Ball & Chain

“I know.”



Nick grunted and picked up his pen again. “Anything else you didn’t see?”



“No, but you don’t have to be snippy about it.”



Nick fumed for a second. “What time did you return to your room?”



“One, maybe.”



“And who was with you?”



Ty sighed.



“Ty, just answer the fucking questions, okay?”



Ty rolled his eyes. “Zane was with me.”



“And you remained there?”



“Yes. I got tied up in the curtains.”



Nick squeezed his eyes closed. “Why would you tell me that?”



“No, I mean I literally got tied up in the curtains. I got stuck. Zane left me there.”



Nick glanced up, frowning.



Ty rolled his eyes, blushing a little. “I got tangled in the curtains and I couldn’t stop laughing, so Zane left me there and I fell asleep.”



“You mean you passed out drunk.”



“If that’s what they call ‘sleeping’ in Boston, sure.”



“So . . . could Zane have left the room at any point?”



Ty frowned, shifting on his stool. “I guess.”



Nick gave a curt nod and jotted it down.



“Did you just write that down?” Ty asked with an accusatory point.



“Yes.”



“Why?”



“Because I’m writing everything down, Ty.”



“You didn’t write down that you and Deacon were getting high in the garden!”



“Because it wasn’t pertinent to the murder.”



“Neither is Zane leaving me passed out drunk in the curtains!”



“I thought you said you weren’t drunk.”



“Don’t try to confuse me to get a confession, damn you!”



“Tyler, come on!”



“This is police brutality!”



“I swear to God, Beaumont . . .”



Ty glowered for a moment. “Okay, so is that all?”



“Yeah.”



“Your turn?”



Nick’s stomach tangled up, but he nodded and slid the pad across the bar top. “Go for it.”



Ty ran through the same questions Nick had been asking all morning. With every answer, Nick got more and more nervous. He’d probably fail a fucking lie detector test at this point.



“What time did you return to your room?” Ty asked.



“Just after midnight.”



“And you were there the remainder of the night?”



“I was.” Nick watched as Ty’s pen moved across the pad. He swiped his palms across his knees, trying to steel himself for what was coming.



“What did you do in your room the remainder of the night?”



Nick swallowed hard. “I was in bed.”



Ty raised his head. “You were in bed or you were sleeping?”



Nick stared at him, holding his breath. “I was in bed.”



Ty’s eyebrows shot up, and he straightened. He almost looked like he’d been expecting the answer, like maybe he’d heard enough through the wall last night to know Nick hadn’t been sleeping, but he still seemed perturbed by it. “I gather you weren’t alone.”



“No, I wasn’t,” Nick answered. He took a deep, shaky breath. “Look, Ty, this is not the way I wanted to tell you about this. We were waiting until after the wedding stuff died down so you wouldn’t freak out and go nuclear when you’re already under stress.”



Ty narrowed his eyes. He placed the pen on his pad of paper, the movement briefly drawing Nick’s eyes. “Who?” Ty asked, his voice going low and dangerous.



“Oh, Ty, don’t freak out.”



“Who were you with, O’Flaherty?”



Nick couldn’t get enough air to take a breath to steady himself, much less extract a promise from Ty to remain calm. “I was with Kelly,” he said in a rush.



Ty stared, his brow furrowing and the tension seeping out of his shoulders. “Kelly who?”



Nick frowned. “Kelly. Our Kelly. Doc.”



Ty was still staring like he didn’t understand, his head cocked like a puppy hearing a new sound. He glanced at the door, then at Nick again. “You were fucking Kelly?”



“Yes.”



Ty was silent for several more seconds, then barked out a laugh. “I thought you were talking about Emma!”



Nick sighed in relief. This was not the reaction he’d expected, but he’d take it.



Ty laughed harder, but soon he wound down and then stood up. “Wait, you were boning Kelly? How fucking high were you two last night?”



“That’s not . . . it’s not just last night.”



“What does that mean?” Ty demanded.



“I mean it wasn’t the first time. I didn’t just bring him because he has a gun.”



“What the fuck, man, how did that happen?”



“It’s a really long story.”



“I have time,” Ty growled. “How long has it been going on?”



“It started after New Orleans, when we got to Colorado.”



“That was . . . that was months ago! Why the hell am I just finding this out now?”



Nick stood so he would be on the same level as Ty. He was glad the wet bar was between them. “It kind of caught us both by surprise. Then I got deployed before we could figure anything out. Ty, we didn’t even know what the hell there was between us. We kept it quiet because we wanted to know it was serious before we said anything.”



“Bullshit, you could have told me any— Wait, what do you mean serious?”



Nick found himself snickering again. He couldn’t seem to stop, and the more he laughed the more agitated Ty got. He put out a hand to try to calm Ty. “It’s serious.”



“How serious?” Ty asked, still looking scandalized. Nick half expected him to hold his hand to his heart any second now, maybe clutch a string of pearls. Nick howled, doubling over and holding his stomach as Ty glared at him.



“What is so funny?” Ty shouted. “I feel like I need bleach for my ear holes!”



“You,” Nick gasped. He pointed at Ty and shook his head, trying for enough breath to speak. He finally got himself under control and straightened his shoulders to meet Ty’s eyes. He smiled almost serenely. “I love him.”



Ty blinked at that, his mouth falling open.



“I love him, Ty.”



Ty stared at him, then looked down at the bar top for a long few seconds, then back up at Nick with narrowed eyes. “Are we talking with the heart love or with the dick love?” he asked, echoing Nick’s words from so long ago.



Nick merely grinned.



“Good,” Ty said softly.



“What?”



“Good,” Ty repeated. He came around the end of the wet bar, beginning to smile, then pulled Nick into a hug, holding him and patting him on the back. “He’ll treat you right and you deserve that. That’s good.”



