East of the Sun

by Trey R. Barker

  His eyes narrowed. “Uh huh. Well . . . go get that bust.” He handed each woman a business card. “You guys call, you need me.”

  “Thanks . . . uh . . . Captain.”

  He grinned. “I ain’t no captain; I work for a living. Few more weeks, anyway.”

  “Thanks, Simon.”

  “I gotta tell you, I’m intrigued by the tattoo.” For a long, discomforting moment, his gaze was heavy on the base of Jace’s throat. “Half a heart? When my daughter was a junior in high school, she and her boyfriend both had a necklace with half a heart. Put ’em together and all was right with the world.” He winked. “Got a high-school boyfriend?”

  Self-consciously, she covered the tattoo with her hand. “I’d probably remember.”

  He shook hands with them. “Sucks ass to work on Christmas, but at least you get time and a half. Have a good one.”

  When he was gone, Kleopping shoved his cell phone in his pocket. “No tour tonight.”

  “What’s up?” Jimmson sat against the wall, eyes closed.

  “Well, before tonight’s tour, Dr. Ernesto R. Cruz apparently took the visiting administrators out.”

  “Shouldn’t’a had a tour on Christmas Eve anyway,” Laimo said.

  Kleopping shrugged. “Holidays do not wait on millions of dollars. Some sort of deadline for paperwork and blah blah blah.”

  Jimmson looked at his fingernails. “Sort of funny to think of our little jail doctor spreading all over the state—”

  “Like a fungus,” Laimo said.

  “—snatching up new jails.”

  “Anyway,” Kleopping said. “No tour because I guess they got—”

  “Rolled by hookers?” Rory said.

  “Drunk, Deputy. So no tour, which is fine with me. Probably tomorrow.”

  Rory rolled her eyes. “Guess they should’a come before they got—”

  “Rolled,” Jace said.

  “Drunk.” Rory gave Jace a half-smirk. “All those administrators from all over the state drive me batty.”

  Laimo snorted. “Short-ass drive.”

  “Shorter than your ’stache, anyway.”

  “Let’s keep it professional.” Kleopping stared hard at everyone.

  “Hey, Corporal.” Rory winked. “Aces, that’s us. The most professional shift at Zachary County. Top-shelf professional all the time.”

  Jimmson laughed. “Going to Hell for lying, Bogan.”

  “Not just administrators and sheriffs, either,” Kleopping said. “Lt. Beem told me there’s been a Mexican cop in here a couple of times.”

  “A federale.” Rory whistled. “I guess Dr. Cruz is going big time.”

  “Wouldn’t mind seeing a Mexican badge,” Jimmson said.

  Rory giggled. “Badges? We don’t need no stinking badges.”

  “That’s not how the quote goes, idiot,” Laimo said.

  “Kiss my—”

  —so . . . how many cops does it take to throw a suspect down the stairs? None. He fell, I swear, Your Honor, he just fell—

  This time, the laughs were subdued even as they slipped out like cracked mortar from between bricks.

  “Day late and a dollar short,” Rory said.

  “Short of actual comedy.”

  “Holy balls.” Rory’s eyes grew wide. “Two jokes? Not just one but two? In one night?” She went to Jace’s side, tilted her head back and stared into her eyes. “Who are you and what have you done with Deputy Jace Salome? And don’t lie to me because you work here and I’ll find out who you are.”

  A moment later, Sgt. Dillon’s voice came over the radio. “Officer Urrea, that’s the funniest one yet. Why don’t you come to my office and tell me where you got it?”

  —uh . . . no, thanks, sir . . . I’m pretty busy here—

  —control room . . . M-medical outer—

  Everyone listened. There was no thump of the door being opened.

  —M-medical outer—

  Still, the lock was silent.

  “Conroy.” Kleopping barked into his radio. “Medical outer. Now.”

  “Can’t wait for Bibb to roll his big ass back in.” Rory sighed.

  A moment later, everyone heard the outer door open. There was a pause and then the officer, the same guard who’d come out of B Pod minutes earlier, asked for the inner medical door.

  Laimo snorted. “Prisoner’s lying. Wants his fix or a cushy bed.”

  “They don’t all lie, Laimo.” Jace spoke through a mouthful of annoyance.

