Cross & Crown (9 page)

Kelly glanced at Nick, holding his breath when Nick met his eyes. Nick looked truly regretful. He joked about being the bad cop and how everyone here considered him a hard-ass, but Kelly knew better. Nick had the purest heart of anyone he’d ever known.

“All it means is that you’ve seen this before,” Nick assured JD. “You could have been a regular customer at the shop. You could have seen this photo somewhere, say… an insurance company or a museum. The only thing it proves is that you weren’t there by chance. You are connected to this robbery somehow, that’s all we can say with any certainty.”

JD took a deep, shaky breath. “Okay.”

Nick tapped his stack of photos, straightening them, then he set them on the table as he stood. “We’ll be right back. You need anything? Food, drink?”

JD answered with a dejected shake of his head.

Nick and Kelly left him sitting there. Kelly noticed a uniform lurking near the door as they exited, and Nick gave
him a nod as they passed. Whether JD knew it or not, he was being held prisoner.

“You were blowing smoke up his ass, right?” Kelly said under his breath. “He’s your main suspect, isn’t he?”

“Pretty much,” Nick admitted. “He’s looking damn guilty.”

“That sucks. To commit a crime and not even remember why you did it?”

“Like Tijuana that one time.”

Nick and Kelly both shuddered with the shared memory. Nick sat at his desk and turned his chair to glance back at the break room.

“Dude,” Hagan said. “I know in your mind he’s a puppy in a cardboard box with a ‘take me home’ sign around his neck, but you can’t fight the evidence building up here.”

“Did the prints come back yet?” Nick asked, sounding frustrated.

“Yeah. John Doe Number Alive didn’t hit anywhere. But John Doe Number Dead came up with a prior.” Hagan turned his computer screen around so Nick and Kelly could see it.

“Darragh O’Doyle,” Nick read under his breath.

“That sounds made up,” Kelly said. “Is that real?”

“He’s not local,” Hagan told them.

“Irish national?” Nick asked. Hagan nodded. “Known associates?”

“None listed. He got pinched last year but he never turned on his crew. Did six months, got out on good behavior, last record of him was that he’d headed back to Ireland.”

“Well he’s back now. So we have an Irish connection.” Nick sat back in his chair, making a clicking sound with his teeth and tongue as he stared at the screen. “Let’s expand the fingerprints to international databases, see if we get a hit.”

Kelly cleared his throat, waiting until Hagan got up and left before leaning toward Nick. “Isn’t Julian Cross Irish?”

Nick nodded and pulled his phone from his back pocket. “We need to talk to him.” He hit the speaker button and set his phone on the desk between them.

“Special Agent in Charge Garrett here.”

“Well, aren’t we fancy,” Kelly teased.

Nick shook his head. “Hey, Garrett, it’s O’Flaherty. And the Doc, obviously.”

“Oh God, what now? Are you in jail? Being held by the IRA? Stuck on a reef in the Caribbean?”

“Wow,” Kelly said. “That’s uncalled for.”

Zane laughed. “I thought being engaged to Ty gave me some extra snark privileges.”

“Hey!” Nick shouted. “Do I come running when you need help? Did I get shoved off the edge of a cliff for your ungrateful ass? Does my boat still have bullet holes in it?”

“It still floats,” Zane countered, a smirk obvious in his voice.

Nick grunted.

“Haven’t heard from you two in a while, what’s going on?” Zane said, voice casual. Kelly had grown familiar enough with Zane to know he was taking care with his words, though. “You need to come to Baltimore, come see us.”

Kelly gave Nick a sideways glance to see how he’d react to that, but Nick was expressionless. “Sorry, babe, this isn’t a social call. I need to know how to get in touch with Julian Cross.”

“Cross. Why?”

Nick made another clicking sound, refusing to answer.

“Never mind, I didn’t ask,” Zane said quickly. “I don’t know how to get in touch with him. I assume he just shows up when he smells blood.”

“How about Grady? You think he’d know?”

“Hell no. Ty spits nails when you mention Cross’s name. He says Cross stole his kitties.”

