by GB Williams
Between him and MR3 was not just the gate, but two heavy-set thugs with vicious blades. One weapon was a meat cleaver, so the other was probably from the kitchen, too. They lounged until someone approached, then jumped to attention. Charlie didn’t want to believe he’d seen who he’d seen, but he wasn’t overly surprised.
Pulling back, he leaned against the wall, looked heavenward, and swore.
‘Well?’ Carlisle kept the harsh demand low.
‘Peter Jones.’
‘The Governor?’ Carlisle needed confirmation. ‘The rot really does go all the way to the top.’
‘Well, it couldn’t stop with Robbins,’ Keen muttered, ‘but I wasn’t sure Jones was smart enough for all this.’
Charlie risked popping his head around the corner again. This time, he watched the men’s attention caught by something else, one of them put his hand straight to his crotch. A naked woman walked into view. Charlie was so stunned, it took him a moment to realise it was Rebecca Fry. He could hear other men’s voices, as Fry moved towards them. She ran her hand over their groins, whispered something, then the three of them moved out of sight. When the way was clear, Charlie walked up to the gate, which took a moment to unlock. ‘We’re through,’ he whispered. ‘Maintenance Room Three ahead.’
‘Negative.’
He greeted that command with a restrained expletive.
‘I’m screwed,’ Teddington allowed, finding herself surprisingly calm. What was left to fear? Charlie was dead, she would be soon. As far as she could tell, Piper couldn’t get here in time. ‘All of my rescues are gone. Winehouse is doing this to control a wing. What’s your excuse?’
‘Reformation.’ Jones crouched down before her. ‘If you’d been susceptible, you would have been an asset to the team, but you and Malkin over there are going to have to be the sacrificial lambs to the greater good.’
‘Are you Leo?’ she asked. ‘Odd choice for a code name.’
‘It’s not a code name,’ he told her easily. ‘It’s my name. Leonard Peter Jones.’
She frowned. ‘That’s not on the records, or your degree certificates.’
He shrugged; it clearly wasn’t important to him. ‘I didn’t like the name in school, so had it removed by deed poll.’
The more she learned about the man, the odder he became. ‘What about Bell?’ she asked. ‘Winehouse said he was dead.’
‘He is,’ Winehouse was overly happy to tell her.
She didn’t dare look at the smug bastard. Accepting she was going to die was somehow easier than accepting Charlie already had. ‘What’s your cover story there?’
Jones shrugged. ‘He’s a bent cop. Plenty of people in here want him dead. He’s just another insignificant, who’ll get lost along the way.’
If Jones thought that, he hadn’t understood what he’d read in the papers or in Charlie’s fan mail. ‘So you just agreed to have him killed, because you could?’
‘I’m not the one bank-rolling that.’
‘Who is?’
‘What’s it to you?’
She laughed. ‘Nothing, but I’m wondering if it’s something to do with Mansel-Jones. You’re a Jones,’ she said. ‘If you’d lie about your first name, why not lie about your surname. Are you really a Mansel-Jones?’
Teddington swallowed as she peered up at the Guv. She had to be careful how she played this. Piper would be listening. With luck, his men were already calming the wings. ‘Bell killed a Mansel-Jones. Was he family? Is this some kind of petty revenge?’
‘Petty revenge!’ Jones spat in her face with the roar. ‘Bell appointed himself judge, jury, and executioner.’
‘Of a murderous -’
Her words were cut off by his punch. This time, she did yell. Her head snapped back against the wall, her vision swam. She felt her lip split, felt her teeth rattle, tasted her own blood. She wondered if the dentist would see her tomorrow, then laughed hysterically at the ridiculous notion she would get to see tomorrow.
The voice in Charlie’s ear repeated. ‘Negative. Do not proceed to MR3. We are moving in at the front of the building, locking this thing down, but you hold back. The Honey,’ not the most imaginative code name ever, ‘has Papa Bear, and the story is unfolding.’
