Judged (The Mercenary Series Book 4)

by Marissa Farrar

  “Guard!” I yelled. “C.O. Reynolds!”

  I stepped forward, and just as I did, I noticed something poking out from beneath the shower door, buffeted by the flow of the water. A set of thick, black framed glasses, broken in several places.

  My heart plummeted.

  Praying there was still something I could do, while instinctively knowing there wasn’t, I rushed forward and slammed open the shower door.

  Eddie sat slumped against the tiles. Fully clothed, it was clear he hadn’t come in here to shower. His clothes clung to him, soaked not only by the water, but by the huge quantity of blood he’d lost. He was folded over, so all I could see was that he had stab marks to his chest and stomach. I couldn’t see how many, not that it mattered. He was clearly dead, and I had a fairly good idea who was responsible.

  The sound of feet came running behind me. Something slammed into my back.

  The guard’s shout, “Get down on the ground!”

  Weariness took over me, and I slowly dropped to my knees and then lay face down on the wet tiled floor.

  “He was like this when I walked in,” I tried to explain, as he climbed on top of me, and grabbed my hands to pull them behind my back.

  “Shut it. The prison warden will be asking you plenty of questions.”

  “He’s been dead awhile,” I tried again. “You just saw me walk by two minutes ago.”

  I hoped common sense would kick in, but the man had a job to do. I knew he wasn’t allowed to appear weak and indecisive, even if he knew I was telling the truth.

  I was on the ground, my face jammed against the cold, slimy tiles. The weight of the C.O crushed down on my back, my hands pulled together, straining my shoulders. There was no point in trying to fight back. Above my head, the guard spoke into a radio, calling for backup.

  Fuck, poor Eddie. I didn’t have any doubts who was responsible for his death. Was I partly to blame as well, for ever striking up a friendship with the younger man?

  Within a minute, more guards rushed in.

  “Jesus, fucking, Christ,” said Damps as he caught sight of the body. “What a fucking mess.” He noticed me on the ground. “Is that the guy responsible?”

  I was relieved to hear C.O. Wyber say, “Nah, he just found the body.”

  Thank God, common sense had come into play.

  “We need to go on lockdown,” Wyber continued. “Get the cops and forensics in here before more people contaminate the crime scene.”

  Damps made a growling sound at the back of his throat. “Dammit. I hate when those assholes have to get involved.”

  Wyber exhaled a huff of air. “How did this happen? There’s going to be some tough questions asked.”

  I was hauled to my feet. I cast a final glance at Eddie’s body, before the guards marched me out of there and took me back down to the dorms. A siren cut through the air.

  I was pushed into the dorm and the door locked behind me. Everyone else had been woken by the alarms, everyone questioning what was going on. My shirt was damp from being pushed to the floor, and I saw a hint of pink on the damp patch—Eddie’s diluted blood.

  Numerous eyes were fixed in my direction.

  “What the hell’s going on, man?” someone yelled.

  “Eddie’s dead,” I shouted back. “Someone stabbed him in the showers.”

  Yells of ‘what the fuck,’ ‘how the hell,’ rose from the small crowd.

  I lifted both hands. “I just found him. I don’t know anything else.”

  But I felt Callum and his friends looking at me with extra focus, and I deliberately did my best not to make eye contact with them. I went to my bunk and changed my wet, bloodied shirt. At least Callum was no longer beneath me in the bunks, having swapped his sleeping position with another prisoner a couple of days earlier. I only wanted for Callum and his gang to leave me the hell alone.

  Didn’t seem that was going to happen, however.

  Shawn walked past and leaned down to me. He spoke in a voice so soft it was almost a whisper. “Eddie cried like a little baby when I shanked him in the gut.”

  Rage coiled tight inside me and it took every ounce of strength I had not to retaliate. That son-of-a-bitch. He might have been the one to carry out the dirty work, but I knew Callum was behind it.

