THE PLAN HAD backfired. The parents had used the Buick and had been killed instead. Kevin knew he couldn’t trust anyone to do the job right. He’d do it himself when he got out. He was not happy with the situation, but at least here he could get a good education on what to do when he was sprung.
He had much to learn and able instructors to teach him. While he scrubbed floors, he drew out Steve Summers, a black inmate who’d conned his grandmother into willing him her money before he laced her tea with rat poison.
“I’d have been home free if that fuckin’ hardware man hadn’t ratted, excuse the pun,” Steven said, wringing the mop and rinsing the floor.
Kevin sympathized, but made sure to quiz Steve on the type and proportion of the poison he’d used. He wouldn’t rule out any possibility, though he wasn’t sure if he’d have the opportunity to use this one. Well, there were other routes.
While scrubbing a urinal, Kevin leaned on the brush and gabbed with Daryl Johnson, who was wiping down the adjoining stall.
“I hear you know something about lock picking.”
Daryl filled him in on the basics, but stressed the job required finesse. “Judging from the way you handle a toilet brush, you might be in trouble, boy,” Daryl jibed.
Kevin flipped the brush at him, making Daryl jump.
On kitchen duty, Kevin ran into Stone Branton, a wily munitions expert who’d been nabbed blowing up a tire factory.
“Hey, Stone, that must’ve been some explosion,” Kevin said, flashing an admiring grin, as he guided a batch of red onions into the dicer.
Stone gripped a potato and grinned. “You’re damn right. You could see the smoke and flames for blocks—a sight to behold, if I do say so myself.”
“What went wrong?”
“Hell, I almost made it. It was just my luck I didn’t notice the prick of a guard taking a whiz behind the bush. Wouldn’t you know, he saw me leave. When the explosion happened ten minutes later, he remembered my face and picked me out of a book.”
“How’d you do it anyway?”
“Oh, I rigged it up ahead of time, drove a few blocks, and then pushed my handy dandy remote. My cell phone would have worked, but I wasn’t sure if it would be traced.”
Kevin nodded. “You played it smart.”
“Damn straight, Jack. And let me tell you, the experience was almost worth getting caught. That explosion was somethin’ else.”
Enough B.S. He wanted details. “Hey, Stone could you teach me how to make a bomb?”
Stone carefully placed the potato back on the counter and looked across at Kevin. “Sure, pal. The first thing to remember is respect. Bombs are dangerous. You do everything perfect or you don’t live to talk about it.”
As Stone explained the makings, Kevin was amazed at how simple it was. That suited him fine, since he dare not scribble any bomb recipes and leave them around his cell. He’d keep this bit of knowledge, along with the rest of the stuff he’d learned, deep inside his brain until the exact right moment.
The following Monday afternoon, as he cut through the rec room, the place was buzzing.
“What’s going on, man?” he asked Pedro.
“Wake up, sweetie. What planet are you on? The basketball draft’s today.”
“Oh, yeah. Thanks for the heads up.”
“Glad to oblige,” Pedro said with a knowing smile.
The draft. The blood rushed to Kevin’s head. Ages ago he’d dreamt of being a pro. He was quick, tall and fast. He would have made it.
“Who do you think they’ll pick?” Kevin asked.
“That fine lookin’ Callaway’s a shoe-in,” Pedro said.