by Susanne Beck
I put my head in my hands, my sigh fogging up what little varnish was left on the elderly table. "This is just so bizarre."
"Ready for the kicker?"
I lifted up my head to meet her eyes. "Yeah. Might as well."
"A member of your jury, its foreman, in fact, was a man by the name of Robert Cort."
"I’m sorry, that name doesn’t ring any bells."
"I didn’t think it would. My investigator went to some of the bars your husband used to hang out in and found that this same man was one of Peter’s drinking buddies."
"Please tell me you’re joking, Donita."
"Nope. And that’s a good thing. You see, when my investigator talked to some of the bar’s other patrons, he was told that on the night after Peter’s murder, Robert swore that he was going to find a way to get on your jury and, quote ‘convict that bitch’ unquote."
"He what?!"
"That’s what the witnesses say. We’ve got sworn statements from four of them. We don’t yet know how he managed to get into the pool of potential jurors, but when we pulled out his sheet, we found out he lied quite convincingly to get in."
"Jesus Christ."
"It gets worse. When we polled the jurors, the only two women on the panel had been convinced of your innocence when they went in for deliberations. They both stated to me, personally, that they were intimidated into changing their votes by the foreman, Robert Cort."
The sound of my hand slamming down on the table was loud in the small room. "Then why didn’t they ever tell anybody?"
Donita’s chocolate eyes were compassionate. "They said they were scared to come forward. So they didn’t."
"Why are they talking now?" I couldn’t help it. My voice was filled with the bitterness in my heart.
"They’ve both been eaten away with guilt over it, Angel. They’ve both given us sworn statements as to what happened and are both willing and ready to testify at a new trial. They know they’ve made a mistake, but they’re willing to try and rectify it."
"Don’t they care that their mistake cost me four years of my life?!?" Tears, scalding and bitter as my words, flooded my eyes and streamed down my cheeks, wetting the table beneath me in a flood of anger.
Donita came around the table and put an arm around my shoulder. Her skin was soft and warm. The light scent of her perfume soothed me even as my mind was a whirling torrent of delayed grief. During the entire four-plus years I’d been a resident of the Bog, I’d never indulged in self-pity over the events that caused me to be here.
But the knowledge that my freedom had been taken away by a combination of an incompetent lawyer, a failed protection system, a bully and two timid women brought all home to me. I couldn’t stop my sobs as I thought of what might have been.
A guard, who was keeping tabs on us through the reinforced glass window set into one wall, entered the visitor’s room with a box of tissues which she slid across the table. Donita thanked her pleasantly and the guard nodded, then left. I knew my crying spell would hit the grapevine in less time than it took to write out this sentence.
A dark arm threaded its way through our embrace, handing me a tissue. I swiped my eyes with it, then leaned back and emptied my sinuses, feeling the pressure in my head ease slightly. I felt exhausted. "Sorry about that," I mumbled.
Donita smiled at me. "No need to be sorry. If it had been me, I’d probably have torn this room to shambles." She looked around. "Though to tell you the truth, that might have improved things."
That surprised a laugh out of me and she grinned back, handing me another tissue and discarding the used one in an overflowing wastebasket near the table. I took in a long, shuddering breath, then let it out slowly. "So," I said, tracing my tears on the table, "where do we go from here?"
"Well, I’ve talked to the DA about dismissing the conviction altogether. But he’s a hard-line butt-hole who wears his church pin on his lapel. He won’t budge. Convinced they still have a case against you. So . . . I’ve set up a date to talk to one of the appellate judges in the district. It’s in two weeks. I’ll present this new evidence and see what he says."
"What do you think he’ll say?"
"He’d be crazy not to overturn the conviction, Angel. This evidence is damning. Especially the jury tampering. The DA won’t let it go, though. So even if the judge does decide to do what’s right and overturn your conviction and sentence, the State will demand a new trial." She laid a hand on my wrist. "What do you think about that? Do you think you can go through that again?"
