Chapter 1: Locked In With the Wolf
The cell door shut with a final, metallic shriek that echoed down the block. The sound of the lock engaging was a thick, definitive thunk. Robbie stood just inside, his duffel bag clutched to his chest like a shield. The air was warm and close, tasting of stale sweat, industrial bleach, and something else—something sour, like old fear.
His new cellmate was sitting on the bottom bunk, back against the wall. The man was huge, his shoulders stretching the seams of his standard-issue tan shirt. Faded tattoos, a chaotic library of ink, covered his thick forearms and climbed his neck. He wasn’t looking at Robbie. He was meticulously cleaning under his fingernails with a straightened paperclip.
Robbie’s eyes darted around the concrete box. Six by nine. A stainless steel toilet-sink combo. The upper bunk, bare and waiting. A small, grimy window set too high to see anything but a slice of bleached-out sky.
“You gonna stand there all day, or you gonna claim your real estate?” The voice was a low rumble, bored.
“Right. Sorry.” Robbie’s own voice came out thin. He sidestepped to the empty bunk, his shoulder brushing the cold wall. He could feel the man’s eyes on him now, a physical weight. He made a show of unrolling his mattress pad, smoothing the thin blanket.
“Name’s Marshawn.”
“Robbie.”
“Robbie.” Marshawn repeated it, letting it sit in the damp air. “What brings a little thing like you to a premium suite like this?”
“Uh. Theft. Parole violation.” Robbie kept his eyes on his bedding. He didn’t mention the panic, the dumb, desperate choices, the friend who’d set him up to take the fall.
Marshawn chuckled, a dry, soundless shake of his broad chest. “A thief. Cute.” The paperclip tapped against a thick fingernail. Tap. Tap. Tap. “You look like the type who gets stolen from, not the one doin’ the stealin’.”
Robbie said nothing. He hoisted his bag onto the top bunk, the movement awkward. His shirt rode up, exposing a pale strip of skin above his waistband. He quickly tugged it down.
The tap-tap-tapping stopped.
Robbie felt the silence swell, becoming heavier than the noise of the block. He forced himself to turn. Marshawn was staring now, his gaze a flat, appraising thing. It traveled slowly from Robbie’s scuffed shoes, up his thin legs, over his narrow hips, settling on his face. He didn’t blink. His tongue swept across his bottom lip, a slow, deliberate motion.
“You nervous, Robbie?”
“No.” It was a brittle word.
“Yeah, you are. I can smell it on you. It’s sharp. Like ammonia.” Marshawn shifted his weight, the bunk creaking in protest. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and his presence seemed to fill the lower half of the cell. “Let’s establish some rules for our happy home. My space,” he gestured to the floor around his bunk, a few feet of stained concrete, “is mine. Your space is up there. You stay out of mine, I might stay out of yours. You follow?”
Robbie nodded, a quick, bird-like jerk of his head.
“Good. Second rule. You don’t look at me when I’m changing. You don’t stare. You keep your eyes on the wall or the ceiling. You understand?”
“Yeah. I got it.”
“Third rule.” Marshawn’s voice dropped, becoming almost conversational, which was worse. “You’re a guest here. In my house. Guests… contribute. To the household.”
Robbie’s mouth was dry. “I get my commissary next week. I can share some coffee, maybe some—”
“I don’t want your coffee, Robbie.” Marshawn cut him off, his voice slicing through the offer. He smiled then, and it didn’t touch his eyes. They remained dark, pitiless. “We’ll talk about your contribution later. When we know each other better.”
He stood up suddenly. Robbie flinched, taking a half-step back until his spine pressed into the cold cinderblocks. Marshawn wasn’t just tall; he was a wall of muscle and intent. He stepped into the center of the cell, into Robbie’s space, and looked down at him. The light from the high window caught the scar tissue over his brow.
“For now,” Marshawn said, his breath a warm, unpleasant smell of processed meat and mint toothpaste, “just get the layout. This is my world. You’re just visiting it.” He reached out, not fast, but with an inevitable certainty. His thumb brushed Robbie’s cheekbone, a rough, calloused stroke. “And visitors do what the locals tell them to do.”
Robbie froze. Every muscle locked. The touch was a brand. He couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe.
Marshawn withdrew his hand, his smirk widening. He seemed pleased by the paralysis. “Relax, kid. We’re gonna be great friends.” He turned and walked the two steps to the sink, turning the faucet on with a loud squeak.
Robbie exhaled, a shaky, silent release. He climbed onto his bunk, moving like an old man. He lay on his back on the thin pad, staring at the underside of the ceiling, which was another inmate’s bunk in another cell. The springs were inches from his face. He could hear Marshawn humming tunelessly below, the sound a soft, vibrating threat.
The fear wasn’t a spike anymore. It was a cold, settling liquid, filling him from the toes up. It wasn’t just the threat of violence. It was the specific, hungry shape of Marshawn’s attention. The way his eyes had lingered. The dry, possessive touch.
You’re just visiting, the voice had said.
But as the block’s lights dimmed for the evening count, and the distant shouts and clangs faded to a restless murmur, Robbie understood, with a clarity that turned his guts to ice, that there was no leaving this particular world. The visit had just become a permanent stay. The rules had been set. And down below him, in the gathering dark, his new friend was waiting.