Summary: Part of the "Vocabulary Lessons" series. Nick learns the meaning of 'ambiguous' evidence.
Author's Note: This is the first story in the "Vocabulary Lessons" series. It is a series of drabbles that focus on Nick, but other characters feature as well.
ambiguous (am BIG yew us) – having more than one meaning; unclear, uncertain
synonyms >> cryptic, enigmatic, equivocal, obscure
Nick strode down the hall and walked into the DNA lab where Mia was collecting evidence from a figurine. A figurine, Nick realized, that was not from his case. He frowned at that and leaned against the table that she was working on catching her attention.
"C'mon, Mia," he begged, "tell me you've got my results."
"Which results?" she asked with a blank face.
He stared at her with an unbelieving expression. "Mia, don't do this to me."
"Nick, I've got exactly thirty-eight unsolved and unprocessed cases on my table—half of which are backlogged from day and swing shift. You've got to tell me which results." She explained in a tired voice.
"From the Aaronson case?" he reminded her. "A pocket knife? It was found dumped two blocks from the house covered in the victims' blood? We were hoping to find some foreign DNA on it—"
"Oh, right, right," she interrupted. "The two boys murdered in their own home. I remember." She rolled her chair over to the cabinet and sifted through it. "Aha," she said as she brought out a bag and a sheet of paper. She glanced at it before handing it back to him. "I did find some blood with DNA not from your vics but it was underneath the victims' DNA meaning it could have happened anytime prior to their deaths. Ran it through CODIS just in case—didn't get any hits, but according to that, whoever it's from is male and shares seven alleles in common with your boys."
"Taylor and David didn't have anymore brothers," Nick said slowly with a grin, "which only leaves the father. He said he had never seen this knife before, which means he's a liar. We've got a suspect." He got up to leave the lab.
"Wait, Nick!" Mia called out to him, causing him to stop and turn toward her. "You may not have your suspect."
"What do you mean? We've got his blood on the murder weapon," he argued.
"True," she said, "but like I said, it was found underneath the victim's blood. Besides that, when I was taking samples from the knife, I uncovered something on the knife under all that blood." She grabbed the evidence bag with the knife inside. "Take a look at the blade."
Nick took the bag looked closely at the blade and sighed at what he saw. "Bryan Aaronson, the father."
"His name is engraved on the blade of the knife, meaning it's probably his." She told him.
"But why deny ever seeing the knife in the first place if it belonged to him?" he asked, more to himself than to her.
Mia shrugged. "Maybe he didn't know it was his, or maybe he didn't know that his was missing. That's a pretty common looking pocket knife—I gave one just like that to my brother last Christmas."
"But still," he said, trying to keep his suspect, "his blood—"
"—could have gotten there some other way," she finished. "If you ask me, that's some pretty ambiguous evidence you've got there."
Nick sighed. "Yeah, you're right. Thanks anyway, Mia." He glanced at the knife again before shaking his head sadly and leaving the lab.