Page 7 of Ride the Whirlwind

“I believe you. However, why the haste? When you told me about the escape, you sounded like there was no hurry. What made you change your mind?” Suddenly, Ardan's eyes widened in horror, and a lump formed in his throat. “Something's wrong at The Base, and you found out somehow. Tell me the truth, Brodie!”

“One of the guards carries a torch for Cook for quite a long time, and he keeps him updated with the latest news. Two days ago, the guy in question overheard an interesting conversation between two of the warden's minions. Apparently, the one-hour visit your family got approval for was a trap to lure them here and lock them up.”

“The bastards planned to do what?” Ardan balled his hands into fists, clenching them until the knuckles turned white and almost protruding the skin. “Goddamn, filthy animals. How dare they! Thank gods Pater, Spitfire, and the others discovered the lie and avoided the trap! I'll hit the road whenever you tell me to, and once outside, you'll go with me to The Base.”

“Thank you for the kind offer. To be honest, I could use a roof over my head and a bed to lie in at night because I don't think any of my siblings would be thrilled to have me as a guest. Gay or not, I'm a convicted felon who shot a pregnant woman and three men in cold blood.” Brodie ran a hand over his face, sighing in defeat.

“You don't need those people in your life,” Ardan whispered, gently touching his cellmate's shoulder. “Everyone at The Base would be happy to have a resourceful, caring, and smart guy like you as a friend. Plus, the kiddies will love their brand new, huge stuffie. So, what's the big plan?”

Brodie didn't answer right away; for a few moments, he stared into Ardan's incandescent eyes, letting himself be contaminated by the man's enthusiasm. Once the sadness that had overtaken him at the thought of his siblings not wanting him in their life was gone, he started to talk about the escape plan, his voice becoming lively as he revealed the details to Ardan.

Cook got his hands on some very strong sleeping pills that he was going to mix in the guards' food, knocking them out cold for about two hours. That would give the two enough time to get out of the jail, change their clothes, and, hopefully, convince someone to give them a ride to The Base. Also, Brodie would reverse the surveillance system's circuit so the cameras would show the guards snoring when they were supposed to patrol instead of being directed at the cells and corridors.

The plan was flawless, everything was calculated with mathematical precision, from the time the sleeping pills would take to kick in to how long it would take to the two of them to get out of the jail's perimeter. However, Ardan had a bad feeling about the whole thing. He felt his stomach tightening into a knot from the second Brodie told him about the plan.

Then, he realized: his cellmate didn't mention how he was going to take care of the extremely dangerous inmates known as the beasts who lived in regular prison cells and envied the so-called high-risk inmates' privileges. The system keeping the beasts' cells locked was the only one operated from the security room, and, with the guards sleeping, there was no one to activate it.

Brodie listened to Ardan voicing his concern, then told him that the effect of the pills would show half an hour after they would be administered, leaving the guards enough time to lock the cages. All the inmates, the man said, had to be back into their cells ten minutes after the last one finished eating dinner.

In the three decades he spent in that place, Brodie learned the schedule by heart, and his explanations calmed Ardan down, making him relax. A tiny voice inside his head continued to nag him for a while, but he silenced it in the end. He trusted his cellmate completely and had no reason to believe something would go wrong once the man came with all the extra explanations.

The night and the next day flew fast, and dinner time came before the two men knew it. Except the three guards supervising the beasts interacting with the group of dangerous inmates more often than usual, nothing seemed out of place. Ardan took a look at the clock on the cafeteria's wall. In less than an hour, he and Brodie would be out of that place and on their way to The Base.

CHAPTER 6

When he finally heard the loud click announcing that the doors on the beasts' cells were locked, Brodie let out a sigh of relief. “It was about time,” he said to himself, heading to his cell to take the small backpack with the change of clothes he and Ardan would need once they got out. On the way, the man checked his old wristwatch. There’s already a five-minute delay to the initial schedule, he thought, frowning a little.

Ardan was supposed to wait for him at the end of the main hall, which had two ramifications. One of them was that it was a dead end, and the other was that it led to a secret passage Brodie had discovered during one of his exploratory walks. The passage gave them direct access to the outside world, but at the time he found out about it, he wasn't interested in leaving the prison.

