“What happened?” Hagan demanded.
“Order up an unmarked, we’re going for a ride,” Nick said.
He took JD by the elbow and led him toward the door.
Kelly hurried to right the chair Nick had left in his wake, then shrugged in response to Hagan’s questioning look and jogged after his lover. He caught up to them in the stairwell.
“What’s going on, what happened?” JD kept asking.
“New evidence,” Nick snarled. “Need you to walk us through something.”
JD’s eyes were still wide and confused, but he was smart enough to stay quiet. Even Kelly kept his mouth shut until they were in the parking lot.
“Nick,” he finally demanded, and he grabbed at Nick’s elbow. He turned him until they were facing each other, trying to make Nick look into his eyes and realize he was spiraling out of control. Kelly didn’t want to divert the spiral, because he was of the opinion that JD needed to see what he was messing around with if he was faking. But he didn’t want to be left behind, either. “Where are we going, and what do you want us to do?”
Nick’s eyes darted over Kelly’s face, then to Julian, who was silently following along. “You two follow us in my car.”
Kelly nodded and let him go.
Hagan held up the keys to the unmarked sedan he’d requisitioned, and Kelly stood aside and watched Nick shove JD into the backseat and slam the door.
Julian clucked his tongue, then sauntered over to the Range Rover. But Kelly remained rooted to the spot for another few seconds. Nick hated being lied to, despised it with more passion than anything, even the New York Yankees.
God help JD if he was trying to play Nick with a lie. God help them al .
Once on the road, Kelly had a hard time keeping up with Hagan until Julian casually flicked on the flashing dashboard light. They shared a look, both of them trying not to grin and failing.
“I could get used to this,” Julian drawled.
“Hell yeah.”
When they reached the bookstore again, Nick was already out of the car and standing in the middle of the street. They’d parked their vehicle with its lights flashing across the narrow lane to block traffic, and Nick was waving to Kelly, telling him where to park the Range Rover.
Kelly angled it, glancing around uneasily. He kept having to remind himself that Nick was a real cop on a real case and everything he did was with the appropriate authority. Kelly hoped it was, at least.
He got out of the Range Rover, his hand going to the butt of the gun under his jacket out of habit. He rarely wore a weapon on his hip anymore, but he was getting used to the feeling of having it there again.
Nick strode toward them and pointed to a chalk marking on the ground. “Shooter right here,” he said to Kelly. “Stand there. Bullet holes in the building put the shooter facing this way. Don’t move.”
“All righty,” Kelly muttered.
Hagan and JD joined them as Nick was positioning Kelly.
“Getting a little bossy, there, O,” Hagan observed. “It’s a damn miracle you ever get laid.”
Nick didn’t respond to the attempt at banter. He beckoned JD with two fingers, walking midway into the street and pointing to another mark on the ground. “Stand here. Face the car.”
JD nodded, standing where he’d been told. He kept staring up at Nick with wide blue eyes, like a puppy being scolded. Kelly and Hagan shared a concerned glance.
“This is the staff sergeant coming out,” Kelly told Hagan quietly. “I’m used to it.”
Hagan looked him up and down, narrowing his eyes. “You come like a fire hose when he gives you an order, don’t you?”
“Only if he tells me to,” Kelly countered with a smirk.
Hagan rolled his eyes. Nick called him from where he was standing on the sidewalk in front of the shop door, and Hagan strolled over to join him. They were far enough away that Kelly had to strain to hear what they were saying. Nick was telling Hagan he was the owner who’d been gunned down walking into the store. Then Julian obliged Nick’s request to stand in the doorway, where the thief had been shot dead and fallen across the threshold.
When they were all standing where the evidence indicated they should have been, Nick walked through the scene, studying them, a frown firmly on his face.
“How do you know where the van was?” Kelly called to him.
“Window glass,” Nick answered as he circled JD. “Had JD’s blood on it. Bullet clipped him, carried onto the van.”
He stepped back, looking first at Kelly, then at Julian. Hagan stood to the side, out of the line of fire. But Julian and Kelly were directly across from one another, and JD formed a direct line of fire between the two.
Nick put his hands on his hips, prowling back and forth, chewing on his lip. “Fuck,” he finally grunted.
Julian raised his hand as if he were holding a gun, and Kelly did the same, firing an imaginary bullet at him.
“No way of knowing what was fired first,” Hagan called.
“But if you ask me, this looks like an assassination. Whoever was standing where the Doc is, he took out his own man in cold blood.”
Nick had a hand over his mouth, still circling JD, studying him, his feet, the way he was positioned versus the rest of them.
“You’re making me really nervous right now,” JD finally told him.
Nick stopped in front of him. He waited a beat, and behind them Julian raised his hand again as if aiming a weapon at them. “Turn around,” Nick ordered JD.
When JD did, he flinched at the sight of Julian aiming at him. He took a step back and knocked into Nick, who didn’t give an inch of ground. He held on to JD instead, keeping him from panicking or bolting.
Kelly abandoned his position and jogged over to them.
“Hey. That shit’s uncalled for, man. Not cool,” he shouted.
He moved to help free JD from Nick’s grasp, but the stunned look of terror on JD’s face stopped him. “You okay?”
“I remember . . . running.” JD took a shallow, shaky breath.
“I was running away from the store. Away from him.”
“From him?” Nick asked, pointing at Julian.
“Wasn’t me!” Julian called in a bored voice.
“No, from the man who was shot. I ran out of the store.
I was in there.” He put both hands to his head and closed his eyes. “Oh God. I really was in there.”
When Nick finally met Kelly’s eyes, he looked weary and almost sick. Kelly realized the hard-ass hissy fit he’d just thrown had all been part of a show he was putting on for JD, hoping to jog something loose. It had worked. It had been brutal and perhaps a little immoral, but it had worked.