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kathierif_ficTitle: Light yourself a candle
Author: Kathie
Fandom: CSI:NY
Pairings: Don Flack/Mac Taylor, a bit of Lindsay Monroe/Danny Messer
Rating: FRAO/NC-17
Warnings: AU, future!fic, slash, het
Word Count: 22,877 words
Disclaimer: Not a work for profit, only love and affection for the show CSI:NY, which I don’t own.
Beta: WPAdmirer, who did a kick-ass awesome job!
Summary: In a world where hell is above the people and heaven is below them, the forensic team around Mac Taylor gets called to two crime scenes: a reporter stabbed on a staircase and a famous director found shot in his apartment. While they rush to solve the crimes, personal trouble threatens to distract them.
Author’s Notes: written for the csi_bigbang. There aren’t enough words to express my thankfulness to the people who held my hand during the writing of this: Ginny, Mer and Dee. Thanks so much!
I.
If there, as religious people believed and preached, existed a Hell, it would be above them.
If there was a Heaven, it would be far below their feet, somewhere close to the center of the Earth, where it was warm and safe and only the richest people had found their home; far away and safe from the intense radioactivity that had been poisoning the surface of the planet for several centuries now. The radioactivity had started to seep into the ground, despite their best efforts of shielding the colonies buried deep in the planet, making the upper levels almost uninhabitable.
Only books and ancient movies, carefully preserved through the ages, reminded of a time when humanity had lived on the surface of the Earth. The sun, the sky, the stars – they were myths and something from fairytales, to be told to children at night, when they were wrapped in blankets in their beds and begging with wide eyes for a good night story.
Everybody knew that the upper levels were dangerous. It was dangerous there, not only because of the radioactivity. Nobody in their right minds went to the upper-most levels, where only the poorest of the poor had found a home, far away from the civilized parts of the colonies.
The poor and the criminals.
Up here, there were no elevators, no escalators, and no working transport tubes – the old elevator shafts stood silent and empty, out of service ever since people had retreated, closer to the center of the Earth. They were a remnant of times long gone, a silent memorial to the first generations of humans – those that had hoped that their retreat into Earth was only temporary.
People who lived on these levels nowadays had to do with the gigantic network of old, steely staircases that stretched over miles in every direction, running through the whole colony like a nervous system, usually hidden behind doors and steel plates. It was a maze of stainless steel beams and flickering lights that gave out more often than not. Nobody was bothering to replace them, besides the caretaker robots that still made their rounds, dutifully and patient.
Once people settled up there, they usually didn’t go anywhere anymore. Once up here, it was almost impossible to ever come back down.
It was a one-way street to hell.
Hell on Earth.
Or, to be more exact, hell under Earth.
It was only fitting that he found himself here, he thought fuzzily, while clenching blood-smeared fingers into the railing of an old, severely dented to the point of almost being broken part of the ancient staircase, and pulled himself up another step, another step closer to Hell.
He didn’t deserve anything better than this. It was poetic justice, in a way. He’d stuck his nose into things he had no business sticking it in, and this was the price he had to pay for his curiosity.
Curiosity, after all, killed the cat. Why had he expected to escape the same fate?
His breath came in short gasps, and his calves and thighs burned with the exertion while he leaned against the railing for a moment and tried to get enough oxygen into his burning lungs, to make the black spots that danced in front of his eyes disappear. He needed clarity to return to his thoughts. He needed to stop thinking like the author of one of the novels of old, long-forgotten times, he reprimanded himself, his thoughts fraying already on the edges again.
Below him, at the middle levels, there would be help. There would be hospitals, there would be shopping malls full of people who could offer him protection simply by being there. They would be able to help him against those that still followed him. When he concentrated, he could hear their footsteps over the thumping of his own blood in his ears, expensive shoes on steel, taking one step after the next.
They were hunting him.
They had done this to him.
And there was only way he could run, and that was up.
A coughing fit overwhelmed him for a moment. He tried to suppress it, to keep as quiet as possible, for the remote chance that he could escape his followers for a moment longer. However, it proved to be a futile attempt. Pressing his hand to his mouth, he tasted the metallic tang of blood, and when he pulled his hand back, he saw the reddish mist sprayed over the palm of his hand – saliva mixed with blood, never a good sign. More blood spilled brightly over his bluish, pale lips and down his chin, clinging to his stubble before dripping onto his once crisp-white shirt, now soaked with red.
His knees weakened, and he stumbled up another step before he could feel himself falling.
His arms were too weak to catch him, and his thoughts swam – he didn’t even feel it when his forehead connected painfully with the steel of the steps. Suddenly, he found himself sitting on the stairs, dazed and confused, several steps below the point where he’d stumbled. His arm had tangled with the railing, aching numbly, but he didn’t pay attention to the pain or his inability to move it beyond a very limited range.
He didn’t find it in himself to get back to his feet. On his hands and knees, he crawled up another step, but it was obvious to everybody but himself that he wouldn’t make it any further.
With the last of his waning strength, he turned around, to look down. A broad, bloody trail showed his progress up the stairs.
If they wanted to find him, they just needed to follow his tracks.
And he could hear them coming.
It didn’t matter anymore.
Death would get him before anyone else would.
It was too late for him.
The world became darkness.
~*~*~
If there was one sound Don Flack hated, it was the beep of his phone early in the morning, when he was still in bed, his head still fuzzy with sleep.
It was a sound he heard way too often, and rarely it meant something good, he thought darkly while rolling toward the bedside table and fumblingly reaching for the offensive contraption.
One glance at the clock confirmed that it was still too early to be even counted as morning, and he bit back a soft curse as his fingers traced the keys of his phone that allowed him to accept the call.
A soft grunt reminded him that he wasn’t alone in bed, and he thought he should probably get up. Before he could move, a strong arm was slung around his waist, and he was pulled backwards, toward a warm and familiar body.
“On my way,” he murmured into his phone before disconnecting the call and allowing himself the luxury of relaxing against the body behind him for a few precious moments.
Hot breath ghosted along his shoulder. “New case?” Mac asked, his voice rough from sleep.
Don sighed. “Yeah.” He grabbed his watch – it was two in the morning, he and Mac had gone to bed just a few, too short hours ago – and twisted his head to press a brief, dry kiss to Mac’s cheek. “Dead body found on one of the upper levels.”
Mac raised an amused eyebrow. “Should I expect a call from the investigating detective soon?” he asked, but he released his grip on Don and allowed the younger man to sit up and swing his legs over the edge of their comfortable bed. The blankets slipped off of Don, revealing his state of undress, and Mac licked his lips unconsciously.
