Chapter 1
Calleigh woke up with a headache. She felt confused. She wasn't at home or even at a place she knew. Everything around seemed very tidy and clean. It took her a few minutes to realize that there was somebody with her in the bed. The next thing she realized was that she was completely naked. The man next to her was naked, too. She could feel his bare skin on her back. He held her tight. Calleigh couldn't remember what had happened. She just wanted to go home. Carefully she pulled his arms off her and sneaked out of the bed. All her clothes were carefully folded up on the chair. Calleigh was ready to leave when she looked to the bed for a first time. She needed to know whom she was with. Her eyes opened wide from the surprise.
8 weeks later
God, how was this possible? This was the fifth victim for the last two and a half months. All the trace led them nowhere. All the vics were single women between 30 and 40, blonde hair and light eyes. But aside from the physic similarities there was nothing to relate them. The autopsy discovered that the cause of death was strangulation. The victims also had sexual contacts shortly before the time of death but there was no semen. The tox found traces of a face-type ecstasy in the women's blood.
Horatio, Ryan and Eric felt like in the cold end. They had nothing. The only thing that seemed to remain was to wait for the next victim.
"We can't give up." Ryan said when they were checking all the evidence again. "We must be missing something."
Then he suddenly shut up. Jake Berkeley was just coming in.
"Calleigh's luckiest day." Eric joked. "Two ex-lovers to handle at the same time. I don't want to be on her place."
Calleigh was working on a case of bank robbery with Peter Elliott. Ryan thought too that this would be awkward but she was a grown woman and she could handle it herself.
A few minutes later they saw her walking between the two men. She was obviously flirting with them. With both of them.
"It seems that Calleigh is handling it very well." Ryan said.
"But that's not our business." Horatio showed up, as Ryan thought, from nowhere. "We have to find our killer and stop him. Anything new?"
Through the glass Ryan saw how Calleigh suddenly rushed to the lady's bathroom.
"Nothing by now." Eric sighed.
Elliot and Berkeley walked towards them.
"How's it going here, guys?" asked Jake. "What do you have?"
They looked at the photos on the table.
"Oh, these are the victims of the serial killer, aren't they?" Peter said.
Natalia walked out of the lady's bathroom.
"What do you want?" asked Ryan a little roughly.
Before somebody could answer Natalia walked in.
"Hey, does somebody know what's up with Calleigh?" she asked.
"What do you mean?" Ryan asked worriedly. "What's wrong with Calleigh?"
"She is throwing up in the bathroom. It looks like she is sick." Natalia explained.
"Mr. Wolfe, you seem very worried about Calleigh's health." Peter Elliott said.
"Oh, you don't know?" Jake asked ironically. "He is in love with her. And he is very disappointed that she won't even look at him."
"Mr. Berkeley, I think that Mr. Wolfe feelings are beyond your competency." Horatio interrupted him.
Ryan was ready to kill Jake but Horatio's words stopped him. If only Jake knew…
"So what do you have?" Peter Elliott tried to change the subject.
"Five women, blonde, blue or green eyes, strangled, no signs of struggle, sexual activity but no semen, traces of a face-type ecstasy in their blood. Probably the bodies had been washed before to be dumped." Eric answered.
"A face-type ecstasy?" Jake repeated.
"What do you know about it?" asked Horatio.
"A drug, not very similar with the "normal" ecstasy, has no color or smell, tastes a little salty. It increases sexual tension and causes loss of memory. The rapists' drug. They just put it in the woman's drink and do whatever they want to. Usually the victims don't even know that they were raped." Jake said. "Actually the drug makes them seduce the abductor. In the end it leads to a totally senseless state. The victim doesn't understand where she is or what happens with her."
"Thank you for the full information, Mr. Berkeley."
"For nothing." Jake smiled ironically and left the room.
Peter Elliott followed him. At the same time Ryan seemed very intrigued from something.
"This doesn't fit?" he murmured. "Is that possible?"
"Mr. Wolfe, would you mind sharing with us what you found?" Horatio interrupted him.
"This doesn't fit! Look! The first murder was ten weeks ago, the next one was four weeks later and since then we had one murder every two weeks." Nobody seemed to understand. "Why is the pause between the first two vics four not two weeks?"
"Maybe it's escalating?" Natalia supposed.
"No, because since then the interval hasn't changed." Ryan shook his head.
"What are you aiming at, Mr. Wolfe?" Horatio asked.
"Maybe there was another victim who we don't know about."
"No, he dumped the bodies in public areas." Eric disagreed. "If there was another dead body we would have found it by now."
"That's the point." Ryan nodded again. "Maybe there is no body because the victim is not dead."
"You mean that she survived?" Eric asked.
"Maybe…" Ryan bit his lip. "Horatio, could I talk to you for a minute?"
Horatio and Ryan walked to his office.
"So what's up, Mr. Wolfe?" Horatio asked.
"It… It's about Calleigh."
"And what about her?"
"She perfectly fits the victim's profile."
"Calleigh knows how to take care of herself."
"I… I am not so sure." Ryan didn't know how to start. "Eight weeks ago I was in a club with some friends of mine. We got a little drunk…"
"And what happened then?"
"I… I saw Calleigh." Ryan swallowed. "She was with one man. I offered to give her a ride and she accepted. She seemed a little strange. She flirted with me and I just couldn't resist it. We… we did some things. The next morning I woke up alone. I tried to speak with her later but she blamed me taking advantage of her drunk condition. She told me that she hated me and doesn't want to have anything to do with me."
Horatio could see the tears in the younger man's eyes.
"Then I was thinking that she was really drunk but..."
"But?"
"Horatio, I am pretty sure that actually Calleigh doesn't remember anything from that night." Ryan took a deep breath. "She wasn't that drunk, believe me. I think that she could have been drugged. This happened eight weeks ago. Exactly the time for a second vic."
"Mr. Wolfe, what makes you so sure that Calleigh doesn't remember that night?"
"Because we got married that night. If she did remember it she would at least try to annulate the marriage."
A/N: This is my first CaRWash fic. Please tell me what you think! Should I continue?
Special thanks to EmmaBerlin for being my beta!