Page 10

After a quick call to Faulkner Hayes, assuring he was in the office, Ronan, Jude, and Fitzgibbon headed over to Boston Police Headquarters. Everyone else was going to the Boston Children’s Museum. They’d all meet up after for lunch at an Italian restaurant in the North End.

As they drove, Ronan called Cisco Jackson.

“Let me guess, there was a murder at the circus you want to solve,”

Cisco said, not bothering to say hello.

“Faulk called, didn’t he?”

Ronan said with a sigh. He should have known.

“Yes, he did. Unlike my own detectives, Faulk thought it was a good idea to call me about this potential case.”

Cisco shouted.

“We’re calling you now, Cisco,”

Fitzgibbon said. “We reached out to Faulk to see if there was even a case file available. There was no sense getting you involved until we knew there was something more than Ten’s chat with the dead clown.”

“Of course the murdered man would reach out to Ten.”

Cisco said, all earlier traces of his anger gone. He might have been upset that he wasn’t Ronan’s first call, but when it came to solving cold murder cases, Cisco was all in. “What happened?”

“Jumping Jack was murdered on opening night. His body was found inside the tiger cage, drenched in blood, but the tiger didn’t kill him. The man was shot,”

Jude said.

“All members of the crew were interviewed, but no one was arrested and the circus was allowed to leave town a week after their school vacation week performances. In a weirdly related note, I was there the night of the murder.”

Ronan was sure that little personal tidbit would sink the hook deeper into Cisco.

“Jesus, you were there that night? How the hell old were you?”

“I was thirteen. Mom had taken me to the parade of elephants and then to the event inside the old Boston Garden. I met one of the clowns, who was an absolute dick and this beautiful girl, who is his daughter. Ying Yang is right up there at the top of my list of suspects. He’s physically abusive to both his wife and his daughter, according to what the Celestina told Ten.”

“Do you believe Celestina?”

Cisco asked. “I’m putting that on our baby name list.”

The smile in Cisco’s voice was obvious.

“Yes, I believe her,”

Ronan said. “What’s this about a baby?”

“Luca and I are going to adopt another child,”

Cisco said. “Fingers crossed. We should know in about six weeks. Just have to make sure the birth mother is still willing to give her daughter up. We’re trying not to get our hopes up, but it’s hard not to.”

“I hear that,”

Jude said. “I remember how agonizing it was waiting for Lizbet’s birth mother to sign away her legal rights.”

“I remember how hard that was, especially since you were still in the hospital after nearly getting your dumb ass murdered by a serial killer.”

Cisco snorted, sounding as if the memory of the night they’d saved Jude was a good one. “Back to business, find out what you can from Faulk and get a copy of the case file. Pull criminal history on this Ding Dong character and go from there. Keep me updated. Jace dropped off tickets for the circus performance, so I’ll be down there at some point.”

“Gotcha,”

Fitzgibbon said, all smiles. “Thanks for the leeway to work this case.”

“Don’t make me regret giving it to you.”

With those words, Cisco ended the call.

“Well, at least we asked permission this time instead of begging for forgiveness,”

Ronan said, feeling victorious. There had been plenty of times when the opposite had been true.

Fifteen minutes later, the van pulled up in front of Boston Police Headquarters in South Boston. “Home sweet home. This is where it all began for us, Fitzy.”

Ronan slung an arm around his boss.

“I knew you were trouble from the word go.”

Fitzgibbon rolled his eyes. “Captain Davidson came to me and begged to let you join cold case after you got out of rehab. That man loved you like a son and he wanted to make sure you’d have a place to land when you got your shit together.”

“Cap was one of the good ones.”

Ronan never knew Davidson had gone to bat for him until now. All he remembered from that time was being grateful to still have a job. The fact that he was able to keep his detective’s shield was a bonus, Ronan was eternally grateful for.

The detectives hurried across the street and into the precinct. After waving to a few old friends, they piled into the elevator and were on their way. When the elevator dinged, Ronan stepped out into the hallway and turned toward Cold Case.

The office smelled the same, a strange mix of coffee and dirty socks. “There’s my old desk!”

Ronan didn’t know the young detective sitting there, but knew he was good if Faulk had hired him.

Ronan and Faulk had hooked up on a case for the first time when mob boss Vito Dragonni had his murder conviction overturned on appeal. Faulk had been deep undercover in the Dragonni crime family and was instrumental in bringing Dragonni to justice after he’d started killing those who’d put him behind bars in the first place. Ronan’s name had been on Dragonni’s hit list. Thankfully, they’d found Dragonni before he found Ronan.

“Hey, man!”

Ronan said, knocking on Faulk’s office door, which was standing open. The office had been his after Fitzgibbon retired to stay home with Aurora.

“Hey, Ronan, Jude, Cap.”

Faulk got out of his seat to shake hands with each of the detectives.

“Were you able to find a case file on the circus murder back in 1995?”

Faulk nodded. “Yeah, but there’s not much. We’ve got the 911 call from that night, crime scene photographs, along with the interviews conducted with the employees of the circus. Lastly is the autopsy report. Unfortunately, the doctor who performed it has passed on. There was no murder weapon found.”

“Slim pickings,”

Fitzgibbon muttered.

“Yup. I had copies of everything made for you.”

Faulk handed Jude an accordion folder divided into different sections.

“Thanks, Faulk, we really appreciate you letting us run with this case.”

Ronan grinned at the captain.

“There’s no one better at this than the three of you plus Ten. You’ve got seven days until the charity circus performance and then everyone leaves town. I would imagine they’ll go deeper off the grid this time if the murder is still unsolved by the time the big top comes down, so to speak.”

Ronan had been thinking the same thing. Celestina had been able to contact a lot of the old gang to round them up for this performance. He had a feeling none of those phone numbers would work come Sunday morning. “We’ll let you know what we dig up.”

“I’d appreciate that. Oh, and you’ll need these.”

Faulk reached into his desk and pulled out several gold badges.

Ronan took his from Faulk. “Why do you still have these? They should have been reassigned to other people.”

“No way,”

Faulk laughed. “I knew sooner or later you’d be needing them again and there’s too much paperwork required to requisition new ones. Let me know if there’s any evidence you need to run through the lab. Although, after all these years, I can’t imagine there being anything left to test.”

“Unless Jack’s killer held on to the murder weapon,”

Fitz mused. “We all know how killers love their trophies.”

“Indeed we do,”

Faulk agreed. “Good luck, guys. Riordan, the girls, and I will see you at the circus performance. Isla and Macy have been talking non-stop about getting to see the clowns.”

Ronan shivered in the room. “They need to have their heads examined.”

“Amen, brother, but don’t tell my husband. He loves clowns too.”

Faulk grimaced.

“We’ll be in touch.”

Ronan hung his badge on his waistband and headed out the door. “We’ve got half an hour before we have to meet Ten and the others at the restaurant, which means we’re not going to have a lot of time to look over the file.”

He pressed the button for the elevator.

“Jude you’re on crime scene photos,”

Fitz said. “Ronan, you get the witness interviews, and I’ll handle the autopsy. We’ll get together tomorrow and share our findings.”

“You got it.”

Ronan couldn’t wait to share this information with Tennyson. There might be some details his gift would give him that wasn’t in the case file. Ronan hoped this would help take his mind off the recurring nightmare and his vision of Celestina. Ten thought the two were connected, which troubled Ronan more than he was willing to admit.

His eye was firmly set on Ying Yang as the killer, which he knew he needed to set aside until facts led him in that direction. Just because a man threatened kids, beat his wife, and controlled his daughter didn’t mean he was a killer.

Or did it?