CHAPTER 10 SHAWN—THE YARD
Yard time still throws Shawn off balance. Too much sky after weeks of concrete ceilings, too much open ground with too many eyes on it, all of them reading him before he's even picked a direction to walk.
Nobody's drawn him a map. Nobody bothers, this early. You're supposed to already know where the lines sit, and Shawn doesn't, not really, not the kind of knowing that keeps you upright.
He drifts toward a stretch of fence on the far side, quieter than the rest, figures quiet means safe. Doesn't know yet that quiet, on this yard, means claimed.
"You lost, güero?"
Shawn turns. Three guys, maybe four, peeling off a huddle near the handball wall, moving toward him with the kind of unhurried certainty that's worse than if they'd come running.
"Just walking," Shawn says.
"Not here you're not."
He doesn't know the words for what's happening, not exactly, but his body does. Weight shifting back onto his heels. Eyes cataloging exits that aren't really there, not on a yard boxed in on every side.
"Didn't know this part was spoken for," Shawn says, trying for casual, missing it by a mile.
"Now you know." The one in front steps closer. Not touching yet. Just close enough that the threat doesn't need saying out loud. "So walk it back."
Shawn's read enough rooms in his life to know backing down fast is usually the smart play. Starts to turn.
A hand catches his shoulder before he gets the chance.
"Not so fast, güero."
The grip's not gentle. Shawn's stomach drops somewhere past his knees, adrenaline flooding in hot and useless, and for one long second he can't find a single word that's going to fix this.
Then, from somewhere behind him, flat and carrying farther than it has any right to across an open yard:
"He's with me."
Every head turns.
Jorge's walking toward them like he's got nowhere else to be, hands loose at his sides, face doing nothing that gives away how fast his heart's actually going. Shawn's seen him controlled before. Hasn't seen this particular flavor of it, the kind that's daring somebody to test it.
"This ain't your business, Delgado," the one holding Shawn's shoulder says.
"Made it my business." Jorge stops close enough that the standoff's no longer three-on-one. "Let go of him."
Nobody moves for a second that stretches out long enough to hurt.
Then the hand comes off Shawn's shoulder. Slow. Deliberate. Like it was always going to happen this way and everybody just needed the appropriate amount of time pretending otherwise.
"Watch your cellie better next time," the guy says, stepping back. "Yard's got rules he don't know yet."
"He'll learn them." Jorge's voice doesn't warm up even now, even with the threat backing off. "Won't need you teaching him."
The group peels away, unhurried, nothing about their exit conceding anything. Shawn's still catching his breath by the time they're out of earshot.
"You didn't have to do that," he says.
Jorge doesn't look at him. Jaw tight, hands not quite steady at his sides, something coiled in him that hasn't found anywhere to go yet.
"Yeah," Jorge says. "I did."
He walks off toward the fence line without waiting to see if Shawn follows.
Shawn follows anyway. Doesn't know yet that the thing he just watched simmer under Jorge's skin isn't finished simmering.