Red Fish, Dead Fish

by Amy Lane

  “Yes,” Jackson told him, still petting Billy Bob. “We get along swimmingly. Do you know what we don’t do?”

  “Cook?” They’d been living on takeout and Ellery’s cooking, mostly, with the occasional pity meal from Jade and Mike.

  “No.”

  “Investigate corrupt military personnel?”

  Jackson managed a look over his shoulder. “I thought we were saving him for before Christmas.”

  Lacey had not sat well with either one of them. But after Jade had driven him to the airport he hadn’t followed through on his threats of fiery JAG Corps retribution. On the one hand, that could have been a relief.

  On the other hand, Jackson had asked what in the fuck the guy was hiding. Whatever it was, Ellery was still suspicious. Karl Lacey’s very coldness had told Ellery something important needed to be flushed out.

  “Maybe afterward,” Ellery said uneasily. “Let’s wait until we can both run five miles without breaking a sweat.”

  Jackson let out a grunt of acknowledgment. “So that’s on the back burner.” He pushed himself up on his good elbow and pinned Ellery with a glare, raising his eyebrows. “And that’s not what I’m talking about.”

  Ellery was baffled. “Clarify.”

  “Sex, Ellery. It’s been an entire week—don’t you miss sex?”

  Ellery’s brain checked out, and his groin held a party without him. When he checked back in, his erection was tight against the placket of his slacks.

  “Yes,” he said numbly.

  Jackson grinned, a little bit of long-buried evil in his eyes. “I could, uh, you know, do something, except….” He pressed against the bulge under Ellery’s slacks.

  Ellery fought off a moan. “Tonight. Late. When she’s asleep.”

  Jackson dropped his hand. “Three days. Broad daylight. When she’s on a plane!”

  Oh my God. “Seriously?” Because Ellery’s erection was not going down.

  “No, Ellery, there is no sex unless your mother is out of the house. I am totally serious.”

  Goddammit. “We’ve got to let her stay!” he wailed, sitting down and rubbing Jackson’s much-diminished ass through his jeans.

  “I know,” Jackson said, eyes closing. “Just, you know, wake me up when she’s gone.”

  Ellery wasn’t sure if he was joking or not. He’d been pretty active the last two days, but he was looking very tired now.

  Ellery bent down and kissed his temple. “You go ahead and sleep. Because the minute she’s on the plane, you and me are going to be doing the wild thing like lemmings.”

  Jackson chuckled softly, eyes still closed. “Look forward to it, Counselor. Love you.”

  Ellery paused, bent over, lips on Jackson’s skin.

  “I love you too.”

  Jackson chuckled, still falling asleep. “Surprise!” he laughed.

  “Asshole,” Ellery accused, but Jackson was out, and he had nobody to complain to but his mother.

  THE NEXT three days went surprisingly quickly—and were not as relaxing as Ellery hoped.

  He and Jackson had to be exhaustively deposed by the police department for two days, and all the records they’d put together were analyzed ad infinitum. At the end of the second day, Jackson lost his temper.

  “I’m done,” he announced, standing and walking out of the interrogation room. “Ellery, you with me?”

  Ellery startled, shoving papers and files into his briefcase. He’d made copies for the DA’s office. Arizona—the lawyer and sometime ally sitting across the table from them this day—knew everything he did.

  “Ellery, we’re not finished here!” she complained, standing up a beat late.

  “Are we being charged?” Jackson demanded, shifting from foot to foot at the doorway.

  “No, there are no charges pending.” Arizona ran her fingers through her buzz-cut gray hair. “In fact, the department is thinking about giving you a commendation.”

  “That’s lovely,” Jackson snarled. “I’d like to live to see it. I’m done with the questions. Ellery gave you all the paperwork. You have nothing to hold us on. It’s a beautiful day outside, and I just spent a week in the fucking hospital. I’m. Done. We did the investigative work, and you ignored us. It’s your job to count the motherfucking bodies. I….” His voice broke. “I saw them up close and personal. I almost was one. Twice. Finish your investigation and then ask us questions. Jesus Christ, you lazy motherfuckers, do some of your own goddamned work!”

