Fish Out of Water (18 page)

That wasn’t what happened here. What happened was Jackson ended up with his ass in the damned CR-V, with Ellery on the passenger’s side, giving directions for the test drive.

“I’m not getting this,” Jackson said moodily.

“Do you feel that?” Ellery asked excitedly. “See how easy it steers?”

“This sticks out like a sore thumb—”

“Well, sir,” said the eager salesman, “studies have shown that white and silver cars are practically invisible these days. The majority of the cars on the road have a similar color and body type—older vehicles are really more noticeable.”

Jackson pulled to a halt at Lead Hill Boulevard—and oh, yes, the brakes were wonderfully responsive compared to his old car—and glared at Ellery. Not the salesman. Ellery.

“I liked my old Toyota,” he said grimly, not wanting to think about having to reclaim his stuff from the damned thing in the junkyard. “I’ve had that car since I graduated from high school.”

Ellery’s bored look indicated this didn’t surprise him in the least. “Well, yes, but now you have your adult card, Jackson. You can drink and
everything
. Now tell me you hate the damned car and I’ll let you go cruise the old clunkers—”

“But this one’s on
sale
,” the rep practically wailed. “And it’s got a
warranty
—”

“Against bullet holes?” Jackson snapped, swinging the thing in a
sweet
little U-turn that threw the guy up against the back window. Ellery remained upright, and Jackson thought foully that he probably sat on a Pilates ball for part of his workday. There was no other explanation.

“Well, no,” the sales rep said, sounding depressed. He was a decent guy, really. Had talked about his wife and how much she wanted this car, but they had three kids, so she had to go with the Odyssey instead. “But I mean, life doesn’t come with guarantees, and this is one sweet ride!”

Jackson grunted.

“Admit it,” Ellery said, nodding. “You like it.”

He opened his mouth and started gesturing with one hand, but before he could frame the refusal he
really needed
to voice, Ellery turned to the sales rep and started negotiations.

Aw, fuck.

This was the part Jackson sucked at anyway.

Fucking hell.

“I’m not getting silver.”

TWO HOURS
later Jackson fumed in the passenger seat of Ellery’s Lexus again as Ellery parked at Tahoe Joe’s.

“We have things to do,” he muttered.

“‘Gee, Ellery, thank you for the car. I’m hungry, aren’t you?’ ‘Why yes, Jackson, I’m hungry too, and since the world isn’t coming to an end
this instant
, I think it’s safe for us to eat, don’t you?’ ‘Absolutely, Ellery. I think we should eat.’”

Must. Not. Laugh. “There’s a Wendy’s down the street,” Jackson muttered.

Ellery gave an elegant snort. “Nobody eats fast food in this car.”

“We ate Chipotle last night,” Jackson parried.

“That’s not fast food—and it’s an exception.”

“You’re mighty smooth for a guy wearing an off-the-rack suit from Penney’s.” He didn’t look bad in it, actually. Although Ellery had one of those slender builds—he could have worn an American box suit and made it look good.

“I used to look up your court dates,” Ellery said as he parked the car.

Jackson stared at him. “Because….”

“Because I’d see you in a suit or a tie—it was like watching a cage match wrestler dress up like a stockbroker. Sexiest fucking thing I’ve ever seen.”

Jackson’s tongue cleaved to the top of his mouth. There wasn’t another goddamned thing he could say. In a daze, he got out of the car, following Ellery like a puppy into the damned restaurant. What else was he going to do? Someone else was driving.

Lunch was surprisingly productive. Ellery
brought his laptop, and he had Jackson sit next to him at the booth so they could create a timeline and make a list of threads to pull.

The air-conditioning was pretty intense, and Jackson didn’t notice how
close they were sitting—or how much it was affecting him—until Ellery hit him with an irritated elbow.

“What is that… that
thing
you’re doing?” he muttered. “It’s making the seat buckle.”

Jackson stared at him and, quite unconsciously, flexed his asscheeks tight and then relaxed them.

“Yeah!
That
!”

The rush of heat that hit his face shocked him. “Just, uhm… glutes… stretching…,” he mumbled. Oh God. He was
hard
from sitting next to Ellery. He’d been flexing his ass to make his cock rub against his jeans. Jesus fucking Christ, he had no more self-control than Billy Bob. It was just that the guy had said something… sweet. Totally sweet and, well,
courtly
. Looking to see when Jackson was going to be wearing a suit? Who
did
that?

