by Pandora Pine
All Ronan had to show for their lovemaking was the faded handprint on his ass. Tennyson couldn’t help wondering if he’d managed to mark Ronan on the inside as well, but he sure as hell wasn’t about to ask.
It was easier for Ten to ponder this question than it was to think about where he and Ronan were currently headed, which was the Suffolk County Medical Examiner’s Office. He’d never been to a morgue before and had only seen dead bodies in the movies, never in person.
He’d only seen Michael Frye’s garbage bag shroud last night, not what was inside of it, but this afternoon, he was going to come face-to-face with the five-year-old’s remains and on camera, no less. There was no way he was going to be able to see Michael Frye by himself, with Ronan at his side, and then do it again for Brett McCabe and his cameras. It was all going to have to be done live. No second takes.
Tennyson had to keep reminding himself that what he was going to see today wasn’t what the boy looked like now on the other side. There, the boy was perfect. That image of Michael wasn’t making Tennyson feel any better now.
“You’re awfully quiet.” Ronan’s voice had taken on a solemn tone. This was a man who was used to visiting the morgue, used to seeing death in all of its hideous, violent forms.
“I’ve never done this before,” Tennyson admitted shyly. It was odd that just a few hours ago he’d freely given his body and soul to Ronan, but now, pushing the words past his lips was a struggle. Not to mention the fact that his confession was being picked up by the voice-activated cameras Brett McCabe’s film crew had wired into the car.
“What, you’ve never witnessed an autopsy? Very few civilians have. You can wait outside if you don’t think you can handle it. It doesn’t make you any less of a man for not being able to see a child in this state,” Ronan said gently.
Tennyson shook his head before turning to stare out the window at the barren winter landscape zipping past the car window. “No, it’s not that. I’ve never seen a dead person before.”
Ronan took his eyes off the road to stare at Tennyson for a moment. “You see dead people all the time. You told me you’ve seen them from the time you were in high school.”
“I’ve seen people’s spirits. Whole and uninjured, not dead and,” Ten took a shaky breath, “broken.”
“So, you’ve never seen an actual dead body before? How is that possible? You’re like what, twenty-five years old?”
Tennyson laughed, grateful for Ronan’s sense of humor. Twenty-five was definitely in his rear-view mirror.
“What’s funny? Don’t tell me you’re only twenty-one. I’ve seen you naked!” Ronan waggled his eyebrows.
“Actually, I’m thirty, but thanks for the compliment.” Tennyson shook his head while trying to decide how much of the story he should tell Ronan.
“You’ve got the tightest ass I’ve ever had the pleasure of spanking. There’s no way you’re thirty.”
Tennyson felt himself blush down to his toes. He couldn’t help wondering if he should remind Ronan they were on Candid Camera.
“Seriously, though, how are you your age and have never been to a funeral?” Ronan’s voice held genuine interest. All traces of teasing were gone.
Tennyson sighed. He hated this story. This memory. “I came out to my parents at the beginning of my senior year of high school. I told them about my gift and about being gay.”
Ronan whistled low. “Wow. That’s a lot of information to take in all at once. How were you seventeen years old and your mother didn’t already didn’t know you were gay? You don’t exactly hide your rainbow under your hat.”
Tennyson snorted and started to laugh. He wasn’t expecting to laugh while he told this story. “Religion and naiveté.” He shrugged, feeling Ronan’s love bite tingle all over again. “I grew up in a small town in Kansas. There was so much praying going on in that small town that my mother didn’t have time to notice I wasn’t like the other boys.”
“There was time enough for praying, but not time enough for listening, huh?”
Tennyson was shocked that Ronan understood the situation this quickly. “Something like that,” he agreed. “Anyway, being that Jesus was more important than me, they disowned me, but since I was still a minor at the time, they let me live at home until I graduated from high school. In that time, no one that I knew or loved passed away, thankfully, so I never went to a funeral or a wake.”