“You could just as well get up now,” Don agreed and ran a hand through his dark, short hair. “Get to the scene with me. Get a head start on this thing.”
Mac stared at him for a moment, and, without further comment, got up as well.
They both had experience in dressing in just a short amount of time, and before long, they were ready to leave. Don checked one last time that he had his badge and gun, while Mac simply grabbed his kit, secure in the knowledge that it was fully stocked and ready to deal with another crime scene.
Mac waited by the door, and when Don passed him, he stopped him with a hand on Don’s arm. His fingers brushed up until it rested against the back of Don’s neck, and Mac pulled the younger man into a brief kiss before letting him go and ushering him out of the apartment.
Don shot him an amused glance, but he didn’t comment on the little ritual. It was something Mac had started to always do, whenever they left their home together.
To the outside world, Mac might look like he didn’t express emotions well, and, if he was honest, Don knew that it was the truth. Mac had been fumbling his way through all of the important points of their relationship more or less successful, but Don had known Mac for a long time now.
He knew to let Mac come to him on his own time, even if it was frustrating sometimes. He also suspected that Stella occasionally reminded Mac of some of the things that she thought should be part of a relationship, things that Mac with his intense focus on solving crimes and making the world a better place simply didn’t think of. It was okay. Don was a guy. He didn’t need roses and big commitment speeches.
He had figured that this, the kiss before they left the apartment, was Mac’s way of telling him that he cared about him, despite his alleged shortcomings in the relationship department, and for Don, it was enough.
The cruiser was small enough to navigate the elevator shafts and staircases, and it was fast enough to bring them to the crime scene within just a few minutes. Don used the time to mentally prepare himself for yet another gruesome crime scene.
Uniformed officers already had cordoned off the crime scene, and Don shared a brief look with Mac before each of them set off with their own set of things they had to do.
~*~*~
“Male victim, white. No ID.” Don glanced down at the electronic memo book in his right hand. Unlike many of his colleagues, he preferred the actual note-taking to voice records, and the slender pen in his left hand moved over the screen of his pad with practiced ease, bringing up more information about the pile of bones and flesh that once had been a human being.
“Who found him?” Mac asked while snapping on a fresh pair of gloves.
Don gestured toward the shadows beyond the brightly lit crime scene. “Caretaker Robot followed the blood trail up the stairs. The protocols can be accessed from the central, I’ll stop by there to find out where the trail started.”
Mac nodded and snapped a few pictures of their victim before handing the camera to Don and hunching down next to the body, next to where Sheldon Hawkes was already crouched down. “He’s definitely not from up here,” he noted. “This shirt is expensive, he has all his teeth, and he doesn’t look malnourished or like a drug addict.”
Hawkes nodded his agreement. “Signs of a struggle – abrasion on the forehead, the right arm has been dislocated.” He pressed down on the victim’s chest, drawing their attention to the ripped shirt that was encrusted with blood. “Cause of death appears to be exsanguination due to these stab wounds in the chest and abdomen.”
“Time of death?”
Hawkes reached into the open crime scene kit and selected a thermometer, which he used to determine the time of death. Don shifted from one foot to the other, as anxious to get the result as the CSIs. He didn’t feel like shifting through the complete protocol of the robot. Narrowing down the time would be a huge help for him.
~*~*~
“Good morning.” Danny shifted his kit from one hand to the other and bounced on the balls of his feet, managing to appear young and impatient while at the same time holding on to his professionalism, proven by the fact that he almost immediately set down his kit and snapped on a pair of gloves.
“Morning, Danny,” Stella replied. She raised both eyebrows and followed Danny right through the electronic crime scene tape. The yellow barrier registered the shield clipped to Danny’s and her belts and allowed them access to the apartment that held their crime scene.
“What do we’ve got?”
“Edward Allen.”
Danny reached up and pushed his glasses up his nose with his knuckles. “The famous theater director?”
“Yeah, that one.” Jess Angell had appeared behind Danny without him noticing. “The housekeeper confirmed that it’s him. She found him this morning in his apartment. At first she thought he was just sleeping and left him alone, until she noticed the huge puddle of blood he was lying in.”
She glanced at the pad she was holding. “His new stage production premiered yesterday night, but he hasn’t been there. It’s the headline in every newspaper.” The corners of her mouth twitched slightly. “Looks like he had a valid reason not to attend his own greatest creation.”
Danny glanced at her from the side. From the way she had stressed the last words, it was obvious that she had quoted someone, probably one of the many newspaper headlines she had mentioned.
“Right now, uniforms are keeping her from throwing a party,” Jess continued.
“Charming,” Danny muttered.
“Well,” Stella interrupted and looked around the room, taking in the framed posters of previous productions Edward Allen had been involved with, the blood-strained, previously white carpet, and in the middle of it, the body of the late superstar of theater productions. “At least it won’t be hard to find suspects.”
“Yeah,” Danny agreed with a sigh. “Was there anyone who’d met this guy and not hated him on sight?”
“Let’s find out,” Stella suggested, her attention already focused on the evidence in front of her again. At the moment, they could only speculate about the murderer, and they weren't getting paid for speculation and assumption. They were here to collect evidence, and the evidence would lead them to the person they were looking for, not wild guessing.
“What do you need me to do?” Danny asked, and Stella grinned and handed him the camera.
"Documentation."
They worked quietly and efficiently, documenting the state of the body and its position.
“Cause of death seems to be a gunshot wound. The bullet entered his torso at the lower abdomen…” Stella’s fingertips pressed against the blood-soaked fabric of Edward Allen’s shirt. “Jagged edges, wound canal seems to be going upwards…” She moved around the body and pushed her palms under the body’s shoulders, to lift them off the floor. “Exit wound between the shoulder blades. Looks like a straight through-and-through.”
“Okay, we’ll know more after Sid did the autopsy,” Danny replied absent-mindedly.
“Signs of a fight,” Stella noted and nodded to the broken remains of a chair lying in a corner. “Looks like this is our primary scene.”
Danny scrunched up his nose. “Maybe that’s his idea of modern art,” he replied, but he still moved to take a picture of the chair. “Is the vic showing any defensive wounds?”
“Slight bruising around the wrists,” Stella told him. “But no abrasions on the forearms or palms.” She picked up a fiber and sealed into an evidence bag. “How’s things with you and Lindsay?”