“That’s what I figured,” Nick said with a sigh. “That’s why I called you.”

“Is it?” Zane asked pointedly.

Kelly tensed and couldn’t stop himself from glancing toward the framed photo of their team, Ty’s arm around Nick’s shoulders as they smiled. The state of Nick and Ty’s fracturing friendship was a topic only the bravest of men would touch on. Zane had balls of brass to do it.

Kelly cleared his throat and leaned closer to the phone. “We figured with your Bureau contacts, you’d be the better source. Since Ty is all… wild card now.”

“Right,” Zane said wryly.

“You got a lead on Cross, or no?” Nick asked, his words more clipped than they had been.

“No. Want me to put out some feelers? Or get Ty on it? Please God, let me put Ty on it, he needs something to do besides remodeling that damn building.”

“No. Fuck no. I don’t want Cross to know I’m coming.”

“If you’re looking for him, he already knows.”

“Right. Hey, thanks Garrett. We’ll talk to you later.” Nick ended the call and slammed his hand onto the desk. “Damn it!”

“That mean Cross is a dead end?” Kelly asked gently.

“For now. Next thread.” Nick tapped the evidence photos of the books that had been recovered at the scene. “We follow your books.”

“My books? No. No, you’re not pinning those on me for when they go bust.” Nick smirked. Kelly snorted. “You’re enjoying this too much.”

“Come on, babe, it’s a treasure hunt,” Nick teased.

“You
hope
it’s a treasure hunt, or you’re going to look stupid.”

“You’re the special consultant.”

“You’re the detective who called in the special consultant.”

Nick glanced over Kelly’s shoulder, then stood and stole a quick kiss. “Come on. Let’s get some lunch before Hagan gets back and I have to buy his food.”

They didn’t even make it to the stairs before Hagan caught them trying to sneak out. “Fuck no, I get to interrogate the boyfriend, damn you,” Hagan called to them. He grabbed his coat off his chair, making it spin around and bang into the desk.

They stopped to wait for him. Nick was chuckling softly.

“I like your partner,” Kelly said quietly.

“Yeah, don’t tell him that though.”

Kelly nodded, but Nick’s eyes were straying to the break room, where the uniformed officer was still standing guard. Kelly’s brow furrowed as he thought about JD sitting in there alone, his mind turning over everything he couldn’t remember. He knew Nick was thinking the same thing.

“Hey,” he murmured. “Is it legal and shit to take your witness with us? Maybe new surroundings will get him remembering faster.”

Nick chewed on his bottom lip, frowning, his eyes lingering on the break room door. He took a deep breath and then sighed before heading over there.

Hagan was fighting with his coat when he joined Kelly. “He bringing the stray to lunch?”

“Did you expect anything less from him?” Kelly asked fondly.

Hagan grunted. “You should see the last stray he convinced me to keep around. Teeny tiny little puppy he found in a storm drain, half-dead and starving in the middle of the night. All the local shelters were closed up so we had to take it in for the night. Bastard told me he couldn’t have it on his boat ’cause it’d fall off and drown. Fucking thing was too weak to walk and he convinced me it’d take a header off the side of a boat!”

Kelly couldn’t stop his grin.

Hagan appeared almost sheepish. “I still got that damn mutt. Weighs a hundred pounds. Best friend I ever had.”

Kelly laughed. “Well he can’t keep this stray either. You have room for an amnesiac with great bone structure?”

“Not if he pisses on the carpet like the last one,” Hagan grumbled as he headed for the elevators.

They sat at a booth in a local pub near the precinct house that obviously catered to cops. In fact, after staring around at the pictures on the walls long enough, Kelly found Nick up there. He gazed up at the photo, smirking. Most of the photos were official, full uniform and regalia, with stone-faced men and women staring at the camera like they could cause it to burst into flame. It reminded Kelly of the military photos they’d taken.

Nick didn’t exactly smile in photos, but he didn’t keep a straight face either. The look he usually gave was more of a challenge, with a half smirk that basically said “come at me, bro” and a glint that said Nick would enjoy the fight. He’d made the same expression in his police portrait that
sat high on one of the walls, and Kelly couldn’t take his eyes off that face.

