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  “Can we get him out of the restraints?”

  “No, sir. That wouldn’t be a good idea at all.”

  “I’ll take the risk.”

  There was an unfriendly guffaw from the guard as he mumbled under his breath.

  “You got no idea who you’re dealing with, do ya?”

  “What does that mean?”

  My eyes traveled from Mark to the guard at the end of the bed. He was the unit supervisor, and though I didn’t remember his name, I did remember him making sure the cuffs were nice and tight as he restrained me. We locked gazes for a moment, and I stared at him with an intense, silent warning until he looked away.

  Even if I didn’t give a shit about what happened to me now, I wasn’t going to let Rinaldo’s name into the conversation. There was some pride in me and also some loyalty, even if it was a fucked up version of allegiance.

  “Sorry, sir,” the supervisor said to Mark, “but I can’t release him without orders from the warden.”

  A deep sigh came from Mark as he pulled up a rolling chair close to the edge of the bed.

  “Evan?”

  I closed my eyes and tried to cross my arms in front of my chest, but of course, the handcuffs stopped me. A shudder passed through my body, and my breathing increased along with the pounding of my heart. I could taste and feel sand in my throat.

  It’s not real.

  Real or not, it sent me back into the desert.

  “Lieutenant Evan Nathanial Arden, service number zero-four-seven-two-”

  My teeth clench together to keep myself from screaming. I can’t see what the bearded man is using to whip the back of my neck down to my ass, but it stings like a motherfucker. I’m surprisingly glad I went through all the torture resistance training back in the spring.

  “Did I ask you for your numbers?” The man in front of me—the leader of the group—kicks sand into my face, and I don’t manage to close my eyes in time.

  I try to shake my head to get rid of some of the grains, but it doesn’t work. My eyes burn, and I can’t stop the desperate grunt that escapes my throat.

  “You don’t like the sand here?” the leader asks. “You should get used to it!”

  I still can’t open my eyes enough to see, but I feel rough hands on the back of my neck, and my face is shoved into the grains of sand in front of my knees. He twists and turns my head as I try to hold my breath.

  With my hands balled into fists, I opened my eyes and looked to Mark in desperation. I couldn’t seem to actually say anything as my lungs screamed for oxygen. I was practically panting, but it wasn’t enough air. All I could feel going into my chest were grains of sand.

  He put his hand on my forearm, but I jumped back away. The handcuffs bit into the skin of my wrist, and I gasped out loud. My body tensed—frozen in one spot as additional memories flooded through my brain.

  “I’m going to get those off of you,” Mark said. “Just hang in there a little while longer, okay?”

  I tried to nod but had no idea if I was successful or not.

  Mark went on to argue with the unit leader about the handcuffs and to ask why I hadn’t been moved to a cell yet. I only half paid attention to the conversation. I certainly wanted to be out of the cuffs, but I wasn’t so sure moving from one part of the prison to another was going to make any kind of significant difference. It wasn’t like I was going to be able to sleep any better on a different cot.

  “He’s still supposed to be on suicide watch.”

  “I don’t think he’s a threat to himself.”

  “You didn’t think he’d blow up a park either.”

  “I can’t treat him if he’s nonresponsive, and he’s going to be that way as long as you have him restrained. Didn’t you read my notes?”

  “Yeah, yeah, I saw them. Shell-shocked.”

  “A little outdated on your terminology but essentially correct.”

  Sometimes all you really needed was a little happy coincidence, and right at that time, about a dozen people entered the medical center—four guards and a bunch of inmates all holding their stomachs. It didn’t take long for the nurses to assess the situation and start moving the food-poisoned prisoners to the various cots around me. A few minutes later, as Mark continued to argue, another batch was brought in.

  “We’re going to need all the beds we can get,” the nurse told him.

  He let out a long sigh, glared at Mark and then at me.

  “Solitary.”

  “I’ll take it.” Mark nodded vigorously.

