The Day I decided to Call

I stared at the huge man who wore the preacher’s collar. Odd but this preacher is tattooed, and will built, He was dressed like a preacher but this cock sucker was anything but holy. He was apart of a rival club, and he was turning snitch using information he had to not only take down his rag time crew but also the Red Devil Mafia.

My Club

He’d been crippled by paid-for violence, dragged downstairs, and tossed onto the marble floor. His arrogant face and body bruised by the brass knuckles that were at my side. (I never claimed to be a ‘fair’ fighter) He was a big man, much bigger than I. He was almost as big as John Coffey, from that movie the Green Mile, just white and donning a $3,000 suit and a pair of gators.

Preacher
“Who are you? Why are you doing this? What’s your goddamn name?”

I yawned, exhausted from traveling.

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Don’t play fucking stupid, you know damn fucking will just who the fuck I am”

He knew who I was, even if he didn’t know me by name the cut on my back told him all he needed to know. I looked at this piece of shit as if he was nothing more then a fucking task to get paid.

A task to keep my club free from the walls of the pen

A task that stood in his way of living another day

Preacher
“Give me a break man; I really have no idea who you are?”

We were a few hours out of Diageo almost into the Vegas valley. My cut was the only thing I had on, it was enough to shelter my weapons of choice. I was creating terror at midnight in a little subdivision. A sweet $2 million home, paid for by the feds to get this piece of shit to feel comfortable before he took the stand. This Place had everything, a four bedroom layout, three full baths. A half bath on the main floor.

We were in the basement.

A finished basement that was laid to the bone. Marble. Golden fixtures. Games room. Full gym. Bar. Bathroom. Jacuzzi. Kid’s playroom. Wine room. Place looked like something you saw from MTV Cribs.

Feds knew how to take care of there rats

I had disabled the alarm system in less than ten seconds. People bought million-dollar homes and never had the phone company move the D-Mark box inside their cribs. If they didn’t have backup power, all it took was a pair of dime-store wire cutters to slice the phone lines and shut down the alarm system. I already knew what kind of system had been installed before I crept around back and cut a single wire. I had information on the floor plans for the house, had studied its layout before I compromised the mansion. I had sat in the dark, just another shadow, waiting for the reverend disguised rat to come home.

Church had run longer than I had expected.

Preacher
“What political Stable are you representing?”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“I hate taking on exterminating jobs.”

Preacher
“In god’s name who are you?”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Is this marble floor cooled for the summer? Has to be. Marble gets damn hot in the fucking summer heat.”

Preacher
“Who.Are.You?”

His voice echoed, but no one could hear him scream. Not they anyone would care. Pictures of the rat and his family were on the walls. Photos of people who could be his parents and in laws, political figures and church members, were in every nook and cranny. High-end art from Europe, sculptures from many parts of Africa, Ralph Lauren paint on every wall, the place was decorated to the bone. On the back wall was the largest high-def television I had ever seen. Had to be one hundred inches wide. Had to have been imported straight from Japan. Picture so clear it seemed like I should be able to get up and walk right into the screen.

Where most of the country was suffering from a depression and a banking scandal, this dick head was living it up.

I tugged at my leather gloves

✠ SnubZ ✠
“I’m watching the news. Do you mind?”

My cell was in my hand. I took a picture of the injured man, sent it to the person who was responsible for this job. The phone on this end was a clone, stolen and untraceable, just like the one on the other end, both to be disposed of when the evening came to its premeditated conclusion. I looked out the window again, stared at the open desert. The weather was in the high 90’s, was going to hit a hundred before long.

Reverend Coleman raised his pain-filled voice and asked:

Preacher
“How much are they paying you?”

I looked at him

Preacher
“I’ll pay you one hundred thousand to reverse this shit and…and…and…”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Do unto others.”

The Preacher growled
“An eye for and eye.”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“In the name of the lord.”

Preacher
“I’m offering you one hundred thousand dollars.”

Religion had vacated his tone, replaced by vulgarity and desperation. The act was binging to be forgotten and his true self was shining through the bullshit

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Let me think about it.”

I went back to watching the Local 4 News. There were accidents on the main highway, thirteen mile road, and on the connector ramp to the opposite freeway. Another report had more stores closing due to unpaid debt, homes being foreclosed. Country was falling apart. So much for the black man asking for change.

