AN - Hello! Thank you for the reviews! I was surprised to get that many responses. Well, I got the next chapter for you. Forgive me for the wait - I've been a little stressed lately. I hope you like this one, but it's not quite the sprint like first chapter - you'll have to hold on a little longer if you want to know what happened - I'm evil, yes, I know that. Let me know what you think. /K.
24 hours earlier
"First round's on me," LaSalle drawled and caught the jacket off the back of his chair.
"I hope you brought your wallet, cause I'm gonna need a lot of first rounds after today," Percy sighed at put the finishing touches on her report with loud taps.
"What about you, Special Agent Tammy Gregorio, you in?" Chris asked, strolling over to Brody's desk where the agent was tapping away furiously on the keyboard. She answered without looking up and she kept tapping away.
"No, sorry, not tonight, I got plans already," she said as she stood and grabbed her bag.
"Suit yourself, girl," Percy said as she walked over to stand next to Chris and corrected the strap on her shoulder bag. "We're still going, though, right?" she asked her partner with a raised eyebrow.
"We're all going somewhere else, Sonja," Pride said ruefully when he walked out of the kitchen. He headed straight for the filing cabinet to retrieve his gun.
"Aah, man, we've just finished a case," Percy sighed and walked back to her desk to grab her work backpack.
"Come on, King, we need to rest between cases," Chris said when Pride holstered his weapon.
"A lieutenant's kid was taken from their home," Pride threw back at him with a look, tense enough to silence the team.
"Kidnapping?" Percy asked as the team walked up to the front door of the little house. "At home, at night?" she continued, sounding a little bit surprised by the boldness.
"Doesn't seem right, does it?" Gregorio asked from the back.
"Technically, this could be a family matter, but we don't take that chance until it's proven," Pride said.
"Does the lieutenant have any intel or access someone would want to get their hands on?" Chris asked before he entered the front door as the first one. Percy followed soon after and took a look around the entry. They had arrived in two cars, and had to leave them at the end of the street because of the massive presence of squad cars blocking every kind of access to the house.
"We'll have to ask her," Pride answered as he stepped inside with Gregorio. The front lawn was flashing red and blue and police officers milled around the place, most of them wearing gloves, collecting samples of every kind. "Gregorio and I will talk with the lieutenant and the husband.
"We'll go find some witnesses, then," Chris offered and both he and Percy caught a look of a red faced woman sitting by a breakfast bar and a man next to her, looking equally as terrified, before heading out.
"I can't even begin to imagine what they are going through," Gregorio whispered as they walked into the kitchen and the two of them looked up with hope in their eyes. It quickly faded away, when they realized it wasn't anything new.
"I'm Special Agent Pride with NCIS and this is Special Agent Gregorio, FBI," Pride introduced and gave them a few seconds to look at his ID.
"I'm Alex Dale and this is my wife, Janet," the man said and the woman smiled bravely. "What's NCIS?" the man asked, confused as normal.
"Naval Criminal Investigative Service," the fragile woman said before Pride could respond. He noticed she sat a little straighter when she said it, her training kicking in. It was hard to imagine she was a lieutenant five days a week, when you looked at her now.
"And the FBI? I only thought they were involved when the state borders were crossed. You don't think our daugther has been taken to another state?" Alex asked, getting more alarmed by every word.
"Take it easy Mr. Dale. Don't jump to any conclusions, it's still early," Pride tried, sounding calm and comforting.
"Mrs. Dale, do you have a recent photo of…" Gregorio let the sentence hang in the air, fishing for the name of the girl.
"Masey," Janet said, sniffled and slid of the chair. She walked to the fridge and retrieved a picture of a smiling girl, with white hair and endlessly deep blue eyes. She studied the face for a moment, like she was trying to hold on to memories. She turned around and handed it the photo to Gregorio. "This was taken four months ago. Her hair is a little bit longer now," the mother said, holding back another wave of crying and sobbing. Gregorio couldn't help the tiny smile that was forming on the corner of her mouth as she looked at the girl in the photo.
"She's beautiful," Gregorio said and showed the picture to Pride who nodded. Then she eyed the two parents and then looked back at the picture. She could see a bit of the mother's nose and mouth, but other than that, the girl didn't look like the two people in front of them. Janet had auburn hair and brown eyes and Alex had grayish eyes and almost black hair.
"She takes after her biological father," Alex commented when he noticed Gregorio study their faces. Pride looked at him for a moment and then at Janet, for an explanation.
"Her father left before she was born and I met Alex shortly after. We married and he adopted her before her first birthday. Alex is her dad in every single way," she clarified and Pride nodded.
"We're going to need everything on her biological father," the older agent said and Alex went into panic again.
"You don't think he's the one who took her? I mean, he hasn't even seen Masey, ever. We've never heard from him, either," the man started to breathe faster and Janet had to put a calming hand on his arm. He took a couple of deep breaths to calm down.
"Matt Wainwright… last time I saw him was a decade ago. He lived in the French Quarter, then," she supplied the two agents with the address and Gregorio wrote it down in her notebook. Pride gave Gregorio a look and she nodded curtly, before stepping away to make a call. The faster they could get a location on the man, the better.
"Patton, I need you to run a name, asap," she said even before the man had a chance to greet her.
"Go, I'm ready," he replied, his voice serious as he could sense the urgency in her tone.
