Disclaimer: They are not mine, they belong to CBS - though I am saving up for them
A very special thanks to my two amazing Betas : Mrose and Bellabrew. You are both outstanding and I am grateful for the time and effort you have put in.
This story is a casefile with romantic overtones. It may take a while to see it, but if you look hard enough you will find them lurking there amongst all of the words!
Chapter 1
Make it go away or make it better
Isn't that what love is supposed to do?
(Dark Dear Heart – Holly Cole)
North Las Vegas
256 Rosemount Lane
August 21, 2006
1:05 pm
Greg Sanders glanced at the dashboard clock before taking a final sip of the roof-tar that was being passed off as coffee, by the local donut shop. He was midway through his second shift, and reporting to the scene of a 419 that he hoped would be more interesting than the trick roll he'd processed at the beginning of the night. The afternoon air was heavy with the possibility of an unusual, but impending Las Vegas thunderstorm.
Casting an uncertain glance around him, he shucked off the almost palpable smell of rotting garbage that was drifting out of the alleyway beside the small cookie cutter home he'd just been called to. The house itself unimpressive, one of about ten others on the end of a small dead end street, it fit in perfectly. Aside from the differing colors of peeling paint, and the yellow tape that cordoned it off, it could easily have been lost in amongst the thousands of others in the poverty stricken outlying neighborhood.
Number 256, itself, was a grayed mint green, with clap board shutters, all of which were missing a varying number of slats, and a few of which were missing entirely. The front lawn was a small patch of wilted and dying greenery that was frequently interrupted by bald patches of darkened earth.
Standing at the foot of the driveway and engrossed in the inspection of a king sized Marlboro was a tall older man, with thinning fire red hair and a host of orange freckles. Tanner Mayfield was a level three CSI and had been for fifteen years. Though advancement had at one time been his prime ambition, years of gruesome crime scenes and slogging evidence, and had worn away his lofty aspirations to a dull and complacent boredom. At this point in his career, he was content with simply showing up at his assignment and clocking out on time. Inhaling deeply he took a final drag, and dropped the remaining filter into the storm drain at the edge of the crumbling curb.
Walking up to join his assigned partner, Greg stared at the older CSI standing outside the yellow crime tape, and took in the wrinkled condition of his ill fitting gray suit. "Hey Mayfield..." He intoned tiredly. He wouldn't have minded the 419 at the beginning of his first shift. But mid way through his second, he was less than enthusiastic. His own black t-shirt and pants were already moist with sweat of the previous night, and he felt as though the dirt of the desert had city had permanently fixed itself to his skin.
"Sanders…" The red-head spit up a small pile of phlegm around an explosive cough, and stared at the younger man listlessly, as it flew from his thin mouth into the sewer. The last thing he needed was a wet behind the ears newbie messing up his crime scene.
"Prime real estate..." Greg noted conversationally; his eyes following the cordoned off perimeter to where a rotund Detective O'Reilly was talking to a skinny platinum blonde with big hair, who was dressed in Walmart's version of professional office attire. Her voice was a high pitched squeak, and slightly garbled by the wad of gum she was talking around. "Tell me, again, why am I working with you?" Sanders turned to the man beside him. He knew that things were insanely busy, but wondered who he'd pissed off to be partnered up with CSI's version of Napoleon Dynamite. "It seems that this is actually a day shift case… Not that I am complaining mind you, but has anyone cleared this with Gil Grissom? I'm already close to maxing out my overtime this month. He's likely to feed me to his roaches if he needs me for something and the big Kahunas who sign my paycheck say no…"
"We're slammed up the wazoo little man." Aggravation was woven into Mayfield's words, and served as enough of a warning to end Greg Sander's questions. "Ecklie's orders, we're stretched to the max, screw the overtime. If you are paged you come in, even if you're not on call. Almost everyone has put in a second or third shift already - even on graveyard. You're the freshest we have right now." That said the man threw a quick look around the perimeter as Detective O'Reilly closed his notebook and walked toward the two CSIs.
"The roommate works for the Office Angels temp agency. She was sent home from work early today and found the front door unlocked and her friend dead." The large detective led them into the house. Stopping outside the living room he faced them, his expression serious."Brace yourselves." He warned, before making his way over to the body.
The small living area was stifling and the odor of old dust and mildew permeated the air. Greg noted upon closer inspection, that the home did appear to be tidy, if not clean. Clearly the occupants though not wealthy, had tried to make it a comfortable place to live. The pale mismatched furnishings were worn, but well maintained and stood out against the bright red paint of the living room walls. The thick white sheers covering the small front window had been pulled shut to keep out the penetrating light and heat of a Las Vegas summer day and from the few details Greg could make out within the semi-darkness, they were doing their job well
"Hey, Dave..." Greg greeted the assistant coroner as he wobbled through the door, his bag clutched tightly in one thick hand.
