the First Rule (2010) (34 page)

THREE WEEKS LATER, one day after they removed the cast from his arm, Michael Darko scowled at the flat, dry fields as they approached Corcoran, California, and thought, This must be the far side of the moon. Darko was surprised that morning when he was herded onto a bus and told he was being relocated to Corcoran State Prison. Darko had spent the past two weeks at Terminal Island, a federal facility he thought would be his home for the next many years. He asked why he was being transferred, but no one offered an answer.

Another inmate on the ride up told him Corcoran was a very bad place with many dangerous people, but now, after four hours in the bus and seeing the prison in the distance, Darko was not so much scared that this place would be dangerous, but disappointed because it was ugly.

After what he had known in Bosnia, American prisons and American prisoners did not frighten him, just as American policemen did not frighten him. Michael Darko had come from a dangerous place, and was, himself, a dangerous man.

Even as the prison grew in the van's dusty windows, Darko was planning to establish contact with other East European inmates, and forge relationships with the Aryan Brotherhood. Many of these associations were already in place, and would be useful in building an empire.

Ten minutes later, the van entered the facility through a rolling gate, then drove into a small parking area where several guards waited. Darko and the two inmates sharing the ride had to wait for the guards to enter the van and unlock them. Each of the three were wearing hand and ankle restraints, and had been locked to separate seats well out of reach of each other. This was done because violent inmates often tried to kill, maim, fornicate with, and sometimes eat each other on the long drive up to nowhere.

The guards entered the van one by one, unhooked an inmate, and walked him off, one guard per inmate. Darko was taken off last. He gave his guard a merciless leer.

Home, sweet home! It is a beautiful place, is it not?

The guard had seen tough-guy swagger before, and paid no attention.

The three new inmates were herded through the admitting process. They were stripped, searched, probed, and X-rayed, then were fingerprinted, photographed, and had a DNA sample removed and recorded. They were sprayed with de-louser, made to shower, and given new clothes and shoes. The clothes and shoes they were wearing when they arrived were discarded. The allowable possessions transferred with them were inspected, logged into their records, and returned.

The admission process took forty minutes, during which the chief guard-of-the-watch lectured them on the dos and don'ts of Corcoran, read them a set of written rules, and issued their housing assignments.

Michael Darko was assigned a cell in Level Three Housing, a facility for homicidal offenders capable of self-restraint. Two guards walked him to his new home, turned him over to yet more guards, who processed him into their facility. He was then given fresh bedding, and led to his cell.

He arrived during the afternoon break, a time at which the cells on the main block were open, and main block prisoners were allowed to mingle in the common areas.

The two guards brought Darko to his cell and pointed out a sheet-less bunk.

This side. Your bunkie's a brother named Nathaniel Adama-bey. Calls himself a Moor. He's in for two homicides, but he ain't so bad.

I am sure we will become great friends.

I'm sure you will.

The guards left, and Darko turned to his bunk. He unrolled the mattress, straightened it, then picked up his sheet. It was coarse, and stiff with plenty of starch. Darko hated making a bed, and wished he had one of his whores to take care of it. Then he chuckled. Maybe he would make this Nathaniel Adama-bey his whore, and then Nathaniel could do it.

Darko unfolded the sheet, and shook it into the air to open it. The sheet billowed out, and floated for a moment like a great white bubble. The bubble was still in the air when Michael Darko slammed face-first into the wall, breaking his nose. Then an arm as hard as steel locked around his throat, and something stung his back like an angry wasp, low on his side over his kidney, stickstickstick, stickstickstick, stickstickstick, a sharp pricking that happened too fast to hurt, and moved from his side to his ribs, stickstickstick, stickstickstick.

Michael Darko tried to rise, but the man kept him off balance, stickstickstick, until a hissing, hot breath scalded his ear.

Don't die yet, not yet.

Darko was flipped over. He saw a short Asian man with tremendous shoulders and arms, whose face was dimpled with scars as if from horrible wounds. Michael Darko tried to raise his hands, but couldn't. He tried to defend himself, but was beyond all that. The man's arm moved as furiously as a needle on a sewing machine, stickstickstick, stickstickstick, punching Darko in the chest with an ice pick.

Michael Darko watched himself being killed.

The man suddenly grabbed Darko's face, and leaned close with his rage, close enough for a kiss.

You're gonna meet Frank Meyer, you piece of shit. Tell'm Lonny sends his love.

The man shoved the ice pick hard into Darko's chest, all the way to the hilt, and abruptly walked away.

Michael Darko looked down at the handle, protruding from his chest. He wanted to pull it out, but his hands wouldn't move. Darko slid off his bunk into his sheet, and the folds draped over him like a shawl. His back and chest felt as if ants were migrating under his skin, and seemed to be swelling. Darko tried to call for help, but could not find the breath. He could not breathe. He felt light-headed, and cold, and afraid.

