The Holes Fish Dig
HENRY WAS still in the critical care unit, mostly because the dumb asshole had gotten himself a fever.
“Look at you,” Jackson all but snarled, taking in the bright crescents of heat next to his pale skin. “You look like shit. You people tell me that sitting by your bedside and willing you to be better won’t work, but I haven’t seen a damned thing to prove it wouldn’t have better results.”
Henry peered at him through half-open eyes. “Look at you, all big with ego. I didn’t get shot to piss you off, sensei—it just fucking happened.”
Jackson scowled and threw himself into the vacant chair by the bed. There were two very nice chenille throws in blues and golds on the chairs, and Jackson picked one up and frowned at it.
“Did Lance do this?” he asked, his temper cooling for a moment.
“Galen,” Henry said, smiling through cracked lips. “There is no emotional path so fraught that Galen can’t approach it with a little bit of retail therapy.” Jackson managed a weak smile, and Henry added, “Where’s Cody? I got a whole earful about how you two went out and rescued children without me last night. Rude, is all I’m saying. I’m out of it for a little bit, and everybody gets delusions of grandeur.”
Jackson’s smile got a little stronger. “Take it easy, Han Solo. Cody stayed in the hallway in deference to your doctors, who only want one visitor at a time. I came in to tell you….” He paused, not sure how to phrase this. “To tell you that what you were doing? Taking care of that one kid, watching Isabelle Roberts and keeping her safe? That was a big deal, Henry. Nobody expected it to be such a big deal. We all knew Cowboy probably heard a… a murder. But it’s so much bigger than that. Just, you know. When you’re all better and getting pissed off because healing sucks and I know it, remember you did a big thing.”
Henry grunted. “That’s sweet,” he said. “Now get to the part about how you look worse than I do.”
A harsh sound escaped Jackson’s throat. “Buddy, in a week, you’re going to be at home, and I’m going to be playing video games with you so you don’t die of boredom. I’ll tell you about my shitty childhood—”
“Now,” Henry muttered. “It’s been eating at you for weeks. Now.”
“The difference between you and Ellery,” Jackson said, hoisting himself out of his chair, “is that—”
“I don’t want to see you naked,” Henry interrupted. “Now spill.”
“I was going to say, Ellery can tell me what to do,” Jackson said with dignity, falling back into the chair.
“Please?” Henry asked. “It’s been bothering me. You know all my secrets, Jackson. You know about my abusive ex-boyfriend, you know how I betrayed my family—”
“He did that,” Jackson said harshly.
“Yeah, and you believe that. So you should know I won’t hold this against you. Maybe you tell one person besides Ellery—”
“And his mother,” Jackson muttered.
“Ouch,” Henry commiserated. “Come on. I’ve been lying here, trying to keep Lance from losing his shit, and it occurred to me that I know how to handle boyfriends, but you’re my first real friend. Please? Let me be a real friend too.”
Like with most big painful secrets, this one was easier to tell the second time. Jackson finished the story about how he’d called child services on his one living family member in a relatively short time and then stood, avoiding Henry’s eyes.
“So see?” he said. “Not too much to tell.”
“Jackson?” Henry said softly.
“Yeah?”
“You’re still my first real friend.”
Jackson gave him a wicked grin. “Well, I’ve got scads of them. Millions. I could go to the corner and find another Henry Worrall and—”
“Shut up,” Henry said, and he was falling asleep, but he was also laughing.
“Only because that wasn’t true,” Jackson told him. He didn’t want to get too close—he was wearing a mask, but one never knew what kinds of nasty bugs occupied space with a person just walking around. He did take Henry’s hand, though. “You hang in there, brother. I’ve got plans to drive you batshit insane when you’re getting better. I owe you.”
“You gonna bust Shitbag Retty?” Henry asked plaintively, and that made Jackson pause.
“What if I told you I think she’s already dead?”
Henry’s eyes popped open, and he grimaced. “My head hurts like a motherfucker, and you’re springing that on me now ?”
Jackson shrugged. “Henry, they took her yesterday, and she was ‘the package.’ I get the feeling her other ‘packages’ have been… you know….”
“Dead teenagers,” Henry muttered. “Oh fuck me. Yeah. Okay. I hear you. Revenge isn’t the deal this time.”
“Wish I could tell you it was.”
“Live teenagers are a better outcome,” Henry rasped and then coughed.
“Live Henry is also important,” Jackson murmured, touching Henry’s burning forehead lightly. “Heal. Forget the rest of this bullshit. Shitbag Retty’s not gonna bother anybody anymore.”
“Get ’em, brother.”