Listening to orders from someone who wasn’t risking his life was never easy for those on the front line, but Charlie knew a confession would go a long way to securing a conviction.
But, it was Teddington’s life on the line here. Wanting to rush in to save her was one thing, but he had to balance that against the risk of barrelling in like a fool and getting her killed. He bit his lip, and moved back to the adjoining corridor. From there, they could hear the movements of other men, the sounds of sex.
Carlisle stepped around him, eyeing the commotion going on where Fry had been taken, thankfully out of the path to MR3. ‘Jesus,’ he said, when he moved back. ‘Three of them, one of her.’
Then, there was the sound of slapping, and Fry cried out. Charlie moved back to the gate, some masochistic tendency demanding he know what was going on. Fry telling them to stop, begging them to stop, was a waste of breath. She’d sacrificed herself, and now, she was paying the price, as they forced themselves inside her in every way possible. She was screaming, and the pain was real.
‘You want some of this?’ one of the men looked up and asked him. Thankfully, these men weren’t from C-Wing. They didn’t know who he was.
A third man Charlie hadn’t seen before had moved in to grab Fry’s head, gripping her jaw, stopping the screaming, gagging her with his cock.
‘No thanks,’ Charlie muttered. ‘You done with that knife?’ He pointed to the carving knife the man was carrying.
For a second the man just looked at it dumb, then handed it over. ‘Don’t need it for this one.’
Charlie nearly forgot to reach for it, he was so stunned at the agreement, but he stepped through the gate and took the weapon before turning away. With no more guards to stop him, he walked towards Maintenance Room Three, trying to block out the sounds of the desperate struggle behind him.
‘There’s nothing you could do,’ he heard Keen tell Carlisle, stopping him from getting distracted by the rape. When he checked over his shoulder, Charlie saw Carlisle looked as wretched as he felt.
It was true, but that truth didn’t lessen the self-loathing of leaving a woman to such a fate.
Teddington looked up at Jones. If he liked submissive women, maybe that was something that she should think about. ‘Why me?’ she asked plaintively.
‘Why not?’ Jones asked. ‘You made yourself a target.’
‘You sent Robbins to my home that night. To plant those papers?’
‘Setting you up was so easy. I know you were taken to the station and held overnight. I can’t believe they didn’t charge you.’
‘Just shows how useless that Piper bloke is,’ Robbins said from behind them.
‘Who did them?’ Teddington asked. ‘Who forged it all?’
‘Regis.’
She hung her head.
‘You should be proud.’
Jones, put his hand beneath her chin, and made her look at him, even as his thumb pressed the split on her lip. Apparently, he liked causing pain. She was thankful he didn’t appear to be carrying a weapon.
‘You are to be instrumental in the sweeping reforms that will ensure no officer ever again has to be afraid to walk a landing for fear of shiv or anal rape.’
The manic gleam in his eye scared Teddington more than his words.
‘I’m going to make this world better. No more over-crowding, no more under staffing. Just a nice, quiet, steady life.’
That would be good, but she didn’t believe it possible. ‘How?’
‘Politics.’
She’d forgotten in all this that he was running for election somewhere.
He pressed one last time on her damaged lip, then stood and puffed up like a peacock. Strutted his stuff. ‘It will take time, but I’ll introduce a new Private
Members Bill. Bring back the death sentence for multiple convictions. That’ll reduce prisoner numbers.’
Teddington stared at him. The man was utterly delusional. The British public might be getting more radical, but they weren’t that radical. Were they?
‘We, the humble honest tax payer, won’t have to continually pay for these institutionalised scumbags to live in luxury.’
Luxury? She swallowed, wondering when Jones had last looked into the cells, when Jones had last walked in the real world, full stop. She kept her voice level. ‘This is nuts.’
‘We’ve more of a supportive following than you think. These hard times have made for harder people,’ Jones went on. ‘Tougher immigration laws are already going through, more will follow, and soon – thanks to your sacrifice – the campaign for the return of the death sentence will start. It’ll all be in your honour, and, of course, memory. Ariadne’s Law, perhaps? Winehouse, a knife. I want to kill this bitch.’
