Number Seven

Nick/Viva Charles (the pyromaniac from Bad Words--I promise that I have my reasons), but nothing really serious--this is definitely not a love story.

Note: This story started out as just a kind of 'what if' Nick had actually tried to pursue a relationship with the pyromaniac in Bad Words…it was supposed to be a funny little story, and it ended up having a serial killer--I'm thinking this is because I watch too much CSI.

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Prologue

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Nick Stokes was having a bad day. Correction: He had a wonderful day. He was having a bad night. He had fallen out of bed at six o'clock, two hours before he was supposed to be at the lab, when his pager went off. He'd landed on a pile of matchbooks on the floor. Viva Charles was not the domestic type, and her house was just to the right of scary. He had toyed with the question of what he might find if he ever brought his equipment here, but dismissed the thought when he decided he didn't want to know.

He had slipped into his jeans and grabbed his t-shirt off the chair in the corner. There was a large hole burned through the front of it, near the lower left edge. He rolled his eyes and pulled it over his head. He didn't have time to stop by his place before Grissom would begin calling after him again. There had been a body found in casino hotel room, and he was needed there ten minutes ago already.

He dropped to his knees when he noticed his shoes were not where he left them, and looked under the bed. More matchbooks. "Viva, I think this is a fire hazard."

"I love it when you talk sexy," Viva Charles said, as she pulled the sheet around and leaned over the edge of the bed. "What are you looking for?"

"I can't find my shoes."

She smiled at him and sat up on the bed. "I hid them."

He paused, and then glanced up at her incredulously. "You hid my shoes?"

She nodded. "Let's see you leave now, hotshot." She laughed at his stricken look and he let his head fall into his hands.

He'd been dating the pyromaniac for two weeks. They had met two months after the arson case had been closed at the grocery store, and even though he knew it was probably a bad idea he asked her out. He had learned, around about date two, that she had more problems than just the fire thing, and she was, frankly, quite possibly insane. But every time he tried to break it off she did something that would make him stay, and he had to admit, he was strangely drawn to her.

"Viva?" He started, his voice muffled as he covered his head with his hands.

"Hmm?"

He lifted his head. "If you don't give me back my shoes, I'm going to get fired."

She glared at him and then with a growl, jumped from the bed and stalked across the room. He noticed she was wearing a pair of his sweat pants, which he thought was strange, because he had never brought them here. Mentally, he added kleptomania to the list. When she returned she was holding his favorite pair of white sneakers, and without pause, she launched them one after the other at his head.

The first one slammed into his right cheek bone, and he caught the second. He glared up at her. "Viv! What the hell is wrong with you?"

"Nothing. Aren't you going to leave?" she snapped.

He pulled the shoes on and grabbed his jacket and keys from the nightstand. "Okay, that's it, Viv, I think we've got to talk--"

"If you're trying to break up with me again," she said. "Why don't you just say so?"

He smiled widely, falsely. "Okay. Viv, I'm breaking up with you."

"Good!" she snapped. "Out! Get out!"

Next thing he knew, he'd been shoved out the front door, his jacket dangling from his left hand and his phone ringing. He sighed and opened the flip phone. It was Grissom. He wasn't surprised. "Stokes," he said.

"Nick, where are you?"

"What are you still doing here?!" The shout came from above him. Viva was leaning out the second story window. "Go!" she yelled, before throwing a telephone out the window. He stepped back and it broke to pieces at his feet.

"Nick? What was that, are you alright?"

"I'm on my way, Grissom. Sorry I'm running late." Nick quickly got into his car, out of the way of flying telephones, and started down the street.

"That's alright, Nick," Grissom said, his voice calm and curious like always. "Just get here."

Nick turned off the cell phone and stepped on the gas.

Nick parked in front of the casino. There were media vans already, but the police lines were keeping them at bay. He leaned into the back seat and grabbed his vest, hoping it would cover the burn in his shirt. The frayed edges of the lower part of the hole still stuck out beneath it and he rolled his eyes, put his jacket on over it, and grabbed his kit from the backseat.

When he entered the room, Grissom shot him a curious glance, and Catherine's eyebrows raised. "You look like hell," she said, grinning the whole time.

"Thank you, Catherine," he replied politely, setting his kit out of the way and pulling on his gloves. "What's the situation?"

Catherine watched him for a moment before she spoke. "The D.B.'s a casino host here. He lives in Las Vegas, but two days ago he asked for time off work and rented a room."

Nick cast her a curious glance. "You think he was hiding from someone?"

"That would be my guess," she nodded. "Apparently with good reason. From what we can tell, he was strangled. There are rope burns around the throat, and we found a few fibers in the wound."

Nick nodded and pulled out his flashlight. His eyes flickered to the center of the room. The D.B. was laid out on the bed, eyes still open. He could tell it was strangulation from where he stood. His eyes narrowed and he took a step forward. The guy was young, probably still in his twenties. Nick thought he looked familiar. "What was his name?"

Grissom came to stand beside him. "Mark Call. Why? Do you know him?"

Nick shook his head. "He looks familiar though." He turned his flashlight away from the body, towards the nightstand. The drawer was ajar. "Have we checked the nightstands yet?" he asked.

"Not yet," Grissom said. "What do you have?"

"Nothing yet," he said softly. He got to his knees and began dusting for prints. Two showed up, and he pulled them up with the fingerprint kit and slowly pulled the drawer open. A mail package was open inside, no return address. He carefully lifted it out. "Grissom?"

Grissom appeared behind him. "Interesting. Why don't we see what's in it?"