“Fine,” Danny said shortly before putting down the camera and helped Stella picking up traces and dusting the room for fingerprints. It was more than obvious that he didn’t want to talk about his and Lindsay’s relationship and the problems they were struggling with, and Stella accepted it and moved on. She would, she decided as she kneeled down to check the space under the bed, grab Lindsay for lunch and ask her. She was sure that Lindsay wouldn’t be as tight-lipped as Danny was.
“Housekeeper is worth her money,” she noted. “Not a spec of dust down here.”
“Keep on looking,” Danny grunted. “Maybe she missed a spot or something.”
~*~*~
The crime lab of the colony New York was situated on top of one of the many precincts, in a cave that nobody remembered if it was artificial or of natural origins on a medium level. Blocks upon blocks of buildings had been crammed into the cave, some bigger and some smaller, giving parts of the lab a slightly claustrophobic atmosphere, but for Mac, the lab had been more home than his own apartment for many years. He didn’t notice the tight corridors one had to squeeze through to get to some parts of the lab anymore. It was just a fact of life, especially considering that the lab was filled to the brim with the latest and best equipment and technology that was on the market.
There was enough room to work, and that, to Mac, was the main purpose of the lab. He didn’t think they needed more room in the hallways, and the rate of solved crimes seemed to favor his perspective. The crime lab was running like a well-oiled machine.
Mac smiled slightly at his reflection in the glass wall of the elevator that brought him up to his lab. He had good people working for him, for the lab, good people who had become wonderful friends, like Stella, who was waiting for the elevator, her fingers tapping impatiently against the flat computer she was holding in her hands.
Mac gave her a small nod in greeting, which Stella returned, but they both didn’t stop to chat. Stella obviously was in a hurry, but Mac trusted her implicitly with whatever she was working on, and he himself was on his way to log the evidence of his own case.
Technically, he thought while squeezing past Adam, the Stairs, connecting every level of the colony, were a public place. Exit doors were discreetly integrated into the walls, but they weren’t locked. Everybody could step through them and use the Stairs. Only laziness and the need to get from one end of the colony to the other within certain time limits stopped more people from actually using them. The tube network was reliable and fast, and almost everybody used that kind of public transportation. Apparently, their man was not one of them.
Public places were under constant surveillance, he thought. It shouldn’t be a problem to access the tapes and follow their victim’s progress throughout the system of tunnels and staircases, and with just a little bit of luck, they could follow his tracks and find the primary scene of their murder.
Maybe, he thought as he put the evidence bags he’d carried on the table in the layout room, they were even able of identifying their murderer from the tapes.
He made a quick mental note to get Flack on it – it was Flack, never Don, when they were working – before returning his attention to the evidence. From the corner of his eye, he could see Danny through the glass walls of the lab, walking by with an unhappy frown, his shoulders slumped.
Maybe Don knew what was wrong with Danny, too, Mac thought, but he managed to push that thought out of the focus of his mind for now. Other things were more important right now.
~*~*~
“Edward Allen junior. He has more enemies than he has money.” Angell tapped her memo book with her pen and shifted from one foot to the other. “And he has a lot of money. In addition to being one of the most recognized directors of his time, he owns half of EA Energies. They control the market for new energies.”
Danny nodded without turning away from the computer. He was busy digitalizing the fingerprint he’d found at the scene, but it didn’t stop him from listening to every word the young detective told him. Of course he’d heard the name EA Energy. It was one of the big brand names, especially since people were always looking for new ways of creating clean energy. It was essential for the survival of humanity. The majority of energy needed by the colonies was produced by the heat produced by the liquid outer core of the planet, but there always was the search for other forms, especially considering the slow but certain cooling down of the planet.
“His brother Conrad owns the other half of the company,” Angell continued, interrupting Danny’s musings. “He’s the one who’s taking the responsibility for EA Energy, but every decision he makes had to be signed off by our vic. There have reportedly been several heated arguments between them about that.”
“Motive?” Danny guessed and finally turned on his chair. “By getting rid of his brother, he finally can do what he wants with the company.”
Angell shrugged. “As soon as we got a time of death, I can check if he has an alibi,” she told him, making a little note on her pad. “Until then…I’m having the pleasure of telling Allen’s wife that her husband is dead.”
“Good luck,” Danny wished with a slight twist of his lips and returned his attention to the fingerprints. He was just glad that Angell would do this, and that he wasn’t involved in it – at least not this time.
“Are you kidding me, if the housekeeper can be believed, his wife is going to invite me to the party,” Angell replied while already turning on her heel. “Let me know when you guys find out something, okay?”
Danny lifted a hand in a silent salute and agreement, and Jess left. She had a job to do.
As soon as she was gone, Lindsay entered the lab and pulled the second chair close.
Silence filled the room.
Danny shifted slightly.
Lindsay took a deep breath and slowly released it.
“Listen…” she started, but she didn’t know how to continue, and Danny had no clue either what to say.
“Listen,” Lindsay said again, “I’m sorry for blowing you off like that yesterday.”
“Hm,” Danny grunted non-committal.
“It’s just, I was tired after running around all day long,” Lindsay continued, lifting her hands. She almost immediately dropped them again and wrapped them around her swollen stomach.
The bright light of the lab glinted off the ring Danny himself had put on her finger, and he swallowed against the taste of disappointment rising in his throat and threatening to choke him. He had married Lindsay because he had firmly believed that it was the right thing to do, for the baby she was expecting and for the two of them, but it hadn’t made things between them any easier.
“I thought we wanted to go to the courthouse, get applications for a new apartment,” he finally said, and even if he tried to hide it, his disappointment was clearly audible.
Lindsay flinched. “I know,” she replied defensively. “I told you I was tired! You try carrying around a baby all day long.”
Now it was Danny’s turn to flinch. “Sorry,” he said gruffly and slowly uncurled his fingers that had clenched tightly into his thigh. “You think we can go today?"
Lindsay shrugged. "I don't know," she said evasively.
Danny sighed and dropped his head. "You think you can raise a child in your apartment?" he asked. "Hell, even put up a crib somewhere?"
Lindsay didn't answer. She didn't need to. Both of them had been in her tiny one-person apartment, assigned to her by the authorities. It had been enough for her, especially considering that she barely used it apart for sleeping and eating, but now they needed more room.
"We're married," Danny pointed out, his voice quiet and filled with pain and disappointment. "And still not living together. Don't you think we should fix this?"
"Danny..." She sighed. "I'm going home for a few days," she then abruptly changed topics. "To visit my parents." A smile appeared on her face. "Telling them I'm pregnant."
