Page 26 of Endangered Species
Nicky swallowed hard before giving the barest hint of a nod. Cy touched their foreheads together. “Hang on for just a little longer.”
“I’ll try.”
Webster slid a tattered copy ofOf Mice and Menonto the shelf in the small dank room that was the makeshift prison library. It was the worst possible place for a room full of books. There was a wet smell to the place, a moisture in the air that warped book pages and caused damage to covers. He’d bet money there was mold behind the walls and even in the carpets, but, to him, this place was paradise.
As far as work assignments went, helping out in the prison library was a coveted gig, and he had no idea how he’d scored it when he wasn’t even technically an inmate of the prison. But he refused to question his luck, especially since it meant the only people who could get to him were the guards, and they tended to avoid the library. Webster wasn’t sure why, but he was almost positive it had to do with his unofficial boss, Javier de la Fuenta.
Javier was only a few years older than Webster, but, unlike his other Mexican Mafia counterparts, he didn’t bear the mark of somebody who ran with the major gangs on the outside. He was tall and sleek with jet black hair, a five o’clock shadow, hazel eyes that Webster probably would have fallen into had Cy not taken up permanent residence in his head.
“Hey,guero. Get your head out of the clouds. You got work to do. I don’t pay you to daydream.” There was no malice behind the man’s words. His face split into a grin, revealing perfect white teeth. Yeah, on the outside, Javier would have been another unrequited crush, for sure.
“You don’t pay me at all,” Webster reminded, sliding another book home.
“I gotta get today’s special requests ready. I’ll be back.”
Webster nodded but didn’t say anything else. His job was just to return books to their homes in the morning and wheel a cart around the pods in the afternoon, offering reading material to inmates and accepting the books due to be returned. It wasn’t his job to question what exactly one of Javier’s special requests entailed.
Tig and Iggy said Javier was cool but he was not to be fucked with. He was a high level enforcer for a gunrunner in Mexico, which was why he ran with the Mexican Mafia within the walls of the prison. He wasn’t doing a long stint, but it was apparent from day one that Javier wasn’t just peddling books. He was passing contraband.
Webster didn’t give a fuck what Javier was peddling as long as it got him out of Thor’s sight for eight hours a day. Maybe that was why Javier had chosen him? Maybe he saw the dark cloud hanging over Webster’s head and knew somebody that desperate would keep his mouth shut? Javier was always watching Webster over the tops of books or side-eyeing him as he ‘packaged’ up bundles for inmates. Sometimes, Webster swore Javier even followed him on his deliveries. It was disconcerting, but since Webster just did as he was told, he did his best to ignore it. Truthfully, he’d rather Javier follow him than Thor and his crew. At least, with Javier, his agenda was clear. Keep his pipeline moving and all would be well.
Webster would be lying to himself if he didn’t say part of him was happy that Javier’s import/export business might directly interfere with Thor’s drug running enterprise. While it wasn’t likely to make him anymore popular with the skinheads, it did make him feel more like he had a small part in making Thor’s life as miserable as he made Webster’s. That in and of itself was enough for the moment.
Webster was nearing a full month behind bars and had somehow managed to stay ahead of the guards, but not without all of it taking a toll on him. If it wasn’t for Cy, Webster would have given up weeks ago. But being in Cy’s arms every night, being able to escape under the weight of his body, the heat of his skin, the way he kissed Webster like nobody else in the world existed but him… It let him reset the clock every morning and vow to get through another day.
“Time to get going. You gotta lot of deliveries today.”
Webster looked at the rolling cart stacked full of books with tiny pieces of paper with inmates’ names stuck in the folds. “I’m on it,” Webster said, setting a book back on the return stack. “I’ll finish these when I get back.”
Javier gave an uninterested nod. Nobody gave a shit about the condition of the library, least of all the people who ran the prison. It was far more beneficial to them that they all remain ignorant of the laws and their rights. The only part of the prison library that ever saw any real action was the law section where the inmates worked to become jailhouse lawyers.
Webster made his way to pod A, finishing his rounds in a little under an hour. It was nice wandering the other pods because he was unknown to everybody, even some of the guards. There, he was just another inmate. It was easier to let his guard down when he was far away from D pod.
That was why he never saw them coming.
They came at him from behind, grabbing him somewhere between B and C pod and dragging him into a dark empty room. Blood rushed in his ears as he tried to force his eyes to adjust to the sudden dark, but then his glasses were knocked from his face and a dirty rag was shoved in his mouth, the taste of dirt and oil coating his tongue a split second before the first blow came.
It was like somebody drove an anvil into his stomach, his whole body seizing as pain rocketed through him. Two people held him against the wall and pressed the rag harder against his face as his attacker continued his assault. Another blow to the stomach, his solar plexus, his right side. He might have puked if not for the rag stuffed in his throat. Two blows to the face, and he wasn’t even sure what was upright any longer.
“Turn him around,” Thor said with a laugh. “I’ve been waiting for this for weeks.”
Webster couldn’t even fight back. When Thor’s henchmen turned him around, driving his face into the wall, he let his brain shut down, not really wanting to remember anything he was about to endure. He could feel hands tugging at his clothing, but then nothing.
“Well, this hardly seems like a fair fight.”
Javier.
“Mind your business. This ain’t your affair,” Thor said.
“That’s my employee, and you’ve interrupted my work day. Seems like this is definitely my business.” Javier sounded bored, but there was a sharp edge of warning to his cadence—something that insisted he wanted them to start something. “You boys would do well to remember that I have plenty of friends on the outside. It would be a shame if anything were to happen to people you care about all over one little nerdy white boy, no?”
Thor’s frustrated snarl would have made Webster laugh if he wasn’t a little afraid his teeth would fall out. “What the fuck do you care about this? You can find somebody else to peddle your shit. This one’s mine.”
“No. He’s not. My boss has designated this white boy as off limits. He’s a special friend of his. I know that your boss would hate to lose access to my boss’s toy box. So, you’re going to have to content yourself with a different toy. Unless, you want to explain why exactly you blew up such a valuable relationship just to get your dick wet.”
“This isn’t over,” Thor promised.
The hands holding Webster disappeared, and he could no longer bear his own weight. He slid down the wall, his face feeling wet and pliable. A foot stomped on his kidney, and then he just laid there, the pain so diffuse he wasn’t sure where it started or ended. Light suddenly flooded the room, causing stars to dance before his eyes, and then Javier hauled him into a sitting position. “Up you go,guero.”
