Chapter 10

“Yes, Mom, Anna’s started her new job. Yes, she’s got herself a new place. And yes, she’s coming by later and bringing dinner with her. And no, I am not taking Mister Hanson up on his job offer,” said Lea.

“Well, okay, but if he’s offering twice as much as you’re making now...” started Cecilia.

“Yes, and what would he want in return, Mom. He picks up to young women in a diner and offers them fancy jobs and fancy dinners at the Waterbury. What’s in it for him. Mom, I was a whore. You know it, Anna knows it, and I know men.

“Yes, he is handsome and very rich I guess, but the greatest man in the world is suffering because of me. I will not betray him, not for anything,” said Lea. Her mother nodded, but it was a dubious nod.

“But you’re going to be having dinner with him tonight, right?” said Cecilia.

“Yes, I asked him if he could maybe do something to help Andrew. He said, no problem, that he’d be looking into it. I guess he has, and tonight he’s going to let me in on whatever it is,” she said.

“Okay, well, let me know how it goes, okay?” said Cecilia.

“I will Momma, promise,” she said.

“Well, pretty lady, we’re here,” said Carlton. Lea Scott smiled.

“My mom liked you, or we wouldn’t be here,” she said. “I mean my man upstate...”

“I understand. You don’t want to be put in a position where you feel like you’re doing him wrong. I really do completely understand. I will say given what I now know, that that man is very lucky to have woman of your class and loyalty to support him while he’s in prison,” he said. Her look was one of surprise; it was the only way to describe it, her look.

“Thank you, but in point of fact he more than deserves my loyalty and support, Carlton, really,” she said.

“Okay, I bow to your assessment,” he said. But as I mentioned to you, I was going have his situation looked into, and I have. And, he has been having a tough time of it, not as tough as some others, but bad enough,” he said.

“Oh my God!” she said. He held up his hand to short shank her interrupting him.

“I have set things in motion to set things right. In fact, I’m relatively certain that they already have been. I’ll know for sure by the end of the upcoming week.”

“Can I ask...” she started.

“I have contacts in the governor’s office. They are in a position to effect some changes so to speak,” he said.

“Oh my. I sure hope, I mean really hope that something can be done for him,” she said.

“I know. And it has been done. But Lea, prison is not a nice place. Things happen and can happen.

“I learned, well, my man did, that your Andrew was being seriously abused by his cellmate. I saw to it that from now on, so long as he is in that place with the same warden, that he will no longer be sharing a cell with anyone,” he said.

“Okay?” she said.

“But, the problem with that is that since it is a maximum-security unit that he’s in, loneliness will now be his biggest problem. No more physical abuse, or very seldom at worst, but the loneliness. It’s going to be bad for him,” he said. He noticed that she was starting to cry.

“I will be writing him more, much more,” she said. “I will be sending him more pictures of our daughter too.” The man across from her nodded.

Carlton Hanson had been thinking about it, a lot. But no more, he’d made up his mind: this woman was for him. She for sure was one of a kind. He had to have her. Problem was she was not going to be abandoning the man in prison, not unless it was in her man’s best interest. And, it had to be that the man himself would accept it as being in his best interest and agree to letting his woman go. Oh yes, that would be the absolute bottom line, no question! Talk about tough nuts! But there had to be a way; there always was a way.

Over the next weeks and months, Carlton kept up a steady barrage of information about her man inside. The Pearl, the occasional afternoon at the Waterbury. Even the local city park for picnics were the venues of choice.