  He was behind everything around here, and I wasn’t going to let him get away with it this time.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  V

  Things settled down after our talk with Leon, and so far telling Dylan the truth hadn’t come back on me in any way. I counted down the days until I was able to visit X again, but otherwise life continued as normal.

  “Where are you going?” asked Nickie as I grabbed my purse.

  “I have an appointment at the doctor’s office at eleven.”

  “Everything okay?”

  “Yeah, it’s just a routine OB check.”

  “Can I come?”

  I smiled. “Of course. I’d love to have you there.” I should have thought to invite her along. She rarely left the house lately, and I was worried about her. Every time we left the house, something bad happened. She no longer felt safe in this world, and I understood that, though it broke my heart. So much wrong had been done to her, and sometimes I struggled to remember she was eighteen. There were moments when I thought her to be a small child again, and other times when I imagined her to be far older than her years.

  “Great. Just give me five, okay?”

  She took the stairs two at a time and vanished into her bedroom. I waited until she reappeared, her hair tied back and a dab of lip gloss on her mouth. It was the first time I’d seen her make an effort with her appearance, too. I used to hate how high maintenance she was, but her recent lack of self-grooming had worried me.

  We left the house and took the car to drive to the office. I was always cautious now when I left the property, one part of me looking out for any signs that our father was near. As I drove, I constantly checked in the rearview mirror, making sure we weren’t being followed. Perhaps I was paranoid, but with everything that had happened, I figured I had good reason to be.

  The OB’s office was in a separate building adjoining the hospital via a glass corridor. We didn’t have to wait long to be called in. I gave the usual samples, and then went to lie down on the bed.

  “So, how have you been feeling?” the doctor asked me.

  “Not too bad. A little tired. Hungry all the time. But otherwise okay.”

  “Excellent. Well, let’s take a look.”

  I lay back on the bed, my stomach now making me a silhouette of hills and mountains. The doctor placed cool gel onto my bump, and then used the Doppler to locate the heartbeat. Nicole and I exchanged a smile as the room was filled with the hollow, rapid clip-clops of my baby’s heartbeat.

  “Everything’s okay?” I asked the doctor, still nervous that all the stress I’d been through might have affected the baby somehow.

  “Yes,” she said with a smile. “Everything looks great.”

  I exhaled a sigh of relief.

  “It makes it all so real, doesn’t it?” Nicole said, and then, to my surprise and dismay, burst into tears.

  I exchanged a glance with the doctor, who quickly wiped the gel off my tummy and pulled down my shirt. “I’ll give you a few minutes,” she said, and left the room.

  “Nickie, what is it? What’s wrong?”

  I managed to haul my ever-expanding frame upright and pulled my sister to sit down next to me on the bed.

  She wiped at her face with her hand. “I don’t want this baby to have the sort of life we’ve had.”

  “Neither do I, Nickie. That’s why we’re going to get away from here as soon as X gets out.”

  She shook her head. “No, it’s not going to happen.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I can see it already. Even if our father never turns up, you’re going to end up sliding into his shoes. You suit this life, Vee. You thrive on it. How are you ever
going to be able to let go?”

  “I can, and I will,” I said, taking her hand and looking into her eyes. “I’m only doing this now to get X out. Once he’s free, and the baby is born, I won’t have time for anything else.”

  “And what about me?” she said, her voice quiet.

  Her question surprised me. “What do you mean?”

  “What do I do when the baby is born, and you and X are playing happy families?”

  “You’re our family, too, Nickie. You’ll be the baby’s aunt, and you’ll always be my sister. None of that is going to change.”

  “You promise?”

  “Of course, I promise. After everything we’ve been through, did you really think I was going to just abandon you because I had other people in my life, too? Love isn’t finite, Nickie. There’s plenty to go around.”

  We hugged each other hard and the baby kicked between us.

  “See,” I laughed. “Bump agrees, too.”

  All this time, I’d thought Nicole’s silences and that she’d shut herself away was purely because she’d been worried about our father and mourning Mateo, when in fact she’d been concerned about what was going to happen to her after the baby was born.

