She looked at Prosper for help. But to Gia’s disappointment, she found no help there.
“Gia, he’s right. You look like hell. Take a load off and sit for a few.”
“But what if we don’t get on the shuttle bus this time around? How long will we have to wait for the next one? I don’t want to lose my place in this whole process.” Gia looked around again at the large crowd. Aside from herding them all in like cattle, she really had no idea how the system worked.
The officer patiently explained, “The shuttles come every twenty minutes and you will be chosen in groups to get on. After you get off the bus, it’s more of the same. You’re just going to be sitting some more, standing some more and waiting some more. And honestly, ma’am, you don’t look like you’re up for it. I should be sending for the medic and a wagon to get you out of here. I know you don’t want that. What I am trying to do is give you another option, ma’am, but I’ve got hundreds of folks I need to move along. So, I’m done here. If you don’t sit and rest for a few minutes, then I’m going to deny your visit and put in that call to medical. Now, please, take a seat and I’ll make sure you’re the first one on the next round of shuttles.” Then the officer gave her a hard look, shoved a cold bottle of water into her hands and walked away.
Prosper looked relieved. “Gotta agree with the young fucker, Gia. You’re not gonna do Riker, yourself, or anybody else any damn good by getting sent back out. And trust me, that man meant what he said. Now, it’s already been a long ass day, hydrate yourself and take a load off. If we stay here, we’ll be in the front of the line.”
When Gia gave a slight nod of capitulation, Prosper led her to one of the hard metal chairs. Not the most comfortable of seating arrangements, but then nothing about this place screamed hearth and home. Gia leaned her head against the cool of the cement wall and looked again with awe at the throngs of people lined up. It seemed that visiting day at prison was an equal opportunity event. There were people from all walks of life in that line, all ages, all genders, all races. And every one of them had the same weary, age-old look that screamed disappointment at life. The air in the visitors’ center crackled with tension, defeat and barely controlled violence. Gia sipped on the icy water and tried not to think about it.
The officer kept his word and Gia was first on the next shuttle. Then she and Prosper waited in yet another line for the guards to unlock the imposing brick building in front of them. They had to show their identification cards again and remove their shoes again before going through yet another metal detector. Then to ensure the same person came out as went in, their hands were stamped in blacklight ink.
Finally, Gia and Prosper made it through the long, exhausting, labyrinth to the last holding room. Visitors milled about and waited—some sat in the plastic chairs, some bought snacks from the vending machine, some stared blankly at the cheap TV on the wall that blared mind-numbing daytime television. The space reminded Gia of a doctor’s office or the emergency room in a hospital—except that the inmates’ names were called instead of your own.
They were only allowed to go in one visitor at a time, and when Riker’s name was announced, Prosper went in first…
“Denied fuckin’ bail.” Prosper scrubbed a hand over his face. “I gotta tell you, I didn’t see that coming. Hell, I didn’t see any of this coming. And that, in and of itself, gives me a fucking headache.”
Riker leaned in across the metal table of the prison visiting room. “It was a set up. They knew I was coming—they were fucking waiting for me. And now they say that I’m a flight risk? Where the fuck do they think I’m gonna go? Cocksuckers. You’re keeping an eye on her, yeah?”
Prosper nodded. “Goes without saying, brother.”
“Nothing goes without saying when it comes to the safety of my kid and woman.” Riker’s body tensed, and he had to clench his hands together to stop himself from putting a fist through the wall. “Boss, this shit? We never had a bust of this fucking magnitude happen before. You know it and I know it. Someone is talking.”
Prosper’s mouth formed a hard line. He glanced over at the officer standing guard in the room and kept his voice low. “First goddamn Rooster turning on the club—now this. I hate to think that the authorities have ears on us through one of our own, but I’m not gonna be stupid about it either. I’m having all the chapters look into their recent recruits and patch- overs. I can’t believe that if we do have a rat that it’s a long term member, but I suppose at this rate anything is possible. Regardless, it’s just a matter of time before we find out who the fucker is before he can do any more damage. I’m calling in every marker we have out there in order to make that happen. You ain’t gonna do one more fucking day in here than you have to.”
