A/N: I don't own any of the "Psych" characters and I am not making any money from writing this.

Please forgive any minor spelling or grammar mistakes, English is not my native language.

I'd really like to thank my really good fanfiction friend, Loafer, who has given me some very helpful suggestions, and also beta-read this chapter. Thank you very much, and happy Halloween!

Halloween themed fanfiction. Lassiet (by the end). Multi-chapter, probably four or five chapters long. Set sometime around season four (first chapter takes place about five days before Halloween). That is all.

Almost the whole house was ransacked; papers pulled out from the drawers and scattered across the floor, vases and clocks knocked off the cupboards and shelves. The dead body of a young woman was lying on a kitchen floor, in a face-up position, her T-shirt soaked in blood. Carlton and Juliet exchanged a look before observing the body again, then looking over the crime scene one more time, the big unanswered question hanging in the air.

"So, what do you think?", Carlton commented more than asked, turning to face her. Juliet frowned for a moment, then looked over the crime scene again. That was their common tactic during the more... bizarre cases. Try to talk it out. She decided to state the most obvious conclusion first.

"The victim was stabbed multiple times", she said, observing the body. "Could be a crime of passion."

"No murder weapon has been recovered on the scene", Carlton pointed out. "Could have been premditated."

Juliet took one more look around, carefully stepping over some papers scattered over the floor. "The house is ransacked, but all cash and jewelry appear to be intact", she noted. "The killer was probably looking for something, but his motive almost certainly wasn't burglary."

"That sure points to that conclusion", Carlton agreed, nodding his head. He sighed and remained silent for a moment, before finally addressing an elephant in the room. "That and the fact that all the doors and windows were locked from the inside when the body was found", he said under his breath, glaring at the front door and then at the windows around himself.

And that was the problem. The thing that didn't make sense. At all.

Second tactic: question every important (meaning: suspicious) detail. "Emily's mother, Bridget Watkins, who found her body... she is absolutely sure of that?", she asked, though she had already heard pretty much the same thing that Carlton had.

Still, Carlton pulled out his notepad and quickly flipped through the pages, stopping by the middle, where the latest information was written down. "It certainly sounded that way", he pointed out, looking over the entries. "Though, to be fair, she was pretty shaken up, but her statement seemed pretty coherent..." He sighed, then started reading. "She arrived here at three pm, to join her daughter for lunch. A part of their routine. She rang a doorbell a few times, nobody answered. She tried opening the door, it was locked. She tried unlocking the door with a spare key, but couldn't. Something was inside the lock, on the other end. Bridget then looked through the window and saw her daughter's dead body lying face-up on the kitchen floor, covered with blood. She tried opening the window-it was locked too. She took one of the rocks from the yard and broke the glass. She managed to get in, she checked Emily's pulse-there was none. So she called 911, explained the situation the best she could. Bridget then went to the front door and saw that the key was in the lock, from the inside. She unlocked the door. She remembered that Emily's neighbor was a doctor, she thought he might be able to help her, so she ran to the neighboring house, but nobody answered. She ran back into Emily's house and staid there until the police and ambulance arrived. She tried performing CPR, but it didn't work. Paramedics could only pronounce", he concluded with a sigh, before closing the notepad and pocketing it.

Juliet turned toward the front door, Carlton's words echoing in her head. "The key was definitely still in the lock", she concluded. "She said she left it there after unlocking the door. It's still here. I'm sure forensics have photographed this area by now." "The window was broken. From the outside. There are glass shards on the floor. And it is definitely locked. From the inside."

"As well as all other windows", Carlton added. "Including the bathroom window. And the back door." He took a deep breath, running a hand through his hair. "Also... do you feel this? There is some strange... odor in here. It is like the house is filled with it."

Juliet grimaced, inhaling shadowy. "Yeah", she agreed. "It kind of smells like... pineapple." She looked around, a concerned look on her face. "Kind of creepy, don't you think?", Juliet couldn't help but comment, her voice almost a hushed whisper. "Real-life locked room mystery", she said, looking around.

