The object blocking the cell bay’s rear exit had finally been removed, and the three of us piled back into my old 4Runner. Blood and Sweet ducked down in the back seat making themselves invisible, while I fired up the recently refurbished eight-cylinder and waited for the backyard gates to slide open. When they did, I slowly drove out, careful not to raise the suspicions of any of the few remaining reporters stubbornly clung to the county lockup, hoping for a major scoop.
Only when we were far enough away from the sheriff’s office and heading toward Dannemora, the narrow country road flanked on both sides by tall trees and thick brush, did I ask Blood to remove Sweet’s cuffs. Blood did so, careful not to disturb the con’s injured thumb.
I watched Sweet in the rearview mirror. His expression was one of confusion.
“What gives?” he said. “Thought you guys were responsible for me.”
“You still want your freedom?” I said.
The confused expression turned into a smile. “Fuck yeah.”
Blood gave him a slight elbow. “It’ll cost you, thin man. But not the three hundred you originally offered.”
Blood, raising the ante. Wish I’d thought of that myself…
“How much?” Sweet said.
“Five hundred,” Blood said. “Two fifty a piece.”
The con bit down on his lips and rubbed his damaged hand.
“Fucking choice do I have?” he said. “Let’s hope that kind of cash is sitting around the Crypt and that Rodney himself isn’t sitting on it.”
“No choice,” Blood said.
Up ahead in the distance now, the big, razor wire-topped walls of Dannemora Prison. From my vantage point, it looked like most of the journos and reporters who’d planted themselves here over the past couple of days had now transported themselves to Willsboro. Looked like the media was taking Sheriff Hylton’s presser very seriously. A good thing, you asked me. The fewer eyes on us, the better.
“Home sweet home,” I said.
“Think I’m gonna puke,” Sweet said.
“Ain’t life grand?” Blood said.
I pulled off the side of the road, asked Sweet the best place for me to pull in.
“Service entrance,” he said. “You’re gonna see a guard shack out front, of course. An armed guard there. But if it’s the right screw, he’ll know me. Could be we’ll be okay.”
“What’s ‘could be’ mean?” Blood said.
“Means if he knows me, and he don’t hate me, he’ll let me pass after I explain the situation to him. Course, you’ll have to pay him.”
“You mean you’ll have to pay him,” I said.
“Whatever the fuck,” he said dismissively. “I probably won’t live through the afternoon anyway.”
“And what happens when he let us through?” Blood said. “We just walk in the back door, shout, ‘Home again, home again, jiggety-jig’?”
“Not exactly,” he said. “My best bet is to go in through the laundry detail. You probably already know this, Marconi, but there’s a steady stream of clean linens going in and shit-stained stuff coming out. I go in with the clean and out with the shit. That is, I’m still alive.”
“What’s with the I?” I said.
“Yeah,” Blood said. “There no I in team. Only an E, as in we.”
“Wait a minute,” Sweet said, “you can’t come in there with me. Rodney and his inner circle of evil maggots want me dead. Maybe I can get myself in if I promise the right payoffs to the right individuals, but they’ll kill me on the spot they see me sneaking back into prison with a couple of armed soldiers of fortune.”
“That what we are, Blood?” I said. “Soldiers of fortune?”
“More like soldiers of misfortune. A regular dirty duo, partner.” Then to Sweet, “No choice. We coming for the ride.”
“Then I want a weapon. At least do me that favor.”
“You crazier than I thought,” Blood said. “You don’t get to play with guns no more.”
“Then, no deal.”
“Keep, get Governor Valente on the phone. Tell him we’re ready to bring in our prisoner.”
Sweet put both hands up in surrender. “Okay, okay, fuck, fuck, fucking fuck. Let’s just go. See what happens.”
“That’s the spirit,” I said.
I threw the tranny back in drive, pulled back out onto the road to perdition.