The Wrong Man

by Jason Dean

  Bishop scanned the immediate area. The short corridor leading to the refectory ahead remained empty. Monkey boy’s presence must have warned off any witnesses – ironically, most inmates generally didn’t want to be around when blood got spilled; it wasn’t worth the grief. Bishop stood motionless for a few moments, breathing slowly. He knew he should just keep walking. Down the hallway, through the mess hall and back to his cell. He’d halved the odds for the guy; the rest was up to Falstaff. Whatever the problem was – business dispute, personality clash – it wasn’t his problem.

  Except it wasn’t that clear cut. Nothing ever was. And then Bishop realized this might actually work in his favour. At least, that’s the reason he gave himself as he turned and pushed back through the library door.

  SIX

  Both men were still in the same alcove. Falstaff was pinned against the wall by Alvin, who had his back to Bishop. With the sounds coming from the unseen TV Bishop could make out harsh whispers, but couldn’t hear the words.

  Keeping to the right, he spotted a pencil under a table. He put the bloody magazine down next to an ancient crime paperback and knelt down to pick the pencil up, keeping it in his left hand.

  When Bishop was about twenty feet away, Falstaff noticed him and his eyes got wider. Without turning, Alvin said, ‘You don’t want to be here.’

  ‘Is that a fact?’ said Bishop.

  Alvin had his left hand in Falstaff’s dreadlocks, forcing his head against the wall. His right held the homemade blade against Falstaff’s Adam’s apple. The young hustler made no noise as blood dripped steadily onto his grey shirt. Bishop could see the whites of his eyes and smell the acrid stench of sweat.

  Without releasing the pressure, Alvin turned to look at Bishop. ‘Need some time with your dark meat before he takes the express? If it’s your roll you’re worried about I’ll send it to you when I’m done.’ He grinned. ‘If I remember.’

  Bishop said, ‘You’re already done.’ He briefly considered telling him to drop the weapon, but why waste valuable breath?

  ‘Tough baby,’ Alvin said and moved his hand down from Falstaff’s hair to cover his mouth before kneeing him in the groin. As Falstaff silently collapsed to the floor, Alvin turned with his right arm extended to display two inches of jagged mirror.

  He reduced the space between them and began circling Bishop. ‘Just stay right there, black boy,’ he said over his shoulder. ‘We’re still gonna have our fun once I’ve finished with blue-eyes here.’

  In response, Bishop crouched with his empty right hand raised towards Alvin and mirrored the man’s movements so only his right side was exposed at any time. Alvin suddenly ducked forward and gave a playful jab to test his reactions and Bishop jerked back with a look of fake surprise on his face.

  The Aryan’s smile became broader as he continued to circle, pleased with his own swiftness. That was fine. Bishop had been in enough knife fights to know that overconfidence in an enemy should always be encouraged.

  As they shuffled around each other, Bishop studied Alvin’s right shoulder muscle. He took three or four steps to match his opponent’s and saw the deltoid tense. He jerked back at the exact instant Alvin’s arm shot out and almost smiled. Then he saw the shoulder begin to twitch again and took another step back as Alvin lunged forward and missed his face again by inches.

  The Aryan’s grin faltered. ‘Bad baby,’ he said. ‘No dessert for you.’

  Bishop remained silent as he awaited his cue. This was already taking too long.

  Ten more seconds passed as they circled, each waiting for the other to make his play. With every movement their rubber soles squeaked on the polished tile. Twenty seconds. Come on, urged Bishop. Come on. Thirty seconds. Then he saw the deltoid tighten for the third and last time.

  A millisecond before Alvin thrust his arm forward Bishop dropped his left shoulder, moving his head out of the danger area. He aimed a side kick straight at Alvin’s armpit. Alvin saw it coming and began to swerve his body and Bishop’s right foot struck the edge of his ribcage instead. The Aryan staggered back two steps and Bishop immediately darted forward. He dodged the outstretched arm and gripped Alvin’s shirt, using his right foot to connect with Alvin’s left ankle and sweep his leg out from under him. As Alvin lost his balance, Bishop used the power in his hips and threw the bigger man to the floor in one fluid movement.

