A mix of emotions goes through my head. Rage at not telling me. Embarrassment for ever doubting his love for me. Regret at not telling him sooner.
But overpowering all of that to the point of obsolescence is one single overriding feeling.
Love. For Lucien Stone.
Even as a prisoner with a fraction of the freedoms that I enjoy, Lucien found a way to protect me. And I know in that moment that despite the danger that I’m in, with the Deputy Warden up to something, that Lucien will protect me.
I’m beginning to seriously doubt that he had anything at all to do with the Deputy Warden bringing me here.
“Kerri,” Lucien says and I lean forward, bringing the phone closer as my fingers touch the glass where his are. “I need to tell you something.”
I nod to him. I’m all ears.
“I need you to forgive me,” he says simply.
Forgive him? Did he have a hand in bringing me here?
“Forgive you for what?” I ask.
“This,” he says and before I can figure out what’s happening, Lucien’s already out of his chair and dropped the phone.
I watch in shock as he moves with the speed of lightning, his muscles straining and pulls at the phone receiver. It takes a moment but snaps from where it’s tethered to the wall.
“Hey, what the fuck!” the guard in the cubicle yells, opening the door from his cubbyhole toward Lucien’s side of the room.
But by then, Lucien has already turned around and taken aim and thrown the phone receiver.
It sails through the air with deadly accuracy toward the closed circuit camera that’s recording his side of the room.
The phone receiver makes contact with the camera and shatters it, knocking it off its place and causing it to tumble to the floor.
“You’re in some serious fucking trouble, brother,” the guard says as he approaches Lucien with his baton, his mouth opens at the display of raw athletic skill in front of him.
Those are the last words for a while from the guard as Lucien takes the chair with one hand and lifts it in a swing, swirling it around him and making contact with his head. I hear a thud as the guard falls to the floor. Before even his body hits the ground, Lucien has grabbed a pair of keys, his baton, and his gun and rushes over to my side, where he kicks open the door.
I run to him, but Lucien rushes past me and takes the phone receiver that I was just using.
He snaps it off, aims at the camera, closes one eye, brings his hand back, and throws.
It meets the same fate as its counterpart had moments earlier.
I stare at the clock on the wall. The whole episode took less than 3 minutes.
And that’s when the alarms start going off. Sensing loss of contact with the Visitation Room, the prison starts to go into alert.
We have minutes, if that. I go back toward Lucien and reach for him.
He grabs me and looks at me.
“You’re not safe out there, Marshall is going to come for you again!” Lucien says, his eyes scanning the entrances for guards approaching as he cocks the gun.
I nod. “What do we do?”
That’s right. I’m with him. No matter what.
He doesn’t think. Rather, he operates on pure instinct.
“Come with me,” he says and grabs my hand.