Dead To Me (Cold Case Psychic Book 5)

by Pandora Pine

  Hustling down the hall from their room to the dining room, Ronan hoped he was able to pick up breakfast for everyone before Tennyson even realized he was gone. He saw that the breakfast buffet was laid out and went to work grabbing muffins and making coffees.

  Before he’d left the room, he’d checked his email on his phone and had seen the places Truman had had sent over for him to consider for the wedding. Ronan would never really have thought of himself a romantic man in the past, but the idea now of planning a surprise wedding, of sorts, for Tennyson was exciting.

  “Christ, did you leave any muffins for the rest of us?” Fitzgibbon barked from behind him.

  “These are for us.” Ronan rolled his eyes. “I grabbed blueberry for you and chocolate chip for Greeley. Two of each.”

  “Oh, well, sorry about that. I slept like shit last night.” Kevin shook his head as he piled hard boiled eggs into a bowl.

  “Do I even want to know why?” Living with a teenager was equal parts joy and angst, it seemed. Greeley was a great kid, but like everyone else of that age, his moods swung like Tarzan on a vine: fast and often.

  “Ortiz fucked something up on a case,” Kevin muttered.

  “Ortiz? You mean Ortiz your favorite Cold Case Detective? That Ortiz?” Ronan bit his lip to keep from laughing out loud.

  “Yes, that Ortiz.” Fitzgibbon’s lip curled into a snarl.

  “What the hell did he do?” Ronan knew Ortiz really wasn’t the captain’s favorite detective. Fitzgibbon had just said that to drive Ronan nuts. Not that it worked though. It wasn’t like Ortiz to mess anything up either.

  “He lost a piece of evidence.”

  “What do you mean lost a piece of evidence?”

  “Do you really need me to pull up Webster’s Dictionary and quote you the fucking definition of lost, Ronan?” Kevin barked.

  “You do realize that one member of our esteemed consulting team is a fricken psychic, right? All you need to do is explain the situation to Tennyson and he can probably find what you’ve lost. Or, you can say the novena to Saint Anthony, the patron saint of lost things and hope the evidence turns up.” Ronan shrugged and started to walk away. He was beginning to wonder if Kansas was poisoning everyone.

  “Ronan, wait!” Kevin called. “I’m an asshole.”

  “I know!” Ronan returned without turning around. He grabbed a copy of the newspaper off the front table. “Be ready to go in ten, Cap.”

  Fifteen minutes later when everyone was piled into Ronan’s rented truck, the only one of them with a smile on his face with Greeley. He was stuffing his face with muffins and chatting on about how much fun being a consultant was going to be.

  Ronan led them all into the sheriff’s station, but there was no one to meet them at the front desk. He pulled out his phone and punched the contact he’d entered into his phone for Barlow Reed. A minute later, the sheriff walked into the main office.

  “Ronan! So glad you could make it. Uh, this isn’t a day care,” Reed said when he got a look a Greeley.

  “That’s good because I’m here to work, sheriff.” Greeley’s posture was straight and his voice was firm.

  “You asked for consultants. You’ve got four of them. Let’s get to work.” Ronan wasn’t in the mood for any bullshit today. One wrong word out of the sheriff’s mouth and he was going to be poolside back at the hotel working on his tan.

  Barlow Reed studied Ronan and the others for a minute before sighing and buzzing the door open that led from the lobby into the office. “I’ve got a conference room set up for you all to work in. Coffee, tea, and bottled water are in the kitchen. Shitter is down the hall.” Reed pointed.

  Ronan bit his tongue. He could never imagine Captain Fitzgibbon treating guests in his precinct like this, but to each his own. “Thanks, sheriff.”

  “I introduced Ronan to my people at the funeral, but for the rest of you, these are Janowitz, Lazaro, Boone and Walsh.” Reed pointed them out as he called their names.

  “Well, if it isn’t little Tennyson Grimm,” Janowitz sneered.

  “Janowitz, I see you’re the same booger-eating amoeba you’ve always been,” Tennyson shot right back.

  “Booger-eating amoeba?” Ronan bit his bottom lip to keep from laughing.