  Bishop came down with him, used his right hand to grab hold of the man’s throat and crunched his knee painfully into Alvin’s knife arm, trapping it. Tightening his grip on the pencil in his left, Bishop was about to thrust it towards Alvin’s shoulder when Alvin’s free hand slammed into his throat with the force of a sledgehammer. As Bishop gagged, he felt Alvin’s fingers clasp the wrist and start to turn it inwards.

  Instead of increasing the pressure, Bishop let the arm go slack. When the pencil tip was pointing towards his face, he relaxed his grip slightly and the shaft came out the other end instead, the blunt end now protruding from his clenched fist like a dagger. He then ground his knee further into Alvin’s wounded arm until he heard something snap and the man’s grip on him eased. Bishop shook his hand free and immediately plunged the blunt end of the pencil down into Alvin’s face. Towards the area where Alvin’s cheek would have been if he hadn’t turned his head towards the snapping sound.

  It pierced Alvin’s left eye instead.

  The eyeball immediately collapsed in on itself and blood and dark tissue spurted from the wound. Bishop clamped his other hand over Alvin’s mouth to stifle the man’s animal cries and adjusted his position to avoid the blood. Alvin’s movements became frenzied and Bishop took his hands away, grabbed the man’s head by the ears and slammed it against the floor. The struggling immediately stopped as the Aryan lost consciousness, blood pooling around his head like a red halo.

  Bishop placed his fingers against Alvin’s artery to check for a pulse. Still alive. He was trying to decide whether that was good or bad when a shaky voice from behind him said, ‘Whoa.’

  Bishop got to his feet and looked down at Alvin, frowning as he thought through the pros and cons of leaving him and the one outside alive. After a moment, he decided to go with the lesser of two evils.

  ‘What now, man?’ asked Falstaff.

  Bishop turned to see him raising himself up against the wall, still in pain. ‘You say, “Two weeks, maybe less,” and then you leave,’ he said.

  ‘Two weeks it is.’ The younger man tried to smile and failed. ‘Hey, maybe less.’

  Bishop nodded. ‘So get going.’ After a few seconds Falstaff still had not moved. ‘I didn’t do it for you,’ he said, ‘so don’t bother. Get moving. Keep to the left.’

  Falstaff let out a long breath. ‘Sure. Sure, man. I’m on it.’ He stepped over the body and ran towards the door. When he pushed it open he stopped by the second man on the floor outside and looked back at Bishop briefly. Then he was gone.

  Bishop studied the pencil shaft in Alvin’s eye. It was shiny with blood now, obscuring any prints it might have held. He jogged over to the door and checked outside. Still nobody, but that could change at any time. Grabbing monkey boy’s wrists, he dragged him back into the room and dropped him next to his partner. Then he wiped the mirror piece clean and dropped it in the pool of blood near Alvin’s head.

  He walked back towards the door and stopped by the magazine he’d used earlier. And people complained GQ had too many ads. He tore the covers off and put them in his pocket. He’d flush them in the cell later.

  Glancing across at the closed librarian’s door behind its barred wall of steel, he could still hear the TV through the frosted glass pane. The state employee was either asleep or still wrapped up in the football. Either option was fine with Bishop. With a final look around the room, he pushed through the door and walked back to his cellblock.

  Fifteen days. He just needed to steer clear of any further trouble for the next fifteen days.

  SEVEN

  Facing the exercise yard with his back t
o the wall of F Block, Bishop shook his head at the scene in front of him. A small guy was attempting to drive a long shot from thirty yards, only to crumple under an intercept from a huge point guard. He obviously hadn’t yet worked out that pace could only get you so far. To beat them you had to be crafty.

  Standing there was about as much exercise as Bishop could hope for since the library incident a fortnight before. With the contract out on him, it was too dangerous. Even a trip to the shower room had to be carefully planned in advance.

