Down – hold – up again. Down – hold – up again. And again. And again. Tom was keeping himself fit. Sit-ups in a cell was cramped enough, in a shared cell just about impossible. But he had to keep himself fit, keep himself sane. Keep himself ready.
Evening. Association time but neither of them had left their cell. Cunningham lay on the top bunk, singing softly to himself. He had the kind of voice Tom would have expected given his choir background, high and clear, even at low volume. Something in Latin, Tom thought. Some religious piece or perhaps even opera. Nothing he recognised. Cunningham tuned out of the room when he sang to himself, and it was something he had been doing more and more since Tom came back onto the wing. So with Cunningham doing that and Tom doing his exercises, it was like two different worlds coexisting in the smallest space possible, or so Tom thought.
Everything was back to the way it had been. At least superficially. Cunningham’s face had lit up when he returned. There were red marks and welts on his face and arms, they looked like they stung. Perhaps Tom’s presence had stopped other inmates bullying and abusing his cellmate. Perhaps that was why he was so pleased to have him back.
Earlier, Tom had tried talking to Cunningham, with some success.
‘So I hear you’re looking to get out, visit your mother?’
Cunningham jumped as if he had been shocked. ‘Who told you that?’
‘Thought everyone knew. They’re waiting for you to give up some information then you can go, yeah?’
Cunningham thought about Tom’s words, smiled. ‘Yeah . . .’
Tom saw, in that moment, why Cunningham hadn’t given up the location of his bodies yet. The power it gave him. Not only over the police and prison staff, but the families of the victims themselves. He was enjoying it.
‘Why not tell them? Then you can get out? Seems simple.’
‘It’s not. Not that simple. It has to be . . . I have to see my mother when . . . when the time is right.’
‘What d’you mean?’
‘She’s still in the hospital. There’s nothing they can do for her. They’re going to send her home to die.’
Tom couldn’t work out what kind of emotion was behind the words. But he kept talking. ‘So you want to see her at home, right?’
Cunningham nodded.
‘Why don’t you tell them what they want to know, then arrange to see her when she’s back at home?’
Cunningham stood up, his eyes angry little dots. ‘Because I’m doing it my way. My way. Don’t tell me . . . don’t tell me . . .’
Tom held up his hands. ‘OK, OK . . .’ He waited for Cunningham to calm down. ‘Hey, here’s an idea. Why don’t you tell me? Then I can tell them when you want me to?’
Cunningham looked at him, something like joy appearing briefly in his eyes.
‘I mean,’ Tom continued, ‘that’s what friends are for, helping each other out when they need to.’
Cunningham said nothing, but it looked as though a war was being waged behind his eyes. Like a cartoon character with a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other. Tom waited.
Eventually Cunningham turned away, looking like he had lost his train of thought, or lost interest in the conversation. That was when he began to sing.
And didn’t stop.
Tom, realising he wasn’t getting anywhere but needing to do something in that small space, started his sit-ups.
As he exercised, he thought. The phone call. Blake. Anger and fear danced within him, each vying for prominence. He tried to tame the fear but couldn’t. Too overwhelming, too all-embracing. He was stranded, in prison, alone. His only contact with the outside world gone. His life in danger.
He’d walked back to his cell, numb. Lain there all night, not knowing if he slept or not. Unsure even whether he heard Cunningham’s night terrors. Just letting the enormity of his situation sink in. Trapped. Stranded.
The next day had been the same. Every movement around him became a potential threat. He was ready to retaliate, his body tensed and coiled, get the first punch in, make it count, make it dirty. Don’t be fair, just win. Everyone from the inmates to the officers. They could come at him one at a time or all together. He just had to be ready.
He thought about pulling his razor apart, melting the blade into his toothbrush with a lighter. He decided not to risk it. If he was discovered with it he’d be busted down to basic, and he didn’t need that. So he started exercising.
Push-ups, sit-ups, squats, anything he could manage in that cramped space to make his body harder, stronger. Focus his mind away from the ever-present fear. As he worked out, he planned. What to do next, how to get out of there.
Just walk up to the Governor and tell him who he was and what he was doing there. And be disbelieved. With no backup and no way to find out if Sheridan was working with anyone else besides Blake, his claims would make him the laughing stock of the wing and an even bigger target than he already was. Quint? There was nothing his old commando mate could do either. He was only insurance in case anyone tried to get to him through Lila or Pearl. No. There was only one way out that didn’t involve serving his whole sentence.
Get Cunningham to confess.
Dr Bradshaw had said doing so would reduce his sentence. He wondered how sympathetic she would be to hearing his whole story. First though, he had to get results.
He finished up, having reached his number, rolled over on to his back, stared at the ceiling while he got his breath back, about to start on his push-ups.
