Romancing the Crown: Nina & Dominic: A Royal Murder

Nina removed her elbow from his grasp and took his hand as if she, too, were looking for a port in a storm. He laced his fingers through hers.

They halted in front of a door marked Laboratory, next to which was a window set into the wall. The window had kept distance between the viewer and the body before modern technology, with its camera equipment, had made it unnecessary. The blinds were drawn on the inside.

He gave Nina’s hand a bracing little squeeze and then released it as he tapped on the door with one knuckle.

Doc opened it and stood back to allow them entrance. Ryan forced himself to enter before Nina, as if he could police up the area and make it less terrible if Doc had not. Of course there was nothing he could do about it at that point, but he’d have acted the same upon entering any room with a woman where there was a chance of anything threatening. The urge to run interference for a female had been ingrained from childhood, and he’d never been able to shake it. Thank you, Mama.

Doc had removed the body from the drawer, had placed it on a table and had covered it with a pale green sheet. There was nothing else in view—no instruments or other cadavers—to cause her any horror, but Ryan supposed the remains of her brother would be enough to do that.

Even though they weren’t touching now, he could feel her tension. Or maybe it was his. Ryan couldn’t tell. She appeared calm enough, though the lights in the lab faded her complexion to white.

Doc stood waiting to be introduced. Ryan jerked his attention to that chore and kept it brief. “Nina Caruso, Dr. Angelo.”

They nodded to one another and Doc spoke in that deep, resonant voice that reminded Ryan of Boris Karloff. “My condolences, Ms. Caruso.” He looked a bit like Boris, come to think of it.

“Thank you,” she said in automatic response. “May I see him now?”

She wanted to do her duty and get the hell out of there, Ryan thought, but no more than he did. He fought the flashes of memory and pain associated with another time, another morgue, two pull-out, refrigerated drawers containing… He shook his head, cleared his throat and tried to clear his mind of his own feelings so he could observe hers. After all, that’s the reason he’d let her come, he reminded himself. She looked up at him, silently asking him to accompany her to the table. Ryan slid an arm around her, his hand at her waist, and guided her to the examination table.

Doc turned back the sheet so that only the head and shoulders were visible. Thank God he’d done everything he could. There was no blood. Even the gash on the temple, deep as it was, didn’t look particularly lethal now that it had been cleaned up.

Contrary to Ryan’s warning to Nina, the body didn’t look radically different from what she might have viewed if it had been prepared for a funeral and lying in a casket, except for the absence of a suit and tie and a bit of flesh putty to fill in the wound. Ryan had not been involved in the case or seen the body at the crime scene before it had been removed and brought here. But even there it wouldn’t have been nearly as gruesome as some he’d seen.

Nina stepped closer and touched the forehead, brushing a lock of dark hair from the brow. “He’s… so cold.” Two tears made tracks down her cheeks and dripped off her chin. For a long moment, she stood looking down at the remains and mouthed the word goodbye.

So much for disassociation. Ryan turned away. He realized he should have done what she was doing six years ago. He should have touched. He should have wept. He should have said his goodbyes and let go. Instead, he’d felt a welling of rage so great he hadn’t been able to contain it.

Hell, he couldn’t even remember what he’d said then, what he’d done, but he knew it hadn’t been anywhere near as dignified as this. The things he did recall he was still working to forget.

His partner, Sam, had gotten him out of that morgue somehow, and when reason had returned—a brief spate of it, anyway—Ryan had been able to do what had to be done. Only when his obligations had been met had he fallen apart. Then had begun that lost year, twelve months of nothingness. Dragging his mind back to the present, now almost thankful for where he was and for any excuse to dismiss the past, Ryan carefully examined the victim’s wound and checked the rest of the body for bruising and lividity. He noted the hands. No trauma there, which meant no fistfight. Hardly a surprise. No needle marks that he could ascertain. “Any evidence of illegal substance?” he asked the doctor.

“None evident. Wait for the lab results. That will be in the autopsy report.”

“I guess that’s it,” Ryan said, backing away from the table as the doctor covered the body. A memory flashed. Another covering up, the finality of it triggering something savage in him.

“I’m ready to go,” Nina said.

“Thanks, Doc,” he muttered to Angelo as he guided her out. “I’ll call you later.”

He would have to come here again, Ryan thought with resignation. After the autopsy, he’d have to come back. It never got any easier.

She appeared to be completely recovered, Ryan thought when they exited the elevator on the ground floor. Dry-eyed and composed now, she seemed to be in deep thought. Not at all the emotional wreck she might have been after seeing a beloved brother’s dead body.

Ryan filed away the impression that the bond of affection between Desmond and Nina Caruso must not have been all that tight if her grief was this superficial.

Chapter 3

When they emerged from the hospital, Ryan sucked in a deep breath of fresh air. Better. He squinted against the bright sunlight, welcoming it.

The limo cruised up to the curb and Ryan automatically reached past Nina to open her door. She slid inside.

When he got in, she turned to him and said the last thing he would have expected. “He wasn’t struck from behind.”

“No,” Ryan agreed as he fastened his seat belt and motioned for her to do the same.

“Then whoever did it was facing him, holding the statuette?” “Yes, given the placement of the wound.”

“Could I see the weapon?” she asked.

He sighed. “Nina, you’re taking this Murder She Wrote business a little too seriously, you know that?”

“Maybe,” she admitted, “but I think you should humor me. I do have permission to assist you.”

Well, hell. Ryan couldn’t tell her the real reason the king had sent her directly to him.

“Okay. Tomorrow. We’ll go over the evidence then. Today I think you’ve done enough, don’t you?”

She looked pointedly at her watch. “It’s barely one o’clock.”

“We’ll grab a bite of lunch and drop you at the apartment so you can rest.”

“But—”

“No buts,” he warned. “This is not the only case I’m working on, Nina. There’s plenty I have to do this afternoon that has nothing to do with this. I can’t drag you all over the island while I take care of business.”

“But tomorrow you’ll be back on this case, right?”

“Yes, tomorrow morning.”

“And I can go with you?”

He nodded emphatically. “Now, what would you like to eat?”

In a self-conscious gesture, she tucked her hair behind her ears, crossed her arms beneath her breasts and looked out the opposite window. “Oatmeal,” she mumbled.

“Excuse me?”

Defiantly, she turned her head and pinned him with a glare. “I said oatmeal. With wheat toast and butter and cinnamon. And hot tea. Earl Grey with lemon.”

“You’re joking, right? I don’t know anywhere in San Sebastian that serves oatmeal.”

She raised one dark brow in challenge. “Well, you did ask.”

Ryan shook his head. He’d known she would be trouble from the minute he’d laid eyes on her. “Your wish is my command. Apparently that’s turning out to be my phrase for the day.”

He leaned forward, pushed the intercom button and ordered the driver to stop at the nearest grocery.

“You’ll have to cook it yourself unless you want me to send you back to the palace,” he told her emphatically. “I don’t do oatmeal.”