Page 4 of Jackson

But this one was different.

With his big brown curious eyes, his soft features, and the unsure way he carried himself, he wasn’t the typical kind of felon I worked with.

What could such a pretty young thing like him have done in his past to end him up here of all places?

Caught up in a gang, maybe?

The innocent ones always did. And then they ended up doing something stupid and landing themselves behind bars.

A. Gonzalez.

That was the name stitched onto the front of his jumpsuit.

A soft whine, along with a single long scratching drag against it, had me turning toward the door. Shaking my head, I leaned far enough over in the small room to catch the door handle and tug it open. Roxy, my golden, trotted in happily, her tail wagging.

“What, you thought we left you out, huh,” I said with a chuckle, and closed the door again.

She panted at me and then turned to our newest companion—Gonzalez.

“You afraid of dogs at all?” I asked him, craning my head back around to look at him tucked into the only chair inside of the medic station. He looked so small in his large oversized jumpsuit, only furthering my curiosity on why the hell he was here.

“Um, not usually?” he said, eying Roxy warily.

“Don’t worry, she’s not trained to take down inmates or anything if they decide to run—unless it’s after dark.” It was meant as a teasing note, but Gonzalez seemed to take it a little more seriously than I meant for it to land, because he stiffened up immediately. “I’m kidding.”

Still, he didn’t seem to relax at all. He only stared guardedly at my dog.

I really needed to stop teasing this poor kid.

However, the small squawk he let out when Roxy trotted over to him and sat down in order to rest her head in his lap had me smiling. Her doe-eyes glanced up at Gonzalez curiously, watching him as he leaned fully back in his chair to give himself a bit of distance.

“She’s a softie. Especially if you feed her scraps from the mess hall,” I said, trying to keep the amusement out of my voice.

WhatIneeded to do was to keep my own distance. Getting chummy with an inmate spelled disaster in too many fonts to name.

“Noted,” he mumbled.

I didn’t have the heart to tell him that Roxy wasn’t usually one to hang out around the inmates, choosing to keep a wide berth between herself and them. I wasn’t sure when that behavior of hers started, but I didn’t really blame her for it.

The guys who came through here weren’t the violent type by any means, at least not outwardly, but a criminal always had a certain air about them that was a little off-putting. Despite that, though, Gonzalez didn’t seem to possess that trait at all. In fact, it seemed like the complete opposite.

Something that Roxy, along with myself, seemed to have picked up on.

“Here we go,” I said, finding the right kit and tugging it off the shelf. “I should’ve grabbed your hand away from that flame sooner. That’s on me.”

Truth be told, I’d been distracted—heavily—by the enraptured look on Gonzalez’s face as he watched his flame turn from small embers into something more tangible. I don’t know why, maybeit was because of those doe-eyes or maybe it was that slight smile that he wore. But either way, he’d gotten hurt because of my negligence, and to me, that was just unacceptable.

These guys may have only volunteered to be here in order to win favor with their parole boards, but that didn’t mean I was supposed to be lax in my own job at teaching them the proper safety measures when it came to dealing with fire in any capacity.

“It’s fine,” he mumbled, scooting forward while trying to not disturb my dog.

I grabbed the rolling stool and sat down on it before rolling over to where he was. The small rolling tray next to him was the next thing I grabbed while placing the first aid kit on top of it and popping the top open. It was packed nicely, thanks to Riviera, who’d been in a manic mood all last week while she cleaned the entire station before any of our inmates were dropped off today.

I grabbed the ice pack off his hand and assessed the burn. It wasn’t too deep, thankfully caught early, but it definitely was hurting him. The middle was a bright red while the edges were a softer pink. Thankfully, no blisters had formed, though.

“How bad is it?” he asked, looking down at his palm.

“You’ll live.” I snatched the gauze out of the kit and began to unravel it. “It’s a Christmas miracle.”

---