by Pandora Pine
“Don’t you talk like that about my mother, Carlotta!” Tony shouted from down the hall.
“Am I lying?” She shouted back on a laugh.
“Well, no, but that’s besides the point.” Tony laughed along with her.
Ronan rolled his eyes, while his best friend scooped his wife into his arms and peppered her face with kisses. He wasn’t the jealous type, but it sure would be nice to have someone he could kiss whenever the mood struck him.
16
Tennyson
Tennyson had spent more of the first quarter watching Truman's front door for signs of Ronan than he spent watching Rob Gronkowski’s tight ass when he lined up on offense for the New England Patriots. He'd never been a door-watcher in all of his life. Like it or not, Ronan was a game-changer.
"Maybe he isn't coming." Cole set Laurel's bottle down on the coffee table to rub his infant daughter's back. The baby rewarded her father with a burp and a bit of barf.
"Oh, he's coming all right." Tennyson didn't need to be psychic to know that. "I dangled a carrot he won't be able to resist in front of him.” He wore a self-satisfied smirk on his face.
Carson laughed. "Now this I've got to hear."
Tennyson was about to explain the cryptic text message he'd settled on sending Ronan instead of calling to tell him about the candy factory turned apartment complex when the doorbell rang.
"Hark! I believeth your prince approacheth!" Truman giggled.
"You had to marry a drama queen, didn't you?” Tennyson used the burp cloth on Cole’s shoulder to dab at the corner of Laurel’s Cupid’s bow mouth.
"It was love at first sight." Carson batted his eyelashes.
"Hey, Ronan!” Truman called from the front door. “Glad you could make it! Nice Gronk jersey. You and Ten are twins. Well, almost. Let me take that cookie tray while you take off your coat." Truman shot Tennyson a wink while he carried the dessert into the kitchen.
When Ronan came into the living room, Ten could see he was wearing the home version of the Patriots' tight end jersey, navy blue with white letters and numbers. Tennyson's version of the jersey was a bit different.
"Holy fuck, it's pink!" Ronan laughed. "I didn't figure you as the pink jersey type."
"You shush!" Cole laughed. "That's Ten's good luck jersey."
"You get lucky while you were wearing it, Nostradamus?" Ronan’s million watt grin stretched from ear to ear.
"No," Tennyson rolled his eyes, "but Tom Brady did. The Patriots were getting their asses so badly kicked in the Super Bowl last year against the Falcons that I decided I needed to do something to help. I didn't have a hat to flip around backward, so I grabbed the Gronk shirt. I'd gotten this jersey as a Christmas present from a well-meaning client, but there was no way in hell I was going to wear it, well, not until the Pats were down by twenty-five points in the third quarter."
"Let me get this straight, you think the Patriots won the Super Bowl because you put that ridiculous shirt on?" Ronan laughed.
Tennyson nodded.
"You're psychic, didn't you just know they were going to win?" Ronan asked.
The three psychics in the room shook their heads and groaned.
"Have a slice of pizza, Ronan." Cassie offered him a clean plate and the grilled pie on a tray.
Ronan obeyed and took a seat on the sofa between Cole and his daughter and Tennyson.
"It doesn't work that way, Ronan. At least it shouldn't. I've vowed to only use my gifts to help other people, like the Fryes. There are other, less scrupulous, sensitives who use their powers for personal gain, but I would never associate with them." Tennyson grabbed a slice of pizza once Ronan had put two slices on his own plate.
"None of us would. Would we, princess?" Cole pressed a kiss to his daughter's forehead.
Ronan looked back and forth between Cole and Tennyson, the look on his face impossible to read. "So, what's this about you figuring out what Michael meant about candy?"
"Straight to final Jeopardy!" Carson laughed.
"Actually, I can't take total credit for this. It was really Truman who came up with a viable resting place for Michael's remains."
"WHAT?" Ronan bellowed.
Laurel startled and screeched in Cole's arms.