“I’m facing a lot of time if shit goes wrong…” Riker began.
“Shit ain’t gonna go wrong.” Prosper interrupted with a snarl.
“I’m facing a lot of time if shit goes wrong.” Riker repeated. His eyes narrowed, and laser focused on Prosper. “I want Gia and the kid taken care of.”
“You think you got to ask that, brother?” Prosper frowned.
“Not just taken care of by the club. I want your word, boss. I want you to promise me that you’ll take her on as your personal responsibility. Get Gia and my baby the fuck out of here, send her to Italy or some other fucking place. I don’t want a woman tied to me when I got nothing to give but a couple of damn hours a week visitation. She deserves more, my kid deserves more. You understand me? Whatever the fuck it takes, I want her shed of the club, of me, and of this life. I offered her better and you’re gonna help me make sure she gets better.”
“And what if that ain’t what she wants?”
“Don’t matter. But on the same token, don’t think I’m giving up so fucking easy either. I plan to be out in time to watch my kid being born. With you and the brothers working overtime on the outside, I’m gonna be working every angle possible in here.”
Prosper nodded. “And you ain’t gonna be alone in that either. The club’s got you covered. We’re arranging for protection, you’ll be approached in a day…two at the most. You need anything in the meantime, brother?”
“Yeah, smokes, twinkies and stamps.”
“I’ll put money in the commissary before I leave.” Then Prosper looked at Riker carefully. “So, you ready now?”
“Ready as I’m ever gonna be.” Riker breathed out. And for the first time since the arrest, Prosper thought Riker looked scared.
“Might as well get it over with.” Riker steeled his spine and waited for Prosper to leave and for Gia to enter.
“James Devlin!” The guard yelled out for a second time. “Visitor number two!”
“Honey is that you?” The older lady sitting in the seat next to Gia, pointed to the white ticket in her lap. When Gia realized they had been calling for her, she raised her hand straight in the air.
“Here!” She yelled out.
It seemed like everyone in the large waiting room stopped what they were doing and stared at her.
“Sweetheart, I’m not taking attendance.” The guard called out while the room erupted into small titters of laughter.
“Just get in line.” The woman next to her nodded at the cue that was forming at the door.
“But the guy I am with went in and hasn’t come out yet. I don’t understand how this whole thing works.” Gia frowned.
“No big mystery.” The lady shrugged. “Think of it as a one way ticket.”
“What do you mean?” Gia looked at the woman with a horrified expression.
The woman cackled at Gia’s obvious confusion. “They don’t keep you here and lock you up with the prisoner, honey. I just mean there’s another maze on the way out, but not as bad as the one on the way in. After the visit, they’ll buzz you out again and swing you around to the place where you pick up your stuff. Then there will be a long line where the guards will check the ink on your hand with a black light. After that you just follow the exit door
s to the departing shuttle station. Hurry up now, girl, he ain’t gonna call again.”
Gia moved as quickly as she could towards the guard who buzzed her in to the next area. She was then ushered into a room that was filled with low tables and chairs that were bolted in to the ground. To her right, behind double paned glass, was what looked like a day care. It was filled with toys, mothers and their kids. Their fathers, who were wearing the state issued orange jumpsuits, sat on the floor with their children or held them on their laps.
Gia searched the room and saw Riker standing up next to one of the small tables. He was a big man in a room full of big men, but to Gia he seemed to tower above everyone and everything. Their eyes met, and she flashed Riker an uncertain smile that he did not return. As Gia moved towards him she searched his face for signs of stress, fatigue or worry. There was nothing but a hard mask in place. Any sign of the man she had begun to love—a man filled with tenderness, humor, and patience was gone.
“Riker?” Automatically she reached across the table for him. He tensed as the officer standing in the corner began to approach. “Pull your hand back, Gia. You can’t touch me.” He told her.