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Economy is fucked all around ay. I figured as much. Didn’t know it was this bad.”

The reverend struggled to breathe.
“Are you…planning…to kill me?”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Will you please shut up?”

He ignored my request and shouted
“If this is a robbery, get to robbing and get the hell out of my home.”

Go fucking figure. I’ve already beat the shit out of the guy, and pretty much have him begging for his life, just to keep my club off the radar and the keep money flowing in. And he’s just now telling me to get the hell out? Funny world we live in. Of course I wasn’t taken back from the macho outburst.

✠ SnubZ ✠
“What part of shut up don’t you understand?”

Preacher
“I have a family.”

So much for the macho look, he was starting to cry at this point.

Preacher
“A beautiful wife. A daughter. A little boy.”

I forgot about the news and looked at him. His right eye was swollen, the size of a baseball. His left eye wasn’t too much smaller.

Preacher
“There isn’t much money here at the house, I swear, but let me ring my wife. She will pay whatever you ask, without question, without reporting the incident. Let me talk to my children. I want you to hear their voices, hear the love. You have a heart, don’t you? You have children?”

He spat on the floor. Blood and saliva. Marked the floor with his DNA.

I looked at my watch

Revered Coleman sounded like he was in the pulpit, fire and brimstone in his voice, as if he were in charge.

Preacher
“I have two. Two wonderful children. Both attend Christian schools.”

Confirmation was due five minutes ago.

Palms sweating. Listing for sirens. That had left me more than nervous. Couldn’t do no good if I got sent back to Sing Sing

Preacher
“Greater Life Academy. A Christian school. Children must attend schools that are not afraid to acknowledge Jesus and give praise to the lord. Do you believe in the lord? My daughter is six. My son is four. Straight-A students.”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Hallelujah, Reverend. Now shut the fuck up.”

He closed his eyes, prayed. Back to the news for me. The mayor’s recent state of the city address was being talked about, debated, said the mayor was forth-right when he said his city was in trouble, refused to let it die on his watch, pundits saying the city was already dead and needed to be federalized.

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Reverend…is that you and a group of protestors standing behind the mayor?”

Preacher
“Is that what this is about?”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“You sure didn’t do a good job hiding, guess you were sold in this pretend life”

Preacher
“Is that what this is about? Me testifying?”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Wow. Look at that close-up of you as the Man in charge of are city is speaking. Man, you look pissed off.”

Preacher
“Because this isn’t the life I wanted. I loved my club, being tossed into a political mix wasn’t what was supposed to happen.”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“A rats a rat.”

Preacher
“Did the Punishers send you to do this?”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“This is my pleasure?”

Preacher
“That overrated, pimp-suit-wearing son of a…does he have something to do with this?”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“I don’t know, he sort of reminds me of a white Suge Knight. Whatever happened to Suge? Last I saw he was getting laid out.”

Preacher
“I am a simple man. A man of God. I have been a pillar of the community for a year now. I left the MC life behind”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“But you really didn’t did you?”

Preacher
“Please, let me go.”

There were enough pictures of him and others like him to display his lust for power. His photos told me he was a man who had to be in control. Now he had no Control! The reverend had a lot. Seeing his worldly possessions reminded me that I’d been robbed of all I owned. Robbed by Joyellen. I though about Joyellen. Though about the last time I saw her. I thought about all she had taken from me. I should’ve put a bullet in her heart and killed my anger. My eyes went to the pictures of the Rev’s family and friends. So much love in the pictures between him and his wife. That forever love. Sometimes I wanted that.

What I saw in those pictures, I wanted that shit for myself.

✠ SnubZ ✠
“I caught feelings for this women a long time ago.”

The Preacher grunted.
“What you say?”

Stunned, who wouldn’t be? I just beat this fucker and now I’m carrying a conversation.

Fucked up isn’t it

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Was talking. Telling you about this girl. Met her at on a beach in South Cali. The old man they called Big V ran this hot spot. A bona fide thieves’ paradise. A simple girl, she was. At least she was back then. Beautiful, exotic girl dressed in Salvation Army clothes. But the part of her I found so beautiful, nobody could see. She didn’t see it herself. I saw beyond her daddy issues, the issues she had with her mother, saw beyond the sibling rivalry she had, saw beyond all that shit in her life.”

Preacher
“What’s your problem, son?”

The Preacher Coleman coughed, spat up blood.
“Speak your mind.”