“Will do.”
CODY WAS sprawled out in his chair, texting like an old newsman on a typewriter, grunting to himself, as Jackson emerged from the CCU.
“How is he?” Cody asked.
“Fighting infection,” Jackson muttered. “God, this phase of it sucks. It’s so scary. It can turn on a dime.”
“It’s amazing how much you know about healing,” Cody pronounced, eyes still glued to his screen. “And yet you are still apparently a neurotic mess.”
“Seems to be the consensus,” Jackson said sourly. “Did you want to stay and finish your conversation while I go down to the morgue?”
“No,” Cody said, with unexpected vehemence, and Jackson realized he’d probably typed the word too. “No, no, no, no, no, because don’t be an asshole, that’s why.” With a final savage poke at his phone, Cody shoved the thing in his pocket and stood.
“Anything I should know about?” Jackson asked, leading the way to the elevators.
“US Marshals are assholes,” Cody replied as the thing dinged.
“All of them,” Jackson asked carefully, getting in, “or just the one?”
“Only the one. Delicate constitution my ass,” he muttered, shifting to the classic voice of mockery. “‘Oh, but Cody, this is a delicate time in your healing journey.’ You know what’s a delicate time in my healing journey?” Cody asked rhetorically.
“Conversations with yourself?” Jackson hazarded.
“Fucking boredom is a delicate time in my healing journey,” Cody blurted as the door opened on, oh, hey, the maternity ward. “Beg your pardon, ma’am,” he said to the woman getting onto the elevator with a car carrier in one hand, a baby bag over the other shoulder, and a bemused partner on the other side of the elevator doors who had apparently just watched the mother of his child leave without him.
“No, no,” the woman said, sounding as put out as Cody. “I’m with you. Lying around waiting for shit to start does nothing for me. If this kid is going to start driving me crazy, I want it to happen in my own damned home.”
The elevator door opened on the ground floor, and she got out, and Jackson and Cody continued down to the basement, chuckling a little.
“Apparently you are not alone,” Jackson said softly.
“No,” Cody muttered and then sighed. “No. And that’s all he wants me to know. I’m not alone on my ‘healing journey.’” He used finger quotes, and Jackson felt his deep disgust.
“You know,” he said, “you can tell him to stop calling it that.”
Cody grunted. “Recovery is fine, thank you. Worst thing about being a recovering addict is the… the lingo . It’s like once you put a title on it, you feel like a fraud. You can’t live with a title to your own stupidity—it gives it too much gravitas.”
Jackson had to chuckle. “You know,” he said, “I am a fan of that philosophy.” Then he sobered, remembering the night before and Henry’s request that Jackson actually confide in him—like a real friend—that afternoon. “But giving voice to the things that hurt you?” he said thoughtfully. “That shows somebody that they’re part of your circle, you know? Even if it’s just a circle of two.”
Cody grunted. “Why? Why would he want to be a part of my circle of two?”
Jackson smiled to himself as he remembered Cody shouting, “Jackson, Plan B!” the night before, just as all hell was breaking loose.
“Because when you’re sober and in full control of your faculties, you are a blast to be around,” he said, feeling that in his bones.
Cody chuckled a little. “That was one of my finer moments.”
“Tell him that,” Jackson said. “Let him know you want more of them.”
“Speaking of….” Cody let out a breath.
As they’d been talking, the elevator had let them out on the basement floor, and Jackson had begun leading him through the echoey, chill, and labyrinthine corridors of the basement floor.
Now Jackson took that right, directly into Toby’s offices, where Josh, the assistant, and Toby huddled over what appeared to be a prehistoric desktop computer.
“Jackson, hold on a sec,” Toby said, without glancing up. “I know you’re on a deadline, and I almost have your information.”
Jackson and Cody exchanged glances. “Toby, doesn’t the rest of the hospital have tablets and shit?”
“Nobody wants to give money to dead people,” Josh said, proving once again that he had the tact and diplomacy of a doctor who needed to be nowhere near the living.
“He’s right,” Toby said, hitting a key on the keyboard repeatedly. “As my son keeps telling me—”
“Parker?” Jackson asked, because that was the gay son that Toby had been trying to set him up with for years.
“No, the youngest. Niles.”
“Isn’t Niles a baby ?” Jackson asked, appalled.
“He’s in high school,” Toby told him, rolling his eyes. “And he’s very smart for his age. Anyway, he tells me repeatedly that the morgue is not a consumer-driven business, so it doesn’t get consumer-appropriate equipment.”
Jackson blinked. “High school, you say?”
