Page 136 of Devil and the Deep Blue Fish

Their jackets parted dramatically, and the two hundred or so students caught their breath as they read the big white letters on the specialized shirts.

I’M AN AVENGING F—G ANGEL.

HANDS OFF MY FAMILY.

They didn’t even need to see the rest of what was printed on the backs of the shirts to know that the Cameron kids should be well and truly left alone.

Teaching Randy to Drive

By Amy Lane

Note:This story happens about a month before the events ofGuarding Randy, which has yet to be written, andDevil and the Deep Blue Fish. It was—as so many things are—inspired by a conversation with my bestie as I explained why my Mate was the preferred parent to teach our adult children to drive, and not myself. For the record, Dex’s yell was my yell, and Jackson’s quiet chiding was how Mate got our kids to make miles upon miles of laps of the accurately described Sunrise Mall.

Mary, this one is all your fault.

Dex—

“C’MON, RANDY,”Dex wheedled, smiling playfully at the big teenager through the door with the chain on it. “You know me. We’re friends. I’m your boss, for heaven’s sake. We agreed to do this weeks ago. You don’t want to quit after one try, do you?”

Randy was turning twenty in less than a month, and the look he gave Dex was agonized. “I’m sorry, Dex,” he said, his long-boned face crunched up like a little boy’s. “I don’t want to let you down, but I can’t!”

“But Randy,” Dex said, using the voice he’d used to cajole Frances to visit the doctor, get shots, even try on new clothes. “It didn’t go badly last time. We just ran into a—”

“You yelled!” Randy shouted through the gap between the door and the frame; then he clapped his hand over his mouth.“You yelled,” he said through his hand. “You promised not to yell.”

Dex sucked air in through his teeth. “It’s true,” he acknowledged. “I yelled. And I’m sorry. But it was an unusual circumstance—”

“But you were mad at me, and you yelled,” Randy told him, almost tearful. “Dex, I can’t deal with you yelling at me. I… you’re always so nice, and you can’t yell!”

Dex let out the air he’d just sucked in and gave up. “Okay,” he said. “Understood. I violated a trust. Would you like me to get Henry instead?”

“Can I drive his minivan?” Randy asked hopefully.

Dex stared. “The ugly brown thing?” He would have thought that, if nothing else, Dex’s new Forester would have made Randy eager to learn to drive.

“Yeah,” Randy said, sounding much more relaxed already. “If I ding that thing on a light post, nobody will know but me and Henry.”

Dex squinted a little, thinking. “It’s… well, you know the minivan is technically Rivers’s vehicle, right? Henry gets use of it a lot, but I don’t know if he has ittoday.”

Randy’s face fell, and Dex—who had promised Randy months ago to help him get a driver’s license so maybe he could become more independent, and, hey, get a jobnot porn,which Dex had to admit, would be a lot healthier for this kid, even though Randy made the company Dex helped runscadsof money—felt the sweet sweat of desperation dew his brow.

“Let me talk to him,” he said, and gave Randy’s completely naked—and admittedly magnificent—ginger-furred body a once-over through the crack in the door. “I’ll be back in an hour.” Because Dex felt like he deserved an hour to talk to his little brother. “In the meantime, you need to go put on some clothes. You knew I was coming, Randy—it’s forty-five degrees outside.”

Randy glanced down at himself. “D’oh! You’d think I’d learn not to answer the door like this!” he said. “Sure thing, Dex.”

He closed the door, and Dex closed his eyes. Eight-and-a-half-inches long when erect, and three—three—inches in diameter, and that thing showed zero shrinkage in the cold. And yet, Dex could not in good conscience keep this kid in porn any longer than necessary. Dear God, this kid needed to find his head with both hands and position it firmly on his shoulders.

With a sigh, Dex clattered down the steps of the flophouse apartment building and knocked on his brother’s apartment door on the ground floor.

Henry answered while pulling a sweatshirt over his bare torso, scowling. “Lance isn’t here,” he muttered. “I was sleeping in.”

Dex said, “Do you have breakfast or coffee? Can I come in and beg a favor?”

Henry’s eyes popped open. “You want breakfast?” he asked, sounding excited. “As in, if Icook you an omelet,withcheeseand some sour cream and salsa, you’d eat it? Coffee with cream and sugar? A fruit salad? Yes! Come in! Please, God, do you have any idea what it’s like trying to feed those fuck-monkeys upstairs? Every goddamned one of them has an eating disorder—I canbarelyget Lance to eat enough to fuel his insane schedule, and Jackson and I have beenlearning to cook.Get your ass in here, big brother. I’ve got such plans!”

Dex found himself at the small kitchen table of the two-bedroom apartment, drinking coffee and looking around at a blessedly adult living space. No blowup mattress on the floor, no, uhm,stainedcouch or love seat in the living room, a television on a stand and not on a stack of cinderblocks and 2x4s, and artwork—actualartwork—on the walls.

“I’m old,” he said, taking a satisfyingly cinnamon-sprinkled sip of some first-rate coffee. “But I like it.”

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