Chapter 2
JESSE
AUGUST
Leg day was a bitch, whether you were in an expensive air-conditioned gym or in a cracked-dirt prison yard in the triple-digit heat. Of course I’d rather have the air conditioning, but that wasn’t exactly on the menu.
Most guys skipped yard time in favor of their cells on days like this and an abandoned yard was a safe yard. Besides, I still had three pounds of muscle to put on if I wanted to reclaim the ten I’d lost in my first three months of incarceration.
Everything that went down in the courtroom was my fault, I guess, but the confusingly hot Detective Fucking Rafferty broke three of my ribs, punctured a lung, and left me to the tender mercies of the prison healthcare system.
My cousin Kyler once asked if I’d been trying to escape or if I’d intended to go after the detective who put me in jail, and I didn’t know what to tell him.
Gun to my head, I still couldn’t come up with a decent answer.
All I knew was that the number of times I’d jerked off to the thought of Rafferty fucking me into the mattress was not a small amount.
Maybe it was the violence of the takedown that had me jerking it to the memory of the good detective’s unfairly plush lips, maybe it was Rafferty’s refusal to file charges against me, maybe it was the lack of fuckable men on the inside.
Or maybe it was because my father, after forcing me into this godforsaken life, had written me off the second the cuffs landed on my wrists.
I’d given up on trying to make it make sense.
Despite the detailed fantasies and my increasingly chafed cock, I had a list of assholes who’d be dead on sight the second I got out of this place, and Detective Rafferty was at the top of that list.
If I survived.
Lots of guys were trying to make sure that didn’t happen. Call it daddy issues, but I was pretty sure Pops wouldn’t shed too many tears over my untimely demise.
I wasn’t entirely sure he hadn’t sponsored a few of those attempts, and it made me regret not taking the DA’s offer.
I’d only survived in here because people underestimated me, believing the social media hype, thinking that a few broken ribs made for easy pickings.
By the time I left the prison hospital, I had a reputation for making sure anyone stupid enough to come after me paid with an extended hospital stay of their own.
Sure, it had occasionally set back my recovery and, more recently, I got moved to a different hellhole, but it’d been two weeks since I’d had to fend off a murder attempt, which was a win in my book.
That didn’t mean I was gonna let myself get soft in this place, especially now that I could take a deep breath and lift my arms above my head. Fuck the hot weather.
Two officers, miserable in full gear and bulletproof vests, waited to the side as I grunted through set after set. Near the end of my third circuit, one of the officers got a call on his shoulder walkie, and a quick conversation ensued. He replaced the device, then gestured for me to finish up.
“I’ve got six more minutes,” I said, pointing to the cracked and faded clock near the door.
“Fine. If you don’t wanna talk to your lawyer, I’ll tell them to kick his ass out.”
I set the weights back in place, cursing.
Trent wasn’t scheduled to come out here for another three weeks. I doubted it was good news.
“No, let’s get this over with.”
I cooperated, letting them cuff me without issue, mostly because I didn’t need to make my time in here any more miserable than it had to be. They walked me, sweaty, through a series of locked corridors until we reached the room with my lawyer.
Trent sat at the table, his suit neat and his expression unreadable. I paid out the nose for his time, but he was well worth it. Despite the guilty verdict, he’d smoothed over my courtroom indiscretion with the judge and somehow engineered a shorter-than-average sentence.
I was still looking down the barrel at a lot of years, but I wouldn’t need Viagra for my first post-jail fuck.
As long as I made it out of this stretch alive.
“Trent, buddy. What’s this about?” I asked, not bothering to wait until the officers cuffed me to the table and left.
Trent was a bit more circumspect, waiting until the door closed with a loud clank before leaning forward. He stroked his chin, examining me closely. I shifted, not sure what his deal was.
“Is that a new bruise?” he asked, pointing at my cheekbone.
“Just a love tap,” I answered. “Nothing to get your panties in a bunch about.”
He rolled his eyes and sat down, then said nothing.
“Is this a new way for you to bill me? Are we just staring at each other now?”
Trent kept staring, hoping to see what I didn’t know.
