“Excellent,” the man said. “I’ll make the arrangements. You’ll be out of here in less than an hour.”
Alex heard the shuffle of his shoes on cement, and stiffened. With this guy on the move, there was no way she’d make it back to the other block without being seen.
She turned quickly, and scanned the cells along the wall.
The door to each was open. Thinking it would be a bad idea to hide in the cell right next to El-Hashim’s, she scrambled for the next one over and moved inside. As she dropped to the floor and slipped under the front bunk, she heard the man’s steps entering the common area.
Lying on her stomach, her chin propped on the cement, she looked out through the bars. A second later the man came into view — a guard she was sure she’d never seen before.
She was thinking she must have been wrong about recognizing the voice when another set of steps echoed through the common area, and a second man walked into view.
The warden.
Son of a bitch.
So El-Hashim had the most powerful person in Slavne Prison in her pocket. No wonder the Stonewell contact was being extra cautious.
As soon as Alex was sure the two men were off the block, she started to crawl out from under the bed, but froze again when she heard someone else enter the common area.
It was the woman who’d been visiting the cafeteria in Building One. She walked quickly through the outer room and over to cell 259. A moment later, voices drifted down from El-Hashim’s cell, not quite as clear from this distance.
“…list…”
“Don’t…for any…”
“…finished.”
Alex scooted out of her hiding spot, tiptoed to the door, and carefully peeked around it.
The common area was clear. They were all inside their cell.
It was now or never.
She left the cell and quietly retraced her steps to the cellblock doorway. She was within seconds of the exit, when a voice behind her shouted in Arabic. It was a word she had learned while stationed in Iraq, and she knew exactly what it meant:
Stop!
Rather than comply, Alex took off, running through the doorway and into the next block. Behind her she could hear the pounding of footsteps, someone in hot pursuit.
Alex bore down, speeding through block one and into the stairwell, then took the steps two at a time, hurrying down to the first floor. As she leaped off the last step, she nearly ran into a group of inmates who had just entered the stairway. They jumped out of the way, and yelled at her as she rushed by.
“Sorry,” she said, as she rounded the corner into the hallway leading to the building’s exit.
A few seconds later, she heard more shouts behind her that she assumed meant her pursuer was still following.
The door to the outside was propped open now. She sprinted over the threshold and into the yard. The outdoor area was no longer empty, as many prisoners were taking advantage of a few minutes of fresh air before the buildings were locked up for the night. Alex ran to the corner of Building Two, then turned into the open space between it and Building One.
“Hey, what’s the hurry?”
Rachel was leaning against the wall.
Alex made a snap decision, put on the brakes, and quickly moved over to her.
“We’ve been here awhile,” Alex said.
“All right,” Rachel said, intrigued. “You want to give me a little—”
Before she could finish her sentence, one of El-Hashim’s protectors ran across the opening between the buildings. When she noticed Alex and Rachel, she immediately changed course and headed toward them.
As soon as the woman was in range, she grabbed the front of Alex’s dress. “Why you there?”
“Hey, let go,” Alex said. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Why you there?” the woman yelled.
“Why was I where?”
“Outside cell.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. When was this?”
“Liar! Outside cell just now.”
“Just now?” Alex looked at her as if she were crazy. “I’ve been right here since I finished dinner.”
There was a hint of uncertainty in the woman’s eyes. Since everyone wore the same gray dress, and Alex was not the only dark-haired woman in the prison, the only way El-Hashim’s colleague could be sure she had the right person was if she’d seen Alex’s face.
And it was clear by her reaction that she hadn’t.
“Leave my friend alone,” Rachel said.
“You outside cell,” the woman said to Alex again, only this time her tone wasn’t quite as sharp.
“I don’t know what to tell you,” Alex said. “Not me.”
“Yeah, we’ve been right here for, like, twenty minutes,” Rachel added.
“Here? Twenty minutes?”
“Well, we started off down there,” Rachel said, pointing at a spot a dozen feet away. “But we ended up here.”
“Not you running?” the woman asked Alex.
“Running where?”
She pointed at Building Two. “Out of building.”
“That would be no,” Alex said, looking at the woman’s fist still grasping her dress. “So, do you mind?”
The woman glared at her through the slit in her hijab. She leaned forward and said to Alex, “Don’t come near us again.”
“Whatever.”
With a final, cold look, the woman walked away.
As soon as they were alone, Rachel said, “That was fun.”
Alex was already pushing herself off the wall. “Thanks for backing me up.” She started to walk away.
“Hey, aren’t you going to tell me what that was all about?”
“Just a misunderstanding, that’s all.”
“Some misunderstanding. She was ready to take your head off.”
Alex gave her a quick smile. “Thanks again.”
She headed back into the main yard in front of the buildings, and moved in near a cluster of prisoners, close enough to seem part of their group without actually having to join them.
She’d learned one interesting thing during her excursion. While El-Hashim and her friends were clearly trying to portray themselves as Arabs, their accents all seemed to be European instead of Middle Eastern. Were they Arab or not?
It wasn’t a question she’d be able to answer right now. Besides, she had more important things to worry about at the moment.
She focused her attention on the administration building. If she was right, the warden, or someone representing him, would be making a return trip to Building Two.
I’ll make the arrangements.
You’ll be out of here in less than an hour.
If Alex hadn’t overheard the earlier part of the conversation, she would have assumed the warden was planning to remove El-Hashim from the prison altogether. And if that were the case, the Stonewell project would be dead in the water. But taking into consideration what El-Hashim and Marie had said just prior to that, it seemed pretty clear that they would not be leaving, even though El-Hashim’s life was apparently in danger.
So what was the warden planning?
The main door to the administration building finally opened and out walked the man of the hour, followed by a squad of six guards. This was not about to go unnoticed by the other prisoners. All conversations stopped as the inmates watched the procession march past them and enter Building Two.
A moment later, the horn blared, telling everyone it was time to go back inside.
Shit.
Alex was sure El-Hashim would be with those guards when they came out again. She needed to know where they were going to take her.
Apparently evening yard time was ending early, because the other prisoners were making unhappy noises like they were being shortchanged. This was obviously a move on the warden’s part, to get them all out of the yard while he and his guards did whatever they were planning to do.