Danny bit his lip sharply to stop himself from lashing out angrily at her. This was not how he had imagined the whole married-thing to go down. This was the first thing he'd heard about Lindsay's plans, but it sounded as if they were definite already.
"Fine," he replied finally. "You want me to take care of it?"
Lindsay looked like she wanted to protest, but finally, she nodded and heaved herself to her feet again, one hand pressed against her back and one rubbing her stomach soothingly.
"Come on, little one," she whispered. "Daddy has to work now."
Danny rolled his chair closer to her and pressed a gentle kiss to her stomach. "Yeah," he agreed. "Daddy loves you, baby."
Lindsay's hand brushed briefly against his cheek, and then she was off, and Danny was left alone with the rest of the fingerprints he had to check out.
~*~*~
Sid Hammerback was already awaiting them when Mac and Hawkes entered the morgue. The body of their victim was partly covered by a white sheet, the incision in his torso ready to be sewn up neatly.
"Well?" Mac asked with an amused smile. "What did you find out?"
"His name, for one," Sid said and snapped his glasses together. "Jeff Horkins."
Mac nodded, indicating that he understood, and stepped closer to the deceased. "Cause of death?"
"Exsanguination due to multiple sharp force traumata to the upper abdomen and chest area," Sid answered without missing a beat. "He was stabbed to death."
He pointed to the wounds, visible now that the body had been cleaned. "There are defensive wounds on his hands and forearms. This might be interesting for you."
He turned around and picked up an evidence container. It contained a roughly triangular, silvery object.
Hawkes squinted at it. "Tip of a knife?" he guessed.
Sid handed the container to him. "It's not my job to find that out," he replied. "But I found it stuck in one of his ribs."
Hawkes chuckled. "Okay," he conceded. "I'm on it."
"Anything else?" Mac asked.
Sid shrugged. "Tox screen came back negative. His last meal - nothing out of the ordinary, just a few standard food rations. Apart from the fact that he was stabbed, he was an extraordinarily healthy young man." He scratched his grey hair briefly. "Levels of radioactivity indicate that he was spending quite some time on the upper levels," he revealed. "However, he obviously was born into a wealthy family. Nails were broken and bitten down. I found trace underneath them, sent them to the lab."
Mac nodded. "I'll let Flack check him out," he promised. "Thanks, Sid."
"And I'll look at the mysterious trace," Hawkes added with a smile in Sid's direction.
Sid handed him the preliminary autopsy report, saved conveniently on a small chip, and the two left the morgue quickly. They had work to do.
~*~*~
"Look what my uniforms found," Flack greeted them when they returned to the lab. He was sitting in the small, cramped break room together with Danny, a bottle of water and a snack ration in front of him, together with a sealed evidence bag.
Mac picked it up curiously. "A notebook."
"It was found half a block down from where we found our vic," Don reported. "Considering the fact that there isn't much else on those staircases, especially on that level...I thought it could be important. We’re probably lucky that nobody else found it before we did. This thing is expensive." He pointed at the small rectangular object in Mac’s hands.
"His name was Jefferson Horkins," Mac said. "See if you can find out anything about him."
Flack nodded and, taking another bite of his snack, scribbled the name down on his own pad. "Anything else?" he asked.
Mac quickly filled him in on what they already knew. "The first thing we have to do is find the primary crime scene," he finished. "Take Danny, maybe the service robots missed a spot."
Flack nodded, crumbled the wrapper of his food, and stood. "Will do." He hesitated briefly. "Dinner tonight?" he asked then.
Mac sighed. "Paperwork," he deflected. "I'm probably going to be late."
Flack didn't reply with words, but Mac could read the amused tolerance in his eyes and his smile. They didn't need words to communicate as the tall detective left, his sleeve barely brushing against Mac's as he passed him.
An hour later, he and Danny were standing on steel grates, the only sign that this had been a crime scene a few specs of blood that clung to the metal.
"Damn service bots," Danny grumbled and crouched down, bottle of chemicals in his hands. "They compromised the scene. Again."
Flack chuckled. "They're bots," he replied and looked around. "They probably didn't a very good job cleaning up all that blood. Do they ever?"
"No, probably not," Danny agreed and gave him a wide grin. "You ready to hunt?"
~*~*~
“Cause of death is a single gunshot wound to the chest.”
Sid gesticulated toward the hole in the torso of the body, right next to the incision he’d made when he’d performed the autopsy. The body had been washed and cleaned prior to that, but Sid handed Stella one of the ubiquitous tablet computers. It showed a picture of the wound.
“The area around the wound appears stippled,” Stella noticed after just a brief glance at the pictures Sid had taken. “The shooter was less than two feet away from our vic.”
Sid nodded. “The shot was angled slightly downwards, indicating that the shooter is taller than our deceased Mr. Allen was. The bullet entered the body here and exited it here.” He rolled the body seemingly effortlessly, despite his physical appearance, and pointed to a larger hole right next to the victim’s spine. “It grazed the sixth thoracic vertebra and left the body – did you find a bullet at the scene?
Stella handed the tablet back with a snort. “The whole place was spotless, and there was no sign of a bullet – not that I remember,” she said, lost in thought. “But I’ll double check it anyways.”
She glanced at the body of the dead man again. “He was small,” she noted. “Even Lindsay is taller than him.”
“Maybe she shot him?” Sid replied with a sardonic grin.
Stella did him the favor of not grimacing and even forced a grin. “Anything else you can tell me?” she asked, choosing not to comment on the possibility and probability of Lindsay being able to murder someone in the state she was in.
Sid snapped his glasses together once more. “Stomach contents…” he answered and handed over a jar before returning his attention to the body. “Reveal nothing out of the ordinary. Tox screen shows that he took a dose of amphetamines just a short time before death. Radiation levels were within the expected norms for someone of his caliber.”
“Very low, then,” Stella translated. “Okay, thank you, Sid.”
“My pleasure, as usual,” he replied, giving her another of his smiles. “I’ll keep poking and prodding at him, maybe I’ll find out something else, but so far, his body doesn’t show anything out of the ordinary, besides that bullet wound.”
Stella nodded. The case seemed pretty straight forward, she thought while gathering the preliminary autopsy report and the stomach contents. Now they just needed to find the gun, the bullet, and their killer.
Nothing easier than that.
“Oh, Sid?” she asked, turning around one last time.
Sid gave her a questioning glance.
“Time of death?”
“My guess…between four and eight pm yesterday.”
“Okay. Thank you, Sid.”
