All in a Day's Work

Shipping: FlackOC, possible DL & MS

Spoilers: Through the end of Season 2; later chapters may reference Season 3, but I'll be sure to let you know if they do.

Summary: When a case hits close to home, Flack and the team must rush to keep one of NYPD's own from being killed.

Disclaimer: I don't own CSI: NY or any of its characters. Nor do I own Law and Order: SVU. Please don't sue me, I don't have any money.

Saturday, October 7, 2006

Detective Elizabeth Armstrong scowled as she slammed the case file for Shirley Johnson down on her desk. Her partner, Jimmy Craig, looked up as she dropped into her chair.

"No luck?" He asked as he hung the phone he'd been talking on prior to her abrupt interruption.

"That sonofabitch's prints didn't match! Can you believe it? We've got an ex-con with a history of sexual assault that lives down the hall from our vic, and he's not the murderer! Arrgh!"

"I know, I just got off the phone with the law firm Ackerson was proofreading at, he was there from 8 pm to 5am, with nine people who can alibi him. He has worked as a proofreader at the firm Shirley Johnson worked at, but her work hours don't match up with those of the proofreaders. She was the day receptionist; the night receptionist came in a 6 pm and was in charge of the proofreaders, and according to her Shirley never had any interaction with them. At least you won't have to talk to him again. He really did a number on you."

"Do we know of anyone who's been into her apartment recently? Has she had any deliveries or repairs in the past couple of weeks?" Jimmy had gone back after Ackerson's released and had canvassed their vic's floor and the four floors above and below it with some uniforms. No one had seen or heard anything out of the ordinary.

He'd stopped in to see the super and had instead met the super's wife. She'd given him cookies and coffee while he waited for her husband who was doing some repair in the building's laundry room. The super's wife, Angela, had told Jimmy that they were in the process of adopting a child, since Jimmy had commented on the abundance of children's toys in the apartment. They wanted a little boy, and since the apartments were small, they'd had to sell some of their belongings to make room for all the children's things. When the super had arrived, Jimmy had asked him a few more questions about Shirley and then had headed back to the precinct. He hadn't learned anything of value to their case.

"The super said half of her floor had had plumbing issues and he'd done repair in everyone's apartments, but none of her neighbors really paid much attention to her comings and goings. We don't even have any suspects now that Ackerson is out. I guess I'll head over to her office; she might have a friend there since she calls the office frequently when she's not working. Maybe she was seeing someone at her work."

"I guess I'll take another look at the evidence; maybe we missed something the first time through. Call me if you get anything?" She asked as she grabbed her lab coat.

"Of course," Jimmy grabbed his gun and his badge and headed out the door.

Lizzy decided to sort through the evidence that she hadn't processed. Some of the other CSIs had gone through the evidence, but she hadn't looked at all of it yet. According to the lab report, the DNA from the epithelials on the necklace Lizzy had found matched the DNA in the semen on Shirley Johnson's sheets and the semen from her rape kit; the sample didn't match anything in CODIS, so that was a dead end for now. The lab techs had analyzed the semen on the sheets and found that some of it was degraded, indicating it had been there a while, while other samples were newer. So Shirley Johnson had been sleeping with someone regularly and they had killed her. If only we knew who she was seeing. What woman leaves no signs of a boyfriend or lover in her apartment? No photos, no mementos, not even a postcard. It must have been something she wanted kept secret.

The fingerprints on the necklace had matched the fingerprints scattered throughout the apartment, including some partials that had been imprinted on the tape on the victim's package. Maybe the killer sent her something by mistake and went to retrieve it. Maybe when he didn't find it he got mad and killed her. But we have no idea who he is. The package, with it's wrapping intact, had been carefully opened by the lab techs to reveal nothing but assorted books.

