Ball & Chain

“Well . . . it’s a small island,” Maisie Ross told him. “Jockie and I grew up together, so of course we’ve been together. There are only a handful of year-round staff, and I’m one of them, even if I am just the nanny when the family’s here. I work as a housekeeper as well, and I help Jockie with the gardening. But when Amelia’s on the island, she’s my only job. I was with her that night, asleep. I have to sleep when she does or she runs me ragged.”



Most of the staff and wedding guests were cooperative. Others were so nervous they could barely remember their names when Nick asked, and a select few were irritable or downright combative about being there. The Snake Eaters, especially, were irate when they were questioned.



Nick put the latter guests in a special list, which included all five of the Snake Eaters, to question them again. Just to irritate them.



“My men wouldn’t kill someone by bashing their head in with a rock,” John English insisted. “That’s just insulting.”



“You’re damn right it’s insulting,” Lenny Hardin sneered. He was around Nick’s size, with dark hair and a receding hairline he tried to hide by keeping his head nearly shaved. “If I was going to kill some snot-nosed little bitch like that Milton guy, I sure as damn hell wouldn’t use a rock. Come on. I bet even you Recon bitches know how to snap someone’s neck.”



Solomon Frost was one of the Snake Eaters Nick actually liked. He was lanky and laid-back, with close-cropped blond hair and a hard face that seemed at odds when he smiled. “I was doing my rounds. The beach wasn’t part of our territory; we stuck close to the house. I’m just here to do a job. Are you getting paid for this shit? Because you should be.”



The one female Snake Eater, Avery Kline, was even more irritated at being questioned than the others had been. “Do you know what it’s like being the only woman on a team like this? I have to work twice as hard to prove myself, and I still get the shitty assignments. They kept me inside the house the entire night, said it would make the female guests feel more comfortable. Do you know how much bullshit that is? Half those girls weren’t even in their own beds most of the night anyway!”



Riddle Park, the silent Korean Snake Eater, had nothing to say about the night before. Nick was searching his memory for the few bits and pieces of Korean he had learned to ask if the man spoke English when Park leaned closer to him and peered over the sunglasses he wore. One eye was a milky-white color. “I saw nothing,” he said, and then got up to leave.



Hours into the day, after over thirty questionings, a picture of everyone on the island in his iPad, and an entire notepad full of notes, charts, and scribbles, Nick was ready to bash himself in the head with a pool cue.



He glanced up when the door clicked shut, and he sighed in relief when he saw that his next interview was Kelly.



“Good afternoon, Detective,” Kelly drawled. He pulled up the stool opposite Nick and sat.



“This is fucking exhausting,” Nick said. “Anyone out there look nervous?”



“Everyone out there looks nervous. What the hell are you doing to people in here?”



Nick shrugged helplessly.



“On the plus side, no one else has shown up dead.”



Nick rubbed at his eyes, fighting the throbbing that had started up about an hour ago.



“You okay?” Kelly asked, his voice going softer.



Nick met Kelly’s multicolored eyes, and warmth spread through him, easing the stress. He reached across the bar top and took Kelly’s hand in his, kissing his palm without a word.



“Aren’t you going to take my picture for your records and ask me where I was last night?” Kelly teased.



Nick responded with a low rumble, because he damn well remembered every last second of where Kelly had been last night. They were both silent for a few moments, their hands clasped. Kelly finally picked up Nick’s iPad and took his own picture, making a face when he clicked it. Nick chuckled and took it away from him, setting it aside.



“You remember anything from last night that was off?”



Kelly shook his head. “I’ve been trying, but I can’t think of anything.”



Nick nodded. That was the answer he’d been getting all day.



Kelly stood and walked around the end of the bar, coming up to Nick and sliding his arms around his shoulders. Nick rested his cheek against Kelly’s chest and closed his eyes as Kelly rested his chin on Nick’s head. He wrapped his arms around Kelly’s waist and Kelly slid closer, holding him tight. They stayed that way for long minutes, giving Nick a break, soaking in each other’s presence.