Toby gave him a rather wolfish grin over the computer monitor. “Terrifying, isn’t it?” He stepped away from the desk with a “Keep working on it, Josh,” while he pulled out his phone and tapped frantically.
“And we need the computer why?” Jackson asked as Toby approached.
“I’m trying ,” Toby said with some frustration, “to get you a map .”
Oh. “A map of what ?”
Toby glared up at him, all hints of playfulness gone. “A map of the location where a friend of mine was training cadaver dogs last month and found the bodies of three teenaged boys at the bottom of an old mine. It’s up in Gold Country somewhere, not too far from Twain Harte.”
Jackson blinked slowly. “Near Sonora?” he asked carefully.
Toby gave him a grim nod. “You expected this?”
“Let’s just say the place keeps coming up, and….” He let out a sigh, thinking about Caleb and his suspicion from the very first that the boy wouldn’t be found alive. “Well, there was a reason I asked you. But….” He swallowed. “Three?”
Toby nodded and didn’t force him to ask. “In various stages of decomp, I’m afraid. And on a tricky bit of land.”
“Tricky?”
“Well, this is why I wanted the damned map,” Toby said. “See, this area has some really nice houses, often placed by one of the small lakes in the area. But it’s also got some desolate stretches of oak trees with absolute bupkiss. Sometimes there’s farms, sometimes there’s mansions, sometimes there’s forest land, and sometimes there’s fuckall, you understand?”
Jackson’s eyes widened. “Great,” he said. “Because I’m sort of a city/suburb cat myself. Cody, you?”
Cody was peering over Jackson’s shoulder as the doc tried to show Jackson the map, and it might have been super crowded, but Cody was tall enough to make it feel not quite so claustrophobic.
“I’ve got some backwoods experience,” he said. “There’s no snow there this time of year, but there sure is a lot of mud.”
“Well, I’m wearing hiking tennies,” Jackson said. “And we’ve got rain gear in the car.” He peered at Toby’s phone and played with the picture for a minute. “Okay,” he said softly. “This here—what’s this?” He pointed to what appeared to be a residential road, but one that was solidly in the middle of nowhere.
“That’s a property,” Toby told him. “Josh, did you look up the address?”
“Yup. It’s 22000 Ward Lake Road,” Josh said. “It’s one of those big mansions that front the lake, but you can see the fire roads and such in the rear of the property. That backs up against federal woodland.”
“And right here?” Jackson traced up to what in the satellite photo on Toby’s phone looked like a UFO landing spot, because it was an almost perfect circle. “This is a mine cap, right?” The mine caps were a leftover from the gold rush days, in an effort to repair the damage done to the hills after the miners had come through. The mines—some of which were no more than ten or so feet deep—were filled in with rocks and soil so the land could be used again. The mines weren’t always covered responsibly, though. Most of them were solidly packed, but sometimes there were air pockets or shafts that could be dangerous to anybody who walked the land.
“Exactly,” Toby said. “It’s on the federal land. The cap itself should be pretty solid. But back here….” He pointed to a copse of trees that hid everything from the satellite view. “This, according to my friend, is where the mine shaft opens. Dirt had fallen in on the top of the elevator car, but they had to send spelunkers in, their guide ropes attached to trees, in order to retrieve the bodies. Once they were there—” Toby rolled his eyes. “—apparently there was a much easier way down.”
Jackson frowned. “So on federal land. Why didn’t we hear this in the news?”
Toby shrugged. “For one thing, it’s in a whole other county—and not even one that’s adjacent to Sacramento County. For another—” He gave Jackson a bleak look. “—they haven’t identified the bodies yet. It’s one of those things. Nobody wants people to find out about their loved ones on the news, and you don’t want to scare people. My friend says the press release was confined to ‘lost hikers sadly recovered,’ in the hopes that families would reach out. But, like I said, a month.”
Jackson, suddenly claustrophobic, thrust the phone back into Toby’s hands and strode away, trying hard to think.
“It’s been discovered,” he muttered. “ We may not have heard about it down here, but you can bet damned sure anybody living on that residential mansion road has.”
“Are you wondering if they’d use it again?” Cody asked, and Jackson blessed him, because he had spent time on the streets, and he could think like a cop and a criminal.
“Yeah,” Jackson muttered. “If Ellery and his mother can find Caleb’s name in that paperwork I gave them, and we can find the body on that property, we’ve got them. We’ve got all of them, dead to rights.” He felt fury roaring down his spine as he scowled up at Cody. “I want them to pay ,” he snarled, feeling it in the pit of his balls. “They… they begged, borrowed, stole, cajoled, and cadged kids away from their parents by selling them bad religion, and this —” He stabbed his finger at Toby’s old, hapless phone. “— this is what they do to them.”
