by Randy Singer
“I’ve gotta go potty,” he admitted after a few seconds of dancing around.
The Pretty Lady rolled her eyes. “Oh, for goodness’ sakes,” she said. “Why didn’t you go five minutes ago when we took Hannah up to the boardwalk so she could go.”
“I didn’t have to go then,” Tiger said. It sounded logical.
“Number one or number two?” Miss Nikki asked.
Who taught her the code? Tiger wondered. “Number one,” he answered.
“That’s easy,” she said. “Just go in the ocean.”
Tiger looked down at the waves crashing against the beach and smiled. Why hadn’t he thought of that? There was a lot of water out there. And he wouldn’t even have to flush.
“Okay,” Tiger said. He bent down and gave Miss Nikki a hug. Some of the sand that had been covering his body now stuck to the Pretty Lady’s oily skin. Then he sprinted toward the ocean, sand flying everywhere.
The Pretty Lady is really smart, he said to himself.
19
THOMAS HAMMOND SQUINTED as he stepped out into the bright afternoon sun. Rec time for the inmates. The barren ground stretched before him, reflecting waves of heat like a giant uncovered oven, baking the dirt into cinders so parched and hard that it felt like concrete. Within seconds Thomas felt his jumpsuit sticking to his back, the small sweat stains under his arms fanning out and changing the color of his garment from orange to dark brown. The rec area, surrounded by a high chain-link fence topped off by twisted barbed wire, served as a stark reminder that he was now a criminal. Worms had more freedom.
The men spread out and formed their cliques. It seemed that everyone in jail belonged to some sort of gang, seeking protection in numbers, the most notorious one being led by Buster. They called themselves the Ebony Sopranos, or ES for short. One of the white fish told Thomas that the name had something to do with a television show about organized crime. Thomas didn’t care. He had no desire to join any gang, especially since the whites were led by a skinhead shot caller from the Aryan Nation.
Thomas could take care of himself.
The asphalt basketball court was the site of a game that resembled football in sneakers. There would be some dribbling, a lot of pushing, a pass or two, more shoving, then a shot, and elbows would fly. Fouls would be called and denied, loud arguments would ensue, and the game would grind to a halt.
Thomas was never much for basketball anyway.
Other inmates loitered in groups of four or five, smoking cigarettes and playing cards. No prospects there. Thomas resisted the urge to lecture them.
The only thing that remotely interested Thomas was the group of inmates working out with free weights on a slab of concrete in a far corner of the lot. Thomas checked to make sure the group was integrated—he had learned his lesson at lunch—and headed over to get some exercise. He was not used to being cooped up indoors and didn’t want to gain any more weight than necessary during his time in the big house. He already tipped the scales at nearly two-sixty, and clothes were hard to find. The last thing he needed was more girth.
The bench press was not in use, so he would start there. He hadn’t lifted weights since his wrestling days in high school; he didn’t need to with the exertion of his daily work. He decided to start light. He threw one forty-five-pound plate and one thirty-five-pound plate on each end of the bar. Add in the bar and you were looking at two-oh-five. He lay down on the bench and took a few deep breaths.
He found himself staring up at the glistening pecs and gleaming gold tooth of Buster Jackson. Where did he come from? Buster had unzipped his orange jumpsuit to the waist and stripped it off his arms and back so it exposed the top half of his body, showcasing mountainous deltoids. His biceps and forearms were sculpted like granite and accentuated with bulging veins. His hands were on his hips.
“I was usin’ that,” he growled.
Without a word, Thomas sat up and looked at Buster. Thomas shook his head and rose from the bench, giving way to his tormentor.
“Need a spot?” Thomas asked.
Buster snorted. “For this?”
Then Buster reached down, slid off the thirty-fives and threw a forty-five-and a twenty-five-pound plate on each end. For good measure, he added two tens on each side, then slapped on the collars.
Three fifteen.