“So,” JD finally said, clearing his throat and glancing around uncomfortably. “Is this like a last meal or something?”

“You’re awful fatalistic for a dude who lived through being shot in the head,” Hagan observed.

“Maybe if I remembered it, I’d be more likely to look on the bright side,” JD grumbled.

“Innocent until proven guilty, babe.” Nick’s voice was low and sent a shiver up Kelly’s spine. “Look, we haven’t had any hits, but we have eliminated some things, and frankly, that’s as good as we could hope for.”

“Right.” Hagan pointed his fork at Nick. “We put you through all the systems and got nothing.”

“That… sounds awesome,” JD said, voice flat and sarcastic.

“What that means is you don’t have a record,” Nick offered.

“Meaning I’m a smart felon and I’ve never been caught. You’re right, that is good news.”

Kelly coughed to cover a laugh.

Nick pursed his lips, narrowing his eyes. “It also means you’re not military, and you’ve never worked government or municipal. You’re not part of any education systems, and so on. Rules out everything you would have been printed for.”

JD nodded and looked down at his hands, turning them over to run a finger across his tips. His nails were still stained from the ink they’d printed him with.

Nick was watching him too, frowning harder the longer he looked at him. He reached to the cuff of his shirt, unbuttoning and rolling it up. He showed JD the inside of his arm and tapped the tattoo with his finger. “You know what this is?”

JD nodded. “I told you yesterday, I recognized it. It’s the Recon Jack.”

Nick glanced at Kelly, one eyebrow raised. Kelly couldn’t school his features fast enough to hide the surprise. Nick looked around the pub. It was early for lunch, so there weren’t many people there. He began to unbutton his shirt.

“Dude,” Hagan said through a mouthful of food. “That’s your
other
job. Got to stop confusing them. Tired of suspects stuffing your pants with dollar bills during interrogation.”

Nick shoved his sleeve aside, then pulled up the sleeve of his undershirt to reveal a well-defined biceps and shoulder. Kelly leaned away from him to get a better view. Nick glanced sideways at him, giving him a dirty look.

“Yeah, I’m perving on you. What then?” Kelly asked.

They all laughed at him, and Hagan whistled and pointed his fork at the bite mark Nick had exposed on his neck. “Good Lord,” he said. “Do you even call it sex, or is it more like sparring with you two?”

Nick rolled his eyes. He tapped the oversized tattoo on his shoulder. It covered his entire shoulder, running from the center of his collarbone to his biceps and covering both the front and back sides of his arm. It was a work of art, pure and simple, following the defined lines of Nick’s muscles. “You know what this is?”

“Eagle, globe, and anchor,” JD answered immediately. “Marines.”

Hagan’s eyebrows had shot higher, but he remained silent.

Nick began to button up his shirt again, and he jerked his chin toward Kelly. “Show him yours.”

Kelly nodded. The one on his arm was partially visible under the sleeve of his T-shirt, so he just pulled the sleeve up and turned so JD could get a good look. It was a simple
anchor, but with snakes encircling it and wings at the top to form a caduceus. The word NAVY was written on a scroll at the bottom.

JD studied it for a moment, then glanced between Nick and Kelly. “Well, it’s a Navy tattoo, that much is obvious. I don’t recognize it, but I know it means you were a corpsman. Probably a SARC, since you two served together and he’s a Marine.”

“Goddamn, he knows more about this shit than I do,” Hagan said.

Kelly glanced between them. He wasn’t sure what this meant since he didn’t have the whole picture, but Nick looked troubled. Kelly didn’t blame him. This guy hadn’t printed as military, but he knew what Nick’s Recon Jack was, and that was a pretty specialized symbol. People might recognize it as being military, but they didn’t know what it meant, not really.

JD did. People who knew military but weren’t military were usually mercs.

“What?” JD asked, beginning to fidget again. “Is this bad? I see the look on your faces; this is bad.”

Nick ran his fingers across his lower lip, not responding. Kelly watched him, wondering if he’d come to the same conclusion, and if he’d be honest with his suspect when he did.