Cold Touch (26 page)

keep the mood light.

Julia chuckled, as did Olivia. Gabe didn’t. This guy wasn’t answering any of his questions. “So, back to the point. What

exactly do you do?”

“I know things.”

“Yeah, yeah, you’re al psychic.”

“I’m not,” Julia said from across the room. “I don’t have a psychic bone in my body.”

Wel , at least she admitted it.

“I’m not real y psychic, either,” Mick said. “I can’t tel the future.”

“So what
is
your trick?” Ty asked, sounding halfamused, half-interested.

Mick glanced at Olivia. “Do you mind?”

“Your cal ,” she said with a shrug.

Mick nodded, looked around the room and didn’t seem to see what he wanted. Saying “I’l be right back,” he walked out of

the den, heading to the formal dining room, which looked like it was al set for the queen and her family to sit down for tea.

Gabe had glanced in there yesterday and hadn’t liked the heavy, antique furniture, room-darkening drapes and prissy, rose-

patterned china displayed in a glass-front hutch. It didn’t suit Olivia, who, though feminine and graceful, was in no way prissy.

Not with the steel she had running through her spine.

When Mick came back, he was carrying a cup. One single rose-patterned teacup.

“Don’t you dare drop it,” Olivia warned him. “That thing’s valuable.”

“Hey, no hinting,” Mick said. Putting the cup down, he took off one of his gloves.

Gabe took a step back, having a sudden, vivid memory of what had happened that afternoon when Liv had torn one

fingertip off hers. From beside him, he felt the brush of her hand. He looked down at her, sitting on the edge of the couch, and

she mouthed, “It’s okay.”

Yeah, he hoped so. Because he sure as hel wasn’t carrying this guy upstairs and climbing into bed with him.

Across the room, he saw Ty leaning forward on his chair. Brooke was doing the same thing. Julia, obviously used to this

dog-and-pony

show,

wasn’t

even

watching,

instead

staring

at

something

out

in

the

hal way.

Frankly,

he

didn’t

want

to

know

what

it was.

Once his right hand was ungloved, Mick reached down with the left one, picked up the teacup, and deposited it in his bare

palm. Fortunately, he didn’t start to shudder, shake, or scream. He only scrunched his eyes shut, then nodded.

“Wel ?” Olivia asked.

“Your grandmother, she liked her tea with lemon but no milk.”

“This is the South, darlin’; that’s how al the best people take their tea,” Julia drawled. “Come on, you can do better than that.

Impress us, hotshot.”

Mick chuckled, not offended. “Okay. Wait.”

A long silence, then he spoke again. This time, his voice was a static monotone, like he was describing a series of boring

pictures in his mind. “You’ve never sipped anything out of this cup, Olivia. Your mouth hasn’t been on it, though your hand has.

You’ve washed it, cleaned it less than a month ago, but it hasn’t held anything except dust for at least ten years.”

Olivia nodded once, though Mick’s eyes were closed and he couldn’t see her do it.

Gabe crossed his arms over his chest, stil waiting to be wowed.

“The last time it was real y used was at a bridge luncheon in January of 1999.”

“My grandmother loved bridge, but she stopped playing when my grandfather died.”

What rich, old Southern woman didn’t play bridge?

“A woman named Agnes Bedford drank out of it,” Mick added. “She wasn’t very happy. She and her partner, Bitty Bates,

just couldn’t get it together.”

“Agnes and Bitty were my grandmother’s best friends. Debutante class of 1933.”

Okay, a little more interesting. But he stil wasn’t convinced Mick didn’t know Olivia wel enough to know the names of . . .

her dead grandmother’s friends?
Hmm
.

“Your grandmother used the set for her bridge club meetings because she knew ‘the girls’ were al so impressed by it.

Something about where it came from. . . . Other than that, it was used once a year at Easter, and children under fifteen weren’t

al owed to touch it.”

Brooke laughed softly. “I used to stick my finger on the plates when she wasn’t looking.”