  Hands grabbed my arms, and I was hauled out of the medical unit and into a hallway. An elevator door opened, and my pair of escorts shoved me inside with Mark following. When the doors opened again, we walked out into the common area of one of the cell units.

  The area was carpeted and painted with warm earth tones. Several inmates sat around small, round tables in cheap plastic chairs and played cards while a few others stood around a bumper pool table. A couple of them looked up as I was led up a short flight of stairs and paraded along the curved railing that overlooked the recreation room.

  Along the walkway were several numbered doors without windows in them. I was brought to the last door which contained a small window at eye level and a slotted opening in the center. The guard unlocked the door to take me inside.

  The narrow cell was obviously designed for single occupancy. I could have walked the length between the door and the tall, narrow window overlooking downtown Chicago in about four steps. A metal-framed bed in the center took up most of the floor space. The legs of the bed were bolted to the floor, and I could see four loops that could be used for restraining straps on the sides. Aside from the obligatory toilet and sink, there was only a small writing desk with a single, thin drawer under the tabletop, a stool, and a locker shoved up against the foot of the bed to complete the room.

  As soon as I was inside, the guard removed the cuffs, and I felt nearly dizzy with relief as the weight left me. I squeezed my hands into fists a couple of times to restore the feeling of blood running freely through my veins and tried to take a few long breaths.

  “I’d like to have my session with Mr. Arden now,” Mark said with conviction.

  Another long sigh from the guard, but he didn’t protest. He moved outside the cell, locked the door, and peered at us through the window as Mark ran his hand through his hair and watched me.

  Without any other direction, I sat down on the edge of the bed and rubbed my wrists. Once I had myself convinced that the restraints were really gone, I let out a long sigh and closed my eyes. Now I could wrap my arms around my gut and try to force myself to think of anything but sand.

  Mark pulled the stool next to the bed and sat on it.

  Glancing back to his face, I could see how distressed he was and felt a little bad about it. I knew he’d tried to help on more than one occasion; it just wasn’t the kind of help I was seeking. I needed to be able to sleep—that’s all I had wanted. He couldn’t do that, though, because he wasn’t going to break that patient-counselor code long enough to lie down in bed with me.

  Without the cuffs around my wrists, I managed to find my voice.

  “Sorry to disappoint you, sir,” I said.

  Another sigh.

  “I’m not disappointed,” he said.

  I raised an eyebrow at him. I didn’t believe a word of it—he was a proud guy and considered himself good at what he did. It wasn’t his fault I wouldn’t tell him everything that was going on in my head. It wouldn’t have helped anyway.

  “I’m angrier with myself,” Mark claimed, “because I didn’t see this coming. Not at all. It’s rare I’m caught so off-guard.”

  My chest tightened as memories flooded over my brain like an ice-cold shower. There was a time I thought I understood people when I really didn’t—not at all. A single conversation changed everything.

  “Do you know what she said to me?” I asked Mark.

  “Who?”

  I turned my head toward him
, but my vision was focused entirely inward.

  “The wife of the journalist guy who was killed in the video. You remember that guy?”

  “Yeah, I do. You told them to kill you instead of him.”

  “Yeah, that guy.” I nodded, remembering. “His wife came to the hospital in Virginia, and they told me who she was before I ever talked to her. My stomach was all tied up before she even walked into the room. I mean, I’d watched her husband die, ya know? I couldn’t do anything about it. Even though I told them to kill me, it didn’t make any difference—they wouldn’t listen. I think they wanted it to be him because he wasn’t military and because he did have a family.”

  I shifted and bumped the edge of the metal bed with my shoe. The clang from the springs reverberated and caught my attention. I stared down at the base of the bed, saw the loops meant for restraints again, and could nearly feel the sandy walls of the hole around my shoulders.

  “What did she say to you, Evan?”

  I shook my head a bit to clear it.