Ronan didn’t say a word, but Tennyson saw his hands tighten on the steering wheel. He didn’t quite know what to make of the detective’s behavior. It wasn’t like Ronan to keep his opinion to himself, especially one that was seeming to incite strong emotion in him. If he gripped the steering wheel much tighter, he was going to snap it off.
“It all worked out, Ronan,” Tennyson said gently, setting a hand on his lover’s thigh. “After high school, I moved to Salem and started my own business. I made friends, became part of the community here. For the first time in my life I was accepted for the gay, ghost whisperer I’d been born to be.”
“If I ever meet your father, I’m punching him in the face,” Ronan said coldly. “Twice.”
Tennyson thought about those words for a minute. Never in his life had another person been on his side when it came to his parents’ treatment of him. Everyone back in Union Chapel had told him repeatedly during his senior year how truly lucky he was that his parents were the charitable people they were for letting him remain in their home. “Deal!” Tennyson agreed.
Going to the morgue to view Michael Frye’s remains was going to be the worst moment of his life. Tennyson was already prepared for that, but with Ronan at his side, he knew he could handle what was to come.
What he wasn’t sure he could handle was Ronan’s reaction when he reminded him about the voice-activated cameras.
25
Ronan
Ronan’s emotions were all over the place as he pulled into a parking space at the morgue. His anger over Tennyson’s parents’ treatment of him warred with his growing feelings for his lover. Pride battled embarrassment over his comments that the voice-activated cameras picked up indicating that he and Ten were clearly more than colleagues. Top among all of his feelings was the real reason he and Ten were sitting in the parking lot in the first place.
This part of his job never got easier. The fact that the victim they were about to see was a five-year-old child would haunt him forever. “Will he be here?” Ronan knew he didn’t have to say who the “he” was out loud.
Tennyson covered Ronan’s right hand that was still gripping the steering wheel hard enough for his knuckles to turn white. “I don’t know.” Tennyson took a deep breath as if he needed a minute to think over the question. “Spirits don’t usually show up at cemeteries. Sometimes they come to their own funeral as a last way of seeing all of the people who loved them in life in one place at the same time. Since I’ve never been to a morgue before...” Ten trailed off.
From his spot in the driver’s seat, he could see Brett McCabe’s van parked across the way. He knew the film crew had been at the morgue filming since the morning. They’d been shooting the scenery of this part of South Boston as well as speaking to the medical examiner who would be working with Michael Frye’s remains.
This wasn’t going to get any easier the longer they sat here. “Let’s go.” Ronan opened the door and moved quickly around to the passenger side to hold the door open for Tennyson. He thought the psychic was brave for agreeing to come and do this, but wasn’t sure how to say that to him. Ronan knew Ten was barely hanging on as it was.
He kept his mouth wisely shut as he led Tennyson through the main door and through the metal detector after he’d shown his badge and checked his gun in with the Suffolk County Sheriff Deputy on duty. After securing both Ten and himself a visitors’ badges, he headed over toward the bank of elevators where a cameraman was waiting for them.
Once they were all inside, Ronan hit the button marked “B.”
“Oh Christ, it’s in the basem
ent?” Tennyson shivered and rubbed his arms.
Ronan nodded. “Makes it easier for drop-offs and pickups.”
Tennyson nodded and shut his eyes. He appeared to be taking deep breaths. Ronan could see his lips moving and wondered if he was praying.
“There.” Tennyson opened his eyes and brushed his hands off on his pants. “I asked my spirit guides to protect us.”
“Protect us against what?”
Tennyson raised an eyebrow as if he expected Ronan to know the answer to the question without his help.
“Oh, glomming spirits looking to hitchhike a ride on my white light.” He should have known that. It wasn’t everyday someone told him about how attractive his soul’s white light was to less desirables.
“Maybe. Like I said, I’ve never been to a place like this before. I can only guess what’s waiting for us inside that room, aside from Michael Frye’s remains.”