"If it makes you feel any better, I'm sure there's a... rational explanation for this", Carlton said, though he didn't seem as confident and convinced as usual.

"That's what the spirits have been telling me!", a high-pitched voice exclaimed, audible approaching them with every second.

Carlton suppressed a cringe as he turned toward the front door, seeing Shawn Spencer bundle into the crime scene, followed by his partner, Gus, who, like Many times before, seemed to be annoyed, tired and somewhat interested in the same time.

"Isn't that an oxymoron?", Carlton couldn't help but comment, his voice dripping with annoyance.

"Sorry, Lassie, can't hear you due to all the useful information in my head", Shawn said with a smirk, looking around the crime scene as he did.

"How did you even find out about this investigation so soon?", Juliet couldn't help but ask.

Gus sighed, deciding to explain their path instead of Shawn. "We were returning some files back to the precinct. We came across Buzz, who mentioned you two were just assigned to investigate a murder in some suburb. Shawn soon..." He sighed, suppressing a cringe. ""Saw" the address, and here we are." He frowned. "And what is with this smell of pineapple in this room? I mean, I don't mind it, but the air is kind of heavy in here."

"We're as confused as you are", Juliet admitted.

"Do the spirits ever tell you to shut up?", Carlton asked Shawn, glaring at him.

Spencer closed his eyes, putting his hands on his temples. "Darkness!", he exclaimed. "Despair! Stone-no. Stove!"

"The victim's mother is two rooms away", Carlton hissed, glaring at Spencer. "Just keep it down, OK?"

Shawn took a deep breath, suddenly opening his eyes, then quickly turned to face Carlton, suddenly calm and collected again... almost serious and mature in appearance. "Well, sooner or later, somebody will have to tell her that her daughter committed suicide", he said calmly, looking Carlton in the eyes.

The silence that ensued was as tense as it was awkward. Carlton just stared Back at Shawn. Juliet kept looking at Shawn, then Gus, then Carlton, then back at Shawn again, part of her wondering was all that just some elaborate bad joke. "What?", Carlton finally objected, a disgusted look on his face.

Shawn didn't miss a beat. "She ransacked her own house, then went to the kitchen and stabbed herself in the chest four..." He frowned, silent for a moment, as he observed the body. "Five times", he continued, turning to face Carlton again. "Probably with a switchblade. She then lay down on the floor, closed the switchblade, to avoid leaving a blood trail, pushed it under the near by stove and, as a final act of her master deception, died", Shawn concluded with an obnoxious sigh, before making a small bow for the "audience".

Dozens of insults and rebuttals floated around Carlton's mind, but he eventually decided to go with the most honest and justified one. "You're insane."

Shawn, like usual, didn't seem too affected. "That's easy enough to check", he replied. "Somebody check under the stove, please!", he called out, looking around.

All three forensic techs looked up. Carlton sighed, turned to face them, and, despite his dissatisfaction, nodded his head as a sign of approval. One of the techs walked over to the stove, crouched next to it, took a look under it, snapped a photograph, then carefully reached under it, and soon pulled out... a switchblade. Closed, but with a few small but visible blood stains with on a handle.

"This doesn't prove anything!", Carlton mantained. "The killer could have dropped it here."

Shawn shrugged, a smug look on his face. "I guess we'll just have to wait for forensics to process the switchblade for fingerprints then."

"People don't commit suicide on a whim", Juliet pointed out, before heading toward the near by bathroom. "If you want to know what kind of life they had been leading, inspect their bathroom cabinet", she exclaimed enthusiastically. As she headed into the bathroom, Juliet felt like she actually hoped she wouldn't find anything suspicious. Though Shawn's suicide theory, as bizarre as it was, seemed like an only rational explanation at this point, something about it seemed... off putting to her. Or maybe it was the way it was presented...

