Confession of a King

Things were happier between Matt and I after our discussion a few weeks ago, and a trip to the hospital for having a toddler with the flu. I had to take about four days off of work, taking care of Alec and repairing my marriage. We were working together and Matt was opening up to me more. After swearing that I would not push medications on him, he decided to let down all of those Shadows’ walls and cry in my arms about how his life had completely flipped upside down. He didn’t know what he was going to do with himself once we enrolled Alec into daycare in two months. He didn’t miss the gang world, but he didn’t know anything but it. Needless to say, he also didn’t want to sit around the house bored out of his mind, and no place would hire a convicted murderer/gang lord. Matt would never allow anyone to be his boss, anyway.

Every ounce of me wanted to tell him to just jump back into the dark side of things. Grab ahold of the Avenged reigns and do what he does best. But, I couldn’t. I told him before that I wouldn’t judge him if he went back into managing a gang, but things were different now. It wasn’t that I had my job back and things were different. It was that we were trying to get pregnant. Trying to have another baby. Alec’s life was risked and he was shoved off into the arms of his grandparents for a few months while Avenged was spread thin. We couldn’t do that with our next one. We wouldn’t do that with our next one.

I placed the portfolio that was in my hands down onto my wooden desk, running my fists over my make-up free eyelids. I glanced down at my planner, groaning to myself as I counted the number of meetings I had today. First things first, I had a meeting with Mr. Morgan as soon as I stepped foot into the building. He stated in his e-mail that he just wanted to check-in and see how the transition back into work was going. I knew he would bring up the Cal situation, as I completely avoided that weeks ago and then he had been out for vacation. We had our all-staff meeting at eleven, ten minutes away. Matt was picking me up to go out to lunch at noon. Then at one-thirty, I had a meeting with an inmate who was just transferred to us from a different facility. Lastly, I had a three o’clock meeting with Jimmy… aka Mr. I’ve been stuck in solitary for a month because I can’t keep my ass out of trouble.

I made my way down the hall, heading toward the break room and found a seat somewhere in the middle. Sandy pushed her way through the crowd of chairs to take a seat next to me, just like old times. I laughed to myself internally, remembering when she wanted me to use my morning sickness as an excuse to vomit and get us both out of the meeting. She was such a doll when it came to my previous time working here. Between being supportive and allowing me to risk my life to say goodbye to Matt, she rocked.

Mr. Morgan cleared his voice as he entered the room, standing at the front and jotting something down on the white board as if he were a professor and we were his classroom of idiotic college students. “Do we have an update in the Jacobson case, Mr. Fields?” he looked to the front row at a detective.

The blonde man shook his head, “No. I am still working on trying to find a perp. Our suspect sadly had a great number of alibis that support his claims. We are now looking into the possibility of a non-gang-related homicide for Adrienne Jacobson.”

“And I am assuming you have ran this by every and all outlet you can get ahold of, Mr. Fields?” Mr. Morgan crossed his arms over his chest.

“Almost each gang in the area has their own spokesperson that was willing to come to questioning. We checked in with three of the biggest, and a handful of the smallest. Corey Montfort is no longer a suspect, and has stated that Avenged plays no part in this either. We cannot identify any of the members for questioning.” The blonde, Mr. Fields, finished his statement. Eyes throughout the room fell onto me, Mr. Morgan’s being the last to bore into me.

My boss pursed his lips, “I should know better than to ask you, Ivy, to instruct your husbands old friends to meet with us.”

“You should know better, or I’ll hand in my badge now,” I responded, completely serious. “I’m here for one reason, and that is to do my job. I am not affiliated with Avenged and I refuse to be involved in conversations regarding them.”

“Understood,” Mr. Morgan nodded and took his eyes away from me for a minute. Just long enough to write Cal’s name up on the white board for the room of officers to see, “Although, you do not need to be actively involved in this conversation, Mrs. Sanders. We are pinning the murder of Delirious gang member, and former inmate, Calvert Williams on Avenged. Once we determine who Shadows’ passed the torch onto, we will be pressing murder charges.”

I stood up from my seat, pushing through officers to make my way out of the room. “This is a load of bullshit. You literally just had a conversation with me about the killing and agreed that it had nothing to do with my husband!” I shouted in the direction of my boss, feeling my blood boil under my skin.

“Mrs. Sanders,” Mr. Morgan said sternly, obviously aggravated by my outburst. “Is your husband still affiliated with Avenged?”

“No.”

Mr. Morgan laughed, “Then I agreed with you that the murder of Calvert Williams does not involve your husband. All of the pieces add up to point it in the direction of your husbands ex-gang. You and I are both aware that Cal was taken out because of the way he spoke about you. I would consider yourself lucky that Shadows is not taking the heat for this one.”

“Stop calling him that,” I seethed hatred with each word I spoke. I swallowed the spit building up in my mouth, “I am going to take an early lunch and spend time with my husband. I asked for him to get me answers about the murder and everything came up blank. It was not an Avenged job, regardless of what your clues tell you. I will be back to finish up my work for my next appointment at one-thirty, and I would prefer not to be bothered for the rest of the day.”

