Falling For The Enemy. Dawn Stewardson
she shouldn’t assume Armstrong was jumping through hoops at all. She’d had enough contact with him to know that, like most wardens, he was hardly the type of man who’d let himself be intimidated.
Of course, bribery was always a possibility, although she seriously doubted Armstrong could be bought. In fact, she could readily imagine him throwing Reeves out on his ear if he tried either intimidation or bribery. So why this big rush?
Quite possibly, she’d never know. Armstrong wasn’t obliged to give her any explanations. When it came to things at Poquette, he was in complete charge. Which, in this case, was definitely a good thing.
As Peggy had said, if Reeves or Fitzgerald wanted to find out what Hayley recommended, they could. So it was just as well they were aware that the ultimate decision on a transfer wasn’t hers. Because, at least based on what she knew to this point, there was no way she could recommend one. Not with a clear conscience.
When she turned her attention back to her driving she was nearing the tall bridge that lay partway between Port Sulphur and Buras. The structure always struck her as spooky, although she wasn’t quite sure why.
Possibly it was the weirdness of there being freshwater on one side and saltwater on the other. Or maybe there was just too little land and too much ocean along this stretch.
Whatever, she was always glad to leave the bridge behind and drive the remaining few miles to the gravel road leading from the highway to the prison.
A couple of minutes later she could see it in the distance, a tired-looking big brick quadrangle in the middle of nowhere. Surrounded by a heavy link fence topped with razor ribbon, it always struck her as utterly depressing—the sight of it frequently reminding her she could have specialized in other areas of psychology.
But with a mother who taught criminology at Penn State and a father who was a district attorney, her interest in the correctional treatment of psychopathology was hardly surprising.
And even though the vast majority of prisoners were damaged beyond repair, there were enough she could help to make her work rewarding. In fact, one of her most treasured possessions was a little box containing cards and letters from ex-cons who’d made it on the outside.
Reaching her destination, she stopped at the concrete post in front of the gate and pressed the button.
“Yes?” a guard asked through the speaker.
“Dr. Hayley Morgan.”
The gate slowly swung open. She drove through, parked and headed for the staff entrance—where she stepped reluctantly from the cheery daylight into the dim interior of the prison.
After signing in, she passed through the metal detector and started down the hall. At the end of it, a correctional officer unlocked the heavy door and let her into another world. One in which an eerie sense of pent-up danger hung in the air like static before an electrical storm.
In contrast to the Orleans Parish state government building, with Muzak whispering in the elevators and sunlight streaming through the windows on every floor, Poquette was stark and harsh—the epitome of uninviting.
It felt...hollow was a good word. The clicking of her heels on the stone floor echoed far too loudly. And even though sounds from the cell blocks didn’t actually reach the admin wing, she couldn’t keep from imagining steel doors clanging and voices calling out from behind bars.
At Records she picked up Billy Fitzgerald’s file, then proceeded to the psych area. She barely reached her little Tuesdays office before nine o’clock. Minutes later, as prearranged, a C.O. delivered Billy Fitzgerald.
He was a few inches taller than she was, five foot nine or ten, and somewhat overweight, although not sloppily so. His eyes were blue, his thinning hair mostly gray, with just enough traces of red to tell her that was its original color.
In media shots she’d seen of him he’d been a dapper and confident-looking man. Not surprisingly, he was far less imposing in drab, prison-issue cotton. His bearing, however, said he was a man used to issuing orders and having them followed.
The C.O. caught Hayley’s glance and said, “I’ll be right outside if you need me.”
After nodding to him, she looked at Fitzgerald again. “I’m Dr. Morgan, Mr. Fitzgerald.”
“Billy,” he said, giving her a smile. “Call me Billy.”
She returned his smile and gestured for him to sit, thinking that even though he’d lived in the Garden District before he landed in Poquette it wasn’t where his roots lay.
He spoke with a slight accent that was almost Brooklynese, almost movie gangster—typical of the Irish Channel part of New Orleans, where, generations earlier, a rough, tough collection of Irish immigrants had settled.
As he sat down across the desk from her, she opened his folder. The top document was a photocopy of his request for a transfer.
“Wishes to enter a rehabilitation program” was all that was typed as the Reason for Request.
She flipped through the routine incarceration documents until she located the original of the intake evaluation she’d studied yesterday.
“I have your initial psychological assessment records here,” she told him. “You’ve been at Poquette so briefly I don’t think we need to spend time going over the same things again. Why don’t we just talk about why you want a transfer.”
“Sloan Reeves spoke to you about that, didn’t he?” Fitzgerald’s tone was carefully nonconfrontational. He sounded like a man simply seeking information, nothing more.
“Yes, he came by my office yesterday. There was one question I didn’t think to ask him though. Is there any particular prison you’d prefer to be transferred to?”
“Not really. Any one with a rehab program would be fine.”
“I see.” It had occurred to her that there might be some way he could arrange for special treatment at a specific prison, but his answer shot down that theory.
“Why don’t you tell me, in your own words,” she suggested, “the reasons you’d like to be in one of the programs.”
He nodded, the picture of cooperation, then proceeded to recite from the same script Reeves had used. He had a problem with the isolation; he wanted more human interaction; he needed something to occupy his mind.
Fitzgerald’s explanation was pat and polished. Hayley didn’t buy it from him any more than she’d bought it from Reeves.
She’d spent years in classrooms studying human nature, followed by more years in the real world doing the same. And she was absolutely certain Fitzgerald had no more desire to get into a rehab program than she did.
He obviously figured he had something to gain from a transfer, but the longer they talked, the more apparent it became that he wasn’t going to tell her what it was. Finally, she concluded the interview and opened the door to tell the correctional officer. they were finished.
“Thank you,” Fitzgerald said when he rose to leave.
He gave her another of his charming smiles and extended his hand with an uncertainty she doubted was real.
“I’m not up on prison etiquette yet, Dr. Morgan, but on the outside...”
She reached over and shook hands with him, guessing that his was damp because he was far more anxious than he’d let on.
After the C.O. escorted him out and their footsteps had faded into silence, she sat staring at the blank evaluation form in front of her for a few minutes. Then she picked up her pen and began to write.
Once she was done, she tucked the form into her briefcase. Then, after gathering up the file on Fitzgerald, she returned it to Records and headed for Armstrong’s office.
The instant she arrived, his assistant buzzed the warden and ushered her in.
“Dr.