Lizzy scowled as she glanced at all the bags of evidence lying across the table. There didn't seem to be anything that could help point them to their killer. Lost in thought, she pulled out her memo book to see if she written anything down that could help trigger a revelation. It was just before she flipped the page that she saw her notation about the foreign substance on the sheets and the flakes on the dresser. Setting her memo book aside, she searched through the bags until she found the evidence swab from the bed. She prepped the swab and ran it through the mass spectrometer. While she was waiting she looked through the lab reports and found the printout for the flakes, which one of the lab techs must have finished. Fish food? Why would our vic have fish food? There were no fish in her apartment—but there was that water stain on her dresser, which could have been from a fish bowl. But then where did the fish go?

As Lizzy was pondering the disappearance of the fish, her phone buzzed in her pocket. She pulled it out and flipped it open, "Armstong."

"Hey, I talked to the people at her office. One of the secretaries said our vic had been talking at work about some guy she was seeing. Apparently, the guy was married so Shirley had to keep it hush-hush. No one here knows his name, but the secretary told me that he'd given Shirley some fancy pet fish. Apparently the guy was a collector."

"That matches up with some evidence I've found, but there's no fish in the apartment. Maybe it died? If it was rare or expensive, it could have caused the boyfriend to kill her."

"Over a fish? C'mon, Lizzy, you don't really believe that do you?"

"Some tropical fish cost thousands of dollars; you never know. Maybe he saw it as a sign she didn't love him if she let it die. Ask the secretary if she knows what happened to the fish, maybe our vic told her if it died."

"Alright, I'll see what she says," Lizzy heard the mass spectrometer shut off.

"Hey, Jimmy I've got to go. My results just came in."

"I'll talk to you soon." Lizzy flipped her phone shut and walked over to examine her results. According to the chemical analysis, had traces of copper sulfate and sulfuric acid, frequently used in preparation of copper. Copper was used in piping and Jimmy had said the super had been doing repair on the piping on their vic's floor. The super was a married man; the secretary had said Shirley's boyfriend was married. But the super and his wife were getting ready to adopt, that didn't seem likely if he was having an affair.

Frustrated, Lizzy ran a hand through her hair as she looked over everything she had. Okay, what we know so far. One, the vic was dating her murderer. Two, he was married. Three, he left a Kiss Me, I'm Irish necklace behind. Four, he gave her a fish. Five, he sent her a package of books. Lizzy felt her phone go off again, the Caller Id flashed Jimmy. "Armstrong," she answered.

"Hey, I got something. The secretary said the fish was still alive as far as she knew."

"Um, okay, so that wipes out the revenge for the dead fish theory, but that doesn't get us anywhere."

"That doesn't, but the secretary said that Shirley had gone with the boyfriend to pick out the fish. She gave a business card from the fish store to her boss, because he'd wanted to get a tropical fish for his son. The boss still had the business card, Al's Exotic Fish and Aquatic Supply; it's off Broadway. I'm going to head down there and see if the guy recognizes a picture of Shirley. If he does, he might remember who she came in with. The secretary also said, from the way Shirley talked, the boyfriend lived in the same building as her."

"Excellent! I guess I'll try questioning the rest of the tenants to see if I can find her boyfriend."

"I'll call you when I finish talking to the fish guy."

"'K, I'll talk to you later." Lizzy grabbed her coat and the list of tenants of off Jimmy's desk and headed out.

Two hours later

Lizzy had talked to everyone else in the building, and no one had known Shirley. Well, if they had, they'd done a tremendous job of acting as if they didn't. Jimmy had called her earlier to tell her the owner had been at home, but was going to come in and help Jimmy look through the store's customer records to find Shirley's purchase. Lizzy figured she might as well head back to the precinct to wait for Jimmy, since she'd struck out here. She was just getting to the front doors when a woman, over laden with grocery bags, came in. Seeing one of the bags on the verge of falling, Lizzy offered the woman a hand.

"Hi, I'm Detective Armstrong. Do you live here?" Lizzy asked as she set the groceries on the woman's kitchen counter.

"Hello, Detective. I'm Angela O'Connelly, the superintendent's wife. I think I spoke with your partner yesterday. Have you had any luck finding Shirley's killer?"

"Unfortunately, no. Did you know her well?"

"I'd met her a few times. She was a very nice girl. Sometimes she'd come down and visit with me while Shawn was working. It's a shame, she was very young."

