Ball & Chain

“Anyway. One of the guys sitting in front of us turned around to say something and I told him to shut the fuck up and turn back around before he got a handful of something he wasn’t ready for. Nick told me later it was the first time someone had stood up for him just because they could. Ever. First time in his life.”



“And that’s why he says you earned his loyalty when you sat down.”



“That’s right. When I asked him who’d broken his rib, he said his father. When I pointed at his knuckles and asked why he hadn’t hit back, he told me he had. But he’d used a baseball bat.” Ty smiled when he remembered the silence that had come over the kids sitting around them, eavesdropping. There had been no mistaking Nick’s tone for a joke, but Ty had laughed his ass off at the time. “I just told him I liked his style, and we were inseparable after that. When I got news that Deuce had been in his wreck, I was . . . Nick was the one who kept me from going AWOL. We looked out for each other, had each other’s six.”



“You two going to be okay now?”



“Yeah,” Ty said without giving it even a second of thought. “I need to do better by him.”



When they reached the patio of the mansion, they found a lot of activity going on, much more than could be justified by the tail end of dinner or the fact that someone had partially repaired the generators. As they stepped into the circle of light cast by the landscape lighting, Nick came jogging out to them, Kelly on his heels.



“What’s going on?” Zane asked.



Nick grimaced, trying to catch his breath. “Richard Burns is dead.”



Chapter 13



They tried to keep Ty out of the room, but he bulled his way past all three of them, so they just followed him in, hanging back. Earl was there, refusing to leave. Richard Burns was sprawled on the floor. There was no blood, no obvious injuries or signs of violence on his body. The room, however, hadn’t come through unscathed. Tables were overturned, pictures and lamps had been knocked to the floor, even a small chaise lounge had been tumbled over and crashed into a wall.



The stone walls were so thick throughout the mansion that no one had heard what seemed to have been a pretty epic battle.



The electricity was working again in parts of the mansion, including this room. Ty didn’t know how, and he didn’t ask.



“His neck’s been broke,” Earl told Ty. His voice was gruff. He knelt beside Burns’s body, holding the man’s hand.



“Dad . . .” Ty took a few halting steps and stopped again. His knees went weak, and he would have sunk to the floor if a strong arm hadn’t wrapped around him.



He gripped Zane’s shirt, clinging to him.



“I’m sorry,” Zane whispered.



Earl’s eyes traveled over all four men. “Look around this room,” he said, his voice full of gravel and anger. “Tell me what happened. And then find out who did this.”



Ty nodded, his breath coming harder, his focus narrowing down to nothing but the body on the ground.



Kelly knelt by the body. “May I, sir?” he said to Earl.



Earl refused to let go of Burns’s hand, but he nodded. Kelly began to check the body over. Zane left Ty where he stood, moving to search the room along with Nick. Ty finally tore his attention away from the body of his adopted uncle and began to scour the room too.



Burns had obviously fought against his attacker. He’d fought with all the skill and knowledge he’d acquired in his years. Someone had still managed to take him out, and for that they’d either been very good, caught Burns when his guard was down, or both.



Anger and grief boiled deep in Ty’s gut. He could barely concentrate on the crime scene. Zane and Nick had made a round of the room and returned to the body, hovering over Kelly as they waited for his report. Ty could find nothing but the obvious signs of a struggle in the room. If they had actual crime scene equipment, they might be able to do something with this, but no visual evidence had been left behind. In a fight like this, something should have been left behind.



Ty swallowed hard. “It was a pro.”



Kelly sat back on his heels, sighing and glancing up at Nick and Zane. “He’s been dead for hours. Probably right after he left your interview with him.”



Ty was still moving around the periphery of the room, unable to look back at them. He couldn’t see Richard Burns on the ground like that.



“Could it have been Kline?” Nick asked.



Kelly shrugged. “She certainly had the capability.”



“We know there’s at least one more out there, a guy. The man we saw on the beach,” Zane reminded them.



“Could that have been Fraser?” Kelly asked.



“He said it wasn’t and . . . I believe him,” Nick said.



