Anti-Hero | Tim Bradford

Chapter Nineteen - Conversing

Damian Barrett moved the coins in his hands, rattling them back and forth as he waited for the seconds as they passed. He had been instructed to call at exactly 17:47, not a second sooner or late. He was to say a few words and hang-up. The call had to be short, and from a payphone. The Instructions had been very clear, he had no margin for error.

He looked down to his cracked watch for the third time this minute, he only had 30 more seconds. His heart was pounding in his chest, so much so he could hear every thump after thump after thump. Taking a deep breath, he counted a few more seconds before slotting the coins, one by one, into the payphone and dialling the number he had memorised weeks ago.

He listened as the phone rang once, twice, three times before the recipient answered. "Hello, Damian. I am so glad to hear from you, and at the correct time too. Good boy."

"I was arrested earlier, one of the cops, some redhead chick detective or whatever. She recognised my snake tattoo." He said gruffly, trying to keep his voice quiet in such a public setting.

"And...?" The voice rang out, satisfied at the report so far.

"She seemed thrown off by it. Then they let me go, no charge."

The voice laughed softly, so much so Damian wasn't sure he had heard it. "Excellent. You did well."

"Is that all you wanted from me? Are we even yet?" He snapped.

Damian had been in business with the person behind the voice for a while. He had never seen their face or even learnt their first name. He was desperate one day when his phone rang, he took the offer, forever debiting himself to the faceless voice.

"Not quite," The voice said before pausing for a moment. Damian nearly hung up the phone when they began to speak again. "Although, if you want to pay off some more of that debt, I have another job for you, relatively easy."

"Easy?" He snapped, "Nothing is easy with you! I've just been arrested, and youre saying whatever comes next is easy."

"Calm yourself, or I won't be so nice next time. You've seen what happens when I decide that I want someone gone. It's why I enlisted you of course. Besides, a child could do this job."

Damian leant his head back, cursing everything he could think of. "Fine. What is it."

"I need you to mail me something..."

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The payphone was found destroyed in the morning, the machine was smashed to bits. Local CCTV placed a hooded man waiting there for nearly half hour before taking a short phone call.

It didn't take long for the case to wind up on Detective Bradford's desk. Opening the file, her eyes cast down to the images captured by the surveillance camera. It was a little blurred, but once she focussed into the details, it was unmissable. A snake tattoo with bright red eyes.

Swiftly, she grabbed the file and images, weaving throughout the bull pen to Lopez's desk. It took some restraint not to slam it down.

"Hey, I think we were right to be concerned about Barret." She opened the file again, letting Angela look inside, "This wasn't long after he left here."

Lopez picked up the file, flipping through the pages as Morgan had done only a few moments prior. "I think we need to go to Grey, this should be added to the reports. But that phone is smashed, you do know that we will have no record of anything dialled from there? It's another loose end."

"Yeah, I know, but it is something, more than we had at least."

"It's something to watch out for."

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The crinkled paper felt familiarly rough under her fingers as she ran them along the pages. Ideally she wouldn't have had to read books in such disrepair but you do not get many luxuries in prison, so she would take what she could get. Placing the book down, the prisoner sighed, laying down in her bed.

She didn't need a clock to know what the time was, she had spent years observing the routines of the days and the movements of the guards. She could practically tell what they ate for lunch at this point. It was a simple way to keep her mind occupied, death row wasn't full of mental stimulation after all. She knew that in less than four minutes a guard, most likely Donovan, would be coming round with mail that had been pre read and searched for any kind of threat.

They couldn't be blamed, if anything she found it adorable. Their pathetic attempts to stop her communicating with the outside world. The prison should have known about her contraband phone and stationary, she did make it far too obvious after all. But then again, if someone doesn't want to see something, it has a slight habit of not being noticeable.

Two minutes.

She could tell by the sound of the cart entering the corridor. It was a creaky old thing, one of the wheels tended to spin away from the others, making an awful screech when it was turned. It was a shame the prison was too cheap for a can of WD-40. It would've made her predictions a tad more challenging.

Thirty seconds.

She sat up again, straightening out the bright orange prison uniform she wore. She had always taken pride in her appearance and the uniform made no dent in that. Power was exerted from looks, and she would be damned if she didn't keep a firm hold of the power.

Ten seconds.

Slowly she stood up, stretching her arms out, waiting for the door hatch to open

Five seconds...

...four...

...three...

...two

The hatch slammed open, a parcel of torn open letters shoved through. As she had predicted, the voice of guard Donovan rang out before the hatch slammed shut again. "Rosalind Dyer, mail call."