Carlton followed her into the bathroom, closely followed by Shawn and Gus. Juliet opened the bathroom cabinet above the sink, revealing four orange pill bottles at the bottom. She picked up one of them, took a closer look at the label, and read the description.

"Antidepressants. Prescription..."

Shawn grinned. Carlton groaned. "Lots of people...", he started, then scoffed, crossing his arms over his chest. He observed the bottles for a few moments, ignoring Shawn's smug face, before turning towards him, not bothering to hide his annoyance. "You expect me to believe that this poor woman went through all this trouble in order to disguise her suicide as murder, but didn't even bother to stage a break in?", he pointed out. "Not even that, but she happened to leave all the doors and Windows locked from the inside? With the key left in the front door lock? How does that make sense?"

"You... don't touch anything. Stay quiet. Me and O'Hara are going to question the victim's mother."

They walked into the living room, Carlton making sure to look over his shoulder every now and then. Thankfully, Shawn wasn't following them.

Bridget Watkins was sitting on the couch, staring blankly at the wall. Her eyes were reddish and watery, her face pale. Carlton and Juliet sat down on a sofa slowly, carefully, like they were afraid that any loud sound could unnerve her even more. As Carlton pulled out his notepad and a pen, Juliet gulped, then looked Bridget in the eyes.

"Ms. Watkins... can we ask you a few questions?", she asked softly.

"Sure. Whatever you need to..." She sighed, shivering. "Catch whoever did that to my daughter", she whispered, wiping away her tears.

"Do you know if your daughter had any enemies?", Juliet asked softly, looking Bridget in the eyes. "Was there anyone who would want to hurt her?"

Bridget shook her head, choking back a sob. "No", she whispered. "She never mentioned anything like that. I never noticed any... signs either."

"Did your daughter seem worried or stressed out in the days leading up to her death? Did you notice any strange cars parked around her neighborhood?", Juliet inquired.

Bridget shook her head, gasping before she managed to answer. "No. I'm telling you, this all seems so... senseless. Almost surreal."

"How was your daughter, exactly?", Carlton asked gently, then quickly worded his question a bit better. "I mean, what was her life like?"

Bridget shrugged, a small, sad smile on her lips. "She was a good girl. A bit shy, withdrawn though. She mostly worked at home. She was a website designer. She also volunteered at a local youth center." Bridget sighed, looking down at the floor for a moment. "She... she suffered from depression. But she was taking medication, going to therapy... she was doing much better. She... she attempted suicide a year ago. Slit her wrists. I made her seek professional help."

Carlton and Juliet exchanged a look. Though the house was enveloped in silence, he could swear that he felt Shawn chuckling a few rooms away.

#

There wasn't much that could have been done at the crime scene by that point. Half an hour later, Carlton and Juliet were on their way back to the precinct, although only after Carlton made sure that Shawn and Gus left the scene.

"No way", Carlton said, for the third time during the ride, gripping at the steering wheel tightly.

Juliet sighed. "Come on, Carlton. Get it all out."

Like he had been waiting for her approval, Carlton immediately continued with his criticism. "There is no way that somebody would go through all that trouble to make suicide look like murder, and leave all the doors and windows locked from the inside."

"But if all the doors and windows were locked from the inside, how did the killer flee?", Juliet asked.

"That is what we have to figure out", Carlton responded, almost immediately. He groaned, turning his attention back to the road. "If anyone believes us after Shawn did his... crap vision psychic thing", he couldn't help but add.

He had certain doubts about continuing his criticism, but he couldn't help himself. "I mean... Sorry, but I'm not buying it", he admitted. "Spirits? Visions? Psychic powers? He must have noticed that there were no defense wounds on victim's hands and forearms, and that her hands were stained with blood, so he came up with the suicide theory. As for the stove, it was the only possible hiding place closest to the body."

