Nolan scrubbed a hand over his face. If he could leave in the next thirty minutes, he might still be able to make the final boarding call for his cruise—
His phone rang, Agent Ramos’ name and number on the caller ID. “Tell me you’re on your way.”
“I wish,” she said.
He let out a hard sigh. “What’s keeping everyone?”
“Orders.”
Nolan groaned. “Whoseorders? I’m not even supposed to be here. Where’s the official FBI response?”
“I don’t know.” Ramos made a frustrated sound. “It’s—weird.”
Something in the tone of her voice raised the hairs on his neck. “Weird how?”
In the background, he heard her close a door. “You asked about Seattle’s other empath, the one who works with the soldiers at the veterans’ hospital?”
“Cora Falcon.” He sat up straighter. “Did you find her? Can we get an off-the-record read of the witness?”
“We’re not allowed to call her.”
“What? We have adead senator.If we want an empath and no questions, we can have a goddamn empath and no questions. If not Falcon, there’s an empath who consults for the Bureau in Chicago—”
“No dice. Empaths have been forbidden from the crime scene and the witness.”
Wait,what? Yes, using empaths for anything law-enforcement-related was a gray area, making judges testy, defense attorneys froth at the mouth, and the little whiners themselves too opinionated about their reads only being used for “good.” But a full empath ban from a location? That was the kind of thing Hathaway had wanted to pass, but it wasn’t law yet. “By whose order?”
“Someone higher than me.” She lowered her voice. “But I bet you it’s the same person keeping us off the scene.”
Nolan huffed again. “Well, I’m already here, but what the hell am I supposed to do alone? All I’ve got is a catatonic witness I can’t even get near, because some special doctors showed up and they won’t talk to anyone.”
“Special,”she repeated meaningfully. “I’ll call if I learn anything new.”
Nolan hung up with a frown. Who could forbid that empaths even set foot on a scene of this importance? His irritation with Davies kicked up another notch. If the little whiner had kept it together, they could have had answers already.
He stepped down from his SUV to the parking lot. But as he glanced across the lot, he paused. The ambulance with Braker had vanished, and in its place was a black truck. Not one of the Northwest’s mud-stained beaters either, but a giant cowboy wet dream with a gleaming four-door cab and a racing exhaust.
Nolan crossed the lot, only to find the truck was empty. His frown deepened.
He made his way down the wooden ramp and onto the dock, which shifted under his weight as he walked toward Stone’s yacht. The SPD had already amassed a list of angry yacht-owners threatening to file suits over being kept away from their property that morning. He’d have to make sure the situation was handled with tact; the SPD couldn’t be trusted to get anything right.
Case in point: as he approached Stone’s yacht,The Bulwark, an unusually fit man was emerging from the ladder of an open hatch on the aft deck, a fringe of blondish-brownish hair visible under his winter hat, his tall frame and broad shoulders covered by a stylish shearling coat that was definitely not police-issue.
How the hell had the SPD missed a civilian climbing onto Stone’s yacht? Nolan broke into a run. “Sir!”
The man looked up, younger than Nolan had expected, maybe twenty-five or twenty-six.
“Sir,”Nolan called again, masking his anger with curt politeness. Stone wasn’t the only millionaire to keep his yacht here, and this stranger could have walked straight off a glossy poster in a swooning teenage girl’s room. Pretty boys and empaths; this place really was a circus. “I’m afraid you’re trespassing on a crime scene. I’ll have an officer escort—”
“Special Agent Damian Nolan?”
Nolan paused. The Texas drawl was a surprise, out of place against the gray skies and freezing rain. He reflexively touched his gun through his jacket. “How do you know my name?”
“You can keep that Glock where it is. My name’s Evan Grayson.”
Nolan’s blood went cold. “Agent Grayson.” He stood, frozen in place on the dock, as Grayson shut the hatch. “I didn’t know—”you were real“—you were coming.”
“I’m getting a lot of that this morning.”