~*~*~
tbc
Author: Kathie
Fandom: CSI:NY
Pairings: Don Flack/Mac Taylor, a bit of Lindsay Monroe/Danny Messer
Rating: FRAO/NC-17
Warnings: AU, future!fic, slash, het
Word Count: 22,877 words
Disclaimer: Not a work for profit, only love and affection for the show CSI:NY, which I don’t own.
Beta: WPAdmirer, who did a kick-ass awesome job!
Summary: In a world where hell is above the people and heaven is below them, the forensic team around Mac Taylor gets called to two crime scenes: a reporter stabbed on a staircase and a famous director found shot in his apartment. While they rush to solve the crimes, personal trouble threatens to distract them.
Author’s Notes: written for the csi_bigbang. There aren’t enough words to express my thankfulness to the people who held my hand during the writing of this: Ginny, Mer and Dee. Thanks so much!
I.
If there, as religious people believed and preached, existed a Hell, it would be above them.
If there was a Heaven, it would be far below their feet, somewhere close to the center of the Earth, where it was warm and safe and only the richest people had found their home; far away and safe from the intense radioactivity that had been poisoning the surface of the planet for several centuries now. The radioactivity had started to seep into the ground, despite their best efforts of shielding the colonies buried deep in the planet, making the upper levels almost uninhabitable.
Only books and ancient movies, carefully preserved through the ages, reminded of a time when humanity had lived on the surface of the Earth. The sun, the sky, the stars – they were myths and something from fairytales, to be told to children at night, when they were wrapped in blankets in their beds and begging with wide eyes for a good night story.
Everybody knew that the upper levels were dangerous. It was dangerous there, not only because of the radioactivity. Nobody in their right minds went to the upper-most levels, where only the poorest of the poor had found a home, far away from the civilized parts of the colonies.
The poor and the criminals.
Up here, there were no elevators, no escalators, and no working transport tubes – the old elevator shafts stood silent and empty, out of service ever since people had retreated, closer to the center of the Earth. They were a remnant of times long gone, a silent memorial to the first generations of humans – those that had hoped that their retreat into Earth was only temporary.
People who lived on these levels nowadays had to do with the gigantic network of old, steely staircases that stretched over miles in every direction, running through the whole colony like a nervous system, usually hidden behind doors and steel plates. It was a maze of stainless steel beams and flickering lights that gave out more often than not. Nobody was bothering to replace them, besides the caretaker robots that still made their rounds, dutifully and patient.
Once people settled up there, they usually didn’t go anywhere anymore. Once up here, it was almost impossible to ever come back down.
It was a one-way street to hell.
Hell on Earth.
Or, to be more exact, hell under Earth.
It was only fitting that he found himself here, he thought fuzzily, while clenching blood-smeared fingers into the railing of an old, severely dented to the point of almost being broken part of the ancient staircase, and pulled himself up another step, another step closer to Hell.
He didn’t deserve anything better than this. It was poetic justice, in a way. He’d stuck his nose into things he had no business sticking it in, and this was the price he had to pay for his curiosity.
Curiosity, after all, killed the cat. Why had he expected to escape the same fate?
His breath came in short gasps, and his calves and thighs burned with the exertion while he leaned against the railing for a moment and tried to get enough oxygen into his burning lungs, to make the black spots that danced in front of his eyes disappear. He needed clarity to return to his thoughts. He needed to stop thinking like the author of one of the novels of old, long-forgotten times, he reprimanded himself, his thoughts fraying already on the edges again.
Below him, at the middle levels, there would be help. There would be hospitals, there would be shopping malls full of people who could offer him protection simply by being there. They would be able to help him against those that still followed him. When he concentrated, he could hear their footsteps over the thumping of his own blood in his ears, expensive shoes on steel, taking one step after the next.
They were hunting him.
They had done this to him.
And there was only way he could run, and that was up.
A coughing fit overwhelmed him for a moment. He tried to suppress it, to keep as quiet as possible, for the remote chance that he could escape his followers for a moment longer. However, it proved to be a futile attempt. Pressing his hand to his mouth, he tasted the metallic tang of blood, and when he pulled his hand back, he saw the reddish mist sprayed over the palm of his hand – saliva mixed with blood, never a good sign. More blood spilled brightly over his bluish, pale lips and down his chin, clinging to his stubble before dripping onto his once crisp-white shirt, now soaked with red.
His knees weakened, and he stumbled up another step before he could feel himself falling.
His arms were too weak to catch him, and his thoughts swam – he didn’t even feel it when his forehead connected painfully with the steel of the steps. Suddenly, he found himself sitting on the stairs, dazed and confused, several steps below the point where he’d stumbled. His arm had tangled with the railing, aching numbly, but he didn’t pay attention to the pain or his inability to move it beyond a very limited range.
He didn’t find it in himself to get back to his feet. On his hands and knees, he crawled up another step, but it was obvious to everybody but himself that he wouldn’t make it any further.
With the last of his waning strength, he turned around, to look down. A broad, bloody trail showed his progress up the stairs.
If they wanted to find him, they just needed to follow his tracks.
And he could hear them coming.
It didn’t matter anymore.
Death would get him before anyone else would.
It was too late for him.
The world became darkness.
~*~*~
If there was one sound Don Flack hated, it was the beep of his phone early in the morning, when he was still in bed, his head still fuzzy with sleep.
It was a sound he heard way too often, and rarely it meant something good, he thought darkly while rolling toward the bedside table and fumblingly reaching for the offensive contraption.
One glance at the clock confirmed that it was still too early to be even counted as morning, and he bit back a soft curse as his fingers traced the keys of his phone that allowed him to accept the call.
A soft grunt reminded him that he wasn’t alone in bed, and he thought he should probably get up. Before he could move, a strong arm was slung around his waist, and he was pulled backwards, toward a warm and familiar body.
“On my way,” he murmured into his phone before disconnecting the call and allowing himself the luxury of relaxing against the body behind him for a few precious moments.
Hot breath ghosted along his shoulder. “New case?” Mac asked, his voice rough from sleep.
Don sighed. “Yeah.” He grabbed his watch – it was two in the morning, he and Mac had gone to bed just a few, too short hours ago – and twisted his head to press a brief, dry kiss to Mac’s cheek. “Dead body found on one of the upper levels.”
Mac raised an amused eyebrow. “Should I expect a call from the investigating detective soon?” he asked, but he released his grip on Don and allowed the younger man to sit up and swing his legs over the edge of their comfortable bed. The blankets slipped off of Don, revealing his state of undress, and Mac licked his lips unconsciously.