Gabe couldn’t deny growing more interested, but the skeptic in him could stil come up with a rational explanation for al of

this. The late senator and his wife were very wel known; her best friends might have been mentioned in society articles that

Mick could have seen. What old lady didn’t like to lord it over her friends a little with her best china, and who wouldn’t insist that the kids not touch it?

“Tel us something you couldn’t possibly know,” Olivia charged, correctly reading Gabe’s skepticism.

Mick nodded. “It is a family heirloom, a wedding present to your great-great-grandmother. The wedding was . . .
umm
. . .

spring of 1863, I think?”

Interesting? Or utter bul shit?

Olivia rose to stand beside him, frowning at his lack of faith.

“That’s right, Mick.” Then she took Gabe’s arm and pul ed him with her as she walked over to a bookshelf on the far wal .

Stil silent, she reached up, pul ed down a leather-bound book marked “The Wainwright Family: A Genealogy” and put it into

Gabe’s hands.

He guessed that rich, old Southern families did things like print up entire books about their family history. If anybody were to

do that for his family, it’d have about two pages, the only names in it being his, his mother’s, his grandmother’s and his grandfather’s. His mother had died when he was nine, his grandmother six months after that. As for his grandfather, wel , he

was too mean to be courteous enough to die and leave the earth to better folks. Gabe had never met his father—his mother

wasn’t even al owed to mention his name once her daddy had let her “come crawling back home with her no-good little bastard” when she had no place else to go. Gabe had been about two at the time.

So, yeah. Fuck genealogy.

“Tel me the ancestor’s name, and then tel me who gave her the gift,” Olivia ordered Mick, from across the room, though her

attention remained on Gabe.

While Mick concentrated, Olivia flipped the pages, stopping on one with an old, tintype-style wedding photo of a very dour-

looking man and his equal y constipated-looking, frumpy bride. Gabe couldn’t help whispering, “The happy couple?”

With a smile tickling her lips, Olivia nudged him in the ribs with her elbow.
“Shh.”

“Uh, seriously, Liv?” Mick said. “Your great-great-grandmother’s name was Bathilda?”

Olivia tapped the tip of her finger on the caption beneath the photo.

Bathilda Chester Wainwright
.

“Her father was German,” Olivia said. “Yes. Now, who gave it to her?”

Mick thought a second more, then said, “Cool!”

Mick thought a second more, then said, “Cool!”

“Who was it?” asked Ty, obviously intrigued.

“President and Mrs. Jefferson Davis,” Mick said. “Old Jeff himself picked up this very cup to examine it when shopping for

the gift in Richmond.”

Again, Olivia tapped something on the page. It turned out to be a list of the guests who had attended the wedding. The

honored president of the Confederacy and his wife were right on top.

Son of a bitch.

“Oh,” Mick muttered. His eyes flying open, he put the cup down suddenly, as if needing to get it away from himself.

“What?” Gabe asked.

Mick’s jovial demeanor had faded, his smile no longer conveying a good mood. In fact, his suddenly clenched jaw said it

was anything but. “The whole box was wrapped in lace and tied with blue silk ribbons,” he said, his tone dripping distaste, “by

Mrs. Davis’s house slave, who dropped one of the matching cups. She didn’t have a very good day.”

Everyone fel silent for a moment. Then Ty asked, “Is he for real? Seriously, for real?”

Gabe was wondering the same thing. But he couldn’t deny the evidence was strong; he was holding the book right in his

hands. There was no way Mick could see it. There certainly had been no time to set this whole thing up as some elaborate

scheme, nor did he think Olivia ever would. He’d already accepted the fact that he’d seen evidence of a true, inexplicable

phenomenon yesterday in that examination room. How could he deny it existed in this form?

Yeah, this might be for real
. Crazy, impossible. But real.

Mick tugged on his glove, not saying anything more, then sat on the couch, remaining silent. Suddenly it hit Gabe how tough

it would be to have an ability like that. How difficult it must be to go out in the world, unable to touch anything without fearing

some random object’s dark history would overwhelm you at any given time. He’d once read that paper currency was one of

the dirtiest things you could touch because it had been handled by so many people. God, how would this guy even manage to

pay for a cup of coffee without a glove on his hand?

