A/N: This chapter's a bit shorter, but I like to write while the idea is still fresh in my head. This won't be as long as some of my other fics (not that I've posted any NY ones before!) and I already have the end mapped. I hope Lindsay isn't too OOC but I conferred with a friend, who has a child, and they assured me that rational people do irrational things when it comes down to their children. Also, I know nothing about Danny's parents (I probably erased any information I did know about them from my mind knowing me) so I hope they're ok. Thanks for reading. Again I have no beta (apart from the aforementioned friend, who I tested ideas on but she only read the odd sentences) so any mistakes are my own. Please take into consideration that I'm British, so I apologize if I got any Americanisms wrong or anything.
Disclaimer: Guess what? Still don't own anything or anyone in CSI. Apart from Katy. She's from my own imagination.
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It was scary being on the other side of a crime like this, Danny decided. Realizing, with some reluctance, that they were of no use lingering around the apartment, Danny had taken a silently sobbing Lindsay over to his parents' house. That felt weird too; they only ever went to his mom's to drop off Katy. The empty booster-seat in the back was a constant reminder that a big part – if not the biggest part – of them was missing. As they parked up outside the house, Danny clambered out of the car and walked towards the front door. He realized Lindsay was not with him, and turned to find her standing outside the car, staring at the back seat.
"Linds?" he said softly, placing a hand gently in the crook of her elbow, wrapping fingers delicately round so that the tips touched. She didn't move, frozen solid.
Danny had never seen Lindsay like this. They'd gone through some pretty deep things together - the trial in Montana, everything with him and Rikki, and he'd lost count of the times they'd almost lost each other on particularly risky days at work– but this was different. It was as if she wasn't even Lindsay anymore. And he understood. To some extent, he understood, he just wished he understood more. Being a CSI was a risky job, but that meant they were prepared for that risk. They knew they could die doing the job. It was something they had to accept. But their children, that was a different matter. No, don't think about that. Katy's not dead, she's fine. Someone's taking care of her. He sighed, trying to pull himself together, as much for Lindsay's sake as his own.
"I don't want to leave her," Lindsay whispered.
Before they'd left, Hawkes had given Lindsay some weak sedatives to calm her down. After the spot of blood on the curtain had been confirmed as being human, she'd started screaming and nobody could calm her down. It took something like this to turn a rational woman irrational, Danny understood that now. The sedatives were supposed to put her to sleep, but they didn't seem to have kicked in fully yet. But she definitely wasn't herself.
"She's not in there sweetie," Danny whispered, pulling her towards him and wrapping his arms around her. She stayed perfectly still, until he carefully took her inside.
Once in the house, Lindsay lay down on the sofa and was soon fast asleep, tears drying on her pale cheeks, glistening in the low lighting of the living room.
"She's not holding up too well huh?" Danny's mom asked, stroking Lindsay's hair absentmindedly.
"No… and I… I don't even know what I can do or say to make everything okay. Because everything isn't okay. Our daughter is out there somewhere and we're… we're useless. We can't find her. We don't even know where to begin and they won't let us help and--!"
"You know better than anyone else that your daughter's disappearance is in safe hands. The best hands. Stella, Mac… your colleagues. They'll find her," she whispered, squeezing her son's hand encouragingly.
"I know. I know. But… mom… what if they don't? What if… what if there's no Katy left to be found?" he looked up into his mom's eyes, tears clouding his glasses, "I keep closing my eyes, and I see her lying on the floor, limp. Dead. What if she's dead?"
"Do you think talk like that is going to help anybody? Least of all Lindsay," Mrs. Messer hissed, feeling Lindsay stir lightly under her touch.
"I'm scared," he whispered, and for the first time in 20-odd years, his eyes swam with the genuine fear of a child.
"I know."
-
Stella had tested and retested all the evidence. It was only day one – good, because the child hadn't been missing for 24 hours yet, but bad because they'd already exhausted every lead they had so far. Flack was looking into some people who might have a grudge against either Lindsay or Danny, but with the number of convictions each of them, or both of them, had made testimony on, he was looking at lists as long as his arm, if not longer. And the science was turning up empty. Apart from the fact that it was in fact from a piece of rope, the fibre was no use. It had no DNA trace on it, and was too small for fingerprints. The window was clean too, and apart from identifying the size shoe of the person who had stepped on the teddy – a size 12 – they were no closer to finding their kidnapper.
What also worried her was that there hadn't been any calls about ransom. If it was a kidnapper, there would have been by now. 13 hours had passed.
"Got anything?" Hawkes asked, entering the break room to find Stella with her head resting on the table, a mug of coffee steaming beside her head.
"Nope. You?"
"That kind of rope is sold in just about every camping and hardware store in New York, as well as every other state, and probably most other countries as well. In short, I have nothing."
Stella sighed, "Well, we must be missing something. We have tread scuffs on the wall outside the window, so that confirms our route of entry. The CCTV is conveniently broken… do you think we're looking for someone who knew this apartment block well? Well enough to know that the CCTV didn't work, that Danny and Lindsay kept Katy in that particular room, and…"
"I don't know Stell, I just don't know," Hawkes shook his head, rubbing at his eyes, "what I do know is that window had to be slightly open. There's no signs of our snatcher breaking it, and it can only be opened from inside. So someone must have left it slightly open,"
"How about we keep that piece of information to ourselves huh? Lindsay's already feeling bad enough about all of this,"
He nodded, "Yeah. I've never seen her like that. I don't think I've seen anyone like that,"
"With all that girl's been through, I'm thinking this is the final straw," Stella said, sadly.
Lindsay had been so strong up until now. But even a blind man could see how in love with Danny she was, and how much both of them adored their little girl.
Stella's cell rang, interrupting her thoughts, and she picked it up, "Bonasera."
"Stella, it's Adam. Danny left Lindsay at his parents' place… 10 minutes after he got back, the phone rang… I think it's our snatcher. We've got a trace."
Adam passed on the address, and Stella scribbled it down before hanging up and turning to Hawkes with a frown.
"We've got an address."
"Okay… why don't you look pleased?"
Stella sighed again, "it's a hotel payphone."
"Oh."
TBC.