"Shit. Me, I play round ball." She eased back, craned her neck to look under the table. "You got a lot of leg, but I'd still whip your ass on the court."
"We'll have to find time for a pickup game one of these fine days, but right now I'm here about Julianna Dunne. You had the cage beside hers the last three years."
"We don't call them cages 'round here." She sent Eve a sneer. "They call 'em personal areas. Fucking personal areas. Miller, he's an asshole."
Eve wasn't sure what it said that she and Sanchez had that basic point of agreement. "What did you and Dunne talk about when you were in your respective personal areas?"
"I don't give nothing to cops. Oh wait, yeah, I give one thing to cops." She held up her middle finger.
"Bet they've got a salon in this country club. You could use a manicure. You and Dunne make any girl talk?"
"I got nothing to say to her, she got nothing to say to me. Bitch thought she was better than anybody."
"You don't like her, neither do I. We can start from there."
"Like her better than I do cops. Buzz is she offed some rich old bastard over in New York. What do I care about that?"
"She's out, you're not. Isn't that enough?"
Sanchez examined her nails as if she were indeed contemplating that manicure. "No skin off my ass where she is, but I bet yours is burning."
"I guess you think Julianna's pretty smart."
Sanchez snorted through her nose. "She thinks she is."
"Too smart for a cop to figure—then again, I'm one of the cops who put her in here."
A little smirk tipped up the right corner of Sanchez's mouth. "Didn't keep her in."
"That's not my job." Eve leaned back. "You're going to be in another ten to fifteen, given your fondness for jabbing sharp implements into sensitive areas of other people's anatomy."
"Don't do nothing to no motherfucker they don't try to do to me. Woman's got to defend herself out in the bad, bad world."
"Maybe, but you won't breathe the air in that bad, bad world for at least a dime more considering your in-house record won't earn you the crown for Miss Congeniality or cop you toward an early for good behavior release."
"What the fuck I care? Place like this, you can do a dime standing on your head scratching your butt."
"You get conjugals in here, Sanchez?"
Her eyes sharpened. "Sure. Part of the rehabilitation gig. Gotta keep the machine in tune, right?"
"But you're a violent tendency. VT's just get to hump droids. Could be I can wrangle you an lc. A genuine warm body for a night of romance. In exchange."
"You fucking with me?"
"No, but I'll get you a pro who will if you give me something I can use. Who'd she talk to, who did she use. What do you know?"
"I want a big guy, good-looking, who can keep his dick up till I get off."
"Tell me something I want to hear, and I'll get you the conjugal, the rest is up to you. Julianna Dunne."
It was a choice between real sex and screwing a cop. Sanchez went for real sex. "Bitch. Texas gringo beauty fucking queen. Kept to herself much as she could. Treated the guards like they were Sunday school teachers. Yes, ma'am, thank you, ma'am. Made you wanna puke. They lapped it up, gave her extra privileges. She got coin in. Greased palms, paid some of the lesbos to lay off her. Free time she spent in the library or the gym. She had Loopy for her bitch—not a sex thing, more like a puppy."
"And Loopy would be?"
"Lois Loop, funky junkie, doing twenty for icing her old man. Had the cage other side of the bitch. Heard them talking sometimes." Sanchez shrugged. "She'd promise to set Loopy up somewhere cozy when she got sprung, said how she had a lot of money and a nice place to live. Texas, maybe."
"She planned to go back to Texas?"