I looked directly at her, knowing my eyes were intense. "Donita, to get my name cleared of this mess, I’d walk through Hell itself." I looked down at the table again. "It didn’t much matter before. Peter was dead. I did it. I thought I deserved punishment. But this . . .this travesty has changed my whole way of thinking."
Donita smiled. "Ice was right about you."
"She was?"
"Yup. She said you were a fighter with the heart of a lion."
I felt my eyes go wide. "Ice said that? About me?"
"Sure did. That’s why I agreed to come in and talk to you in the first place. Ice doesn’t give out compliments easily you know." Her warm hand squeezed my wrist. "She has a lot of faith in you, Angel. And, she loves you very deeply."
I could feel my blush burn my neck, cheeks and ears as it spread over my face. I ducked my head again. "I love her very much, too."
"I know."
I traced the moisture on the table again. "I’m . . .um . . .sorry, . . .Donita."
"Sorry? For what, Angel?"
My blush deepened. I damned myself for my fair skin. "Ice . . .um . . .told me about . . .um . . . ."
"She told you we were lovers in the past?"
"Yeah. That’d be it."
"And it bothers you because the two of you are together now and I’m here to see it?"
"Yes." If I could have sunk my chair through the ground right then, I would have done it.
Her hand reached out and cupped my chin, bringing our gazes level. "Angel, never apologize for being happy. And never apologize for making Ice happy."
"But . . . ."
"No buts, Angel. Ice is a very important person in my life. To see her as happy as she is makes me very happy. It wasn’t meant to be for Ice and I. We both knew that while we were together." She smiled. "Still, in a way, we were a good match. She took great pains to keep her personal life a secret from everyone, including me. Though it shouldn’t have been a surprise to find out what I did about her with her arrest, it did. Of course, we never lived together and were never in one another’s presence for long stretches of time. Still, I felt a bit guilt-ridden that I missed some kind of sign I should have seen. And, of course, I was very angry."
"I can understand that. I would have been as well."
She spread her hands. "And when she wouldn’t let me defend her, well . . . ." She sighed. "It almost ended our friendship." Then she smiled. "I’m glad it didn’t. And I’m also glad that it gave me a chance to meet you. You’re a good soul, Angel. And there are damn few of those around anymore. So stop worrying and, for God’s sake, stop blushing. Everything’s fine from that angle, alright?"
Reading the absolute sincerity in her eyes, I nodded. "Thanks."
Donita tipped me a wink. "Not a problem, Angel. Not a problem at all."
Moving away from me, she went around to the other side of the table, stuffed my file into her expensive leather briefcase, and latched it shut before pulling it off the table by the handle. "I’ll talk to you in a couple of weeks, if not before, alright? Just try to take it easy and relax. Let me do the worrying for the both of us."
I gave her a half smile, the best I could offer. "I’ll try my best."
"You do that. Bye for now."
With a final smile and a wave, she was gone, leaving me alone in the visitors’ room with only my tears and my thoughts for company.
* * *
I pulled what we all referred to as "an Ice" and hid out i
n my cell after finally dragging my exhausted butt from the visitors’ room. For some reason, the tears, of frustration, of anger, of grief, just didn’t seem to want to stop falling.
Critter came up to talk, but I remained sullen and uncommunicative, and she finally gave up in frustration, leaving me to my enforced solitude.
I must have fallen into a doze of mental exhaustion, because the next thing I knew, my eyes opened to see Ice standing just inside my cell, concern seemingly emanating from her every pore. "You okay?"
I managed a weak smile. "I’ve been better."
"Wanna talk about it?" she asked from her position by the door.
And suddenly, I did.
Seeing my expression, she closed the distance in a quick stride and lowered herself onto the bed, gathering me into a hug that went a long way toward taking a great deal of my pain away. I pressed my head against her chest and let the tears fall again. Only this time, they seemed to be tears of healing rather than pain.
Ice rocked me gently within her embrace, seeming to know what kind of tears these were. Normally, the sight of my crying distressed her greatly. Now, however, she silently waited out the minor storm, content only to be there for me. It was a quiet strength I relied on more than words could ever articulate.
