Page 141 of Devil and the Deep Blue Fish

“Step on the brake,” Randy muttered, suiting actions to words. “Put the car into Park. Get out of the seat, jump in the back.”

“That’s my boy.”

While Randy was jumping in the back, Jackson crawled over the console.

“Seat belt on,” Jackson muttered.

“Go!” Randy shouted.

As if on cue, Henry ran up to the women and knocked the giant Macy’s bags out of their hands—yes, the same Macy’s that had gone out of business—and whirled around, taking pictures of clothes that had all the tags and none of the receipts.

And Jackson stepped on the gas and roared down the street that passed behind the mall and then around to the front.

He got there just in time for Henry—covered in red underwear and a stunning blue formal, all of it draped from his head and shoulders and floating behind him like a banner of shame—to launch himself from the double doors.

Jackson screeched to a halt long enough for Henry to jump in, and they peeled away and off toward the Greenback entrance before the women even got a look at the crap-brown minivan serving as his getaway vehicle.

Jackson cut corners, jumped curbs, and cut off several pissed-off motorists merging onto Greenback and roaring toward Fair Oaks, their empty Dutch Bros. cups rattling in the holders while Henry freed himself from tacky lingerie and finally got his seat belt on.

It took them three miles to stop laughing, and another mile for Henry to start texting the pictures to Ellery so he could use them to bargain for their client’s freedom.

“Well,” Henry breathed when they finally all calmed down, “put another one in the ‘Listen to Ernie’ column.”

“Who’s Ernie?” Randy asked from the back seat, and Jackson had to keep himself from startling, because he and Henry had been in their work mode and had almost forgotten he was there.

“A friend,” Jackson told him. “He told me Henry should come along for the ride.”

“I wonder what he meant by getting bent out of shape if I didn’t?” Henry asked, and Jackson shook his head.

But he was thinking about his desperate peel out around the mall and how several vehicles had been entering a once-vacant side road as Jackson had ripped down the drive.

Several Trump Trucks, on parade.

There was no guarantee Randy would have gunned the engine and gone for it if he’d seen them—after all the “That’s a car” exercise had been purely hypothetical.

But no guarantee he wouldn’t have, either.

“I got nothing,” he lied smoothly, and Henry gave him a look that said they’d talk later.

“That was awesome,” Randy said, sounding content. “Can we come here next week and do that? You’re both so relaxed. I think I might learn how to drive after all!”

Jackson let out a breath and silently consigned a couple months of Sundays to this enterprise, and next to him, he could hear Henry do the same.

“It’s fine,” Jackson said. “I really can’t standMeet the Press.”

“Thanks, guys,” Randy said, his gratitude literally on his sleeve. “With you guys, I feel safe as a kitten.”

Henry snorted next to him, and before Jackson could send him a “Hush!” look, his seat belt unhooked out of nowhere and smacked his fingers as it got sucked back up into the release mechanism.

“See?” Jackson muttered.

“Yeah, I know,” Henry muttered back. “Sorry, Jennifer—didn’t mean to tempt fate.”

“What’s that?” Randy asked.

“Nothing, kid,” Jackson told him. He and Henry both shook their heads in silent prayer. “Not a damned thing.”

Continue Reading for an Excerpt fromFish in a Barrel, Book #7 in the Fish Out of Water series by Amy Lane.

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