Borrow Trouble. Mary Monroe

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      CHAPTER 4

      “A year? What the hell do you mean?” I asked, my lips twisted like a stroke victim’s. “You can’t be serious! Are you telling me that these people can keep me in jail, awaiting trial, for a year? A whole fucking year?” I looked in Debra’s eyes again, blinking so hard, I could barely see her. But I could still see the hopeless look on her face, and that didn’t go over too well with me. Debra gave me a hesitant nod.

      “Well, if they keep me in jail for a year, that would be punishment enough, wouldn’t it? Why would I even need a trial if they keep me in jail for a year? I was told that if I didn’t pay the fine and got convicted, the most time I’d have to spend in jail is three months. I know enough about the law to know that locking me up for a year, until they can sentence me to three months afterwards, makes no sense at all.”

      I looked at the floor. Debra and I remained silent for a full minute before I looked up again, saying the first thing that came to my mind. “The woman that I came down here with, she can be a character witness for me.” Now I was really talking crazy. As big a whore as Inez was, even a weak prosecutor could shoot so many holes in her credibility that she’d probably get thrown in jail, too!

      “Is this the same woman that you had the argument with?” Debra wanted to know.

      I nodded.

      “And if it’s not too personal, may I ask what you fought with her about?”

      My throat was lined with bile, and the rumbling pain in my stomach was almost as bad as labor. “She told me that she’d slept with my husband,” I mumbled.

      “I see. And where is this woman now?”

      “I don’t even know,” I muttered, with a heavy shrug, a scared look on my face. “After I slapped her, she checked into a different hotel. I can’t believe what is happening to me. This was supposed to be the vacation of a lifetime,” I said, with a profound shudder. “Women have vacation flings all the time, and they don’t get arrested for it!” I yelled. “What is wrong with these people down here? Don’t they have enough drug dealers, murderers, and thieves to keep them busy? Why are they making such a big deal out of what I did?” I sobbed.

      Debra squeezed my hand again. “Mrs. Webb, let me remind you, you are not in the United States. These little islands are not as idyllic as the travel ads make them seem. If you stay out of trouble, you can really have a wonderful time down here, and in other locations outside of the States. But down here, the laws vary from one island to another. Now if you’d been arrested in Jamaica or Martinique, you’d probably be back home by now.” Debra shook her head so hard, a lock of hair fell across her eye. “You picked the wrong island. It’s as simple as that,” she told me, pushing her hair back off of her face.

      “Are you here to help me?” The meek tone had returned to my voice.

      “I’m going to try.”

      “Can I borrow the ten thousand dollars from you? I swear to God, I’ll pay you back as soon as I get back to Ohio,” I said, so excited I squeezed Debra’s hand so hard, she pulled it away.

      “I wish things were that simple. I barely make enough to live on as it is,” Debra said, with an embarrassed look on her face.

      “Can you get me out of this mess, anyway? A woman in your position must have a lot of friends. Can you borrow from them? I have a five-year-old daughter that I need to get home to. School starts in a couple of weeks.” I stopped when I realized it was doing me no good to ramble. Despite his flaws, Leon was a good father to our daughter, Cheryl. And both our mothers doted on that child. My daughter was the last thing I needed to be worrying about.

      “I am afraid I can’t get you out of this,” Debra reluctantly admitted, her eyes unable to meet mine.

      “Then what the hell are you here for?” I asked, rising again.

      Debra motioned for me to sit back down. “I can’t get you out of this, but I can make things a little easier for you. You’re not the first American I’ve come to assist, and I doubt you’ll be the last. Here is what I can do for you.” She paused and sucked in a long, loud breath. Her gray eyes were flat and beady. Like the eyes on a dead fish. “I can speak to the court on your behalf.”

      “Like a lawyer?”

      “If you can afford a lawyer, I can help you find one.”

      “If I had money, I could pay my fine. I wouldn’t need a lawyer. They told me that if I paid ten thousand dollars, they would release me.”

      “True. But you don’t have ten thousand dollars. And that’s why I am here.”

      “What happens if I plead guilty?”

      “As grim as it sounds, that would be my recommendation. In your case, as you’ve already been advised, the penalty would be three-months confinement.”

      “I see,” I muttered, looking at the floor. I started talking out of the side of my mouth again. “Why did this have to happen to me?”

      “Don’t beat yourself up, Renee. It won’t help you at all. You just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Twelve other women were arrested for the same crime within hours of you; most had been tailed from that same bar. And, by the way, that nice local man who’d been so interested in your tale of woe, he works for the police. Several local women are now serving time because of Jose Garcia, and other men like him.”

      Jose. The very name sounded obscene to me now. I saw red in more ways than one: his red hair, his red shirt, my red-hot anger. One of the more sympathetic officers had already told me Jose’s story. Jose, and other men like him, made money by helping the cops identify prostitutes and get them off the streets. It showed the world that this tiny island was doing its part to fight crime. After the disappearance in nearby Aruba of that pretty White schoolgirl from Alabama, and the shabby investigation, all eyes around the world were on the Caribbean. Some island officials had decided to flex what little muscle they had by making as many arrests for as many different crimes as possible. And I was part of the crime wave.

      “That motherfucker. Jose’s the one who should be in jail. He had sex with me. I thought that all undercover vice cops were supposed to do was get you to quote a price. They are not supposed to actually fuck you!” I shouted.

      “Let me remind you again, Mrs. Webb, you are not in the United States. You are on foreign soil, and I am sorry, but you just might be here longer than you want to be.”

      CHAPTER 5

      Before they returned me to my cell, I was ushered down yet another dim hallway into a communal shower, along with two other women. By now my legs felt like rubber. It had been a while since I’d felt my butt. I was surprised that under these extreme circumstances, I was still able to walk and function.

      I had seen a lot of large female guards in the compound, but the one who escorted me to the showers, then accosted me with a rubber hose, was the most strapping one I’d seen so far. She was not that much taller than me, but she weighed at least three hundred pounds. A short, severe Afro covered her moon-shaped head like a stocking cap.

      Without saying a word, the hefty woman strapped on some kind of a surgical gauze mask and then proceeded to hose me and the СКАЧАТЬ