by Aiden Bates
"Oh my god." Katherine tried to pull her blouse closer to her neck. "That's terrible." Two huge tears rolled down her cheeks. "I didn't even know her, but I’ve always believed that she got away somehow. That I had a cousin somewhere, maybe San Francisco or something, that I'd meet someday."
Ryan passed her a tissue and gave her a moment to pull herself together. "Katherine, we're investigating the two cases together, and we don't have any firm suspects at this point. We do, however, need to eliminate people as suspects, which means that we'll probably ask you a few uncomfortable questions. I hope you understand that we're not trying to railroad anyone, but to just do our due diligence and show that we didn't go in with any kind of bias."
He cleared his throat and threw her a softball to get started. "Katherine, do you remember hearing any stories within the family about people who might have had problems with your family, or problems with Maureen?"
Katherine sighed. "Everyone had problems with Maureen. She was the wild child, you know? And outside the family, she was the one who was dating a black man." She bit her lip. "To be honest, I tried to stay as far away from my father and his side of the family as I could after my parents split up." She turned red-rimmed eyes to them. "My dad—I'm sure he meant well, you know? But he could be vicious. The rest of them encouraged him. All except for Uncle Steven, and he never did anything to stop Dad. He just went along with everything Dad wanted, but he'd come by and try to comfort me later."
Ryan was writing as fast as his hand could move, so it was up to Nick to speak. "That was really nice of him."
"It was." She smiled, a little weakly. "He was a nice guy. Super sweet, and a little sad. He never got married, and he never did have kids that I heard about. He took real good care of me and Joey, though." She hung her head. "I think he was close with her, you know? Close with Maureen, I mean."
"How so?" Ryan bit the end of his pen as he waited for his witness to elaborate.
"Well, he used to sometimes say that I reminded him of her. He was probably right." She chuckled. "I dated a guy in college, a black guy. Tariq, his name was. One of the sweetest guys I know. Anyway I happened to show a picture of Tariq and me to Uncle Steve. You know what he said to me?"
Ryan had almost forgotten to write things down. He was too caught up in the story. "What?"
"He said, 'He looks like a great guy, and you look super happy together. Whatever you do, Kathy dear, you cannot let your dad find out about this. You just can't. He won't be able to handle it, baby girl. He'd go crazy.' And I understood that, I guess. Not the sentiment, but the warning. Dad didn't say a lot about that kind of thing, but he made enough comments here and there that you knew what he was thinking."
"So he was a racist." Nick sat back in his chair.
"I don't know that I'd go that far. Maybe. I know he didn't like for people to mix. He was definitely a segregationist, which I thought was a little weird since we live in Boston. But whatever." She rolled her eyes. "You meet all kinds, I guess."
"I guess you do." Ryan figured that it must have been difficult, growing up with a father like that. "How would you characterize your relationship with your father?"
"I hated him." She didn't hesitate when she spoke. "I still do. If you'd seen what he did to my mom, you wouldn't even be able to ask that question."
"Your brother seems comfortable with him." Nick couldn't look her in the eye when he asked the question. Ryan didn't blame him.
"Joey's getting a leg up on a damn good job by playing nice with him." Katherine gave a toss of her head. "I had to toe the line for a long time. I don't have to do that anymore. I don't visit him. I don't call him. I see him if he happens to show up to something like my nephew's christening. I don't associate with him and I don't intend to start now."
"All right. I guess that's a pretty firm statement." Ryan smirked. "For what it's worth, I'm really sorry to have to bring all of this up to you. I know it's difficult to have someone rehash the worst times in your life without a lot of warning."
Katherine turned her head away and looked down for a moment. "I'm sorry. You're right, it's not fun. But it has to get done, right? I mean, you can't find their killers without digging at this stuff."
"No, we can't." Ryan took Katherine's hand. "I can promise you that we're going to do everything in our power to find them, Katherine. And we're going to bring them to justice. It's just going to take a little while longer."
"I hope it's soon, Detectives. They've waited long enough."
***
Nick flung himself into his chair and buried his face on his desk. If a meteor landed on the police station and flattened it into rubble, killing him instantly, he'd thank it for ending the day. Ryan had been cool toward him, with good cause he guessed, and then they'd had that terrible interview with Katherine Tierney.
"What's up with the poop face?" Pat Tessaro, one of the other detectives, plopped himself down on Ryan's desk.
Nick looked up at him. "Poop face?"
"You know. That face you get when they can hear you angsting down in the traffic division." Pat picked up one of the rubber stamps that Nick had left out on his desk, examined it, and put it down again.
"I don't angst." Nick pouted and crossed his arms over his chest.
"Dude. They could bottle you and release it at Twilight showings. Come on, out with it. What's up with you lately?" Pat tossed his ponytail behind him and ruffled Nick's head.
"Don't do that." Nick glared at him. "It's just been a challenging week, okay? I had to tell some lady that the aunt she'd thought had gotten away actually got killed, and then I got to make her relive the crappiest parts of her childhood while she was at work. I'm feeling a little bit down about that."
