School of Fish (Fish Out of Water #6) - Amy Lane Page 0,38

him. “What you think happened? Isn’t that why I’m here? Because the cops think they know what happened?”

“Yeah,” Jackson said. “But they don’t know what I know, so listen up.”

“Yes,” Tage said, voice limp and dead. “Go on.”

“What I think happened is that No Neck and Ziggy were in your laundry room when some bad men came to your apartment building. You were actually doing laundry because you’re a good kid, and the police report says there was a basket of laundry scattered on the floor and covered in No Neck’s blood. So you get down there, see that Ziggy has actually taken a switchblade to No Neck’s throat, and you stare at him, shocked. While you’re staring, someone comes up behind you and knocks you on the head, hard. You go down, and you don’t wake up until you’re surrounded by cops and there’s a dead body next to you. How am I doing so far?”

“I don’t know this Ziggy,” Tage said, his voice showing uncertainty—and maybe a little hope. “But otherwise, I’m very impressed.”

“Good,” Jackson said, nodding. He looked at the guard. “I’m reaching for my phone.” The guard nodded and watched while Jackson pulled it out and summoned Ziggy’s picture. He showed it to the guard and then showed it to Tage. “This is Ziggy.”

It was like he got hit by lightning. Tage’s face went from pasty to green, and he let out a little whimper.

“That,” Jackson said, tucking his phone back in his pocket, “was Ziggy.”

“I can’t,” Tage said, shuddering. “I can’t tell—”

Jackson shook his head. “Not going to make you,” he said. “Let me finish your story.”

Tage nodded weakly.

Jackson continued. “So, you wake up, and you’re horrified because that kid almost had his head cut off, and while you start babbling, which is perfectly understandable, your father comes down. And he looks at you, and you know something’s wrong. And he starts to wail ‘My son, my only son!’ and you realize your brother and sister have been taken. Probably by Ziggy’s pals, which you didn’t know about because you were out cold. How you doing?”

Tage slow blinked. And then quick blinked. And then kept blinking until Jackson held up a hand. “I’m going to take that as yes.”

Tage actually nodded his head.

“Now, do you know where your brother and sister are?”

Tage shook his head no.

“Do your parents?”

Tage lifted one shoulder, and Jackson got it.

“They might, but they’re afraid, so they’re not talking.”

Tage nodded again.

“Okay. So, if we let you out of jail, will you and your family be safer or less safe than they are now?”

Tage’s hands were cuffed to the table in front of him through a bolted-down bar, and at Jackson’s words, he simply laid his head between his arms and cried.

Jackson looked at the guard, who shook his head no. No touching the prisoner. His body actually shook with the need to comfort.

“Please,” he begged. “This kid—he doesn’t belong here.”

“None of them do,” the guard said flatly.

Jackson tasted bile. He got it. He’d met some guys who would have used that gesture of comfort to disembowel Jackson and then rip their hands out of the handcuffs to get away. Jail, prison, these were ugly places where ugly things were done, and not everyone he and Ellery defended was innocent.

But this kid was.

“Kid,” Jackson said, keeping his voice low. “We’re going to do everything we can to get you out of here. We’re going to do everything we can to keep your family safe. But I need to know something—anything—that will help us find your brother and sister, that will help back up your story. What was No Neck doing there? His house was at least a half mile away. Can you at least tell me that?”

Tage turned his head and blinked at him. “He has family in the apartment complex,” he said gruffly. “His uncle’s family.” He shuddered, his chin crumpling. “It is not a good place, their apartment.”

Jackson nodded. He got that. Some of the apartments in midtown were like that: solid, working-class families in one unit, gangsters-R-us in the next. A complex like Tage’s—the kind with two-story clusters of apartments spaced closely around the apartment grounds, a pool in the middle, and laundry rooms in every cluster—wouldn’t have security footage. The laundry room itself was a small white-tiled affair with six machines total and two chairs and a folding table as the barest amenities. According to the crime scene photos, Tage had been found in the center aisle, right