Death Row Breakout Read Online Free Page B

remember saying goodbye – but when he walked back toward the gate, a different deputy was at the desk – the same one who had sneered at him over the phone call, called him a
nigger
and told him to get his
black ass
moving. Now he had to get up from the desk to unlock the gate so Booker could exit. They came face-to-face and the deputy apparently had no recollection of the earlier moment. That galled Booker even more. The deputy became the focus of all his frustration and pain.
    “You wanna call me a nigger now?”
    “Huh?”
    “Last evenin’ in the bookin’ office –”
    The deputy remembered. His chin rose to a haughty pose – and red flashed through Booker’s brain. He hadn’t thought beyond saying something, and now he thought not at all. His right fist lashed out. The splat of fist and the crack of broken jaw were loud enough to silence everyone in the Attorney Room and turn every eye in his direction.
    They saw the deputy slide down the gate to the floor. Booker was surprised; he had not expected what he had done. There was one moment of satisfaction, followed by a wave of despair, for he knew that this was a terrible crime and he would pay an awful price.
    The deputy watching the nearest table came running. Booker threw a straight right hand and the deputy impaled himself on it. His head stopped cold and his feet kept coming. He went down flat on his back, emitting a loud grunt as the floor knocked the air from his lungs. He lay gasping and rolling. The first deputy, groggy and in pain, tried to grab the bars and pull himself to his feet. Booker kicked him in his exposed ribs. He fell back down.
    Another deputy approaching him stopped ten feet away. Booker looked him in the eye and saw fear. Booker took a step toward him and the deputy backed up. Booker nearly laughed.
    His hilarity was momentary. Two more deputies arrived within seconds. One had corporal’s stripes. He motioned the other two to spread out; they would rush him from three sides and gang-tackle him.
    Booker didn’t wait. He charged first, right at the corporal in the center. He drove head and shoulders into the man’s chest and kept going. The corporal was carried backward onto one of the tables. A leg gave way; the table went down, so did the corporal. Bells rang, attorneys and bail bondsmen scattered – and deputies came running from everywhere.
    Booker fell on top of the corporal. He pushed up to get leverage and smashed his fist into the corporal’s nose. Blood spurted.
    A deputy ran up and kicked Booker. He whirled like a cat and grabbed the foot, twisting it so the man fell onto the desk.
    Then they were on him, so many that some were unable to reach him in the press of bodies. But lights began flashing in his brain, accompanied by bolts of pain, as the fists and boots and slaps began to land, driven by pack frenzy. Booker lunged backward, carrying one on his back and dragging others. When he slammed into the wall, the deputy on his back grunted and fell off. Someone smashed his eye and sent coruscating lights through his brain. Another rammed a club into his ribs and snatched his wind.
    They punched and stomped and dragged him through the jail; on a steel stairway, his head bouncing on each step. Their frenzy was such that they tripped and the whole mass fell tumbling down, one screaming as his ankle snapped. Booker came down on top of the pile. It was outside a tank of white prisoners. They were at the bars, yelling and banging cups and spitting through the bars as Booker was dragged past. By then he was oblivious except for momentary flashes of pain.
    Through gates and along corridors, they dragged him to the hole on the 14th floor. They tore off his clothes while still punching, kicking and cursing him. They threw him naked onto the concrete floor and closed the solid steel door. The key turned and he was locked in Stygian blackness. His entire body was a mass of throbbing pain. Each breath sent a bolt of fire through him. A rib