"Yikes." Pat fussed with the scarf he was wearing today; some kind of fringed thing he'd picked up Lord only knew where. "I hate doing family notifications. I hate doing them even more when I wasn't planning to do them."
Nick snapped his fingers. "But isn't that the thing? I mean the brother, Steven, he made the identification. He should have told the rest of the family. And Katherine said she had a good relationship with Steven, so I can't imagine a reason why he wouldn't have notified the rest of them." He sighed. "I hate it when he's right."
Pat gave a little chuckle. "By he you mean Pretty Boy."
Nick glowered. "Pretty Boy has a name. And a very long history of convictions under his belt, thank you very much."
Pat raised his hands. "Easy, tiger. My bad. Detective Tran, then." He rolled his eyes. "I had no idea that you felt so strongly about him. I heard you'd done the deed, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything."
"Jesus, you guys gossip worse than a bunch of old women." Nick smacked a hand down on his desk. "Why does anyone even care who I do or don't sleep with?"
"What are we supposed to talk about, Devlin's latest haircut?" Pat laughed. "But seriously, man, none of us thought that it meant anything. I mean, he's pretty, and he smells good, but it's not like he's the kind of guy who you'd usually take home."
"I usually take home one night stands, Pat." Nick looked up at him. "Ryan's not like that. At least I don't think he is."
"Really?" Pat whistled. "Wow. That's kind of huge. I mean, none of us have mated. You'd be the first."
Nick pushed away from his desk. "I'm not going to claim him, Pat! For crying out loud, we work together! I can't claim my work partner!"
"Of course you can." Pat waved a dismissive hand. "I mean, it's a little weird, but it's not like he's a real member of the Cold Case unit. He's going back to Abused Persons when this is all over. You wouldn't be working with your mate; you'd just both be cops. Which isn't that unusual. Lots of beta cops marry other cops." Pat put a hand on Nick's shoulder. "What you need to do here is to figure out what's really going on in that head of yours. The decision to claim someone or not is a big deal, and it's one that you can't take back. If you're hesitating, there's a reason for it. You need to figure out why.
"Now, the two of you
argue a lot. There's no getting around that." Pat picked up a pen and flipped it up in the air. "You've got your reasons, and so does he, I'm guessing. Are you arguing with him all the time because you're afraid of your reaction to him?"
"What?" Nick scoffed. "That's absurd."
"Not so much. I was in a relationship with this guy, years ago, and I had it bad for him. He was brilliant, and he was amazing, and I could barely keep my hands off of him when I was around him. That terrified me, and I guess I didn't recognize what it was that I wanted from him. Or maybe I did, and he just didn't want the same thing from me. Either way, he took off, and I'm alone. You've absolutely got that spark, man. No one would go after someone else the way you've gone after Pre—Tran if you didn't. But you need to sit yourself down and figure out what you want from him and how you're going to get it, or you'll regret it for the rest of your life."
Nick sat back and looked at his friend. Pat's normally cocky and jovial face was deathly serious, and Nick had to take him seriously. "Okay, but I'm not even sure that's something that I want. And I barely know the guy." He stood up and stretched his back. "I mean, I don't know whether or not he'll even want a claim, not after losing his alpha all those years ago. And it's not like he's all that familiar with family life, right?"
Pat stroked his chin and looked up at the fluorescent lights in the ceiling. "Well," he drawled. "The way I see it, you've got two options. You could sit here with me until the rest of the team comes back, and we could talk in circles around each other until we're seeing goldfish on the wall or something."
Nick shuddered. "Option B?"
"Talk to your boy. See what he's thinking, from his own mouth. That way there's no doubts and no questions." Pat shrugged. "I know which one I'd prefer. If we talk in circles around one another I don't have to do the paperwork for the Schwenke case."
Nick threw a paper clip at him, and Pat laughed and returned to his desk.
Nick pulled out his phone and sent a quick text to Ryan. You free this weekend?
Ryan replied about five minutes later. I can be. Why?
Nick stared at the screen. This was a big deal. Have something case-related to discuss, but I thought it might be nice to spend the weekend together. He paused. We can go to my place.
Ryan seemed to give that some thought, because the reply took ten minutes this time. The whole weekend?
We don't have to if you don't want to. Nick typed back his reply right away, even though his stomach was tied up in knots.
Ryan's text came back so fast that it made Nick jump. I want to. I just need to get my things. There was a pause. Text me your address and I'll meet you over there when you're ready?
A wave of relief washed over Nick. Ryan was willing to give it a try, at least. Well, he was willing to give something a try. Nick had no way to know exactly what that something might be, but he'd give it a shot. He texted his address back to Ryan and told him what time he expected to get home and turned back to his work with a much lighter heart.
Ryan got to Nick's house at seven o'clock that night, carrying an overnight bag and wearing a little smile. Nick brought the bag up to the master bedroom and kissed him before whisking him out to a local taqueria for dinner. After their food was brought out, along with a margarita for each of them, Nick grinned at Ryan. "Okay. Here's the only official business I want to discuss this weekend."