“Ty is waiting for the next interview,” Kelly finally said, his voice suddenly tense.



Nick groaned, closing his eyes and burying his face in Kelly’s chest. After interviewing Ty, they would have to switch and Ty would interrogate him. This was not the way he had envisioned telling Ty about himself and Kelly, but he supposed there was no choice now. It was his alibi, after all.



“It’ll be okay,” Kelly told him. He patted Nick’s cheek and stepped back. Nick’s hands fell away as Kelly headed for the door. “Scream if he tries to kill you.”



“That’s not funny.”



“It’s a little funny.”



Nick grunted as Kelly slid out of the room, and before the door closed, Ty had stepped in.



“You look rough, buddy,” Ty said with a smirk. He set a bottle of water down at Nick’s elbow, along with a couple of aspirin, then took the stool across from him.



“Thanks.” Nick stared at the bottle, feeling like his entire body was tumbling with nerves.



“Anyone stand out?”



Nick forced himself to meet Ty’s eyes. “Not anything glaring. I’ve been starting with the party and having them walk me through to four this morning. Most of the answers I’m getting are alcohol or someone else’s bed.”



“Not surprised,” Ty said with a huff. “Why the party? Why so early?”



“Doc’s temp check said eight hours at least. Even accounting for the night being cold, that puts us around midnight, give or take an hour. The watch is wrong.”



Ty frowned hard, leaning his elbows on the bar. “So he . . . he probably left the party and then bought it. How’d his watch break at three something?”



Nick raised an eyebrow and nodded. He’d been asking himself the same thing. “I have no clue. I have two theories, though. Want to hear them?”



“Yeah.”



“A few people have said they noticed he was messing with his watch all night. It could have been broken, frozen at that time.”



“Huh. What’s the other theory?”



Nick shrugged. “Someone killed him knowing time of death would be tricky way out here, so they wound the watch to a later time and smashed it. Made it an easy TOD. Made sure someone saw them hours later for the alibi.”



Ty narrowed his eyes, cocking his head.



“That’s what I’d do, anyway. In a pinch. Hope no one would bring out the turkey thermometer.”



“You’d make a really scary serial killer, Irish.”



Nick tapped his pen on his pad of paper, staring until Ty shifted uneasily. “Okay. Walk me through the party.”



“Well. We ate. We had the meeting with Stanton. I think I left the patio twice over the course of the night to go take a piss. Then we wound up in the garden watching you smoke a joint with my brother.”



“We’ll leave that out of the notes,” Nick grumbled as he wrote the rest down. “Did you see the victim at the party?”



“Not after the meeting in the study.”



Nick added Ty to the list of people who hadn’t seen Milton after the time of that meeting. He’d obviously not returned to the patio that night, and that gave them roughly a ten-hour window for the crime.



“Did you see anyone leave the party after the meeting, anyone who struck you as behaving oddly?”



Ty gave it some real thought before shaking his head. “Honestly, I was more concerned with you and Doc chatting up my baby cousin than watching anyone else.”



Nick tried hard not laugh. “Where did you go after you left the party?”



“We took a walk toward the beach. I asked Zane to marry me. He turned me down. Then we headed back to the room.”



Nick stared at his best friend for a few beats before saying, “What?”



Ty slammed his hand on the bar top. “He said no! Twice!”



“Ty.” Nick sighed, rubbing his temple as he recognized the warning signs of Ty winding up.



“No, no. Three times! Three times he’s turned me down!”



Nick reached for the aspirin Ty had brought him.



“Three times!”



“Tyler, listen, I’m really sorry about the . . . three times, but you seem to be handling it pretty well this far, and this isn’t one of those instances where I need to talk you off the edge, so could we maybe save this until after I eat?”



“Look, a beautiful beach in Scotland? Nope. Castle? Nuh uh. Rug in front of a fire?”



