by Pandora Pine
“What if we could find him, Ronan?” Tennyson asked softly. “What if we could bring him home?”
His head felt like it was stuffed with cotton, almost as if Tennyson’s touch had lulled him into a trance. “What?”
Tennyson’s dark eyes softened. “What if the cameras filmed us while we worked? What harm would that do to our investigation?”
“There is no our investigation. I came here to… Shit, I don’t even know what I came here to do.” Ronan shook his head, feeling more confused than ever. All he’d wanted to do was talk to Tennyson, one-on-one.
“We both know you came here to consult me on the Michael Frye case. So, let me see the file and let’s get to work.” Tennyson held out his hand.
“No!” Brett McCabe practically shouted. “If we’re going to do this, it all needs to be authentic. The biggest gripe people have with this kind of show is thinking it’s contrived. You need to see the file for the first time and hear Ronan describe it on camera. All of your reactions and feelings need to be genuine.”
“Even if, and it’s a pretty big if, I agree to work with him, there’s no way in hell the Boston Police Department is going to agree to allow an active investigation to be assisted by a psychic let alone to allow that investigation to be filmed for public consumption.” Ronan felt the beginnings of a headache and not just a physical one either. He’d only been working with his new captain for a few months now and he didn’t know the man well enough yet to figure out how the man would react to this situation.
“Bullshit!” McCabe said gleefully, crossing his arms over his chest. “While we’ve been talking, I Googled you, Detective O’Mara, and after the Garcia shooting and subsequent wrongful death lawsuit, you need all the good press you can get. With all the recent allegations of racism and members of the 59th precinct taking bribes from drug dealers, the BPD needs good press too. I can spin this to your captain in a way that makes it a win-win situation for everyone. All you have to do is agree to work with us. It was your idea to work with Tennyson in the first place.”
As much as Ronan hated to admit it, McCabe had a point. Several of them in fact. It had been his idea to drive north and show Tennyson the Michael Frye case file. What hadn’t been his idea was any of this shit show that had followed: crystals, magic-feeling touches, reality television and a man who he somehow felt magnetically pulled toward and knew he needed to protect. Ronan sighed as if the weight of his career were on his shoulders. “Fine, I’m in.”
4
Tennyson
The project, tentatively titled, Cold Case Psychic, had been given the green light by the Boston Police Department a week later. According to Brett McCabe, the Reality Show Network had to give up final creative control to the BPD, who’d been afraid the network would make them look like a bunch of Keystone Cops otherwise.
Tennyson didn’t much care about any of those things. What was foremost in his mind was helping to find that missing boy and bringing him home to his grieving family.
Running a close second in Tennyson’s mind was Ronan O’Mara. The gruff, but handsome detective was never far from his thoughts. They’d exchanged phone numbers after Brett McCabe had left the store to begin working on his plan to woo Ronan’s boss into allowing his production company to shoot the investigation, but so far, Tennyson hadn’t been brave enough to use it.
Not that it mattered now anyway. Today was the first day of the investigation. The production team had arrived at West Side Magick around 5am to set up cameras for shooting around the store. He and Ronan would use the reading room as Ronan walked him through the entire Michael Frye case file.
Surprisingly, Brett and Ronan had been in agreement that this whole thing would be a one-take operation. If someone misspoke or stuttered, tough luck, it all stayed in as part of the record. Above all else, the investigation needed to be authentic. If the dialogue sounded too perfect or scripted, they’d lose credibility. Tennyson found himself agreeing with this line of thought.
He'd seen the detective in question only briefly when he'd arrived at West Side Magick. Truman had introduced himself and taken the cop over to the bakery he co-owned with Cole’s wife, Cassie, and had gotten him a muffin and a cup of coffee.
For all of Ronan's gruffness, the one thing that had been crystal-clear had been the man's caring nature. The most important thing to him was Michael Frye and the missing boy's family.
