In other circumstances he wouldn’t mind a change in scenery. A new pond to cut through, countless fish trapped in a bowl in need of a good cleansing. A few dozen culled from the masses should empty the tank into a somewhat less crowded bog.
“You can try.”
“Try?” Warden scoffs. Picking up the phone in what he probably hopes is a good bluff, beginning to click numbers. “I can have it done before the hour’s out.”
Sinn'ous relaxes his shoulders, calming his body into a wash of loose muscles. Visibly changing his entire posture to one of laid-back indifference, even with his hands still fixed in front.
“Heard your daughter’s wedding was spectacular,” he murmurs softly, almost seductively. “Big turn out. Beautiful cake. Lovely reception.”
Warden’s eyes slowly crawl up from the phone, stoppingon Sinn'ous’s own. The room goes still, held in frozen suspense.
Warden places the phone back down, and it clicks in a deafening finality.
“With these extenuating circumstances it would only be best to have Jasper removed from the kitchen staff, for his own safety.” Warden speaks to the room, not looking at Sinn'ous, like he just came to this conclusion out of the goodness of his heart and not the blatant threats from an outside force.
“Hisown safety,” Sinn'ous laces his tone in bemusement, kicking the Warden while he’s down.
Papers are pushed over the littered desk of a mildly functional prison, Warden’s hands busying themselves to hide their tremors. It’s a futile and glaringly obvious action.
He sends down a quick prayer to Satan to grant him the strength he needs to stay where he is and not vault the table and use his restraints to choke the life out of the warden.
Wardencontinues going over papers, feigning as though he is checking job listings. Jobs that he would already know which door don’t have openings. Besides, it wouldn’t matter either way, he’s the warden, he can make an opening.
“There is a slot open in maintenance—”
“Laundry.” Sinn'ous cuts in.
Warden chews his tongue, angry eyes boring a hole into the wall over Sinn'ous’s shoulders. “Yeah, that’s what I said. Laundry.”
“And Romos Casimiro will be let out of solitary confinement.”
As much as he hates the loudmouth Reni getting in his way he will have to make do. He needs someone to protect Jasper while he gains his prey’s favour and manipulates his trust. And he is willing to work around the irritation that is Reni to ensure his prey is healthy for the time when Sinn'ous gets to use his razors on that delicateskin.
“He’s shown remorse for his actions, he isn’t a threat to the general population, it was already being done.” Warden says, holding onto his act of authority.
Sinn'ous plasters on a warm smile, as fake as a plastic cadaver used in crime movieshe sometimes perused when he was bored. “This has been a pleasant conversation, Warden. Thank you for your help and listening to my concerns,” his tone is one of synthetic appreciation and respect.
“Inmate welfare is my top priority,” he quips through gritted teeth.
In all the time Sinn'ous has been here he’s not had to call in a favour to Zayne to put pressure on outside family members. But the option is there, should he need it.
No one knows his connection to Zayne comes with a dangerous beastliving inside his brother. While they aren’t blood related, they were—for all intents and purposes—adopted by the same father. Even if it hadn’t been in a legal capacity. It’s surprisingly simple to buy documentations—for birthcertificates and adoption agencies. The dark web is the epitome of shopping to disappear and-or reinvent yourself.
Sinn'ous dips his chin in a near imperceivablenod to the end of the conversation of total bullshit anyone could smell from a mile away. Men locked on the other side of the prison are scrunching their nose and checking their shoes trying to find the source of it.
He leaves the room before being dismissed, the silence at his back is paired to the burning of eyes boring holes in the back of his head. A lesser manwould falter at the intensity. Sinn'ous only preens.
Cuffed hands make doorknob turning a minor challenge, nothing that takes more than a brief pause to get around. Then he is in the corridor where Rogers is leaning back against the chunkypaint of the white brick wall. Ready to escort him back to the prisoner side of Sandstone Correctional.
The warden’s office is set behind several locked gates—separating it and the visitation space. They pass by the empty waiting area where the general public loiters to wait on whomever they are visiting. Two barred gates are all that keep Sinn'ous in the corridor, and not killing his way through the fakely-inviting chaired space to the locked glass front doors and the carpark beyond.
The first thing he will do when he gets out is take someone out into the woods to kill them under the moonlit stars. Or maybe he’ll take two, and kill one while the stars peer down at him and the other while the sun’s warmth cascades over him.
18
SINN'OUS
Buzzers. Always loud to the point of driving anyone to stick an ice pick into their ear canals to puncture their eardrums. Anything to dull the ringing they cause to your whole existence. A silent flashing light would work just as well to announce mealtimes, and everything else the guards’ unnecessarily decide needs to be announced via foghorn. Although, a constant stream of blinking lights would get on his nerves just the same, and an eyeball vivisectionwould be in order.
