Page 67 of Fish in a Barrel
“Okay, Counselor,” he said softly. They both heard his phone buzz from the table. “Is it enough to get you through your day?”
Ellery nodded, content and sweet in Jackson’s arms as he very rarely was. His phone buzzed again, angrier this time, as though it knew that Ellery had put his work concerns aside for a few moments to be human and vulnerable and needy.
Jackson kissed his forehead. “Good, because I think your day is about to hit you like a sledgehammer, so you need to have your shit together.”
Ellery took a step back and nodded grimly. “What are you planning to do?” he asked, and before Jackson could protest in all innocence that he was going to mooch around the house and heal as ordered, he gave Jackson a droll look. “I’m well aware that you’re not about to sit this one out.”
Jackson chuckled. “Well, let’s say I’ve been thinking about the DA sending Christie and de Souza out here. Don’t Christie and K-Ski have the best record in the department?”
Ellery nodded. It was common knowledge that when Sean Kryzynski and Andre Christie worked together, they were pure gold.
“So why would the DA send one of his best teams out here to chase down a bullshit lead with the added benefit of harassing the boyfriend of the guy who had just annoyed him?”
Ellery slow-blinked. “He knows something,” he said softly. “Something he doesn’t want anybody to know, including the police. They weren’t sent here because he thought you did it. They were sent here because he might know who did.”
“Yeah.” Jackson nodded. “And the only way to figure out what he knows is to solve the case ourselves. And I bet ol’ Sean is feeling mighty bored by now….”
Ellery’s smile was completely self-satisfied. “And he can’t go running off into the wild blue yonder either.”
“No he cannot,” Jackson said. “You have found yourself the perfect babysitter.”
“Better yet,” Ellery said brightly, “you found him for me!”
Jackson grinned, relieved that Ellery seemed to have located his center again. “Lucky you.”
But Ellery sobered. “Yes. I’mverylucky. And I haven’t forgotten that you’re talking marriage, and that it’s going to be in a park, under a blue sky, with all our friends around us.”
Jackson felt his cheeks heat. “That’s pretty romantic,” he said, wondering what had possessed him.
“And practical.” Ellery gave a decisive nod that fooled neither of them. “If you’re anywhere near a candle, odds are, you’ll burn the place down.”
“Heh heh heh heh heh heh….”
Ellery stalked toward the table, obviously intent on his coffee and on getting to the office close to on time. “It’s not funny,” he huffed.
“It’s hilarious.”
“It’s pathological.”
“It’s the best thing I’ve heard all day!” Jackson said on a laugh.
Ellery turned a smug smile toward him. “Not me,” he said, and Jackson abruptly stopped laughing. As Ellery bustled around the kitchen and then into the bedroom again for a final lint roll, he sank down next to his breakfast plate and waited for the panic to assail him.
I said we were going to get married!
But by the time Ellery had hustled out, filled his travel mug with coffee and doctored it, and then kissed Jackson meltingly on the mouth before disappearing into the garage to leave, Jackson realized no panic was coming.
When he realized that the only thing in his chest at the thought of marrying Ellery Cramer was a deep and abiding sense of peace, he let out a breath and stood. He’d mull on the proposal later. But right now, they had so much work to do.
Breadcrumbs
THE THINGabout Galen Henderson’s Sahara-dry Southern sense of humor was that Ellery could tell him anything and only be the recipient of a long slow blink of the eyes as feedback. Given that Ellery came from stolid and practical New Englanders whoalsotried very hard not to overreact, it meant that when Galen reacted to something that Ellery reacted to, it really had to be beyond the pale.
“So,” Galen said, regarding Ellery over his desk, “there were detectives at your door at five o’clock in the morning. Jackson convinced them he hadn’t moved—nor should he have moved, nor should he move for another week, although I know he will—and then patted them on the head and asked them to leave, giving you two more hours of uninterrupted shut-eye, and you are upset?”
Ellery made a frustrated noise. “Galen, what do we tell every client who walks through the door. Every. Damned. One.”
“You shouldn’t have fucked up, but now that you have, we’re glad you’re here?” Henry supplied, strolling through Galen’s door without invitation.