When the elevator doors dinged open, Ronan took Tennyson by the hand and led him out into the hallway. “Look, if this whole thing becomes too much for you to handle, step out into the hallway. If you need me to come with you, work the code word, cactus, into the conversation and I’ll get us out of there.”
Tennyson nodded, his eyes downcast toward the industrial floor tile. A second later his eyes lifted back to Ronan’s. “Michael Frye spent the last seven years buried under two tons of concrete. He didn’t have the option to step out. The least I can do for him is spend half an hour in the morgue with you to gather every clue possible to catch the motherfucker who did this to him.”
Ronan didn’t know which he was taken more aback by, the steely determination in Tennyson’s dark eyes or his choice of words. “Okay.” He squeezed Tennyson’s shoulder and pushed open the door to the morgue.
“Ah, Detective O’Mara. I’ve been waiting for you.”
“Good to see you, Doctor Hoffman.” Ronan shook the handsome medical examiner’s hand. The doctor reminded him of the actor who played Dr. Sheldon Hawkes on CSI:NY. Once upon a time, he’d pictured himself dating the handsome doctor, but then Josh had asked him out and all thoughts of Vann Hoffman vanished from his mind. Seemed like maybe now wasn’t the right time for their trajectories to align either.
“Good to see you too, Ronan. This must be your new partner, the stunning psychic I’ve heard so much about.” Vann turned his charming smile on Tennyson before offering his hand to shake.
“Tennyson Grimm. It’s nice to meet you, Doctor Hoffman.” Tennyson took the doctor’s hand and offered him a shy smile.
Ronan could see Tennyson blush as the doctor turned on the charm full blast. Vann had that effect on people, he just wished Tennyson wasn’t one of them. “Why don’t we get to work, Vann. This is going to be hard enough…” Ronan trailed off, hoping Doctor Feelgood would get the message and stop pumping Tennyson’s hand. If this kept up, he’d be kissing the inside of his wrist next.
What was worse was that Brett McCabe’s cameras were capturing all of this. He could see the television producer standing off to the back of the room near the industrial-sized sinks. He was wearing a Yankees cap that looked like it had seen better days. Brett looked like shit too. Ronan would guess he was having a hard time being in a place like this.
“Right,” Vann said absently, his demeanor turning all business as he led Tennyson and Ronan to the last table in the room. It was draped in white.
Ronan saw Tennyson stiffen his spine as they headed back to the shrouded exam table. He wished he could give some of his strength to Tennyson. This was just another unpleasant part of his job, one that he’d grown accustomed to over the years, but for Tennyson, this was something he’d never had to do before.
“Let’s start with the good news. Vann stopped at the table next to the one shrouded.
Ronan could see Michael Frye’s clothing laid out as if he were going to walk in any moment and dress himself. There was the striped shirt that Ross Frye had used to identify his son’s remains, along with blue jeans, socks, and a pair of underpants patterned with what looked like characters from SpongeBob SquarePants.
“Thankfully the garbage bag used to hold the child’s remains stayed intact all of those years underground and preserved the clothing. I was able to recover a single strand of hair from inside the boy’s underwear. I’ve bagged it to be sent off for DNA testing.”
“Is that possible after having been in the ground for seven years?” Tennyson asked with a shaking voice.
“It is,” Vann agreed. “I’ve got a crime tech on the way over who will bag the rest of the clothing so that it can be processed for fibers and touch DNA testing. I wanted to be able to show all of the evidence to both of you first.”
“What’s touch DNA?” Tennyson looked confused.
Ronan grinned at the psychic. “You touched the door to the morgue when we came in a minute ago. Not only did you leave your fingerprints on the door, you also left DNA behind.”
“Yeah, but the sample must be miniscule. I mean I only touched the door for a few seconds.”
“Exactly. The tech has advanced so far that a tiny sample is all we need to develop your DNA profile, Tennyson.” Vann winked at him.
“So far as I can tell, advancing technology is the only thing working in my favor when it comes to cold cases.” Ronan offered Tennyson a casual shrug. He knew their bond was only a few weeks old but he hoped his lover wasn’t swayed by the ME’s smooth moves.
