The Brotherhood of the Wheel

by R. S. Belcher

  “What’s in Memphis?” Lovina asked.

  “The King,” Jimmie said with a smile and a wink.

  FOURTEEN

  “10-61”

  You ask the right people in Memphis where to go after dark, where the action is, they’ll tell you some juke joint like Wild Bill’s, or a club like Alfred’s or Alchemy. If you ask the wrong people—the kind of folks you don’t want to know in the cold light of day—they’ll tell you there’s only one place to hang your hat when the sun’s been run out of town: the after-hours club called TCB. Jimmie knew how to find the place. They left his rig and Heck’s motorcycle behind in a Walmart parking lot and took Lovina’s Charger out to an old boat dock south of Mud Island River Park, on the slumbering Mississippi River. It was after eight, and the lights of the city were blurry smears, echoes of color, on the ancient black waters.

  A group of partygoers were huddled near the dock. Most of them were in good spirits and had obviously already had a few drinks. A laughing young man, wearing a cowboy hat, several glow-stick necklaces, and boots, offered Jimmie, Lovina, and Heck his flask. The cowboy’s eyes were bright and glassy from some type of chemical.

  Heck grinned and took a swig from the flask. “Thanks, pardner,” he said as the club-cowboy danced away, leaving his flask behind. Heck looked at Jimmie and said, “Shitty hat, good scotch.” He took another sip.

  “Remember, we’re on the clock,” Jimmie said. “Don’t get too festive.”

  “Explain to me again where we’re going?” Lovina said as they walked closer to the water.

  “TCB,” Jimmie said. “We’re either meeting our contact from the Builders or I’m getting us answers through my own channels. Either way, we learn more of what we’re up against and where we need to head next to shut them down.”

  Lovina’s phone buzzed softly. It was a text from Russell Lime: “Got some info on symbol in video. Possible lead on Mark Stolar, too. Will call soon. I hate texting, BTW. I hate BTW, by the way.” Lovina smiled and slid the phone down into her pocket.

  There was the hollow hoot of a boat horn and a forty-one-foot Stern cigarette boat glided toward the docks. A burly bearded man in a black shirt and jeans tied the lines to the dock while a slender black man in an impeccable Brioni suit, the pilot of the craft, greeted the line of partiers. Jimmie, Heck, and Lovina slipped into the line. Each party in line produced a necklace with a charm on it, and the pilot nodded and let them on the boat. There were couches set up along the bow and stern to accommodate them. When it was their turn, Jimmie fished a small gold chain with a charm out of his jeans pocket and presented it to the pilot. The thin man nodded, smiled slightly, and gestured them onto the boat.

  “Let me see that,” Lovina said. Jimmie handed her the necklace. The charm was a simple flat piece of metal with the letters “TCB” on it. The “C” on the charm was lower than the other two letters, and above it was a lightning bolt that looked like something straight out of a Shazam! comic book.

  “That is some sad-ass-looking bling,” she said, handing it back to him.

  Heck took another drag off the flask and then passed it back over to the laughing cowboy. “You get that out of a vending machine somewhere?”

  “Keys to the kingdom,” Jimmie said with a laugh, and put the necklace away.

  The passengers were all on board now. The pilot had to chase off a few folks who wanted to go but had no necklaces. The burly man in the T-shirt helped explain it to one drunk fella who tried to get on the boat. The drunk was politely but firmly deposited on the bank of the river, and a few moments later the lines were cast off. The boat rumbled out into the middle of the shadowy river, headed north.

  The ride was short but very jovial, with the passengers drinking, laughing, and singing. The city began to give way to dark forests on either shore of the river, and the stars appeared, no longer hidden by light pollution. While dismissing offers of jugs of wine, joints, and key-chain grinders of cocaine, Jimmie returned to an earlier conversation with Lovina, who was peering out into the darkness.

  “So Dewey Rears was looking into child disappearances and relating them to Black-Eyed Kid sightings?” Jimmie said.

  “For almost eight years, until he disappeared,” Lovina said. “Maybe abducted by these BEKs he was hunting.”

  “And you’ve got someone looking into the stuff that he had on his computer related to sightings?” Heck said, fishing out a cigarette and lighting up.

