Chapter 4
Hanna didn’t like all this going on around her.
She should have been put on the bus by herself and not had to go to the courthouse with all these people.
They were criminals, the lot of them, and she didn’t feel the need to be around them.
Charles, her son, was going to pay for this, and she was going to get to that wife of his, too.
“Damned people.” All she had wanted was more money in order to live the life that she deserved.
Her damned husband had left everything to their son so that nothing came to her but an allowance.
Like she was five years old or something.
Well, she was going to get as much as she wanted if she had to knock a few heads together to get it.
“They took my damned guns, and I want them back.”
She’d meant to kill Dani off, Charles’ wife, and that damned kid of theirs, Mackenzie.
They actually tossed her out of the house as if she wasn’t there to set the record straight.
Then they told her that the retirement place she’d been staying had kicked her to the curb, and they’d moved all her things into storage of all things.
“Like they could run that place without me there to set the record straight. Damned people.” One of the inmates on the bus with her tried to have a conversation with her. She ignored him. She wasn’t a criminal, and that sort of person was beneath her. But he wouldn’t leave her alone.
“You’re the woman who wants fine dining while in a jail cell.
I hear you bitching all the time.” She told him she wasn’t bitching at all but trying to get them to treat her with the respect that she deserves.
“You’re in jail. You’ll have to give up on respect.
People no longer will treat you like a person now that you’ve been behind bars. ”
“What do you know? I’m a well-respected person of wealth, and I get things done.
” He told her that she was still eating the food that he did.
“As soon as my son gets his head out of his ass, then I’ll have that and more.
What do you care anyway? You’ve probably never done a day’s work in your life. ”
“Oh, I work hard at being what I am. It took me a long time to forge the will for my grandda. Fat lot of good it did me. Debra still won anyway, but I’m going to get back at her today.
See that I don’t.” He laughed. “She tried to pay me off with a measly million dollars when I know that she has billions. My grandda left it all to her. A woman to have fun with. And then she tells me that I have to get away from her from now on, like I’m not her only living relative. What the fuck is up with that?”
“If I had my cane, I’d hit you with it. Didn’t your grandda teach you any manners and not speak like that in front of your elders?
You should be ashamed of yourself.” He said that the only thing he was ashamed of was getting caught.
“Yes, well, my only regret is that I didn’t go into the house with both guns blazing and kill the lot of them.
Don’t think I will make that mistake again.
Even that granddaughter of mine. She should have been killed when they first created her.
Damned upstart. I’ll show her too when I get out of here.
And they’d better have my stuff back where it was.
Can you imagine them going into my home and touching my things?
Then they used my money to pay the bills that I purposely didn’t pay because I am above such things. Damned people.”
They were at the courthouse in no time at all.
They could have taken them over in one of the police cars, and it would have been nicer.
Cooler for sure. These people were starting to get on her last nerve, and when she was backed into a corner like she was, she came out with her guns.
People underestimated her one time, then never again.
Chained up like a dog, she was seated next to the man who had been chatty with her.
Not that she liked talking to his sort, but he did while away the time so that she wasn’t as pissed off when she arrived.
It was important to her to show her best side, and she’d been reminded before that being pissed off at the judge wasn’t a smart way to go.
She didn’t want to be fined right out of the start when she needed her son there to see that she wasn’t going to be taking his shit either.
The odor around the convicts was strong, and she was going to need her smelling salts before too much longer. Telling the others to back away from her did very little good as they were chained together like a string of lights on a Christmas tree. And she was the only bright bulb in the group.
Hanna wondered how it had come to her being in jail when she was the rock of so many things.
Ten minutes with her around and things would not only run better, but they’d be making more money too.
And all she wanted out of it was their devotion to her in the form of money.
No one knew the things that she had to go through just to have a few bucks stashed away for a rainy day.
By her estimations, she should have had about four hundred thousand dollars stashed away in her place, and it had better be just where she left it, too, or someone was going to pay.
That damned granddaughter of hers was on her list, and no one wanted to be on her list for very long.
Mackenzie had been on her list since she first saw the mongrel.
She would have been better served being a stain on the sheets than a granddaughter of hers.
They were taking people off the string of them into the courtroom one at a time.
She wasn’t supposed to go first because of something about her being second to last in being arrested.
If they didn’t have time to listen to her today, she’d have to be the first one next time the judge came through, and that just wasn’t going to happen.
It was going to be today, by god, or heads were going to be rolling.
“Excuse me, I have important matters that need to be attended to.” The chatty man snorted, and she tried her best to ignore him. “I want to go in there now and have my turn. I’ve been locked up long enough, and I want my son to come bail me out.”
“It’s not your turn. You’ll be gotten to soon, but not next.
” The officer said she was fifth in line, and that was the way it went.
“When it’s your turn, you’ll have your say.
Not that I think anyone cares. You’ve been spouting off your complaints for the last two weeks, and we’re all frankly sick of hearing them.
If I had my way, I would have put you first so that you’d be out of my hair, but I don’t make the rules. ”
“I make the rules around here, and you’re going to be doing what I said.
Put me in line next, or so help me I’ll snatch you bald.
Do you understand me?” He said that he did, but just didn’t care what she said.
“What a thing to say to me. I demand to be put in front of these others, or so help me, I’ll have your job. ”
“Take it. See how much fun it is wrangling inmates like you all day.” He unhooked the person next to her and told them they were next. “You keep bitching like you are, and you’ll be last, not fourth like you are now.”
She wanted her gun. At the very least, she wanted her cane so that she could knock some sense into the man.
There was no way that her taxes—if she ever paid them, were paying this man a wage to treat her like this.
If she’d had her way, she would have fired him on the spot and done what she wanted.
But without her weapons of choice, she was left to the treatment of those around her. Damned people. She hated them all.
When it was her turn to go into the courtroom, the first thing she did was look for her son and his ungrateful family.
If they only knew what she did on a daily basis, they’d have a great deal more respect for her.
Just as she was going to ask the judge where they were, they lot of them came into the room from the back.
She was disappointed to see that milksop of a wife next to her grandson, Charles. Then she saw Mackenzie.
“I don’t want her in here. She’s mouthy and will cause a disruption by pissing me off more than I already am.” The judge told her to watch her language. “I will not. I know my rights.”
“Oh, I’ve heard about you. You’re the woman who keeps calling my office demanding things that are well above the norm for an inmate.
” She said that she should have what she wanted, as people knew better than to say no to her.
“Well, aren’t you just a bucket of sunshine.
The word no is going to be said a lot, I’m afraid to warn you. Now, let’s get down to business.”
“I refuse to listen to you with that thing in here.” He told her that she only had to nod once in a while that she was getting it, and that was his rules. “I don’t care for your rules. I have my own set that are far above anything that you might say to me.”
“This will go a good deal faster if you can keep your mouth shut.” He started reading off all the things that she’d been brought before the court for.
Some of them were petty things like not paying her bills on time or at all, but the one about back taxes got her standing up again.
“You have something to say about owning the government some money?”
“I don’t have a job, so how do I have to pay taxes to a government that has done nothing for me?
” He explained that she had income from her son’s estate.
“It’s not his anything. That should have been mine if my stupid husband had done right by me.
He left it all to that cur of a son there and only gives me a small stipend each month that I’m supposed to be happy with. ”