"Seriously, asshole?" Cole punched Ronan's arm when Cassie took the baby from his arms. "You may be used to browbeating suspects, but you've got a hell of a lot to learn about how to treat your friends and their babies." Cole shook his head and followed his wife and daughter out of the living room.
"Wow, I'm a colossal dick," Ronan said sheepishly.
"No arguments here, big fella." Tennyson waggled his eyebrows at Ronan.
"This is my last chance, guys. I know that doesn't excuse my behavior here or over the last few days, but if I don't solve this case, I could lose my shield,” Ronan admitted.
"What shield?" Carson asked.
"Captain America's shield!" Tennyson answered tensely. "His detective's shield."
"You're taking on Ronan's traits, Ten," Truman cautioned, sitting on the arm of Carson's wing chair.
"I don't get it. These cases are years, sometimes decades cold. How are you expected to solve them when all of the detectives who came before you couldn’t?" Carson leaned in closer.
"That's just the thing. Sometimes witnesses come forward after years have gone by. Circumstances change that make them want to confess what they know. Technology might be available to test DNA that wasn't around when the crime was committed. Or new evidence could come to light." Ronan shrugged.
"You don't have any of those things in the Michael Frye case." Tennyson reached out to link hands with Ronan. He could feel anxiety and desperation pouring off the cop.
"No and that's what made me reach out to you. After you found the Lanski boy, I thought you could help me find Michael and at least bring his family some closure."
"That's what we're going to do, Ronan." Tennyson felt sure of it. "But here's the thing. First and foremost in Michael's mind was bringing his parents peace. When you die, your priorities change. Gone is the need for revenge or payback. Not that a five-year-old has much of a capacity for that anyway. Do you understand what I'm saying?"
Ronan stared at their joined hands as if he were trying to figure out where he started and where Tennyson ended. "Telling us where his body is wasn't important to him when he hadn't spoken to his parents in seven years."
"Exactly," Tennyson said in a soothing voice. "Just because you're dead, doesn't mean you have all the answers in life either. Michael didn't understand why his parents weren’t the same people they were when he died. He needed to know why. That was also more important to him than telling us where to find his bones."
Ronan looked up from their hands. His mouth gaped open like a fish out of water.
"That's how Michael sees his physical remains, Ronan," Carson chimed in. "The most important part of himself is free now. It has been since the moment he passed. The living put such high importance on the physical body of loved ones because it’s all we have left. If everyone could see spirits like I do, the need to find and bury bones wouldn't be as important."
"I still don't get what you're saying." Ronan sounded confused.
"Picture the worst murder victim you've ever seen," Carson suggested.
"Floater. Poor bastard had been in Charles River for five days in July." Ronan shivered in the warm room.
"Gross," Truman dry-heaved.
Carson nodded at his husband. "How long ago did that murder happen?"
"God, that was my first week as a homicide detective, so nine years ago. I can still remember the way he smelled."
"You just made my point. If you had been able to see his spirit, young, whole and perfectly healthy, I'm betting the way that man looked and smelled in death wouldn't have stuck with you for nearly a decade."
Ronan nodded, looking as if he was considering Carson's words.
"Once Michael had comforted his parents, he was willing to work with your bu
rning questions. Keep in mind though, he was five years old when he died. Yes, he could read, but that doesn't mean he was sitting in the passenger seat of the killer's car reading street signs. He could have been unconscious or locked in the trunk of a car."
"Yeah." Ronan nodded.
"So back to the case at hand, the three of us got together on Friday night and talked about candy. We came up with some ideas about what Michael could have been talking about." Tennyson was grateful to Carson for taking the time to explain things to Ronan.
There was so much the detective didn’t understand and couldn’t interpret with his own five senses. It helped that Carson had jumped in to explain this, rather than it coming from him. Tennyson got the idea that sometimes Ronan was just more receptive to concepts that weren’t coming out of his mouth.
"What did you come up with?" Ronan pulled his notebook out of his back pocket and snapped out the tip of his pen.
"Well, the obvious answer is that the killer offered him candy to lure him into a vehicle."