“Seriously, dude. Are they gonna tack on more years because I defended myself? And if they do, how much are we going to sue them?”
“This isn’t about that.”
I sent him a cuffed bird, then rattled my chains. “Say what you gotta say. And say it quick.”
After another moment, he nodded as though he’d decided something.
Finally, he smiled. “How would you like to be out of here by Christmas?”
Well… shit.
“Wait.” I narrowed my eyes at him. “They made an offer?”
“That they did,” he said, producing a folder.
I opened the folder and laughed. Every staple and paperclip had been removed, leaving the top left corner of each page jagged and crimped. Accustomed to reading legal documents, I skipped to the good part.
“Full immunity,” I said, reading and re-reading the words.
“Yes. With witness protection.” He flipped the page and pointed to a section near the bottom. “You’ll stay with a contingent of Texas Rangers in a safe house until your testimony. Then we’ll look into moving you out of state.”
“When do I get out?” I asked, gesturing to the bruise on my face. “I can handle the occasional misunderstanding, but I’ve definitely got a target on my back.”
“There’s still some moving parts, so you’re gonna have to keep yourself alive in here for at least another couple of months.
And the first step is a doozy. You’ll have to agree to give up every single person involved in the organization.
Your dad, your uncles, everyone who is involved, even the runners.
You can’t leave anyone off. Not even Kyler,” he said, raising a brow.
“Kyler isn’t involved,” I said, lying through my teeth. “Unlike me, he actually has a good father.”
That part was true. Kyler’s dad had refused to involve him in the operation until he was twenty-one, and even then, only allowed him to help with the digital work. Kyler—my best friend and practically my twin—was the reason APD hadn’t been able to crack the code to our finances.
Kyler was also the only family member who’d come to visit me in jail. I was never gonna flip on him.
Trent leaned forward, staring into my eyes. “You willing to stake your freedom on that?”
“Fuck yeah.” I tapped the table. “Give me a pen and paper. I’ll give you every fucking name but his.”
Kyler would have to forgive me for giving up his dad. There was no way to unlink my uncle from his dealings with my father. I would feel bad about that, but neither of those motherfuckers listened to me when I warned them about Jimmy Shoes. I wouldn’t be in here if they had.
Trent pushed the yellow notepad and the jail-approved pen across the table to me. It was annoying, having to write in handcuffs, but there was a lot I would do to get the fuck out of here.
Could I survive in here for the rest of my sentence?
Probably. If I were willing to live with my head on a swivel for the next ten years or so.
But I had a chance to create the life I chose rather than the one that had been chosen for me.
I’d never be a hundred percent above board—fuck that, obviously—but I liked to help more than harm, and I missed my designer clothes, high thread count sheets, and not having to shit in front of other grown men.
Ten minutes later, I pushed the list back across the table to Trent.
“Are you sure Kyler doesn’t need to be on here?” he asked, skimming the names.
“Yep.”
He paused, re-reading the list before sending me a long look. “Kyler might not feel so generous about you leaving his name off the list while you added his dad and almost every other member of your family.”
“Maybe, but he’s clean, and I’m not letting him take the fall for the shit our fathers decided to do.”
Holding my look for another long moment, Trent nodded and went over the specifics with me one more time. There was a lot I had to do to ensure that the state held up their end of the deal, and I was going to dot every fucking I and cross every fucking T to get out of here and start over.
There was nothing left of this life that I wanted to go back to, save for my cousin. I’d miss Kyler, but in my heart, I knew he wouldn’t hold it against me.
Hell, maybe one of these days I wouldn’t need protective custody, and we’d be able to start a business together like we’d always wanted.
Trent shoved the signed paperwork into his briefcase, and we parted on finger guns. As the officers walked me back to my cell, I felt lighter than I had since I was first arrested.
That said, I was still a criminal, and I had some criminal shit to attend to.
After the officers left, I fished out the contraband cell phone and fired off a quick text to Ky.
Me: Need you to help me track down some pork. Rib-cracking good.
Kyler: On it.
Kyler: That mean you’re gonna be free to fry some bacon?
Me: Maybe.