She stood her ground, hands still shackled. “I didn’t murder anyone! This is all a mistake!” When the bailiff jumped up to grab her, she pushed him down again with her foot.
Bedlam erupted. While the perps in the cage woofed and spectators crowded for a better view, the other bailiffs descended on her. SK didn’t resist. She let them corral her from behind, lift her off the ground, until the one she had tripped, his face balled up in anger, rushed over, club drawn.
“No!” Summer leaped forward to intervene, but Levi held her back.
For a split second, Summer saw a smile crease SK’s face. Then, suspended a foot off the ground by the struggling bailiffs, she doubled him over with a kick so laser-quick that Summer almost blinked through it.
The other bailiffs shackled her feet and carted her off, while the prisoners jangled their chains. It started as a low clanking that picked up when they added foot stomps, whistles, and then a chant: Fuck the system .
Angiers tried to bring the court to order, but others in the visitors’ gallery joined in, until the entire courtroom rumbled.
The chanting and chain music continued long after SK was gone.
Chapter 7
Summer wished the hands probing her breasts weren’t so cold, so flinty. She closed her eyes, waiting it out. Goosebumps rode up her neck, under the sweat.
She was twisted around, face-to-wall. She didn’t resist. Fluorescent light buzzed above, blinding her, the wall painted institutional gray. Fingers ran down her leg, then up the other. Summer took it.
The butch prison guard leered at Summer. “Proceed,” she grunted.
Summer hated visiting clients at the jail, hated the barbed wire lining the roof and the armed guards paroling there, hated being frisked, hated being drawn into her clients’ pathetic lives and lies. She promised herself that if she ever ended up here as an inmate, she would kill herself. Never would she be able to cede control of her life to a fixed schedule: a gray breakfast at 7, mindless work detail from 8 to 4, exercise for an hour, TV, lights out at 10. The mindless death scared her as much as prison violence.
Summer tucked her blouse into her skirt and stepped through the metal detector. She was buzzed through another door, into another guard station.
“I’ll take over, Maggie,” Joseph Spivak, another guard, called over the intercom. “Why, Summer and me, we go way back. Her dad and I were like this—” he held his fist up to the portal.
Maggie pushed back her cap and nodded, like she had heard it all before, and returned to her post.
Summer pecked Spivak on the cheek. When Wib died, Spivak had taken care of the funeral arrangements and comforted Sonia. Summer was so grateful, she’d let him take over the mortgage on Wib’s condo, where he guzzled beer, watched sports, grew tomatoes, and raised Dobermans.
“Hey, Spiv,” she said, “what are you doing here?”
“Saw from the visitors log you were on your way in; figured I should be your tour guide.”
Summer scrunched up her nose, not at the prospect of Spiv acting as her escort—which was, she admitted, a relief—but at the flat odor that permeated the air, a cloying mixture of unwashed inmates, institutional chow, bug poison, and detergent.
“Before we head in,” she said, “could I have my notebook and a pen back? I’m having a meeting with a client, not digging her out of here with a ballpoint.”
Spiv yawned. His belly strained against his uniform, tufts of white undershirt briefly visible, reminding Summer of a plastic pack of tissues. “Orders is orders, Sunshine. In the hands of some of these fruitcakes, pens can be weapons. When I worked the men’s side, I once saw a guy carve out his own Adam’s apple. Blood everywhere. Lots of crazy shit down here.”
Summer had a formula for calculating the veracity of Spiv’s tales: subtract two-thirds. If he said it took fifteen guards to bust up a riot, it was five. If he claimed he earned a few
Bedlam erupted. While the perps in the cage woofed and spectators crowded for a better view, the other bailiffs descended on her. SK didn’t resist. She let them corral her from behind, lift her off the ground, until the one she had tripped, his face balled up in anger, rushed over, club drawn.
“No!” Summer leaped forward to intervene, but Levi held her back.
For a split second, Summer saw a smile crease SK’s face. Then, suspended a foot off the ground by the struggling bailiffs, she doubled him over with a kick so laser-quick that Summer almost blinked through it.
The other bailiffs shackled her feet and carted her off, while the prisoners jangled their chains. It started as a low clanking that picked up when they added foot stomps, whistles, and then a chant: Fuck the system .
Angiers tried to bring the court to order, but others in the visitors’ gallery joined in, until the entire courtroom rumbled.
The chanting and chain music continued long after SK was gone.
Chapter 7
Summer wished the hands probing her breasts weren’t so cold, so flinty. She closed her eyes, waiting it out. Goosebumps rode up her neck, under the sweat.
She was twisted around, face-to-wall. She didn’t resist. Fluorescent light buzzed above, blinding her, the wall painted institutional gray. Fingers ran down her leg, then up the other. Summer took it.
The butch prison guard leered at Summer. “Proceed,” she grunted.
Summer hated visiting clients at the jail, hated the barbed wire lining the roof and the armed guards paroling there, hated being frisked, hated being drawn into her clients’ pathetic lives and lies. She promised herself that if she ever ended up here as an inmate, she would kill herself. Never would she be able to cede control of her life to a fixed schedule: a gray breakfast at 7, mindless work detail from 8 to 4, exercise for an hour, TV, lights out at 10. The mindless death scared her as much as prison violence.
Summer tucked her blouse into her skirt and stepped through the metal detector. She was buzzed through another door, into another guard station.
“I’ll take over, Maggie,” Joseph Spivak, another guard, called over the intercom. “Why, Summer and me, we go way back. Her dad and I were like this—” he held his fist up to the portal.
Maggie pushed back her cap and nodded, like she had heard it all before, and returned to her post.
Summer pecked Spivak on the cheek. When Wib died, Spivak had taken care of the funeral arrangements and comforted Sonia. Summer was so grateful, she’d let him take over the mortgage on Wib’s condo, where he guzzled beer, watched sports, grew tomatoes, and raised Dobermans.
“Hey, Spiv,” she said, “what are you doing here?”
“Saw from the visitors log you were on your way in; figured I should be your tour guide.”
Summer scrunched up her nose, not at the prospect of Spiv acting as her escort—which was, she admitted, a relief—but at the flat odor that permeated the air, a cloying mixture of unwashed inmates, institutional chow, bug poison, and detergent.
“Before we head in,” she said, “could I have my notebook and a pen back? I’m having a meeting with a client, not digging her out of here with a ballpoint.”
Spiv yawned. His belly strained against his uniform, tufts of white undershirt briefly visible, reminding Summer of a plastic pack of tissues. “Orders is orders, Sunshine. In the hands of some of these fruitcakes, pens can be weapons. When I worked the men’s side, I once saw a guy carve out his own Adam’s apple. Blood everywhere. Lots of crazy shit down here.”
Summer had a formula for calculating the veracity of Spiv’s tales: subtract two-thirds. If he said it took fifteen guards to bust up a riot, it was five. If he claimed he earned a few
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