"I had considered that too," Ronan agreed. "What else?"
Tennyson rolled his eyes. "Demanding bastard. We'd also considered the fact that candy could be someone's name. Do you think maybe Michael knew his killer?"
"That's always a possibility in child abduction cases. It could explain why none of the neighbors heard the boy screaming for help or out of panic when he was taken. But if Michael knew his killer, why didn't he just tell us the name on Friday?"
"Not on his agenda at the moment," Carson said. "You ever spend any time at all with kids? They aren't like trained seals performing on command."
"That's for sure," Truman agreed. "I couldn't even get my nephews to sit still long enough to tell me what they wanted for Christmas last month.”
"Lastly, and this was all Truman," Tennyson smiled at his friend. "Candy could be a place."
"A place?" Ronan's head tilted to the side.
Tennyson could swear he could see the cop's brain working to figure it out for himself.
"Shit, the old candy factory in Dorchester?" Ronan’s eyes lit up.
Truman nodded. "That was my first thought. We did a little internet research on the property and they were doing active construction work on it in October of 2010 when Michael disappeared."
"Oh my God," Ronan half-whispered. He looked around the living room at the other men.
"What's our next step?" Tennyson squeezed their joined hands.
"Aside from demolishing these hot wings?" Cole asked from the kitchen door. "Get 'em while they're hot."
"I'll call my captain. I want you at the precinct with me first thing in the morning to explain all of this to him. We're going to need some kind of ground-penetrating radar to look for the body and that's not something I can requisition on my own."
"Anything I can do to help." Now that Ronan wasn't throwing off massive amounts of anxiety and tension, he could feel their mutual attraction flowing through their joined hands. It was a nice, peaceful feeling. One Ten knew wasn't going to last.
17
Ronan
Ronan could feel hordes of butterflies rioting in his stomach. So much was riding on this meeting with Captain Fitzgibbon. He didn’t have the same open-minded nature as his former captain in homicide. Ronan had no idea how Brett McCabe had talked him into letting Tennyson assist on this investigation in the first place.
He’d been up since 4am and had gone for a run around the John F. Kennedy Library out at Columbia Point in Dorchester. The soaring glass structure looked out over Boston Harbor and was part of Boston’s Harbor Walk, a forty-three mile long system of paths lining the waterways of the city, which was favored by runners.
Ronan used his time to come up with the right words to say to his captain to get the stubborn man to agree to sending the heavy equipment out to the candy factory apartments. He knew there were risks involved in this, one of them being the public attention this would attract. There was no way you could bring ground-penetrating radar into an apartment complex quietly. Especially in the age of smartphones.
Ronan was pacing outside of the building, waiting for Tennyson. He pulled his iPhone out of his pocket again to check the time. It was 7:40am. His meeting with the psychic and the captain started at 8am and Fitzgibbon was a man who demanded promptness. He’d stressed that to Tennyson several times yesterday, during and after Sunday dinner at Truman’s house.
It had been the lure of Ten’s clue about Michael Frye that had gotten him out of his apartment to go to the football party, but once he was there, he was glad he’d gone. Tennyson’s friends, more like his family, were a great group of people. They supported him one hundred percent, but weren’t afraid to give him shit. Ronan had felt like part of the family by the end of the night and had even fed Laurel a bottle. The baby had rewarded him by spitting up on his Gronk jersey.
He was about to check his phone again when a dark SUV pulled up in front of the precinct. "Parking for official vehicles only," Ronan said when the driver put down his window.
"Does me being a passenger make it an official vehicle?" Tennyson asked with a cheeky grin when he hopped out of the back seat with a rolling suitcase and handed the driver a folded bill. Ronan thought it looked like a hundred.
"Pleasure driving you, Tennyson. Thanks for everything."
"You're welcome, Jack."
"Let me guess, you connected him with his long lost Aunt Sue who left millions stuffed in an old mattress."
"God, you're an asshole. I thought after spending the day with us you finally understood what it is we do."
Tennyson had a point. He was being a dick. "Who did you channel for him?"
