Page 115 of Fish in a Barrel
“Bummer.” Amal turned and handed Jackson the card and then started pulling out sodas. “What’s the other reason I’m blowing town for a few?”
“Because the two guys who drove your car here to drop off my boyfriend’s mother just turned back around, and we need to go fetch it.”
Amal frowned. “Why’d they leave? I mean, I’mrighthere!”
Jackson cocked his head, raising his eyebrows compassionately. “Oh, Amal, surely you can see why someone might have an allergy to the po-po, after today especially.”
Amal looked at the small package of Oreos in his hand, and the soda, and then his knees buckled, and Jackson was barely able to get him into one of the vinyl-and-chrome chairs that lined the wall.
Jackson slid down next to him, and when Ellery and Taylor came to find them an hour later so he could talk to the police, he was still sobbing into Jackson’s shoulder with the heartbreak of innocence lost.
FOUR HOURSand forty centuries later, they’d all given multiple statements and were allowed to leave. Jackson had Amal direct him to a nearby taqueria, and for a moment they ate in exhausted silence.
Then Jackson said, “Amal, do you have a cat?”
“Yeah, but I have a roommate. She’ll take care of it until I come back.”
Jackson nodded. “I’m sure someone where we’re going has some clothes you can borrow. And I’ve been getting texts telling me they have managed to scare us up some places to sleep. Guest rooms, couches, etc.”
“No hotels?” Taylor asked, sounding horrified.
Jackson and Ellery exchanged glances. “Mother,” Ellery said hesitantly, “this isn’t…. I mean, there might be a Motel 6 out there, but I don’t… there’s not really….”
Her eyes widened, and then she laughed, self-deprecation evident. “Look at me, making a fuss over such things. I need to remember what’s important.”
Amal looked at her, and then at Ellery and Jackson. “Complete strangers came cross-country to save my bacon?” he hazarded.
“An innocent man is out of custody,” she said firmly. “And between the DOJ, the FBI, and the LAPD, I think we may have begun to right the even deeper wrong that had you imprisoned there in the first place.” Her face fell. “I’m just so angry right now,” she confessed, raw and vulnerable as Jackson had only ever seen her when Ellery had been hurt. “I’ve labored my entire life for a better world than this. It’s such a step backward.”
“Well, yeah,” Jackson told her. He smiled briefly when she looked up. “But Ellery’s here to pick up the fight.”
Ellery’s hand on the small of his back told him he’d said the right thing.
And her faint smile and the stiffening of her spine told him the same. “Both of you,” she said softly.
He shrugged.
It was perfectly obvious to him that he hadn’t been necessary at all.
THEY MADEit to Victoriana and followed Ace’s directions out to one of maybe threereally nicefinished ranch-style houses in a deserted housing tract that had been meant for at least a dozen. This one had cream-colored stucco, white trim, and desert-chic landscaping of hardy succulents spreading over white gravel.
“The hell?” Jackson said and yawned, pulling up the driveway behind a large battered truck and a now-familiar black motorcycle. “How does someone even know this is out here?”
“If it’s Burton,” Ellery said practically, “he probably doesn’t need anybody to know.”
They sat there after Jackson killed the engine in the much-driven CR-V, and just when Jackson thought they were going to have to get out and do something, Ernie and Burton appeared in the doorway. Ernie hurried over to the back seat where Taylor sat and opened the door for her, while Jackson, Ellery, and Amal all stood creakily and stretched.
“Took you long enough,” Burton chided before pulling Jackson into a bro-hug. Jackson returned it and grinned.
“Nice place you got here,” he said. “I never saw it.”
“Good,” Burton replied. “Because Ernie asks that you stay tomorrow night too. He wants to have a dinner or something. Don’t ask. He’s excited. Is that okay?”
Jackson looked over at Taylor, who was smiling at Ernie in that way that indicated she was charmed but bemused. “Well, Lucy Satan is the boss. You’ll have to ask her. But….” He yawned again. “Later. Ask her later. Man, what time is it?”
“Two in the morning.”
“Is that fucking all? This has been the weirdest day!”
