3 Pitch Black ‡ Given the right company and a soft bed, Danny Crispin would have welcomed the hot summer storm. He’d have opened his bedroom curtains, tossed up the window glass and let the wet wind howl right inside. Wouldn’t matter if his bed got saturated. The thought of a certain redhead covered in rain and sweat, green eyes glinting hotter than any flash of lightning, tightened his body. However, a thunderstorm spelled trouble this night. He gazed up from behind the wheel of the prison pickup and watched yet another brilliant flash dance and pop across the strands of the concertina wire high atop the chain-link fence. “Sarge, did you see that?” the radio squawked, all formal radio protocols forgotten by the new guard in the South Tower. Danny understood Officer First Class Hughes’s concern. The towers were open metal cages, no glass in the windows to protect the guards from the elements. No doubt the young officer had parked his weapon in a corner, his metal chair beside it, and stood in his rain poncho with his rubber-soled boots on the iron grating while rain sliced sideways, soaking him.