Cody gestured for the phone, and Toby gave it to him.
“What are you looking for?” the older man asked, and Jackson saw Cody’s fierce grin.
“A similar spot,” he said, glancing at Jackson. “See, if I was the bad guy, I’d look for another place like the first—like, say, see? This one? Or this one here?”
“I hear you,” Jackson muttered. He pulled out his phone and texted Ellery.
Quick. Need Hoover’s address.
24000 Ward Lake Road , Ellery texted back, and Jackson grunted in satisfaction because that was pretty much what he’d expected.
Thought so , he replied. How much property ? Out loud, he said, “Okay, so the mine cap where they discovered bodies is the closest one to where our suspect lives. Which is right here.” He pointed to the address, and even through the grainy depiction of the satellite photo, he gave a low whistle. “Nice digs.”
His own phone buzzed, and he glanced at it. Only ten, which isn’t much considering all the land in the area.
Much of it is federal owned , Jackson sent back, the thought making him bounce on his toes.
“What’s got you so happy?” Cody asked.
“Hoover only has ten acres,” Jackson said. “So all of this? This area with the three different mines where he could have been disposing of bodies?”
“Is free for us to search,” Cody said, catching on.
Jackson grunted, still staring at the phone. It was a lot of area—and they didn’t have a lot of time. “My God, I wish I knew someone with a cadaver dog.”
“Oh,” Toby said, as though surprised to hear this. “I know somebody who could meet you there. He’s training a couple of them right now. I bet he’d be happy to help.”
Jackson cleared his throat. “Toby, we’re not exactly legit right here. I was hoping to find the bodies, call the authorities, and then confront the bad guys.”
Toby shrugged. “You got a lot of territory to stake out—and he could help you do it before it gets dark. When were you planning to leave for Sonora?”
Later, Jackson would remember how much faith Toby had in him, and it would give him strength. “Twelve thirty,” he said, because Ellery had texted him earlier. “Why?”
“Because it still gets dark fairly early,” Toby said frankly. “By the time you get there, it’ll be around three, and you’ll have less than three hours to search. I’m assuming you’re on a time crunch?”
“Yeah,” Jackson said, thinking hard. “Actually, we’re going to leave now . I’m changing the plan. See this road?” he still had Toby’s phone, and he indicated a small winding snake of a road.
“Yes?” Toby said.
“It bottoms out right where our first searching position starts. Send me that map, and get me in touch with your dog friend. Cody and I are taking off right now!”
As he and Cody tore out of the morgue, Cody said, “Are we even going to tell Ellery?”
Jackson snorted. “Of course we are. I may be reckless, but I’m only a little bit stupid.”
ELLERY SEEMED to think differently.
“The plan was,” he explained patiently, “that we would all go up together—”
“And I appreciate that plan,” Jackson replied, glad he’d entrusted the driving to Cody. “It was a good plan. But it did not accommodate for how soon it gets dark or the fact that there have already been bodies found up there.”
Cody took a hard left, and Jackson found himself pressed up against the passenger window. He tried not to say something sarcastic because his original assessment of Cody needing his hand held had not only been dead wrong, Jackson was starting to suspect that little noises like, “Oh my God, we’re all going to die!” would only egg the guy on.
“But that’s the point,” Ellery said, and it sounded like he and his mother were doing a paperwork roundup on a massive scale. “We can give their coroner some pictures of some of the missing children and see if they match the identities of the young people we haven’t managed to round up.”
Jackson let out a long breath. “Ellery, I asked those kids at the table this morning how long was their longest stay in that place. Do you know what they said?”
“Oh my God,” Ellery muttered. “I… I hadn’t even thought to ask that. Or to ask the advocates. Or to—”
“We’ve been busy!” Jackson told him. “But I asked, and you know what he said?”
“What?”
“Three months. The longest any of them could recall a kid being there was from three months ago. Now I may not have time to study that paperwork I was scanning for you, but you know what I do remember seeing?”
“Oh God…,” Ellery rasped. “They’ve had that part of it up and running for over nine months.”
Jackson hoped his voice wouldn’t break. “Where are they?” he asked. “Yeah, some of them escaped, but we saw how well that didn’t work for a lot of them. Some of them, I hope, made it back to their parents—in fact, I would bet a lot of them made it back to their parents. But at least four that we know of didn’t end up on the street and didn’t end up back at their parents’ houses, and you know what we have to ask now, don’t you?”
“How many more are out there,” Ellery whispered. “Oh Jesus, Jackson. What do we do?”