  With that he turned and stalked out of the room, and Ellery stood to follow him.

  “Ellery!” Arizona cried, sounding a little desperate. “You can’t just leave us like this—”

  “Sure we can. We’re not being charged, and you’ve got bodies to count. Remember the last time I sent you evidence that Owens was operating? Remember that?”

  She grunted and had the grace to look uncomfortable. “I said you were paranoid and Jackson was delusional.”

  Well, at least she owned it.

  “Well I’m paranoid that Jackson’s getting sick again, and you’re delusional if you think I’m staying in this room and arguing with you. He’s right. It’s pissing down rain—but we’re free and clear, and that’s a beautiful day.”

  He stalked out of the law office, furious and frustrated, catching up with Jackson as he strode to the car. “Hey, hey—slow down there! I’m not one of the assholes, remember.”

  Jackson gave him the side-eye. “Sure you are. I just like your asshole. At least I think I do—it’s been a while.”

  Ellery rolled his eyes. “I am actually so sexually frustrated I almost find that funny.” He adjusted the collar of his coat against the rain. “So, what now? Should we go home?”

  Jackson grunted. “No. Your mother’s there, and she’s so bored at our house she’s going to start baking cookies.”

  Ellery clapped his hand to his mouth in horror. “And that would be bad,” he whispered.

  Jackson managed a chuckle. “We could always rent a hotel room by the hour,” he joked. “That would be something.”

  It was like the entire world spun in a whirling vortex to that moment right there.

  “Your HIV test was clear,” he said, and Jackson stumbled on a perfectly even path.

  “Uh….” He turned and actually looked at Ellery, green eyes wide, the rain plastering his hair to his head.

  “Lube.” Ellery was babbling. “Ten bucks. You can get lube at the grocery store. I’ll get us a nice room. The Hyatt downtown. Upper floor.”

  Jackson gaped, wiping water out of his eyes. “And ten-dollar lube?”

  Ellery nodded, suddenly desperate for the two of them, naked, without serial killers or sickness or his ever-blessed mother in the way. He held his umbrella over Jackson’s head too so Jackson would know he was serious.

  “It’s one in the afternoon. We could be there for hours.”

  Jackson turned toward the car lot and walked faster. Ellery’s disappointment hit him in the gut. His feet made leaden splats in the water running on the sidewalk.

  “Unless you’re getting sick again—”

  He was unprepared for the heat of Jackson’s glare. “Fuck getting sick. Move faster, dammit! You drive. I’ll look up drugstores on the way!”

  Fish Flop

  JACKSON WAS the one to run into the drugstore.

  The premium lube—extra-large bottle—was easy to find, but he threw in a travel pack of wipes, a bottle of Diet Coke and one of Dr Pepper, and a couple of bags of chocolate-covered pretzels (because cravings).

  It wasn’t until he was standing in line, his basket of incriminating purchases held in his good hand in front of him, that he was attacked by nerves.

  We’ve done this. We’ve even done this since Meadowview.

  We’ve done this since he said it. The big thing. The scary, irrevocable thing.

  Yeah. Sure.

  But Jackson had literally died since then. He’d said the words back. He’d had time to grieve, to process, to rec
ognize in himself the vulnerability he’d been fighting all his life.

  He’d had a lot of lovers. He’d been careful and considerate with every one of them. He’d never had anyone even remotely like Ellery.

  His hands shook as he gripped the basket tighter.

  He didn’t want gentleness. He didn’t want Ellery’s kindness and consideration. His heart pounded in his throat, and for a moment he wondered if the scarring he’d been warned about wasn’t going to kill him as he stood.

  He wanted possession. He wanted it so bad.

  Ellery made promises by the porn star’s buttload, but oh God—so hard to believe. Even from Ellery. Jackson needed to be taken irrevocably. He needed to belong, inside and out, to the man who’d hauled him from the darkness to the light.

  Given how much Ellery probably needed reassurance that Jackson was as committed as he was, getting to play the helpless maiden was a terrible thing to ask.

  Jackson paid for his purchases and hurried back to the car, his body wired tight, his previous joy hardened and changed.