"Matt Wainwright, he lived in the French Quarter ten years ago," the agent said and heard the tapping immediately.
"Got it. Driver's license from Louisiana, registered owner of a cottage just out of town. I'll text you address and directions. No vehicles in his names, oh… he's got a criminal record, though. Armed carjacking and a smash and grab, six years ago," Patton reeled off.
"Thanks," was her only response before she ended the call. Pride came over to the corner she had found. "Our guy has a record of armed carjacking and smash and grab," she said and glanced at her phone when it beeped. "He's got an address outside the city. We can grab LaSalle and Percy to pick him up, if you want?" she suggested and Pride nodded.
"You go, I'll stay here for a while. Nine out of ten kidnappings are committed by a relative, so it is possible, that he's our guy. If there's a ransom demand, I want to hear it first hand," the older agent said quietly.
"All right. You got anything else out of them?" Gregorio asked.
"She doesn't work with any sensitive intelligence or anything that could provide a motive. The husband is a banker from a high class family," he replied.
"Wait, you think, this could be set up for his money? They don't live like wealthy people," she said in a hushed voice and looked around the house. If she stretched her income, she could afford it, too.
"It's is a possibility, but nothing is sure yet. Call me, when you get him," he said and turned back to continue the questioning. Gregorio headed out and quickly caught a glimpse of the two agents she was looking for.
"Let's go," she called across the front garden and the two agents apologized to the man they were talking with before they hurried over to meet her. She gave them a quick rundown and soon after, they were heading south in two cars. It didn't take them long to cover the distance, with the flashing lights clearing the way. They came to a halt at the driveway of the small property and exited the cars.
"I'll go around the back," Chris announced and jumped the dog fence as graceful as a ballet dancer. He ran fast, but low his weapon already out and prepared. Gregorio and Percy ascended the steps to the veranda and positioned themselves on both sides of the front door. The house was dark and silent, but they still took every kind of precautions.
"It looks too empty," Sonja noted before Gregorio knocked on the door, so hard, that even Chris would be able to hear it. She only glanced at Sonja, before raising her voice. Both of them had their weapons and flashlight at the ready.
"Matt Wainwright, federal agents, open up!" Nothing happened and Sonja tried the handle. She pushed the door open, and the two of them hurried inside, clearing the room effectively. Gregorio went into the kitchen while Sonja turned left into what should be a living room. Finding it empty, she continued to the bedroom and wrinkled her nose when a faint smell surrounded her. The buzzing of flies attracted her attention to the half open door to the bathroom. She pushed it wide open with the toe of her boot and grimaced by the sight. The flashlight exposed the dead and definitely decaying body of a young man.
"Clear!" she heard from the other end of the house and Sonja stepped back a few paces.
"In here! We got a body!" she called out and holstered her weapon before pulling on a pair of gloves. When trying the light switch, nothing happened. She waved at the air, trying to get the flies away as she squatted down and checked the dead man for a wallet or anything that might reveal his identity. Chris and Gregorio came in and both of them scowled at the smell and sight.
"Power's out. No sign of a little girl being kept here," Gregorio said. "Not even a scrap of edible food in the kitchen," she said. The dead man was on the floor in the confined bathroom. He was dressed in long shorts, with pockets covering every inch of the fabric, and a dull, red t-shirt, that had been washed so many times it was almost worn out. Sonja pulled out a driver's license from a pocket on the side of the left knee.
"Well, say hello to Ian Shelton," Sonja said as she compared the photo of the driver's license to the dead man's face. "He's twenty-four and has an address just down the road from here," she continued and handed the little card to Chris who had knelt down on the other side of the body.
"You think he has a connection to Wainwright? Or the girl?" he asked and pointed his flashlight at the faint bruising around the body's neck. "Looks like, he was strangled. We should get Loretta out here," Chris mentioned and rose to his feet. He shone his flashlight at the cracked mirror in the medicine cabinet above the sink. His multiple reflections stared back at him. It looked like a spider web and a few trickles of blood had seeped into the cracks. He opened the cabinet and looked at a variety of small pill bottles. Sonja whistled, impressed by the dozen orange containers with white caps.
"That's something," Sonja said as Chris took out a few and read the labels.
"They have Matt Wainwright's name on them. Seroquel, Abilify, Zyprexa, Compazine, what are these?" he asked, confused.
"They are all treatments for Schizophrenia," Gregorio said, looking at her phone, and dialed a number. "I'll call Pride and give him an update," she said.
"But these are almost full," Sonja said and read a few more of the labels. "They are all prescribed by the same doctor. Some Dr. E. Mackey," she said.
"He must be off his meds," Chris said and stepped out of the bathroom. He walked to the closet and opened the door. He reached up to the top shelf and pulled out a cigar box from the otherwise empty closet. "Take a look at this," he said when he opened the box. He took out a stack of old photos. "This is the girl, Masey," he said. The photo was taken at a distance, but clear. It had a horizontal crease and worn edges, it had possibly been carried around in a pocket for a while.
"Now we know for sure, that he knew about his daughter," Gregorio said, glancing over Percy's shoulder. "Pride's on his way with Loretta and Sebastian," she said.
AN - Hello, again! Leave a review - I love them! Let me know, if you find any mistakes, spelling, grammar, context. /K.