  Lovina nodded. “There’s a photo of my missing kids—Shawn Ruth and her friends—attacking your missing kids, Karen Collie and her friends,” she said. “That picture has been making the rounds of various occult and supernatural websites for years now. I think Rears was close to uncovering the source of these BEKs and who’s behind them. Rears had another photo in his files that he labeled ‘Patient Zero.’ Both our groups of missing kids had also seen that photo on occult websites. I think whoever started turning kids into these things abducted Rears and his friend Mark Stolar, maybe killed them.”

  “I’ve been fighting long-leggedy beasties since I was sixteen with the Jocks,” Heck said. “These things feel … different, like something bigger is inside them, working through them. It’s fucked up.”

  “There’s something else,” Lovina said. “Rears was mapping the missing kids and BEK sightings and linking them up to the interstate-highway system. There’s a connection to this Road you guys were taking about.”

  There was music playing up ahead on the riverbank. Lights broke through the dense cover of the Barnishee Bayou. The boat slowed and turned toward a long dock with several other craft already moored to it. There was a long, tiered wooden staircase with multiple landings that ascended to a large, old, plantation-style mansion up on the hill at the edge of the bayou. The dock and the stairs were wrapped in small blue and white Christmas-tree-style lights. People were lounging on the landings, drinking, laughing, flirting, and chatting, while “Smokestack Lightnin’,” by Howlin’ Wolf, growled through the swamp and made the windows of the old mansion tremble. Everyone disembarked the boat, and staff on the dock once again examined the necklaces. Jimmie’s charm passed inspection.

  “Where did you get that thing?” Heck asked, smoke streaming out his nostrils, as they ascended the stairs with the other new arrivals.

  “From the owner of this joint,” Jimmie said. “We’ve helped each other out a few times over the years.” They reached the top. The back porch of the mansion was wide and wrapped around the whole house. There were tables and a bar out here. A heavyset black man in a suit and a top hat opened the door to the interior for Lovina. Heck and Jimmie followed.

  “And who would that be?” Heck asked.

  Inside TCB, the walls sweated from the heat of hundreds of bodies and the cool breath of the swamp at night. The cigarette smoke swirled like hurricane fronts seen on radar—milky spiral galaxies, masking voices, promises, and lies. Howlin’ Wolf faded away, to be replaced by “Dust My Broom,” by Elmore James.

  “Him,” Jimmie said, pointing up to the balcony that overlooked the barroom floor. The man leaning against the rail, surveying his kingdom, had coal-black hair styled in a loose pompadour with sideburns. His eyes were as blue as a robin’s egg and flashed even from across the room, cutting through the fog of smoke. He was handsome—a cross between an angel and a thug, with a sneer threatening at the edges of his full lips. He was slender, dressed in a partially zipped black leather jacket, with no shirt underneath, and tight black leather pants.

  “Holy shit!” Heck said. “Is that?”

  “It can’t be,” Lovina said. “It’s got to be an impersonator.” Then she added, “My goodness. Nice likeness, though.”

  “It’s not an impersonator,” Jimmie said, waving to the man, who appeared to be in his early thirties. The leather-garbed figure gestured for them to ascend the stairs with a thumbs-up and a wink. Jimmie gave the “okay” sign, and they began to slowly wrestle their way through the crowds toward the curving staircase. There
were two such staircases on either side of the club’s floor. Both rose to the man in black leather. “It’s him.”

  “But … he’s dead, man,” Heck said.

  “Yeah,” Jimmie said. “He was for a spell. He got over it.”

  “Devil in Disguise” started to play. Jimmie was making good headway in the crowd. “Look, whatever you do, don’t mention the dead thing, okay?” he said. “He’s really touchy about that. I’ll tell you later what the deal is, but just play along right now, okay? He calls himself Aaron now. Don’t use his old name. He’s got another nickname, too, in the occult underworld, but, for the love of baby Jesus, do not call him that to his face!”

  “Call him what?” Lovina said. They had reached the stairs. Another security guy unhooked the velvet rope at the bottom of the stairwell and allowed them to pass after a thumbs-up from the man in the leather suit.

  “Helvis,” Jimmie said.