  The official investigation had been a joke, as he knew it would be. As long as the status quo wasn’t disrupted too much, nobody really gave a damn who got hurt. Alvin was currently on a morphine drip in the prison infirmary, but those who mattered knew what had gone down once his partner spilled his guts to the current chief of the Aryan Brotherhood. And of course, Bishop had immediately been labelled a ‘target of opportunity’. Within days, he had successfully fended off two separate attacks. Nothing since then, but it was only a matter of time.

  A smart man would have closed the book on the two Aryans when he had the chance, but cold-blooded executions had never really been his style. Besides, he figured two unnecessary killings here would have brought down additional security he could do without.

  Raising his head to the guard turrets atop the sixty-foot-high concrete walls on this west side, Bishop saw six – no, seven – equally spaced armed guards looking down. He knew behind those walls, surrounding the entire prison, lay a concrete no-man’s-land filled with cameras, motion detectors and highly trained dogs. And if, by some miracle, you made it that far you had an impenetrable twenty-foot-high barrier of razor wire to look forward to.

  There was always a way, though. Always.

  He took a deep breath. The effect of the sun on his face was calming and he closed his eyes, relishing the feeling. It would be so easy to let go for a few moments. Just a few. Since being sent down, Bishop’s sleep patterns had been erratic at best. And it wasn’t because of the noise. Eight years in the Marine Corps and you learn to sleep anywhere, under any conditions. This was different. In here, any time he began to drift off at night, his mind began working and reworking the same questions that consumed his waking hours. Keeping him awake and further feeding the anger that bubbled away at a steady boil just beneath the surface. But Bishop liked that anger. It kept him sharp and motivated. It had been a constant companion for the last two years and eight months, and he’d be taking it with him when he left. That was for damn sure.

  Still, at least Falstaff had come through like he promised. Bishop reached under his collar, letting his fingers brush across the thick black band around his neck until they found the smooth, polished surface of the onyx totem hanging underneath.

  He let the insults being thrown across the court wash over him as he rubbed the Buddha icon, visualizing a beer in one hand and two hours to waste at the Giants Stadium watching the Red Bulls slaughter the visitors. Yeah, the small pleasures definitely took on greater significance when they were taken away from you.

  But now wasn’t the time to let his guard down. Especially not with the all-important delivery tomorrow.

  Exercise time was almost over. Pushing away from the wall, he moved back inside F Block before everyone else got called in, his senses on high alert as he began the long trek back to the cell. He passed small groups of cons of varying ethnic denominations, most of whom avoided him like the plague, and managed to keep a minimum of three feet between himself and the rest of the human race as he moved amongst them.

  He entered the main section and looked up at the three tiers of cells. The incessant din of two hundred prisoners packed closely together filled the air like smoke. More would join once they blew the whistle in the yard. Cons walked in and out of cells, playing cards, boiling noodles, making deals and avoiding eyes. Some would be in the TV room on the second tier, catching up on the soaps. Most faces turned from him as he passed. Word had gotten around he wasn’t long for this world and nobody wanted to be seen talking to a dead man.

  Bishop climbed the stairs and at the top tier turned left on the catwalk with his hand on the rail. As he walked towards his two-man cell, he noticed all the other cells between the stairs and his were empty. And he didn’t see any movement in the ones beyond, either.

  He came to a stop outside the cubicle he’d called home for the last three years and stared at the two large men waiting for him inside.

  EIGHT

  For whatever reason, a con involved in a conflict with a fellow inmate might find himself unable or unwilling to tackle the problem on his own, and that’s usually where the Three Bears came in. Big Bear, Bigger Bear and Biggest Bear. For a price, they would transfer any load onto their large shoulders and bring a natural end to the conflict.

  Once the Three Bears were hired, the client received three guarantees. One: the job would be completed exactly to his specifications. Two: only hands would be used. And three: it would be expensive. In a climate where few could be trusted, the Three Bears prided themselves on their professionalism, their success rate and the almost surgical precision with which they could inflict injury on a person’s body. Sometimes to within an inch of that person’s life. Occasionally beyond, if the rumours were true.

  Two of them were currently occupying Bishop’s cell.

  ‘Meatloaf day today,’ said Bigger Bear, the more effusive brother. His black hair was cropped close to the skull and he had intricate tattoos from the neck down. He lay on Bishop’s lower bunk reading one of Jorge’s long letters from his ex-wife. ‘How was it?’

