Page 1

One

Declan

There are three kinds of men in prison. Men who are scared, men pretending they aren’t scared, and men everybody else is scared of.

I don’t need to tell you which one I am.

“Greene. Attorney visit.”

I look up from my book. Officer Walsh is standing outside my cell with one hand near the shit on his belt. Near it. Not on it. He’s been working this block a long time, and he’s a smart man.

I check the clock. Cillian’s early. Fucker. I was at a good part.

I get up, and Walsh takes a step back. They all do. I’m six foot six and close to three hundred pounds, and four years with nothing to do but push-ups hasn’t made me any smaller. Add the scars, the tats, and the beard I haven’t bothered with in a month, and the fact that every man in this building knows what happened to the last guy who walked into my cell without an invitation… Yeah. People give me space.

“Hands.”

I turn around and give him my wrists. The cuffs click shut, and my jaw goes tight.

I fucking hate the cuffs.

My wolf hates them more. He’s been pacing under my skin since the day they locked us in here. Back and forth, back and fucking forth, for four years, looking for a way out that isn’t there. He doesn’t get concrete. He doesn’t get appeals. He doesn’t get that I could go through every guard between here and the front gate and it wouldn’t matter, because of the towers and the rifles.

Out, he says. Every single day. Out. Out. OUT.

I know, buddy. Me too.

The thing is, he understands cages. And he fucking hates cages.

* * *

Walsh walks me down the block. It gets quiet when I go by. Not silent, prison’s never silent. But quieter. Guys look without looking. There’s one dumb motherfucker on the upper level, a new one, who stares a little too long. I stop walking. I tip my head back and look at him.

He finds something real interesting on the wall.

That’s what I thought.

“Your brother called again,” Walsh says, while we’re waiting on the first security door.

“Which one?”

His mouth twitches. I’ve got three. “Redhead.”

That doesn’t narrow it down much. “What’d he want?”

“Didn’t say. Apparently I’m not high enough in the Greene organization.”

“You’re not.”

“Figured.”

The door buzzes, and we go through.

My brothers have been running the family without me for four years. Mostly. There’s a difference between being locked up and being gone, and I’m not fucking gone. Guys still call. Money still moves. When there’s a decision that matters, it finds its way in here to me, one way or another, and my answer finds its way back out. The government took my freedom. They didn’t take my name.

There’s a guard on the second door I don’t like. Pruitt. Fat, sweaty little prick with a smirk I’ve wanted to take off his face for years.

“Hold up, Greene.”