Page 121 of Devil and the Deep Blue Fish

“On it, boss!” Cody had followed Jackson into the great room, and Jackson—clutching a wound in his arm—turned his back on that situation, giving Ellery some faith that it was well in hand. He’d dropped his briefcase in the hallway as the situation had gone to hell, and now he turned to grab it, reaching for the first aid kit he’d started carrying since, well, he and Jackson had become a couple.

“Lucy!” Jackson snapped, and Ellery’s mother put both her hands on her opponent’s shoulders and shoved, although the woman was mostly groaning now. “Who in the fuck is that?”

“Valerie Trainor,” Taylor said with a sniff. “She tried to hold a gun on me, and I introduced her to my briefcase.”

Ellery sucked air in through his teeth. “The leather is steel reinforced,” he said.

Jackson chuckled meanly. “So she’s going to need some new cheekbones and a new set of teeth,” he said. “Lucy, stand down. Cody—”

“I’ll get there,” Cody said.

Jackson had drawn near Ellery’s side by this time, and gently—oh so gently—he tugged the gun from Ellery’s grip and held it, safety on, down by his thigh. Ellery could see the trembling in his hand now, the clenched jaw he used to disguise the pain, but he could also see that the wound in his armwas superficial—a graze—and while they probably had to settle themselves in for some stitches and a fever—Jackson always ran a fever after an injury—Ellery felt an almost giddy sense of relief that he might be okay.

“Who’s the guy sobbing in the corner?” Jackson asked.

“Gannett Hoover,” Ellery told him. “He, uhm, told us that Dwayne killed his wife.”

Jackson grunted and gestured with the gun, since his other arm was being held gingerly to his ribs. “I can vouch for that. Retty’s still alive—she told us who was in the pit with her.”

“Still alive?” Valerie Trainor muttered thickly. Cody was on her now with the zip ties, and with some help from Ellery’s mother, Jackson’s new partner pro tempore rolled the woman over to her side so they could talk. “Retty’s not dead?” she asked, the hope in her voice pitiful.

“No, ma’am,” Jackson said. “Although you all tried your best.”

“Schmitty did it.” She sobbed weakly, tears cutting through the grime and blood on her face. “Our whole lives together, that was my one request. He not hurt Loretta Jane.”

There was a groan from “Schmitty’s” place on the floor, and Ellery winced as Galen gave him one last thump with the cane.

“This sadistic asshole broke a promise?” Galen asked, his usually even tones dripping with fury. “I am fucking surprised.”

“My daddy said I had one goddamned thing to do,” Trainor continued, as though the rest of them weren’t speaking. “I had to watch out for Loretta. And she tried so hard to help, but Schmitty said she’d fucked up, had ruined the entire goddamned operation. Nobody would notice a dead kid, he said, but when females start shooting up apartment buildings, somebody’s going to sit up and pay attention.”

Ellery’s vision went red, and at that moment the FBI crashed in through the foyerandthrough the ballroom entrance,crying out, “FBI, put your weapons down and step away from the civilians.”

Jackson cocked his head at Ellery and said, “Really? You thought we needed these bozos?”

Gerald Manning, who had come racing in from the ballroom—probably, Ellery realized dimly, because it faced the back of the property and led to the paths that went between the federal land and the mansion itself—lowered his weapon, and glared at his black-suited, sunglass-wearing compatriots.

“Really?” he said. “Really? How hard is it, you guys, to make me look cool?”

Jackson chuckled weakly. “Are those kids safe?” he asked.

“Yessir,” Manning said soberly, holstering his weapon. “I left my partner there and called in reinforcements to come take the kids into custody, and the attorney general is getting hold of Mr. Cramer’s child advocates as we speak. Your search-and-rescue people got the wounded woman in the air and are taking her to the nearest hospital, in handcuffs as you apparently suggested to them.”

Jackson gave a hard nod. “Fair. Don’t worry about these hosers. You’re cool.”

“Great!” Manning said, perking up and appearing absurdly young for a middle-aged man shaped like a bulldog. “Now could you, perhaps, enlighten me as to what in theactualfuck we burst in on here?”

Hoover was still sobbing, Melanie Schnarf/Valerie Trainor was crying quietly, and Conway Schmitt/Newton Dwayne was moaning and bleeding onto the carpet, which, outside of the cave under the desk, appeared to be pristine.

Ellery noted dimly that there wasn’t a domestic assistant or housekeeper in sight.

“This,” Jackson said with grim emphasis, “is what happens when pure evil meets vanity and weak minds and festers for twenty years.”

“Very pretty,” Ellery’s mother said sharply. “While you’re elaborating on that, Jackson, is there any way you couldstop bleeding?”

Jackson grimaced. “Yes, ma’am,” he said, and Ellery held up his briefcase, which was more easily rifled now that he’d set down the gun.

“I’ve got a first aid kit,” he said. “If the Day-Late-and-a-Dollar-Short Surprise Posse could gather up the criminals, we can give you a brief history of bad-guys central.”

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