32
‘Go!’ the voice in his ear virtually screamed. ‘Get her out!’
Charlie smashed the door in with one good kick. It hadn’t been locked, and the movement drew all attention to him, as he strode into the room.
Winehouse was to his right with Runt and Malkin, to his left, Holden and Robbins. And directly in front, Jones rose from where he knelt before Teddington. Holden and Robbins lunged at Charlie, while Jones was hauling Teddington to her feet. Runt raised his arm, and Holden, who’d got closer to Charlie than Robbins, jerked to the ticking sound, howled, and fell to the floor in a twitching, trouser-wetting heap. Charlie was glad the big man was apparently on his side.
Robbins only hesitated long enough to jump over the body, as he leapt towards Charlie, who side-stepped, pulling the blade across Robbins’ front. He felt the warmth of another man’s blood on his hands, but Robbins was neither down nor out. Carlisle grabbed him, twisting him round. In Charlie’s peripheral vision, he saw Keen facing Winehouse; the younger man looked momentarily cocky, then an unexpectedly accurate karate kick chopped him down to size. Runt moved over and stamped on Winehouse’s head, before grabbing his hands behind his back and producing a zip tie to bind the hands of the Garden Godfather. Charlie left Carlisle to slug it out with Robbins, and twisted to Jones.
He was faced with Teddington.
Her shirt had been reduced to cuffs hanging at her wrists, which were tied with torn sheeting to the down pipe. Her lip was split. Because of her angle to the pipe, Jones couldn’t quite hold her flat in front of him, and the awkward angle displayed welts across her back. Charlie saw the belt on the floor. Red coloured his vision, but now wasn’t the time for anger. He had to be calm, and get that damn knife away from her jugular.
‘What does it take to get rid of you?’ Jones demanded. His left hand was around Teddington’s neck holding her up against him, nearly choking her, as his right hand moved down to slice the binding at her wrists.
Charlie knew she was looking at him, her eyes were wide, but he didn’t dare meet her gaze - that might just push him places he couldn’t afford to go.
‘What’s the plan, Jones?’ he asked, as the Guv finally released the material around Teddington’s wrists.
The knife was instantly back at her neck as his left hand moved to span her waist and cleave her back to his chest, the knife biting against the soft, white flesh of her throat. ‘I’m going to walk out of here, and you’re going to let me.’
Teddington was keeping her eyes down, dealing with this as best she could.
‘Not happening,’ Charlie snarled.
‘Let it happen,’ the voice in his ear told him.
Jones laughed, cold and humourless. ‘I know you’ve no hesitation to kill. What makes you sure I’m not the same?’
‘Step aside, Bell.’
He couldn’t believe he was hearing it, or who from, but now, Teddington looked up at him. Tear tracks marked her cheeks, but her eyes were blazing with anger. If she was at all afraid, it didn’t show. All he could do was stare at her.
‘Step,’ she grated, ‘aside.’
‘Do it.’
Piper’s voice in his ear took him back to past operations.
‘I step aside,’ Charlie spoke ostensibly to Teddington, but the words were as much for Piper, ‘you won’t live long after he’s out of this room.’
‘Step aside!’
He heard the instruction in stereo. Swallowing the lump in his throat, Charlie stepped aside.
He couldn’t look at her directly, as Jones stepped forward, which was why he had no idea just what Teddington did to make Jones grunt in surprise and pain. Then, she was stepping backwards, the pair of them falling over Holden’s prone body.
The air was forced from Jones’ lungs, as Teddington’s weight landed squarely on him. Then Teddington was over, straddling Jones, the hand with the knife held away from her. Charlie kicked out, his toe connecting with Jones’ hand, the knife went sailing away. Jones tried to scramble out from under her, but Teddington was quicker, her fear and anger overtaking any other consideration, as she took Jones’ head in both hands and smashed it repeatedly into the concrete of the floor.