The big man lay down on the bench and started pumping out reps. Five . . . six . . . seven. His muscles swelled, his enormous chest heaving in and out, veins popping out on his arms, blood rushing to his head. His arms started to shake. Eight . . . nine . . . ten. He finished his last rep and slammed down the weights. He exploded up from the bench and began stretching and preening around, a combination of a peacock and Mr. Universe.
Thomas took advantage of the opening and slid under the weights. He checked his grip, took a deep breath, and pushed with all his might. To his surprise, the bar actually moved. Adrenaline stoked by anger got him through the first few reps. But his arms grew tired quickly and started trembling. The fourth rep was a strain; he felt like he would explode. Five . . . six . . . seven . . . eight . . . and then the bar stuck halfway up.
He had been arching his back, cheating a little, pushing with his eyes closed. When he opened them, still straining against the weight, he saw Buster, one hand on the bar, slowly pushing down on the doggone bar. Smiling.
The bar inched down toward Thomas’s neck, Buster tipping the scales against him. It stopped momentarily, suspended there, Thomas straining with all his might, Buster leaning and smiling. Thomas felt his strength oozing out, his tired muscles losing to the combined force of gravity and steady pressure from Buster Jackson. Thomas eased up and the bar lowered until it was just inches from his throat.
Then Thomas exploded. Every ounce of strength mustered for one last desperate second. The burst of power surprised Buster, and Thomas managed to lift the bar a few inches away from his throat and chest and then quickly slid out from under it. He let the bar drop on the bench and Thomas jumped to his feet, facing Buster.
“Better get yourself a spotter next time,” Buster said calmly. “Man could get himself killed.”
The other weightlifters gathered around as the big men squared off. Thomas didn’t speak, couldn’t speak, as the anger burned away any semblance of control. He breathed heavily and stared at Buster, the air red with a growing hatred toward the man standing in front of him, mocking him.
“You got a problem, white boy?” Buster asked, playing to the crowd.
“Yeah,” Thomas said. “You.”
This time there would be no backing down. Both men raised their fists. Buster moved quickly on the balls of his feet, graceful movements for a big man. Thomas moved in for the kill, flat-footed.
He didn’t even see it coming. The lightning quick left jab sent pain stabbing through Thomas’s cheekbone, snapping his head back. Then a right caught Thomas in the ribs. He gasped and reeled backward, catching his footing.
Thomas shook his head and ignored the searing pain from his ribcage. He snorted and lurched forward, this time shielding his face with his forearms. Buster danced and smirked some more, and his quick hands found their mark again—a combination to the right eye and jaw of Thomas. The dull sound of knuckles on bone. Blood spurting from the cut above the eye. The taste of blood filling Thomas’s mouth.
He lowered his head and charged again.
More blows from Buster, but this time they were deflected by Thomas’s forearms. The inmates were cheering now, and the guards walked slowly toward the fight, letting the men have a little fun. Buster backpedaled, measuring, looking for another opening. He found one and landed another flurry of blows. Thomas shook them off, blood and sweat flying from his face.
And still he kept coming, moving forward while Buster shuffled back.
“Is that all you got?” Thomas mocked.
Then he lowered his shoulder and lunged, a textbook tackle driving Buster hard to the turf. Thomas’s wrestling instincts took over. In a flash he had Buster
in a headlock, his body wrenched at unnatural angles by the powerful legs of Thomas. A scissor hold—Thomas’s best move. He pried Buster’s left arm behind his back, nearly ripping it out of the socket, while Thomas’s strong legs squeezed the air out of Buster’s lungs.
But Buster somehow wiggled his right arm free, grabbed a ten-pound weight lying on the ground next to the men, and swung it hard toward Thomas’s head.
The weight never landed. The guards, who had arrived seconds earlier, deflected the blow just before it cracked Thomas’s skull. In the chaos that followed, it took three guards and four inmates to separate the two gladiators.
The two giants stood there facing each other, chests heaving, held back by the guards and fellow inmates stationed between them. Buster tried to break loose, but a few guards formed a human wall while the others grabbed his arms.
“Let go of me,” Buster demanded, and for some reason even the guards holding him obeyed, though others still held their ground between Buster and Thomas.