“You could just as well get up now,” Don agreed and ran a hand through his dark, short hair. “Get to the scene with me. Get a head start on this thing.”
Mac stared at him for a moment, and, without further comment, got up as well.
They both had experience in dressing in just a short amount of time, and before long, they were ready to leave. Don checked one last time that he had his badge and gun, while Mac simply grabbed his kit, secure in the knowledge that it was fully stocked and ready to deal with another crime scene.
Mac waited by the door, and when Don passed him, he stopped him with a hand on Don’s arm. His fingers brushed up until it rested against the back of Don’s neck, and Mac pulled the younger man into a brief kiss before letting him go and ushering him out of the apartment.
Don shot him an amused glance, but he didn’t comment on the little ritual. It was something Mac had started to always do, whenever they left their home together.
To the outside world, Mac might look like he didn’t express emotions well, and, if he was honest, Don knew that it was the truth. Mac had been fumbling his way through all of the important points of their relationship more or less successful, but Don had known Mac for a long time now.
He knew to let Mac come to him on his own time, even if it was frustrating sometimes. He also suspected that Stella occasionally reminded Mac of some of the things that she thought should be part of a relationship, things that Mac with his intense focus on solving crimes and making the world a better place simply didn’t think of. It was okay. Don was a guy. He didn’t need roses and big commitment speeches.
He had figured that this, the kiss before they left the apartment, was Mac’s way of telling him that he cared about him, despite his alleged shortcomings in the relationship department, and for Don, it was enough.
The cruiser was small enough to navigate the elevator shafts and staircases, and it was fast enough to bring them to the crime scene within just a few minutes. Don used the time to mentally prepare himself for yet another gruesome crime scene.
Uniformed officers already had cordoned off the crime scene, and Don shared a brief look with Mac before each of them set off with their own set of things they had to do.
~*~*~
“Male victim, white. No ID.” Don glanced down at the electronic memo book in his right hand. Unlike many of his colleagues, he preferred the actual note-taking to voice records, and the slender pen in his left hand moved over the screen of his pad with practiced ease, bringing up more information about the pile of bones and flesh that once had been a human being.
“Who found him?” Mac asked while snapping on a fresh pair of gloves.
Don gestured toward the shadows beyond the brightly lit crime scene. “Caretaker Robot followed the blood trail up the stairs. The protocols can be accessed from the central, I’ll stop by there to find out where the trail started.”
Mac nodded and snapped a few pictures of their victim before handing the camera to Don and hunching down next to the body, next to where Sheldon Hawkes was already crouched down. “He’s definitely not from up here,” he noted. “This shirt is expensive, he has all his teeth, and he doesn’t look malnourished or like a drug addict.”
Hawkes nodded his agreement. “Signs of a struggle – abrasion on the forehead, the right arm has been dislocated.” He pressed down on the victim’s chest, drawing their attention to the ripped shirt that was encrusted with blood. “Cause of death appears to be exsanguination due to these stab wounds in the chest and abdomen.”
“Time of death?”
Hawkes reached into the open crime scene kit and selected a thermometer, which he used to determine the time of death. Don shifted from one foot to the other, as anxious to get the result as the CSIs. He didn’t feel like shifting through the complete protocol of the robot. Narrowing down the time would be a huge help for him.
~*~*~
“Good morning.” Danny shifted his kit from one hand to the other and bounced on the balls of his feet, managing to appear young and impatient while at the same time holding on to his professionalism, proven by the fact that he almost immediately set down his kit and snapped on a pair of gloves.
“Morning, Danny,” Stella replied. She raised both eyebrows and followed Danny right through the electronic crime scene tape. The yellow barrier registered the shield clipped to Danny’s and her belts and allowed them access to the apartment that held their crime scene.
“What do we’ve got?”
“Edward Allen.”
Danny reached up and pushed his glasses up his nose with his knuckles. “The famous theater director?”
“Yeah, that one.” Jess Angell had appeared behind Danny without him noticing. “The housekeeper confirmed that it’s him. She found him this morning in his apartment. At first she thought he was just sleeping and left him alone, until she noticed the huge puddle of blood he was lying in.”
She glanced at the pad she was holding. “His new stage production premiered yesterday night, but he hasn’t been there. It’s the headline in every newspaper.” The corners of her mouth twitched slightly. “Looks like he had a valid reason not to attend his own greatest creation.”
Danny glanced at her from the side. From the way she had stressed the last words, it was obvious that she had quoted someone, probably one of the many newspaper headlines she had mentioned.
“Right now, uniforms are keeping her from throwing a party,” Jess continued.
“Charming,” Danny muttered.
“Well,” Stella interrupted and looked around the room, taking in the framed posters of previous productions Edward Allen had been involved with, the blood-strained, previously white carpet, and in the middle of it, the body of the late superstar of theater productions. “At least it won’t be hard to find suspects.”
“Yeah,” Danny agreed with a sigh. “Was there anyone who’d met this guy and not hated him on sight?”
“Let’s find out,” Stella suggested, her attention already focused on the evidence in front of her again. At the moment, they could only speculate about the murderer, and they weren't getting paid for speculation and assumption. They were here to collect evidence, and the evidence would lead them to the person they were looking for, not wild guessing.
“What do you need me to do?” Danny asked, and Stella grinned and handed him the camera.
"Documentation."
They worked quietly and efficiently, documenting the state of the body and its position.
“Cause of death seems to be a gunshot wound. The bullet entered his torso at the lower abdomen…” Stella’s fingertips pressed against the blood-soaked fabric of Edward Allen’s shirt. “Jagged edges, wound canal seems to be going upwards…” She moved around the body and pushed her palms under the body’s shoulders, to lift them off the floor. “Exit wound between the shoulder blades. Looks like a straight through-and-through.”
“Okay, we’ll know more after Sid did the autopsy,” Danny replied absent-mindedly.
“Signs of a fight,” Stella noted and nodded to the broken remains of a chair lying in a corner. “Looks like this is our primary scene.”
Danny scrunched up his nose. “Maybe that’s his idea of modern art,” he replied, but he still moved to take a picture of the chair. “Is the vic showing any defensive wounds?”
“Slight bruising around the wrists,” Stella told him. “But no abrasions on the forearms or palms.” She picked up a fiber and sealed into an evidence bag. “How’s things with you and Lindsay?”
