Page 67
I run the inventory. The heavy one is Inmate thirty five—the guy who tried to stake me in the canteen. His walk is broad and confident, the kind that comes from years in the system. The second, lighter, more measured. I tense, but force myself to keep the posture casual, hands still braced on the wall, face turned away.
They wait a beat. The heavy one speaks first.
“Shit, look at that. Fresh meat, all alone in the wet room.”
His voice bounces off the tile, thick with intent. I keep my eyes locked on the soap dish embedded in the wall, letting the water mask my face.
“I’ll make it quick,” he says, laughter in the words. “You Authority girls, you always act tough until someone puts you on your knees. What you gonna do when I bury my cock in that pretty mouth if you can’t fight back, princess?”
I risk a glance. He’s in the doorway, flanked by the corrupt guard from yesterday—the one who let the fight ride, then wrote it up as “disorderly conduct.” The guard leans against the frame, expression blank, already turning away to light a cigarette.
“You gonna watch, or you gonna fuck off?” He sneers to the guard.
The guard shrugs, barely meeting my gaze. “Just don’t get blood on the drain. I’m not writing it up again.”
I turn back to the wall, force my body to stay loose. If I tense, he’ll know I’m expecting it. That’s when they go for bone instead of just skin.
He steps up behind me, the heat of his breath on my neck. “You hear me, doc?”
His hand finds my shoulder, squeezing hard enough to grind the joint. I let my knees bend, making him think I’m collapsing. Instead, I slide my left hand down, palm flat against the broken tile under the soap dish. My thumb finds the edge—a razor sliver, forgotten by the last fight.
He crowds closer. “Good girl,” he says. “Knew you’d see sense. You Authority bitches are all the same. Strip off that uniform and you’re just another hole.”
His other hand finds my hip, twisting me toward him. I move with the pull, stepping sideways and pivoting so my right side is to the wall, water still running. His hand is now at my waist, thick fingers digging in.
“You wanna beg now, or after?” he says, voice rising as he tries to laugh.
I angle my head just enough to see him. His face is inches from mine, jaw stubbled, scar above his right eye, the faint stink of rot in his breath. I fix the image in my mind.
He leans in, tongue darting to wet his lips. “Come on, doc. Show me what Authority teaches you.”
He presses his knee between my legs, pushing until my back is against the wall, bare skin freezing on the tile. I clamp the tile shard between two fingers, palm up, and drive it straight across his cheek, from lip to ear.
The cut isn’t deep, but it’s clean. Blood beads, then spills, bright against the white tile. He rears back, shock turning to rage in an instant. His hand flies to his face, then comes back red.
“You fucking cunt—”
He swings, hard. I duck, but his fist catches my ear and sends me sideways, head ringing. I hit the wall, sliding to the floor, knees skidding on wet ceramic.
He’s on me before I can move, left hand in my hair, yanking my head back. The tile shard is still in my fist, but the angle is gone. I rake it upward, catching him in the armpit. It doesn’t break skin through the jumpsuit, but he howls, kneeing me in the side.
I gasp, air gone. He drops on top of me, pinning my arms overhead, his bulk pressing every ounce of breath from my lungs.
“Should have just opened your legs,” he says, spitting blood as he slams my wrists against the tile. “Now I’m going to fuck you until you scream for—”
His voice cuts off, replaced by the shriek of the door slamming open.
The world lurches as the guard is flung through the air, crashing into the partition. I twist, craning my neck, and see Captain Kang—face set, eyes flat as glass—hauling the corrupt guard by the throat, dragging him like dead weight. Kang slams the guard’s head into the tile, once, twice, three times, until the neck snaps with a wet, final sound. He drops the body, then turns to Inmate thirty-five, fists clenched.
For a heartbeat, everything is silent except for the drip of water and the ragged rasp of my own breath.
Then Kang charges, and the world goes blue.
Kang’s charge is physics, not violence. He covers the space in two strides, boots hydroplaning on the soaked floor, and smashes Inmate 35 into the wall so hard the tile flexes. The sound is a shotgun blast—bone and ceramic giving way in unison. The first punch lands in the man’s solar plexus, folding him double. The second is an uppercut to the chin that snaps his head back, blood and spit and something yellow spraying across the grout.
Thirty-Five manages a grunt, but Kang is already on his throat, lifting him a full inch off the ground, pinning him to the tile with one hand while the other hammers into his ribs, once, twice, again. The man kicks, flails, but Kang is stone. The muscle at his jaw twitches, eyes flat and vacant, the face of someone who’s not here to make a point, just to erase the problem.
I press myself into the furthest corner, the cold shower still blasting down my back. My hands are numb, the tile shard somewhere under my knees. The air is chemical with bleach and adrenaline and the bright metallic tang of blood atomized into the steam. My heart hammers, every beat a shotgun in my ears. I can’t decide if I’m terrified or thrilled.
