Page 10 of Fish in a Barrel
Jackson snorted. “Well for one thing, theywouldn’tbe at the policeman’s union shindig. Think about it. Where are the cops who don’t like the No Broken Windows policy going to be?”
“Working,” Galen said, sounding pleased. “That’s some very fine deduction, young man. The people willing to dish about the new order are going to be the people not necessarily invited to the party.”
Jackson nodded, and while he very well could have looked pleased with himself, he was instead looking grim. “And given that Henry and I made some nice contacts with the cops who don’t suck over the summer, I’ll bet those are the people we’ll run into if we do a sweep of the station and the cop haunts tomorrow night. A little bit of casual conversation on a slow night might net us enough info to keep Ezekiel out of prison, at the very least.”
“So what are we doing tonight?” Henry wanted to know.
Jackson grimaced. “We’re doing the jobs of the cops who’ve already sucked Cartman’s balls,” he said. “Do you know who’s not on the witness list?”
Ellery nodded. They’d discussed this over the past week during trial prep.
“I got no idea,” Henry said. He shrugged apologetically. “So sue me, I’ve been taking classes.”
“Keep taking them, Junior,” Jackson said, “because I’ll give you this one for free. Annette Frazier. Zeke is being tried for criminal mischief and assault with a deadly weapon. Someone held a knife to Annette Frazier’s throat and ripped it across her clavicle, leaving a gash it took twenty-seven stitches to close. We’ve got her picture, we’ve got her statement admitted into evidence, but you know what we don’t have? We don’t have her in court. And we don’t have the right guy. So we’re going to start with her and work the facts of the case, and we’re going to track down therightguy tonight so they don’t imprison the wrong guy tomorrow. I swear to Christ, if we hadn’t had to work so hard tracking down witnesses and doing trial prep, I would have been on this already, but they fast-tracked this case, and I’m pretty sure it was to keep us off-balance.”
“Easier to railroad us if we don’t have time to prepare,” Ellery said. “And they used the threat of revoking Ezekiel’s bail and putting him back in jail to do it. People have spent years in jail awaiting trial. We couldn’t take that risk.”
Galen let out a pained grunt. “Agreed. As soon as they realized Zeke had decent representation, the DA’s office began playing hardball. I hope your friend Arizona isn’t putting herself too much at risk. There are plenty of people ready to fill her shoes if Cartman doesn’t think she’s balling hard enough. And those people won’t have Brooks’s sense of fair play.”
“So we’ve got to find the guy who really did it, and we’ve got to put him on the stand,” Jackson said, looking at Henry. “You ready for a rough night?”
Henry gave a diabolical grin. “Somuch better than school.”
A Few Meager Chances
ELLERY WASnotexcited about letting him off his leash.
Jackson could admit it. As he headed for the front door of the office and out into the blustery evening, he would have much rather gone back to their posh, spacious house on American River Drive and curled up with a cup of hot chocolate and a streaming service. He and Ellery could put on their pajamas and have foot fights in the middle of the couch, and then, when the movie was over, they could go to bed and spend some time finishing that kiss they’d started under the thruway.
But the risk to Ezekiel Halliday was far too grave for him and Ellery to put their night of snuggle bunnies before his case.
Sometimes they got to prioritize each other, but the thing that had brought them together and welded them tight was fixing the fucked-up they could fix.
It was time to pony up.
But that didn’t mean Ellery didn’t have one more moment of “be careful” left in him.
“Jackson, wait up,” he said as Jackson turned the door latch. Ellery stepped neatly in front of Henry and drew intimately close. He put his hand on the sleeve of the denim jacket Jackson wore over his hoodie and grimaced. “It’s raining outside, and this is what you’re wearing?”
“Easier to move in,” Jackson said briefly. “Now stop nagging me and give me a kiss for luck and tell me you’re going to go home and feed the cats.”
Ellery grunted. “Stay close to Henry. Don’t take any unnecessary chances. And of course I’m going to feed the heathens, because if I don’t they’ll eat my eyeballs as I sleep.”
Jackson choked back a laugh. “They will not! Theylikeyou.” Well, Billy Bob, his battle-torn three-legged Siamese, liked Ellery, mostly because moving in with Ellery had resulted in the swank wet food, and Billy Bob knew that was Ellery’s doing. Lucifer, their four-month-old black kitten—also with three legs—was used to being spoiled. Hemightgo after Ellery’s eyeballs, but not out of malice. Mostly out of curiosity, which reallywasgoing to kill the cat if he didn’t learn to stop being curious about Billy Bob’s ass, which he kept trying to lick. Cats—endlessly fascinating, but once you learned the answers to why they were trying to destroy the house at 3:00 a.m., you wondered why you bothered.
“Well, I like you,” Ellery said dryly, keeping them on topic. “And I like you not bleeding and not sick. Be careful.” And with that, he kissed Jackson quick and hard before backing up and gesturing for him and Henry to proceed.
Jackson stepped into the blustery evening with a sigh, wishing somebody could have contradicted the logic of what he and Henry were about to do.
“Are we taking the crap-mobile?” Henry asked as they headed for the stairs. The building had an elevator that Galen would probably use when Jade took him home, but Henry was like Jackson—his body got twitchy if he didn’t use it enough.
“Probably to Galen’s immense relief,” Jackson said to answer Henry’s question. Henry’s official job title was Driver and Personal Assistant. He didn’t have his PI’s license yet, although he’d proven adept at the job, and he and Jackson worked together better than Jackson had ever imagined he could with a partner. But while Henry earned his license, he collected his check from the law firm for, ostensibly, driving Galen to and from the office, as well as running errands, since Galen’s mobility was compromised. Henry didn’t have a car of his own and went back and forth between driving the town car John had bought for Galen’s comfort and whatever car Jackson was driving that hadn’t been blown up, crashed, or otherwise destroyed.
This month’s version was a “rental.” Jackson’s newish CR-V had been destroyed in a parking space, and Jackson had given the car to a friend to fix up, under the table since he figured Ellery’s insurance would give them the boot if they reported one more claim. His buddy had gotten them a “good deal” on the bodywork and a rental, but after they’d gotten the CR-V back the first time, there had been some electrical glitches, which had devolved into engine work, which had devolved into work on the frame and then the interior and then the cooling system and then….
And long story short, Jackson and Henry had been driving around in a ten-year-old crap-brown Chrysler Town & Country for the past two months, and Galen hyperventilated whenever Henry drove it to his house to pick him up.
It didn’t help that the damned thing was haunted, either.