“Did you ever tell the truth when it was us?” Ty asked him.



Nick gave him a negligent shrug. “A man like Fraser hasn’t exactly been trained for what I put him through.”



“I’m not a medical examiner,” Kelly announced, trying to cut the tension, “but I’m pretty sure his neck was snapped.”



He pointed to Burns’s chin, refraining from lifting it off the floor. They had to get down on the ground to see what he was talking about. Ty moved closer, looking almost sideways in an attempt to see but not see. There were bruises where Kelly was indicating, like someone had taken his chin and jerked it.



“The positioning’s all wrong,” Nick murmured. He was on his hands and knees beside Kelly, tilting his head to see.



Kelly nodded. “Either it wasn’t someone with training, or Burns fought like hell and fucked up their hold.”



“Or the person was injured,” Zane pointed out.



“Burns was a large man,” Nick added. “Avery Kline would’ve had a time of this too, no matter how skilled she was. Trying to snap someone’s neck when they’re a foot taller than you isn’t exactly easy.”



“That would explain why she panicked and made that move on Stanton,” Zane whispered.



Earl was glaring at both men. “I ain’t hearing any answers from you two, just a bunch of maybes.”



Nick and Zane both glanced at him guiltily before going back to their examination. Earl got to his feet and paced a few steps, his eyes meeting Ty’s. He stopped in front of him, then put his arm around Ty’s shoulders, releasing him quickly when Ty winced away, holding his dislocated shoulder. Earl took his good arm again, and Ty was forced to look at the body of Richard Burns.



Earl pointed at him. “Look at that man, son.”



Ty stared at his father for a few moments, then turned his eyes to the floor.



“I met him on a helicopter going into the jungle, Ty. You know what that is?” Earl grabbed Ty’s shirt front, pulling him closer to whisper in his ear. “That’s Nick on the ground, Beaumont. You go fucking find who did this, and you kill him.”



Ty stared at the men kneeling. At the body on the floor. His stomach turned at the thought of any of these men in Burns’s place, lying dead on the floor, murdered. He remembered the anguish of standing at Elias Sanchez’s funeral, of carrying that casket. He remembered the desperate need for revenge.



“Yes, sir.”



Earl stormed out of the room. He had to go somewhere and grieve, somewhere to be away from the body of his oldest and dearest friend. And to deal with guilt, because he’d spent the past several hours enraged over the things he’d learned about Burns.



The Grady family would never be the same after this loss.



Zane clambered to his feet and came to Ty, taking him by his good arm. “Come on,” he said into Ty’s ear.



Ty shook his head, his nostrils flaring and his focus narrowing to a pinpoint. “Someone else was behind this, Zane. Someone else was orchestrating this.”



“Come on, Ty, let’s get out of here.”



“It wasn’t him.”



“Ty.”



“Someone else did all this!” Ty shouted, jabbing his finger at Burns’s body.



“Tyler,” Nick barked. “Get your ass in gear and go!”



Ty nodded woodenly, moving to obey that tone of voice almost automatically. Zane stayed with him, fingers digging into his arm.



“Are you okay?” Zane asked as soon as they were on the stairs.



“They killed him, Zane.”



Zane stopped halfway down the steps and pulled him closer. “I know.” He turned Ty to him, making sure he met his eyes. “You’ve taken a lot of hits in the last few days, Ty. Let me take this last one for you.”



Ty stared at him, struck breathless, struck speechless. He snaked his arm around Zane’s neck and hugged him tight. He nodded, still unable to speak.



“We’ll round up everyone physically capable of doing this,” Zane murmured against Ty’s hair, “and we’ll find out who it is even if we have to take Nick’s ball and chain to every one of them.”



There were a great deal of complaints when Ty and Zane gathered every able-bodied person in the dining room and frog-marched them into the study, but the weapons they wielded and the look in Ty’s eyes were enough motivation to get everyone moving and keep them cooperating.



