Page 30 of Judas

Get out of your head, Nadia, you have plenty of time. We have plenty of time.

Those words, they sound like him; a mixture of our voices echo in my ears as I think them. Almost as if we are saying them in unison. I will myself back to the moment, back to fostering whatever this relationship needs to be with Fury, allowing it to happen—because Kace set it in motion.

“You’re white. How are you managing here, then?” I ask, shifting to the side, the edema in my ankles and feet causing my legs to hurt and the sciatic nerve in my back to stun. I lower myself down onto the bunk I dressed not minutes before. Definitely not my comfortable bed I had in my apartment, but I’m glad it’s not the floor. Looking back up to Fury, she stands close by and unloads all the details I thought I knew.

Goes by Fury because that’s what put her here. Extreme aggression and anger that bubbled over into a work-setting. According to her—and I take everything inmates say with a grain of salt—she was being harassed by the CEO of the company, and in an act of anger, she wiped out his entire intelligence infrastructure and relocated the funds from every account to charitable organizations across the globe so the money couldn’t be given back.

Best part? She burned the whole fucking building down—could change her name to Fuere Frei. Should take some arson lessons from her while I’m here. Burned Dad’s house down, but it was sloppy and had me on Whitlock’s radar outside of the cocaine suspicions. Clean up my methods, make it bigger, make it hotter—you know, firebug type shit.

Chapter eleven

Babalon

Time Served — Three years

Time Left — Fourteen years

“Hey girl.”

It’s loud in the common area today, but I startle anyway when her voice catches me off guard. My nerves are shot; everything and everyone seems to make it worse with each tiny noise. This place is loud. Mind you, the hollering makes it easy to understand how she was able to get the jump on me—zero rest for the wicked. Though I wasn’t expecting Fury to join, I know why she’s here. I can hear it in the tone of her voice. Placating almost, which only pisses me off because I don’t want to be treated any differently. But when she or one of the others gets the same tone, I know they’re going to make a bigdeal about what they heard. She knows what happened last night—something I can’t hide. My expression and body language gave me away.

We have been friends since I arrived; took to each other rather quickly after our little show, and have been close ever since. Fury’s little gaggle of friends—Monika, Birdie, Jerrikah, Tora, and Yael are my family now—have become sisters I never thought I needed. Let’s be honest: while we are here, I didn’t want a family after my biological one fell apart. All six of them have fought for me, sometimes against me, but continue to be a system of support and emotional competence. Can’t say much for the rest of the mean ass bitches in here—guards included..

Fury is definitely the ring leader of the bunch, but the thing about all of these women is that they’re not your typical criminals. They’re brilliant, beyond educated, quick witted, poised, and Tora comes from money. When I say money, I mean MONEY, like billions. She was bored with her kept life and wanted a thrill, so she started heisting irreplaceable historical artifacts.

Jerrikah, formerly known as Eden, came from a cult setting. Her mother was one of several wives, grooming Jerrikah and her other sisters into sex slavery for the limited number of men within the congregation. Jerrikah was sixteen when she finally reached out to authorities but before they could arrive to save them, their commune leader attacked her and she killed him out of self defense. The group that ran their religious dealings pushed for her execution but the prosecutor settled for involuntary manslaughter. Living in a state that holds religion above the lives of its constituents? That’s how you end up in the same position Jerrikah is in. Religion is ruinous.

Birdie is the oldest of us. She’s like a mother hen, keeping all of us calm and collected when things pop off. She also calls for order and supports us emotionally since we are all so damaged—very much our matriarch. She is a three time PHD: Biological Sciences, Psychology, and Alternative Medicine. Birdie is locked away because of unsanctioned human experiments that resulted in death. She introduced the concept and formula for a holistic medication to eliminate psychosis at the fraction of the cost of other pharmaceutical grade antipsychotics. Allow me to dumb it down for you. She gave unauthorized drugs to psychotic patients and they killed themselves. Psilocybins, to be more precise—she was on the right track, just with the wrong mushrooms. I think people take Lion’s Mane now.