Nick laid out a white sheet, and carefully emptied the contents onto it. A small piece of thin white cardboard fell out, and with it, a small male doll that had been decapitated and burned. The number one was carved into its chest. "Nice," Nick said. "This looks like a crime of passion. What do you think? Love notes?"

Grissom squinted at the evidence, and turned the piece of cardboard over. The other side had the word 'burn' written in red capitals. He leaned back on his heels. "You may have something there, Nick."

Catherine headed back to the lab with Nick, to investigate the mysterious package and the fingerprints they had pulled so far, as well as the thread they had found in the strangulation wound while Grissom finished processing the scene. Nick could feel Catherine's eyes alternately flickering towards him, and then back to the road.

He sighed. "What?" he asked softly.

"Nothing," she said quickly. "I was just wondering how that happened?" She motioned to the burn in his shirt, which had shifted into view.

Nick shrugged. "Accident with a candle." He decided to leave out just whose candle it had been, because he was pretty sure Catherine would not approve.

"It looks like you're getting a bruise on your cheek," she said casually.

Nick shifted and was grateful to see they had arrived. "Oh look, we're here."

Catherine gave him a look, not fooled, and then shook her head ruefully. She decided not to grill him about his social life, at the moment anyway. They had enough on their hands with the new case. They entered the lab together, carefully holding the bags of evidence.

"You want to take the doll and I'll do fingerprints? I can pass the thread off on Warrick."

Catherine nodded. "Sounds like a plan."

"Nick!" One of the lab receptionists ran out in front of them, holding a package. "This came for you." She held it out and he took it curiously. "It arrived two days ago, actually, I had time off and when I came back it was still here…I'm so sorry, I hope it's nothing important."

He smiled at her. "I'm sure it's fine, Carrie, don't worry about it."

She smiled too, and headed back to her desk.

Catherine smiled wryly at him once she had gone. "Carrie, huh? First name basis?"

He laughed. "I like people, what can I say? It's nothing untoward, Catherine, I promise you. I'm kind of seeing someone right now, anyway."

"Only kind of?" Catherine asked. Her eyes strayed back to his t-shirt. "Candles?"

"Its hell having investigators for friends," he said good-naturedly, as they headed into the lab. He placed the evidence on one of the counters and turned to his own package.

"You're not going to tell me, are you?" she asked wryly. "I'll find out eventually, you know."

He laughed. "Okay, yes, I'm seeing someone. Or I was. She kind of threw me out this morning."

"Harsh," she laughed. "She sounds charming."

"You have no idea," Nick said slyly. He took off the vest and threw it over the chair. He quickly put his jacket on in its place to cover the burn hole, but not before Catherine caught sight of just how large it was.

Something clicked, and she closed her eyes and gave a long-suffering sigh. "Oh, Nick. Tell me you didn't--the pyromaniac?"

He smiled at her sheepishly. "She's cute."

"She's psychopathic," Catherine shot back.

Nick shrugged and opened his package. "It's over anyway. I think. We've kind of had a few break ups already so it's hard to tell." He looked inside the envelope and froze. "Ah, Catherine, you might want to have a look at this…"

She came up beside him and gasped. She grabbed the phone. "Grissom, we've got a problem."

The whole gang sat around the conference table, Grissom standing at the head, Nick in the corner, his thumb placed on his lip as he stared at the contents of the table.

"You don't have any idea who could have sent this to you, Nick?" Grissom asked.

Nick shook his head. "Nope."

Instead of one doll on the table, now there were two. The writing on the packages were a perfect match, and neither had a return address. Both contained the note 'burn.' They were exactly the same, except for the fact that while the victim's doll had a one carved on its chest, Nick's read seven.

"I do," Catherine said, shooting Nick a censuring glance. She didn't know why he hadn't mentioned it himself, but if this was a threat on his life she wasn't going to leave anything to chance. "Nick has been seeing Viva Charles, the pyromaniac." She nodded towards the burned dolls. "And whoever sent these notes likes to play with fire."

Nick shook his head. "No, she's harmless." At Catherine's incredulous look, he gave a half-hearted grin. "Nuts, but harmless. Besides, we…spent the day together and Dave put the time of death at about one this afternoon. She couldn't have done it."

Grissom watched the interchange. "What were you doing?"

"We were sleeping," Nick said, looking defiant. Sara snorted, and he glanced at her, mildly amused.

"You just worked a triple shift, didn't you?" Grissom asked. "I imagine you were pretty tired. Is there any way she could have left at some point? The two of you would be on very different schedules."

"Actually, she kind of…switched schedules for me. She's been sleeping during days for the last couple of weeks."

Catherine glanced at him surprised, growing more worried by the moment. "We still can't rule her out. She could have left and returned without your knowledge, the casino isn't very far from her home."

Nick took a deep breath. "It's possible, I suppose, but--"

"Warrick," Grissom started.

"I'm on it," he responded quickly. After shooting one quick concerned glance in Nick's direction, he headed out to see if he could place Viva at the scene.

"Nick," Grissom said. "I don't think I need to tell you that you're off the case." Technically, Grissom knew it might be better to take all of them off the case--including himself. They were all getting too close to it now that one of their own was at risk, but he wanted them to handle it if they could. Nick's life could be at stake.

Nick sighed. "No."

"Why don't you stick around the lab, anyway?" he suggested lightly. "And maybe stay away from Ms. Charles for a few days?"

Nick nodded, looking confused and mildly hurt, before leaving the room.

Sara let out a breath and looked at the two dolls after he had gone. "Why does Nick always attract the psychos?"

Catherine glanced at her, before her eyes settled back on the charred seven. "Maybe because he's the one that reaches out to them."

TBC…