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TWO
A storm was coming. Nick felt it in his right knee as he shuffled up the sidewalk to Big Joe’s. It was a steady throbbing at the joint, which was held together by titanium pins and polyurethane supports. After the surgery, Nick joked that he was a few bolts shy of being the Six Million Dollar Man. In reality, though, he had become a walking weather vane, able to pick up a low-pressure system from miles away.
The one he detected that morning was a whopper. He had no idea what direction it was traveling or when it would reach Perry Hollow, but the buzzing pain he felt told him it was most definitely on its way. The knee didn’t lie.
The downside to feeling the weather was that it also made walking difficult. Nick’s right leg felt like jelly whenever he put weight on it, which made his limp more pronounced. By the time he entered Big Joe’s, he was leaning on his cane so much he felt like Tiny Tim.
Kat was already inside, as Nick knew she would be, and waved when she saw him. Nick tried to wave back, which wasn’t easy with one hand still holding the door and the other firmly gripping his cane. The end result was an awkward shifting of limbs and jabbing of elbows that ended with him simply nodding a greeting.
The coffee shop was laid out in such a way that walking a straight line from the door to the counter was impossible. Instead, patrons had to wind their way around tiny tables scattered across the floor. It was annoying for someone with two good legs. Since Nick was technically working with one and a half, he found it to be a royal pain in the ass.
“Sit,” Kat said. “I’ll get your coffee.”
Nick declined the offer. “I can do it. My physical therapist says I need to learn how to do things for myself. The bitch.”
His physical therapist, a brick house of a woman named Shirley, also told him he needed to rely less on the cane and more on his leg. He was using the cane as a crutch, she said, which made Nick logically ask, “Isn’t that what it’s for?”
Shirley hadn’t found that very funny. Nick did, because he had no intention of laying off the cane. For one thing, it helped him get around. It also, he had to admit, was a pretty cool accessory. The staff was solid teak. The handle was bronze, sculpted into the shape of a pit bull. A gift from his former colleagues in the state police, its meaning was clear—never stop being tenacious.
He took that message to heart, even if it meant limping to the counter of an overpriced coffee joint and ordering an extralarge house blend. Once the coffee was in hand, he returned to the table, sat down, and let out a relieved sigh. The knee felt better with some weight off it. And now that he was indoors, the Weather Channel embedded inside it had been muted.
“How’s the leg?” Kat asked.
“Still hurts, but I’ll live.”
“And because of it, so will I.”
Nick had shattered his knee while saving Kat’s life, although she didn’t make a big deal out of it and neither did he. Both of them liked it that way.
“Have you heard from Henry?” Nick asked.
He was referring to Henry Goll, the other person he had destroyed his leg to save. Like Kat, Henry had come face-to-face with the killer known as the Grim Reaper and lived to tell about it. Barely. Now he was in Italy. Maybe. Nick wasn’t sure anymore. All he knew was that Henry was no longer in Perry Hollow, and the town was poorer for it.
“Nothing since New Year’s Day,” Kat said, frowning. “And I honestly doubt I’ll hear from him again.”
Nick took that as a sign that he should drop the subject. He did, turning his attention to a sheet of paper that he removed from a jacket pocket and placed on the table. The page was a reproduction of an old newspaper article, accompanied by a photograph of a boy who had a tiny nose and jug-ears. He wore a shirt and tie and had spit-slicked blond hair, leading Nick to assume it was a school picture. And although the boy was giving a lopsided smile, there was sadness in his eyes.
Above the article and photo was a simple, devastating headline: PERRY HOLLOW BOY, 10, MISSING.
“Charlie Olmstead,” Kat said.
“So you know the story?”
“Everyone in town has heard about Charlie.”
“What happened to him?”
“No one knows. Which is probably why everyone has heard about him.”
Nick stabbed the article with an index finger. “The story is pretty vague. Although it quotes the police chief at the time. Jim Campbell. Does that name ring a bell?”
The man in question was Kat’s father, who had been Perry Hollow’s police chief until he died when she was eighteen. Nick knew this bit of information, and Kat knew that he knew. He had hoped it would make her smile. Instead, she frowned at the page.
“This was a long time ago, Nick.”
“I know.”
“And it’s really the foundation’s next case?”
“As a matter of fact, it is.”
The Sarah Donnelly Foundation was named after Nick’s sister, who was murdered when he was ten. The killer was never caught, but Nick had a pretty good idea who did it. Since that man had died in jail years ago, there would be no closure for him. That’s where the foundation came in. The Philadelphia newspapers referred to Nick as a cold case philanthropist. Nick couldn’t have said it better himself. His mission was straightforward—find unsolved cases and solve them. It didn’t matter if his clients were rich or poor, young or old, city slickers or backwoods hillbillies. They needed closure and Nick tried to help them get it.
Other than himself, everyone who worked on a case did so on a voluntary basis. Kat had helped him out in the past, flipping through files, riding with him to distant crime scenes, even calling a few police colleagues in other towns and asking for information. Only this time, the situation was different. Her town was involved. So was her father’s police work. It understandably put her on edge.
“You know I’m happy to share whatever information I have,” she said. “If you want, we can go to the station’s basement right now and take a look at the report. But if you’re expecting me to help, I can’t. The case has been officially closed for decades.”
“Would it change your mind if I told you who hired me?”
Kat sighed. “Not likely.”
“His brother.”
“You talked to Eric?”
She had done a good job of trying to temper her surprise. Her voice remained steady. Her body stayed loose. The only thing she couldn’t control was a slight widening of the eyes, which Nick naturally noticed. He was good at spotting the little things that betrayed people’s emotions. It’s what had made him a great cop.
“I guess you two knew each other,” he said.
“We did.”
Nick watched her closely, searching for the slightest sign that
