Prologue
“Did you call the cops?”
“What the hell did you do, Kavanagh?”
“Is he dead?”
“Run!”
Kieran Kavanagh’s sneakers hit the cement hard as he pushed off and sprinted toward the edge of the empty swimming pool. Glancing down at his hands, he realized they were covered in blood, and it wasn’t his. He pulled the wrap tape off them and threw it to the side as he ran, hoping to rid himself of the evidence.
Gripping the top edge of the pool wall, he hoisted himself up to the ground, his biceps straining with the swift movement, only to come to a dead stop when confronted by three uniformed police officers, their weapons drawn.
“Hands where I can see ’em!”
Kieran’s eyes went wide, his breathing ragged, his hands slowly rising in the air. Nearly everyone who’d been watching and betting on the illegal fight had cleared out. The few stragglers who weren’t fast enough were being cuffed and read their rights.
“Hands behind your back.” The officers pulled his arms down behind him, cuffing his wrists and holding his forearms with an iron grip.
Looking over his shoulder, Kieran saw the bloodied mess of his opponent lying motionless on the empty pool floor. Police were already climbing down to help him when he spotted Rory, his older brother, in the mix. Rory’s eyes found Kieran, and the look of shock and disappointment was enough to gut him.
“Fuck.”
Chapter 1
TWO YEARS LATER
“Kavanagh! Up! Let’s go, you’re being processed out,” a burly guard announced from the hallway outside his cell.
“About fucking time.” Kieran jumped down from the top bunk he’d been stretched out on. It had been his home for two years, and yet each night he’d had to come up with a new way to fold himself onto the tiny metal platform with a sorry excuse for a mattress pad. Either his feet hung off the end—the steel edge digging into his calf—or one of his arms fell to the side, or his head was crunched up against the dingy gray wall.
“Hands through the slot,” the guard instructed, pulling out a pair of cuffs.
Kieran pushed both hands through a small opening in the bars and waited as the guard slapped the cuffs over his wrists. Once secured, Kieran stepped back from the bars and the guard called his cell number into his radio. A buzzer sounded and the bars slowly slid open, grunting and complaining the entire way.
“Let’s go.” The guard motioned for Kieran to move, which he did. He wanted to get out of here just as much as this guard didn’t want to have to deal with him anymore.
At this point, he was double the size of most of the guards, and even most of the inmates. He’d spent his prison sentence working out because, frankly, there was nothing else to do. He needed to keep busy, stay active, in order not to let his mind dwell on the fact that he was wasting his youth behind bars.
“Is anyone here to pick me up?” Kieran asked the guard as they walked through the prison.
“What do I look like? Your fucking babysitter?”
“Um.” Kieran paused, considering saying something snappy that would no doubt earn him a nightstick between the shoulder blades.
“Shut the fuck up, Kavanagh.” The guard unlocked two doors in a row, escorting him into the processing area of the prison. “Go get your clothes from over there.”
Kieran glanced in the direction he was pointing to see another guard sitting at a desk behind a glass pane. Once uncuffed, Kieran headed toward her and pulled his inmate badge off, pushing it through the slot.
“Kavanagh. All right, here’s your stuff. Go get changed and bring your coveralls back when you’re done.” She pushed a clear plastic bag through the slot, and he recognized his jeans and shirt.
Kieran sifted through the bag of clothing in his hands. “That’s everything I had on me?”
The first guard scoffed from behind him. “You weren’t exactly draped in gold and diamonds when you got arrested, Kavanagh.”
Kieran ignore the jab and headed into a small room off to the side of the processing area. He hurried to yank the dull gray jumpsuit down his body, pushing it to the ground and stepping out.
He slid on his old jeans, feeling they were a bit tight around his thighs. Every muscle on his body had tripled in size, even his legs. Pulling on his old T-shirt, he wasn’t the least bit surprised when it barely made it down his midsection, stretching tightly over his defined pecs and chiseled abs.
Thankfully, his sweatshirt fit better since he’d always worn them a bit baggy anyway. With the warmth of spring he knew the extra layer would be somewhat uncomfortable, but at least the sweatshirt covered his stomach. He was already loving the feeling of the familiar old fabric against his skin, rather than stiff, scratchy prison garb.