“You gonna die,” Buster sneered, bouncing on the balls of his feet, looking for a chance to charge through the peacemakers.
“You ain’t so bad,” Thomas replied, spitting blood to the side. “You ain’t so bad.”
Rebecca Crawford made Officer Thrasher wait nearly ten minutes in the lobby of the commonwealth’s attorney’s office before she asked the receptionist to send him back. Thrasher had blown the case against the street preacher—couldn’t stop running his big mouth—and he had made everyone look bad. The least she could do was make him wait a little. She did the same thing with any defense lawyer who came to her office, reminding them who was in charge.
When Thrasher did swagger in and stand in front of her desk, she was disappointed not to see any signs of penance. Must have been a productive search at the Hammonds’ trailer.
“What’d you find?” she asked. There would be no small talk with Thrasher; they had nothing in common.
“No drugs.”
The Barracuda tried not to let the disappointment register on her face. Searching the trailer for prescription drugs had been her idea. How easy it would be to convict parents who may have gone to the doctor themselves but refused to take their child. “Not even birth-control pills or antibiotics or pain medication—”
“No drugs.”
“Did you check for prescriptions?”
Thrasher gave her a nasty look that confirmed he didn’t like his professionalism being questioned.
“Just making sure,” the Barracuda said quickly.
“I did find a few things.” He placed a small and worn color photo on the desk, the kind that fits inside a wallet. Crawford looked at the photo, then up at Thrasher. She picked it up and studied the pudgy little face. It was Joshua, she knew. He was all dressed up with shorts and suspenders, a white shirt, and a bow tie that had fallen half off. It looked like the kind of shot you might have done at a Kmart store. Joshua was grinning broadly, bunching his cheeks into puffy little balls, and causing his eyes to nearly dance off the page.
The Barracuda felt the familiar rage begin in the pit of her stomach. She felt sorry for this kid, but sorry wouldn’t help her through this case. It was the anger that motivated her. The anger that would start as a bile in her gut and eventually consume her when she gave her closing argument. Juries responded to righteous indignation, not pity. And the parents deserved every ounce of the Barracuda’s scorn. They had let Joshua die . . . sat right there and watched him die. But first, they had let this defenseless little boy suffer in excruciating pain.
“I didn’t put that one on the inventory,” Thrasher said, snapping Crawford out of her thoughts.
“Thanks.” She placed the picture next to the black trial notebook that would eventually be its home.
“One other thing,” Thrasher said, placing a small notebook with a soft leather cover on the desk in front of the Barracuda. “And we definitely inventoried this one.”
Crawford gave him a quizzical look and watched his lips form a wicked little smirk.
She flipped open the well-worn notebook and started reading. It was easy to see why Thrasher was so proud of himself.
“Almost as good as finding drugs,” Thrasher said.
“Almost,” the Barracuda said, too engrossed in her reading to even look up.
“Miss Nikki,” Tiger yelled. “Miss Nikki!”
She grunted and rolled over in bed so she could see her digital clock. Midnight. Tiger was calling her for the third time from the guest room down the hall of her condo. She had finally dozed off in her queen-size bed in the master bedroom.
“You’re gonna drive me crazy,” she said under her breath as she padded down the hall. She was trying to be patient with the little rascal. It had been an emotional night. Tiger and Hannah had gone home earlier that evening, and their mom had packed their clothes and sleeping bags for them. It was a tearful separation, with their mom waving good-bye on the front stoop of their trailer. So Nikki was trying to cut them a little slack.
But her patience was wearing thin.
“What is it this time?” she asked as she knelt down next to Tiger’s sleeping bag on the floor.
“My back and arms hurt,” Tiger whined. “Like somebody’s pricking me with a bazillion needles.”
Nikki put some more lotion on his sunburned little body and got him yet another drink of water. Before she left, Tiger had her check behind all the boxes stored in the room, just to make sure the bogeyman was not hiding out and biding his time. She surveyed every nook and cranny for the third time that night. There was no sign of him.
Just as she left the room, she heard it again.
