Part One
Chapter One
Lucas Cain could still remember the sound ofthe heavy door closing behind him when he’d arrived at this place.Back then, the noise had meant the end of freedom—the beginning ofa whole new kind of terror.Now, with Lucas on the other side ofthe door and moving in the opposite direction, the clang soundedjust as threatening, and somehow seemed to mean the exact samething.
“Lukey!”he heard, first from one familiarvoice, and then from others.
“Luke!”
“Captain Cain!”
And from one unfortunate, quickly hushedvoice, “Killer!”
They were all there, waiting for him at theprison’s outer doors like a family welcoming one of their own atthe airport.Well, Luke had never been in an airport and he’d neverhad much of a family, but he’d seen it on TV, and this was as closeas he was ever likely to get to the original.
So he forced a smile and hoped it didn’t lookas fake as it felt.“Hey, guys,” he said, and let himself be pulledinto their rough embraces.Mikey was there, tall and wide andgrinning.Scotty, with a new scar on his pale face.Casey, Tinker,Paul, all thumping Luke on his back and shoulders as if he weresome sort of hero.And there, a couple steps away, Sean Gage,watching it all with fond amusement, waiting for the attention heknew was his due.
“Sean,” Luke said, and now his smile wasbeginning to feel natural.
“Luke,” Sean returned, and they steppedforward at the same time, wrapping their arms around each other andsqueezing tight for a moment before beginning the ritual punchingand shoving.
“Let’s get out of here,” Sean said, his voicethick with emotion he would never express.He kept one arm lockedaround Lucas’s neck while he half-turned and gave the finger to theguards watching the reunion.“Fuck you all!”he growled, thenpressed a hard kiss to Lucas’s temple.“We got our boy back, andnow you can all go fuck yourselves.”
It was pointless, at best.The guards hadjust been doing their jobs, and they really hadn’t been a problemfor Lucas.But they were the closest symbol of the authority Seanhad spent his life resenting and resisting, and there was no pointtrying to protect them from his random hostility.Lucas deflectedinstead.“You said we were getting out of here?”
“Fuck, yeah,” Sean agreed, and he stoppedonly long enough to light a cigarette before he led the way acrossthe parking lot.
Lucas tried to imagine what they looked like.That had been one of the exercises the prison psychologist hadgiven him: try to look at yourself through someone else’s eyes.Ithad been impossible at first, but the psychologist had prompted himto expand his mind beyond the walls of the prison, and beyond theboundaries of time.Try to imagine how your kindergarten teachersaw you.How about your fifth grade teacher?High school principal?Old lady on the street?Woman you try to pick up in a bar?Guy youargue with in a bar…
That had been when Lucas had stalked out ofthe office.Technically, the sessions were mandatory, but Dr.Clarkhad let him go.And when she led him through the exercise in latersessions, she never asked him to imagine the impression of the guyin the bar again.It was too bad, because Lucas knew what the rightanswer to the question would be.To the guy he fought with in abar, he looked like Death.
But this was supposed to be a happy occasion,and Lucas tried to pull his brain away from the past.What did theylook like now?To that woman coming toward them, tucking herdaughter around to the other side so she was shielded by thewoman’s body, they clearly looked like trouble.Not a gang—nothingso organized—just young men with too much energy and aggression andnot enough to do with their time.But, no, that was how Lucas sawthem.The exercise was to put himself in someone else’s shoes.Andfrom someone else’s shoes, they probably just looked likethugs.
“Feels pretty good, huh?”Tinker asked.He’dspent a couple months in juvie and a few more in the local jail, sohe considered himself the group’s expert on doing time.His crownhad obviously been stolen by Lucas after three years in a federalprison, but if he could get Lucas talking to him as an equal, maybethey could share the throne.“You’re a free man, now!You can doanything you want.”He spread his arms wide.“Go anywhere.”
Too terrifying to even think about any ofthat.But luckily, it wasn’t really true.“I have to report to myparole officer twice a week.”He turned his head enough to make itclear he was speaking to Sean.“You’re sure your mom’s okay withthis?With me staying with you?I’ve got to be somewhere theyapprove of, but it doesn’t have to be your place, man.”
“Are you kidding?She’s thrilled.She’s athome now, cooking your big homecoming feast.”
“I don’t want to put her out.”
“She’d be pissed to even hear you talkinglike that, and you know it.”Sean’s arm tightened around Lucas’sneck.“You’re family.Of course you’re staying with us.”
“She’d kick Sean out before she got rid ofyou,” Mikey chimed in.“She wants to start charging him rent!”
Lucas grinned, thinking of Mrs.Gage’s lastvisit to the prison.“She told me she used to worry about yougetting some girl knocked up, but now she’s praying for it so you’dhave to get your own place to raise the kid.”
“Fuck that,” Sean retorted.“If I had a kid,I’d stay there for sure!I’d need Granny to take care of the littlebastard.”
“The baby’s mother might have a differentplan,” Lucas said.
“My women know their place,” Sean said, andhe made a crude gesture to show exactly where that place was.“Ifshe wants to have her own plan, she can get the fuck out and do itherself.”
And there it was.Sean was actually angry,not at his friends but at this imaginary woman with her imaginarybaby who’d had the nerve to imaginarily tell him she wanted them toget their own apartment.It felt familiar, but it didn’t feelnatural.Not anymore.
Lucas didn’t want to think about it.“What’sshe making?”he asked, and at Sean’s blank look he added, “Yourmom.What’s my feast going to be?”
“Fucked if I know,” Sean responded, his goodmood easily restored.“Let’s go find out.”