  Another pair of suited attendants, obviously armed beneath their tailored jackets, opened another velvet rope and allowed the three to enter. The foyer at the top of the grand staircases had been roped off and turned into a private lounge with a long Chesterfield leather sofa and two antique high-backed wooden chairs that looked as if they came straight out of the Middle Ages. As they approached him, the black-leather-clad man who now called himself Aaron strode forward and offered a hand to Jimmie. Lovina noted that Aaron almost swaggered with power and confidence. It was him. She had watched enough of his movies with her pops to recognize the walk, but how could that possibly be?

  “Jimmie Aussapile,” Aaron said. “Gearjammin’ knight of the ribbon! How are you, you old dog?”

  Jimmie laughed and took the hand; it turned into a bear hug between the burly trucker and the black-clad, seemingly younger man.

  “Keeping it between the lines and outta the ditches, A,” he said. “This is Lovina Marcou and Heck Sinclair. They’re friends of mine, working on something with me.”

  Aaron’s eyebrow went up slightly, and the ghost of a sneer returned as he took Lovina’s hand and kissed it. “Pleasure, darlin’,” he said. The veteran detective couldn’t help feeling her heart flutter and a flush of warmth on her face for a second. She suddenly understood all those women screaming and grabbing at this man in all the old black-and-white footage. The man had it, whatever the hell “it” was; he owned it.

  Aaron turned his attention to Heck and narrowed his eyes. There was a flash of something there for a second—a glint of silver before the blue.

  Heck took Aaron’s hand and shook it firmly. “Pleasure,” he said with a grin. “Huge fan.”

  Aaron looked to Jimmie for a second and found whatever validation he needed in the trucker’s gaze.

  “Thank you,” Aaron said to Heck. “Thank you very much. Y’all have a seat. You hungry? Care for a drink?” He gestured for one of his attendants, a young man in a white silk shirt, to approach.

  Aaron sat in one of the chairs. There was a stylized pentagram worked into the design on the chair’s back. Jimmie took the chair beside him, and Heck and Lovina sat on the huge Chesterfield.

  “I could use a scotch,” Heck said. “Maybe a peanut-butter-and-nanner sandwich?” Jimmie frowned but said nothing.

  “Water, please,” Lovina said.

  “I’m good, thanks,” Jimmie said.

  “Get me a rum and Pepsi and three bacon cheeseburgers,” Aaron said. The attendant nodded and departed without a word. “So what you working on, Jim? How can I help you, after all you and the Brotherhood did for me?”

  “Missing children,” Jimmie said. “Being transformed into creatures, possibly a vessel for some other possessing force. It looks like it may be related to the Road, too. They’re called Black-Eyed Kids. You hear anything about them from the left side of the street?”

  Aaron’s features lost their almost unconscious charm. He narrowed his eyes and the silver flash returned. “Children … sumbitches. Ought to be ashamed of themselves, if they could be. Me ’n the Memphis Mafia just cleaned out a nest of incubuses that were possessing priests in Chicago, molesting little kids. I’ve heard stories about these BEKs, but I figured it was all Internet bullshit.” Aaron glanced up at Lovina and raised a hand. “Pardon my French, darlin’. The Internet is full of all kinds of lies and misinformation. Trust me, I know. I ain’t never had any kind of relationship with Bigfoot. We’re just good friends.”

  “These myths are real,” Jimmie said. “We tangled with them just yesterday. Lost a brother in it.”

  The man in the white shirt returned with two lovely young women in long black evening gowns, slit to their shapely thighs. The man and the women unfolded and placed down simple TV dining trays that seemed somewhat out of place in the gritty opulence of the juke joint-mansion. The food and drinks were passed out. Heck downed half his scotch in a single gulp and started on the deep-fried, powdered-sugar-coated monstrosity in front of him with equal abandon.

  The man in the white shirt leaned close to Aaron’s ear. “A, got something that needs your attention,” he said. Aaron stood.

  “Y’all eat up, enjoy the music, and relax. You need anything, you tell Skeets, here,” he said jerking a thumb at the attendant with the military crew cut and the machine gun under his coat. “I’ll be back in a spell, and I’ll see what I can dig up on these BEKs for you, Jim.” Aaron and his man departed and headed down the stairs to the club floor below. Lightnin’ Hopkins’s “Bring Me My Shotgun” was playing below, above the river of the crowd’s voice.