“Fetzer and Hardison were in the ER last night,” Jackson told him. “They know the basic story. You need to call them and tell them you need help screening all those parent forms to see if the parents know where their children are. You said your mother was talking to the state AG—which is great. I’m glad we have contacts. Your visit to Hoover and Schmitt will be very necessary, and getting warrants will be very necessary, but right now we have a way to search for more proof and more….” He worked hard to stay strong for the missing and the dead. “More lost children,” he said. “There’s also some outbuildings back along the property line,” he added, because he’d been studying the map Toby had sent to his phone since he’d buckled in. “Cody and I can check those out too, while everybody is focused on your little lawfare excursion.”
“Where will you be?” Ellery asked, sounding disconsolate and, for lack of a better word, young.
Jackson gave him directions, sending the map Toby had pulled up for him to Ellery’s phone.
“Cody and I will be along the back edge of the property,” Jackson told him. “If you can come up early, there’s a small picnic area with a parking lot and some restrooms and picnic tables on the west side of the river. Cody and I have a two-hour head start on you—we’ll be ready for a break in four or so hours.”
“Jackson,” Ellery said, sounding wretched. “We can’t even call in any police. We’re supposed to be a fact-finding mission!”
“Well, we are on a fact-finding mission!” Jackson argued back. “And Toby hooked us up with his friend who’s training a cadaver dog— he’s got all of the law enforcement contacts for this area and a satellite radio to boot.” There had been good reasons for making all those other phone calls before he called Ellery, he thought virtuously.
“Oh God,” Ellery muttered. “Jackson, do I have to tell you to—”
“Be careful?” Jackson finished for him. “Take care of your property? Come back okay? No, baby. You do not have to tell me that. Do I have to tell you the same thing?”
“I’m not going to be in any danger.”
“You’re going to be facing off against a child molester and two killers,” Jackson snapped back. “And whether you’re doing it with guns or computers and fake smiles, it’s going to be a grim, dirty business. Tell Lucy Satan to keep her wits about her, and make sure the whole world knows where she’s going and why or you two need to stay the hell home.”
“And Galen and Jade,” Ellery added, from what Jackson could tell, for pure meanness.
“Now why would you put so much of my family in one fucking basket and dangle it over a fucking cliff?” Jackson snapped, out of patience. “You had better meet us in four hours—I don’t care if you have to stand on the accelerator and put a light and siren on top of the goddamned Lexus. If we’ve found enough evidence, there might be no reason for you to go in there and face off against Hoover and Schmitt and fuckin’ Twitty and the Dwaynes at all. Neither of us have the easy job today, Ellery, so maybe… you know. Have some faith in me, and be careful yourself, okay?”
“Of course,” Ellery replied with dignity. “And I’ll be sure to pass along your regards to my mother.”
“She’s a good broad,” Jackson said, knowing the anachronism would make Ellery smile.
“She is indeed. Take care of my Detective.”
“Take care of my Counselor,” Jackson replied, and they both hung up. He glanced around, and realized they’d hit the freeway and Cody was taking Highway 50 to Sunrise Boulevard.
“Wow,” Cody said. “That was intense. You have those conversations a lot?”
Jackson grunted. “You spend enough time in the CCU, for yourself and others, getting hurt on the job becomes a real possibility. It’s rough to live with.”
Cody looked stricken for a moment, and then he seemed to shake himself out of it. “It was good,” he said after a moment. “What you two said. You made it clear why we had to go hauling ass out of there. You two are quick.” He let out an almost melancholy sigh. “I was never that quick. I mean, I could think on my feet undercover, but you two, digging up information, putting it together—it would have taken me weeks to get what you’ve gotten in, what? Two days?”
“It’s not only me,” Jackson told him, feeling this in his stomach. “You haven’t met the whole team, but we’ve got people running down leads on computers, and we’ve got Ellery and his mother—and they’ve both got more brain power than I could even think of, and she’s got connections out the yang. We’ve got Jade, who is keeping our world running while we go off and try to find out why our friend got hurt. I mean, everything from the people taking care of our first witness to Ellery’s child advocate army—that’s, you know, pulling out all the stops, calling in all the favors, going balls to the walls, and leaving nothing behind. Henry was hurt. The guy’s my partner—I need to have his back.”
Cody let out a sigh. “Man, I would give ungodly parts of my soul to work with your operation full time.”
“Enjoy it now,” Jackson said, giving a wolfish grin. “I mean, I was lying my balls off to Ellery. For all I know, we won’t even make it through the day.”
Cody perked up. “That’s the spirit. I’m totally in.”