TITLE: When She Became The Target
AUTHOR: RaeAnne
RATING: PG-13
SPOILERS: um, well it takes place in season one, after Megan left and before Yelina (I really can't stand that woman!) So yeah, all is fair game between those lines.
DISCLAIMER: Not mine, wish that hunk of a CSI Horatio was, but alas he is not :-( all belong to who ever they belong to (which is not me). Please don't sue, you wont get much I am afraid.
AUTHORS NOTE: Hi! This is my first CSI fanfic, I am so crazy about this show it isn't funny! I love the Calleigh/Horatio pairing. I know that is story is slightly reminiscent of 'Body Count' but I actually only saw that episode a couple days ago and this story was not based on that. Please excuse any incorrect references to CSI related tools or resources, still trying to get everything down. The plot is lacking, I am sorry, I was just trying to find a reason to write Horatio/Calleigh romance... lol as if anyone really need a reason. :-) I hope you all enjoy this story and leave lots of feedback! Thank you so much!
RaeAnne
When She Became The Target
Most nights at this time the Crime Scene Investigation Headquarters would be dark, but tonight light spills into the Miami night from a solitary window.
She knew she should be at home, she knew she was becoming all most too focused and that soon she would lose her ability to look for both the obvious and the unobvious, which she knew would not sit well with her boss. But still she into the midnight hour she worked.
The case was straight forward but yet that was what was bothering her, she felt like she was missing something, something important. She couldn't take it at face value, she knew. She poured over her reports, comparing them to her new work, everything still add up. "I guess no matter how you try, two plus two will always equal…four," she thought helplessly. A pent up, exasperated sigh escaped her lips as she closed her eyes willing her mind to think clearly.
"I thought I told you go home—three hours ago," a deep, low voice tickled her ears and caressed her soul. With her eyes still momentarily shut a picture of the man whom the voice belonged filled her mind, making her force down a smile.
"Hey Handsome," she slowly opened her eyes and turned to him. "If you had gone home, and staid home you wouldn't have known I was still here."
He pondered her words, she had tried to give them a teasing quality but they fell short. She saw that he was still in his suit, he hadn't even bothered to change. He looked her over carefully and saw that light blue circles had started to form under her eyes and that from the slump of her shoulders to the shifting of the weight from either foot it seemed her entire body screamed for rest.
"This is true," he started slowly, "but if there was anyone who came close to being as much a workaholic as I am it would be you." His words were low and gravely.
She tried to turn her attention back to her work but ignoring her boss who stood only a few feet from her, hands positioned on his hips was not something one could do easily… if at all.
"I want you go home now, I'm personally seeing you out. I need and a full and alert team tomorrow, so lets get you home Bullet Girl," he stated and his words held no laughter but he was gentle and somehow coaxed her out of her reverie and out of the lab.
"Good job guys, nice work, we got him!" Horatio declared words rumbling throatily a small smile pulling at the corners of his mouth. The CSI team watched as a detective cuffed and led out a very evil man. A man who was put away by the ballistics work of Calleigh Duquesne.
"Nice work, Cal," Speed nodded his approval as he clapped a hand on her shoulder. She only returned his nod and gave a weak smile. It was a long week, a long investigation.
Everything had been finished, every loose end tied, every report filed but something still didn't sit right with Calleigh. She watched Eric and Speed disappear to places unknown she remained there silently sharing the space with Horatio.
"We got him, go home, get some sleep," he said firmly before turning towards his office.
She hesitated, a groan welling up in her. She teetered on exhaustion but she knew she had to talk to him. So she headed toward the stairs to invade his sanctuary. She felt a pang of nerves.
She respected Horatio Caine more then she could put to words. His pursuit of justice, his compassion, his dedication, his fervent sense of duty and personal excellence was something she hoped to one day duplicate, she didn't just want to match his hours spent on a case she aspired to have that dedication. But the relationship they had was at a strange cross road. Nothing was like it had been in the pass weeks, the usual camaraderie lost. He was aloof, cold, and distant. She tried to joke with him, tried to keep it light and bring back the easy flow of conversation. He just seemed to almost block her out and she hated it. She hated she got lost in his eyes, and he just got lost; anywhere but where she was, that is where you would find Horatio.
Maybe somewhere in her heart there was something more to her teasing remarks that held slight innuendo… like that little "nothing but leather chaps" incident that had earned her not even a hint of a smile but instead an almost harsh reply. She felt so humiliated, so angry when he seemed to reprimand. She tried to explain it was a joke, he didn't smile even then, didn't do anything but make her feel like a little girl who had just greatly disappointed her father, but in this case she didn't disappoint her father, but someone whose respect meant the world to her, and she hated that.
She was fast running out of steps and his door loomed. With a deep breath she quickly but firmly rapped on his door. She was promptly met with a deep "Come in."
She straightened her shoulders and held her head high and opened the door.
"Hello, Calleigh," he said absently not looking up from his folder.
She opened her mouth to start but she turned her train of thought.
"How did you know that it was me?"
He didn't answer just pointed a lazy finger to the large window that looked out on the lab.
"Aww, I see," she said quietly.
"Have a seat Calleigh," he broke her rapid thoughts. She nodded sitting and he laid down his papers.
