Page 57 of Devil and the Deep Blue Fish

“Too bad,” Jackson told him, darting through the infirmary and toward the storeroom. “You fed me and let your cat make sweet lurve to me—I think we have to be friends now.”

“Only if we live,” Cody promised direly, closing the storeroom door behind him as Jackson opened the window. Together they stared down, and Jackson realized that they weren’ttwostories up—the bottom story had a vaulted roof. They were nearlythreestories up.

“No promises,” he muttered. The day was still gray and cold, but at least it wasn’t pouring rain. He leaned over, scenting the damp breeze and realizing how stifling the rehab center was inside—it felt like his entire day had been dogged by stale tobacco and urine.

Using the fresh air as a goad, he reached for the trellis under the ivy and tugged, grateful when it held tight to the crumbling mortar of the brick façade that took over for the stucco in the back.

“It’s a good thing we’re both scrawny as fuck,” Cody muttered, watching anxiously as Jackson slid out of the window and shoved his feet through the foliage to find the ladder. “If either one of us were fighting weight, this thing would collapse.”

“I’ll have you know,” Jackson said, his words coming carefully as he chose his hand- and footholds, “I haven’t weighed this much in a year and a half.”

“What happened—” Cody was watching him, scrambling down the same way Jackson was, only letting Jackson go first. “—a year and a half ago?”

“Dirty/Pretty Killer,” Jackson breathed.

“Oh my God,” Cody muttered.

“What? You’re going to fall?” Jackson glanced up in a panic, partly because he didn’t want Cody to break something if he hit the ground from this height and partly because he was afraid the other man would take him down.

“No!” Cody panted. “I just remember that case. I forget sometimes. I got rescued by a legend.”

“Ouch!” Jackson jerked his hand back as something scratched it. Anxiously he searched the dusty, twisted vines of ivy for a tiny black nightmare with a red splotch on its back, and he breathed out a sigh of relief when the real culprit revealed itself.

“Spider?” Cody asked, his voice rising in a way to let Jackson know they were a particular fear for his new partner.

“Nail,” Jackson muttered, wincing at the jagged little cut. “Don’t worry.” He took a step down and then sideways. “I’m the proverbial canary in a coal mine. If it gets me, it won’t get any—”

“Ouch!” Cody exclaimed. “Vicious sucker. Does that make us blood brothers?”

“Holy Jesus,” Jackson muttered. “No. Yes. Whatever. I think it makes us dangerous in close quarters. God.”

“What does that—augh!”

Jackson watched in horror as Gabriel’s foot slid on the wooden slat his own had just vacated, and Cody Gabriel went flailing, falling past Jackson to land on his back with a solidoolfon the wet pile of leaves that had been pushed up against the house.

“Well shit,” Jackson said, finishing his clamber down and leaping the last couple feet to the ground. “Gabriel? You okay? Speak to me, man!”

Cody blinked up from his back with the air of a man counting ribs. “That was fun,” he said. “I think I’m okay. My back might be feeling it in the morning.”

“You okay with ibuprofen?” Jackson asked. Some people in recovery refused it—he did on principle, because watching his mother spend her life down the rabbit hole had left a mark.

“Yeah,” Cody said, reaching up his own wounded hand for Jackson’s, both of them dripping blood onto the loam. “Pain relief is perfectly acceptable.” He winced as he stood, and Jackson went to brush leaves from his back.

“We can probably get you a hot/cold pack while we’re at it,” he said. “It’s time to check in with Ellery and let you change.” He grimaced. “You’re gonna want to—”

Cody grimaced, his shoulders twitching, probably because he felt the damp seeping in through the ragged hoodie he’d put on over his grubby garden clothes.

“Tell me there’s no cat shit,” he begged. “I can take anything but cat shit.”

“Nope,” Jackson said, flicking two tiny slugs off his shoulder. “Nothing but this snail on your ass.”

“Ew!” Cody swept his hand down, and Jackson grimaced as the he heard the shell crack, and then the poor thing went flying against the house.

“I could have gotten it,” Jackson told him. “You didn’t have to kill it.”

Cody Gabriel grunted. “I’m sorry, Rivers, but if you’re not going to grab my ass romantically, I’d rather you not touch it professionally.”

“I’m not that kind of private detective,” Jackson said, taking a step back with his hands up. “Now come on before the cops sweep around the house.”

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