The Ambush

Jasper didn't sleep that night.

Every muscle in his body told him that tonight was the night. Ragor wasn't the kind of man to let an insult sit for too long. The fact that he'd waited this long meant only one thing—he was planning something big.

Jasper lay on his bunk, eyes half-closed but fully alert, listening to the low murmurs of the cell block. Footsteps, whispered conversations, the occasional distant clang of metal on metal.

Then—silence.

A wrong kind of silence.

The hairs on Jasper's arms stood up.

Then came the click of a cell door opening.

His.

Jasper rolled off his bunk just as a shadow lunged at him.

A glint of metal—a shiv.

He twisted, the blade barely missing his ribs, instead slicing into his forearm. Pain flared, but Jasper ignored it. He grabbed the attacker's wrist and slammed his elbow into their face. The man grunted, staggering back.

More figures rushed in.

Three of them.

Ragor's crew.

The first attacker, a bald, tattooed thug, came at him again, swinging wildly. Jasper ducked under the blow and drove his fist into the man's stomach, then brought his knee up into his jaw. Teeth cracked. The man dropped.

The second rushed him from the side, wrapping an arm around Jasper's throat. A classic prison move—choke from behind while the others finish the job.

Jasper threw his head back, smashing his skull into the man's nose. The grip loosened just enough for Jasper to drive his elbow into his ribs and twist free.

Too slow.

A third attacker slammed a fist into Jasper's stomach, sending him stumbling back onto his bunk. The first man—the one with the shiv—was already coming at him again.

Jasper grabbed the only weapon he had—a metal food tray—and swung. Hard.

CRACK.

The shiv wielder collapsed, blood dripping from his head.

Jasper turned, breathing hard.

Only one left standing now—the man who had choked him.

A big guy. Muscles. Smiling.

"You fight better than I thought, Cruz," the man sneered, rolling his shoulders. "But we were just softening you up."

The hairs on Jasper's neck rose.

A shadow moved outside the cell.

Too late.

Ragor stepped in.

And he was holding a blade.