Read Online Faces in Time by Lewis E. Aleman - Free Book Online Page B

dangling from it.
    Edmund reaches out to grab it, but Rutherford tosses it through bars. Edmund catches it with one hand, driving a corner of its rough plastic into his palm. Glancing at it in his opened hand, the words “Visitor’s Pass” glare out at him. The smaller print has the date and the call letters of a local TV station among other words that he is not going to read.
    “That should make walking out of here a lot easier.”
    Turning, taking two steps, and looking back, Rutherford says, “Tell Chapetta I’m sorry it had to be this way. Wrong place, bad time.”
    Smiling at the prospect, “Sure, I’ll send him your regards.”
    The footsteps grow softer with each echoing step.
    Edmund thinks the deputy warden an idiot for not stepping quieter. Rutherford is the prison’s steward—it’s not unusual for him to wander down the halls inspecting, and any convict who notices him has weak credibility even if he decides to talk. But, it seems simply stupid to do anything to link oneself to a crime scene. Edmund can’t make sense of his logic except that maybe there is none. Maybe he’s so secure in his job and comfortable in his power that he thinks nothing could condemn him, even being in the vicinity minutes before a jail break.
    The reminders to heed the plan were most unnecessary; Edmund’s done little but go over the steps in his head since it was agreed upon nearly two weeks ago. During every meal, he has thought of shaving his head and beard and hiding the hairs between the bed cushion and the cover. During every break, he’s focused on changing his clothes as quickly as possible. During his work, he’s dreamed of the first step into the hallway.
    It is a good plan. The electronic doors do malfunction occasionally. In fact, the cells on both sides of Edmund are currently vacant while the prison waits for its budget to grow large enough to repair their faulty doors. Just last year, an inciden made the news involving two inmates yelling for the guard when their doors mysteriously popped open. They had no plan, and in Edmund’s mind no imagination—the type of prisoners that he thought deserved to rot here. But, the public enjoyed the thought of prisoners not wanting to get into trouble and calling for the guard to lock them back up.
    Every time Edmund has heard their story, he has gritted his teeth at the wasted opportunity, the very type of a chance that he’s become obsessed with. One year later, their lost getaway makes Edmund’s escape seem less a conspiracy and more like an electronic malfunction. No doubt it helped sway Rutherford to believe a plan like this would work without any suspicion of prison staff involvement, especially if it involves the death of a new, inexperienced prison guard.
    It’s not likely that anyone will be suspicious. Contraband finds its way into prisons in much the same way that the roaches do—any little crack and it’ll reshape itself to fit through it and invade. No one will investigate much into a change of street clothes and a razor making their way into a three time felon’s cell. In fact, it sounds likely.
    Add to it all that today is the day a local news team is coming to film a piece on the prison, a day that the prison will be filled with street-clothed visitors, and it appears flawless. Rutherford isn’t a man of morals, but he isn’t stupid, having devised a plan that should leave him completely in the clear.
    Edmund shoves his head through the neckline of the gray drugstore shirt, completing his street garb, and he immediately stares at the lock. Despite his earlier threats on getting to Rutherford if he didn’t uphold his end of their bargain, he’s feared a double cross from the first raised eyebrow of their negotiations. An alliance in prison is a sculpture made in the shadows, one never knowing what it will look like when it’s brought into the light, or if it will bear any resemblance to the words that formed it or the desired image in one’s