Jones was weaponless, and he flailed at Teddington. A few of his punches would have landed, but Keen was dragging her off. Charlie grabbed one of Jones’ arms, Runt was on the other, then, they flipped Jones over. Runt knelt on the struggling man’s back, as he produced another zip tie to bind Jones’ hands.
Charlie turned to Teddington, but she was hugging and being hugged by Keen.
The noise in the corridor had reduced to a woman sobbing, the men around her spent and quiet.
‘They’re on their way.’
Charlie turned to Carlisle, not understanding. ‘What?’
‘C-Wing is quiet. Piper’s team are coming in. The prison officers have taken back A-Wing and B is being controlled.’
Carlisle told the room the details Charlie was being fed into his own ear. Charlie wasn’t paying attention to either voice. Mostly all he could do was stare at Teddington, wondering why she was so comfortable being held by Keen. The old man’s hand was stroking her hair, holding her tight, yet mindful of her injuries.
‘Here.’ Malkin had taken off his own shirt revealing a white vest. He placed the shirt around Teddington’s shoulders.
Charlie moved in closer.
Teddington lifted her head off Keen’s shoulder and moved away, struggling to unbutton her ruined cuffs, before wincing as she pulled Malkin’s shirt around her. Malkin had moved away, a last moment for revenge as he kicked Jones in the side. The way he groaned suggested the action hurt Malkin as much as Jones.
Teddington glanced up as Charlie moved in closer, she was trying to button the shirt, but her hands were shaking too much to close. Seeing Charlie’s confusion, she explained, keeping her voice down. ‘Charlie,’ she said, as Keen took over buttoning the shirt, ‘meet my Uncle Billy,’
Charlie felt his jaw slacken. How had he missed that?
33
Charlie didn’t bother reading the newspaper reports about the riot. Start to finish was less than an hour. Keen had never given up as much control as Jones and Winehouse had believed, and he had pulled the riot back as easily as he had started it.
The whole thing was a mess. No one came out looking good, not the prison, parole, or police services.
Jones had been vilified, but that was nothing less than he deserved. There was to be a full public enquiry.
Fry was being portrayed as a poor, hapless victim. She was still alive, her body was recovering, though it was questionable if her mind would.
Houghton from B-Wing, still calling himself Mohammed, had gained an unwelcome reputation and an increased following. It wasn’t going to last; Keen was seeing to that.
That was two months ago. Now, the prison was back to normal; people were circulating again, talking was above a hush, the backchat and the interactions, both good and bad, had returned. The balance of power had settled again. There were new rul
es, there were new guards on duty, and the population was showing the due respect. As things should be.
Sanchez had returned to work, and Teddington was due to. And, in two hours, Charlie would be gone. He was fully packed, an archive box crammed full of all his stuff. On the top, he placed the books she had sent.
The Sacred Art of Stealing.
If only it was that easy.
Teddington was watching the monitors. Having been back in work for a month, she’d done what she could to repair the records on Prism, but she wouldn’t be trusting anything she read in there for a while.
She knew what today was, but she hadn’t said anything to anyone. She was still being watched too closely. Jones might be gone, but the stain on her record wasn’t. At least no one had mentioned her relationship to Keen; if they did, one of them would have to move on, and she didn’t want that, because as the employee, she was the one who’d failed to report the fact, so she would be the one moved on. Probably to the unemployment line. Where she was now, yes, she had to prove herself all over again, but she wasn’t starting from scratch. Added to that, if the acting Governor didn’t become the new Governor, then she was going to have to go through the whole process a third time with whoever did fill that post. The future was looking like hard work, she didn’t need to make it harder.
It wasn’t going to be easy, but she was determined to show she was good at her job, because she was determined to keep her job.
‘Okay?’
She looked up at Malkin, who had transferred to monitoring since the riot; a vicious kick to the pelvis hadn’t done him any favours. Long term, he’d be fine, but was in no fit state to be on the floor just yet. ‘Fine, thanks,’ she smiled.
‘Aren’t you going to see him off?’