  “Yeah, they do. You’ll figure it out if you last long enough.”

  Rory whistled. “She’ll last longer than you. I got ten bucks says so.”

  “That’s all? Better stop spending your quarters on Skittles; gonna leave you toothless and broke.”

  Rory stood, hands clenched to fists, chest squared, feet planted.

  “Rory.” Jace touched her hand.

  “Tougher than you when I’m sleeping,” Laimo said.

  “I am asleep,” Jace said. “Can’t we get even one arrest?”

  It was a lie. Jace hadn’t slept worth a crap since her beating, though the nights had gotten better lately. She usually managed some sleep, though it was inevitably interrupted by broken images; dreams of a small house up on cinder blocks, windows broken and doors hanging from destroyed hinges, walls with holes, and stains of brown paint everywhere. Bright orange sun, a morning sun, blasted through the windows and tattered curtains and she knew, with dead certain dream-knowledge, that those windows faced west.

  She woke from that dream, every time, with cotton in her mouth, her skin soaked in sweat, a barely remembered jazz tune that Mama danced to in her head, and all she wanted was to shove the dream away and burrow deeper under the comforter.

  “Jace?” Rory’s voice was hushed. “You okay?”

  Jace shook her head clear of the dust storms. “Right as the rain.”

  “Ain’t rained in like . . . I don’t know . . . a year. News keeps talking about the drought? Ringing any bells?”

  The silence, unnerving as cold steel against a throat, fell again. Kleopping gently banged his head against the wall while Laimo scraped old polish from her nails. At the far end, a new guy, assigned badge 410, went back to his car magazine. Another new guy, badge number 429, scribbled madly in a small notebook. Another officer came through the sally-port door, stubbing out a cigarette butt while he hummed some twangy country song.

  And still the clock never moved.

  “. . . need my meds . . .” The voice was muffled but angry and it came from the medical pod, just on the other side of one of the many sets of doors that dotted the booking hallway.

  “Told you.” Laimo looked up from her nail polish and smirked. “Looking for meds.”

  “Bite my ass.” Rory blew her a kiss.

  “. . . that ain’t right . . . it ain’t fucking right . . . I need my meds; my doctor prescribed them.” The same voice, still muffled as though from some great distance, but angrier now, loaded with menace and righteousness.

  Jace glanced nervously at the medical-pod door.

  “Calm down.” Rory tapped Jace’s foot with her own.

  “Yeah, yeah. It’s nothing. I’m fine.”

  “Well, you ain’t fine, but you’re right, it’s nothing. An inmate upset he can’t get some aspirin or something.” Rory didn’t even bother looking toward medical and Jace had no idea if her friend was actually unconcerned or simply trying to appear unconcerned.

  “You wanna see me dead? ’Cause that’s what’ll happen. I need my ’script.”

  The voice was sharper now. What was missing from the conversation was the guard’s response. Jace knew, from both the academy and the few months she’d already put in, the guard would be talking slowly and calmly. Probably his hands were up, palms out, trying to ease the inmate’s agitation.

  Rory kept her eyes on the computer screen. “Nothing going on you need to worry about. Just another agitated inmate. You’ve seen it lots of times, worm, nothing new.
It’ll be fine.”

  “Why do you keep saying that?” It came out sharper than Jace expected.

  “Because you’re getting scared.”

  “It’s going to come to blows in there.”

  “Maybe, but it’s not your fight. You don’t have to worry about it. And even if it does, it’ll never end like Thomas.”

  “Do not say it won’t happen again. Do not.”

  “Jace, listen to me.” Rory grabbed her friend’s head and turned it until they were face to face. “An inmate will not be killed in this jail on this night.”

  “You can’t promise that.”

  Rory sighed. “You’re right, I can’t. But I believe it. How’s that?”

  —zebra 2! zebra 2!—

  “Son of a bitch.” Jace’s heart dropped into her stomach and she felt it all at once: the adrenaline, the fear, the anger, the sudden certainty she’d chosen the wrong profession. She stood, sweat exploding on her skin and her heart revving in her chest like Art Blakey pissed off and drumming to save his life.

  “Sit down.” Rory said it as a command.

  The facility-wide alarm exploded, its blast as piercing as an ice pick to the eardrum.