It was obvious to Tennyson that the detective felt that being assigned to work in the cold case unit was a demotion, but that didn't stop Ronan from giving it his all. He admired that in his new partner. Not that he was going to tell Ronan that piece of information. He had a feeling hearing that from him would prickle more than the actual demotion.
Another thing that was clearly apparent was that Ronan was mourning a relationship of some kind. Tennyson didn't need to use his psychic abilities to see the jealous look in Ronan's cornflower blue eyes when he'd spy a happy couple walk into the bakery.
One of Tennyson’s iron-clad rules was not to read someone unless that person asked him to. Ten was having a hard time sticking to that rule with the detective. He wanted to learn more about the man and find out what made him tick, but he was going to have to do that the old-fashioned way and get to know him through conversation.
"Are you ready to get this shit show on the road?" Ronan asked from behind him, making Tennyson jump a bit.
Straightening his spine, Ten turned around to face the cop. "I'm ready when you are."
"You sure about that, Witch City Medium? You look a little jumpy to me.” Ronan folded his arms over his broad chest, a shit-eating grin plastered to his face.
"What a clever nickname, detective. Think that up all on your own, did you?" Tennyson turned and headed toward Carson who'd just come into the shop with Cole who was holding his infant daughter.
Even when Laurel was screeching her tiny head off like a banshee, holding the baby brought him moments of absolute calm. The one-month-old had no spirits following her and no visions to interpret. "Hello, my angel girl." Tennyson pressed a kiss to her forehead before Cole handed the baby to him.
Tennyson closed his eyes and focused on the baby's pure aura, relaxing himself in her calming presence.
"Cute kid. She's not going on camera, right?" Ronan asked, his voice filled with doom and gloom.
His Zen broken, Ten opened his eyes to see Ronan staring at him intently. "That will be up to Cole and Cassie. She's their daughter."
"Babies bring out the crazies. Makes my blood run cold when I see celebrities and reality show people showing their kids off. It's like you're giving rabid fans an invitation to exploit or kidnap your kids."
Tennyson pulled the baby closer to his chest. The need to protect the child burned fiercely through his entire body. Although what all 5'9" of him could do against a person intent on doing Laurel harm, he didn't know. What he did know, was that Ronan would give his life to save the little girl. "I'll mention that to Cole." Unable to stand the intensity of Ronan's icy blue stare, Tennyson headed off to find Cole and Cassie.
Tennyson’s emotions were all over the place. Arousal was battling with stone-cold worry. Ronan O’Mara was the best looking man he’d ever set his eyes on. He reminded Ten of Scott Eastwood with his piercing blue eyes, brooding stare, and long legs. His unpleasant sarcastic demeanor was where the similarities ended. How was it possible to be this attracted to such a dick?
Pushing the attraction to Detective Dickhead aside, it was the worry that had Tennyson feeling off. Never one to doubt his abilities, he was worried now. The Frye case could go one of two ways. Either the boy was dead or he'd been kidnapped and was living far away from New England under a new name with a new family.
If it was the latter, it wouldn't be so simple to find the child. He'd gotten lucky with the Lanski boy. He'd been familiar with the Scituate neighborhood where the boy was being held because it was near the lighthouse.
Tennyson had visited the lighthouse and the beach hu
ndreds of times since he'd moved to Massachusetts. If the boy was living in Florida or somewhere in the middle of nowhere, Texas, finding him would be near to impossible.
As much as he hated to even think it, his best chance of finding Michael Frye was if the boy was dead and his spirit could lead Tennyson to his remains and hopefully, his killer
5
Ronan
Ronan was as nervous as Tennyson. He was just better at schooling his emotions from his face.
Working an investigation was always a crap shoot. Sometimes you got lucky with evidence, leads, and eyewitnesses, but with this case being seven years cold, the odds of catching a lucky break were slim to none.
Not only did he have the pressure of solving this case sitting on his shoulders, but all of his work and methods were going to be chronicled for the world to see on video. Any mistake or wrong step would be there for the entire viewing audience and his captain to see, live and in living color.
