“Honey, there isn’t anything anyone doesn’t hear in here. There’s nothing else to do. What I want to know is how does a nice girl from Rosedale know Darius Madden?”
“I…”
Her laughter fills the cell, and she comes to sit on my bunk next to me.
“I need to come clean.”
I tense and wait for her to explain. She rolls up her sleeve and a Dog’s Blood insignia is tattooed on her inner arm. Darius has the same tattoo in the middle of his chest, and on his shoulder, and on his thigh.
“I knew who you were the night you were denied bail. Jermaine got word to us to look out for you.”
Jermaine? The guy who hates me? The guy who offered me to any gangbanger who wanted to take me? Yet now he’s looking out for me. I don’t understand.
“Darius is your baby daddy and you’re not from Rosedale, your father is one of the wealthiest in the city, and I know you’re innocent because I heard the truth from Jermaine myself.”
Darius is behind this, not Jermaine, he’s acting on behalf of the father of my daughter.
“Come on, dinner will be called soon. You wanna talk later, I’m down, but now I’m hungry.”
I follow CeCe into the main part of the pod and my stomach sinks at the thought of eating the disgusting slop they pass for food around here.
I catch a few of the women huddled around a table across the pod glaring my way and I shrink closer to CeCe. I don’t want to get caught staring, around here that’s a crime I don’t want to pay the price for, but I can’t help sneaking glances to see if they’re still staring. And they are.
“Have I done something to upset them,” I whisper to CeCe.
She discreetly looks around and then walks backward as she says, “They’re from the Six-Nighters gang. Some old ladies, some members in their own right. Anyone who isn’t one of them upsets them. Just pretend they’re not here.”
It’s easy for her to say, she isn’t feeling like she’s about to hit trouble with twelve women.
31
Darius
Slamming the front door open, I stumble into the living room finding Clare lounging on the couch like a queen bee. The sight of her has me needing to lash out.
Grabbing onto her t-shirt, I yank her up, her toes barely brushing against the dirty carpet.
“Let me down,” she shrieks.
Tariq barrels in from the kitchen and Jermaine appears from where I don’t know and blocks him off.
“You dirty fucking whore,” I sneer.
She scratches at my hands, but I jolt her back harshly and her arms fall to her sides like a ragdoll.
“Get off me!”
“Every breath you take is one you don’t deserve.”
“Has something happened?” Tariq asks, the fear I’ll hurt his girl growing stronger by the second.
“Apart from Amelia is still stuck in county?”
Isn’t that enough to still be pissed?
“Let her go, man,” Tariq pleads.
“I’m just reminding her where her place is. How easy it would be to squeeze the life out of her.”