After several moments, I finally pulled away, wiping my messy face with the back of my sleeve. Then, after a few, deep, hitching breaths, I blurted out the whole tale, leaving nothing out.
Ice’s expression became thundery, but I didn’t fear it, knowing her anger was directed against those who had harmed me and not at me, myself. She growled in frustration, her fists clenched uselessly against an enemy she knew I would have to handle myself.
"Of course, the good side to all this," I began, gently taking one of her fisted hands and relaxing it into my own, "is that this goes a long way toward assuring me a new trial. This kind of evidence is something that you can’t just ignore."
She grunted in agreement.
As I sat there, contemplating my words, the one thought I’d heretofore successfully kept at the very back of my mind demanded to make its presence known. I willed the tears away, but when I turned to look up at Ice, my words were stilled by a finger to my lips.
"Don’t," she said, her voice low.
"Don’t what?" I murmured around her finger.
"Don’t say it. Don’t even think it."
"How do you know what I’m thinking?"
"Because I can tell by the expression on your face. You’re wondering if you should fight for this opportunity, because if you’re successful, and you will be, that means that you’ll leave here. And you don’t know if you want to do that because of what we have." Her eyes bit into mine, her eyebrow arched, daring me to contradict her.
I couldn’t. I blinked, then looked away, flushing guiltily. "You’re right," I whispered.
"I know I am. I know you and how you think. And I also know that I’m not going to let you give up this chance for me."
"Not even for us?"
Smiling, she cupped my chin. "Angel, there will always be ‘us’. In here, out there, it doesn’t matter. You’re a part of me, and you always will be, no matter where you are."
I sighed, knowing she was right but still wanting to fight the issue. Trouble was, I didn’t have any good ammunition to argue with.
"Angel, you’ve spent the last four years here trying to get me to see inside myself. You’ve tried to get me to see that guilt shouldn’t rule my actions. That’s a hard lesson to learn, and it won’t be made any easier if you decide to give up your fight for freedom."
"I don’t understand."
"Don’t you? If you give up this fight for what’s right, this fight for freedom, because of me . . . ."
She didn’t need to finish her sentence. The meaning was all too clear. Though it would be my own decision whether to stay or fight, if I decided to do the former, she would always feel the guilt of that action.
"So . . .I guess that means you want me to go for it, huh?"
"Damn right I want you to go for it, Angel. This is your ticket out of this shit-hole. Run with it and don’t look back."
After a moment, I gave her a watery smile and thudded my head against her collar-bone. "Alright, coach."
We settled into a comfortable silence that the growling of my abused stomach chose to interrupt. I blushed again as Ice patted it. "Let’s go down and feed this monster before the cafeteria closes and you keep all the inmates up tonight with those weird growling noises."
Lazily back handing her on the arm, I allowed her to pull me to my feet. In step, our hips brushing casually against one another, we walked down to the cafeteria to attempt to consume God only knew what.
PART 14
THE NEXT FEW weeks went by in a blur that was full of disappointing news. Donita called twice to tell me, each time, that the judge she was scheduled to speak with had other cases that had priority over mine. It was difficult, this ‘hurry up and wait’ roller coaster ride of emotions I was going through. One minute I was up, ready to take on the world. The next, I was swimming in a sea of depression, shunning everyone. Everyone, even Ice, started to treat me with kid gloves.
As if feeding off my swirling emotions, the prison natives also began to get restless. There was a feeling of increasing tension within the Bog; a tension so thick that even I, who was deep in a morass of my very own, could feel it. It was almost like the time before the riots, when the stress was so thick, you could snip at it with dull scissors if you had a mind to.
Ice was putting in inordinately long hours at the auto shop, going down each day after morning head count and not returning to her cell until shortly before lights out. Apparently, Morrison had struck paydirt in his stolen car racket and was using Ice’s special skills to the limit. What little spare time she had, she seemed to want to spend alone, or, almost grudgingly, it seemed, with me from time to time over those long weeks. There was something deeper going on with her. But, my mind tied up with my own troubles, I didn’t take the time to dig deep enough.
