A/N: Sorry this seems like such a short chapter but I'm battling that time of month (if you're a girl you'll know what I'm talking about) plus a nasty sinus cold so I'm not completely up to par. Thanks for reading and thanks for the kind reviews.

Chapter 11

It had taken a little bit but Natalia and Ryan had managed to find the gold cross. Once it had been found, along with the case file, they had called in a specialist to examine the cross and have it properly evaluated, maybe even find a maker's mark on it. While they waited for the specialist, they talked.

"So, what do you think of Nina Johnson?" Natalia asked.

"I'm not sure what to think," Ryan admitted. "Everything she said, it goes against everything I know. I don't know whether or not to believe her."

"Neither do I, especially not after what I saw when she was lifted off her feet, choked by something none of us could see, and sent flying nearly eighteen feet to the elevators," Natalia admitted. "There was nothing there that could have helped her do that, nothing real or solid. Not to mention the bruises that were forming around her neck."

"Yeah, those were definitely very real," Ryan admitted. "And then there was that business with Jessop. How could she have known that? I dunno, Nat. I just, I don't know what to think."

"If it really is a priest that's haunting us, then I'm in serious trouble," Natalia said.

"Why's that?"

She grinned and said, "I haven't gone to church in a looooonnng while."

Ryan chuckled. "Yeah, same problem. Life kinda caught up to me. Mind you, I've always thought I didn't have to go to church just to believe in God."

"Oh?"

"Yeah. Someone once told me, long time ago, that sometimes, just having faith and trying to do the right thing every day, sometimes that was enough," he explained. "I was told you didn't have to go to church just to believe in God or to pray because God was all around you and as long as you kept trying to do the right thing, kept trying to care, to believe in hope and faith, then the whole world was your church."

Natalia nodded. "I like that. Especially since God seems to have so many different names." She smiled. "Guess it's all in the heart."

Once the specialist had arrived and settled in to examine the cross, both Ryan and Natalia resumed their own work, leaving the specialist to examine the cross in peace. That took half an hour and by the time the specialist reported back to him, the elderly man was practically drooling.

"It's a fine, fine, fine example of Spanish Colonial jewelry," the man, a Mr. Montgomery, said.

"So it is of Spanish origin?" Ryan asked.

"Oh most definitely! And the stones themselves! Definitely late sixteenth century cut!" Mr. Montgomery said. "Did you know that the early Christians believed emeralds represented immortality and faith? Some even believed it represented Christ's resurrection. Emeralds were also said to represent rebirth and fertility, bestow inner peace on the wearer, and increase the person's intelligence, especially if that person was a scholar."

Ryan and Natalia looked at each other and then at Mr. Montgomery. "So something like this could have definitely belonged to a priest?" Natalia asked.

"Most assuredly!" Mr. Montgomery said.

After promising to fax them a copy of his report and assuring him that they would let him know what they decided to do with the cross, Mr. Montgomery left. Shortly afterwards Horatio called to let them know that he and Frank had found Father Fernandez's journal and the original location of the cross. Ryan reported what Mr. Montgomery had told them about the cross.

"So it looks like we are looking at one very valuable box those kids found," Ryan concluded.

"Indeed," Horatio said.

"Something like that should be turned over to a museum," Ryan said. "Or perhaps even the Catholic church."

"Which would, in fact, probably appease Father Fernandez," Horatio said.

"C'mon, H. Surely you don't believe in that sort of stuff?" Ryan asked.

"At this point, unless the evidence tells me otherwise, I'm willing to go along with it," Horatio said.

"And if the evidence does suggest otherwise?"

"Then Nina has a lot of explaining to do."