“Fine,” Danny said shortly before putting down the camera and helped Stella picking up traces and dusting the room for fingerprints. It was more than obvious that he didn’t want to talk about his and Lindsay’s relationship and the problems they were struggling with, and Stella accepted it and moved on. She would, she decided as she kneeled down to check the space under the bed, grab Lindsay for lunch and ask her. She was sure that Lindsay wouldn’t be as tight-lipped as Danny was.
“Housekeeper is worth her money,” she noted. “Not a spec of dust down here.”
“Keep on looking,” Danny grunted. “Maybe she missed a spot or something.”
~*~*~
The crime lab of the colony New York was situated on top of one of the many precincts, in a cave that nobody remembered if it was artificial or of natural origins on a medium level. Blocks upon blocks of buildings had been crammed into the cave, some bigger and some smaller, giving parts of the lab a slightly claustrophobic atmosphere, but for Mac, the lab had been more home than his own apartment for many years. He didn’t notice the tight corridors one had to squeeze through to get to some parts of the lab anymore. It was just a fact of life, especially considering that the lab was filled to the brim with the latest and best equipment and technology that was on the market.
There was enough room to work, and that, to Mac, was the main purpose of the lab. He didn’t think they needed more room in the hallways, and the rate of solved crimes seemed to favor his perspective. The crime lab was running like a well-oiled machine.
Mac smiled slightly at his reflection in the glass wall of the elevator that brought him up to his lab. He had good people working for him, for the lab, good people who had become wonderful friends, like Stella, who was waiting for the elevator, her fingers tapping impatiently against the flat computer she was holding in her hands.
Mac gave her a small nod in greeting, which Stella returned, but they both didn’t stop to chat. Stella obviously was in a hurry, but Mac trusted her implicitly with whatever she was working on, and he himself was on his way to log the evidence of his own case.
Technically, he thought while squeezing past Adam, the Stairs, connecting every level of the colony, were a public place. Exit doors were discreetly integrated into the walls, but they weren’t locked. Everybody could step through them and use the Stairs. Only laziness and the need to get from one end of the colony to the other within certain time limits stopped more people from actually using them. The tube network was reliable and fast, and almost everybody used that kind of public transportation. Apparently, their man was not one of them.
Public places were under constant surveillance, he thought. It shouldn’t be a problem to access the tapes and follow their victim’s progress throughout the system of tunnels and staircases, and with just a little bit of luck, they could follow his tracks and find the primary scene of their murder.
Maybe, he thought as he put the evidence bags he’d carried on the table in the layout room, they were even able of identifying their murderer from the tapes.
He made a quick mental note to get Flack on it – it was Flack, never Don, when they were working – before returning his attention to the evidence. From the corner of his eye, he could see Danny through the glass walls of the lab, walking by with an unhappy frown, his shoulders slumped.
Maybe Don knew what was wrong with Danny, too, Mac thought, but he managed to push that thought out of the focus of his mind for now. Other things were more important right now.
~*~*~
“Edward Allen junior. He has more enemies than he has money.” Angell tapped her memo book with her pen and shifted from one foot to the other. “And he has a lot of money. In addition to being one of the most recognized directors of his time, he owns half of EA Energies. They control the market for new energies.”
Danny nodded without turning away from the computer. He was busy digitalizing the fingerprint he’d found at the scene, but it didn’t stop him from listening to every word the young detective told him. Of course he’d heard the name EA Energy. It was one of the big brand names, especially since people were always looking for new ways of creating clean energy. It was essential for the survival of humanity. The majority of energy needed by the colonies was produced by the heat produced by the liquid outer core of the planet, but there always was the search for other forms, especially considering the slow but certain cooling down of the planet.
“His brother Conrad owns the other half of the company,” Angell continued, interrupting Danny’s musings. “He’s the one who’s taking the responsibility for EA Energy, but every decision he makes had to be signed off by our vic. There have reportedly been several heated arguments between them about that.”
“Motive?” Danny guessed and finally turned on his chair. “By getting rid of his brother, he finally can do what he wants with the company.”
Angell shrugged. “As soon as we got a time of death, I can check if he has an alibi,” she told him, making a little note on her pad. “Until then…I’m having the pleasure of telling Allen’s wife that her husband is dead.”
“Good luck,” Danny wished with a slight twist of his lips and returned his attention to the fingerprints. He was just glad that Angell would do this, and that he wasn’t involved in it – at least not this time.
“Are you kidding me, if the housekeeper can be believed, his wife is going to invite me to the party,” Angell replied while already turning on her heel. “Let me know when you guys find out something, okay?”
Danny lifted a hand in a silent salute and agreement, and Jess left. She had a job to do.
As soon as she was gone, Lindsay entered the lab and pulled the second chair close.
Silence filled the room.
Danny shifted slightly.
Lindsay took a deep breath and slowly released it.
“Listen…” she started, but she didn’t know how to continue, and Danny had no clue either what to say.
“Listen,” Lindsay said again, “I’m sorry for blowing you off like that yesterday.”
“Hm,” Danny grunted non-committal.
“It’s just, I was tired after running around all day long,” Lindsay continued, lifting her hands. She almost immediately dropped them again and wrapped them around her swollen stomach.
The bright light of the lab glinted off the ring Danny himself had put on her finger, and he swallowed against the taste of disappointment rising in his throat and threatening to choke him. He had married Lindsay because he had firmly believed that it was the right thing to do, for the baby she was expecting and for the two of them, but it hadn’t made things between them any easier.
“I thought we wanted to go to the courthouse, get applications for a new apartment,” he finally said, and even if he tried to hide it, his disappointment was clearly audible.
Lindsay flinched. “I know,” she replied defensively. “I told you I was tired! You try carrying around a baby all day long.”
Now it was Danny’s turn to flinch. “Sorry,” he said gruffly and slowly uncurled his fingers that had clenched tightly into his thigh. “You think we can go today?"
Lindsay shrugged. "I don't know," she said evasively.
Danny sighed and dropped his head. "You think you can raise a child in your apartment?" he asked. "Hell, even put up a crib somewhere?"
Lindsay didn't answer. She didn't need to. Both of them had been in her tiny one-person apartment, assigned to her by the authorities. It had been enough for her, especially considering that she barely used it apart for sleeping and eating, but now they needed more room.
"We're married," Danny pointed out, his voice quiet and filled with pain and disappointment. "And still not living together. Don't you think we should fix this?"
"Danny..." She sighed. "I'm going home for a few days," she then abruptly changed topics. "To visit my parents." A smile appeared on her face. "Telling them I'm pregnant."
