a point farther up the mountain and then to a spot nearby where a faint path disappeared into the brush. âItâs not all that far, but itâs steep. Youâll need to watch your step.â
âYOU GONNA BE ALL RIGHT now?â Aubrey Bayless asked, pushing John Lassiterâs bulky wheelchair into his cell and locking the wheels close enough to the metal cot that the prisoner would be able to manage the last bit of distance on his own.
âIâm fine, Aubrey,â Lassiter said, levering his heavy frame out of the chair and onto the narrow bed. âThank you for bringing me back.â
Big Bad John Lassiter was still big, but the bad part had largely disappeared. Multiple sclerosis had turned him into a wheelchair-Âbound mass of mostly uncooperative muscles. It was hard to tell if he was still bad because, on occasion, he was also virtually helpless. He lived alone in a cell not because he was a danger to himself or others, but because none of the other inmates at the Arizona State Prison in Florence was willing to help him with his ever-Âincreasing physical deficits.
That job usually fell to Aubrey Bayless, a kind, grizzle-Âhaired old black man who primarily functioned as an orderly inside the prisonâs infirmary. It was there the two menâÂprisoner and caregiverâÂhad gradually developed a friendship. On those occasions when John wasnât confined to a hospital bed, Aubrey voluntarily helped him in and out of his cell as well as back and forth to the dining room and elsewhere.
âWhen you gonna agree to see that daughter of yours?â Aubrey wanted to know. âThose guys in the visitorsâ office tell me she keeps asking and asking.â
âHow many times do I have to tell you?â John replied wearily. âI donât have a daughter. I signed away my parental rights to that girl the moment she was born.â
âYou maybe signed âem away, but I donât think she be listening,â Aubrey countered. âThey say she even gots the same thing you got. Sheâs what, not even forty years old, and she already stuck on one of them scooters.â
That hurt. The idea that MS was hereditary and that heâd most likely passed his own ailment along to an offspring heâd never met seemed grossly unfair. All Big Bad John knew about his daughter was her nameâÂthe name her adoptive parents had given herâÂAmanda Wasser.
Years had passed between the time Amos Warren disappeared and when his remains had been found. By the time John was charged with his murder, his onetime girlfriend, Ava MartinâÂthe one who had caused all the troubleâÂwas years in his rearview mirror. At the time John was taken into custody, he and his then girlfriend, Bernadette Benson, had actually started thinking about getting married. By the time the baby was born, heâd been found guilty and sentenced to life without parole for Amosâs murder.
Bernadette had come to the prison visitorsâ room, hugely pregnant. She had begged him to marry her and give the baby his last name, promising that sheâd keep the child and raise it on her own, but John had steadfastly refused. Why give the poor kid the name of a guy who would be spending the rest of his life in prison? Bernadette had no education beyond high school. Without Johnâs support, she was barely scratching out a meager existence working as a waitress.
âWhy not give the kid up for adoption?â he had asked her. âWhy not let him have half a chance at a decent life?â
Of course, the baby had turned out to be a girl rather than a boy, but Bernadette had come around to Johnâs way of thinking. Heâd been surprised when she had put the baby up for adoption, signing away her parental rights at the same time John gave up his. He knew how much Bernadette regretted that decision because she herself had told him so, saying over and over that,