Chapter Three
The Smallest Cell
Menace
The weather outside the police cruiser matched my mood. It was dark, drizzling, and lightning crackled in the distance every now and then. The windshield was wet, but not enough to require the wipers to flash back and forth over it at the rate they were. It made a rubbing noise that grated my nerves and interrupted my thoughts every so often.
There was only one thing churning in my mind. How could there be anything but that golden question?
Who the fuck did I get?
The uniformed officer drove in silence, but his radio chattered endlessly. I winced against the sound and closed my eyes as we pulled into the parking garage of the local police department. The car stopped near a set of manned double doors and an officer walked toward the car to assist with my intake.
I’d done it a time or two and wasn’t looking forward to what awaited me. It wasn’t the fingerprints, or even the interrogation that drained me. It was the maddening sound of a hundred chaotic souls being locked on one unit that was already making me wince inside.
It was hell for an introvert.
The noise. The inability to shut yourself off from it all was maddening.
“No. No, here.” An officer in a white shirt indicated, and the other officers steered me toward an interrogation room before I was even processed and printed.
I laughed and shook my head.
“You’re fuckin’ wasting your time, boss.” I planted both feet at the door and stared at the man in white.
Anyone who had been inside knew he was the rank in the room.
“Get. In,” he ground out, his grey eyes tightened making the wrinkles at the edge flutter a bit.
“If you insist, but if you think you’re getting anything but silence, you better call a fucking psychic or something. I ain’t got nothing to say to you or any law enforcement officer. I choose to embrace my right to remain silent. My lawyer will answer any questions you may have.”
“Alright, wise ass. Have it your way.” The old man quipped, before straightening the front of his white uniformed top. “Take him down to the bullpen.”
“Oh, no. Not the holding cell.” I did my best Gingerbread man voice for him and his hand curled into a fist.
“Look at you.” I laughed, my gaze pointedly dropping to his badge. “Harrington, huh?”
“Would you get him down there, Randy?” he barked at the officer to my right.
Randy was obedient, we moved at a swift pace down the hall, past the processing desk.
Larissa Porter was working behind the desk. She doubled as dispatch on the weekends. Her eyes widened when they dragged me past without stopping. I blew her a kiss and swallowed another laugh.
“Be back with you shortly, sweetheart,” I assured her.
She was a better time than Jessica, if memory served me, but it had been a few years.
“Porter, if you please.” Randy huffed when we were forced to stop in front of the heavy blue door.
She scrambled to buzz us through. The door sounded like it had been a hundred years since it last moved on its hinges. The way it sounded when it shut, however, was soul jarring. Every. Fucking. Time.
A dozen eyes anchored to me as we neared the holding cell. None of them looked particularly problematic. I recognized Vince right away.
Randy opened the door of the holding cell and shoved me inside, quickly closing and securing the door behind me. He walked away without another word.
“Asshole,” I sang after him. “An obedient little bitch, but an asshole nonetheless.”
He could have at least loosened the cuffs, if not removed them!
“Menace,” Vince hissed, drawing my attention to his panic-stricken face.
My attention swung around the cell. The man on the far side was entirely dependent on the bars to hold him up. His eyes, though pinned on me, were bloodshot, and he kept blinking like he was having a hard time focusing. I didn’t know him, but I knew he wasn’t any kind of threat.
The two men on the other end of the bench caught my eye next. One was built like a Pitbull. His jaw and head were big, and his arms bulged. He had a teardrop tattooed on his face and a permanent scowl. His friend was taller, with long braids, and some ink on his neck that looked like a rose blooming into hundred-dollar bills.
They both had hardened eyes that spoke of their capable nature.
“Mother fuckers don’t get in no hurry, huh? Ya’ll been here a few hours?” I jerked my chin up at them as I spoke.
The bulkier of the two grunted, his dark brow spiking as he side-eyed the blue door at the end of the hall with contempt.
“Never do.” His friend slowly sang, before shaking his head and huffing. He dropped his gaze to the thumbnail he was picking at, and I realized the other two in the cell were still staring at me.
One had a smartly trimmed, reddish-brown beard. The other was taller than the man with the teardrop, but no less bulky. His green eyes were murderous.
“Menace, get over here,” Vince hissed.
I didn’t take my gaze off the last two, and they didn’t stop staring at me, either.
Vince grabbed my arm, his hands uncuffed, and hauled me down to the bench next to him.
“What the fuck are you doing in here, kid?” he carried on.
I shrugged, not breaking eye contact with the pair. “Waiting to be shown to a cell, same as you.”
”What?” Vince abruptly snapped. “Menace… Menace, look at me, damn it!”
I flicked a glance his way, only to instantly return it.
“You can’t go to the general population, Menace. Do you know who the fuck—?” He groaned and glanced wildly around at the corners of the cell.
“Now that every camera in here is focused on you… You were saying?” I asked, more than amused at his lack of discretion.
Vince rubbed his face with his hand, dropped his head and mumbled into his own chest, “Son, you have no idea who got dropped? Honest?”
When I didn’t answer, he filled me in, “That mother fucker was an assassin for the Double Nickel Gang, Menace. This shit is real–”
It was real fucked, that’s what it was. I tuned him out, without even meaning to, probably blinking my ass off as I tried to process shit. I had no idea how much time had passed, but the next thing I knew they were jerking me to my feet, apparently having had to come in the cell after me.
I was jerked down the hallway and shoved against the processing counter.
“Hurry the fuck up, Sergeant says he’s to go to Protective Custody.” Randy grumbled at Larissa.
“I’m not going to fucking PC.” I laughed.
He shoved me into the counter, sending an ache through my ribs.
“Shut the fuck up. You don’t get to pick. This ain’t the county fair, dipshit.”
“I ain’t got no interest in your PC.” I kept right on arguing while they printed and processed, shuffling me along for a picture update and all that happy horse shit. I wasn’t going to protective custody. No fucking way. That was where snitches and people who had reasons to hide went.
I didn’t need their protection.
I struggled all the way down the hall with Randy lecturing behind me, “It isn’t your choice. This facility has a responsibility to keep everyone in it safe. Which means you get a solo cell, bud.”
I was hefted inside and the door slammed shut.
“You can’t leave me in these cuffs!” I shouted.
“Put your hands through the bars.”
I bristled and glared, but it only earned me a shrug.
“Suit yourself,” Randy mused.
“Fuck. Fine.” I turned around and shoved my hands out. He grabbed my wrist and took his time undoing the cuffs.
Once they were free, I couldn’t help it, I turned around and gave a juvenile kick of defeat to the cage.
“Ouch,” Randy flatly returned, before walking away.
“Fuck, I hate this place,” I seethed.
I placed my head to the bars and the sound of a news anchor drifted down the hallway.
“Known Dirty Savage Associate Lennox Zade was arrested placing a spotlight on local biker and mafia disputes in the area, after a confrontation with a known associate of the infamous Double Nickel Gang resulted in one man being left with a near fatal laceration to the throat tonight. More on that at seven!”
The guard flipped the station, only for a similar clip to blare down the hallway. I paced until my legs ached. When I reluctantly surrendered to the bunk, I inwardly cursed Jessica, myself, and the Double Nickel Gang, too. Why of all the bars did they have to be in that one?
What did this mean for my future? What did it mean for my club?
A prison cell had never felt smaller.