Mind Games

“No way! I’m the man of the house, and men get more than girls.”

“Just listen to y’all.” Lucy shook her head as they walked back to the house. “I’ll tell you right off, I don’t run my business with any bias against age or sex. I pay you both just the exact same. I’m thinking, oh, ten cents an hour.”

“Ten cents!”

“That’s what they call my floor, Rem.” She pushed open the screen door. All three dogs rushed in before they did. “Now, start negotiating.”

Chapter Nine

Ray Riggs hated prison. Some of that hate rooted itself in a deep, dark fear. Fear of never getting out.

Due to the double murder, and charges pending on more, he’d earned a no-detour trip to Virginia’s supermax.

During transport, he’d caught a whiff of one of the guard’s thoughts about him, how he was a punk-ass no-account who’d deserved the needle.

His aborted attempt to attack the guard earned him some bruises.

Bruises were nothing, nothing compared to the spit-drying fear of seeing segregation.

Not cells with bars, but doors, blue doors with a single skinny window. Behind those doors, inmates shouted, banged, some cackled. And the noise boomed and echoed as they shuffled him along in his cuffs and leg shackles.

He couldn’t be here, couldn’t stay here. They couldn’t keep him here.

He fought, couldn’t stop himself, but they made him kneel down just inside one of those doors.

He saw the horrible room with its bunk, its toilet, its high little window of frosted glass.

No, he couldn’t stay in here.

His lawyer fucked him over, that’s what happened. He’d get out, kill the bastard.

He didn’t hear what the guards told him as they unlocked his shackles. He didn’t care.

He wouldn’t stay in here.

When they locked him in, he pounded on the door, screaming, adding to those echoes until he couldn’t scream anymore.

Later, food came through a slot in the door, but he didn’t eat it.

He’d heard about hunger strikes. He’d go on a hunger strike, and get the TV people and all those bleeding-heart assholes on his side.

That night he heard voices in his head, taunting him.

And by morning, he was too hungry not to eat what came through the slot.

Later, they made him kneel again, shackled him again. They took him down to a big mesh cage, like he was an animal.

“You get an hour to exercise,” the guard told him.

“Fuck you. I want to make a phone call.” He’d call that asshole lawyer and let him know what was coming.

“You don’t have phone privileges. One hour, Ray.” The cage door closed behind them.

He didn’t exercise. He sat instead on the bench bolted to the floor. In the cage beside his, some Black guy wearing a yellow ski cap over dreads did push-ups.

He looked strong. Ray figured he needed somebody strong on his side. He’d start with this guy, put a gang together. They’d overpower the guards and escape.

“Hey.” Ray hissed the word out. “I’m working on a way out of here. Could use some help.”