When Sam walked in no one looked at him twice, they all gave him a curt hello and then hurried to get out of his way. He found his desk, well Lassiter's desk, quickly. It was just as neat as his house had been. He had barely sat down when a nervous looking policeman stood in front of him holding a coffee.
"Here's your coffee Detective Lassiter." he stammered setting the cup down on the desk.
"What? Oh thanks," Sam said scanning the man's uniform for a name. "McNab." he added finding it printed on the pocket. McNab looked startled.
"Oh, ummm you're welcome" he said and then turned quickly and left. Sam sipped the coffee and pulled a face. There had to be four sugars in it. He set it off to the side and started looking at the papers on the desk and in the drawers. One of the large drawers was locked, but a key from Lassiter's key ring opened it. There was a small black book with names and addresses in it, another gun in a case and in the bottom of the drawer he found a file with divorce papers in it.
"That makes sense," Sam muttered to himself thinking back to the lack of pictures at the apartment.
"What makes sense?" a female voice asked. Sam jumped, slamming the drawer shut. He looked up to find a slim, blonde woman in a khaki suit looking at him. Her head was tilted to the side. Without waiting for him to answer she kept talking. "I went over the report with the chief," Sam then recognized the voice from the phone earlier this must be O'Hara. "and she says everything looks good. She also was worried that you didn't show up this morning. Is everything okay Carlton?" O'Hara leaned on his desk.
"Yeah, everything's fine." Sam said.
"I'll say," Al's voice said joining the conversation with Sam the only one privy to his thoughts. "look at her Sam, she's a beautiful girl." Sam rubbing his head as Al started objectifying O'Hara. "Ziggy says she's Juliet O'Hara, Lassiter's partner at the station."
"Well, okay…" Juliet said trailing off. "The chief wants us to go to the Miller house with Shawn after lunch. She wants his opinion on the robbery."
"Okay, fine." Sam said waving her off and pretending to immerse himself in a file. He figured the Shawn she mentioned was the same one Lassiter had mentioned to Al. He kept whispering to Al to hurry up and figure out what he needed to fix before he could leap again all the while pretending to be working. Al promised he would work as quickly as possible, but he had to leave and check on something with Ziggy. Sam found out a lot about Lassiter while he waited for Al, obviously he was a neat freak, but no one came to say a word to him the entire time. When people walked past his desk they gave it a wide berth and only one or two ventured to say hello. Sam stopped paying attention to the time and only realized how long it had been when his stomach started growling. He glanced up and saw a man sitting at O'Hara's desk staring at him. As soon as Sam met the other man's eyes the man started smiling broadly. Sam groaned inwardly as he headed for Lassiter's desk.
"What's up Lassifrass?" he said plopping himself down on top of all the paperwork on the desk.
"Not much" Sam mumbled. The man's eyes widened in surprise and he turned his head to look at Sam.
"Someone got up on the right side of the bed for once today" he said picking up the name plate sitting on Lassiter's desk. "Usually you'd be all 'What the Hell Spencer' or if you were really mad it'd be 'Get the hell off my desk before I shoot you in the kneecaps'" Sam quickly put two and two together and decided this must be Shawn Spencer and Lassiter didn't seem to like him very much.
"That's what I meant." Sam said trying to be gruff and irritated. "Get the hell off my desk. Don't you have to check out that robbery before this afternoon?" Spencer didn't seem to buy his gruffness, but let it drop.
"Lassie you of all people should know that I don't have to go to the scene of the crime. I divine what I need to know spiritually." Sam snorted in laughter. He'd never held psychics or whatever they called themselves in much regard. Apparently Lassiter didn't either because Shawn started going on about how Lassiter shouldn't doubt him, he would find out who really did it.
"Shawn do you really have a death wish today?" Sam interrupted him after he was on reason number five.
"That's the other thing, since when do you call me Shawn?" Shawn asked his eyes still searching Sam for answers.
"I just had a bad start to my day." Sam said getting up and heading the bathroom.
He got into the bathroom and after checking the stalls he started asking for Al. "Al where are you, you worthless hologram?"
"Worthless?" Al's voice sounded hurt. Sam turned to see Al wearing a black suit, with green neon tie and matching pocket square.
"New clothes?" Sam asked him eyeing the lurid garb.
"Yeah," Al said his voice changing to excitement. "Tina helped me pick them out."
"Have you found out anything more about why I'm here?" Sam asked trying to keep Al's mind on the problem at hand instead of his pretty girl friend.
"Well, we did some checking up on Shawn Spencer since Lassiter keeps talking about him. Almost every case that Lassiter has investigated starting three years ago Spencer has helped with. Spencer appears to be employed by the department as a psychic. Lassiter keeps talking about how he isn't and that one day he'll prove it. He also keeps asking for a gun." Sam rubbed a hand over his face.
"Al this could be tricky."
"Hang on that's not it, Ziggy says there's a 40% chance you're here to stop Spencer and his fried Burton Guster from being killed on Tuesday night."
"Al today is Monday. I've got to hang around for another day!"
"Well there's also the possibility that you're here to save Lassiter's marriage on Tuesday night and the weird thing is the chances of that are around 55%."
"Al, when have I ever leapt to save a marriage instead of stop a murder?" Sam said a little exasperated with the situation he was in. The door to the bathroom opened and Shawn walked in.
"Everything okay in here Lassie?" he asked looking around.
"Yes everything is fine." Sam managed to snap at Shawn. The frustration he was feeling about this leap was fueling Lassiter's dislike for the psychic.
"Cool, cool well I was just coming to see who you were being so buddy buddy with, but it appears that you were just talking to yourself."
"Don't you have a job to do Spencer? Sam said pushing past him and out the door. He headed for Lassiter's desk and grabbed the keys to Lassiter's car. He left to get something to eat. There was cash in Lassiter's wallet so Sam wouldn't have to worry about dealing with credit cards. He had made it out to Lassiter's car and had the key in the door to unlock it when O'Hara and Spencer rushed up behind him.
"We thought we'd get some lunch with you," O'Hara said. "and then head out to the robbery scene after that."
"Gus is meeting us at Del Sol." Shawn added. Sam nodded briefly.
"Where are we eating?" Sam asked as he fastened his seat belt and put the car in gear. Juliet gave him ridiculously complicated directions to a Mexican restaurant called El Gatos del Sol. Her directions ended in the phrase 'turn at the bright green rooster that used to be yellow when that place was a Chuckie's Chicken'. There were a few cars in the parking lot of the restaurant and Sam parked next to a small blue Toyota Echo. As the trio got out of the car Shawn greeted the man driving the Echo and Sam decided he must be Gus. They got a table and ordered their food. Sam was busy looking at the menu to see the raised eyebrows of his lunch companions when he ordered the Burrito con Queso with out the queso on top. Sam excused himself from the table and headed for the bathroom. He needed to find out if Ziggy was glitching or if he really was here for Lassiter's marriage and not Shawn's life.