  “Let’s go.” Kleopping’s emergency-response team members were already moving, their faces stone. He opened the armory closet and deputies moved in and out, jaws tight, getting their equipment.

  Jace whispered, “This guy is gonna get killed.”

  “Jace, it’s not—”

  “It is just like Thomas, damn it, and Stimson and Rissley and all the rest.”

  When Rory slapped her, a rocket went off in her head and blew out the screaming alarm. “Sit down and take a breath, sister.” But even as she ordered it, Rory stood. Her face was flushed. Rory gently cupped Jace’s chin. “Don’t sweat it, worm.”

  “I am not a worm anymore.”

  “My mistake.” She indicated the booking computers, the fingerprinting machines. “You’re intake tonight. That fight isn’t your gig.”

  “But—”

  “Not. Your. Gig.”

  —zebra 2 . . . zebra 2—

  Jace’s mouth dried at the sound of the officer’s voice. The deputy, whoever he was, wasn’t bored anymore; he was scared to death. Zebra 2 was the internal call for the ERTs.

  “Kill the alarm,” Kleopping said into his radio.

  —get me some help—

  The guard’s voice rose into hysteria.

  —get me some help goddamn it—

  —he’s killing me. Goddamn it help me—

  Kleopping keyed his radio and barked, “Where are they, Conroy?”

  Jace could imagine Conroy’s eyes sweeping the multitude of monitor screens mounted on the wall of the control room. Every pod, every holding cell, almost every inch of the jail was covered by a camera.

  —uh . . . medical . . . yeah—

  “You sure?”

  —yeah, uh, I’m . . . I’m sure. Medical—

  One of the ERTs tossed a hard look at Kleopping. The corporal shook his head.

  —all call from control: lockdown. Lockdown until further notice—

  Louder. Jace remembered the chaos louder. Her memory, always a tricky thing, told her it had been louder when she’d been on the floor beneath an ERT shield. Yells and shouts and confusion. The noise of emergencies. Tonight, from this side of the doors and experience, the sound seemed dull and almost bored.

  “Kill the alarm!”

  Her cheek flared where the shield had jammed her to the floor a few months ago. Her bladder ached at the memory of pissing herself.

  The radio exploded.

  —A Pod locked—

  —B Pod locked, one inmate in medical—

  “For God’s sake be—” careful, Jace tried to say.

  “Shut the fuck up, worm.” When Laimo banged the bottom of her ballistic shield on the concrete, the sound cracked like a whip. “Can’t hear squat with you bawling like a titty baby.”

  Tight-faced, Kleopping looked at Jace and put his finger over his lips. She felt like a complete idiot.

  —we’re locked in D Pod—

  —kitchen is locked—

  Kleopping slammed the armory door. Then he put himself at the front of the ERTs and led them to the medical door.

  With a spit of anger, he keyed his mic. “Damn it, Conroy, shut off the alarm. I’m not going to tell you again.” Starting with Kleopping and moving down the line, his crew bumped fists. Then Kleopping took a deep breath. “Medical war.”

  The lock popped, a sound both jarring and comforting, and then everything was over. The ERTs were gone. The alarm died. The M-Pod war door slammed shut. The radio went quiet and the sudden slam of silence drove a stiletto blade into Jace’s brain.

  CHAPTER 2

  “The hell is this, then?” The howl was made worse because it was muffled. “Takes six of you bastards to beat me down? Doctors selling drugs to johnnies and you let that go but you gotta come for me?”

  None of the ERTs answered, per their training. Dead silence, which had been one of the things that unnerved Jace the most when they burst into the pod after Thomas’s death.

  “Hah! Gonna take more than that!”

  Boots pounded against the concrete floor and shields banged. Something shattered on the floor.

  “It ain’t right. It ain’t fair. It ain’t—”

  Sudden silence. Nothing from the inmate, nothing from the ERTs.

  Jace, her breath shallow and frightened, looked at Rory. The woman was transfixed by the medical-pod war door. Her fingers held the desk’s edge so tightly they were as pale and colorless as wax. It’s what she wants. Jace swallowed. Not necessarily the violence, but certainly the blasting heart and hyperawareness, the sense of being alive, that comes with the adrenaline dump. Rory wanted to get in there and do whatever needed doing, for keeping control of the jail, but also for the electricity of the physicality.