  I made a promise to myself that I’d make sure Nickie wouldn’t feel pushed out once the baby was here. Even if X was free, I’d always make sure my sister knew there was a place for her in my life, no matter how old we both got.

  She was the only real family I had.

  Chapter Twenty-two

  X

  Eddie’s murder had left the atmosphere in the jail even more tense than normal. I fought to hold back my rage at the man’s death. I knew who was responsible, even if the guards appeared clueless. I suspected they knew who the guilty party was, but were too frightened to take any action. Callum had too many people behind him. The rest of the white community would riot and more people would end up dead. No one else spoke up, and I kept my mouth shut, too. I knew opening my mouth wouldn’t get me anywhere. I had to take things into my own hands.

  “Do you miss your little friend?” Callum mocked me at every opportunity. “No one to share snacks with now?”

  I bit down on my anger, balling my fists. He wanted me to react, and I wasn’t going to give him what he wanted—not like this, anyway. I needed to be smart. I couldn’t give anyone a clue about what I was doing. I didn’t want to spend any more time behind these bars than necessary, but Callum wasn’t going to get away with what he was doing. He was controlling men on the streets, who were putting pressure on Vee, and now he’d killed Eddie. I’d killed enough men like him in my life, and had gotten away with it.

  Callum had no idea who he was up against.

  I was still on yard duty for work. I appreciated the time outside, but now I had another reason to be out there. One of my main jobs was mowing the grass, something that kept me fit as well.

  The next time I was on yard duty, I quickly checked that no one was looking and then leaned over the front of the machine and pulled the spark plug lead. The mower died instantly.

  “Hey,” I called out to C.O. Wyber. “The mower’s just died on me.”

  “Can’t you get it working again?”

  I just shrugged.

  “Fine. Take it over to electrical. See if they can do anything about it.”

  I nodded and dragged the mower toward the building which housed prisoners working in electrical. They were taught to fix pretty much anything in the building that had power going to it—toasters, washing machines, and, of course, the garden equipment, too.

  A number of men looked up as I walked in, hauling the mower with me. The doors were double wide to accommodate large items of machinery. I spotted the man I wanted.

  Shawn.

  The one responsible for killing Eddie.

  He glanced over the mower and spotted the problem right away. “It’s the spark plug lead. Are you totally fucking useless?”

  I shrugged. “It’s not my job. Can you give it a once over while I’m here? The blades have been jamming.”

  “Fine,” he snapped, tipping the mower onto its side and hunkering down next to it.

  I repressed a smile and left him to it.

  ***

  Two days passed until I got back out there again. The jail had a large number of recreation areas, so the job of cutting grass was never really done.

  After I finished mowing, I bent to the machine, making out as though I was clearing the grass cutting from the rest of the machinery. Instead, each day I worked, I used the end of a set of nail clippers, which I’d dismantled, to loosen the screws on the lawnmower’s throttle lever cover. I knew the time I had available to do this was barely a couple of seconds, just as the guards walked the length of the yard and turned left so their backs were to me. I wasn’t able to loosen the screws in one go. Instead, I came back, day after day, giving the screws a twist to the left each time, until it became looser and looser.

  A single twist one day, then another twist the next, and the next, and the day after that.

  My heart crawled into my throat as finally the cover fell away. Beneath the cover was a large tension spring—several inches in length. Working quickly, I unhooked the spring. The strong piece of metal was curved on one end, like a fishhook, and another inch of coiled wire made up the other end. I grabbed the spring, trying to hide what I was doing with my body, and rolled it into the waistband of my pants, before picking up the cover and jamming it back on with the screws. I felt sure someone would have seen me messing around with the mower, and I was poised for an alarm to sound and for the C.O.s to start yelling for me to get on the ground. But when the alarm sounded, it was only the same one that was used every day to signal the end of work duty.

