Cross & Crown

JD nodded, glancing between them uneasily.



Nick opened the folder and took the top photo. He held it for a few seconds, then laid it on the side of the pile. He went through several more, and Kelly focused on JD’s eyes.



Whenever he thought he saw a glimmer of recognition or a reaction of any sort, he would tap Nick’s thigh beneath the table and Nick would lay that photo sideways.



When they got through the whole pile, Nick separated them, taking only the photos he’d set down sideways. “Okay,” he said to JD, still smiling warmly. “This time if you get anything, let us know. Okay?”



“Okay.”



Nick held up the first few photos. Kelly couldn’t see what they were, but as he watched JD’s face, he could see the man struggling to remember. He’d figured out what they were doing. He knew the photos in this second round were somehow more important than the first. Kelly’s heart went out to him. He looked so lost and frustrated.



On the fifth photo, JD held his hand out. “Stop,” he said urgently.



Nick froze, holding the photo up as JD stared at it.



“I’ve seen that,” JD whispered. He plucked the photo from Nick’s fingers and scowled at it. “This feels familiar to me. I know I’ve seen this before. What is this?”



Nick glanced at Kelly, and suddenly he looked grim. He rested both elbows on the table and frowned at JD. “It’s one of the items that was stolen from the bookstore. We got the IDs an hour ago.”



JD’s head shot up, his eyes widening.



“It’s a brooch worn by a Revolutionary War soldier during the Battle of Bunker Hill. The owner’s daughter said it’d been in their family for over two-hundred years.”



JD’s mouth worked silently, and he looked from the photo to Nick and back. “So since I recognize it . . . does this mean I stole it?”



Kelly glanced at Nick, holding his breath when Nick met his eyes. Nick looked truly regretful. He joked about being the bad cop and how everyone here considered him a hard-ass, but Kelly knew better. Nick had the purest heart of anyone he’d ever known.



“All it means is that you’ve seen this before,” Nick assured JD. “You could have been a regular customer at the shop. You could have seen this photo somewhere, say . . . an insurance company or a museum. The only thing it proves is that you weren’t there by chance. You are connected to this robbery somehow, that’s all we can say with any certainty.”



JD took a deep, shaky breath. “Okay.”



Nick tapped his stack of photos, straightening them, then he set them on the table as he stood. “We’ll be right back. You need anything? Food, drink?”



JD answered with a dejected shake of his head.



Nick and Kelly left him sitting there. Kelly noticed a uniform lurking near the door as they exited, and Nick gave him a nod as they passed. Whether JD knew it or not, he was being held prisoner.



“You were blowing smoke up his ass, right?” Kelly said under his breath. “He’s your main suspect, isn’t he?”



“Pretty much,” Nick admitted. “He’s looking damn guilty.”



“That sucks. To commit a crime and not even remember why you did it?”



“Like Tijuana that one time.”



Nick and Kelly both shuddered with the shared memory.



Nick sat at his desk and turned his chair to glance back at the break room.



“Dude,” Hagan said. “I know in your mind he’s a puppy in a cardboard box with a ‘take me home’ sign around his neck, but you can’t fight the evidence building up here.”



“Did the prints come back yet?” Nick asked, sounding frustrated.



“Yeah. John Doe Number Alive didn’t hit anywhere. But John Doe Number Dead came up with a prior.” Hagan turned his computer screen around so Nick and Kelly could see it.



“Darragh O’Doyle,” Nick read under his breath.



“That sounds made up,” Kelly said. “Is that real?”



“He’s not local,” Hagan told them.



“Irish national?” Nick asked. Hagan nodded. “Known associates?”



“None listed. He got pinched last year but he never turned on his crew. Did six months, got out on good behavior, last record of him was that he’d headed back to Ireland.”



“Well he’s back now. So we have an Irish connection.”



Nick sat back in his chair, making a clicking sound with his teeth and tongue as he stared at the screen. “Let’s expand the fingerprints to international databases, see if we get a hit.”