Juliet didn't react much. She mostly just kept looking through the passenger side window, silent the whole time. Still, age said: "Be that as it may... we will have to find enough evidence to discredit that theory. And that may not be easy."

Carlton sighed, feeling a mixture of relief and remorse. He felt he didn't have to break that illusion, that certainly seemed alluring and even desirable to many people (though definitely not him). But he couldn't handle an obvious murder victim being blamed for her own murder, and he didn't want his partner to believe that scam anymore. He felt she deserved better; their job was hard enough without any fake psychic making it more complicated by claiming he had visions about the case and was pretty much never wrong. To be fair, he often was right in the end, but Carlton knew that Shawn was often wrong until he reached a final conclusion, and that he'd rarely do an actual police work. To be fair, he had a feeling that Juliet mostly knew that, but he just felt a need to remind her... and, maybe, make it absolutely clear that he felt the same, and that it was OK to doubt... or call out people on their bs, even if those clowns happened to be right a few times.

"Forensics will still process the scene", Juliet reasoned. "The autopsy will be performed. We can still look into forensic and autopsy reports. And we can still check Emily Watkins' phone and email records. If she was murdered, there very well might be a clue somewhere in there." She sighed, shifting in her seat. "And if we don't, well..."

Carlton grimaced, taking a turn to the right. "... we'll have to focus on other cases. "Actual" crimes."

#

Twenty minutes later, they were back at the precinct. Thankfully, neither Shawn nor Gus were there. It took Carlton and Juliet over an hour to contact the phone company, explain the matter, obtain the phone records (dating two months back), print them out, and sort them out.

"OK", Juliet exclaimed, giving one file to Carlton while keeping the other one. "Let's start from the end. The latest phone calls and text messages received shortly before the... murder. We should probably start with cellphone records. Not many people use a landline these days. Let's start. We'll split. First half to me, the other to you."

And half an hour to flip through them and get a general idea of Emily Watkins' social life.

"OK", Carlton exclaimed, looking up from his file. "Most of the outcoming and incoming calls seem to be from Emily's mother. The last call she received was also from her. Today, at around ten am. It lasted for two minutes."

"Same with the text messages", Juliet agreed, nodding her head. "Mostly from and to her mother. Usual, normal stuff. "How are you doing?", "How's work?", "Are you taking your meds?", stuff like that. Emily's responses: "Yeah", "OK", "Don't worry about it..."" She frowned, taking a close look at the first page. "Except for this text message, the last one received, today, at around one pm. That is about an hour prior to the murder. Unlisted number, no reply, and it is just... weird."

She walked over to Carlton's desk, the first page in her hand, and showed him the text at the top. "Look, I'm coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to everyone according to what they have done."

"This is a verse from "The Revelation"", Carlton exclaimed, his eyes widening.

Juliet looked at him, both surprise and fascination written on her face. "The Bible?"

"Yes", Carlton confirmed, rubbing his forehead. "The final book of the Bible. It describes the eventual apocalypse, the Doomsday... the end of the world."

Juliet stared at that page again, like she couldn't believe what she was seeing. "This is really creepy", she nearly whispered, feeling shivers run down her back.

"It is peculiar. Suspicious. But nothing more."

Juliet looked back down at the phone records, trying to sort out her thoughts. From the very beginning, she had an... odd feeling about this case. Like there was something particularly sinister, almost inexplicable, about it. But Carlton maintained that there was a rational explanation behind all that, which also strongly reasonated with her. Not just because she knew she had to think logically, but because she felt that he was on the right track. And it is almost like his made her feel... more comfortable about the whole thing. He was a good detective, and her partner; if he said that there was a rational explanation for this whole mess, there must be one, and as long as they work on this together and have each other's back, nothing too bad can happen to them.

