The Payback Man

The kid raised his hands in front of him. “Hey, man, chill, okay?”

“Sit down.” Newman’s voice was dangerously hard and flat.

The moment passed, but Eleanor realized how close to the surface violence flowed among these men. She glanced over at Steve, who hadn’t moved, his knees drawn up, his fine-boned hands dangling between them.

He was watching her, possibly had been watching her throughout the exchange. She felt her skin flush and looked away quickly. The connection between them had been—was—visceral. As though they were alone. She shivered and knew he’d seen her reaction.

“Okay, guys, drop the empties into the cooler, and, Big, would you put it back in my truck for me? Thanks.”

“Up.” Newman prodded Sweet Daddy with the end of his baton.

“Ow, man, ain’t you got nothin’ better to do with that thing?”

“Don’t you sass me, little man.”

The men stood and formed a ragged line.

“Oh, La—Mr. Newman—the men will be allowed to shower and change into fresh clothes when they get back to the compound, won’t they?”

“Huh?”

“Let me rephrase that. They—we—all smell like goats. We’re filthy. They should shower and change before they come in contact with any of the other inmates, not only for comfort but for health reasons.”

“Yeah, I guess.”

Steve caught her eye. He raised one eyebrow and nodded almost imperceptibly. She raised her chin. Apparently she’d done something right, and though she shouldn’t give a darn what Steve thought of her or her decisions, she felt a glow from his approval.

She climbed wearily into her truck and watched as the men trudged up the hill toward the compound.

She’d expected them to turn from mere inmates into people to her, but not this soon and, in one case especially, not so personally.

“YOU BASTARDS THINK you gonna have it easy ’cause she’s a civilian and a female. You ain’t, not with me around,” Mike Newman said. “Showers! Shee-ut.”

“But she said we—” Robert clamped his mouth shut as Steve’s hand fell hard on his forearm.

“She said, she said. What she said don’t mean squat. What I say’s what counts.”

“If we show up dirty in the morning, she’s gonna be pissed.” Slow Rise’s voice was plaintive.

“Shut your yap, old man. Or you gonna find out what this here stick’s for.”

“He’s right, you know,” Steve said mildly, and knew the moment the words left his mouth that he shouldn’t have spoken.

Newman already disliked him. He’d recognized that immediately. Steve tried to be just one of the cons, but he’d never managed to get the shuffle down quite right. Newman saw attitude and arrogance in him and hated both.

He was also looking for revenge after Dr. Grayson called him about the gloves. Someone had been almost certain to take a beating over that. Steve had just broken the cardinal rule of prisoners the world over. He’d called attention to himself.

“You saying I’m wrong? Huh? Yeah, you saying ol’ Mike Newman is wrong. My, my. Well, I do apologize. Sure wouldn’t want to trample on no civil rights of any of you gentlemen, now would I?”

The last rays of sunshine had given way to twilight. Steve knew the blow was coming, but not where or with how much force. He tried to brace himself, but he wasn’t fast enough. The steel baton slashed across the backs of his knees and dropped him. As he fell forward and gritted his teeth to keep from howling, the baton slammed across his kidneys.

Now he couldn’t howl. He couldn’t even breathe. The pain was electric, as though he’d been hit with a cattle prod rather than a baton. He tried to gather strength to roll over, to resist somehow, or at least to present a smaller target, but Newman was nothing if not expert in delivering pain.

Newman could crack his spine with that baton, and there was nothing, not a damn thing, that Steve could do to stop him.

“Enough.” The voice was Gil’s.

God, Steve thought, now Newman would go for Gil. Although Steve barely knew the man, he didn’t want to be responsible for another man’s pain. He groaned and tried to struggle to his hands and knees.

He expected to hear the whish of the baton, to feel it across his shoulders or his hips.

Instead, Newman said with the kind of bluster that usually covers fear, “Ain’t nobody tellin’ me I’m wrong.”

Steve felt hands under his armpits. Sweet Daddy on one side and Slow Rise on the other barely managed to hold him up. His back felt as though it had been broken, but he could still feel his legs, so he supposed it hadn’t.

Newman tried to laugh, but the sound came out strangled. “Hell, even when I’m wrong, I’m right. You remember that. You go on, git, and take your damned showers.”

Steve didn’t turn around. He didn’t think he could move without help, but after a couple of steps he managed to keep his legs straight, to put one foot in front of the other. He gulped in air with every step. He felt like an old man who’d had a stroke.

“Man, you stupid.” Sweet Daddy sounded put out. “Man hates yo’ ass, fool. Next time he gonna kill you.”

Steve turned to Gil. “Thanks,” he managed to choke out.

Gil shrugged. “Hey, man, the bastard kills you, we gonna be up to our asses with Internal Affairs and union reps. I’m not lying for Newman. Easier to keep you alive.”

“Yeah.” Steve managed a faint grin. They reached the door of their dormitory.

Originally an old army barracks, the room now held cots for twenty men. So far only fifteen had been assigned. A two-drawer chest with a lock sat at the end of each cot, and beside it, a single bedside table with a lamp. No posters on the walls, no personal possessions in the open where they could be stolen, nothing to enliven the drab green of the walls or cover up the scars on the old wooden floors. At the far end of the room were latrines and a gang shower that could hold ten men at a time.

The men who were already lounging on their bunks waiting for the call to dinner looked up curiously, then quickly dropped their heads back to their books or porn magazines. Something had obviously happened. Nobody wanted to know what.

“Can you get your clothes off without help?” Slow Rise asked.

Steve nodded. “I think so. I’ll be better after I stand in the shower awhile.”

And he was. He managed to carry his own tray through the chow line and sit down at one of the long tables to eat. As usual, he didn’t speak, and afterward walked slowly and hesitantly to his bunk, lay down and prayed his kidney damage wasn’t permanent. He knew he was leaching blood, probably would be for several days.

Work tomorrow would be difficult if not impossible, but he didn’t dare go to the infirmary. He’d have to explain what had happened or make something up. He suspected the people at the infirmary would take one look at his bruises and recognize precisely what had happened to him.

That would not be a good thing. Either Newman would make up some excuse to deprive him of the good time he’d accrued, or Newman would be brought in and disciplined. Then he’d really be out to get Steve. Either way Steve would lose.

He couldn’t tell Eleanor, either—he already thought of her as Eleanor. She’d tear into Newman with the same effect. Newman would take out any dressing-down he got on the men.

Most of them could fend for themselves. Sweet Daddy was small, but he was wiry and fast. He was also cagey. He usually talked his way out of trouble, or whined his way out, if need be.

Obviously Newman had decided not to mess with Gil Jones. Steve had no idea what Gil had done to land behind bars, but he suspected this wasn’t his first trip. From the tattoos, Steve guessed he was well allied with others in the prison. Newman apparently knew it, too. Together Gil’s people could take on Newman or any of the other guards, take them out if necessary, and nobody would ever know who did the actual killing. Best to keep on Gil’s good side.

Slow Rise was simply a decent man who had a bad temper. Prison had made it worse. He was also an aging con among young men. He had to seem invulnerable to survive.