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due to the metal bars and cement floors.  The two other women sat at the metal dining table reading a Spanish bible.  Kristen and Sophia didn’t speak English.  Kristen would just smile real big and say ‘thank you’ even if one of the girls told her she desperately needed a shower.   She’d just flutter those long black eyelashes and smile.  Sophia looked like she belonged in an 18 th century love story.  Porcelain pink skin, rosy lips and innocent eyes.  Long thick hair wrapped in a bun on top of her head, curly tendrils drooped about her lovely face.   Who would’ve ever thought the duo were drug smugglers?
            “You scared, huh?”  Ruthie asked Dawn.  “Wanna talk about it?”
            Dawn didn’t respond.  Even in that orange jumpsuit, she was a beautiful young woman with tanned skin, hazel eyes and long henna-colored hair.  She was sitting Indian-style on the flimsy mattress with her arms crossed and her head laid back against the concrete wall.  Cassandra could easily stab her in the throat.
            “Talking about it ain’t gonna change nothing,” Cassandra, a medium built white girl with deep set eyes grumbled.
            “I am scared,” Dawn straightened and fixed her with a penetrable gaze.  “Aren’t you?”
            “I’ve been here too many times to be scared.”  A smirk spread across her lips to ears spotted with keloids.
            “For what?”
            “The same shit.  Selling dope to an undercover cop.”
            “Ruthie!”  Dawn exclaimed.
            “Bitch ain’t learn her lesson yet.”  Cassandra sneered, rolling her eyes.  “Bet when I get outta here you won’t see me again.”
            And I’ll probably never get out of here.  “Why are you here?”  Dawn asked.
            “Probation violation.  Drugs.  Shoplifting.  Fuck, the whole book.  I gotta get my life right.  Take care of my girls—“ Cassandra’s voice quivered.  A tear fell from her eye.  She swiped it away.  Quickly, she climbed to her feet and exited Dawn’s cell and plopped herself onto her own hay-filled plastic mattress in the next cell.
            “She’ll be alright.” Ruthie said.  “She know she gonna have to do some time.  Me, too.  My lawyer said I’m looking at five years.  This the third time I’ve been in this bitch for selling to a narc’.  Them m’fuckers getting smart.” She laughed.
            “Damn, Ruthie.” Dawn quipped.  They giggled.
            “I know, huh?” she sprawled herself on Dawn’s bed, a hand behind her head.  Her dirty feet just inches from Dawn’s leg.  “M’fuckas always coming after the ones who just tryin’a to make enough to eat.”
            Dawn saw a sensitive and caring person beneath Ruthie’s street-wise exterior.   She’d made tons of mistakes in her life, but her upbringing had a lot to do with the mischief.  She was sure the girl was from a broken home, her mom was probably a drug user and her dad, she probably never knew him.  When Dawn was searching for a way to pay a car note, Ruthie was desperately looking for her next meal.  They were from two different worlds.  And Dawn wished she’d never experience the life Ruthie lived.
            Although she’d plummeted head-first into this one.

 
    Chapter Two
    Edward Miles greeted Lydia at the door when she sauntered into the garage entry, and one look at his face told her he hadn’t slept much the past few days.  Edward Miles was as pleasant and hospitable as her colleague had described him.  He was at least in his late fifties, she assumed, his black curly hair greying at the temple, and he stood with his arms uncrossed, a welcoming gesture -- an invitation -- even though this meeting meant his only daughter could spend