  “Okay,” Heck said, crumbs from his sandwich flying from his lips. “Trippin’ my balls off during a night firefight in the Registan Desert is now officially the second most surreal experience in my life. Jimmie, what the fuck is going on here? What is his deal?”

  “You all ain’t going to believe this,” Jimmie said. “His deal is that when he was alive and just hitting his stride, becoming the first great rock icon, his mother got sick, really sick. This was back in 1956. She was going to die, in days. He had heard enough tales from all the old bluesmen he worked with; he went to the crossroads at midnight, and he made a deal with the man in the big black car.”

  “Okay,” Lovina said. “I’ve heard that since I was a little girl—meet Papa Legba at the crossroads at midnight, just before dawn, bang on the shovel, name your price—all that jazz. You telling me it’s true, that he sold his soul?”

  “Crossroads are part of the Road,” Jimmie said, “and sometimes they have power, act as places in between worlds. And powers and entries can gather there. In Aaron’s case, it was real. He bought his mama a few more years, and he did all he could to spoil her and make her happy and comfortable. He never told her, told anyone, what he had given up for her, for love.”

  “So that’s why he went downhill so hard,” Heck said. “He knew where he was headed, knew there was no escape.”

  “Yep,” Jimmie said. “It was pretty much a cloud over the rest of his life. He hid from it in drugs and food, bargained with it with all his gospel albums, raged against it in wrecked relationships and false friendships. Finally, he died, lost and alone; he fell into the pit.”

  “So what’s he doing here, looking all fine and running a club, helping us?” Lovina asked. “Isn’t he a demon? One of the bad guys?”

  “He is a demon,” Jimmie said. “He looks that way most of the time. If he gets pissed, he looks … different.”

  “Define ‘different,’” Heck said, wiping the crumbs off his shirt and gesturing with his empty glass toward an attendant. Jimmie plucked the empty glass out of Heck’s hand and shook his head to the attendant that another drink wouldn’t be needed.

  “Imagine him in his seventies, Vegas-sequined jumpsuit, but about nine feet tall and about nine hundred and fifty pounds, all firehouse red, bloated skin, and ram horns; able to rip the head off a grizzly bear and then probably eat it with a side of Memphis barbecue.”

  “Shit,” Heck said.

  “Let’s keep him happy,” Lovina added.
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  “I agree,” Jimmie said. “Anyway, he became very popular in Hell—too popular. He was still a good ole Memphis Baptist boy at heart, and he actually tried to act like a missionary in the pit. He used the only thing he ever knew how to use to praise life and cast light in the heart of darkness: his voice. He actually had a following in Hell, and the management got afraid of him, so they shipped him back up here. He’s been exiled from Hell, and due to his contract deal Heaven can’t touch him. So he tries to help people not make the same mistakes he did. He’s got a crew; he calls them his Memphis Mafia. They hunt demons, foil the plots of the Infernal Masters, and try to help regular folks who have gotten in too deep with the Devil or some other supernatural loan shark.”

  “Okay,” Lovina said. “I’ll buy all this, Jimmie, but I swear to God, if Slim Whitman turns out to be some kind of fucking yodeling vampire, or something, I’m out.”

  Aaron returned at that moment with his attendant and a woman. The woman was in her early thirties. She was short, only a few inches over five feet, with a rounded but slight figure and frame. Her skin was dark in color, as if, a few generations back, she was of Mediterranean or Middle Eastern ancestry. She had a mane of long, curly black hair that fell well below her shoulders. She wore glasses that covered wide, dark, and intelligent eyes, giving her a slightly owlish look. She wore no makeup or jewelry and didn’t seem to want or need either. She was dressed in a pair of jeans, well-worn hiking boots, a gray sweater, and a hooded olive-drab parka jacket that fell to just above her knees. She had a large leather messenger bag slung over her shoulder and across her chest.

  “This young lady was looking for y’all,” Aaron said.

  The woman held a hand out to Jimmie. “Mr. Aussapile,” she said, “I’m Max Leher. I understand you need some consultation on a field case you’re working on?” Leher offered her hand.

  “First things first,” Jimmie said, rising. “The wheel turns.”