Then there were the Fryes. He'd met them two weeks ago when he'd been assigned the case. From the outside looking in, they looked like a happily married couple. They lived in a nice row house on Columbia Road in South Boston, with an unobstructed view of Boston Harbor.
Ross Frye was an ER doctor at Boston Mercy Hospital and his wife, Jackie, was a NICU nurse. She'd left her job when Michael had been born, but after he'd been missing for two years, had gone back to work to keep from sitting at home waiting for a phone call that so far, hadn't come.
Ronan had listened to the story of the day Michael had been taken from their front yard, his heart breaking the entire time. The only good thing about working homicide in Boston was that he'd never before dealt with a child kidnapping case. For the most part he'd worked on cases of dead gang-bangers or hookers who'd been killed by johns or angry pimps.
Hearing the details of a five-year-old who'd been in the fenced-in front yard one second and gone the next, had nearly undone his six months of sobriety. He’d spent a couple nights after that interview at local AA meetings white-knuckling the hard plastic chairs in the local YWCA.
"Good morning, people!" Brett McCabe called cheerily. "Let's make some magic! Pun intended!"
Ronan rolled his eyes. If Brett was going to act like the male version of Tinker Bell, hopped up on speed, it was going to be a long day.
Fifteen minutes later, he found himself sitting at a wooden table in what he'd been told was the reading room of the shop. This was where Carson's psychic mother had conducted her private readings with her customers, and where Cole, Carson, and Tennyson met with customers now.
The room would be used for him to lay out the Frye case to Tennyson. Brett had liked the way the space had been decorated much better than using one of the sterile conference rooms down at the precinct.
They were shooting this segment of the story so early in the morning because Carson and Cole had it booked the rest of the day with readings. Tennyson's own clients had to be rescheduled due to the time he'd be spending with Ronan today.
Looking around the room, Ronan could see woven tapestries depicting Buddha and the chakras. In the left corner of the room was a large, electric waterfall, which was somehow soothing to his raw nerves.
Tibetan chimes hung in the opposite corner and seemed to be moving of their own accord, as the air in the room was still. He imagined there was a vent positioned somewhere that would make the chimes ring at important times during a reading.
God, he was a pessimistic asshole. It was all part of his police training. If he had a nickel for every earnest-looking perp who'd lied straight to his face over his twelve year career, he could buy a Caribbean island and retire in style.
"Here," Tennyson held out his hand.
Ronan opened his palm and felt something soft and warm drop into it. He saw it was another multi-colored stone. "More fluoride for my teeth?"
Rolling his eyes, Tennyson took the seat next to his. "There is so much anxiety rolling off of you it’s making me edgy. I know how nervous you are about me meeting the Fryes. I promise you I'll be nothing but professional when I meet them."
"Stop reading my fucking mind, Grimm." Ronan was anxious. Edgy too. He didn’t need Tennyson pointing that out to him.
"I'm not reading your mind, detective. Your aura is a mess of red from your anxiety. Rub the stone. Imagine it soaking up your anxiety like a sponge drinking up a spill. You'll feel better. I promise."
Against his better judgment, Ronan obeyed the psychic. He felt his heart rate slow a bit and the tension in his body ebb. He was sure it had to do with the fact that he was concentrating on the stupid rock, rather than the polished stone having some kind of super-absorbent power like a roll of Bounty paper towels.
"Guys, that's perfect!" Brett said from the doorway. He was holding two thumbs up.
"Motherfucker," Ronan muttered. "Guess nothing's going to be private from here on out."
"We're ready to roll when the two of you are," Brett grinned.
"Before we get started," Tennyson said, "I only want to hear the bare bones of the case. I don't want to see any pictures of the boy or the crime scene, okay?"