Yael was a mule. Moved heroine across the border—alone, mind you. Most mules work in groups or have people who direct them, almost like pimps, but she did it all herself. Transportation, rendezvous, negotiations, networking, marketing—you name it. It was her own one woman show; it took the DEA years to catch up with her and when they did, she had built a hell of a rap sheet.

Then we have Monika. She’s originally from Belarus and was caught by Red Teaming—a counterintelligence process that checks for loopholes and back door entry points for high profile accounts. She ended up breaching an ally's military base on US soil. She’s brave, I give her that. If it wasn’t for her compliance she may have ended up in a black site somewhere but she was sent to Bluitt with the rest of us for being non-violent. Things have changed since she was sentenced, however. She’s the quietest, and most guarded, of all of the family. Unsure if it’s because she doesn’t quite grasp American English or if she’s waiting to see who stabs her in the back first. Won’t be me.

When you think about it, I don’t fit in with them. I’m here out of love, a guard gone rogue. Hell, I’m not nearly as smart as these women. They chose me, though. Not at first, since Xavier turned me over to be babysat by Fury, but things have changed. On top of it all, they’re ruthless. Other than excessive force inDarkwater, I’m nowhere close to being as violent as they are. While it’s only been three years, there’ve been many times where I’ve sat back and watched them dish out beatings like they were passing around a box of tissues during mass.

There’s not a fucking thing I would change about it, either. They’re mine, I’m theirs.

“Hey,” I finally reply to Fury. If I wait too much longer, she’s going to turn into an overbearing parent.

She’s sitting there with one leg on the inside and one on the outside of the bench seat—straddling it. Assessing me, no less. Skimming me from the floor up to my face; a hands off pat down if you will. Politely waiting for me to explain what was tormenting me last night. Why I was tossing and turning, fighting tears and trying to mask them with the occasional clearing of my throat. All after, a scream had ripped out of me due to the dream I was having.

The list is long, Fury. How much time do you have today?

When she doesn’t push me, but still feeling the weight of her stare burning into the side of my face, I drop my hands onto the top of the table. I realize I just chewed the skin around my nails down until the wounds began to bleed. Sighing exasperatedly, I swallow, hoping to quell the knot forming in my throat so my voice doesn’t crack. Not that she’d give a fuck. Girl is like a vault; what you say to her—even if you’re a danger to yourself—she keeps it locked away. We are supposed to report the possibility of self-harm amongst the inmates but there are those of us who do not cooperate with the officers at all. Fury is one of them. She’s gone toe to toe with a few and ended up being tossed in the mesh sack to keep her from flailing about or strapped to the restraint bed until she stopped acting a fool. I’ve never had to fear for her survival, only her safety for when officers got too excessive.

Ironic.

“Had this nightmare a few months back. It keeps circling around and just when I think it can’t get worse, something else is thrown in there,” I begin, unable to look at her. Not that she will say anything anyway. I move quickly into a full explanation instead of giving her the cliff notes.

“The first dream, I couldn’t hear much of anything, only able to see the area around me burning. Sadie was standing off in the distance with that fucker next to her, petting her like an animal, then her face just—it was dark, wicked, and shifted into some sort of demonic thing. I woke up after that.”

That dream fucked me up for days. I made sure she was hidden… At least, I think I did a good enough job. He is on a life sentence with evidence of violence on staff and loss of life to inmates while in custody, so he’s not getting out. It would take an act of God for Lucien to find his way to my daughter. Let’s hope the one living in his head has taken a permanent vacation and the slimy fuck won’t try to weasel his way out of his conviction. I mean, he came for me and won’t have access to me as long as I am here.

“Every repeat dream since, shit gets worse. Sometimes I see her nailed to a cross as he lights it up like some Salem witch. Turns out, that’s what caused the fire that engulfed everything around us. Other times, as soon as I sink into the dream, she’s standing so damn close I can smell her.”

Closing my eyes, sucking in the deepest breath manageable, my lungs burn from the expansion as I try to recall the scent of her.

“She smells like the ocean, that sharp clean smell of the natural salts. That with lemon, sometimes grapefruit, and a slight hint of jasmine. Until the rot sets in. Pure, scrape an animal off the pavement, rot. Quite the jump scare.”

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