Rattling Snakes Cage 2 Ch. 06

Time is moving towards the escape, but now there are complications. Will Patrick and Rachel be reunited, or will Snake manage to continue to make their life hell.

I hope you are enjoying this multi part 2 to Rattling Snakes Cage and the many colourful characters whos paths cross in this romantic crime thriller.

*

The noise in the D wing shower room was overpowering, with the roar of twenty or so showers thundering water onto old white tiles, and the deep cadence of naked prisoners talking and laughing as they had their chance of sluicing off the smell of sweat and prison for a little while. Some men stood shaving in old cracked and sealed mirrors above sinks, and the subtle and not so subtle insults were exchanged between men forced to live together, and towards the handful of screws who watched the process, making sure nothing untoward was happening.

Patrick stood naked under a shower, letting the tepid water run over his skin, his now longer hair wet and dripping into his eyes, the suds from a hard bar of cheap soap swirling around his feet into the stained rusty grill in the floor. Glancing to his right he watched as Harwell deliberately knocked a couple of men as they stood shaving, always the bully, and then glanced up further into the large shower room checking on the young lad, and making sure he was with one of the brothers out of Hartwell's reach.

Satisfied all was well he continued to shower and as he turned off the water he realised that two men were standing close to him. Looking over his shoulder at them he wrapped the thin white towel around his hips and turned around to face them.

"We have a message from Snake for you...he wants to show you something."

Patrick's stomach plunged at the mention of Snake, knowing that it would be easy for him to set up something to happen to him even here inside. Putting on a brave face so as to not let the two men see he was intimidated in any way he retorted, "Fuck Snake and any message he has for me...tell him to go fuck himself." and he started to walk over to the sinks so that he could shave.

Grabbing his arm as he went to go past, the nails of his fingers biting into Patrick's bicep, one of the men hissed, "Your cell later...you need to see the message...don't be a silly bugger and get Armstrong any madder than he already is with you."

Just giving the man a steel eyed look face to face and then at the hand holding his arm so he would let go, Patrick continued walking towards the sinks.

*

Jerry paced back and forth in his hotel room, the Pay as you Talk mobile grasped tightly in his hand, trying to find a way to tell his friend that Snake had Rachel. He knew that Patrick would go ape shit when he found out and he wasn't looking forward to being the one to break the bad news to him.

Sitting down on the edge of the bed he ran his hand through his blond hair and took off his glasses, huffing on them with his breath and then wiping them with the edge of the mussed up bed sheet, cleaning them before returning them to his face. Damn Snake, he thought, every time they thought they were clear of him he would pop up like a bad smell on the sole of your shoe. He knew that Patrick, once he knew that Snake had Rachel and had completed the escape, wouldn't go down to Brighton to the boat and out of the UK until he had freed her from the bastard.

For there was no way Rachel would willingly be with Snake.

And quite frankly he knew in his heart he couldn't let Patrick go to rescue her by himself. So as well as breaking the bad news to Patrick he was going to have to explain to Davy, Danny and Alan that there was going to be a big change to the plan.

Not sure what the new plan would be, but he knew his biggest problem would end up getting the others to hold off on the final part of the escape to allow Patrick and himself to go and get Rachel out of that evil motherfuckers clutches.

*

By now Nash was coldly lethal, his head focused on ripping Patrick's head off. That's all he thought about in his solitary cell as he sat out his punishment. In his minds eye he could see the bloody broken body of Curtis as he lay at his feet, and his hands clenched into tight fists on his thighs as he ran through the images in his head.

Smiling to himself he started counting down the minutes until tomorrow when his punishment would be up and he could get his hands on him.

*

Tony sat at the bench dividing the white powder into small plastic bags whilst in his mind he counted the amount of men that he thought would be probably present tomorrow when he, John and the rest of the gang hit the lab and got Snake.

He had told John and the others that Friday, late afternoon, would be the best time to make the hit as Snake was always in his office on a Friday until about eight before going on to the club. He would be there as that was when most money came in with the collectors who had delivered the weekend supplies to the dealers and collected and brought in the money owed from them for the past weeks supply.

Looking around at the other men in the room he figured that out of the seven men in the room only possibly one might have a gun, a skinny collector who also did some protection for Snake. There was always a couple of men at the gate up the lane, and he guessed they would be armed, and of course Snake always had a couple of heavies with him and they definitely would be armed, and then of course he guessed Snake himself would have a shooter, especially after being shot six months ago by that rival dealer he had killed.

That made five or six armed men.

There were a couple of dogs out the back roaming around, and they were vicious, but easily handled from afar. A couple of shots and they would be out of it.

No the main problem was the two gate men and the heavies guarding Snake.

But with the numbers that they were going to hit the lab with and the element of surprise he was sure that they would win out in the end and rescue Maria, getting rid of the scum in the process.

*

The two scumbags that had cornered him in the showers were now standing in his cell, Ritchie and the young 'un crowding into the small space each side of him on a face off.

"Get rid of the clowns Curtis...."

Nodding to Ritchie and the serious faced young man he indicated it would be alright for them to leave. They left but hovered outside on the landing just in case they were needed.

Standing lightly on the balls of his feet, his hands lightly fisted at his side just in case, he snarled, "Get it over with......what nugget of wisdom from Armstrong have you got for me."