The slicker-than-snot lawyer picking daintily at his salad so he didn’t eat any croutons—
that’s
who.

“Well, stretch some other way,” Ellery said in annoyance. “Did you have anything to add?”

Jackson nodded. “Yeah. Do we have a blown-up resolution of the girl who took the picture? I’ve got some places I can check to find her. If she’s a street kid, they’ve got limited hangouts in that area.”

Ellery nodded, expression inscrutable. “Any other ideas?”

“Yeah.” Oh, this part was unpleasant. “We should also check the hospitals and the morgue. Unless she was someone special, Bridger had no reason to keep her around.”

Ellery grunted. Well, he’d defended guilty clients—he knew the horrible things people could do to each other. But nobody liked to think of how bad it could get.

“I’ll do that tomorrow,” Jackson said, because that sort of thing was his job, and the Ellery Cramers of the world didn’t need to be fishing around morgues and seeing the dirt beneath the city’s fingernails.

“I’ll come with you.” Ellery met his eyes with a level gaze, and Jackson was mortified to drop his eyes first.

“Please don’t,” he said after a moment. Very consciously, he scooted away. “If she’s in the morgue, it’s hard to see.”

“I’m not made of glass.” Ellery turned toward the computer and made a notation with an unnecessary flourish.

“But it’s not needed,” Jackson told him. “You’re more important doing… you know. Lawyerly things. If we can’t get in to see Bridger today or at least talk to his lawyer, you need to do that. And I know you got rid of some of your cases, but not all of them. You need to keep up with your—”

Ellery just looked at him, head cocked.

Oh God. He was out of excuses, and Ellery could see right through him. “I’ve got to go to the bathroom.”

He fled and huddled in the corner of the one stall, checking his watch, wondering how long he had to hide in there without looking like a total freak and trying hard to figure out
why
he was freaking out.

You are stronger than this.

He was. Eight years of one-night stands, and Jade when he was needy, and he had managed to avoid the sex-and-emotion tangle with ease and aplomb. He
had
no angry exes. Everybody he’d ever slept with had greeted him with a smile and a handshake or a hug when he’d seen them the next day, or week, or month.

And as time passed and people found relationships and moved away, or moved on, if the smiles were tinged with pity and concern?

Well, Jackson was fine.

He’d been an emancipated minor at sixteen. Had woken up on his birthday, grabbed the trash bag he’d packed his clothes into the night before, and moved into J and K’s front room. He’d had a part-time job, had helped with the rent, and hadn’t given Toni Cameron a day’s worth of worry.

As long as he and J and K had one another’s backs, he didn’t need another soul.

And he was definitely not an asset in Ellery Cramer’s well-ordered world.

He opened the stall door at the same time Cramer came in.

“All done,” he said brightly, checking his zipper for show. “You know, too much breakfast. Had to make room.”

“We didn’t eat breakfast,” Ellery said quietly. “You are really panicking.”

“I’m fine.” Jackson clenched his jaw. “Whatever you need me for, boss—let’s eat and hit the road.”

He hit the sink and plunged his hands under icy water, glad for the distraction.

Ellery met his eyes in the mirror and, in two strides, wedged himself up against Jackson’s backside. “I only bite if you need me to,” he whispered.

“Please.” Jackson’s voice cracked, and to his shame, he closed his eyes. “Ellery,” he begged, voice husky, “you know how cats are famous for killing mice?”

“Yeah.”

“Sometimes I think they just want someone to play with. ’Cause you should see the look on Billy Bob’s face when I catch him with a little brown mouse. A vole. Once it was….” Oh man. “It was a half-grown rabbit. And he was just so damned sad. So just… just remember. The cat doesn’t always
mean
to hurt the mouse, but sometimes that’s what happens.”

He dropped his gaze to his hands, which were growing numb in the cold. Fuck. They were in a drought. He turned off the water and reached for a towel, Ellery’s body lighting him up along his back the entire time. He felt soft lips at the nape of his neck, and when he looked into the mirror, Ellery’s eyes were closed.

“This is sort of a redneck town,” Jackson said after a moment.