Kelly cleared his throat, waiting until Hagan got up and left before leaning toward Nick. “Isn’t Julian Cross Irish?”



Nick nodded and pulled his phone from his back pocket.



“We need to talk to him.” He hit the speaker button and set his phone on the desk between them.



“Special Agent in Charge Garrett here.”



“Well, aren’t we fancy,” Kelly teased.



Nick shook his head. “Hey, Garrett, it’s O’Flaherty. And the Doc, obviously.”



“Oh God, what now? Are you in jail? Being held by the IRA? Stuck on a reef in the Caribbean?”



“Wow,” Kelly said. “That’s uncalled for.”



Zane laughed. “I thought being engaged to Ty gave me some extra snark privileges.”



“Hey!” Nick shouted. “Do I come running when you need help? Did I get shoved off the edge of a cliff for your ungrateful ass? Does my boat still have bullet holes in it?”



“It still floats,” Zane countered, a smirk obvious in his voice.



Nick grunted.



“Haven’t heard from you two in a while, what’s going on?”



Zane said, voice casual. Kelly had grown familiar enough with Zane to know he was taking care with his words, though. “You need to come to Baltimore, come see us.”



Kelly gave Nick a sideways glance to see how he’d react to that, but Nick was expressionless. “Sorry, babe, this isn’t a social cal . I need to know how to get in touch with Julian Cross.”



“Cross. Why?”



Nick made another clicking sound, refusing to answer.



“Never mind, I didn’t ask,” Zane said quickly. “I don’t know how to get in touch with him. I assume he just shows up when he smells blood.”



“How about Grady? You think he’d know?”



“Hell no. Ty spits nails when you mention Cross’s name.



He says Cross stole his kitties.”



“That’s what I figured,” Nick said with a sigh. “That’s why I called you.”



“Is it?” Zane asked pointedly.



Kelly tensed and couldn’t stop himself from glancing toward the framed photo of their team, Ty’s arm around Nick’s shoulders as they smiled. The state of Nick and Ty’s fracturing friendship was a topic only the bravest of men would touch on. Zane had balls of brass to do it.



Kelly cleared his throat and leaned closer to the phone.



“We figured with your Bureau contacts, you’d be the better source. Since Ty is all . . . wild card now.”



“Right,” Zane said wryly.



“You got a lead on Cross, or no?” Nick asked, his words more clipped than they had been.



“No. Want me to put out some feelers? Or get Ty on it? Please God, let me put Ty on it, he needs something to do besides remodeling that damn building.”



“No. Fuck no. I don’t want Cross to know I’m coming.”



“If you’re looking for him, he already knows.”



“Right. Hey, thanks Garrett. We’ll talk to you later.”



Nick ended the call and slammed his hand onto the desk.



“Damn it!”



“That mean Cross is a dead end?” Kelly asked gently.



“For now. Next thread.” Nick tapped the evidence photos of the books that had been recovered at the scene. “We follow your books.”



“My books? No. No, you’re not pinning those on me for when they go bust.” Nick smirked. Kelly snorted. “You’re enjoying this too much.”



“Come on, babe, it’s a treasure hunt,” Nick teased.



“You hope it’s a treasure hunt, or you’re going to look stupid.”



“You’re the special consultant.”



“You’re the detective who called in the special consultant.”



Nick glanced over Kelly’s shoulder, then stood and stole a quick kiss. “Come on. Let’s get some lunch before Hagan gets back and I have to buy his food.”



They didn’t even make it to the stairs before Hagan caught them trying to sneak out. “Fuck no, I get to interrogate the boyfriend, damn you,” Hagan called to them. He grabbed his coat off his chair, making it spin around and bang into the desk.



They stopped to wait for him. Nick was chuckling softly.



“I like your partner,” Kelly said quietly.



“Yeah, don’t tell him that though.”



Kelly nodded, but Nick’s eyes were straying to the break room, where the uniformed officer was still standing guard.



