School of Fish (Fish Out of Water #6) - Amy Lane Page 0,44

a couple of crackers to help ward off the stomach burn. When he’d gotten that down, Jackson allowed his shoulders to relax and brought up tender fingers to probe Ellery’s bruised jaw.

“Sorry,” he muttered. “I shouldn’t have—”

“What?” Ellery asked, his smile pulling up one side of his mouth because the other was swollen. “Not ducked? That’s counterproductive.” He grimaced. “It happened so quickly.”

Jackson shook his head and cupped the side of Ellery’s face that wasn’t bruised. “It didn’t,” he said, lips twisting. “The guy was like a coiled spring, even when it was just me and Tage in the room together. You guys came back, and Herrera and I could see him cranking tighter and tighter. That’s why I got so close. He was going to take you out. You gotta watch guys like that. If they think the uniform makes them better than the rest of us, they’re not going to let anything stop them from cheap shots.”

Ellery nodded, swallowing hard. “Good advice,” he said, his voice wobbling a little. He leaned into Jackson’s touch, and right then, in that moment, let his guard down.

Jackson rubbed under his cheekbone with his thumb. “Not used to the hitting, are we?” he murmured.

Ellery shook his head. “No.”

“Good. Nobody beats on you. That’s a rule.”

He gave a tiny smile. “I like that rule,” he admitted, nodding, and Jackson gave him a gentle kiss on the cheek.

“Me too. Now let’s go before we start necking and the entire prison system takes us out on general principle.”

Ellery rolled his eyes. “You exaggerate,” he said, trying hard to keep his voice authoritative, and Jackson backed up and gave him his space.

“Says the man who just got clocked in the face for being right too much,” Jackson countered, pulling the car out into traffic.

“That’s not why I got clocked in the face,” Ellery muttered. “I got clocked in the face because Mayer was an asshat who thought because he was seven feet tall he could beat up on us short people.”

“You are six feet if you’re an inch,” Jackson scoffed.

“Five eleven,” Ellery told him. “You’re six one.”

“That’s not true.” Jackson frowned. “We’re the same height.”

“We are not.”

“I can’t believe we’re arguing over this,” he muttered.

“I can’t believe we’ve known each other for seven years and you don’t know how tall I am.”

“I can’t believe we’ve been together for one year….” Jackson’s voice trailed off, and he did the math. Mid-August. That’s when he and Ellery had gotten together. A couple of furious days fighting the long-simmering attraction between them, then giving in to it.

Followed by three weeks in the hospital and Ellery moving Jackson into his life whether Jackson wanted to be there or not.

And now, Jackson couldn’t even imagine his life without Ellery. His treacherous brain replayed Mayer’s swing in slow motion, and then, because that wasn’t nearly the worst thing that had happened to them, he saw Ellery standing in front of a dusty aluminum hangar in the desert, his body blowing back as he placed himself in danger because that sudden anger, that passion for the people wronged, had taken hold of him at the worst time.

“And what?” Ellery prompted, and Jackson tried to remember where he’d been going with that.

“And just that,” Jackson said, swallowing hard. “I can’t believe we’ve been together for a year.”

“Are you freaking out?” Ellery asked suspiciously.

“No.” Jackson breathed carefully, his throat unexpectedly tight. “No,” he repeated, keeping his eyes stoically on the road. He hit a stoplight and flickered his gaze toward Ellery, who was leaning against the headrest in an unguarded pose because he trusted Jackson and Jackson needed to remember that. “Just no getting hurt, okay, Counselor?”

Ellery’s warm brown eyes met his perceptively. “Same goes for you, Detective.”

Jackson let out a harsh bark of a sound and switched his gaze in time to see the light turn green. “Doesn’t seem to be my problem today.” He scowled as he pressed the gas pedal. “And I’m saying, there oughtta be a fucking law. And somebody should text Lance and tell him to wrap Henry in a big quilt and then put him in a steel box and then wrap that in bubble wrap. I am not okay with the way this day has gone, do you hear me?”

“So noted,” Ellery said dryly, and a silence threatened to steal over the car.

One Jackson felt compelled to break before he turned onto Alhambra. “Ellery?”

“Yeah?”

“We should do something. It’s an anniversary. I know we took that trip when I