The white sheet grew red.

TRAFFIC AT A STANDSTILL. Late afternoon. Someone lost control of his vehicle, and now the southbound 405 was a parking lot. Kelly Walsh didn't mind. Windows up, AC blowing, the horns outside muted. CD player. She touched the replay button, and the backup singers began their soothing riff, dum, dum, dum, dundee, doo-wah, and Roy Orbison kissed her heart with longing and pain.

Only the lonely.

Walsh had listened to the song four times in a row, and was now on her fifth; trapped on the stalled freeway in a cocoon of melancholy.

Walsh missed him terribly, Special Agent Jordan Brant, killed in the line of duty, one of her guys, and could not escape the guilt that she had failed him, then, and even now.

Michael Darko had cut a deal, which meant there had been no trial. Walsh knew she should be happy, but Jordie Brant's wife lost the chance to confront her husband's killer, and Walsh herself lost the righteous vengeance of offering the testimony to nail Darko's conviction. The lack of closure left her feeling as if Jordie remained unavenged, and that she had somehow failed him again. And lost him again.

They're gone forever.

Sitting there, listening to Roy, her cell phone buzzed. Walsh checked the incoming ID, then stopped the music to answer.

Kelly Walsh.

Have you heard?

I get promoted?

Better. Michael Darko was murdered.

Walsh was caught off guard and left feeling surprised. She had expected this call sooner or later, but not this soon, and not today. A mixture of warmth and fear blossomed in her belly.

She said, Couldn't happen to a nicer guy.

These things happen.

Yes. Yes, they do. They know who did it?

Uh-uh. Someone got in his cell during a free period. No video, either. The DVR was down.

Walsh kept the smile from her voice.

No shit. That's a bad break. How'd they kill him?

Looks like an ice pick or a screwdriver. Stuck him sixty-two times.

Walsh smiled a warm, soft smile all the way from Jordie Brant's grave.

Thanks for letting me know. Sounds like someone had a serious mad-on for this prick.

No kidding. Hope that dude doesn't get mad at me.

Walsh laughed politely, then closed her phone. She sat in silence for a moment, feeling her spirits lighten. Walsh had called in big favors to have Darko transferred to Corcoran, and would owe a big favor in return, but Special Agent Kelly Walsh had fulfilled her obligation. Jordie Brant had been one of her guys. You have to take care of your own, and that's what she did.

Walsh had known how she would do it since she learned Lonnie Tang was in Corcoran.

A nasty little sonofabitch.

A natural-born killer.

Walsh ejected the Orbison, and decided she wanted to hear something lighter. More bouncy and upbeat. She loaded her favorite all-girl mix into the player, Pussycat Dolls, No Doubt, Rihanna, and Pink, sprinkled with classics by the Bangles, Bananarama, and the Go-Go's. She hit the play button, and cranked up the volume.

The energy filled her.

She sang with the band.

This town is my town.

She felt better already.

Those women can rock!

COLE FOUND THE FAMILY. They were good people, a young couple from Sierra Madre who had already adopted two children, both, coincidentally, from the former Soviet Union. Cole had checked them out thoroughly, and interviewed them several times, and Pike had watched how they related to the boy and their other children. He thought they would do a fine job.

Walsh had come through on the paperwork. Documents would be created that established the boy as a natural-born citizen of the United States, born to a fictitious couple in Independence, Louisiana, and adopted through a private attorney.

Pike held the boy for the last time on a bright sunny morning outside a federal office building in downtown Los Angeles. A private social worker employed by the attorney was going to deliver the boy to his new parents, who were currently waiting across the street.

The boy liked the sun, and he liked being outside. He flapped his arms and made the gurgling laugh.

Pike said, You good?

The boy flapped his arms harder, and touched Pike's face.

Pike stroked his back, then handed him off to the social worker. Pike watched her deliver him to the young couple. The young woman took the boy in her arms, and the young man made a silly face. The baby seemed happy to see them.

Pike turned away without looking back, went into the building, and found the office. A woman there was going to generate the necessary paperwork.

She told Pike to have a seat, then faced her computer.

I have to fill in the birth information. The name, place of birth, things like that. Most of these things will change with the adoption, like his name, but we need something right now to create his place in the system.

I understand.

I was told you're the one who has that information?

Pike nodded.

Okay. Let's get started. What's his first name?

Peter.

Spell it, please.

P-E-T-E-R.

Middle name?

No middle name.

Most people have a middle name.

I don't. Neither does he.

Okay. His last name?

Pike. P-I-K-E.