  “We went to Kindergarten together. He was a notorious snot-snacker back then too. No one wanted to be his field trip partner because we had to hold hands and he always had one finger busy digging for nose gold.”

  “Eww, TMI, Ten.” Ronan held up a hand. He couldn’t help noticing that the sour looks were back on the faces of the other sheriff’s deputies, same as they were at the funeral yesterday.

  Walsh was openly sneering at them. “What the hell is this? A gay pride parade?”

  “It must be. I’m looking at the clown.” Greeley shot him a wicked smile.

  “We’re here to work, sheriff. If this homophobic bullshit is what we’re in for, we’re out.” Ronan turned toward the door.

  “Detective O’Mara, I assure you that Walsh doesn’t speak for all of us.” Reed shot Walsh a warning look. “Let me show you all to the conference room.”

  Ronan stayed where he was for a minute, staring Walsh down. When the other man looked away, Ronan nodded and followed behind the sheriff as he led the way. It was a typical conference room with a rectangular table and large flat screen television mounted to the front wall. Greeley and Fitzgibbon took the seats on the far side of the table. Ten and Ronan took the seats on the near side. There were document boxes sitting at the far end.

  Barlow hit the power button on the television and it came to life with the photograph of a young brunette woman. “This is thirty-three-year-old Shannon Bradley. She was a wife and mother to a thirteen-year-old daughter named Kayla.” The picture on the screen flipped to one of the Bradley family during happier times.

  They looked like a nice family. Although, every family looked like a nice in posed pictures like this. Once you peeled down through the layers though, that’s when the ugly truths started coming to life.

  “Are you sure the kid’s okay to see this stuff?” Reed asked.

  “He’s tougher than he looks.” Fitzgibbon nodded at his son.

  The sheriff shook his head and flipped to the next picture. It was the mutilated body of Shannon Bradley. “On the night of Thursday, September 6, 2007, someone stabbed Mrs. Bradley twenty-one times. The knife was from the block kept in the kitchen and was left at the crime scene.” The next picture showed the bloody murder weapon laying on the kitchen floor next to the body. “The stab wounds were mostly concentrated on the victim’s torso.”

  “Suspects?” Ronan asked.

  “The husband, Stephen, was out of town. He was a salesman for a plumbing supply company and regularly took trips out to Topeka twice a month. When he did, he was gone for five days at a time, leaving on Monday morning and returning on Friday in time for dinner. The daughter was asleep in her bed at the time of the murder. She woke up for school in the morning and was the one to discover her mother’s body.”

  “Mr. Bradley’s trips out of town were well known?” Greeley asked. His pen was poised to start writing over a page with other notes he’d already jotted down.

  “Yes, neighbors told us they would check-in with Shannon and Kayla during the week to see if they needed anything. They’d also help out with snow removal in the winter and when the tornado sirens would go off as well. Over the course of the investigation we interviewed the usual suspects, sex offenders and people in the area with criminal records. We came up with nothing, which is why when I heard that you were in town I had to ask for help.” The sheriff took a deep breath. “We all watched you on the Reality Show Network, Tennyson. Granted, religion still rules Union Chapel, but I’m open-minded enough to know that whatever skill-set you have on your own and together with Ronan works. This is the first and, so far, only murder we’ve ever had in town and I’d like to get this one off the books.”

  Ronan had to admit it was an impressive l
ittle speech, even if it was born of desperation. “I know this is a long shot, Barlow, but what’s the state of the crime scene?”

  “Abandoned. After the murder investigation cleared him, Stephen Bradley moved to Severance. He and Kayla still live there. I check in with them twice a year. He never got remarried and Kayla’s a mother to a child of her own now.”

  Ronan knew which two days of the year the sheriff checked in with Stephen Bradley: Christmas and the anniversary of the murder. It was standard procedure in Cold Case to call the victim’s family on those two dates every year. Ronan wasn’t looking forward to his first Christmas in the squad for that very reason. “We’d like to go out there if it’s possible.”

  Reed nodded. “You’ll find the keys to the house in one of the evidence boxes. The Sheriff’s Office owns the property now, so you’re free to come and go as you please. Just remember to lock up. The local kids try to get inside to hold seances and other bullshit like that.” His face crumpled. “Ah, sorry, Tennyson.”

