Backblast, Candace Irving [i love reading books .TXT] 📗

from the pocket of his own JC Penney's special had known it too. Mira had received the same tainted kiss from her so-called colleagues and friends at the beginning of the end of her painfully short-lived career as a naval officer. One false accusation, and three grueling months at the Fleet's nuclear power school in Goose Creek had been flushed down the tubes—though, unlike Jerry's, her charges hadn't been leveled maliciously.

Not that it mattered. Nor had her own subsequent exoneration. She'd still gotten the looks from her former fellow sailors. The whispers. Worse, the three a.m., self-doubting what-ifs egged on by an increasingly empty bottle of booze.

Like Jerry, she'd finally bailed. He'd landed at the MPD's detectives' desk. Three years before his rude awakening, she'd turned her back on the Fleet and applied to its watchdog agency, NCIS. But for her own fucked-up first career, she wouldn't have been able to salvage Jerry's. The irony hadn't been lost on either of them at the time.

Guilt cut in for thinking she could abuse that pain now to snag a case…no matter how desperately she needed distraction.

The guilt deepened as Jerry offered her the booties and an exculpatory shrug. "You needed to focus on yourself, not me. You deserved that slot in Yokosuka. You'd worked your ass off, and I didn't want to see you blow it by looking back."

He was right. If she'd known he needed her, she'd have stayed in DC. At the very least, she'd have made the time to check in on him when she'd been back this way for a few months to work a joint investigation nearly a year and a half ago.

Mira swallowed her regret. "So what happened?"

How had he gone from shrinks are evil incarnate to the poster cop for therapy?

"Shelli. It got to the point where I'd come home and dump everything on her. She finally had it. Said I had to see someone—with or without her—or else. Chicken shit that I am, I chose without. Damned if it didn't help. I still go now and then, to touch base and vent. We're both happier and things have never been better between us."

"I can tell. You look fantastic."

Jerry grinned as he ran a hand over the silver that had firmly overtaken the ruddy thatch at his temples. "Despite the frost?"

"Absolutely. Makes you look distinguished." That couldn't hurt in this town.

"Plus, it scares off the pups. You should've seen the one the FBI sent to try and steal this gig."

"I did. He had his tail between his legs as he crawled into his SUV."

"Good. Gloves?"

"Thanks."

Jerry pulled a pair from his jacket, his gaze narrowing suspiciously midway to handing them over. "You have your own, don't you?"

"In my pocket. Booties, too."

"I'll be damned. At least you had the brains to leave your kit in the car."

She smiled. "I did learn from the best."

Presumption was more than a pet peeve with Jerry. It was a cardinal sin.

He tossed the gloves to her anyway and turned to the stairs that presumably led up to the JAG's third-floor condo. "Put 'em on. I left your partner alone in the captain's study."

Partner? Since when?

"The field office sent another agent?" Irritation surged as Jerry nodded. Why hadn't Ramsey mentioned it? "Who?"

"Guy named Sam Riyad."

She shook her head. "Don't know him."

"Me neither. But I've been retired five years. He's FCI, by the way, and new to town."

That explained it. Still, "You left him in your crime scene unattended?" She didn't know whether to be stunned or impressed. As Foreign Counterintelligence, Sam Riyad was all but guaranteed to be a far cry from experienced detective. Closer to spook. A category that fell somewhere below shrink in Jerry's book.

Or had.

Jerry shrugged. "Wasn't my first choice. Someone busted the combination locks on the JAG's filing cabinet and safe. Dumped the contents everywhere. Appears to be casework mostly, but some of it's marked NOFORN. If there's higher classified material lying around—much less missing—I don't want to know. Someone's gonna be navigating shit's creek before this is over as it is, and it ain't gonna be me."

A sage pronouncement if there ever was one. But unlike Jerry, she still answered to the brass at NCIS. She had no choice but to grab an oar along with her fellow mystery agent and start paddling.

Mira was about to follow Jerry up the stairs when the MPD uniform poked his head into the foyer.

"The medical examiner's here, Detective."

"Damn. Okay, on my way."

Mira waited for the uniform to leave. "You want me to loiter outside 'til he's done?"

Jerry shook his head. "If you were gonna screw me over, you'd have done it long before now. Might as well stay for the main attraction. I'll work it out with my boss later."

"I appreciate it."

"So get your butt up there before I change my mind. She's in the bedroom at the end of the hall."

"Thanks." Mira was halfway to the second floor by the time Jerry headed back out into the dark. Another uniformed cop stood guard at the third floor, just outside the JAG's door. She donned the protective booties Jerry had given her and produced her credentials. "Special Agent Ellis, NCIS. I'm with Detective Dahl. He's briefing the ME."

Mira added her name and stats to the crime scene roster and entered the condo's surprisingly chilly foyer. She swore it was colder in here than it was out front. Worse, an unmistakable odor tainted the breeze that drifted up the hall in question.

Had someone opened a few windows to combat that smell?

Or had the killer left them open?

Glancing into what was clearly the JAG's study, she caught sight of a buck-naked, swarthy hand reaching for a sheet of paper on the desk and stiffened. "What the hell are you doing?"

The owner of the hand froze as he retrieved the sheet. Turned. A split second into her first glimpse of the equally dark, distinctive features above that neatly cropped, mosque-ready mustache and beard—and the man's surname and coloring made sense: Saudi.

Disdain tossed