CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Lieutenant Frank Dawson had been a corrections officer for twenty-three years, and in that time, he'd learned to read inmates the way other people read books.
You could tell who was planning something by the way they held themselves, the way their eyes tracked movement in the corridors, the way they went quiet when you passed their cells.
Most inmates were easy. Angry, frustrated, resigned.
They wore their emotions openly because they had nothing left to hide.
But Gabriel Kane was different. He’d sensed it from the first moment he’d encountered the man.
Dawson stopped in front of Kane's cell and looked through the reinforced glass window.
The man sat cross-legged on his bunk with his back against the concrete wall.
His eyes were closed and his hands rested palm-up on his knees.
He looked like he was meditating, which was probably exactly what he was doing.
Kane meditated three times a day, always at the same hours, always in the same position.
"Comfortable in there, Kane?" Dawson called through the door.
Kane's face remained passive, his breathing slow and measured. He didn’t answer or respond in any way.
Dawson had dealt with plenty of killers during his career.
Gang members, domestic abusers, career criminals who'd racked up bodies like other people collected speeding tickets.
But Kane was in a category by himself. The man had orchestrated murders across multiple states, built a network of followers who killed in his name, and he'd done it all while maintaining the calm demeanor of a philosophy professor.
Even in maximum security, even after his conviction, Kane carried himself like he was exactly where he wanted to be.
It made Dawson's skin crawl.
"Must be nice," Dawson continued, leaning closer to the glass. "Having all that time to think. Meditate. Reflect on all the people you got killed."
Still nothing. Kane's chest rose and fell in that same steady rhythm. His eyes stayed closed.
Dawson had tried this before, tried to get a rise out of Kane with mentions of his victims or his failed philosophy.
It never worked. The man simply didn't engage.
He followed the rules, ate his meals, exercised during his allotted time in the yard, and spent the rest of his hours sitting exactly like this. Silent, still, and unsettlingly calm.
It was actually infuriating. Twenty-three years of dealing with the worst humanity had to offer and this calm, smirking psychopath was the one who got under his skin. He opened his mouth to say something else when the explosion hit. The world seemed to shake and scream at the same time.
The blast came from somewhere deeper in the facility, a massive concussive force that shook the entire wing.
The floor bucked under Dawson's feet and he grabbed the wall to keep from falling.
The lights flickered once, twice, then died completely.
Emergency lighting kicked in a second later, bathing everything in dim red.
Alarms began blaring immediately. This was not the usual lockdown alarm but something higher-pitched, more urgent. This was the fire alarm.
Dawson's radio crackled to life with overlapping voices shouting over each other, but he could barely hear it from the echo of the explosion.
"Explosion in the utility corridor, multiple fires, we need backup in C-Block now!"
"Ventilation system is compromised, repeat, ventilation is compromised!"
"Officer down, officer down, we have casualties!"
Dawson grabbed his radio. "This is Dawson in maximum security. What the hell just happened?"
Before anyone could respond, he smelled it. Acrid and chemical, burning his nostrils even from a distance. Smoke was coming through the ventilation system, thick white smoke that poured from the ceiling vents in billowing clouds.
The inmates started shouting. All down the corridor, men were pressing against their cell windows, yelling questions and threats and demands. The noise built on itself, dozens of voices creating a wall of sound that competed with the alarms.
Dawson looked through Kane's window. The man had opened his eyes, but he hadn't moved. He sat perfectly still, looking at something on the far wall. No panic, no surprise. Just that same calm expression he always wore.
Something was very wrong.
The smoke got thicker and second by second, Dawson could feel it burning in his throat now, each breath more difficult than the last. His eyes started watering and he wiped at them with the back of his hand. The emergency lighting turned everything into a hellscape of red shadows and white smoke.
And then there were even more explosions.
These were smaller than the first but closer, much closer.
Dawson felt them in his chest, felt the concussion through the walls.
Flames erupted from somewhere down the corridor, orange and white, burning with an intensity that seemed wrong.
Chemical fire. The smoke was a chemical fire, and it was spreading through the ventilation system.
The inmates were screaming now. Some were banging on their cell doors; others had broken whatever they could find and were smashing it against the windows.
The noise was overwhelming, primal. Dawson had been through riots before but this was different.
This wasn't planned violence. This was pure chaos and terror.
His radio was useless, too many people trying to talk at once. He caught fragments of information through the static.
"All units evacuate C-Block!"
"Fire suppression system offline!"
"We've lost power to the main security panel!"
Dawson tried to move toward the exit, but the smoke was too thick now. He couldn't see more than a few feet in any direction. His eyes were streaming and every breath felt like inhaling broken glass. He pulled his shirt up over his nose and mouth, but it barely helped.
Through the smoke, through his tears, he saw a figure moving toward him. Tall, deliberate, wearing something over their face. A gas mask. The figure was wearing a full gas mask.
Dawson reached for his weapon but his hands wouldn't work properly. The smoke had gotten into his lungs, into his blood. He felt dizzy and disconnected, like he was watching himself from a distance.
The masked figure walked past him without a glance and stopped in front of Kane's cell. They produced a keycard from their pocket and swiped it through the electronic lock. The door clicked open.
Kane stood up from his bunk with fluid grace.
He hadn't been meditating. Dawson understood that now, understood it with the terrible clarity of someone who'd been played.
Kane had been sitting there with his eyes closed and his breathing controlled because he'd known this was coming.
He'd been holding his breath, preparing for the moment when the smoke filled his cell.
The masked figure handed Kane a gas mask. Kane put it on without hurry, adjusting the straps with the same calm precision he brought to everything. Then both men turned and started walking back the way the masked figure had come.
Dawson tried to shout but all that came out was a wet cough. He fumbled for his weapon, finally got his hand on the grip, tried to pull it from the holster. But his fingers were numb and weak and the smoke was everywhere, filling his lungs, choking off his air supply.
He saw Kane and the masked figure disappear into the white smoke. Saw the orange glow of flames spreading along the ceiling. Heard the inmates screaming and the alarms blaring and his own heartbeat thundering in his ears.
Then his legs gave out. Dawson hit the floor hard, his cheek pressing against cold concrete.
He tried to get up, tried to reach for his radio, tried to do anything at all.
But his body wouldn't respond. The smoke had just weakened him far too much.
Hell, he could hardly tell what was up and what was down.
The last thing he saw before darkness took him was the empty cell where Gabriel Kane had been sitting.
The door stood open and the bunk was vacant.
The man who had orchestrated murders across the country, who had built a philosophy of death around the periodic table, who had been safely locked away in maximum security, was gone.
And Dawson had watched it happen.
He tried one more time to move, to call for help, to warn someone that Kane was loose. But the smoke filled his lungs, and his vision went dark and he felt himself sliding away into unconsciousness.
Somewhere in the distance, more explosions. More screams. More chaos as the prison tore itself apart.
Kane was free.
The thought followed Dawson down into the darkness, a final moment of terrible clarity before everything went black.
The whole thing had been planned. The electrician who'd come to fix the breaker weeks ago.
The careful timing of the explosion. The gas mask waiting at exactly the right moment.
Kane hadn't been a prisoner waiting for rescue.
He'd been a piece on a chessboard, positioned exactly where he needed to be for this exact scenario.
And Dawson had stood guard over him every single day, never knowing that the game was already over.