Both Mayfield and Greg stepped around an older model wide screen TV and took in the unmoving form in the middle of the room. O'Reilly's warning had peeked their curiosity, since both had seen more than their share of grisly bodies, and despite the unsettling fact that it was a dead woman, nothing seemed to be worthy of his concern.
The victim, a lithe young woman lay face down on the hardwood floor, her slender arms and legs splayed out at odd angles in relation to her torso. There was no blood, just a pair of black pantyhose wrapped garrote style around her slim pale neck. Her underwear were torn and sat in a crumpled heap about 4 feet away, as if thrown there. Her thin plaid skirt had been unceremoniously yanked up around her waist.
David crouched by the body his gloved hand shoving aside the long dark hair draped across the dead woman's face.
Greg Sanders was the first to react. His breath caught in his throat, and his heart began to hammer its way out of his chest. "Holy shit, man…" The words rolled out of his mouth, tainted with fear and pain.
A soft "No way…" escaped David's pursed mouth, and he too felt a surge of dread wash over him.
"Yeah…" O'Reilly nodded sadly, and threw a chin at the victim whose dark eyes stared at them, unseeing. "I almost had a heart attack when I first saw her face." He pointed to a smiling photo on the one of the 60's styled end tables "If it hadn't been for a positive ID from the roommate, Cassey Adams, I would've been totally messed up."
"So its not…?" Sanders choked out, unable to take his eyes off the striking familiarity of the woman in front of him, and still trying to slow the thudding in his chest.
"No…" The large police man shook his head.
"What's the vic's name?" Mayfield looked at each of the three men uncertain as to what was causing their stress.
"An office clerk… Wendy Maran..." O'Reilly read from his black notebook. "She works at a small dealership around the corner from here. According to the roommate she religiously came home for lunch everyday." He nodded to the reddened areas decorating her interior thigh area. "Looks like she's been raped, too..."
Still trembling in disbelief, Greg Sanders pulled the camera from his case and shot positional photos of the body before David shifted her onto her back.
Everyone in the room remained quiet, as he drew a thermometer from his bag and plunged it into the young woman's liver. The numbers tumbled for a moment, and stopped.
David studied the digital reading for a second and then yanked the thermometer out. "She died within the last hour; liver temp has not dropped significantly and she is still warm…" The assistant coroner announced and backed away.
Immediately, the room burst into a flurry of activity. Greg ran back to the SUV to grab the necessary equipment. Right now, there was little or no time left to speculate on the woman's resemblance to a certain brunette who worked the night shift. There might still be prints left on the body. Despite the crush of time constraints, the young CSI was sorely temped to hit the speed dial on his cell phone, just to hear Sara Sidle's lush voice. He chucked the notion aside as he lugged the items into the living area and dropped them on the floor with a thud. He'd definitely call later.
With David's help the two CSIs began a frantic set up of equipment. They had the chamber in place and the cyanoacrylate fumer started within 7 minutes. Now all they could do was wait for the fumes to do their job and hopefully turn up something useful
North Las Vegas
1699 Ascot Dr.
Aug 21, 2006
5:00 pm
When Sara pulled to a stopoutside of her assignment she was more than a little surprised to see his dark blue Denali already parked in front of the home's dilapidated fence. They hadn't worked a case together in two months, not since that fateful night in the locker room when David Hodges caught them in playful kiss. It was, a momentary indiscretion that exposed them to the one person they knew would willingly rat them out. Had it been anyone else, Sara figured there was a chance that they could have kept it to themselves - at least a little longer.
While there had been major concerns at first, they'd proven in the two months prior to the discovery, that they could maintain a very rigid separation between their work and their relationship. So things had changed, though surprisingly not as significantly as they had predicted.
It had taken a month or so before the gossip about them being officially a couple had finally died down leaving behind only quiet acceptance. The biggest change was that they could no longer be partnered together for assignments when they were on shift at the same time. Since this rule had come from the top, they didn't fight it.
A moment later, she caught sight of his familiar shape stepping around the hood; field kit in hand. A tight ball of anxiety formed in the pit of her stomach. Hopping out she watched as he approached the two uniformed officers who had just exited the front door. Having spotted her, he winked in her direction, before slipping into an easy conversation with the two men.
