Total pages in book: 74
Estimated words: 75193 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 376(@200wpm)___ 301(@250wpm)___ 251(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75193 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 376(@200wpm)___ 301(@250wpm)___ 251(@300wpm)
Seems wardens don’t take kindly to having their jobs threatened. Especially ones that’d been in said jobs for well over thirty years.
I’d gone a tad overboard, but it’d gotten the point across.
Now we were here, and the guards disliked me immensely.
They couldn’t do what they wanted to do, and they knew it.
Eventually, I knew they’d have to be apprised of what was actually going on, but I wanted to see just how far they’d go before I let them in on the game.
And, apparently, they didn’t care if I got the shit beat out of me by seven men.
“That’s enough, dick. Don’t try it again, you’ll only end up in the infirmary like the others,” guard one, Dickinson, said.
I snorted and rolled to my belly, pushing myself up and to my feet in the next second.
“I didn’t tell you to get up, asshole,” guard two, Roans, said, punctuating that comment with a poke in my gut with his baton.
I looked at Roans.
“I know the warden told you not to fuck with me,” I said.
Roans face shut down.
“He said I couldn’t hurt you or search your cell. He didn’t say a damn thing about bothering you. Now get back on the ground,” he ordered.
I shook my head and started walking away.
“Make me.”
Let’s just say, he didn’t make me.
***
“You’re going to have to tell the guards what’s going on, or I’m going to get the hell beat out of me,” I said, pressing my fingers to my jaw and checking out my new shiner in the shower of the infirmary.
“You need to stop fucking with them, and maybe we wouldn’t have to have them apprised,” Kelly countered.
I glanced at him in the mirror.
“True,” I agreed. “But I can’t stand self-righteous pricks who think they’re better than me. They’re not. And they don’t need to treat me like a criminal.”
“They think you are a criminal,” Kelly pointed out.
I shrugged. “Don’t give a fuck. That doesn’t give them the right to fuck with me day and night. I haven’t gotten a full night’s sleep since I got here thanks to them.”
Kelly sighed dramatically.
“Fuck. Fine,” he said, getting up and walking to the infirmary’s door.
“You’re supposed to be my guard. If you leave, I’ll have to leave with you,” I said helpfully.
Kelly glared at me, then snatched the door open and walked away, I presumed, to speak with the guards.
My phone dinged, alerting me to a text message.
I got them a lot now, and to tell the truth, I looked forward to them, too.
Freya never seemed to disappoint me with her words.
It’d been two weeks now since she’d realized that it was me, and she’d yet to make me feel like I was cheating on Aerie.
If I even considered a relationship with any woman, other than the very rare occasions I’d had casual sex, I would immediately feel like I’d done Aerie’s memory a disservice. As if I didn’t love her as much as I thought I did.
Because if I needed another woman’s companionship that meant that maybe Aerie didn’t mean as much to me as I thought she did.
Now, though, with Freya, it didn’t feel wrong.
When I spoke to her, it didn’t feel like I was betraying Aerie’s memory.
It just felt right.
Which hadn’t happened since she’d died well over five years ago.
The door to the infirmary slammed as the first guard showed.
This one was Cruz.
He was actually one of the better ones.
He was smart as a whip, six foot one inches of pissed off Mexican American, and was fair to his core. He felt that the system was true, and never ever made a mistake.
Which was why when he saw me unattended, kicked back against the bed, he froze.
“Where,” he asked, voice tightening, “is your guard?”
“Don’t get your panties in a wad,” Kelly said as he came in the door, four more guards behind him.
Five guards meant there were only eight on shift, which left the entire prison at a disadvantage if a prison break decided to happen while we were having our come-to-Jesus meeting.
It wouldn’t. However, every man felt antsy as they shifted from foot to foot to stare at Kelly and me.
“Why are we here?” Cruz finally asked, miffed at having been brought here.
“We’re here to tell you that Mr. Walker isn’t the man you think he is,” Kelly said evasively.
I sighed.
“What he’s pussyfooting around about is that I’m actually undercover and would appreciate you breaking up the fights a little faster than you have been, or I’ll have to beat the shit out of you,” I replied bluntly, tossing an annoyed glance at Kelly as I did.
I still wasn’t happy that I was here, and most assuredly wasn’t happy with the fact that the guards were being assholes, testing me like they did every new inmate.
They wanted to see what I was made of and, normally, I was all for that. But, in this instance, I wasn’t.