  Bishop leaned against the cell door, his expression neutral, his mind refusing to let his body respond to the danger the brothers represented. First rule in here: never let anyone know what you’re really thinking or feeling. But then, that had never been much of a problem for Bishop. ‘How was what?’ he asked.

  Big Bear turned from Bishop’s small, barred window and said, ‘You know . . .’ He raised an imaginary spoon to his mouth and made chewing motions before turning back to the window.

  Bishop shrugged. ‘Not hungry.’

  ‘Wise man,’ Bigger Bear said and continued reading the letter. After a few seconds Bishop saw the shadow of Biggest Bear hit the cell wall in front of him. It was substantially taller and wider than his. That made three, then. Bears always came in threes.

  After a while, Bigger shook his head, put the letter down and rose from the bunk. He had three inches on Bishop and looked down at him with a puzzled frown. ‘Your cellmate’s seriously weird, man. Still writing puppy dog letters to a bitch who left him for another fool five years ago. What’s with that?’

  Bishop shrugged again. ‘I don’t ask.’

  ‘Maybe you should.’ Bigger Bear started tapping his forefinger repeatedly against his upper lip and looked past Bishop to Biggest Bear. Bishop felt a large hand urge him into the centre of the room.

  ‘Me, I’m curious about everything and everyone,’ Bigger said. ‘Like you, man.’

  ‘What you see is what you get.’

  ‘What I see, I don’t get. For instance, why’d you turn that white boy into a cyclops?’

  ‘We had a slight disagreement.’

  ‘Yeah? Over what?’

  ‘Whose turn it was to borrow the library’s only copy of Little Women.’

  Bishop heard a throaty chuckle from behind him, but Bigger’s frown remained. Big Bear had turned from the window and was watching his brother closely.

  Bigger sighed. ‘A comedian. Still, a contract’s a contract.’ He looked at a point above Bishop’s head and said, ‘Okay.’

  A large, bronze, hairless arm encircled Bishop’s neck and pulled him back like an anaconda with its prey. Instinctively, Bishop brought both hands up to the man’s arm, but the other two brothers took Bishop’s wrists and yanked them behind his body. Somehow Biggest Bear managed to grip both in his one massive hand. Bishop could still use his legs, but all other avenues had been closed in three quick actions.


  Bigger Bear left his line of sight, presumably to act as lookout, while the smallest brother flexed his fingers several times. His face grew solemn as he let his eyes roam over Bishop’s anatomy. The lower torso seemed to get the most attention. After a few moments he pursed his lips, clenched both fists into hard balls and pulled his right arm back.

  Bishop felt a sudden, flaring agony in his midriff. It was unlike any pain he’d known, despite his experiences in the Corps. Jesus Christ, that was one punch. His stomach felt like someone had set fire to it. When he finally finished hacking, he raised his eyes to see Big Bear in the same boxer’s crouch as before. This time Bishop saw the strike coming and clenched his muscles just before it made contact.

  It didn’t help.

  He dry-heaved and the pain only intensified. He tasted blood at the back of his throat and coughed repeatedly.

  When his breathing eventually returned to normal, Big Bear approached him and lifted his head up by the hair, studied his face for a few seconds. He then looked at Bigger by the doorway, still flexing his right hand. A silent exchange was taking place but Bishop had no clue as to what was being said.

  Big turned back and released Bishop’s hair. Then he drew back his right arm once more.

  NINE

  Unlocking the door to C-1, Brendan Cook entered the room reserved for the more volatile patients. It was a smallish room. Two beds bolted to the floor, separated by a wide aisle and a barred window. He looked over at the unconscious man on the left-hand bed. A real mess this one, inside and out, with bandages covering much of his face and an IV drip protruding from each arm.

  ‘How’s it hanging, doc?’

  Cook jumped at the muffled, tinny sound coming from the pocket of his white coat. He checked his diver’s watch. 02.03 already and he’d forgotten to check in. Pulling the walkie-talkie out, he pressed the transmit button.