  “It’s okay, sheriff. Unless you have a talented medium conducting it, any séance is bullshit.” Tennyson winked at Ronan.

  Ronan hid his burst of laughter with a cough. No one else around the table bought it. He’d been right earlier when he thought this was going to be fun. He was doing what he loved with the people he loved most in the world. Best of all, there was no pressure to solve this cold case. He was just here as a consultant.

  19

  Tennyson

  Tennyson breathed a sigh of relief when Sherriff Barlow Reed left the room. It wasn’t that he disliked the man, he just wanted to get to work. The sooner they all had a chance to look over the evidence, the sooner they could get out to the Bradley house.

  Shannon Bradley’s spirit wasn’t here at the sheriff’s station, so Tennyson was hoping that maybe he’d be able to contact her spirit at the family home. If not, his only other hope was a face to face meeting with her widower and daughter.

  “What are you getting, Ten?” Ronan asked.

  “Nothing so far,” Ten said. “Shannon’s spirit isn’t here. Not that I expected it to be.” Why would the ghost of a murdered woman hang out at the sheriff’s station? So far as he knew, she had no connection with the people who worked here.

  “You think we might have better luck at the house?” Ronan asked.

  Ten nodded. “That, or with her daughter. The sheriff said she was a mother now too. If I were a grandparent in the afterlife, I’d be hanging out with my grandchild.”

  “Just like Bertha,” Greeley chimed in.

  “Exactly.” Ten couldn’t help smiling at the teenager. He was glad Greeley was here with them instead of bumming around at the hotel’s pool.

  “Let’s start unpacking the evidence boxes,” Fitzgibbon commanded. “Encyclopedia Brown, you keep notes.”

  Greeley raised an eyebrow at his father, but flipped to a blank page in his notebook.

  “I see you’ve elected yourself boss, Cap.” Ronan pulled an evidence box closer to himself and flipped the lid off.

  “I don’t see any reason why we should deviate from our roles, unless you want to play Nostradamus for the day, Ronan?” Kevin winked at Tennyson.

  “If I’d known his role was up for grabs, I would have dressed in one of his shirts instead of this stupid button-down and tie.” Ronan yanked at the knot in his tie.

  Ten grinned. He’d only packed a few dress shirts for the wake and funeral and hadn’t seen the need to wear them again for the trip to the sheriff’s station, so he’d worn a polo shirt and jeans.

  “I’ve got the box with the victim’s clothes,” Fitzgibbon called out. Ten watched as he unpacked Ziploc bags labeled with the garment stored inside. Each piece of clothing was stained a deep brownish-red.

  Once Greeley had catalogued everything, Ten reached out for Shannon Bradley’s bloodstained blouse. He closed his eyes and focused his attention on the shirt. The crime had been committed ten years ago. It was asking a lot for any psychic residue to still be clinging to the item. He was about to set it back down when a wave of anger blasted toward him. “Holy fuck!” Ten dropped the shirt like it was on fire.

  “What is it?” Ronan was at his side in an instant.

  Ten looked up at Ronan. He could feel his heart pounding in his chest. “Someone was pissed. It felt like a tsunami of anger hitting me at full strength.”

  “Could you tell who it was that killed her?” Fitzgibbon asked.

  Ten shook his head. “No. All I could feel was the white-hot rage. I couldn’t even tell what the rage was directed toward or even who it was that was angry.”

  “What do you mean you couldn’t tell who was angry? Do you mean it could be Shannon’s anger you could be sensing?” Greeley set down his pen to give Ten his full attention.

  “Right. She could have been super pissed at the person killing her or at the idea that she was dying. With my own wedding less than a month away, I’d go nuclear if someone tried to kill me now.” Ten shivered in the warm room. Being within arm’s reach of his dreams coming true he could understand Shannon being filled with rage at the idea of dying. What he couldn’t understand was being filled with enough anger to be on the other end of the murder weapon.

  “I’ll keep that in mind, babe.” Ronan pressed a kiss to the side of Tennyson’s head.

  “I don’t know how the hell the two of you solve so many cases if you’re always kissing each other,” Boone said as she walked into the conference room. She was wearing a good-natured smile on her face.

