The Baddest Ass (Billy Lafitte #3) (12 page)

Colleen's only chance.

She steps over, grabs the rim of the helmet and sticks the barrel right in the woman's eye, the bridge of her nose. "I want my phone, my ID, my keys, right fucking now, and you're letting me leave, you get it? That's happening right now."

"Wait, wait, wait."

"
Now
, bitch, and don't think I won't have an accident with this thing."

She shoves the rifle. The guard squeezes her eyes shut. Colleen pulls hard on the helmet telling the woman "Up up up" until she's on her feet and Colleen turns her around, rifle now on the back of her neck. "Come on. Where's my shit? Now, get it now."

"Wait, listen, wait, they're going to get killed."

"We're both going to get killed if you don't help me out of here."

"No, listen…" Gagging. Her voice is barely there. "It's…Lafitte. He…killed…"

Colleen tenses. Don't listen. She knows your weak spots. She's playing you. "Bullshit. That's bullshit."

"It's all for you. It's all for you. You…" Hack. "If you pay, we get rid of him. That was the deal. But, but, listen, something…it didn't work. Power went out too soon. We weren't supposed to yet…visitors."

"That woman and the kid? That them?"

The guard tries to turn her head, but Colleen pokes the gun tighter. "Lafitte's kid. That's his son, and, and, the woman, that's his mother-in-law."

"Jesus."

"It was an accident. They…she surprised us. You and her on the same day, I mean, we didn't even know until her plane had landed. Please, this is bad. It's really bad."

"So get the motherfucker, right? Shit, go get him."

"Lafitte's out. He killed two guys already. I knew those guys. He killed them."

"In self-defense?"

"He's a fucking traitor. I don't give a fuck. You should've killed him a long time ago. He killed my friends because you couldn't finish him off on your own."

They all know that story, of course. When Lafitte was a fugitive, she crashed into his bike, forced him off the road, but her car flipped. Her fiancé was inside. He died, she had a gun on Lafitte, but she ended up letting him go. Worst fucking decision of her life. Until an hour ago.

No, even that wasn't as bad as letting Lafitte go.

"So you idiots arranged all this? Stop it, then."

"Can't…" Coughing again. Colleen has to wait. Feels like an eternity of phlegm. "Fuck…it was Garner. We were going to hide killing Lafitte with a riot. But the inmates are in on it…yeah, yeah, it's,
real
now. It's the real thing, and we're so fucked. Oh god, please. Don't let them kill that kid. Oh my god. Please."

She can barely hear the woman over the voice in her head screaming
Go go go go go Get out of here get the fuck out
—

"Shit. They're still here?"

"They already saw him. I don't know. Power went out while they…it was just after."

Colleen lets out a steamy breath that turns to a thick cloud, swirls up around her head. But she's not feeling so cold any more. Numb, maybe, but goddamn, what's she going to do? Make it worse and leave a kid to get ripped apart by fucking, what, monsters? Go down the hall and shoot some fucking monsters, yeah, shoot the fuckers, grab the boy and granny and get them all the hell out of here. Maybe they'll be more lenient with her sentencing if she pulls it off.

"Give me the helmet and the vest."

"No, just, here…" The guard walks over to the desk beside the door leading out to the metal detectors. She pulls out a drawer, takes Colleen's phone and keys, hands the over. "Let's just go, please. You take me with you!"

"Can't trust you now. Just…give me the shit and hide under the desk until I get back. Alright? I'm coming right back with them. I swear."

The guard unstraps her helmet and hands it over. Then her flak jacket. "You get me out of here, how much do I get to keep my mouth shut about all this?"

"What?"

"How much? I'll stick with your story. Garner won't get anything. Ten thousand? That's a lot less than what you were going to pay."

Colleen one-hands the helmet onto her head, no straps, and wrestles into the jacket so she can keep the gun on the woman. "It's not enough for me to save your ass?"

"I can walk out any time I want. It's you who needs me." She crosses her arms, teeth chattering.

