Page 112 of Fish in a Barrel
“Leave that part out,” Ernie said. “Understood. We’ll meet you at the ICE office as soon as we pick up the package.”
As Jackson pushed the little car up the terrible gradient of the Grapevine, Ellery wanted to groan. “We may or may not get there by six.”
“You can only try,” Ace told him. “I mean, at eleven this morning, you guys thought your day was gonna go a whole other way, didn’t you?”
“We did indeed,” Jackson said, keeping the irony out of his voice.
Ace signed off, and Ellery thumped back against the seat again. “God. You know, I hope we can get their friend out.”
“You don’t think we can?” Jackson was surprised. He was pretty sure Ellery and his mother could accomplish anything. Particularly when working together. If they had Ellery’s father there, they could probably solve world peace.
“I have some ideas,” Ellery admitted. “But….” He blew out a breath. “Jackson,” he said, none of the arrogance or prissiness Jackson had once thought consumed him evident in his voice now. “Jackson, they have so much faith in us. I mean, here they have people who are completely innocent. Not even accused of a crime—they’revictims.If we can’t help them, what are we doing?”
Jackson’s heart hurt. “Our best,” he said simply. “And your best, Counselor, is terrifying.”
Ellery grunted. “So’s your faith.”
“Ditto,” Jackson told him, but Ellery, mind likely busy with how he was going to approach a government agency with such a prohibitive amount of power, didn’t respond.
Part 3
ACE GLANCEDin the rearview mirror at the formidable woman in the back of Amal Dara’s Jeep and smiled nervously.
“So,” she said, seemingly unperturbed at having been yanked cross-country at a moment’s notice and thrown into the back of a Jeep Cherokee with two men she’d barely met, once, in pretty much the worst of circumstances. “Can you give me the situation, please?”
Ace took a deep breath and pulled into Los Angeles traffic, hating it with every fiber of his being. And then it hit him. “You don’t know why you’re here?” he asked.
“Well, Ellery didn’t know much either,” she said. “Details were sketchy, Mr. Atchison. But you and your friends helped my son when he needed it most, and you seem fairly independent. I’m reasonably certain he wouldn’t have summoned me from three thousand miles away if this was a parking ticket.”
“Ma’am,” Ernie said, a sort of reverence in his voice Ace had never heard. “Would you adopt us?”
“Consider it done,” she said, the faintest edge of humor in her voice telling Ace that she appreciated the sentiment. “Now, about your friend’s situation.”
“The situation, ma’am, is tricky.” Ace frowned, hoping he could make this as concise as possible. “See, our friend Jai is seeing a friend who works as a nurse. He, uhm, has at times worked to help people who, uhm, ordinarily would not be seeking medical attention.”
“Criminals?” she inquired, using the same tone one might say, “Golfers?”
“Immigrants,” he said bluntly. Better she know them for who they were. “Not all of them legal.”
“Oh,” she murmured. “Understood. Not exactly legal, but definitely moral and ethical.” She let out a short, almost bitter laugh. “Laws made by evil men are not necessarily laws we should obey.”
Ace actually felt his eyes burn. “We agree, ma’am. But George, he’s been growing closer to the community. So he sees a little girl in the ER waiting room, and he starts talking to her. Offering her an apple and such. And he asks her what happened to her mother. And she starts crying, and says, ‘hielo.’”
“Oh dear,” Mrs. Cramer, Esquire said, and Ace heard her comprehension and disapproval in those two syllables. “How long has the woman been in the country?”
Ace swallowed because he could hear her rage already. “That’s the thing. She was born here. So was her daughter—and her ex-husband for that matter. She speaks English when she’s not terrified. Apparently this agent threatened to deport her if she said anything. George and Amal didn’t know that. They just knew that ICE was coming in through the front door.”
“Amal Dara. This is the person who was taken into custody?”
“Yes, ma’am. He’s George’s boss, and he gave George the keys to this here vehicle and said, ‘I’ll try to stall.’ George shot through the hospital with the woman and her daughter, thinking that the authorities were going to be after him, and ten minutes later he gets a call that Amal has been taken into custody.”
“And do we know what the charges are?” she asked, and she must have been glancing at her phone because she gasped. “No. We don’t. Because he wasn’t reported as being taken into custody. That is illegal.” She glanced up. “He was born in this country?”
“Yes, ma’am. I asked George, in case that’ll be a hang-up. George says he’s third-generation.”
“Indeed.”
Ace was finding it hard to breathe. The heat screaming off her body as he followed Ernie’s quietly voiced directions coming partly from his phone and partly from his brain almost crushed his lungs.