Then he scowled at the approaching officer and raised his hand. “I got this.”
The officer nodded and stepped back.
“Not at all? We can’t touch at all?” Gia asked him.
“We’re in a prison, Gia, not on a fucking date.” He all but snarled at her.
Gia gasped in shock. Eyes filled bright with tears as she looked at him. They stared at each other for a moment.
“Don’t you dare talk to me like that Riker Devlin. Don’t you dare!” She hissed at him. “In case you haven’t noticed my feet look like I’ve baked bread in my shoes, I have sweat stains underneath my armpits the size of crescent moons and I stink. I smell like a combination of unwashed bodies, tobacco and god- awful, cheap perfume because I have been pressed up against that in line for hours. My back’s on fire from standing and my ass is numb from sitting. So yeah, you can be damn sure I know that we are not on a fucking date.”
Riker’s eyes shifted and when he looked back at Gia the corners of his mouth lifted just slightly.
“Whole wheat or rye?” Riker’s eyes crinkled with amusement.
“What?” Gia looked at him with confusion.
“Your feet. You said you were baking bread.” He full out grinned at her now.
And what that grin did to his face was amazing. That smile transported Gia to another time, another place where it was just the two of them. The ugly orange jumpsuit faded away, the crowded room, the hard metal chairs blurred until it was just him and her. Riker naked, his strong body covering hers. Riker holding her close, Riker beside her, Riker on top of her—Riker inside of her. His mouth…that mouth… Gia’s eyes focused on his full lips and even white teeth. Then she bit her lip and let out a soft sigh of longing.
“Holy fuck, Gia, do not look at me like that.” Riker groaned.
It took every effort she had, but Gia forced herself to look away from that mouth. Then with steely determination she leaned in as close as she dared to Riker and whispered, “We have got to get you out of here.”
“Oh yeah? You got a plan?” Riker leaned in too and whispered back at her. Then, because she wanted to keep seeing that grin on his face, Gia said saucily, “How about if I divert that gnarly looking guard over there by pulling up my shirt and flashing him?”
She flushed magenta when the prisoner at the next table turned from his conversation, smiled broadly at Riker and gave Gia a thumbs up.
“Mind your own damn business, Spider.” Riker growled.
After that, the time seemed to go by at the speed of light. By silent agreement they worked hard to keep the tone light.
Much too soon, a guard came over and handed Gia back her card, a silent signal to the end of the visit.
“So…uh…see you next visitor’s day. If you’re still here that is, I bet you’re home before that, though. I bet you’re home really, really soon…then we can get the baby’s room ready together. But if it takes a little longer, that’s okay too. I’ll just drive in with Prosper every week until your release date…” Gia’s face grew hot as she heard herself babble. Saying goodbye was awkward, uncomfortable, and heartbreaking.
“Gia, no matter what happens, you won’t be coming back here.”
A cold dread filled her heart.
“Yes, I will.”
“No.” He shook his head. “You won’t.”
“I’ll see you next week.” She moved away from him to end the conversation.
He grabbed her arm.
“Hands off!” The guard bellowed from the corner.
“Gia, I won’t put your name on the visiting list again.”
“Don’t do this to me.” She pleaded.
“Baby, I’m doing this for you.” Riker told her. Then he added with reassurance, “but like you said, I’ll probably be home in a few days anyway.”
“Okay. Okay.” Gia nodded in agreement, determined not to have this visit end in angry words. They could revisit the visitation issue at another time— if they had to.
“In the meantime, is there anything I can do?”
“Just take good care of yourself and our baby.”
Gia nodded wordlessly, she didn’t trust herself to speak.
“Inmates, line up!” The correctional officer bellowed out to the room.
Then, while their loved ones looked on, the men in the neon jumpsuits were all shackled together like cattle to slaughter. Then they were led out into hallways of cold, hard concrete and thick steel bars.
Much, much later, a totally exhausted and emotionally overwrought Gia crawled into bed. How could she be this tired and still unable to sleep? Her mind kept racing with thoughts of the day— like flashes of explosive light, the images drained her and sent shockwaves through her system.