After my terrible outburst at our all-staff meeting, I found myself pulled into reading reports of the inmate who I would be dealing with this afternoon. He was being transferred to our facility as his old one was unable to keep him controlled. They weren’t aware of what gang he was affiliated with, but had pegged him for multiple drug and firearm violations, as well as assault and two murders. Reading through his files sent both a shiver down my spine, and a burning sensation of sadness in my heart. He wasn’t much younger than Matt, and his rap sheet was five times as long. I sipped the cup of coffee I had left sitting on my desk, continuing to read on and scrolling on my laptop.

A chuckle filled the room, “I’m having deja vu.”

I looked up and my brown eyes met hazel ones, causing me to let out a deep breath and smile softly. I stood from my desk, closing my laptop and crossing over to my husband. I threw my arms around his shoulders and pulled him into me, “I didn’t think they’d let you in here.”

His lips planted themselves firmly against mine, “Me? You’re the one that got me out of jail. I can’t believe they let you back in here!”

I pulled away from him and smacked his backside lightly before grabbing my purse off my desk. “You’re in a good mood today, Mr. Sanders,” I smiled at him as he slipped his arm around my waist and started to escort me out of my room.

“Yeah, well let’s keep me in a good mood by getting me the fuck out of this place. It’s giving me the creeps just being in here for five minutes,” Matt laughed lightly, but I knew he was being serious. His time in jail wasn’t nearly as bad as the majority of people’s, but he had a few nightmares that he was stuck back in here and abandoned Alec and I at home. Supposedly that was his biggest fear.

When we rounded the corner toward the front desk, Mr. Morgan was standing with Sandy. They seemed to be in a bit of a heated argument, so I hoped we would slip by unnoticed. Of course, nothing went as planned and Mr. Morgan turned just in time to see Matthew Sanders walking freely through his hallway.

His face whitened a bit, eyes widening as he took in the sight of Matt next to me, “Mr. Sanders.”

Matt just nodded at my boss, his jaw tightening with tension. He knew that the conversation about Cal was going to happen today. Matt finally admitted to me that he forced things down the chain of command in Avenged, leading to Johnny hiring a hitman to take out Cal. Matt was furious with the way Cal spoke about me. So, he had him killed off. I knew he was counting down the days until I found out I was pregnant and would be quitting once again.

“Would you be interested in speaking with me this afternoon?” Mr. Morgan raised an eyebrow.

“No, he wouldn’t,” I responded for my husband.

Mr. Morgan narrowed his eyes at me, “I wasn’t speaking to you, as you commanded me exactly that in front of an entire room of officers today.”

Matt tightened his grip around my waist, pulling me into his side, “I don’t know what the fuck you’re trying to do here, but I’m not fucking talking to you or any of your other cops in this place. You have information and shit you’re trying to find, do your job yourself and leave me out of it. And if you speak my name to Ivy one more time, you better pray to god I don’t find out.”

“Is that a threat, Shadows?”

“Take it how you want,” Matt responded and pulled me with him toward the door. “Nice seeing you, Sandy. I’ll have her back in an hour. Then she’ll be back to do her job, and you won’t ask another question about me.”

Lunch with Matt was relaxing even though he threatened my boss before we left the prison. I told him about what happened in our all-staff meeting, and he was ready to turn the car back around and murder Mr. Morgan. It took some coaxing, a lot of kisses and me promising once again that as soon as I was pregnant, I would quit, to make him continue the drive toward the small, Italian restaurant I used to go to with Zacky when Matt was still in prison. My husband informed me that the reason why he was in such a good mood was because he managed to clean the entire upstairs and kitchen since Alec had been with Kim and Gary all morning. He didn’t enjoy me laughing at him and calling him a housewife, but I was happy that he was managing to get some things done at home that I just didn’t have time for now that I was back to full-time at work. He dropped me back off at the prison, pressing a kiss to my lips and muttering something about he had one more stop to make before going home. I asked what it was, and he refused to tell me. I couldn’t even begin to explain how excited I was over the idea that maybe it was something special for the two of us since we wouldn’t have the kid tonight.

All of that excitement left when Mr. Morgan informed me that Jimmy was going back into solitary for beating another inmate to almost death. Once again, I wasn’t going to have my session with Jimmy, and now he needed it more than ever. It was like a switch had flipped in his brain after I left, and things were going haywire in here. I wanted to try to pull strings and get Mr. Morgan to allow me one session with Jimmy, at least today, but after my blow out in the morning that was the last thing he would allow me. So instead, I sat patiently waiting for our transfer inmate, Levi Bratton.

Notes

Are the police going to catch Avenged with that murder?
Ivy is standing up to her boss... and Shadows is.. threatening him?
What the hell is up with Jimmy?

Stay tuned.