Guess it wouldn’t hurt. Fucker would be dead before I left the night. Had to be. I was going to keep my club free. And I would kill for it. But since I have some time before the whole killing starts…

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Melissa”

Preacher
“Speak your mind, son”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Sure you want to hear this?”

He grunted, struggled to breathe.
“Speak your mind.”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“She was seeing somebody else. Flimflam man. A high roller. But I put my bid in. She laughed in my face, told me that if I wanted to be with her, I needed a million dollars in the bank.”

He released more pain. I whispered

✠ SnubZ ✠
“A million dollars and a part time role with the Red Devil Mafia”

Preacher
“So that is what motivates you. Your love for a woman.”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“My hate for one woman fuels my anger while my love for another fuels my purpose.”

Preacher
“Hate is cancer of the soul. Tell me about the one you hate.”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“I don’t want to talk about that whore.”

Preacher
“A man should not speak of a woman with such venom.”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“No you fucking Rat bastard. Whore is accurate. She’s a woman of the night. She’s a whore.”

Preacher
“Like Mary Magdalene.”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“The one I like, I’ve been trying to get a million dollars in the bank ever since I met her.”

Preacher
“The one you hate is a whore.”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Yeah.”

Preacher
“The one you love, she hung out in a den on a beach with thieves and wrongdoers.”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“She’s a thief, runs scams. An artful dodger. Bona fide flimflam woman.”

Preacher
“A thief and a Whore. Criminals and the unrighteous. Transgressors. Like you.”

I took offense to that comment

✠ SnubZ ✠
“I don’t scam or steal. I’ve been stolen from. But I never steal. Never been a righteous man, not like you. Guess you could say criminals always end up being drawn together.”

His pain was getting the best of him. Sweat dripping from his skin like rain. Then my cell phone vibrated. It was a text message. I flipped the phone open and finally saw a three-word message.

FUNDS TRANSFERRED, PROCEED.

It was followed by a smiley face.

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Time for us to raise up out of here.”

Preacher
“Where are you taking me?”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Hot as hell outside.”

Preacher
“Can I please get my cut?”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Afraid not, I have to take that with me. You lost your right to wear that when you turned Rat”

Preacher
“I need to take my bible. A man of god must always travel with his word near his heart.”

He loosened his collar and limped his gigantic frame across the room, went to the wall filled with leather bound books, and with his injured hands struggled to pull out a worn bible. It was a beautiful red bible with golden letters across the front.

It was a hell of a bible to say the least. If I ever carried one, it would have to be in that fashion.

Preacher
“This was my first Bible. My first, had it way before I even joined the Punisher MC. It was father’s first bible. He was a minister and a fighter. He owned it before me. And this bible, it is to be my son’s first bible. Hallelujah, glory to gawd.”

Almost had me ready to yell Amen. I was growing old of this and wanted to get this over with. So I can jump on my bike and make the long trip home

He held the bible to his chest like it was his salvation. Or his bulletproof vest. Again, in a shaky voice, he said

Preacher
“Who are you?”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“You don’t need to know my name.”

Preacher
“I would like to know the name of the man who is going to kill me.”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Why?”

Preacher
“So people know who to be afraid of.”

He laughed a painted laugh. I was dumbfounded. Fucker was cracking jokes when his death was a walk away.

Couldn’t believe it

Would you?

Preacher
“How are people going to know who to be afraid of? You can’t be afraid of someone who doesn’t have a name.”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“I don’t need to give you my name for what I’m doing here.”

Preacher
“What is Jesus didn’t have a name? What if Santa Clause didn’t have a name? Good or evil, everyone must have a name. We name what we praise, we name what we fear.”

The bible he held, though his hands were wounded; at least two fingers were broken.

Preacher
“The wrong you’re doing…stop doing evil while you can. Stop because one day somebody will come for you. One day what you do to other people, that will be done to you.”

His righteous words slowed me down, sent a chill through my frame. Didn’t know why. He had to understand that he was a rat and this is what happens to rats in the MC world

Preacher
“Two hundred thousand. I’ll get you two hundred thousand in thirty minutes.”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“It’ll take more then that.”

Preacher
“If you think I will beg you for my life, your wrong! I will never give it up my pride to a self-righteous, arrogant motherfucka.”