Nick gasped as the relief hit him. He squeezed Ty tightly. “You’re not pissed?”



Ty shook his head. He stepped back, meeting Nick’s eyes. “Not pissed. Maybe a little confused, but . . . it kind of makes sense, the two of you. You fit. And to be honest, I’m relieved.”



“Relieved?”



“I thought you were mad at me, man. You didn’t call, you didn’t write.” He patted Nick hard on the cheek before turning away. “You dog, you.”



Nick found himself gaping as Ty strolled to the door.



Ty said over his shoulder, “I’ll send Zane in so he can tell you what those people looked like.”



Ty came out of the game room with a huge smirk on his face. It immediately put Zane on edge.



“What?” he asked, almost afraid to get an answer.



“I’ll tell you after,” Ty promised with a passing pat to Zane’s stomach.



Zane gave him a sideways glance as he headed for the door. Ty made his way to the lounge area where Kelly was sitting with the four other children who were on the island for the wedding, all kids of Ty’s cousins. Amelia was on Kelly’s knee. Kelly and Ty had been entertaining them during the interviews, telling them campfire stories and doing magic tricks. Both men were exceptionally good with the young ones, but then Kelly should be since he worked at a camp for at-risk youth.



When Zane stepped into the game room, he was nervous for some reason. As soon as he saw Nick, though, the nerves vanished. He was sitting on a stool behind the wet bar, his nose and forehead pressed to the polished wood, his hands flattened to the bar top like he’d just bashed his face into it.



Zane smiled, understanding Ty’s smirk now. Nick picked his head up and stared at him.



“I’m sorry,” Zane said immediately. He sat opposite Nick.



“I’ve never had to interrogate him before. Only ever seen it from the other side.”



Zane bit his lip. “I can’t imagine.”



“He accused me of police brutality.”



Zane finally gave in and chuckled.



Nick just shook his head.



“Do you want to take a break?”



“No, you’re one of the last five on my list,” Nick said. He was flipping through his notes, looking for a blank page. He started talking before he landed on one. “Do you remember seeing anyone on the beach last night during your walk?”



“Yeah, we passed a couple walking, a guy and a girl.”



“Would you recognize them?”



Zane shrugged. “Maybe. I didn’t, though.”



“They weren’t any of the guests or staff?” Nick asked.



“Not that I’ve seen, no. But I haven’t seen everyone.”



Nick handed him the iPad and brought up pictures he’d taken of each person he’d questioned. He tapped the screen. “Start flipping through those for me, see if you recognize anyone.”



Zane took the iPad.



“What can you tell me about them?” Nick asked.



Zane shrugged and began to flip through the photos. “They were both still dressed up from the party. Both fairly young. The guy was possibly blond, the girl maybe had dark hair, it was hard to tell because there was no moon. The girl had an accent.”



Nick raised an eyebrow at that, looking hopeful for the first time. “What kind?”



Zane winced. “I’m not sure. It sounded sort of like a mix, or maybe like she had a problem with her palate. Ty could probably tell you.”



Nick smiled wryly. He rubbed his eyes with the heels of his palms, then nodded like he was giving himself a pep talk to continue. “Did they say anything to you?”



“Not directly, no. They were talking about walking on the beach not being romantic because it made their calves hurt.”



Nick stopped writing and simply peered at Zane for a few moments, letting the silence stretch. Zane fought not to shift in his seat. Finally, he couldn’t handle the scrutiny any longer and said, “What?”



“You should probably know,” Nick started, sounding uncertain. “Ty couldn’t tell me a damn thing about these people.”



Zane frowned, confused.



“Couldn’t even tell me what color hair they had. Didn’t mention the accent. Didn’t give either man or woman a second glance.”



Zane smiled when he realized Nick’s point. Ty had always had straying eyes, and that had never bothered Zane. Hell, he did too sometimes. There was nothing wrong with looking at a beautiful person. But out there last night, holding Zane’s hand on the beach, Ty hadn’t noticed a thing about two possibly attractive people other than the fact that they were walking by.



“Yeah, grin all you want, but these two people might be our doers.”



“Seriously?”



Nick tapped his notes. “None of the other statements account for them. Did you leave your room last night, after Ty fell asleep?”



Zane frowned at the sudden change in questioning, but he nodded. “Well, not the room. I went out on the balcony at one point. I couldn’t sleep.”



“What time was that?”



“Anywhere from four to just before the sun came up. I’m not sure.”



Nick’s expression remained neutral. “Did you see or hear anything? Notice anything unusual?”



“I don’t think so. The storm was going pretty hard at that point.”



Nick gave a curt nod and lowered his head. He stared at his notes for a few more seconds, and then glanced back up, narrowing his eyes. His voice was lower when he spoke. “The storm was going?”



Zane raised both eyebrows. The more he saw of Nick’s professional façade, the more impressed he was. As a rule, federal agents didn’t often get along with police detectives. Their turf war had been turned into something of almost mythical proportions, and was often furthered by strutting and bragging and bickering when they were forced to collaborate. Rookies bought into the rivalry and perpetuated it. Zane had worked with quite a few detectives he enjoyed, but he’d also been forced to deal with more he absolutely hated.



He kind of wondered what it would have been like to have met Nick on a job rather than through Ty.



Nick put his pen down, staring at Zane.



“What?” Zane finally asked.



“Where’d you get your time from?”



“What?”



“You said it was after four,” Nick reminded him. “How can you be sure if you didn’t know the exact time?”



Zane shrugged, beginning to blush. “I . . . you can’t tell Ty this.”



Nick nodded solemnly.



“I remember rolling over at one point and looking at the clock. It was 4:20. I found it funny.”