School of Fish (Fish Out of Water #6) - Amy Lane Page 0,105

guys.”

“Doesn’t every ex-con ‘know some guys’?” Jackson asked.

“You’re the one who runs the little transition condo,” Ellery told him, although in fact Ellery was very proud of the fact that Jackson used his half of his old duplex to help transition nonviolent offenders back into the real world. “You’d know.”

Jackson shrugged. “Okay, okay, AJ’s boyfriend knows some guys. What do these guys know?”

Ellery took the spoon and blopped a little bit of ice cream on the end of Jackson’s nose. “You’re so impertinent,” he said grandly, while Jackson giggled like a kid and tried to wipe the ice cream off and then licked it from the back of his hand.

“Oh my God. We have to be up in, like, five hours. You know that right?”

Ellery let out a breath. Well, yes. And Jackson was looking tired, although he didn’t want to point that out. He may have been champing at the bit these last weeks, but he was supposed to ease into his workload, not hit the ground at full speed.

“Okay,” Ellery conceded, setting the pint down and watching as Jackson picked it up and took a bite. Oh, nice. Jackson’s constant struggle against what was very probably an eating disorder was never going to go away in spite of his resolution to live healthily. It was nice to see him eat something unforced, with joy, because it was a human thing to do. “So Ty Townsend apparently had the bookies in a real spin this year. You know that I know very little about football, but he was, in AJ’s words, ‘the shit.’”

Jackson snickered. “Yes, the kids are calling it that these days.”

“Whatever. So, Ty’s ‘the shit,’ and he’s going to a Pac-12 school, and people are really excited about him. Now, we’ve worked really hard to keep Ty’s arrest out of the papers, and Ty is still, as far as anyone knows, scheduled to start training camp at the end of this week.”

“Yes,” Jackson mumbled over another mouthful of sweet.

“Anyway, somebody in the gambling community let something slip because betting just went up considerably against Ty’s school this year. All of the longshot bettors just changed their odds, and I have no idea how that works, but AJ’s roommate seemed to think it was very exciting.”

“Yeah. That’s what Henry suspected.”

“He was very humble about that when I told him,” Ellery said with a completely straight face.

“How many fist-pumps?” Jackson asked dryly.

“A complete lap around the car dealership,” Ellery said, although he suspected part of that had been to let off steam. Ellery and Jackson weren’t the only ones to be a little stressed over the last two days.

“What car did John and Galen get?” he asked idly, because in spite of the fact that they really did need to catch up, the fact was, they were used to exchanging parts of their day at the end of it. Small conversations about the people they cared for had become part of their routine, and Ellery’s heart gave an extra special throb when he realized how important it was to both of them.

“Galen apparently let him pick,” Ellery said with a snort, and then he sobered. “And Henry asked first about the amenities for the back seat. I was thinking he’d go SUV, but he made it a luxury sedan because it would be harder for Galen to get in and out of an SUV.”

Jackson held a hand to his chest and blinked rapidly. “Our little redneck is all grown up and emotionally available in three short months. It happens so fast!”

“Of course, right after he told me that, I confirmed the hunch about the gambling, and he did the lap around the dealership.”

Jackson pretended to wipe a tear. “But still a good ol’ boy at heart. Does a body good.”

“God, you’re obnoxious.”

Jackson grinned with all his teeth. “It’s an art.” Then he sobered. “Okay, so Ty was not a random target, and it wasn’t just because he’s of color. They wanted him out of commission to make money on the gambling front, but I’m still betting they were trying to get those cops somewhere else. Have we checked out those empty buildings that Fetzer said were left unpatrolled?”

Ellery rolled his eyes. “Yes, Jackson, because there’s an army of us and we can all split ourselves up into clones and multitask like that.”

Jackson snorted. “Okay, okay. It’s on the to-do list after we get Jason to safety. Have you—”

Ellery held up his tablet, which had been open on the table