Colleen checks the gun, makes sure it's ready. She knows guns, knows the AR-15, knows her Glock, knows her daddy's shotguns and Nate's collection of the baddest asses he could find—.44 by Dan Wesson, Desert Eagle, .357 Colt with a six-inch barrel, the revolver that fires magnums and .410 shells, the sawed-off pump he found in a burned-out meth lab. All hers now.

The AR-15 sucks. She hates it. But it'll do.

"When I get back, be here." She starts down the hall, then turns, has to grab the helmet before it falls off. "And the only way you're getting any money is if I can shove it straight up your cunt."

Turns her back and off she goes. That bitch doesn't have the balls to ambush her. What the hell were they thinking? They could make a shit ton more money helping the cons bring in drugs than they ever could off her and Rome's payday. And if they wanted Lafitte dead so bad, why not just do it, right? No money at all. Do it. Just do it. This was like some sort of retard nightmare.

She turns her phone on. A couple of unanswered calls. She dials 911. It never connects. Never rings. Shit. No time.

Around the corner, there's a pile of dead guards, one or two flashlight beams still on and crossing midair. Guns without clips tossed on their bodies. SWAT shit was useless. Colleen dropped her helmet. Ahead, a steel door is closing as if on its own. No, wait, someone behind it, pulling it closed carefully. The magnetic locks aren't working. He must not have heard her. She thinks she hears a man's voice, low and rough. Then a woman's. Yeah, it is. A man and a woman talking. Coming from right behind that door. If she plays it right, maybe she can do this only firing one or two shots. Then, down falls Lafitte. Finally. She and Rome can keep the money, get on with their lives.
Finally
.

She eggshells it past the dead guards, heading for that door.

Ri'Chess waits in the cafeteria with Jean Robert and a few trustee kitchen workers who Ri'Chess owes big time. Couldn't have done it without them. It smells warmer in here than in the rest of the joint. Fresh rolls baking. But the rest, good god, man, whatever meat they got back there smells like toasted rubber or something. If it didn't smell like that all the time, Ri'Chess could've blamed it on his trustees out making sure this fake riot turned into a real one. But it is what it is—bad meat simmering in vats of bad cream of mushroom soup for bad hot dish.

Goddamned stupid name, "hot dish". Ri'Chess says this to Jean Robert and then says, "Call it casserole like the rest of us. No, no, wait, call it what it really is. Call it digestible lube, so, like, later the rape'll go smoother."

Jean Robert barely grins. What the hell, he understands English, right? He thinks it's not funny? Motherfucker rapes every type of man in this joint, but he won't laugh at a rape joke?

"Fuck you, man." Ri'Chess shakes his head. "Crazy nigga, some sort of, uh, like Rocky villain. Shit."

About that time comes shouting from the hallway outside, then some of his men, acting like they just scored a TD, whooping it up, fist-pumping. Following behind are two big sons a bitches, a pissed-off white guy being carried/dragged, whatever, between them. Guy in a fine Captain's uniform. Guy with preacher hair.

"The fuck you think you trying to pull here?" Garner shouts from half the cafeteria away, thinking he still has a say in this, Ri'Chess knows. It's going to get fun up in here.

"Mr. Garner, we couldn't have done it without you."

"It didn't work!" Garner, closer now, tries to pull himself away from the cons. Ri'Chess nods and they let go. Got to play it out a little longer for some real laughs, you know. Especially if he has to stay behind and probably be transferred out again. He's thinking somewhere warm this time. Garner's still going off. "It didn't work, and now Lafitte's out running around, everybody's out and we've got visitors stuck inside. And now you send these assholes to bring
me
to
you
? Call this back. We've got to shut it down. Time for Plan B."

White man in his face. Yeah, got no weapon, no back-up, no chance, and still he's so used to black boys trembling at his every word that he ain't figured it out quite yet.

"I don't have a Plan B, Boss."

Garner shakes his head. "Yours is mine, you fucking moron. We have to shut it all down, get the power going, which it already should've been. You need to bottle up these guys. It was just supposed to be the gym, right? That's your part."