There were two groomsmen: Christian and Matthew. Three bridesmaids: Catalina, Miyoko, and Ashlee. Livi’s brother, Theo, and Emma’s cameraman, Marley. Mackie and Hamish Boyd were the only two staff members who remained, since Fraser was still tied up in the game room. And Ty had somehow convinced the three Snake Eaters to come peacefully. Zane didn’t know how he’d built that rapport, but he was grateful he didn’t have to wrestle John English through a door he didn’t want to go through.



Twelve suspects.



Several others joined them to help keep order, and to help parse the evidence. Stanton, Earl, Mara, and Chester were there, as was Emma, who was still protesting Marley’s inclusion in the suspect pool. Deuce and Livi had left Amelia with Livi’s mother, Susan, and come to be part of the meeting. Nick and Kelly soon came into the room as well. Several of the people who’d heard Jockie Fraser’s screams shied away from Nick when he entered the room.



Zane moved toward the corner, nodding for Nick to join him. “Got anything we can cull the herd with?”



Nick stared at him for a few seconds. “I never realized how disturbing your accent is until you use cow analogies.”



Zane fought hard to keep his face as deadpan as Nick’s. “Yeah okay, say car.”



“Shut up. Kelly narrowed down time of death to a six-hour window, but he wants to make sure everyone knows he’s essentially guessing. Considering the last time Burns was seen was six hours ago, I’m going to back him on his assessment.”



“Great,” Zane huffed.



“He told me that when he and Ty went looking for Burns, Earl said he hadn’t seen him since his talk with you and me. So . . . it’s probably safe to say he went to his room and someone was waiting there for him.”



Zane nodded. “No one could have knocked on Burns’s door and surprised him. You’re right, they would have had to’ve been lying in wait. Okay, let’s see what we can shake loose.” He gave Nick’s shoulder a pat and stepped away.



“What the hell is going on?” Ashlee Knight demanded. Zane knew her only as the bombshell from Nick’s notes. She certainly looked the part.



“There’s been one last murder,” Zane announced.



There was a murmur of shock and alarm, but at least half the people in the room looked like they just wanted to go to bed. Death was no longer traumatic for the island.



Zane glanced at Nick and Ty, holding his breath. They had so little to go on, he was going to have to bluff his way through this. He hoped they would play along.



“We’ve captured or killed all the people responsible for this massacre, all but one,” he said to the people crowded into the room. “The ladies in the room can relax, the killer we’re looking for is a man.”



The three bridesmaids shared relieved, frightened glances before going to sit on a chaise near the far wall, holding each other’s hands and leaning on each other in a huddle.



“Are you saying the killer you’re looking for is in this room right now?” Christian Orr asked. He’d been introduced to Zane as Deuce’s best friend from Philadelphia.



“I sure as hell hope so,” Zane drawled.



“Jesus Christ,” Mathew Ferguson shouted. He glanced to the wall, where Deuce stood amongst the other observers. “Deacon, are you serious right now? You’ve known me since we were freshmen in undergrad!”



“Just roll with it, Matt,” Deuce told him. “They’re good, they’ll find out who did this. You got nothing to worry about. Unless you killed someone.”



“Like hell!” Matthew shouted, but he remained seated.



Zane stepped into the corner for another refrain, beckoning Ty, Nick, and Kelly with him. A buzz of nervous conversation started up behind them. “Who the hell do we like for this?” Zane whispered.



Kelly shook his head. “I want to see if I’m right, man.”



“You want to take bets, don’t you?” Nick asked, voice flat.



Ty rolled his eyes and rubbed his hand over his face.



“What we really need is a confession,” Nick said to Zane. “We don’t have anything but hunches here. We need someone to stand up and say they did it.”



“Oh, is that all?” Zane glared at Nick as he moved away again. The other three remained in the corner, watching him.



Zane considered the remaining suspects. Nine now. Three military men trained in the art of combat. Two old men who’d worked on the island all their lives, one who’d lost his wife to this mess. Three privileged, well-educated males from Pennsylvania, one of whom had everything to gain from his father’s death or downfall. And then there was Marley, the adventuring cameraman Emma Grady was willing to vouch for.