The psychic turned and made eye contact with Ronan. He seemed to be studying the cop’s intent. "His younger brother who died when they were little boys. He was hit by a car when they were running home from school. Jack spent the last thirty years blaming himself for his brother's death."
"Did the brother forgive him?" Ronan knew what it was like to live with that kind of guilt. He carried it with him every day.
"Yes, the brother forgave him. Just like Manuel Garcia forgives you."
Ronan was stunned. He would swear he felt his heart stop beating in his chest. "How do you know that?"
Tennyson sighed. "He's with you, Ronan. Manuel is one of those spirits I told you about who came home with you from work. I tried to get him to cross over the night I stayed at your place, but he doesn't want to go until he can talk to you."
"Me? Why doesn't he want to talk to his family?" Jesus Christ! Manuel Garcia had been living with him for the last six months? He shivered and not from the cold January winds.
"He does," Tennyson leaned closer to whisper. "But, I don't think this is the time or place to talk about that. It's part of the reason I booked the car and packed for the night." He nodded down at his rolling carry-on bag.
Ronan nodded, too confused and frankly too freaked out to say anything else.
"It's going to be okay. I promise." Ten set a hand on the crook of Ronan's arm.
"We should get inside. The captain is expecting us." Ronan led them inside the station house and out of the cold. They took the elevator to the fourth floor, which to his great regret, housed, among other units, homicide, and cold case.
"Here we are." Ronan led Tennyson to his neat-as-a-pin desk. "You can leave your suitcase here. No one will bother it. You want some coffee? I sure the hell could use a cup."
Ten nodded and followed along behind Ronan. He was about to walk into the kitchen when he heard a very familiar voice telling a very familiar story. Ronan stopped short, grunting when Tennyson ran into his back.
"What is it?" Tennyson asked curiously.
Ronan bit back the sarcastic comment on the tip of his tongue. "My ex is in there. Holding court."
"Oh, good. I can't wait to meet the stupid prick." Tennyson gave Ronan a little shove from behind.
Making a mental note to ask Ten what he meant by that later, he walked into
the kitchen.
"Hey, look everyone, it's Ronan and his ghost whisperer." Josh burst out laughing.
Ronan turned to Tennyson who'd just gone pale right before his eyes. "Christ, are you okay?"
Tennyson nodded. "Just starving is all. Where's the food? I thought all cops did was eat donuts? Guess that’s another television myth busted."
All the cops in the room who'd been laughing at Josh turned to laugh at Tennyson’s joke.
"We got some instant oatmeal cups if you're interested in those?" A detective with a name badge reading "O'Dwyer" suggested.
"Thanks, that would be great." Ten offered the Irish cop a smile.
"You gonna wipe his ass too, Mick?" Josh sneered.
"Didn't think you'd be so touchy when your ex got a new man." O'Dwyer winked at Ronan.
Ronan snorted and took the oatmeal from the vice cop and started fixing it for Ten. He could tell by the psychic's demeanor that there was something more wrong with him than simple hunger.
"Nice to meet you, Tennyson. Bring him by later, if you've got a minute, O'Mara. Got a question to run past you both."
Ronan nodded and popped the oatmeal into the microwave. He very much doubted the question Mick wanted to ask had anything thing at all to do with him. He most likely had a question that involved Tennyson’s particular skill set.
One by one, the other cops filed out of the break room until all that was left were him, Ten, and Josh. He could feel his ex's gaze burning a hole in the back of his head. While the food cooked, he made Ten and himself a cup of coffee.
"So you know how ghost whisperer takes his coffee. How sweet. I suppose you know how he likes his cock sucked too."
Tennyson burst out laughing.
When Ronan turned around, the psychic was slapping the table with his left hand.
"What?" Ronan started to giggle along with him.
"I know I promised not to read people without their permission..." He gasped for breath. "But you're so green with envy that you glow like the Grinch Who Stole Christmas!"
Josh growled and took a step toward Tennyson, who suddenly stopped laughing.