  I straightened and made my way back toward the building. I felt like the piece of metal twisted into the waistband of my pants was huge and impossible not to notice, but as I walked toward the building, no one paid me any more attention than normal.

  I caught sight of Callum. He caught my eye and gave me one of his snide grins that made me want to knock all his teeth out. But I held myself back.

  The moment we were back at our bunk beds, I flipped the spring out of the waistband of my pants. Again, using my body to hide what I was doing, I quickly slipped the spring into a hole in the mattress which I’d already created in preparation for this moment. If anyone saw what I was doing, no one dared to say anything. I hoped the guards wouldn’t decide to have another shakedown any time soon. They’d searched the dorms only a couple of days ago, so I hoped I’d be safe. If I was found with such an item in my possession, it wouldn’t look good. I’d probably end up pinned down for Eddie’s murder as well, and I couldn’t afford for that to happen.

  While I wanted my revenge quickly, not only because I wanted Callum to pay, but also because I didn’t like having the spring in my mattress, I needed to bide my time. Things needed to be put into action if this was going to work, including straightening the fish hook end of the spring.

  I had a quiet word with Gil. I needed to get my hands on something else before I could carry out my plan. I traded smokes for what I needed. Gil gave me the nod and handed me a carton, an old juice box, but I knew there wasn’t juice inside.

  I deliberately waited in the bathroom, knowing Callum and his cronies would find me there.

  They walked in, and I hid the box behind my back, but not quickly enough, making sure they saw.

  “Hey, what have you got there?” Callum demanded.

  I scowled. “Nothing.”

  “Bullshit. Hand it over.”

  I glared at him. “Make me?”

  Pleasure swept across his face. “Haven’t you learned to keep your mouth shut and do what you’re told? I thought your friend Eddie would have taught that to you when his blood was running down the drain.”

  “Fuck you.”

  Callum gave the nod to Clark and Shawn. They rushed me, hitting me in the gut, making me double over and snatching the box from me
.

  Shawn took a sniff. “He’s got some hooch.”

  Callum laughed. “I never took you for much of a drinker.”

  I sucked in a breath; the punch had winded me. “I needed something to take the edge off.”

  “This shit is ours now.” He lifted the carton in a mock toast. “Thanks for the drink. Now get the fuck out of here.”

  I kept my head down, pressing the smile threatening to spread across my face between my lips, and left the bathroom. It would be lights out soon. I hoped the hooch would be strong enough to do the job.

  Back in my bunk, I heard the laughter of the others as they returned to their bunks. One of the C.O.s shouted something to them, but they didn’t take them seriously. With little access to alcohol in here, our tolerance levels were at an all-time low, the few mouthfuls affecting the men like several shots of liquor would have done on the outside. I hoped they wouldn’t end up saying or doing something in their inebriated state which would get them thrown into solitary. That would ruin everything.

  I lay in the dark and waited. I was good at waiting. My adrenaline levels were too high to risk me falling asleep. Before long, the dorm was filled with the usual sounds of men sleeping—rhythmical snores, grunts, someone muttering in their sleep. Still, I waited. I needed for everyone to be in the deepest point of their sleep cycle. I couldn’t risk anyone waking up and seeing me.

  The time had come.

  Moving as silently as possible and shielded by the cover of darkness, I slipped from my top bunk, lowering myself to the floor. My bunk mate rolled over in his sleep, and I froze, my breath held. He settled back down again and I allowed myself to breathe. Slowly and cautiously, I pushed my fingers through the slit I’d made in the mattress. My fingertips located cool metal. I’d known it had been there all along, had been able to feel the hardness pressing through the thin mattress, but I’d taken comfort in its presence. I pulled out the spring and quickly used the frame of the bunk bed and brute strength to straighten the curved end into a spike. I slipped the makeshift weapon up the sleeve of my shirt. If someone demanded to know what I had, I’d be screwed, but if someone thought I was just wandering around, they wouldn’t spot the spring.