The very idea of it saddened him, and he found his instinctive mistrust toward the man fading. No, he wasn’t ready to toast

marshmal ows and sing “Kumbaya” with anybody Olivia worked with, not if, as he suspected, they exploited her abilities to her

detriment. Stil , he couldn’t deny he felt sympathy for Mick Tanner. Olivia could avoid touching human remains for the rest of

her life if she chose to. Mick didn’t have the luxury of never touching anything.

Mick looked over at him, the twinkle gone from his eyes. They held a long stare, during which the man silently admitted that

it was just like Gabe was imagining. Bad. Painful. Ugly.

But also, Gabe suspected, very useful when it came to solving crimes. Especial y when it came to solving
cold
crimes. Like

this one.

It could never be as bad as what Olivia already went through to help solve this case
.

He thought about the case, thought about the evidence, thought about the murdered boy. He also thought about the

information he’d read in Olivia’s file early this morning, before he’d come here to pick her up to take her to the family brunch.

The file had mentioned evidence gathered at the scene after Olivia’s rescue. A cigarette butt. An old spoon. The broken tip of

a knife. Al normal items but items that could very wel tel a story if only the right man was there to listen to it. And the right man was practical y begging for the chance to listen to it.

“So what do you think, Detective?” asked Julia, as if sensing he was waffling.

What did he think?
Hmm.
He
thought
he was actual y giving this some serious consideration. He
thought
he was about to take an off-the-wal chance he would never have considered two days ago. He also
thought
he might live to regret it.

Before he went any further and actual y decided, though, he needed to make a few things clear. He stared at the owner of

eXtreme Investigations. “This would be total y off the record.”

She lifted both hands, holding them palms out. “Not a problem.”

“I mean before
and
after. I don’t want to see some newspaper article next week about how the Savannah PD is now working hand in glove . . .” he glanced at Mick, “no pun intended, with your company. And any kind of payment is out of the

question.”

Julia rose, lifting one dark brow over a dark eye. “Olivia is one of us. We’re here for her, not for you, not for any money and

not for the company. Understand?”

“Got it,” he said, glad they had laid it al out. He had suspected as much, but it was better to be up front about what was

expected of everyone in this situation.

“Let’s start by giving it a day, okay? Tomorrow, total y outside regular office hours, just some like-minded people putting their

minds together to work on a problem.” That sounded perfectly reasonable . . . and like something that might not cost him his

job.

You’re dreaming. If this thing goes south you can kiss your job goodbye.

He ignored his inner pessimist. “Ty, you real y up for this? You know we’re walking on thin ice here, right?”

“I know, but you bet I’m in. This dog wil hunt.”

Gabe shook his head and
tsk-tsk
ed. “Not so good that time.”

Ty grinned. “Wel , how about, ‘Why, yes, partner, that’s a fine idea. I’d be happy to.’ ”

“That’s better,” Gabe said, ignoring everyone’s confusion. If they were going to spend time with Ty, they’d figure it out soon

enough. Or, as Ty would probably put it, right quick.

“So, that’s it?” Julia asked. “We’re agreed?”

Gabe turned the whole situation over in his mind one more time, considering what his lieutenant would have to say, what the

press would make of this. But in the end, he came back to the same thing: If it helped get justice for that murdered boy and

peace for Olivia, and helped prevent more people from being hurt, how could he possibly refuse to even try? “Okay, I think

we’ve got a deal.”

He only hoped it was one he didn’t live to regret.

After a few more minutes’ conversation, they al agreed to get a fresh start in the morning at the eXtreme Investigations

offices. Julia left first, with Mick fol owing her out. Ty was next. Then it was just him and Brooke, standing on either side of

Olivia by the front door. Liv’s sister eyed him like he was some despoiler of innocents.

“Thank you, Brooke,” Olivia said, giving her sister a soft kiss on the cheek, setting their departure order without actual y

putting it into words.