Chapter 5: The Coffee

She said yes.

I could have stopped her, but I would have had to say why.

A convict in a gray uniform cannot tell a visitor that a guard is dangerous without proof.

The guard would have written me up before I finished the sentence.

So I watched Katie follow him down the hall toward the staff lounge with her bag clutched to her chest.

I counted to thirty.

Then I told the nearest officer I needed a fresh bucket, and walked the other way.

The landlord's cousin had given me a trusty's keys for the supply closets.

The staff lounge sat at the end of a corridor behind two doors.

The first one was unlocked.

The second stood slightly open, and I could hear voices.

"It's just coffee," the guard said. "Drink up. You look exhausted."

"I'd rather see my father."

"After."

I put my back against the wall and looked through the gap.

The lounge was small and bright, with a worn couch, a table and a coffee machine.

Katie sat on the edge of the couch with a paper cup in both hands.

She hadn't tasted it.

The guard stood behind the counter with his back to me.

I watched his right hand.

He was pouring something from a tiny brown bottle into a second cup.

He did it so neatly that I would have missed it if I hadn't been looking.

He swapped the two cups on the counter, and he walked over to her with the doctored one.

"Here. Take this one. Yours has gone cold."

"I'm fine with mine."

"Take it."

His voice had changed.

She heard it too.

She stood up fast, and the cup in her hand spilled across the floor.

"I want to go now."

"Sit down, Miss Carmody."

Keep reading free with an account. Start Double Life of a Cell Block King from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.