"I also, knew that something wasn't letting you rest. I knew that you would be coming," he said as a matter of fact.
He took in her every detail, the way she tilted her head the almost hurt expression in her eyes, the weariness and upset she wore like an unflattering dress. He felt a pang of guilt.
"You're right, this case doesn't seem finished. I don't know why but it doesn't feel right! It was too simple, but it was complicated in its simplicity! But I still think there is something more!" she spoke rapidly hands helping to express her point.
He nodded not arguing, "Okay, what's missing?" he leaned forward seeking the gaze that had fallen to the floor.
If she wasn't so stressed, so feeling like she had been stretched too thin, maybe if she hadn't felt like her entire friendship between her and Horatio was falling apart she wouldn't have felt like he was just putting up with his temperamental 'bullet girl'.
She brought her eyes to his and there was a spark of anger that Horatio barely caught. "Please don't patronize me! Tell me I'm wrong, tell me I'm being ridiculous, but please don't patronize me," she stated her voice even, cool and hard.
Horatio was undaunted "I wasn't patronizing you, I was asking you as my ballistics expert what was making you question." His words held no rebuke as she might have expected.
"I don't know! I wish I did. That's why I came to you, I thought you could help me figure out why I can't believe in what my own work tells me!" she leaned back in her chair running frustrated hands through her hair.
Horatio felt a tug in his chest and tried to push it away, "I can't figure it out for you, but what I can do is tell you that sometimes you can have a feeling in your gut that wont go away no matter how much you will it to. But Calleigh you have the answer in the evidence, the answer is always there, you all ready have the answer I can't give you."
"But can you at least tell me if you feel there is something more then what is in our file?"
"I again can only tell you that I trust you, your judgment, but what I think or feel will not take away your doubts. I can tell you that the man we put away is a very evil man, we have saved people by putting him in jail, and that is what we do."
"We put away the bad guy," she nodded standing.
"Exactly."
She left his office with a small amount of hope. She went back to the lab, and back to work.
The man they put in jail sat in his temporary holding cell awaiting his transfer to the maximum security prison where he would await his death sentence to be upheld. He pulled a book from under his bed and opened it to the middle, reveling newspaper clipping one from his own trial. There with golden hair and penetrating eyes was the woman who put him there. It is a thin line; a thin line between passionate obsession and consuming hatred, and on both sides of that line he frequently roamed. The woman he sometimes obsessed about with lust and unquenchable desire and often fell consumed in his visions of him letting her life be drained with his hands. He may have been caught this time, but he certainly wasn't finished, he had too much to do.
As time passed Calleigh's doubts lessened but never fully went away.
"Calleigh, can I see you for a minute?" a voice interrupted her work.
"Sure, H, be there is just… a second," she answered removing her safety glasses and went to meet him the hallway.
"What's up?" she asked cheerily.
His face was cold and strained, though it was only detectible if you looked in the right places, and Calleigh knew where to look. Her heart picked up pace as she read many things into his hesitation.
"JD Truman has escaped."
The words reverberated through her making her stomach turn. "When? How?" she asked her southern drawl strengthening as she spoke.
"About a hour ago, he somehow was able to get away from his escorts that were taking him to the prison."
She nodded letting the information sink In, she never tried to hide her disgust for this man, but what she did hide was the fact that for some reason this man got to her, his total lake of remorse or regret gave her a trace of fear that she normally didn't have, no matter the perp.
"Well it seems, they waited a little too long to him there," she cringed.
"Yes—it seems they did."
Calleigh walked to the little store down the street from her apartment trying not to think about Truman.
"Aww, it is my Calleigh come to visit!" the owner exclaimed as she entered, the door chiming her entrance.
"Hello! How are you Mr. Brown?" she asked with a bright smile on her face. Mr. Brown was in his late 70ies, a dear man who reminded Calleigh greatly of her grandfather.
"Better now that you've come to visit! How is everything with you?"
"Very good," she lied as she placed her items on the counter; a loaf of bread and a carton of milk.
Mr. Brown rung up her items then asked for something a little more then her total, "So how about a kiss for an old man huh?"
She lifted her eyebrows with a smile as she contemplated his request. "All right since you asked so nicely and since you are my favorite grocer." She giggled then leaned over the counter to place a quick light peck on his cheek.
"Ho, my girl you keep me young!" he laughed handing her the bag and she laughed waving to him as she exited.
Back in her apartment she pondered once again JD Truman. He was a man without a conscience, without a soul. He murdered an entire family because they had asked him to turn down his music that was blaring from his house next to theirs. Even afterward he held no remorse, no regret, nothing once so ever.
She fell into bed around eleven, her gun on her night stand as she drifted into a deep, but unsettled sleep.
Horatio looked at the fax that laid on his home office desk and could barely control his anger. In the dim light of his desk lamp he read the paper and felt his blood turn from ice cold to an inferno of rage.
"To Calleigh Duquesne,
You put me on death row, but before I resign myself to that fate,
I am going to have you. All of you and when I have satisfied myself I will
take your life just as you have planned to take mine."
Below were comments from the MDPD.
"This was found at the crash site, I thought you would appreciate having an advanced warning."
He was furious, enraged. "She knew something was wrong!" he cursed the air