He didn’t get that far. An officer put his head round the door.
‘On your feet, Killgannon, you’re wanted.’
Tom frowned. ‘Where?’
‘How do I know? Just told to come and get you.’
‘Not my turn for a shower, is it?’ He was sweating profusely from his workout and beginning to stink out the cell. That was why aftershave was almost as valuable as tobacco in prison. ‘Could do with one, though.’
‘Come on.’
Tom got to his feet. Cunningham stopped singing to himself, lowered himself down from the bunk.
‘Not you,’ said the officer, pointing, ‘just him.’
Cunningham wordlessly got back on the bunk. Tom frowned. That seemed odd.
‘Come on.’
Tom was led off the wing. He recognised the officer as one of the two who had given the art group the tour of the topping shed. And that seemed to be where they were headed now.
Tom shivered from more than just the cold. He was off the wing, out in the open night air. The sweat dried to his body, turned suddenly freezing. This wasn’t right, he thought. Something was going on. Then he realised. This is it. This is Foley’s attempt on me. He steeled his body, ready for attack.
The officer reached the door to the topping shed, took out his key to open it.
‘In there.’
Tom turned to face him. The officer flinched. ‘You coming as well?’
The officer became tongue-tied. ‘I . . . there’s someone in there who’ll, who’ll tell you what’s . . . Just get in.’
Tom stared at him, unmoving. Eyes unblinking. ‘How much are they paying you for this?’
The officer turned away, unable to face him.
‘Pathetic,’ said Tom. ‘Fucking pathetic.’
The officer said nothing.
‘At least give me a weapon to defend myself.’
The officer looked up. Conflict in his eyes. But he had made a decision. ‘Just get in there.’
He gave Tom a shove through the door, locked it behind him.
Tom looked round. Or tried to. The room was in darkness. His fingers played along the wall, searching for the light switch. He found it, flicked it on. The room was illuminated by the overhead striplights. It seemed to be as it was the last time he had been inside. Except for one thing. The makeshift noose and rope tied from the central roof beam. The chair beneath it.
Two shapes detached themselves from the shadowed piles of stacked chairs. Two huge inmates. Tom had never seen them before – or didn’t think he had – but he knew the type. Prison enforcers. Big, covered in tattoos, both professionally done and prison marked, with the kind of dead eyes that only came to life when they were taking someone else’s. One had a mohawk, one had a beard but a bald head. Other than that they were indistinguishable
‘Come to give me a message?’ he asked, body already tensing into a fighting stance.
‘Yeah,’ said Mohawk. ‘It’s behind us.’ He pointed to the noose.
Beardy reached into his jogging bottoms pocket, brought out a cell-made shiv. Mohawk did likewise. They began advancing towards him. ‘You going to give us any trouble?’ asked Mohawk. ‘Be easier if you didn’t.’
Tom smiled. No humour reached his eyes. He looked round for potential weapons. Couldn’t see any, except the stacked chairs. Better than nothing. But only just.
Beardy was making his way round Tom’s back, attempting to come at him in the clumsiest pincer movement he’d ever witnessed. They were slow-moving but he didn’t believe they would be slow-witted. Or that wasn’t a chance he was going to take. He feinted to his right, made it look like he was going to run, put the two of them on the front foot, ready to go after him, then quickly darted to his left and the pile of stacked chairs. Before they could react, he had a chair in his hand. He brandished it at them like a lion tamer.
The two of them turned, smiled at him. ‘That the best you can do?’ said Mohawk.
‘Come here and find out.’
They both moved slowly towards him. One of them had to break, he thought, make a sudden movement, attempt to get him. He just had to work out which one.
It was Beardy. He lunged at Tom, trying to get his knife arm around the metal legs of the chair. Tom brought the chair leg down onto his arm. Then again. It had virtually no effect.
Changing tactic he lunged with the chair, aiming it at Beardy’s face. That produced a better result. The leg struck him just above the right eye. He recoiled. Tom struck again. This time he hit him right in the eye. Pushed as hard as he could. Beardy, hands to his face, screamed in pain and retreated.
Tom didn’t have time to relish this triumph. Mohawk was now behind him, a shiv in his hand too. He felt rather than heard its swish, tried to dodge out of the way. The blade, small but vicious, connected with his forearm. He gasped in pain, looked at it. Blood sprayed out of his arm as it scythed away from the blade. He let go of the chair. It dropped to the floor.
Tom tried to ignore the pain, knew there were more important things to do. He could hurt later.
Looking around, he checked his options, quickly assessed the situation, looked for something that might give him an advantage. He jumped on the chair underneath the noose, grabbed for the rope and swung his body towards Mohawk. Both feet connected and the man went over. The shiv fell away. Tom jumped down, picked it up.