  He was going to have to be strong—because Ellery needed him.

  “Oh my God, you look like you’re going into battle!” Ellery laughed as they waited in the valet line in front of the Hyatt.

  Jackson craned his head back like a tourist. It wasn’t often a native got a look at the Hyatt, and the black-windowed building was pretty classy for someone homegrown like Jackson.

  “Making plans to keep you in line,” he said, only partially kidding.

  He was stunned when Ellery reached over and squeezed his upper thigh. “You keep thinking that. You think that until I have you nailed to the mattress screaming my name.”

  For a moment Jackson flailed for air. When he finally got a good lungful, Ellery was handing the valet his keys, and Jackson needed to grab his plastic bag of purchases and follow him into the lobby, heart pounding for what he could mean.

  Six people were in the elevator as they made their way to their room in the penthouse, and Jackson bounced restlessly on his toes.

  I have lubricant in a CVS bag, and we’re going to fuck in a top-flight hotel room.

  The thought was as unreal as the direction this day had taken. Ellery stood across from him, and through three middle-aged couples chatting about basketball, his eyes caught and trapped Jackson against the back of the elevator.

  There was something almost angry in that glare. A delicious half-furious, half-desperate threat.

  Jackson stared back. I’ll do for you, Ellery. I’m strong. I can be your lover and a good man.

  That’s what he had to prove, right?

  But that wasn’t what Ellery’s eyes were saying, lasering through the genial chatter of people who obviously knew each other.

  The car stopped a few floors from theirs, and Ellery and Jackson flattened themselves to opposite sides of the cab to let everybody and their luggage off.

  “Are you getting out here?” inquired one of the women—fiftyish, in a sleek velour track suit. She had ash-blonde hair and laugh lines, as well as freckles, and a kindness about her that was almost as surreal as this little excursion.

  “No, thank you,” Jackson said, charm on automatic.

  “I’m on top,” Ellery said with a feral smile.

  The doors closed slowly, so Jackson had time to register the woman’s startled expression even as he and Ellery locked eyes again.

  Jackson said, “Oh really?”

  And Ellery bared his teeth. “Not another word,” he warned, voice low and dangerous. “I like this hotel. Just follow me out of the elevator when it stops.”

  Jackson’s tongue turned to sandpaper. So many things he should shoot back, so many ways he could mock or banter or insinuate, all of them leading to him buried inside Ellery, taking control.

  None of them leading to where he really wanted to go.

  Still, he found his pride when the doors slid open. No one waited on the landing, and he took a step out of the car. Ellery hauled Jackson back against him and snarled in his ear. “I mean it, Jackson. Just this one goddamned time, follow my lead.”

  For a moment it was touch and go. He could have whirled Ellery around, ravished him, insisted on his dominance. Dammit, he was that guy!

  But Ellery’s arm had moved, was crushing his chest, holding him so firmly, so mercilessly.

  So safely.

  Of all the things in his life he’d never had, safety was primary among them.

  “I—”

  “Please,” Ellery whispered, breaking him. “I need this from you, Jackson. You will never know.”

  “Yeah.”

  Ellery slid past him, taking the lead to their room. Jackson followed on his toes, all their other sex somehow falling away from this moment, from this reckoning.

  The place smelled rich, but the bright details of the carpeting and the view of the city from the end of the hall faded. Jackson was left with an impression of the Sacramento skyline under the deep shadows of a rainy afternoon and the sound of the crinkling plastic bag in his fist.

  Ellery turned in to their hotel room, and Jackson went after him meekly, not sure how this had gone from spontaneous to serious quite so quick.

  “Nice digs,” he said, voice bright as they passed the short hallway that opened into the suite. “Do we really need all this for—”

  Ellery shoved him against the wall without warning, taking his mouth savagely.

  Jackson, who had been afraid of feeling weak, afraid of failing in this, the one thing he knew he could do, found himself relishing the force between them. He returned, hard, nipping, cupping Ellery’s scalp in his spread fingers and holding him there.

  Right where Jackson needed him.

  Ellery tore his mouth away and started ripping at his clothing. Jackson’s hands went to the hem of his own sweatshirt, but Ellery stopped him, suit jacket puddling on the floor, tie askew, shoes already toed off.