  “They’re like swans,” Fitzgibbon laughed. “It strengthens their pair-bond and makes them better detectives. You’ll get used to it over time.”

  Boone laughed along with them. “Look, guys, I just wanted to apologize for the reception you got out there. Janowitz and Walsh worked this case originally and they’re pretty pissed off that Reed asked outsiders to look into it.”

  “I get that, Boone,” Ronan said easily.

  “Throw in the fact that Tennyson is a hometown boy and a psychic and gay to boot and that adds insult to injury.” She shrugged. “Religion is still king here no matter how much the world is changing.”

  “I hear you,” Tennyson agreed. “Thank you for coming in here. I appreciate it.”

  “How does it all work?” she asked. “I mean with you talking to the dead victim. I can’t imagine that evidence is admissible in court, even in a place as liberal as Boston.”

  Ronan barked out a laugh. “Come on, Boone. We’re not that liberal back east!”

  “If I’m able to connect with Shannon Bradley’s spirit and she can tell me who killed her, Ronan and Cap will use that information to hopefully get her killer to confess.”

  Boone seemed to be considering that information. “And what if he doesn’t?”

  “Then we hope she’s given us a clue that leads to additional evidence,” Ronan said.

  “How do you mean?” Boone looked puzzled.

  “Let’s say Shannon kept pictures in a secret place, like in a crawl space or something. If she told Tennyson about it, you or one of your colleagues would be able to collect the evidence and use it against the suspect.” Greeley grinned proudly at his father.

  “What he said.” Fitzgibbon slapped Greeley’s back.

  “Are you planning to go out to the Bradley house?” Boone asked.

  “After we’ve had a look at all the evidence,” Tennyson said.

  “I’d like to come with you. If that’s okay?”

  Ronan exchanged a silent look with Fitzgibbon. “Is the sheriff keeping this investigation on the down low or is he making it public knowledge that he’s looking into the case again?”

  Boone looked around the room. She seemed to be studying the outsiders. “He’s asked us to keep it quiet until you’ve spoken with Stephen and Kayla.”

  “We’ll take unmarked cars when we go out there then. You’re in if Reed signs off on it,” Fitzgibbon agreed.

  Boone smiled. “I appreciate it, guys.”
She smiled as she headed out the door.

  “You want to explain that to me?” Ten asked. “I thought the sheriff wanted us to take a look at things because we were impartial third-party observers.”

  “He does, but he also wants to make sure we stay on a short leash, right Cap?” Ronan looked at Fitzgibbon.

  The captain nodded. “Yup. If I were running this operation back home, I would have stuck one of my detectives in there to tag along, just in case.”

  “So, she’s gonna report back to Reed?” Ten shook his head.

  “You bet your sweet ass she is, but so far as I see it, she’s the lesser of the four evils. Janowitz has an obvious bone to pick with you, Ten. Walsh hates the gays, and I can’t put my finger on Lazaro. At least Boone seems pleasant enough and we don’t have to worry about her flirting with any of us.”

  “Praise, Jesus,” Greeley muttered. “Now, can we get back to work?”

  Tennyson couldn’t help laughing. This kid was one in a million.

  20

  Ronan

  When 4pm rolled around, the concentration around the conference room table was broken by the text jingle going off on Tennyson’s phone. Ronan watched with curiosity as his lover’s face lit up with a smile. Those kinds of smiles had been few and far between on this trip. “Who’s got you smiling like that?”

  “Shelly Brinkman. She’s invited us all to dinner at her house tonight.” Ten grinned over his phone at Ronan.

  “Oh man, I loved meeting her. She was so nice to us at the funeral lunch. Can we go, Dad?” Greeley turned on the charm.

  “Tennyson was the one who was invited. I think it’s up to him.” Fitzgibbon smiled at Ten before he started packing up the box of evidence he’d been working on.

  “What do you think, Ronan?” Ten set the phone down and focused on his husband-to-be.

  Ronan would love nothing more than to watch Tennyson smile like that for the rest of the night. “What kind of cook is Shelly? I mean, are we gonna be eating like kings? Or stopping at McDonald’s on the way home?”