpster? That seemed like a bad idea. Could I just run? It wasn’t all that far to walk home. Was Gentry on my tail? Had he seen me?
I turned around, worried that he’d burst through the door.
Behind me, the van door slid open.
Hands grabbed me and yanked me backward into the vehicle. The door slid closed and I stopped playing the guitar.
Just like “American Pie,” the music died.
And I knew I was next.
CHAPTER TEN
The van screeched out of the alley and made a series of turns I couldn’t keep up with because two Mako Clansmen held me down.
“It won’t do you any good to struggle, Mr. Masters,” one of the Clansmen said.
“You’re crushing my balls,” I said.
It was true. The idiot leaned over me and drove my guitar right into my scrotum. Tears leaked from my eyes. It wasn’t fear. It was the pain of having my nuts squished by a Stratocaster. Might have to rename it a Stratocastrator.
“Good,” the son of a bitch said. “Stop struggling.”
I stopped.
He eased up a bit and I managed to breathe. I wanted to curl up into a ball, but the other guy held me down. Any second now, I just knew one of them would try sampling my flesh.
“Don’t resist,” the guy holding me said. “Jensen will zip tie your hands and I’ll let go of you then. Or we can start eating you. Your choice.”
“Between the two, I’ll take the zip tie.”
“Good,” the Clansman said. “We just ate a ton of shrimp, so I’d rather not gorge on your flesh right now.”
I managed to tuck my guitar pick into my pocket when Jensen pulled the guitar over my head. He tossed the guitar behind him.
“Careful,” I said. “That’s an expensive musical instrument.”
“Maybe I’m Pete Townsend,” Jensen said.
“You look more like a cross between Arnold Schwarzenegger and Joe Pesci.”
He zip tied my wrists. “I’ll cop to that.”
“So who are you guys? You with Gentry?”
“Who?” Jensen asked.
“Clyde Gentry?”
“Never heard of him.”
“So you’re not working for Sinclair?”
“Of course not! No respectable Clansman would work for that bastard after the Tangawa Incident.”
I’d never heard of that incident, but there was more important question at hand. “There are respectable Clansmen?” I asked.
“Shut up and lay still.”
I was nervous and helpless and my mouth had a mind of its own. “Lay still or lie still?” I asked.
“What is this, grammar school?” Jensen asked.
“Lie still could mean you don’t want me to tell the truth.”
“I said lay still.”
“As long as it’s not a sex thing because I don’t swing that way. I’m not judging, but it’s just not my scene. Know what I mean?”
He glared at me.
“I don’t mean to offend you. If you and your friend love each other, it’s cool with me, but I don’t want to witness any public displays of affection.”
“You want me to punch his lights out?” the Clansman who held me asked.
“Not necessary. I think he’s just scared and has diarrhea of the mouth.”
“I’m not scared,” I said. “I don’t want to die, but I’m not scared. Just so we’re clear here.”
“Could you get him to shut up?” the driver asked. “He’s getting on my last nerve.”
“I’m not even touching him,” I said.
“Shut your cake hole.”
“There’s cake?” I asked. “Have you been holding out on me?”
The driver slammed on the brakes.
I rolled forward against the seats.
He turned and made a circular motion in the air then touched my forehead and everything went dark.
I wasn’t unconscious, but I couldn’t speak or see anything. I didn’t get the whole three wise monkeys treatment, though, because I could still hear.
“Nifty trick, Hank.” So Hank was the driver. I hadn’t seen his face, so I had no idea what he looked like.
“Blessed silence,” Hank said.
A cellphone rang. It was the default ring tone with the sing-song notes.
“Yeah, boss?” Jensen said. “Hang on. Raymond, he wants to talk to you.” Now I knew their first names.
I felt Jensen lean across me.
“Yes, sir?” Raymond said. “He’s frightened, but alive. Are you sure? We could take him back to his place and force him to give up the deck. You’re the boss. We’ll be there in five. Yes, sir.”
I felt Raymond’s weight on me as he leaned forward. I assumed he was giving the phone back.
“Head to the mansion,” Raymond said.
“Whatever,” Hank said.
The van turned and I slid a bit and bumped into Jensen.
Five minutes later, the van stopped. I had no clue where we were. The door slid open and I heard movement. Then hands grabbed me and yanked me out of the vehicle. The door slid closed a moment later. I stood on concrete.
“Step up,” Jensen said.
I did as he said and he pulled me up onto a curb.
“Walk, but pick up your feet. The sidewalk is uneven through here.”
I took exaggerated steps.
“Not that high.”
Hands shoved me. I stumbled forward, tripped over a section of sidewalk and fell to the ground, skinning my hands and elbows. It knocked my breath out of me, but I couldn’t even grunt.
I wanted to cuss, but that wasn’t happening.
Hands pulled me to my feet. I walked as fast as I could, stumbling here and there. A lot of the sidewalks in Galveston are uneven due to tree roots growing underneath the concrete. Road crews often paint them yellow to warn pedestrians, but I was blind so if these were colored, I couldn’t tell.
“Turn right.”
I did as he said, keeping my hands out in front of me in case he was guiding me into a palm tree.
“Stairs.”
I eased my foot forward, felt the step, slid my shoe up until there was no resistance and climbed each step carefully. I about lost my balance, but one of the men pushed my back and kept me from falling.
A door opened. I stumbled over the threshold and nearly pitched forward, but again, one of the men caught me. They led me into a carpeted room and shoved me into a chair.
The men whispered and I couldn’t make out what they were saying. A few minutes later, a deep voice with a slightly Spanish accent said, “This is him?”
“Yes, sir,” Raymond said.
“Shall I release him from the spell?” Hank asked.
“Spell?”
“Yes, sir, Mr. Delgado, sir. He’s a smart-ass and a babbler, so I did the mouth and eye spell on him.”
“Mouth and eye?” Mr. Delgado asked.
“I ain’t perfected it yet. I can do the ears solo or I can do all three, but when it comes to mouth and eyes, I can never remember the sigil, so I always do both. Plus, I didn’t think you’d want him to know where you live.”