Ryan raised an eyebrow but otherwise didn't address that. "Okay, shoot."
"We were the ones who notified Katherine Tierney of her aunt's death, correct?" He loaded up his fork with rice and beans.
Ryan made a face. "Yeah. That was kind of unpleasant."
"But her uncle, with whom she had a good relationship, was the one who ID'ed the body." Nick watched, chewing, as Ryan understood his implication.
"I mean it's possible that he just didn't feel like it was something that she needed to know, since she never knew Maureen, but that still doesn't quite fit." Ryan squirmed a little bit in his seat. "It doesn't exactly make the family look less involved, let's put it that way."
"Right?" Nick sighed. "I was definitely hoping for better. It doesn't necessarily mean that they did it, but I can't help but think that they at least colluded." He took a sip of his margarita. "Okay. If it's all right with you, I'd like to propose a blanket ban on talking shop for the rest of the weekend."
"Unless something major comes up," Ryan countered. He toyed with his glass and looked over at Nick, a speculative look in his eye. "I have to say, I'm a little… Let me try that again. What exactly is going on here?"
Nick swallowed hard. He'd been willing enough to have this conversation, back when it had just been him and Pat in the privacy of the empty office. Now that he was confronted with his beautiful omega and that omega's intoxicating scent, a difficult conversation seemed even harder. It had to be done, though. Pat was right. "So, I guess that's the question. What exactly is going on here, and what exactly do we want to be going on here?" He looked down at his plate. "Look, I like you. I like you a lot. I'm just… I'm not used to having any kind of relationship with anyone I'm working with. It's making me nervous."
"Okay. Fair enough." Ryan spoke slowly, and lifted his glass to his lips. "I mean, I definitely like you too. That shouldn't surprise you. We’ve got incredible chemistry together. And you've been kinder to me than I thought you would be, all things considered."
Nick cringed. "I didn't exactly put my best foot forward when we met."
"I guess… I guess I'm nervous. I… Are you looking for a longer-term relationship?"
Nick licked his lips. "I was hesitant. I've never tried to build something longer-term, not since I was a kid anyway. And I never thought it would be a good idea with someone I worked with. But you're not joining Cold Case. This is temporary."
"Right." Ryan met his eyes. "I'm going back to my normal job soon."
"And Pat Tessaro pointed out that plenty of other cops get involved with colleagues." Nick put his hand on Ryan's. "It's not that unusual."
Ryan nodded, and blushed. "I mean, I'm on board. Don't get me wrong." He looked down for a moment and then back up at Nick. "It's kind of weird for me. I haven't even wanted to consider anything beyond just the physical in years, but here you are and I'm like, Well, maybe. I wonder. And that scares me a bit."
"It scares me too." Nick squeezed his hand. "I just think that the reward is probably going to be better than the risk, don't you?"
"Hell yeah." Ryan winked but then sobered up. "The thing is, our entire relationship has been based on conflict. I'm a little worried. We're both strong-willed guys. How do we handle that, without letting it get so bad that we wind up ruining everything that we have?"
Nick bit the inside of his cheek. Ryan had a point. He had an excellent point, in fact. "I don't know," he said after a minute. "I think that if we have enough of a commitment to each other, and to our relationship, we can make it work. We'll probably screw up a few times, here and there. We'll fight. We'll get angry. We're both passionate guys. But if we can make a promise to each other, right here and right now, to make the effort to come back together and work things out, I think we can probably do it."
Ryan took a deep breath and closed his eyes. "I'm nervous. I want this, I do, but I'm scared. I'm afraid that it's going to end badly." He blew out that breath he'd drawn in and opened his eyes. "But you don't gain anything without risk, right? I can live my life in fear or I can let myself experience something good."
Nick laughed with delight. He and Ryan finished their meals and went back to his place.
They made love tenderly that night, less the product of desperation and explosive desire than the fulfillment of the promise they'd made to one another in the restaurant. Ryan let Nick undress him slowly and carefully, exploring every inch of his bronze skin with all of the adoration that he felt. Then Ryan did the same for Nick, mapping out the lines of Nick's body with his tongue.
When Nick finally entered Ryan, it was in the missionary position. He w
anted to watch Ryan's face as he made love to him. He wanted to see how he came apart underneath him, to be able to remember what Ryan looked like after each thrust. Afterward, he held Ryan close and fell asleep with Ryan in his arms, and this time Ryan was still where he was supposed to be when he woke up.
They spent Saturday lazily making out for the most part, although they did take a few hours out to go hike at Ashland State Park. The weather was chilly but not terrible, about normal for mid-November, and Nick certainly wasn't bothered by the cold with his omega by his side. The cool weather had the added bonus of ensuring that almost no one was there to be bothered by the occasional public display of affection. That earned Nick a spectacular blowjob just off the trail, for no other reason than the fact that Ryan felt like it.
Nick knew they shouldn't be doing that, that it was in fact illegal, but he couldn't bring himself to care. There wasn't anyone around to be offended, and Ryan's mouth was a gift from God. So were his eyes, and the way he looked up at Nick with a kind of merry affection.