"So improvise. We out. What you going to do about it?"

"I can sell the warden on a power outage. We can get everyone in here, get the heat going from the ovens, get all the men fed, until we can get up to the control room."

Ri'Chess can't help but grin as his guys start to break up a little. That serious gangsta shit, you know, just playin'. Then they all laughing. Ri'Chess holds up his hands as he tries to calm himself down, tries to calm them down, Garner getting redder in the face.

Ri'Chess says, "I'm sorry, Boss, I'm sorry. Didn't mean no disrespect just now. We…we didn't."

"Getting too cute, Ricardo."

"Sir, sir, listen, sir." Ri'Chess steps over and lays his hand on the Captain's shoulder like a good friend would. "I'm sorry, but what did you expect me to do? What would playing along with your puppet show get us in the end, right? It's got to be something more. So we took it while we could."

"Took
what
?"

"Shit, son, we done took your prison. The power comes back on when I say so. The doors won't lock again until I say so. And you don't even want to know how many of your guys we've killed."

Garner doesn't say anything. He's still red, but Ri'Chess knows the man's not going to blow up now. He's got to regain control. He won't. He can't. But let him try.

"Look, you don't understand. Someone's already noticed we're offline. Has to be. I'm betting they've got a whole goddamned army on its way to figure out why. That blizzard isn't going to stop them from busting in and shooting anything that doesn't drop to the ground. You want that? Or do you want what I promised? One way, you get paid. The other, I don't even want to guess."

Ri'Chess shrugs. "The fuck I need with money? I've got more money that that in my Chrysler, man. In the glovebox, I'm saying. This ain't about money. You handed over the keys to your kingdom, sir. It's mine now."

Another nod at his guys. Garner catches it too late. Too busy being superior to realize he's not. Men on both sides grab his arms. He can't even squirm, so tight they've got him. Drag him over to one of the long, cold aluminum tables, still dirty with streaks from last night's dinner, spilled coffee and tea, congealed cheese sauce. Jean Robert reaches down for the kicking legs and stills them like they're a couple of tree branches. They're that easy to break, at least. He lifts Garner's legs while the other two grit their teeth and swing the rest of the cop on top of the table, then hold him down while he yells and curses and thrashes. But those legs, just one man's hands keep them from moving at all. Ri'Chess is impressed, as always. Goddamned voodoo or something, this nigga.

Garner yells, "What do you want, then? I can give it to you! Do this, you're fucked! You're so fucked! You're fucked!"

"Yeah, you'd think so." Ri'Chess pulls a chair from the next table, takes a seat. Standing that long makes his feet hurt. Like he's been exercising. Sweating, even. Too hot in his own skin to notice everyone else shivering. He's just thinking about those fresh-baked rolls. "Thing is, boss, listen. No matter what I do in here, this whole thing looks worse for you guys. Shoving us in a place not even finished yet while you got the white boys in proper cells. Even the Indians, and compared to them, we're like the Jetsons, we're so civilized. But African-Americans? More of us than anyone else? We get the gym."

"It's not my fault! I just work here, and I handed you a golden ticket. You shit all over it! Come on, man, after it's all over, just think what I can set you up with."

"I already know." He grins, shows some teeth, even. "And it's like some sorta mousetrap. Whatever you give, you can take away. Get me to do anything you want like that, am I right? You ain't giving me shit. You just giving yourself your own personal nigga. Gonna buy me, that's it."

"Come on, you're full of shit."

"Shit. Full of shit. Lot of shit being thrown around, sounds like to me. Once I get done talking to a few reporters, or a congressman, or, hey, maybe some sort of special Congressional hearing. Imagine me on C-SPAN? In a suit, brother? Soon as I tell them what sort of way you run this place? I bet you I'll either be out on the streets again, or at least in a white man's prison. Talking golf courses, shit like that."

Garner shakes his head. "They don't have that any more. Long gone."

"Got to be better than
this
, though. Power goes off, we all turn into Popsicles? Got to be better than this."