  “She came up and sat down next to me,” I said as the detail of the memory returned. “For the longest time we just looked at each other, and eventually I couldn’t take it anymore. I started blathering about how sorry I was and about how I tried to get them to take me instead, but they wouldn’t listen. I probably would have dropped down to my knees and started crying, but she stopped me.”

  I turned my head to Mark and looked him straight in the eye.

  “That’s when she said it was all okay,” I told him. “I figured she was going to start telling me how it wasn’t my fault and there was nothing I could do—the shrinks in the hospital in Germany had said that—but she didn’t. She told me it was okay because she was glad. She was glad he was gone, and now she and her girls could move on with their lives without constantly being in his shadow. She said he was never there for them, and now that he was dead, she could use the insurance money to start up the flower shop she always wanted and he wouldn’t support.”

  Mark’s eyes widened, and he opened his mouth to say something, but nothing came out.

  “She didn’t fucking care,” I told him. I could feel the tension in my voice as much as I could hear it. “She was happy he was dead. I was willing to die for him—a guy whose name I didn’t even know—and the person who should have cared about him the most didn’t give a shit.”

  My sides and stomach tightened up as I remembered the look of…of elation in her eyes as she told me about her business venture and how excited she was to be her own boss and run her own company. I had watched her and waited for her to tell me he was smacking her around or doing things to their daughters that he shouldn’t, but she said none of that. He just hadn’t liked the idea of her going into business on her own instead of working her steady, corporate job.

  My throat seized up, and I forced myself to swallow. It hurt, but the pain was nothing compared to what was happening in my head. I needed to crawl back inside again. I needed to stop thinking and stop remembering.

  But I couldn’t.

  “That’s when I figured it out,” I said quietly. “People live and they die, and it doesn’t fucking matter to anyone around them. Whatever happens, happens. People move on, and they’re probably better off because of it.”

  “That’s what changed you,” he whispered. “I knew there was something that made you different from how all the reports from your rescue described you. I should have pressed you before when I first thought there was something about that video you weren’t telling me. I assumed it was something they did off camera—something classified.”

  I shook my head.

  “I’m very good at being who I am,” I told him. “Don’t blame yourself.”

  “Who are you, Evan?”

  I shook my head.

  “Doesn’t matter. Not now.” I’d fucked up far too publicly, and I couldn’t hide it. It occurred to me that Rinaldo might never refer to me as “son” again, and I leaned back against the head of the medical center cot and closed my eyes. My heart was starting to race, and I feared losing the handcuffs and a bit of privacy weren’t going to be enough to allow me to sleep.

  “It matters to me.” Mark’s voice was quiet but earnest.

  I shook my head.

  Nothing about the conversation was going to go anywhere, so I ended it with my silence.

  Chapter 2—Possible Forgiveness

  With the illness of the inmates identified as the flu instead of the breakfast sausages, I was permanently assigned into the general inmate population to make room for the physically sick. I remained in the same maximum security cell, and there was always a guard outside of it, but at least I wasn’t shackled to the bedrail constantly. I was even allowed into the prison’s gym to work out and up to the top of the building for a little outside time.

  Basketball hoops and prisoners hanging out and smoking filled the triangular shaped exercise area at the very top of the building. I wasn’t much of a basketball player on a good day, and I hadn’t had too many good days recently, so I stuck with sitting up against the wall and alternating between staring at the cloudy sky and staring at the cement under my prison-issue sneakers.

  My head was swimmy from lack of sleep, so I closed my eyes and tried to stop the accompanying nausea by swallowing repeatedly. It helped a little but not enough. I had been thinking about my dog, Odin, and wondered if I would be able to sleep if he were allowed in a cell with me.

  Lia should have him now as one of the arresting officers had promised. She would take good care of him—I had no doubt about that. He liked her, too. He’d taken to her pretty much the moment she lay down in my bed, much like I had taken to her.

  “Arden, right?”