“Oh God, stop. Ty, please,” Nick said quickly. He put his head in his hands. “That’s . . . no.”



Ty cleared his throat and nodded. “Sorry.”



Nick watched him for a few seconds, still covering half his face with one hand. Ty looked absolutely miserable. He might have seemed like he was handling the rejections well, but Nick could see underneath the mask just like he’d always been able to. “Condolences on getting shot down. Repeatedly.”



Ty didn’t even glare at him. He looked like a kicked puppy, and it made Nick want to slam his face into the wet bar. “You need to talk about it, babe?”



“Please. I’m going fucking insane trying not to give him . . . puppy eyes and beg him to rethink it.”



“Well, you can quit giving me puppy eyes. You’ve asked him three times?” Nick asked, hating himself for giving in and feeling sorry for Ty instead of feeling sorry for himself right now.



Ty nodded. “He said I hadn’t thought it through yet.”



“He’s probably right.”



“You’re supposed to be on my side, here,” Ty grunted.



“I’m on the side of the righteous, babe; means I’m rarely on your side.”



Ty barked a laugh.



“What kind of time span are we talking here?”



“I asked him the night we got here,” Ty said as he began to play with one of Nick’s extra pens. “Before the dinner.”



“You’ve asked him to marry you three times in thirty-six hours?”



Ty smacked his hand on the bar again. “If I had you on the balcony of a castle with the motherfucking wilds of fucking Scotland out the window and I asked you to marry me, wouldn’t you say yes?”



Nick shook his head. “No.”



“Damn it!”



“It’s not the location that’ll reel Zane in, Ty.”



Ty looked almost desperate when he realized Nick was willing to give him advice. He leaned forward. “What do I do?”



“Well . . . he said you hadn’t thought it through. So think it the fuck through for him. Let him know you’re serious and you’re thinking about life instead of just wearing a ring. You know him. I mean, think about it, how would you propose to me?”



Ty waited a beat, then said, “Season tickets at Fenway and a ring in your beer during the seventh inning.”



Nick waved a hand. “And I’m yours.” They both laughed. Nick was still smiling when he dropped his voice to a more serious note. “What are Zane’s season tickets? What’s the thing that will tell him you’re in it for the long haul and you want him there with you? It’s sure as hell not a beach in Scotland.”



Ty nodded, his gaze losing focus. Nick let him ruminate for a few seconds, until Ty finally snapped out of it. “Thanks, Irish.”



“He’ll say yes eventually.” Nick looked back down at his notes, trying to remember where they’d been in the interview. “Okay, so you were on the beach getting shot down by the love of your life.”



Ty grumbled wordlessly.



Nick smirked and fought to recover a straight face. “Did you see anyone else while you were out there?”



“Yeah, there were two people walking. Guy and a girl. We passed them.”



Nick frowned at his notes. He paged through them. “What time was this?”



“Maybe . . . half past midnight.”



Nick pulled out every page of interview notes with a woman. No one, man or woman, had mentioned being out on the beach for a walk. “What’d they look like?”



“I don’t know.”



Nick glanced up, eyes going wider. “You don’t know?”



“I didn’t . . . look at them. I don’t know. The girl was wearing a dress.”



“Ty, every woman on the island was wearing a dress last night.”



“I’m sorry, I didn’t pay attention to them.”



“Were they young, old? Flustered, composed? Hair color, height? Were they hot, not? Were they bloody and carrying a very large rock?”



“I don’t know!”



“Tyler!” Nick dropped his pen and rubbed his hands over his face. “Do you realize you may have seen the killers and you can’t even tell me what fucking color their hair was?”



“I’m sorry! I guess I don’t check people out like I used to.”



Nick groaned. “I’ll be sure to inform Garrett that your eyes don’t wander. Did he see them as well?”



“Yeah.”



Nick shook his head in disgust, glaring at Ty. “You’re the worst witness ever.”