Kelly’s brow furrowed as he thought about JD sitting in there alone, his mind turning over everything he couldn’t remember. He knew Nick was thinking the same thing.



“Hey,” he murmured. “Is it legal and shit to take your witness with us? Maybe new surroundings will get him remembering faster.”



Nick chewed on his bottom lip, frowning, his eyes lingering on the break room door. He took a deep breath and then sighed before heading over there.



Hagan was fighting with his coat when he joined Kelly.



“He bringing the stray to lunch?”



“Did you expect anything less from him?” Kelly asked fondly.



Hagan grunted. “You should see the last stray he convinced me to keep around. Teeny tiny little puppy he found in a storm drain, half-dead and starving in the middle of the night. All the local shelters were closed up so we had to take it in for the night. Bastard told me he couldn’t have it on his boat ’cause it’d fall off and drown. Fucking thing was too weak to walk and he convinced me it’d take a header off the side of a boat!”



Kelly couldn’t stop his grin.



Hagan appeared almost sheepish. “I still got that damn mutt. Weighs a hundred pounds. Best friend I ever had.”



Kelly laughed. “Well he can’t keep this stray either. You have room for an amnesiac with great bone structure?”



“Not if he pisses on the carpet like the last one,” Hagan grumbled as he headed for the elevators.



They sat at a booth in a local pub near the precinct house that obviously catered to cops. In fact, after staring around at the pictures on the walls long enough, Kelly found Nick up there. He gazed up at the photo, smirking. Most of the photos were official, full uniform and regalia, with stone-faced men and women staring at the camera like they could cause it to burst into flame. It reminded Kelly of the military photos they’d taken.



Nick didn’t exactly smile in photos, but he didn’t keep a straight face either. The look he usually gave was more of a challenge, with a half smirk that basically said “come at me, bro” and a glint that said Nick would enjoy the fight.



He’d made the same expression in his police portrait that sat high on one of the walls, and Kelly couldn’t take his eyes off that face.



“So,” JD finally said, clearing his throat and glancing around uncomfortably. “Is this like a last meal or something?”



“You’re awful fatalistic for a dude who lived through being shot in the head,” Hagan observed.



“Maybe if I remembered it, I’d be more likely to look on the bright side,” JD grumbled.



“Innocent until proven guilty, babe.” Nick’s voice was low and sent a shiver up Kelly’s spine. “Look, we haven’t had any hits, but we have eliminated some things, and frankly, that’s as good as we could hope for.”



“Right.” Hagan pointed his fork at Nick. “We put you through all the systems and got nothing.”



“That . . . sounds awesome,” JD said, voice flat and sarcastic.



“What that means is you don’t have a record,” Nick offered.



“Meaning I’m a smart felon and I’ve never been caught.



You’re right, that is good news.”



Kelly coughed to cover a laugh.



Nick pursed his lips, narrowing his eyes. “It also means you’re not military, and you’ve never worked government or municipal. You’re not part of any education systems, and so on. Rules out everything you would have been printed for.”



JD nodded and looked down at his hands, turning them over to run a finger across his tips. His nails were still stained from the ink they’d printed him with.



Nick was watching him too, frowning harder the longer he looked at him. He reached to the cuff of his shirt, unbuttoning and rol ing it up. He showed JD the inside of his arm and tapped the tattoo with his finger. “You know what this is?”



JD nodded. “I told you yesterday, I recognized it. It’s the Recon Jack.”



Nick glanced at Kelly, one eyebrow raised. Kelly couldn’t school his features fast enough to hide the surprise. Nick looked around the pub. It was early for lunch, so there weren’t many people there. He began to unbutton his shirt.



“Dude,” Hagan said through a mouthful of food. “That’s your other job. Got to stop confusing them. Tired of suspects stuffing your pants with dol ar bills during interrogation.”



Nick shoved his sleeve aside, then pulled up the sleeve of his undershirt to reveal a well-defined biceps and shoulder.