Her breathing accelerated, and a weight took up residence in her chest, but she fought it back. Grabbing her own kit Sara, made her way around the car and waited as Brass pulled up behind her and jumped out of his sedan. She noted the look of surprise on the Captain's face as his eyes passed from her to her lover and back again. He was well aware of both the situation and the "rule" and was clearly thrown, though it only showed briefly.
"Must be a really busy evening…" He noted as he fell into step beside her.
Keep it together Sidle, her subconscious threw out the order, and she forced herself to relax. "I got the call at home." She informed him indicating she was equally as perplexed. "Swing must be inundated."
"…think it might be a domestic dispute gone bad… We've been here a few times and hauled the husband in for the night more than once." They overheard the younger of the two officers explaining as they moved up in front of him. "There's one DB in the kitchen and another on the couch." He threw a thumb back towards the door. "It's pretty fresh…"
Nodding Sara shivered softly, unsure whether it was brought on by the reality of this being yet another unsettling domestic crime scene or the unusually cool and overcast Las Vegas summer night. Her childhood memories always floated to the surface when faced with these scenarios.
"Have you cleared the place yet?" Brass enquired, his hand going instinctively to his holster.
"Yeah," the older officer, confirmed, and stepped aside. "We were careful not to disturb anything." He pointed to the front door. "The living room is right when you step in. The man is on the couch, it looks like he might be the shooter. The woman's in the kitchen, she's been beaten pretty badly, her face looks like raw hamburger and she is sporting a hole in her chest the size of my fist."
Brass nodded and made his way towards the door, both CSIs hot on his heels.
"Here…" Sara reached into her pocket and pulled out two pairs of paper booties, before slipping hers on, she passed a set to Brass. Throwing a glance beside her to see if her partner was ready, Sara met with two charismatic blue eyes.
He mouthed the word sorry in her direction.
Seizing her kit, Sara shook off his words, her professional decorum wrapping around her like a protective shroud.
"I'll take the kitchen," He offered peaceably. He was well aware of Sara's familial history and made a beeline for the back room the minute they entered the home. Brass moved after him, leaving Sara standing alone at the threshold.
A single lamp in the corner illuminated the living area enough for her to see the DB clearly, but the quality of the light lent itself to little or no detail. Casting a look around she suddenly felt her knees go weak. To say it was a pigsty was being kind. It looked like the sky had opened up and rained a several months worth of garbage down on the small space. There were beer cans and empty liquor bottles strewn about the room.
A threadbare carpet, that looked like it might have once been a dark pea green, covered the floor from door to kitchen and sported darkened muddy looking patches that no doubt contributed to the overwhelming stench of dirt and feces that blanketed the entire house. Sara's stomach churned. This was not specifically because of the smell, though it did, in fact, rival many of the two day old decomps she had worked. But mostly, it was born of familiarity, and the humiliating knowledge that if you had taken this home and placed it on 56 23rd St. in San Francisco, it could have been the place she'd called home for the early part of her teen years.
The house in San Francisco and her life there was so different from that of her childhood. Though fraught with abuse, her life before the move had been almost normal. Her parent's bed and breakfast in Tamales Bay was one of the town's few thriving businesses, so there had been nothing she had ever wanted for materially. Her home was clean, her plate was always full and she had a closet full of clothes. Emotionally, was a different story; but as a child she was a bright and social little girl, so there'd never been any shortage of friends to fill in the empty spaces her parents had left unattended.
All that had changed by her 10th year. As with most things, a lack of care and nurturing had caused a gradual erosion of both her family's business and their home life. Mired in debt brought on by alcohol and drug abuse, her parents had sold the family home and business and ripped her from the only life she knew…
"Evan…" The words had been gasped in aching disbelief, and her hand went instinctively to the older boy's limp fingers.
"What did you expect, little sis, a castle?" His face was a twisted mask of his own disappointment, and his red rimmed eyes said it all. He had been prepared for this eventuality, and had mainlined some of the 'good stuff' just before saying a final good bye to their real home in Tamales Bay. It was the only thing he knew that would stave off the pain, and allow him to look into the horror in his little sister's dark eyes – without falling completely apart.
He wanted to walk away, just scream fuck it and fuck you all, and disappear into the anonymity that life in the big city would allow. But now, staring down at the awkwardly thin ten year-old at his side, he simply couldn't bring himself to do it. "It'll be alright." His words softened, and he watched as she let go of his hand and ambled up the rotting wood steps, of their new home, a tattered knapsack clutched in her slim feminine fingers.
