Page 61 of Fish in a Barrel
Arizona nodded soberly. “Do you trust me?” she asked.
Ellery pulled in a sharp breath. He’d been asking himself the same question. Without meaning to, his eyes flew to Siren’s, and she looked soberly back.
“Do you trustus?” Siren asked softly.
“With what?” he replied, thinking he might already know the answer.
“If a source from the DA’s office leaks the forced homeless relocation to the press,” Arizona said. “No mention of Ezekiel Halliday, no mention of Cody Gabriel, just a suggestion to go up to Lake Whiskeytown and check out some of the homeless encampments that have disappeared from Sacramento. If it comes from us, they’ll do it, and if you’re not implicated, they can’t look at the inciting incident.” Arizona blew out a breath. “I sure would like to make something about this case right, Ellery, but I’d like to do it without losing my job.”
“Right?” Siren chimed in. “You can’t enact prison and sentencing reform without people on the insideonyour side, but it sucks to be on thewrongside, if you know what I mean.”
Ellery nodded, a grim smile twisting his mouth. “I do,” he said, looking up and catching the eye of Lyle Langdon, one of his former employers at Pfeist, Langdon, Harrelson and Cooper. “I’ll be honest—I don’t have a job to lose for that exact reason.”
Lyle Langdon, tall, silver-haired, with a narrow handsome face, gave him a respectful salute, and Ellery wondered if he had enough in him for one more intense conversation. At that moment, Jade showed up at his elbow with a plate piled high with cookies that she held out to Arizona and Siren first.
“You guys want some? I had to elbow a nun to get these!”
In spite of himself, Ellery glanced quickly to the refreshment table, and when he saw, indeed, one of the junior ADAs dressed as the Flying Nun, complete with a wire frame for the fluttering habit, he had to control his semihysterical laughter.
Siren and Arizona didn’t bother to control theirs, but they did thank Jade for the cookies, and the rest of the conversation was about how Jackson could get injured in a pillow fight at a marshmallow farm. Before they parted to mingle with other guests at the “recreational” function, Arizona touched his elbow.
“Not a word about you, Halliday, Rivers, or Gabriel,” she said softly. “I swear to you, Ellery, I wouldn’t do you like that.”
It had been a long, long day on little sleep, and Ellery felt his eyes burn. “I’ll hold you to that,” he said. “Thank you.”
“Tell Jackson to stay out of marshmallow farms, okay?”
Ellery managed a tight grin. “Will do.”
He and Jade had almost made it to the coat check when Lyle Langdon intercepted them.
“Ellery! So good to see you here. I wasn’t sure if you were coming.”
Ellery smiled at his old boss and mentor, unsure if the words were sincere or not. He and Jackson had met when they’d worked for Langdon’s firm, and he’d considered Lyle Langdon a friend. However, his and Jackson’s pursuit of the truth behind the Dirty/Pretty Killer had irritated some of Pfeist, Langdon, Harrelson and Cooper’s more important clients. Ellery had been politely asked to resign, and Jade and Jackson had quit—colorfully—in protest.
“Lyle. Good to see you too.”
Langdon’s expression sobered. “I heard about Jackson. I do hope he’s okay.”
And because Ellery knew that Langdon really had been fond of Jackson—to the extent of telling Jackson that he and Jade could stay with the firm even though they’d asked Ellery to leave—he took this for the sincerity it was.
“I do too. It’s one of the reasons we were out the door.” The other being that he was dead on his feet and Jade was a little giggly after that double Macallan.
“Well, give him my best.” Langdon bit his lip—an uncharacteristically tentative gesture from a man who had made his name in the courtroom as being cold as ice. “Ellery, if you can spare an hour next week, I have a consult for you. I’d pay you for your time, of course, but we would expect complete confidentiality.”
Ellery was about to say yes. Yes of course he’d do this favor for his old friend and mentor. He’d be happy to. And being paid, after all the work on the pro bono Halliday case? That would be amazing!
He wasn’t sure what made him cautious.
“I would of course have to see the name of the client before I accepted the consult,” Ellery said.
Langdon nodded, looking, of all things, relieved. “Of course. You might recognize it, in fact.” His eyes flickered furtively, as though he was afraid of being overheard, and he leaned into Ellery, close enough that nobody in the crowded venue could hear.
When he whispered the name, Ellery recoiled, and Langdon gave him a significant look. Ellery opened his mouth to say he couldn’t possibly listen to anything this man said, and he wouldn’t take adimeto help defend him, when Langdon paused for a moment, one eyebrow raised.
“You’ll let me know next week,” Langdon said coolly, and Ellery remembered that yes, he was still dancing with snakes.
“I’ll have to check my schedule,” he replied, voice even, expression mild. And he recognized this for the gift it was. “But thank you for thinking of me.”