“Miss Nikki,” came the squeaky little voice.
“Give me a break,” she whispered to nobody in particular. “What?!”
“Can I lay down in your room?”
It was not her idea of a restful night, but it had been a traumatic day for Tiger. And he would only be there a week.
“Oh, all right,” Nikki said.
“Yippee,” Tiger shrieked, bouncing up and shaking Hannah. “We’re gonna get to sleep with Miss Nikki!”
The three decided that it would work best for Hannah to sleep in bed with Nikki and for Tiger to sleep on the floor in his sleeping bag. They also decided, by a vote of two-to-one, with Nikki dissenting, that they should leave the hallway light on and leave the bedroom door cracked open. Nikki felt like she was sleeping in a spotlight.
She did insist, however, that Tiger would have to save a few of his 553 questions until the morning. And so, at nearly twelve thirty, the kids stopped squirming around and settled in for the night.
Hannah cuddled closer every time she moved, and Nikki gave her a little more room each time, until Nikki was nearly falling out of her side of the bed. It was going to be a long night.
Silence, blessed silence, filled the room for all of about two minutes.
“Miss Nikki, what’s that picture on your shoulder?” she heard from the squeaky little voice on the floor.
She sighed. “If I answer this last question, will you go to sleep?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Okay. It’s called a tattoo. And it’s a picture of a little girl.”
“Is it your picture?”
“No, Tiger. Now go to sleep.”
Two minutes later: “Miss Nikki, have you ever been married?”
“Tiger!”
“Night, Miss Nikki,” he said quickly.
“Good night, Tiger,” Nikki said, a little more calmly. “And good night, Hannah.”
Hannah cracked open an eye, closed it, and snuggled closer to Nikki.
“You can call me Stinky if you want to,” she said.
20
THERESA HAMMOND ROSE EARLY and wandered around her trailer, feeling very much alone. She had not really slept the prior night. In fact, she could not remember the last time she had achieved deep sleep. She would doze off briefly and then jerk awake, hoping for a split second that it was all a bad drea
m. Then reality would rush in and more sleep would be impossible. She was on the verge of going to the pharmacy to get some sleeping pills, but she figured God was already mad enough at her as it was. Another sin would only make things worse.
She had cried herself out. She felt depleted and exhausted, a helpless spectator to the cruel events swirling around her. She wanted to take some action, do something. But there was nothing she could do. Just survive. One day at a time.
She wandered into the boys’ room, and the memories came flooding back. She had left Joshie’s stuff just like it was the day he died. The crib that had been used by all three kids when they were babies still made up in the corner of the room. Joshie’s stuffed Pooh bear that was a present on his first birthday, rubbed down to a nub from loving, lay lifeless in the crib. LEGOs scattered on the floor. Joshie’s favorite book of Bible stories, opened on the dresser. The dresser itself, badly in need of paint, still bulged with Joshie’s hand-me-down clothes.
She reached in and grabbed the Pooh bear, hugged it close, and breathed deeply of Joshie. Without thinking, she sat down on Tiger’s bed. Her heart ached as she missed her little guys. She closed her eyes, and for a moment, it seemed that she was hugging Joshie again, rocking gently back and forth on the bed, gently humming, “Jesus loves me, this I know . . .”
But then reality hit, and her body began to shake. There were no tears this time, just convulsions of grief and unavoidable questions. Why are You punishing me, God? Why take Joshie? What did I do to deserve Your wrath?
She mustered the strength to rise from the bed, preparing to leave the room. She had to get dressed and find work. With Thomas behind bars, the money from his lawn care business would stop. They had a little money in the bank, a few thousand dollars in a house fund. She could make that last a month, no more. She was determined to hire a good lawyer, a real lawyer, not the sorry court-appointed lawyer they had been assigned at the arraignment. She would work two jobs if that’s what it took.
She had to get her kids back. The child protective services caseworker would be interviewing her today. She had to get her act together. Think clearly, she told herself, and get this trailer cleaned. But it was hard to do all that—it was hard to even move—when you missed the kids so much.