Pulling out a mobile from his pocket, one of the men handed it to Patrick, "Go into video on the menu, it's a personalised message." He sneered, "Enjoy." and the other man laughed. Patrick pressed the buttons pulling up the video store on the menu and watched with growing horror as he saw a crying Rachel on her knees, a mans cock stuffed in her mouth, and then the camera panned up to reveal the man as Snake, a grin on his face. The tinny sound of Snakes voice came over the mobile as Patrick felt his anger rise, his face heat up and his teeth grind. "Patrick, my old friend, your woman is good at giving head....shame you can't get it from her for the next twenty years, but as a good friend of yours I'm going to get her to service me in your absence, film it, and send it in to you regularly so you can enjoy it from there." And then the video scanned down to show Rachel, hands holding her head as Snake thrust into her mouth.

Throwing the mobile across the cell Patrick took a swing at one of the men, a roar of fury accompanying his movement. Ritchie and the young man rushed in and grabbed him, Ritchie hissing at him, "Patrick, think......keep your cool...you don't need to be put in solitary today for fighting...."

Patrick stood breathing heavily his friends holding him back from attacking the two bastards, "Tell Nick that I'm going to kill him..." he snarled, "tell him that he had better start making his will.....I'm going to ram his own cock down his throat when I get my hands on him."

Backing out of the cell one of the men bent down and picked up the mobile from the floor, "Yeah Curtis.....when's that going to be? When you're an old man...."

And then they were gone leaving a furious Patrick shaking, the image of what he had seen seared into his brain.

*

When the mobile rang Jerry nearly jumped out of his skin. Pressing the answer button he put the small device next to his ear, only to hear Patrick's frantic voice. "He's got her. The bastard has got her....."

"I know...I went over to her place last night and her flat mate told me she came accompanied by a man with a snake tattoo on his neck to get her things......"

"Tomorrow...after I get out I'm going over there to kill him and get her....."

"Patrick calm down....we need to plan....if we're going to get her we need to work out how...."

"I know how I'm going to do it...I'm going over to the lab, it's where he'll be at that time of the day....and kill him."

"I don't know if I have time to get hold of some guns...."

"If you can't, get me a good knife....after I'm out, you guys go down to Brighton and get away....I'm doing this by myself."

"Don't be crazy....you'll need more than just you to get into the lab and get him....I'm coming with...."

"Don't you be crazy....you have Megan to think of."

"I am thinking of Megan....we get rid of Snake once and for all, he'll be off both our backs...and then we get the drug money out the safe.....should be close on a million in there on a Friday evening....do you know the combination?"

"If he hasn't changed it..... only he and I knew it.....we can get in there by the back way.....the way I escaped when he caught me stealing the coke...its not usually guarded.....the thick woods are behind the lab...we can climb in through the wire fence, I know a weakness in it, we'll need to have some poisoned steaks for the dogs....and then we can sneak up and get into the lab through the rear....take him by surprise. The men have a loyalty to me more than him, we should be able to handle them. Promise them some of the money."

"I'll get on it. Just you get the diversion up and running for tomorrow and get up the rope ladder as quick as you can....I'll have everything set up this side.....I promise you we'll get her away from him."

"And then he's dead meat....."

"Once and for all....."

*

Davy and Danny were unaware of the proposed changes to the plan and were going ahead with their parts in the escape plan. Everything was going along just as they had planned it, the boat was ready and fuelled down at the Marina, the Merc was parked out at the disused factory half way down the M23, four sets of fresh clothes, black plastic bags and a couple of cans of fuel ready to burn the remains of anything that would have DNA or fingerprints on them that could identify them.

Latex gloves for all men were ready, and the team to black out Wandsworth and the surrounding area and the prison were prepared, people paid off, bent screws receiving the cash for smuggling in the cutters and mobile.

As far as Davy and Danny thought all was ready and nothing was going to go wrong.

*

Hartwell and Manning were squaring off during lunch in the queue, eyeing each other up, chests puffing, muscles tightening with anticipation. Everyone in D wing was hyped up waiting for the fight, watching the two men, discussing the odds, looking forward to the big show.

The three brothers deliberately wound the two men up, a quiet word here, an insult there keeping them on the boil. The young prisoner kept his silence, keeping close to the brothers, watching and waiting, his hand in his pocket fingering the telephone PIN card that was now converted into a very sharp and lethal weapon, one corner of the plastic card now a melted and flattened long point .

The day was going by quickly for everyone except Patrick who felt like time was moving as if in slow motion. Pacing his cell he kept closing his eyes only to see Rachel's tearful face and Snakes cock in her mouth and his mocking comments. Each flash back was like a cut in his soul and in his heart, and as he walked back and forth in the small space of his cell he promised to himself he would make Snakes end as slow and as painful as he possibly could.

*

Jerry walked around the DIY Superstore looking for the area that stored the tins holding something that would be dangerous for animals to put on the steaks that were in the plastic carrier bags in the boot of his car, bought at a butcher only half an hour before.

After he had purchased some weed killer that on the tin said to keep away from animals, he made his way in the car to a hardware store and bought a kitchen set of very sharp knives, including a meat cleaver and a lethal looking carving knife.

At the storage unit where the van and the bikes were stored, using gloves, he put the knives, meat and weed killer in the motorbikes side compartments, and made sure they were full of petrol, also that the vans tank was full.

He had decided not to tell Danny and Davy up front about Rachel and his and Patrick's change of plan, but opted to tell them once Patrick was out and in the van, just in case they pulled out of getting him out of the nick.

Going back to his hotel room he lay down on the bed, staring up at the ceiling and tried to relax, but the coming day he knew could go down in so many ways that he just lay there trying to figure out every angle and how he could anticipate it to reduce the possibility of failure.

*

Night fell, the dark descended and all the players in the drama lay in darkness in their own separate spaces, each lost in their own thoughts and fears, for tomorrow would be a day of reckoning that would affect each and every person for the rest of their life.

And for some that life would come to an end.