  —control room from 419—

  —419 go ahead—

  —situation secure. Repeat. Situation secure. Cancel zebra 2–

  Jace hadn’t realized she wasn’t breathing until she started again. Situation secure meant everything was fine, just as Rory had said. They weren’t calling for an ambulance or the JP. Nor were they calling for the detectives or the Texas Rangers to come investigate an in-custody death.

  —all call from control: cancel zebra 2. Repeat . . . cancel zebra 2—

  “It’s fine.” Jace was fully aware she was whispering. “Everything’s fine.”

  Rory squeezed her hand. “Told you.”

  Jace laughed, slightly embarrassed. “Yeah, you did. That’s why you’re the veteran and I’m the worm.”

  A few minutes later, the door leading to the medical pod popped open and the ERTs came through, babbling and laughing and retelling the call they’d just been through. Jace recognized the banter as the aftermath of the adrenaline high. She’d felt it herself a few times. It was the last bit of nervous energy that had no place to go.

  “You see that guy’s eyes?” Jimmson grinned. “Big as truck tires.”

  Laimo threw Jace a hard eye. “No jailers to arrest tonight, worm. No cops to tear down so I guess we don’t need you.”

  “Shut the hell up.”

  “Insubordination, worm. Be careful who you mouthing off to.” Laimo’s eyes brightened. “Son of a bitch was scared outta his mind, wasn’t he?” Her laugh smeared her face the color of radishes.

  “That’s funny to you?” Jace stood, but Rory’s hand, deftly on the back of Jace’s belt, held her.

  Laimo snorted out another laugh. “Ease off, worm. Ain’t no big thing.”

  “A bit of schadenfreude to make your world better?”

  Laimo frowned. “The hell are you talking about?”

  Jace’s hands clenched. “An ego so big and world so small that you stand on the shoulders of whoever you’ve shoved into the shit?”

  “It was the guy from B Pod. Scared so badly he pissed himself,” B
adge 429 said.

  “Yeah, did you get a load of the smell?” Laimo gagged as she kept laughing. “God awful.”

  “Now it’s people pissing themselves that’s funny to you.”

  When Jace stepped from behind the computer desks and squared off, Laimo drew up to her full height, a couple inches shy of six foot. She spoke slowly and leaned into Jace’s face. “Just as funny as when you pissed yourself.”

  Jace cocked her right arm.

  “Do it, worm, and let’s see where the cookie crumbles.”

  Rory grabbed Jace’s hand and held it tight. Jace yanked but Rory held on. “Not tonight.”

  After a minute of tugging, Jace stopped. She sneered at Laimo’s ballistic shield and baton. “Easier to laugh when you’re the Man, isn’t it?”

  “Kiss my ass, you self-righteous bitch. You don’t know anything about being police.” Laimo’s eyes rolled down to Jace’s boots and back up. “Ain’t even got no real uniform.”

  Jace wore the hunter green and tan of the Zachary County sheriff’s office. Laimo, and every other member of the ERT, wore black.

  “You just a worm, Salome, and you ain’t done nothing.”

  “She’s got a few dents, Laimo.” Rory pulled Jace back. “She’s a hard rookie.”

  “She’s crap.” Laimo glared at Jace. “Sucking off a ranger and double-dealing behind our backs. Didn’t any of us get arrested until she came along. Badgett was doing righteous work.” Laimo spat on Jace’s boots. “She ain’t one of us, Rory, and long as you with her, you ain’t one of us, either.”

  “Righteous?” Jace grabbed the woman’s collar and drew back her fist. This time Rory didn’t stop her. “He was killing inmates for their land, you bitch.”

  “Deputy.” Kleopping’s voice snapped through the air. “Release your fellow officer.”

  No one moved.

  “Now.”

  Grinding her teeth, Jace let go. Smoothing her uniform, Laimo chuckled as she walked away.

  “Whatever this is will not happen in my booking hallway. You want to beat each other silly, do it outside. But remember this, whoever’s standing at the end—and I suspect it’d be Jace—gets the write up and the suspension.”

  Laimo spun toward Kleopping, anger on her lips.

  “Got something to say, Deputy?”