At that point, everyone who was hovering on the periphery of the circle seemed to crowd closer and a few even jumped in to hit or kick him, which triggered a free-for-all.

In one sense, that came as a relief to Jasper. They wouldn’t all be standing around, watching him be raped, as Roland had planned. But with so much anger and testosterone the level of violence erupted so fast—like a match to a flame—and within seconds the situation turned into a regular old-fashioned beating.

Jasper felt blows coming from all sides—fists, feet, knees, elbows. A vicious head butt caused him to see stars, but the agony turned to relief because he couldn’t feel as much after that.

Roland tried to get the others to back off. Dimly, Jasper heard him yell that he could handle it, that it wasn’t fair for everyone to pile on. But, for a change, no one listened to him, so he let go of Jasper and got out of the fray.

Even then Jasper couldn’t escape. He was the carrion and they were the buzzards, feasting on his flesh.

The last thing he remembered was falling to the floor and staring up at the water spurting out of the showerheads as an inmate by the name of Lester, who had gold caps on his two front teeth, leaned over him, brandishing the shiv Roland had shown him earlier.

Maybe he was going to be stabbed before he could be raped, he thought, and then everything went dark.

21

Minneapolis, MN—Tuesday, 4:30 p.m. CST

Beacon Point was a bust. Amarok left frustrated that those in charge didn’t seem to feel more responsible for Bishop getting out. Terry’s boss, when he finally spoke to her, admitted that Terry had been a subpar worker. She said that was why she’d let him go, and she acted as though she’d done her part by giving him notice. But how could she and everyone else have missed the fact that one of their janitors was getting too friendly with a patient who was a known serial killer?

The security guard on duty that night had been fired since. Those in charge pointed to that as proof they’d done all they could in the aftermath. But the security guard wasn’t the only one who hadn’t done her job. Amarok still hadn’t heard an acceptable reason as to why the hospital hadn’t contacted the police immediately upon noticing Lyman’s bed was empty. They claimed it was because they thought he was too impaired to harm anyone; they expected him to be found without any trouble and didn’t want to send the whole community into a panic, especially one that was totally unnecessary.

But Amarok knew it was more about protecting their own asses. They were hoping to avoid the bad press; that was why they were still doing all they could to dodge the really difficult questions.

It was so hot and muggy that Amarok turned on the air-conditioning full blast the second he climbed back into his car. He’d been checking his phone ever since he arrived at the hospital, but he hadn’t yet heard from Lewis.