Cold Shadow (Cold Country #2)(3)

"You love her, then?" He didn't really have to ask, it was all there in his voice. Nathan's love for Quinn and Quinn's child beamed out of him.

"Closest thing to a daughter I'm ever going to have. She has me wrapped pretty tight around her finger." He cleared his throat and went back to watching the search effort in the field. "Are you taking the case from me?"

"Not today. Unless you think you're too close to it, then I'll-"

"I might not be a part of the workings of the plant itself, but it is still my family's business. I am probably the least objective person you can have leading this investigation right now." The old Nathan would never have admitted that. The old Nathan fought him tooth and nail to stay on the track of the man who would ultimately destroy him.

"But you're the most qualified. The feds want to step in, but not until I get inside and talk to the workers being targeted. After that, the game will be in our court. The day after tomorrow at the earliest, unless another man goes missing, then all bets are off." Drew's ass was in a sling over this. There should already be federal agents all over this county, but they weren't because Drew wanted time to scope out what was what without panicking the population. "My dad is Puerto Rican. My mom is a former beauty queen from Nashville. In case you were wondering."

"I wasn't, but thanks for the heads up there, chief." A small smile twitched Nathan's lips.

Drew reached out and tugged the hair lying on Nathan's back. "Who you calling chief there, gringo?"

"Just for that, I'm going to call Natalie and tell her you are on your way to see her." His grin became a broad, disarming leer that had Drew stumbling over his own tongue. "Better wear a cup. She's not a little girl anymore."

"You are a sadist, aren't you? I always thought so." The grin disappeared as memory flashed in his eyes. "Hey, man, sorry."

"Don't worry about it. I'll see you back at the house. Do you remember how to get there?" The pain in his eyes gone as quickly as it came.

"Yeah, I remember." He remembered every damned thing. He turned to trudge back to his car. The memory of Nathan's mutilated body as fresh in his mind today as if it had just happened.

Coming back here was a mistake, one that he swore he'd never make. Too bad his job had other ideas.

* * * * *

Two and a half years, give or take. Nathan shrugged away the crawling sensation in the middle of his back. That's how long he'd lived with the feeling. It was mostly psychosomatic. He knew what was carved into his back no matter how many procedures to erase the words he'd endured.

Walker was there when it happened. Drew Walker, the pain-in-his-ass Tennessee Bureau agent who'd dogged his heels for days with his annoying questions and way-too-observant hazel eyes. Nathan shouldn't even know what color his eyes were. And Drew shouldn't know what was on his back. It linked them, and he didn't like it.

Any more than he liked having him here now. The feds could have sent him anyone and he would have gladly stepped aside and let them take this case. He didn't want it. The mutilated corpses of people he knew was more than his psyche could bear right now. On top of that, the only other person besides Quinn who knew every detail of what happened to him was back.

That the man had a nice ass was the least of his worries; that he noticed that ass was a problem. And the way his hand had tingled when they'd touched. Just another suppressed memory coming back. Walker was part and parcel of that time. Walker was straight. And Quinn would laugh at him because it was Walker's ass that turned his head. In all these years, only Quinn had ever done that.



       
         
       
        

"You okay, Nathan?" He tuned back in to see a pair of fingers snapping in front of his face. Castle, one of his investigators, just looked at him funny for a second and then continued on with what he was saying. "We've been through everything a dozen times. There are no tracks, just like the others. We have no idea how he got here. Poor bastard. Like he was just dropped. The fingers were hidden better this time, so someone had to have …  Nathan, are you listening to me?"

"Yeah, Derrick, just make sure everything is documented. You know the drill. No screw-ups."

"Damn, Nathan, what the hell is the matter with you? You're like a mama grizzly lately. Growling at people. Except for that fed. Come to think of it, I don't think I've ever seen you smile before." Derrick Castle wasn't from around here. He wasn't here back then. He didn't have a clue why this case was eating at Nathan. And Nathan sure as hell wasn't going to enlighten him.