Given the events that transpired only a short time later, everything in me wishes that I could just turn back the clock and do it all again, the right way.
One evening, after shutting down the library, I walked down the silent, dim hallway toward the main square, my thoughts awhirl with turbulent emotions. More than anything, though, I wanted to see Ice and resolved to head up to her cell before I did anything else.
As if by magic, an arm captured me and pulled me into yet another of the doorways that stood silently in the long hallway. My hormones surged and a smile split my lips before the chilling feel of metal pressed up against my neck froze my blood in its veins.
"Hello, little whore," a sing-song voice sounded very close to my ear, "didja miss me?"
Psycho!!, my mind screamed as I tried desperately to control my breathing. Keep calm, Angel. You can figure a way out of this. Just keep calm and don’t react to anything she says until you can use it to your advantage. The words of Montana and Critter and Ice played through my mind in a soothing mantra, calming my heart-rate slightly. "What do you want, Cassandra."
A tinkling laugh sounded behind me. "And here I thought you had all the brains in the relationship, tramp. Isn’t it obvious what I want?"
"Can you just . . .explain it to me? So I know for sure?" I tried to sound as vacant and pitiful as I could, knowing that sometimes that worked on people like Cassandra.
I could feel my plan working when her sigh brushed against the short hair framing my ear. Her grip twisted on the knife just the slightest bit and I readied myself for action. "Oh, alright," she said in a tone reserved for teaching the profoundly mentally disabled. "It’s simple, really. You cuckolded Ice away from me, and so you must die. Is that easy enough for you to understand?"
"Yes, I think I’ve got it now."
"Do you? Good." I could feel her smile against the skin of my cheek as she brought her head down next to mine. "Any last requests?"
"Just one."
"Yes?"
Stamping down on her foot as hard as I could, I brought my hands up hard, fingers stiffened to thrust between her arm and my neck. Prying her away, I brought her arm down with all my strength. "Get your damn knife the hell away from my neck!!"
I could tell she was surprised, because the maneuver, never practiced against a real opponent intent on severing my head from my shoulders, worked perfectly. After a split-second, though, I could feel her start to respond, stabilizing her grip on the knife and turning its lethal edge inward.
There was the muted sound of cloth parting and then I felt a warm trickle run down my left thigh. Though I couldn’t feel anything, I knew I’d been cut. Looking down, I saw the orange of my jumpsuit quickly darken to a rust as my blood seeped from the slice in my flesh.
Determined not to give her another chance, I brought my other hand down on her wrist, twisting for all I was worth. We both grunted. The knife came free, spinning through the small room where I had been taken.
Her reflexes cat-quick, Cassandra dove for the knife right as it skittered across the cement floor. I was just a half step behind her. As she grabbed the knife, my foot came down once again, this time trapping both weapon and flesh beneath my shoe.
During the rush for the knife, the door slammed close behind us, and so Cassandra’s scream of frustration, and I hoped, pain, was unheard by the prison in general. Psycho struggled like a fish on a line, trying to pull both the knife and her hand free, but I was having none of it. "Let me go, you bitch!"
"Let go of the knife and I’ll raise my foot, Cassandra."
"Like hell I will!" Turning her head, she opened her mouth wide and the next thing I felt was my wounded thigh, the same leg that was trapping Cassandra, being bitten into. Hard.
I opened my mouth wide, but panted through the pain, slapping her head as hard as I could to get her to disengage. She shook her head like a terrier, growling as her jaws spasmed shut. The pain was so intense, I almost fainted.
My leg weakened, then jittered. Shouting in triumph, Cassandra pulled the knife free. Her shout freed her teeth from my thigh and, gritting my own teeth so hard I nearly bit off my own tongue, I jammed my foot back down as hard as I could, the abused muscles literally screaming out their own agony. I could hear the sickening crunch of small bones breaking and my stomach did a lazy flip-flop, making me thank God that I’d been too busy to eat dinner. "Let it go, Cassandra!"
