Last Call

Chapter 28

A buzzer pulsated throughout TGK as the guards took Theo back to his cell. It was a sound that Theo hadn't heard since death row, but he knew what it meant even before the voice came over the PA system: "Lockdown. All prisoners to their cells immediately."

A chorus of groans filled the cell block, followed by the shuffling of inmates' feet, like a rag-tag army in defeat, and finally the slamming of cell doors.

Charger climbed up to the top bunk. Theo went to the lower one.

In ten minutes, the place was secure. The PA system keyed for another a

That triggered further grumbling, punctuated by sporadic shouts of profanity and some clanging on the iron bars in protest. But it was short-lived, quieted in part by a team of guards that swept through the cell block, nightsticks drawn in a show of force.

Theo rolled out of his bunk and began to remove his clothes. Charger jumped down and did the same. There was a protocol to undressing in the presence of your cell mate. It had to do with the eyes: you made damn sure they didn't roam.

"What are they looking for now?" said Charger.

"Hell if I know," said Theo.

But he did know. Theo was looking for the same thing: the CD-Town Posse tattoo.

Theo was certain that he'd seen it on somebody's back in the shower, but he remembered nothing more about it. The showers were a steamy crowded mass of naked male flesh. Looking around too much and making eye contact with the wrong dude was a good way to end up a "catcher" – a daily ticket to taking it up the ass. All Theo had been able to tell Jack was that he'd seen the tattoo, and it was on a black guy's back. Jack immediately passed the information along to Andie He

Charger got naked first and walked to the bars. Theo was mindful of the eyes-front protocol, but his curiosity got the better of him. He stole a quick glance at his cell mate's back, checking for the tattoo.

"Like what you see?" said Charger.

For a moment it seemed that the dude had 360-degree vision. "I don't see nothin'."

"It's okay," said Charger, "you can check out my ass if you want to."

"Just shut your mouth."

For more than forty-five minutes they stood at the bars, unclothed and in silence, as a team of guards moved from one cell to the next. Time was something the inmates had plenty of, and the guards wasted it freely. It was a bizarre sight from Theo's perspective, staring out across the block at cell after cell of stark-naked men waiting at the bars. Black, white, and Hispanic. Young and old, fat and slim, many of them cut like bodybuilders, and nearly all of them bearing some kind of tattoo.

Charger spoke softly, his voice barely above a whisper. "Is it true you're in here for helping Isaac escape?"

Theo shook his head, as if losing patience. "You think I'm go

"I'm pretty sure you know what I am," he said, his voice still low.

Theo tried to ignore it, but one question had been burning in his mind ever since he'd found the cream under the mattress. "How well did Isaac know what you are?"

Charger scoffed. "That homophobic jerk. He'd beat the living hell out of me just for thinking about him."

Deep down, Theo had figured as much: The bottom bunk and the cream had belonged to Charger, and his boyfriend was from another cell – not Isaac.

"But you seem nice," said Charger.

"Shut it, fool."

"Arms out," the guard told Theo.

Officer MacDonald was suddenly standing on the other side of the bars, and he treated Theo the same as any other inmate. At the same time, a second guard did a visual search of Charger. The beam of a high-powered flashlight swept the prisoners' front side first. The guards ordered them to turn left, right, and then all the way around, inspecting the entire body. Apparently the prison officials did not want the inmates to know that the search pertained only to the back. Or maybe they'd opted for a whole-body scan to account for the possibility that Theo was mistaken, and that he'd actually seen the tattoo on someone's arm or chest.

"Towels on," the guard said. "Showers in ten minutes."

The search team moved to the next cell. Theo wrapped himself in a white bath towel and waited at the locked cell door. Again, he looked across the cell block at the other inmates – scores of caged sex offenders who had spent the last hour staring straight at his fully exposed equipment.

Shower time, he thought. Oh joy of joys.

FLORIDA STATE TROOPER Mel Stratton was twenty minutes from the end of his shift, and he was way below his normal pace for writing speeding tickets. He couldn't figure it out. This was his favorite spot, just east of orange grove country hiding beneath the Minute Maid Road overpass on Interstate 95. It was a clear night, no rain or fog to slow down traffic. Still, he'd issued far too few citations for a decent day's work.

It was downright embarrassing.

Suddenly a car was racing toward him in the northbound passing lane. His radar gun chirped like a parakeet in orgasm. Ninety-five – no, ninety-seven – miles per hour. Didn't slow down one bit as it whizzed past him. Either the Jeff Gordon wa

Hot damn!

He tripped the siren and lights. Gravel flew and the engine roared as his car gripped the shoulder and tore onto the interstate. In seconds, he was in hot pursuit, but the target only accelerated. Trooper Stratton radioed in the information, but he didn't have much to say. He had no license plate number, no make or model of the vehicle. It had been a blur in the night flying past him.

In two minutes he was closing in. The speeding car hit the exit at over ninety miles per hour, ran a red light at the bottom of the ramp, and continued down the highway. Trooper Stratton gave chase, lights and siren blaring. It was a lonely road, just a gas station on one side and a fast-food joint on the other. The car was three miles beyond any sign of civilization when it made a quick right turn down a dirt road.

The car had disappeared from sight, but barbed-wire fences lined the road and prevented escape. Trooper Stratton continued in pursuit, his car jumping down the bumpy dirt road like a dune buggy. Then he stopped short, skidding to a stop.

The car was dead ahead, parked – stuck in a rut or ravine, he presumed.

The trooper switched on his spotlight and keyed his public address system.

"Remain in your vehicle," he said.

He reached for his radio transmitter to call in the information, but the license plate was too dirty to read. All he could say for sure was that it was a Florida tag. And that it was a red car. With some kind of gang symbol etched onto the rear window.

It looked like an upright knife.

His pulse quickened; he'd seen the statewide BOLO for a red car with the O-Town Posse gang symbol.

The last sound he heard was a deafening pop and the shattering of glass, as the windshield exploded into a thousand pellets that showered his face and landed in his lap.

Some were clear as diamonds; others, red as rubies.

THE BUZZER SOUNDED. The a

Theo exited his cell ahead of his cell mate and walked briskly across the cell block, trying to put some distance between himself and Charger. One man after another hung his towel on a hook and went straight into the community showers. Theo stayed by the sinks, still wrapped in his towel. The only mirror was the dome-shaped security mirror mounted on the ceiling. It was for the guards' benefit, not the inmates'. Theo used it as best he could to check his stitches. The doctor was supposed to remove all of them in a few days. There would definitely be a scar, especially if it was a prison doctor.