Page 22 of Fish in a Barrel
“What?” she asked as they stepped out into the wind-screaming night again. “We blew that place like we were running from the cops. What did Jackson say?”
“He didn’t,” Ellery told her tersely. “Henry did. Jade, the perpetrator? Was an undercover cop.”
“The actual holy fucking hell?” She came to a stop in front of him and whirled to face him, while he almost ran into her. “Do you think Arizona knew that?”
Ellery shook his head. “I’d bet my diploma she didn’t.” He swallowed, and Jade voiced the thought that had just hit him.
“Good, because you might be betting Jackson’s life.”
“Yeah.” He shuddered, a gust of wind smacking them both as they turned toward the parking lot. “Henry said they were on the move. I don’t know what that means. All Idoknow is that we’re meeting Annette Frazier early tomorrow, and he promised to be there.” He paused. “Promised.”
She patted his hand. “It’s not like last time.” It sounded like she was making sure, but he answered her like it was a foregone conclusion.
“Not in the least. He… he’s in a much better place.” Nearly a year before, Jackson had gone off into a dark and stormy night to “investigate a case.” Except he’d seen his mother’s body on a coroner’s slab that day, cut apart by the Dirty/Pretty Killer, and he had not been okay—not even close. And Ellery had lived the longest thirty hours of his life waiting for Jackson to come home. When hehadcome home, after a night of horrors, he’d been half out of his mind with fever and even worse with despair. He’d confessed brokenly to Ellery that he’d only planned on coming home to get Billy Bob and leave, because he didn’t want to fuck Ellery’s life up anymore—his words. Ellery would never, not in a million years, forget the way his heart had beat in his throat at how close Jackson had been to crawling off into a little hole and dying, alone and believing he was unloved.
The year since had been both unbelievably difficult and full of glorious revelations. The difficult part had been the healing they’d both had to do, both body and spirit, to get to a place where Ellery trusted Jackson to take care of himself and Jackson trusted that Ellery was not going to stop loving him if he screwed up. It had almost cost Jackson his life in June, when consequences from that long-ago fever and all that followed had come back to haunt them both in the form of a heart condition that they could manage, but that would never completely heal.
None of Jackson’s wounds would evercompletelyheal, but Jackson had worked hard, so very hard, at being whole enough to sustain a relationship. And Ellery had worked hard at not expecting perfection from a man who had spent much of his life worrying about survival.
They’d both learned so much—and had come to trust each other so very much—in the past year. And as Ellery piloted his beloved Lexus sedan, which herefusedto trade in for a newer model, dammit, back to the house on American River Drive that had seemed empty and bereft of any life before Jackson had moved in, he realized that this was the test of all that learning.
Jackson had kissed him, told him he’d keep in touch, and had left, promising he wouldn’t take any unnecessary risks. Ellery had to trust he’d be back.
And dammit, Jackson had to keep that promise.
Far Away Oceans
“WE READY?”Henry asked as Jackson finished with his transformation. It wasn’t much. Jackson kept old clothes and a shaving kit in the car out of habit, and Henry did too, because he’d seen how often Jackson had needed that secret stash. As they’d approached the homeless camp, Jackson had Henry pull over about a block away, in the dark recesses of a vacant parking lot, so he could change. He took off the denim jacket and swapped out his new T-shirt for one so old that the picture of Marvin the Martian was mostly flaked off, and the new sweatshirt, which was still damp from walking up Annette Frazier’s driveway and back, for an old gray one with frayed sleeves and a Sac State logo that had been discontinued before Jackson was old enough to be in college.
And he’d swapped out his new jeans that fit his ass, with no holes and a stiff button fly, for a pair of old ones with almostnoass and big rips in the knees.
He finished relacing his shoes, which were newish, but it was dark outside and he could do nothing about them, and replaced the denim jacket, because it was worn enough to pass
“Readynow,” he replied, taking a deep breath. Putting on the old clothes didn’t bother him in an aesthetic sense, but God, he was remembering how cold it was to go wandering around in the wind and the rain with his ass hanging out.
“So you got your cell?” Henry asked.
“Got my cell.” He should be insulted that Henry was nursemaiding him like this, but he was also reassured. He’d been out in the cold alone before. He didn’t have to do that ever again. “And my earbud on. It’ll be hidden by the hat and hood, but you’ll be able to hear me.”
“Thank God for technology. Speaking of, got your heartbeat watch?” Henry asked, and Jackson grimaced. The watch had been Ellery’s idea, and it made sense because Jacksonhad a heart condition, but it was also an irritating reminder that he would need to be kept on a healthy leash for a good long time. Per Ellery’s nagging, erm, suggestion, they’d keyed the watch into both Jackson’s phone and Henry’s, and then Lance had promptly bought Henry one so Jackson could have his stats and location too. It was frustrating, and it probably felt like what twins felt when they were harnessed together so they couldn’t escape a controlling mother, but, well, the little bastardsdidkeep escaping, so he figured he and Henry probably had the damned watches coming.
“It’s all charged and everything,” he said. It had a two-day charge, and Ellery made sure he charged it every night.
“Good,” Henry told him. “So’s mine. Keep it hidden, right?”
“Right,” Jackson said, tucking it under his sleeve. Many homeless people had cell phones—it was the only way to apply for a job these days, and nearly a quarter of the unhomed population were employed. But the watch was an indulgence—and an obvious one—and it would make somebody look twice at him when he didn’t want them to look at him at all.
Which reminded him. “Shitty free stocking cap,” he muttered, pulling it over his blond hair. It was cold enough for the hood to go over the hat, which had a slight brim, and put his face in shadow. He was blond enough that his stubble didn’t show for a couple of days, so he figured as long as he stayed out of the light, he should pass. “How do I look?”
Henry grunted. “Normally my answer is ‘homeless,’ but that’s not funny tonight.”
“It never was, Henry,” Jackson told him gently. Then he patted the minivan’s front seat. “I’m gonna get out, and you’re gonna get in the driver’s seat and track me. If things get dicey, I hit Call and leave the phone in my pocket. Hopefully you’ll pick up enough to help. Ready?”
“As I’ll ever be,” Henry said, sounding a little psyched. Well, Jackson was too, so that was fine. With a heave of the door and a shiver as he hopped into the wet, cold night, Jackson was ready to go.
He was soaked before he got that first block to the encampment, and he realized that searching for somebody in the dark and the mud and the rain was not going to be easy. But then, he thought, Cody had been at this for a month; he wouldn’tbein the dark and the mud and the rain. He’d have figured out a way to keep dry and warm, and he may be shooting up or high as a kite, but he’d been high when he’d cut Annette Frazier. He knew what was what when he was high. Or he had a month ago.
Jackson slouched his shoulders and kept his eyes down, scanning from side to side as he picked his way through shopping carts and mini tents, many of which looked uniform, as though they’d been given out recently so the people would at least have something to keep them dry. There were single men curled up neatly on pads, covered in sleeping bags from head to toe, keeping out of the elements in the simplest ways possible, and what looked to be entire families stuffed inside the tents that were only made for one. The tents were on the sidewalk, pushing into the shoulder, bending and warping the chain-link fence that surrounded the precinct parking lot so they could have a place on the gravel. The fence teetered, and in places had almost gone completely flat, in the area of the encampment that stretched at least two blocks before the building itself. At a recess in the fence, somebody had started a fire in a metal trash can, and mostly men were gathered around it, their faces twitchy and illuminated by the flames.