She was stunning by all standards; a tall beauty with long dark curls, and dancing coffee colored eyes. Six years her senior, he'd been forced on more than one occasion to remind his friends that, firstly she was his sister, and secondly, despite her stature, she was still way too young to be looked at as anything other than a child. Though, now as he stared at her standing expectantly on the ramshackle front porch, he understood what they saw. Two long slim legs had been topped off by a worn pair of extremely short cutoffs, and her ill fitting red t-shirt betrayed the beginning of her slow shift into puberty. He shook his head as she smiled uncertainly at him. He was her older brother. He should be the one to protect her, since no one else in his family could give a fuck. But how could he help her find her way, when their shared history had already predetermined that she was would be as broken as he was?
The memory of that fateful day was as ingrained in her. Her support system shot all to hell, Sara had changed dramatically that year. She'd gone from a fairly happy and outgoing child, to a young girl who was both withdrawn and secretive. Though there were many times during her younger days that she'd suffered extreme humiliation at the hands of her parents, lifelong friends had always been there to help her laugh her way through it. For all intents and purposes she had still seen herself as normal. This was not the case by the time she started middle school. With the cash left over from the sale of the B&B her parents had purchased the small rundown house on the outskirts of San Francisco, and from that moment on embarrassment had become her constant companion and her brother an absentee.
Tugging her thoughts back to the present she shoved down the emotions playing tricks with her stomach. Squinting, she caught sight of a man slumped over the couch on the opposite wall. For a moment she wondered if he might have defecated upon death, but the disgusting culprit was actually a moving pile of maggots, flies and dog crap, which she nearly stepped in as she slipped around the half-wall that, divided the entrance from the living room. Watching her footing, she picked her way around the bricks and plywood that had been propped up for use as a coffee table and stared down at the victim.
A hole from a large caliber firearm had entirely blown away the left side of his head at the same time spraying bits of brain, skull and blood across the ancient and yellowing wallpaper. Slumped on the crusted and moth eaten couch, lay a man, who looked to be in his late forties. He wore a blood soaked wife-beater which stretched impossibly over the wide expanse of his abdomen, and ended just above a sagging pair of red boxers. A dark greasy ponytail lay across what was left of his face and looked to have adhered itself to the seeping wound. Grimacing Sara studied the one dark and staring eye that hung loosely from the missing eye socket.
Sara wrinkled her nose and inspected the floor around her. There was a small spot that was devoid of trash carefully placed her kit there before withdrawing her camera from its case.
Triple shots all around… She started with the spatter on the wall and worked her way to the body, paying special attention to both the position of the victim and the injury.
"This is a really large wound… doesn't look like it is from a handgun." She announced to Brass as he moved in front of the pass through to the kitchen. "They said they thought he was the shooter - indicating a murder-suicide, but there's no weapon here. The officers said they didn't disturb the scene. Did they take the gun?" Sara stood up and stared into the kitchen.
A flash of light played out across the cupboards indicating another photo session underway in the other room. "You heard them yourself. They said they stayed clear." Brass stared back at her.
Grabbing her flashlight, Sara dropped to her knees and scanned under the coffee table and then the couch. There was no gun to be found only more garbage and stale cigarette butts.
"What's this?" She asked no one in particular. Running her flashlight across the underside of the couch a second time she spotted it again; a metallic glint in amongst some old food wrappers. Snapping a quick shot she dropped the camera and grabbed a long pair of forceps.
"Careful! I've got a needle…" She announced loudly. "Keep your eyes peeled." Seizing a plastic container she stowed her prize and returned her attention to the body. The last thing anyone needed was to be stuck with a dirty hypodermic.
The scene looked all wrong. "I don't know if this is a domestic as first indicated…" She began naming all of the visual evidence that seemed out of place. "I can't find a weapon. The wound does not look self-inflicted. Angle of the blood spatter looks off, too…"
There was a fresh pile of vomit off to the side of couch, she reached down and scooped up a sample. Behind it there was a stack of ancient magazines with what looked like a tuft of pink fur peeking out from underneath them. Photographing it, she then grasped the pink fur and pulled. Out popped a grubby one eared bunny. "Brass…" She held the rabbit up and waved it around. "There may be a child here."
"The uniforms cleared the scene, Sara. No child. Maybe it belongs to a neighbor's kid..."
Sara shook her head spotting another flash of grimy pink and held up a pair of child's underwear that had come loose when she'd retrieved the toy. "You know children who live in fear learn how to make themselves invisible…" She stared at him brandishing the undies; her mind drifting back to the many times she'd sought refuge from her own family's brutality.
He threw his hands up in resignation and entered the living room; clearly the young woman had some valid concerns... "I'll go take a look around."
"Thanks…" She smiled almost shyly, dropped the toy and the underwear into separate bindles, and reached into her kit for a swab, hoping that she was wrong.
TBC