Ronan nodded, figuring it would be more dramatic when Tennyson described Michael's towhead blonde hair and gap-toothed smile to his parents when they visited them later this morning. "Okay, well this is what we know. Michael Frye was playing in his front yard with a new puppy on the afternoon of October 17, 2010. His father was at work and his mother was in the house making dinner. The puppy needed to do its business and Jackie Frye let Michael take his new pet into the fenced in front yard. When they hadn't returned ten minutes later, she ran out to check on them. The dog was in the yard, but the boy was gone. She searched the neighborhood, calling for him and asking neighbors to help before calling 9-1-1. There were organized searches, a tip line was set up and the parents made several pleas on television for the return of their son. Every tip was investigated but none panned out. It was as if the boy simply vanished into thin air. The parents were investigated and were ruled out as suspects." Ronan folded his hands over the accordion folder with the case notes in it. Knowing the case by heart, he didn't need to refer to them.
Looking to Tennyson, he could see the psychic nodding. "May I?" Ten was reaching out toward the file, setting his left hand on top of it.
"Yeah, go ahead." Ronan thought he didn't want to look at the pictures inside, but hey, whatever floated his boat.
His eyes slipping shut, Tennyson left his hand sitting on top of the file, he didn't move and barely seemed to be breathing. "The parents had nothing to do with his disappearance and all of the tips called in to the tip line are dead ends."
"I just said that, Grimm." Ronan hated the tightness in his voice, but he'd just said that very thing. The cops of the 48th had spent years investigating the leads in the file and this fruitcake set a hand on the folder and could say definitively in seconds what it had taken good men and women years to determine? That was bullshit if he’d ever heard it.
“It’s not bullshit, detective.” There was heat in Tennyson’s words.
“Stop reading my mind,” Ronan gritted out from behind clenched teeth.
“For your information, I’m reading your body language. You tense up like a virgin on a blind date when you’re ready to throw the bullshit flag.” Tennyson shrugged. “Deceit and malice read hot, like when you move your hand over the hot burner of an electric stove.”
Before he knew what he was doing, Ronan reached out and set a hand on the accordion folder. He didn’t feel any heat. The folder was cool to the touch.
Tennyson raised a wordless eyebrow.
“I still think its bullshit. A lot of good men and women spent years running down those leads and for you to pass your hand over the folder like some kind of friggen magician about to pull out a rabbit is bullshit.”
Tennyson set a hand on top of Ronan’s. The detective wasn’t prepared for the instant calm that came over him. He’d been spoiling for a fight, and the second Tennyson
touched him the anger and frustration blew right out of him like a hurricane spinning down over cool water. When his heart slowed and he was able to think clearly again he was even more unprepared for the tsunami of attraction swamping his senses and heading straight for his cock.
About to jerk his hand away from Tennyson like he’d been burned, Ronan remembered they were on Candid Camera. “Is there anything else you need to know about the Frye case before we meet Jackie and Ross?” Getting back to the matter at hand was what Ronan needed more than anything right now.
Tennyson directed his dark stare at him. He seemed to be thinking over exactly what he wanted to say. “What do you think happened to Michael Frye?”
“It’s not my job to speculate.” He didn’t want his worst feelings recorded on tape for Ross and Jackie to see at a later date.
“Come on, detective. You’ve been doing this for a long time. You must have some idea of what happened.”
All of the tension Ronan had managed to let go of with Tennyson’s stupid rock rushed back in. He had a few ideas of what happened to the boy and none of them were good. After reading and rereading the case file he’d figured the boy had been abducted or was dead. “After seven years of being missing, there are a few ways I can see this case going and none of them are going to end with a parade, Grimm.”
6
Tennyson
Ronan hadn’t said a word during the hour-long ride into Boston which suited Tennyson just fine. He was trying to focus on any messages his spirit guides would be sending him about Michael Frye. Oddly enough though, they were silent. It reminded him of what happened when he held Laurel. Dead silence. It was unnerving to say the least.
What was making him feel even more on edge was the steady stream of emotions rippling off Ronan. If his emotions were a stone dropping into a calm pond, it would send breaking waves onto the shore. Not knowing the man well enough to try to soothe him, he kept his mouth shut.