A rush of fear and desperation bloomed in the reverend’s face. He began praying. With those damaged fingers he fumbled with the bible. Struggled to open the damn thing. The pain in his hands were too great. But he never stopped praying. He dropped the bible and it popped open. God’s words had been hollowed out and replaced with a snub-nose .38. That four inch barrel leapt out, hit the marble floor hard, slid ten inches in my favor. His swollen eyes met mine, panic came out of his body on the winds of the loudest scream I’d ever heard. I raced for his .38 like I was racing to stop my own death.

He tackled me like he was a pro bowler, lifted me up quick and fast, ran with me, knocked over North African sculptures; the sheep became a raging bull as he slammed me into the one-hundred-inch television against the wall. I swung at his head, connected a few times, but it did no damage, not enough to take him down. He slammed me into the wall again and again.

I gritted my teeth, grunted with each blow. One final slam and I screamed

Pain consumed me like fire and I went limp, almost blacked out.

He was winded, out of shape, and had to let me go

I went down fast and hard. So did he

He collapsed and laid there praying and breathing hard. I lay there rolling in pain. Revered made it to his feet first, staggered away from me, limped toward the .38.

Preacher
“Satan will not defeat me. The Punishers and the Devils will burn in the eternal flame! I will not die in my home. Not in the lord’s house!”

He picked the gun up, frantic, grunting, his swollen fingers getting the best of him.

Preacher
“Son of a bitch. I’ll kill every motherfucking devil that gets in my way righting my wrongs.”

Funny I was trying to accomplish the same thing.

He grunted and with his aching fingers raised the .38, pointed it at my head. I was staring at the long barrel of death.

Time slowed down.

By sunrise, the revered would be a hero. Attacked in his home by an assassin. Then killing the assassin. God was on his side. He’d into the next round with out breaking a sweat. Larry King would want to chat with him. Octo-mom would be forgotten. He would become a bigger public rat then Sammy the Bull

All from my death

There were three explosions.

The first bullet would’ve been in my left eye, had I still been there.

I scampered across the frozen marble, rolled, and yelled out. My own fear, came up one knee, crouched, now a smaller target. Sweat in my eyes, pain in my lower back, I had come up facing my enemy, my semi-final enemy, my hand reaching underneath my coat, pulling my .22 from its holster.

I was trapped against the wall, broken television behind me, death in front of me.

It was .38 against a .22

The third explosion came from my gun

I had aimed at his chest, but my pain lowered my gun and my shot was way off, the bullet hitting his right leg. He screamed staggered, went down on one knee.

He wasn’t running. They always ran. He was coming after me. Minister by trade, soldier at heart. He’d become the wounded animal after his hunter. His next shot hit the marble floor near my feet. The next hit the shattered television behind me. If I hadn’t beaten him down, if his hands weren’t broken, I’d be dead right now. There were two more explosions. Both came from the .22 I was holding

One tore into his left arm, that brand-new pain slowing him down.

The second ripped opened a tiny hold in the front of the reverend’s head. There was another explosion, one last echo. The final sound from the battle. His gun fired at the ground, the bullet ricocheting off the marble and shattering glass.

The gun fell from his swollen hand; the reverend slumped into his death. He lay there like a big rag doll, his body in a pool of blood, part of his brain decorating the wall behind him.

I swallowed. Trembled. Looked down at the gun in my hand. I used the camera phone, took a photo, sent the image to show the world, we were one short.

I was trembling.

I was drenched. Face damp. Sweat glands were pumping hard. Chest rising and falling.

My phone rang

Sweat in my eye, I pulled myself together and answered

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Talk to me.”

Punisher VP
“Is the rat…did you…”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“You get the picture I sent you?”

Punisher VP
“Yes”

✠ SnubZ ✠
“Then don’t ask stupid questions.”

A chill hit me. Like Death was in the room collection souls, passing through me, its icy fingers grabbing at my insides, knowing it wasn’t my time, but warning me nevertheless. I closed the phone, walked out of the house and jump on my bike that was parked inside his garage.

The motor roared to life and I was heading back to Diageo

My club the Red Devil Mafia was safe for now, and we had enough money to keep us afloat for the moment. But I knew I had to figure out a way to keep a steady stream of cash flowing through the clubhouse doors.

Maybe it was time I represented the Club on a bigger stage

Maybe it was time for me to call that number

Maybe it was time to call Brenton Cyrus up for a job