Danny bit his lip sharply to stop himself from lashing out angrily at her. This was not how he had imagined the whole married-thing to go down. This was the first thing he'd heard about Lindsay's plans, but it sounded as if they were definite already.
"Fine," he replied finally. "You want me to take care of it?"
Lindsay looked like she wanted to protest, but finally, she nodded and heaved herself to her feet again, one hand pressed against her back and one rubbing her stomach soothingly.
"Come on, little one," she whispered. "Daddy has to work now."
Danny rolled his chair closer to her and pressed a gentle kiss to her stomach. "Yeah," he agreed. "Daddy loves you, baby."
Lindsay's hand brushed briefly against his cheek, and then she was off, and Danny was left alone with the rest of the fingerprints he had to check out.
~*~*~
Sid Hammerback was already awaiting them when Mac and Hawkes entered the morgue. The body of their victim was partly covered by a white sheet, the incision in his torso ready to be sewn up neatly.
"Well?" Mac asked with an amused smile. "What did you find out?"
"His name, for one," Sid said and snapped his glasses together. "Jeff Horkins."
Mac nodded, indicating that he understood, and stepped closer to the deceased. "Cause of death?"
"Exsanguination due to multiple sharp force traumata to the upper abdomen and chest area," Sid answered without missing a beat. "He was stabbed to death."
He pointed to the wounds, visible now that the body had been cleaned. "There are defensive wounds on his hands and forearms. This might be interesting for you."
He turned around and picked up an evidence container. It contained a roughly triangular, silvery object.
Hawkes squinted at it. "Tip of a knife?" he guessed.
Sid handed the container to him. "It's not my job to find that out," he replied. "But I found it stuck in one of his ribs."
Hawkes chuckled. "Okay," he conceded. "I'm on it."
"Anything else?" Mac asked.
Sid shrugged. "Tox screen came back negative. His last meal - nothing out of the ordinary, just a few standard food rations. Apart from the fact that he was stabbed, he was an extraordinarily healthy young man." He scratched his grey hair briefly. "Levels of radioactivity indicate that he was spending quite some time on the upper levels," he revealed. "However, he obviously was born into a wealthy family. Nails were broken and bitten down. I found trace underneath them, sent them to the lab."
Mac nodded. "I'll let Flack check him out," he promised. "Thanks, Sid."
"And I'll look at the mysterious trace," Hawkes added with a smile in Sid's direction.
Sid handed him the preliminary autopsy report, saved conveniently on a small chip, and the two left the morgue quickly. They had work to do.
~*~*~
"Look what my uniforms found," Flack greeted them when they returned to the lab. He was sitting in the small, cramped break room together with Danny, a bottle of water and a snack ration in front of him, together with a sealed evidence bag.
Mac picked it up curiously. "A notebook."
"It was found half a block down from where we found our vic," Don reported. "Considering the fact that there isn't much else on those staircases, especially on that level...I thought it could be important. We’re probably lucky that nobody else found it before we did. This thing is expensive." He pointed at the small rectangular object in Mac’s hands.
"His name was Jefferson Horkins," Mac said. "See if you can find out anything about him."
Flack nodded and, taking another bite of his snack, scribbled the name down on his own pad. "Anything else?" he asked.
Mac quickly filled him in on what they already knew. "The first thing we have to do is find the primary crime scene," he finished. "Take Danny, maybe the service robots missed a spot."
Flack nodded, crumbled the wrapper of his food, and stood. "Will do." He hesitated briefly. "Dinner tonight?" he asked then.
Mac sighed. "Paperwork," he deflected. "I'm probably going to be late."
Flack didn't reply with words, but Mac could read the amused tolerance in his eyes and his smile. They didn't need words to communicate as the tall detective left, his sleeve barely brushing against Mac's as he passed him.
An hour later, he and Danny were standing on steel grates, the only sign that this had been a crime scene a few specs of blood that clung to the metal.
"Damn service bots," Danny grumbled and crouched down, bottle of chemicals in his hands. "They compromised the scene. Again."
Flack chuckled. "They're bots," he replied and looked around. "They probably didn't a very good job cleaning up all that blood. Do they ever?"
"No, probably not," Danny agreed and gave him a wide grin. "You ready to hunt?"
~*~*~
“Cause of death is a single gunshot wound to the chest.”
Sid gesticulated toward the hole in the torso of the body, right next to the incision he’d made when he’d performed the autopsy. The body had been washed and cleaned prior to that, but Sid handed Stella one of the ubiquitous tablet computers. It showed a picture of the wound.
“The area around the wound appears stippled,” Stella noticed after just a brief glance at the pictures Sid had taken. “The shooter was less than two feet away from our vic.”
Sid nodded. “The shot was angled slightly downwards, indicating that the shooter is taller than our deceased Mr. Allen was. The bullet entered the body here and exited it here.” He rolled the body seemingly effortlessly, despite his physical appearance, and pointed to a larger hole right next to the victim’s spine. “It grazed the sixth thoracic vertebra and left the body – did you find a bullet at the scene?
Stella handed the tablet back with a snort. “The whole place was spotless, and there was no sign of a bullet – not that I remember,” she said, lost in thought. “But I’ll double check it anyways.”
She glanced at the body of the dead man again. “He was small,” she noted. “Even Lindsay is taller than him.”
“Maybe she shot him?” Sid replied with a sardonic grin.
Stella did him the favor of not grimacing and even forced a grin. “Anything else you can tell me?” she asked, choosing not to comment on the possibility and probability of Lindsay being able to murder someone in the state she was in.
Sid snapped his glasses together once more. “Stomach contents…” he answered and handed over a jar before returning his attention to the body. “Reveal nothing out of the ordinary. Tox screen shows that he took a dose of amphetamines just a short time before death. Radiation levels were within the expected norms for someone of his caliber.”
“Very low, then,” Stella translated. “Okay, thank you, Sid.”
“My pleasure, as usual,” he replied, giving her another of his smiles. “I’ll keep poking and prodding at him, maybe I’ll find out something else, but so far, his body doesn’t show anything out of the ordinary, besides that bullet wound.”
Stella nodded. The case seemed pretty straight forward, she thought while gathering the preliminary autopsy report and the stomach contents. Now they just needed to find the gun, the bullet, and their killer.
Nothing easier than that.
“Oh, Sid?” she asked, turning around one last time.
Sid gave her a questioning glance.
“Time of death?”
“My guess…between four and eight pm yesterday.”
“Okay. Thank you, Sid.”
~*~*~
tbc