And felt a sudden pain across his right shoulder blade. Beardy, half-blinded, had got himself upright and swung at Tom with his shiv again. He felt the blood instantaneously soak through his sweatshirt. Tom dropped the shiv and turned, ready, trying to ignore the extra pain.
No time to think, he went in on Beardy’s blind side, punching him on the side of the head. The man, already in pain, brought his hand up to defend himself. Tom kept punching, as fast and as hard as he could.
Behind him, Mohawk was getting up. Thinking fast, deciding Beardy wasn’t the immediate threat, he bent down, grabbed the shiv and turned to Mohawk who threw a fist that was more hopeful than accurate. Tom managed to grab his meaty, muscled arm with one hand and, holding the shiv in the other, twist it down and round. The man pushed against him and Tom stumbled, losing his footing. He let the arm go. Mohawk swung again.
Tom managed to get most of his body out of the way but his right shoulder took a hit. Right where the shiv had already caught him. Mohawk was so big, his blow so powerful, that Tom felt like his arm had gone dead. Beardy, battered but still going, came up behind him, thrusting his knife. Tom just managed to twist out of the way, going to ground, feeling something in his knee pop as he did so.
He spun away out of the grasp of them both, looked round frantically for a way of escape. Couldn’t see one. He turned back to them. Looked at the shiv in his hand.
‘You want this? Come and fucking get it . . .’
Ready to take the fight to them and be finished, he stepped into the path of the half-blinded Beardy, swung the shiv at him. Backwards and forwards, as deadly and as quick an arc as he could manage, darting and dancing on his feet as much as his damaged knee would allow, becoming a hard target to hit. Beardy put his arm out and the shiv connected. He instinctively pulled his arm back as the blood started to spurt. Tom pressed forwards, swung again. Connected again. Same arm. Beardy grabbed his bleeding arm with his good one. Tom went for a third cut. The blood was now geysering.
He turned to see where Mohawk had got to. The attacker was wary now, standing back from him. Wondering why Tom hadn’t followed the script. He came for him.
Tom scanned the room. In the far corner was a wooden handled mop standing upright in a bucket. He ducked away from the advancing Mohawk, made a grab for the mop.
Thinking he could leave Beardy for a few seconds, Tom turned to Mohawk who had stopped his movement and was regarding him uncertainly. Dropping the shiv, he swung the mop, hard as he could, feet braced as well as he could manage. The wood connected with Mohawk’s head. He actually screamed ‘ow’, which Tom might have found amusing under other circumstances.
He swung again, but Beardy managed to grab the shaft of the broom. He followed through with his grip, pushing it towards Tom, forcing him back. He put both hands on the handle, ran Tom back to the wall, pinned him up against it. Wood against Tom’s throat, pushing.
Tom knew he would choke if he didn’t do something so, knowing one eye was already damaged, pushed his thumbs as hard as he could into both of Beardy’s eyes. The man tried to pull his head back and away from Tom, which eased his grip, making Tom in turn press all the harder. And harder still. Beardy cried out in pain. Tom kept pushing, managed to get his thumb right in the corner of his left eye. He could feel the back of the eyeball, see it beginning to pop out of the socket.
Beardy screamed and pulled away, letting go of the mop, trying to claw Tom’s hand away from his eye. Tom relaxed his grip, took hold of the handle and pushed Beardy back. He stumbled, ended up on the floor. Tom, not waiting to think, just acting on instinct, swung the wood until it connected with his head. Then again. And again. Until he was sure Beardy wasn’t going to get up for a while.
He turned, quickly, looked to see where Mohawk was. He had found the shiv Tom had dropped and stood up, nursing his injured head while holding the shiv out towards Tom without much conviction.
Adrenaline was killing the pain. Tom stood his ground, held the mop handle like a weapon, snarled. ‘What you waiting for? Eh? Come on, then, let’s be having you . . .’
Mohawk just stared. Glanced at the doorway, down to his fallen comrade who was now bleeding profusely from his arm, the side of his head and ear, cradling what was left of his eyes, then back at Tom. He looked at the knife in his hand. It suddenly seemed very small.
‘Come on you fucker, what you waiting for?’ Tom’s voice rising in pitch, in ferocity.
The other man held up his hands. ‘Hey, mate, just a job. No hard feelings.’
He turned and made for the door, dropping the knife as he went.
Tom made to follow him. Before his attacker reached the door it was unlocked from the outside. A crew of officers in riot gear stormed in and stopped, staring at him.
Tom, blood-soaked, anger in his eyes, ready to take on the world just stared back, then yelled, ‘Who’s next then? Who’s fucking next?’
And they were on him.