  I opened my eyes and looked at the heavily muscled, thirty-something guy with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth and a distinctly Mexican accent but didn’t recognize him. There wasn’t any reason to respond to him either, so I didn’t. He wasn’t to be deterred and sat down next to me.

  “I met you once,” he claimed. “The name’s Pablo. I ran snow for your boss before I got caught for possession with intent. I got sentenced to six-to-ten, but they haven’t gotten around to moving me to Marion yet.”

  He still didn’t look familiar, but his story rang a bell. There were three guys busted about a year ago, and I assumed he must be one of them. I still didn’t see his relationship in Moretti’s business as a reason to acknowledge him, though. There were probably twenty guys in here at any given time who had relationships to the organization in one way or another.

  Pablo continued to talk anyway.

  “I heard about why you’re in here,” he said.

  I took in a long, deep breath before leaning forward and resting my arms on my knees. The cement beneath my heels was cracked, and I kicked a bit of it with my toe to knock a loose chunk of it away.

  “I got the routine down here,” Pablo said, “so if you have any questions or anything…”

  His voice trailed off as I sighed and looked up at him darkly.

  There was a scar on his forearm that was certainly the result of a knife fight, and his calloused palms were indicative of someone who liked to spend his free time lifting weights and proving he had more testosterone than anyone else at the gym. The belly hanging out in front of him and the cigarette made it obvious he wasn’t a health nut at all. He was more than likely one of those who just liked to brag about how much he could bench press.

  “Do I look like I give a shit?” I asked him.

  He paused and licked his lips nervously.

  “No,” he admitted as he looked to his pocket to pull out another cigarette. “Still, if you need anything, I’ll help ya out. While I’m still here, anyway.”

  My eyes wandered over him. He had a lot of upper body strength, but his legs weren’t as strong. He either did a lot of lifting and manual labor activities, or he just hated doing squats at the gym so never worked out his legs like he did his arms. He had a variety of uninteresting tatt
oos that were obviously done by a novice artist, probably in exchange for coke, and short-cropped, black, greasy hair.

  I watched the cigarette dangling out of his mouth and wondered what Jonathan was doing right at that moment. I also had a clear memory of leaning back against the side of the motor pool to sneak a cigarette with a young private in my unit.

  “Got an extra one of those?” I asked.

  “Sure,” Pablo said.

  He handed me a smoke and a pack of matches. It was too windy to use matches, so he handed his own cigarette over to me so I could monkey-fuck it to light mine. The smoke burned in my lungs in a way that was immediately familiar and long-forgotten at the same time. It took a couple tries before I got the hang of inhaling again.

  Pablo remained silent for a while as I finished the cigarette and ground it out into the cement crack beneath my shoe. I tried to breathe normally for a minute as my lungs attempted to remember how to deal with the smoke and whatever other shit they put in those things.

  “You want another one?”

  “Not now,” I replied. “Thanks.”

  “You let me know,” Pablo said. “I’ll hook you up with some if you want them.”

  I nodded. I wasn’t sure if I really wanted another one, though. My lungs still burned, and I coughed a couple of times, which caused Pablo to snicker quietly. He shrugged a shoulder when I glanced at him and raised an eyebrow.

  “You gonna kill me for thinking that’s kinda funny?” he asked.

  Other times—other days—I would have. Well, I would have considered it anyway. At the moment, I wasn’t exactly in the right frame of mind. I obviously didn’t have a gun on me, and though I was quite sure I could get a shiv of some kind delivered to my hands without a lot of trouble, they were messy. If I was going to kill Pablo, it would have to be with my hands, and that was just a lot of effort for a chuckle at my expense.

  “No,” I finally said, “I’m not in the mood right now.”

  He let out another laugh, but it was a nervous one. He seemed to be getting the idea that what I said hadn’t actually been a joke and it was best for him to remember who the hell I was. I might have been a little lost inside, but no one else needed to know that.