Page 16 of Jackson

I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from grinning.

The dreaded ‘A’-word. Every CO’s worst nightmare.

Not only would the prison be held responsible for the inmates’ care while there, they’d also have to ship out a few COs in order to guard the doors to make sure no one got the bright idea of slipping out of their room and getting out onto the streets.

And literallyno onewanted guard duty in a hospital. Not only was it boring as all hell to wait outside of a patient’s room twiddling your thumbs, but I doubted any of them would be getting overtime.

Not with the way our Warden worked.

“Yeah. Sure. We’ll meet you over at the station with them,” Stinner said. “He needs to be handcuffed, though.”

Jackson sighed, dropping my hand. “All right.”

I held out my still shaking hands to Stinner, who slapped a pair of cuffs on them, wrenching them tight enough to hurt when I moved my arms around. He was one of the COs that was known to be in a pissy mood if things like inmate fighting cut into his ‘me time’ away from all of us.

Jackson finally took me by the wrist again and led me away from the cabins.

The lights coming off of the buildings we passed by gave us just enough illumination to see where we were going but not enough to look like we’d stepped out onto the center of the sun.

As we grew farther and farther away from the cabins, my heart began to slow and I could breathe again.

Jesus, I hadn’t been that up close and personal to a fight since I first came to SAC. My first week there had been quite the initiation into prison life, with a guy in my unit being stabbed and another one being dragged out and beaten up in the yard during our rec period while I’d been standing close by.

After everything that had happened leading up to me being arrested and going to jail, I’d never had a good track record with being met face-to-face with aggression or imminent threat.

The one time I’d defended myself had landed me in prison. So...

“You okay?” Jackson turned back to look at me right as we reached the medic station.

I swallowed thickly. “Yeah. I, uh... I hope you don’t think I was involved in any of that.”

Why did I say it like that?

And why would Jackson even care?

Did Iwanthim to care?

It wasn’t like his opinion of me should matter. If it did… well, it’d just complicate things.

Right?

“Oh…” He lifted a hand and very gently dragged his fingers through my hair, brushing it back away from my face. “No, not at all. You’re far too sweet to be involved in any of that.”

My entire body flushed with heat as the air in my lungs caught in my throat. I was so glad it was dark out there because I was sure my face was bright red with how hard I was blushing.

What the hell did that even mean?

His thumb traced along my forehead before dropping back down to his side. “Let’s get you cleaned up.”

CHAPTER 7

Jackson

Ayen.

What a pretty name. It was fitting for someone who looked and acted like him.

I ran my gaze over him, taking in his curious expression as he wandered around my cabin. One of his hands gripped at his wrist, rubbing over the red ring that had been left from the too-tight cuffs.

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