Over the years Gia had wondered if her mother and father had done her justice not ever bringing her to see her father behind prison walls—she had wondered if those visits would have somehow filled a void in her. But now those unresolved questions were answered. In many ways going to see Riker today had shed light on a multitude of things. Things that Gia hadn’t known, and could not have known, if she hadn’t experienced the day for herself. For one thing, she hadn’t known that the visit would be a whole day’s journey into the scary and unknown, or that it would leave her so emotionally and physically drained.
As Gia tossed and turned, she thought of the throngs of people she had seen at the prison that day. They had numbered in the hundreds and had waited in line for hours just to get a chance to spend a few precious moments with their loved ones.
Loved ones.
Those two words hit Gia like a sledge hammer to her heart and had her sitting up in bed.
Was it possible that in the past few months that that imperfect, tarnished, rough man had crept under her skin and wrapped his strong fingers around her heart?
Was it possible that a relationship that had started out as compromise and necessity, had become something else entirely?
Was it possible that against all odds and despite some serious intent to the contrary, Gia had fallen for Riker?
The thought took her breath away and caused a momentary spark of panic. Gia’s day to day had never been exactly predictable, but this? This was beyond the pale.
Gia loved Riker.
Every tough, inked, stubborn inch of him.
How unfair it was, that this realization had to come to her now—with Riker facing possibly years of imprisonment.
Well, Gia was just not going to let that happen.
Although, she rarely capitalized on it, Gia’s name afforded her a great deal of power and privilege. If she had to cash in on that, she would.
Gia was going to see Riker freed from prison.
No matter what.
Riker crossed another day off on his Wonders of the World calendar– the only calendar sold in the prison co
mmissary. He laughed at the irony of it– selling pictures of fascinating places around the world to prison inmates. The guy who managed the ordering must have one hell of a twisted and sadistic sense of humor.
Ninety days in – might as well be a fucking lifetime.
It was hard to be locked up. Much harder than Riker ever dreamed it would be. But the club had come through as promised, and that helped. A lot. It meant that he didn’t have to watch his back in the shower, or in the mess hall or in the mean corridors of this rat hole because he had a crew doing that for him. There was about a half dozen Aces serving time on Riker’s block and they let him know they had his six.
Steve Q ran the crew. He had the ripped, strong body of a line-backer. And in fact, before he had the bad break of catching his first charge, Q had been put on the roster as a walk-on for the Detroit Lions. A smooth character with a serious thing for anything Motown, he was also down in a big way with Detroit slang. Amadoo meant I’m going to do, his greeting for everyone was what’s up Doe, and he referred to anyone in corrections as the popo.
Q was serving five to ten for an assault with a deadly weapon…that deadly weapon being his own steel- toed boot. He had beat the crap out of some shithead in a bar fight. Unfortunately, that shithead happened to be the son of a senator.
Q’s second in charge was Two Time Tommy. Tommy was loud, boisterous and always up for a good laugh. He was serving twenty years on a conspiracy charge. He had black, slicked-back hair, a goatee, and a snake tattoo that rose up from his belly-button, wrapped around his torso and ended at the bottom of his left ear lobe. Two Time Tommy said everything twice…how ya doin’, how ya doin’, I’m gonna go workout, go workout…like that. He was funnier than hell, and always up for a laugh. Even though Two cheated like hell at cards, Riker liked him a lot.
Riker started pushing iron with these boys. The weight yard was pretty much spent, but it did the trick. The equipment consisted of some seriously heavy barbells and plates, benches and racks and some dumbbells. The iron on the weights was rusted, cracked, and chipped. The benches were wobbly, and the bars were bent, but the mat was real leather and except for a few long cracks here and there, it was in pretty good shape. Best of all, the whole thing was covered with a fiberglass awning that was stretched tight to keep the weather out. Riker, TT and Steve Q worked out every day, in rain or shine.
Raising Riker (Hells Saints MC) Page 12