Ellery wasn’t stupid. He took a step back and toward the sink just as someone else entered, and Jackson dried his hands. The two of them made their subdued way out to the table, where the food was waiting, and they made polite work-related conversation while they ate. Jackson’s panic subsided, and he thought that maybe Ellery had forgotten the whole cat-and-mouse game they were playing—had maybe even forgotten that Jackson was apparently ruled by his cock and too weak to say no when Ellery Cramer touched him.

Until they got into the car. Ellery hit the ignition and the AC kicked on, thank God, because outside it was hotter than the bowels of hell after the devil ate curried fish. Then Ellery caught Jackson’s gaze.

Jackson’s breath stopped, and he thought he was going to have to jump outside the car and into the curried hell again. Idly, he looked across the street and saw kids sliding down water rides on big inner tubes. Now
that
was the way to spend an August afternoon, wasn’t it!

“Jackson?”

“Yeah?”

“In your little analogy about the cat and the dead mouse, which one of us is Billy Bob and which one of us is the dead mouse?”

Jackson swallowed. “I’m Billy Bob, you asshole. Why would I compare anyone else to my damned cat?”

Ellery shook his head. “You know, I defended a junkie once. He swore up and down that he couldn’t remember killing the middle-aged woman for her credit cards.
Swore
it was a bunch of bad drugs and he’d been too high to even know what he was doing. I didn’t believe him, but I defended him. And so did one of the big guns—I think it was Harrelson—”

“The bald one who likes bow ties?” Jackson asked, because the partners of the firm really
did
stay high above the hoi polloi.

“Yeah!” Ellery smiled warmly, like they were friends. “Anyway, Harrelson wanted me to put him on the stand. He was this sweet little hamster of a guy, big brown eyes and this
really
convincing schtick. But I wouldn’t do it. I just….”

“Had a feeling?” Jackson couldn’t help it. He was hooked. The car idled and they cooled off, and Ellery kept eye contact.

Jackson couldn’t get away.

“Yeah.” Ellery nodded. “Exactly. So we lost the case because the evidence was overwhelming, you know? And the guy was getting hauled away by the bailiff, and he starts shouting. And he says, ‘I’m going to get you, you fucking eel—I’m going to do you like I did the old cunt, and I’m going to slam your head against the wall until your eyeballs spit blood.’”

Jackson cringed in spite of himself. Yeah. It was great when the firm was defending the innocent, but not everybody was innocent. “Sweet.”

“Mm-hm.” Ellery reached out and, very slowly, stroked Jackson’s lower lip with his thumb. “I’m really good at knowing when someone’s lying.” He cupped Jackson’s jaw then, with a gentleness Jackson was not sure he’d ever felt from a lover.

“I’m not lying.” At least he didn’t
think
he was lying. “I—work long hours. I’m not great at being there for people. I haven’t had a relationship for eight years. Why would you think I wasn’t going to break you—”

“Because you haven’t broken another soul in your life.” Ellery smiled. “You’re not going to break me. Don’t panic.”

“I’m
not
panicking,” Jackson gritted. “Now move it. Your carbon emissions are warming the fucking planet, and it’s hot enough.”

At that point Ellery’s pocket buzzed, and he pulled out his phone. Jackson watched as he arched one eyebrow sardonically. Without another word, Ellery put his phone away, backed the car up, and started toward Sacramento.

“Don’t panic,” he said again. “Spend all your time figuring out what to say when we interview Scott Bridger.”

Jackson let out a gasp of air, feeling gut-punched.

The dirty cop who’d set up Kaden? Yeah—
that’s
where he needed to be spending his emotion.

THE SACRAMENTO
Police Department had been remodeled in this century, but an interview room was an interview room.

This one had padded seats and beige walls, and instead of a criminal on the other side of the table, it was a cop.

But Jackson could detect no discernable difference between this room and the county jail.

He wouldn’t mind spraying the walls with Bridger’s blood, just to change it up a little.

Scott Bridger hadn’t served on the force when Jackson had been there. He’d served in the military before the academy, and for some reason, for Jackson, that made things worse. He’d seen chaos in the rest of the world and he wanted to come spread it
here
? It was like he’d betrayed two faiths and had corrupted all the religions in the world.