A Dangerous Affair Read Free

wall to congregate among themselves and avoid the guards dressed in gray slacks, white shirts, and maroon ties. On the west side, groups of fierce, lean, and muscular inmates commandeered the weight pile equipped with bench press machines, crooked barbells, and rusted plates. Rival gangs occupied the wobbly bleachers, employing subtle nods and hand gestures to communicate surreptitiously with other members they instructed to bury knives and pipes in the yard. Above the chaos, Lloyd spotted the guards who monitored the confined space with automatic rifles, housed inside four air-conditioned towers aligned equidistant around the property.
    Sensing danger, Lloyd shifted his attention front and center to ignore the Mexican Mafia soldiers approaching from the bleachers. At the edge of his peripheral vision, members of the Aryan Brotherhood gathered to show force against the Black Guerrilla Family lingering on the basketball courts.
    Despite his best efforts, Lloyd had made his share of enemies during his tenure in the hostile environment. And none hated him more than the Mexican Mafia, who resented his stubborn propensity to side with the black population when the balance of power shifted.
    "Yo hessay," a Mafia soldier in sagging khaki pants and laced boots called out to Lloyd. "Where you going?"
    Lloyd followed the guard in front of him, ignoring the young shot caller with arms sleeved out in dagger tattoos.
    Irate at Lloyd's indifference to his presence, the raging Mexican signaled for his posse to follow. "I'm talking to you, hessay." He lifted his shirt to his chest to expose the bullet hole scars on his stomach.
    "Move away," the guard ordered.
    "You got no play, homey," the Mexican soldier heckled Lloyd. He waited for his men to cram behind him and surreptitiously pass the weapon—a basic shank fashioned from a broken chair leg that had been smuggled into the vocational training shop, sharpened, and then smuggled back out in a pouch sewn inside a jacket sleeve.
    Lloyd deflected the taunts with unshakeable concentration, his mind centered on a single objective.
    "I said wussup, vato," the soldier persisted despite the guard's verbal warning and the threat of a beanbag shot to the body from a rookie tower guard itching to pull the trigger. "Yo, motherfucker! I'm talkin' at you!" Fueled by vengeance, the soldier charged at Lloyd with the shank concealed behind his forearm.
    Lloyd embraced the attack in his shackled hands, using his wrist restraints to trap the weapon and throw his attacker violently to the ground with an elbow lock and a graceful redirection of force.
    Before the other guards on the ground could respond, the control tower abandoned the usual warning shots and fired a barrage of bullets at the ground.
    A hundred prisoners hit the dirt all at once.
    The loudspeakers crackled. "Everybody on the ground! NOW!"
    A buzzer signaled the staff to place the general population on lockdown. One guard confiscated the Mexican soldier's weapon; another hauled the instigator to solitary confinement.
    "Keep moving." The big guard prodded Lloyd with his meat hook hands.
    Lloyd ventured toward the gauntlet of security checkpoints positioned between the yard and the inside entrance to the "love shack"—a minimal security administrative services building that housed the paper pushers and served as a gateway between the incarcerated criminals and those free to come and go with the outside world.
    A warning sign greeted Lloyd at the entrance. Large red letters made a statement about the authorized use of deadly force. Smaller print mentioned the use of video and audio surveillance.
    Escorted by the guard, Lloyd entered a changing room and had his prisoner restraints removed under close supervision from another armed officer stationed in the admin services building.
    Lloyd donned a pair of slacks and a button-down shirt. "I'm supposed to have shoes with these," he said, his words squandered on indifferent ears.
    Lloyd tucked in his