Of course, Shawn's theory about suicide was quite a rational explanation, all things considered (though the text message didn't really fit there, but, to be fair, she really had no idea what to make of it, and it seemed that Carlton really didn't have any explanation either, though he was thinking hard about that bizarre-bizarre, mysterious, creepy-detail). But that, too, didn't really sit well with her. But, even if she and Carlton were to reach the same conclusion, at least they'd do that through an actual police work, rather than... psychic powers? She thought back at Carlton's theory about Shawn's "visions", and shuddered. That, too, was an odd feeling, like she wanted to believe both claims at the same time. Feeling uncomfortable by that train of thought, she said the first case-related thing that came to her mind.

"Especially considering that Emily was an atheist."

Carlton frowned, looking up at her. "How do you know that?"

"I saw Christopher Hitchens' books on a bookcase in her living room", she explained, shifting in her seat. "You think that the murder may be, what, religiously motivated? A work of a moral vigilante or something?"

Carlton sighed, leaning back in his chair. "Well, those two particular verses from "The Revelation" refer to "unbelievers" and "blasphemous". So, it is possible that Emily's beliefs-well, a lack of thereof-and lifestyle were what made her the target of this particular murderer."

"The murderer who managed to flee the crime scene and leave all the doors and windows locked from the inside", Juliet couldn't help but add, her voice a bit lower, almost as a dramatic effect.

She and Carlton locked eyes. Eventually, he looked away and picked up his phone. "I'm going to call our technical analysts", he said, dialing the number. "Tell them to check this cellphone number. Identify a licenced owner, trace a signal..."

Two rings. Then, an answer. "Hello? Yes. Detective Carlton Lassiter speaking. I need you to look into a cellphone number. Identify the owner, track the signal. The number is." Short silence. Carlton sighed, rolling his eyes. "Yes, I'll hold."

He frowned, staring at the phone records on his desk as he waited for the answer. "What do you think... why were there no defense wounds on Emily Watkins' body?"

"She could have been drugged", Carlton pointed out. "Or the killer knocked her unconsciousness. I guess the autopsy will show."

"Interesting how we get assigned to investigate such a... weird case few days before Halloween, huh?", Juliet commented, a coy smile on her lips.

Carlton scoffed. "Interesting or ironic?"

Finally, thete was a voice from the other end of the line.

"Hello?" Short silence. A disappointed look soon appeared on his face. "A burner phone? No registered owner? And the signal doesn't pin anymore? It mist be broken or turned off." Carlton sighed, rubbing his eyes. "OK. Check phone records and the signal records. Yes, I'll wait. Thank you."

Carlton sighed, phone still in his hand, and took a sip of coffee. This time, it was Juliet's turn to ask a question. "Why do you think the killer sent that message to Emily?", she wondered, clasping her hands.

Carlton was silent for a few moments, going through the possible explanations in his head. "Maybe a taunt", he suggested. "Or a message to us. Or a part of his... twisted moral code. A sign. The last chance for Emily. A warning. Telling her to find faith. She didn't reply, so she deserved to die."

"If he knew her cellphone number and an address, maybe he also knew her personally."

"That is definitely possible", Carlton confirmed, just when the technical analyst returned with more information.

"No other calls or text messages had been sent from or received to that number?", Carlton exclaimed more than asked, listening to the report carefully. "And it last pinned in the neighborhood where Emily lived, about an hour before the murder? In fact, all signal records originate from there? OK, thank you. But watch out for the signal, in case the phone is turned back on. Though I doubt that will happen." He sighed and hung up.

"What about the place the burner was purchased from?", Juliet asked.

Carlton shook his head. "No records of that. Many stores, especially small, family-owned ones, don't even list such minor purchases or distributions. Not even phone factories and companies can keep track of every burner that makes it to the market."

Juliet sighed, glancing at the clock on Carlton's desk before gazing through the near by window. It was five pm, and dusk was already present on unusually cloudy Santa Barbara sky, slowly morphing into a dark autumn night. She felt that odd feeling again... a particular unease, discomfort, almost like a bad premonition.