Brodie retrieved the backpack, locked the door, and was headed to the meeting point when an unsettling feeling he couldn't explain started to roil in the pit of his stomach like a hive of mad bees. The man tried to chase it away, but the closer to the destination he got, the more intense the unpleasant sensation became.

And then, the source of that uneasiness revealed to Brodie in all its horror: a group of about twenty beasts surrounded Ardan, pushing him into the dead end until his back hit the cold, hard wall. They were all armed with pipes and baseball bats, determined to end the man's life, getting dangerously closer to him.

Back straight, legs slightly apart and firmly planted on the ground with a defiant smile playing on his lips, Ardan waited for the beasts to attack. Run, you fool, Brodie screamed in his head. You don't stand a chance against them. The goddamn savages will eat you alive. However, he couldn't help stopping to admire the man's posture, his savage determination and attitude.

Scratch that, he’s going to eat them alive, Brodie thought, frantically looking around to see how he could help his cellmate. For a split second, his eyes met Ardan's, and the other man gestured with his head to the backpack. With a curt nod, Brodie threw the backpack into the middle of the crowd.

Taking advantage of the few moments of confusion following his cellmate's gesture, Ardan tried to sneak through the group of dangerous inmates, but they surrounded him again, starting to hit him. The man dodged most of the swings and managed to make one of the aggressors drop his bat, then picked it up, skillfully using it against the aggressors.

For the first time in his life, Brodie regretted that he didn't pay more attention to some form of combat or self-defense techniques, relying too much on the protection the prison's thick walls and the presence of the guards offered. However, he had one of the most powerful and effective weapons out there—his mind—and he was going to use it to get him and Ardan out of that goddamn place.

Picking the backpack up from the floor, Brodie randomly hit a few brick-built guards, distracting them and turning himself into the target of their rage. With the beasts on his tail, the man ran to the security system's command center, activating all the alarms and surveillance cameras. He hoped the guards would wake up and would be lucid enough to disperse the crowd of dangerous inmates and get the situation under control.

Meanwhile, in the dead end, Ardan skillfully wielded the bat, getting a few attackers out of the game for good. However, some of the hits seriously affected him, especially on the back and sides of his torso. He started to wheeze when breathing and suspected one of the broken ribs may have punctured his lung, sending a sharp pain through his body every time he inhaled.

For a split second, Ardan didn't pay attention to one of his opponents' sneaky moves and was surprised by the blow landing at the back of his head that made him fall to the ground. For almost a minute, the man was overwhelmed by the aggressors, who hit and kicked him all over, but somehow, he managed to gather his strength, retrieved the bat, and stood, intimidating the attackers.

Meanwhile, the inmates who followed Brodie managed to corner him, and although thanks to his quick reflexes, he was able to reject most of the blows, some of them landed on his back and legs, almost sending him down to the floor. More likely, the beasts would have finished him off if not for the guards who came running from the opposite end of the hall, pointing their guns in the group's direction.

Thanking his lucky star, Brodie ran back to where he left Ardan, hoping the man was still in one piece. To his relief and amazement, he was still standing, rejecting blow after blow and fighting back, the sound of cracked bones and the wails of the aggressors accompanying every hit of his bat. Anyway, he was starting to get tired, and the attackers sensed that, getting inches close to him, ready to tear him to pieces.

Getting himself together, Brodie found a pipe and went blindly into the middle of the crowd, randomly hitting the inmates who threatened to put him on the floor once again. Finally, he reached a dizzy, disoriented Ardan and dragged him to the secret passage.

The two men crossed the yard without meeting any obstacle, all the guards being busy with getting the beasts back into their cells. However, since the main gate was locked, they had to sneak under a barbed wire fence separating the prison's perimeter from a private landing strip belonging to one of the richest businessmen in San Francisco.

For Ardan, drained of energy with at least two broken ribs putting pressure on his lungs or having already punctured them, crawling under the barb wire fence was pure torture. When he finally made it to the other side, he stood up, but, in spite of his colossal effort and Brodie's help, he fell to the ground after only a few steps. His former cellmate crouched down to help him, but his legs also gave out and he fell on his knees, helpless.

Right then, a limousine entered on the landing strip, heading straight toward the two men. Closing his eyes, Brodie covered Ardan with his body in a desperate attempt to protect him from collision. But the stars smiled down on him once more because whoever was behind the wheel had exceptional driving skills, stopping the vehicle inches away from the two men.

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