“So it’s possible that you’ve already found all the evidence you’ll need to nail Michael’s killer to the wall?”
“There’s never enough evidence,” Ronan said darkly. He’d been a part of too many cases he’d considered iron-clad only to have them fall apart at the hands of skilled defense attorneys.
“Ronan’s right. Look at cases like OJ and Casey Anthony. There were heaps of evidence against them both, DNA and otherwise, and thanks to their fast-talking defense teams, they were both acquitted. We collect all the evidence available and hope the prosecutor can explain the science of it well enough to convince a jury to convict.”
Tennyson wrapped his arms around himself.
Ronan set a hand on his shoulder and gave it a squeeze. He knew none of this was easy. “Is he here, Ten?”
Turning to look at Ronan over his shoulder, Tennyson shook his head. “No, but others are.”
“Do you need a minute to, uh, speak with them?” Ronan offered him a smile.
“At the end. I want to finish hearing about Michael first.” Ten turned back to the medical examiner. “There is more about Michael, isn’t there?”
“Yes, even though there were only skeletal remains left, I was able to determine cause and manner of death.” Vann stepped over to the table and gently pulled back the sheet.
Tennyson gasped when the small skeleton of Michael Frye was revealed.
Ronan had a hard time taking in the small bones as well. This part of his job never got any easier. In a way, it was how he still knew he was human. If seeing the remains of children stopped affecting him, he would know it was time to hand in his detective’s shield and walk away.
“Michael’s hyoid bone was fractured,” Vann said simply. He pulled a pen out of his pristinely white lab coat and pointed at the U-shaped bone. “I’m listing the cause of death as manual strangulation and the manner of death as homicide.”
“The bastard stared Michael in the face as he choked the life out of him.” Ronan’s voice was ice cold.
“We’ll find who did this to him, Ronan.” Tennyson’s words sounded less like a prediction and more like a promise.
26
Tennyson
It was becoming a week of firsts for Tennyson. Firsts he wished he never had experienced. From being at the Candy Factory apartments when Michael Frye’s body was discovered on that brutally cold night, to seeing the boy’s skeletal remains that next day. To now, a week later, sitting in the back pew of Saint Christopher’s Catholic Church in South Boston, listening while Father McCaskill recited the T
wenty-Third Psalm over the tiny white casket covered in a spray of red roses.
The Lord is my Shepherd; I shall not want…
Tennyson remembered the words from his days back in Union Chapel from his time in Sunday School, but they failed to bring any comfort. He could only hope the words were comforting the Fryes who were sitting together, each dressed in black, with a foot of space between them in the front row.
“You okay?” Ronan leaned over to whisper.
Tennyson nodded, reaching over to take Ronan’s hand.
Ronan startled, pulling back for a second before leaving his fingers threaded with Tennyson’s.
“Don’t tell me you were afraid of God smiting the Sodomites in church,” Tennyson chuckled under his breath.
Ronan nodded. “You can’t take the Catholic out of the boy…”
Tennyson angled his chin toward the Fryes. “I can’t imagine how hard this is for them.”
“I almost wonder if this is the easy part,” Ronan whispered back. “The hard part was the seven years of not knowing where Michael was. Not knowing if he was alive or dead or if he had a hot meal in his belly or a safe place to sleep.”
Tennyson thought about those words for a few seconds. Maybe this was the easy part. At least the Fryes knew what came next. There would be a graveside ceremony followed by a mercy meal at a nearby family-run restaurant that had been Michael’s favorite place to eat, then after that, it would be up to the Fryes to figure out what would come next for them.
“Do you think they’ll stay together?” Ronan whispered.
“Not a chance.” Tennyson didn’t need to be a psychic to know that. All he had to do was look at the married couple to see that burying their son was the final thing they would do together. The gulf between them was wider than the twelve inches separating their shoulders. When Jackie dabbed her eyes with a tissue, Ross actually leaned away from her, rather than toward her to offer comfort.