  “You will stay right there,” he panted. “I’ll undress you.”

  Jackson managed to cock his hip and roll his eyes in spite of the way his heart beat so hard he could feel the throbbing in his balls. “Bossy much?”

  Ellery kissed him again, hard, mouth-to-mouth contact only while he continued to drop his clothes. Jackson forgot about his own skin, greedy and starving for Ellery’s under his palms.

  Jackson rubbed his chest, his upper arms, and, as Ellery shoved his slacks and boxers down, grabbed handfuls of taut backside. He needed so badly, he pushed off from the wall and tried to turn the kiss. He wanted his lips on all of Ellery, every pale, exasperating inch.

  Ellery’s response was to push at Jackson’s chest, near his throat, his thumb and forefinger spread so Jackson’s swallow bobbed in the vee of his hand.

  “I will bind you in place with my necktie if I have to,” Ellery promised. “Don’t test me.”

  Jackson’s knees almost gave way, and his eyes rolled back in his head.

  Ellery nodded fiercely. “I need you where I need you,” he said—maybe irrationally, but Jackson understood. He reached for Jackson’s hands and lifted them up, pressing them against the wall by the wrists. “You can lower them if you get tired,” he said, all consideration. “But just… just… I need you like this.”

  Jackson swallowed, out of words. He nodded briefly and pressed his hands back against the cool plaster while Ellery, naked and glorious, yanked on Jackson’s sweatshirt and shirt, hauling them over his head.

  Jackson ducked and helped that way, but after Ellery dropped the clothes on the floor, he glared meaningfully, and Jackson, obedient and needy, braced his shoulders against the wall again and raised his hands, wincing a little, because, dammit—

  Ellery took his weak hand from over his head and lowered it slowly. Turning the palm down, he pressed it against the plaster at Jackson’s thighs. “No pain,” he whispered.

  Jackson nodded, feeling his eyes burn. “Okay.”

  Ellery’s mouth on his was still urgent but less violent, and Jackson
opened, undone by his gentleness. Ellery pulled away again, nibbling down his jaw when Jackson tried to follow. He kept nibbling, down his throat and across his chest.

  He gave Jackson’s shoulder—barely out of bandages, still bruised—excruciatingly gentle touches of his lips, and when he reached the nipple on that side, he rubbed his lips and then licked. And then rubbed his lips and licked.

  Jackson moaned, all breath, and arched his engorged and aching erection against Ellery’s. They flopped together, bouncing off each other but not touching with any friction.

  “Harder,” he begged.

  Ellery straightened and buried his face in the hollow of Jackson’s neck and shoulder. “No.”

  Jackson half laughed. “Ellery!”

  Ellery nipped his earlobe and then said it again. “No.”

  Jackson’s skin ached. “But—”

  “But no pain.” Ellery’s voice grew thick. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  “Blue balls will hurt,” Jackson grated, frantic.

  “That’s not going to happen either.”

  His skin slid over Jackson’s like rough satin, and he kissed another path, this one tugging on the other nipple and then moving down, and down. When he got to the taped gauze on his stomach, Jackson tried to stop him with fingers in his hair, but Ellery stopped and pressed both his hands against the wall again.

  “My necktie, Jackson,” he warned gruffly. Then he sank to his knees and slid his palms up Jackson’s thighs.

  His breath puffed against the dripping end of Jackson’s cock, and Jackson grunted, because it was not enough and way too much.

  “No,” he protested. He knew what Ellery wanted. “Ellery—”

  Ellery licked his head slowly, and Jackson pounded at the wall. He wanted… needed… so hard, so fast, pain be damned!

  But Ellery did it again, this time adding his hand and squeezing from base to tip. Jackson’s shoulders sagged against the wall in relief. “Yes. Please, Ellery—please.”

  Begging for it felt raw and honest, and Ellery didn’t make him wait long. The heat of his mouth seared Jackson’s nerve endings, and the wet silk of his tongue soothed the fire. His hand squeezed firmly around Jackson’s shaft, and he wasn’t tentative or gentle on the stroke.