"Yes she was. Do you know of anyone in the building she might have been seeing? We believe she was dating someone in the building based on something she'd said to a friend."

"No, I hadn't heard anything about Shirley and one of our tenants, but then again, I've been rather busy lately."

"Yes, my partner tells me you're getting ready to adopt, congratulations."

"Thank you, but it's certainly going to be an adjustment. We've had to get rid of a lot of things to make room for the child and to make the apartment safer for a child."

"Oh, did you have a bunch of power tools lying around?" Lizzy asked with a smile.

"Oh, no, nothing like that!" Angela said, laughing. "We had to get rid of some of the chemicals Shawn uses for maintaining the building and we had to sell our fish."

"Fish?" Lizzy said, no longer laughing.

"Yes, we had a huge aquarium—my husband collects you see—but the tank is a drowning hazard for small children. It near broke my husbands heart to sell those fish. In fact, he missed them so much, he went and got a single fish to keep around the house. It's in a small bowl, so it won't be dangerous for a small child."

My god, it's the super. He had fish, he's married, he handled the copper piping, he brought the package to her apartment, and with a name like Shawn O'Connelly, that necklace it likely his. He must have taken the fish that was in her apartment. It's been there for us to see the whole time. But what was his motive? Was he simply afraid that Shirley would blab to his wife? Lizzy's thoughts were broken by Mrs. O'Connelly.

"Are you alright? You seemed lost for a moment there," she asked kindly.

"I was wondering when your husband might be back, because I had a few questions to ask him about the package he delivered to Shirley's when he found her body."

"Package? Why would Shawn be delivering a package? All mail is delivered to the tenants doors by the postman. I guess she must not have been home so the postman dropped it here. That's odd," she seemed to be puzzled, but everything was getting clearer by the minute to Lizzy. He wrapped the books as an excuse to go up to her apartment so he could call it in!"Oh, but Shawn should be home around five. He had some paperwork to drop off for the adoption and he had some supplies to get. Would you like me to tell him to call you?"

"Yes, that would be nice. Whenever he gets the chance, no rush," Lizzy said, handing Mrs. O'Connelly her card. She didn't want the super to suspect they were on to him, and try to run. She said goodbye to Mrs. O'Connelly and rushed out to her car. As soon as she was in she called Jimmy.

"I know who it is."

"What? Who?"

"The super, he was having an affair with Shirley. All the evidence points to him; what I can't figure out is what his motive was."

"That part I have figured out. Doc Harrison called, after doing an autopsy on Shirley Johnson, they found out she's three months pregnant. If the super and his wife were going to adopt, he wouldn't want Shirley to suddenly announce that she was having his love child."

"The wife said her husband would be home around five. I'm pretty sure he thinks he's gotten away with it, so if you can get here in twenty minutes with some backup, we can haul his ass in to jail."

"I'll be there."

Three hours later

They had managed to haul Shawn O'Connelly in without much ceremony, though Lizzy had felt bad for his wife. Once Lizzy and Jimmy had presented him with all the evidence against him, he'd cracked and admitted to murdering her to try and prevent his wife from finding out he'd gotten Shirley pregnant. He'd been booked and locked up and it was time to go home.

"You got any big plans for the night?" Jimmy asked as he finished up his paperwork.

"Yeah, I'm supposed to meet a couple of the girls out at a club. Do a little dancing, have a few beers, relax. I'm off tomorrow so I don't have to make it an early night. What about you?"

"Bev found a babysitter, so we're going to have a nice quiet evening to ourselves. It'll be nice for a change." Lizzy laughed as she gathered her things to leave.

"You two have a fun time, then." She gave Jimmy a friendly kiss on the cheek, waved goodbye to the Captain, who was still in his office, and headed home.

What she didn't know is that she wouldn't be making it to that club tonight. She wouldn't be doing anything she'd planned, because two hours after she got off of work, she'd be attacked, raped, and left for dead.

A/N: Okay, so there's chapter three. Chapter four is going to be back in the present, as Flack and the rest of the team try to figure out what happened to Lizzy. Hope you enjoyed it. Please review, all reviews are appreciated, even the mean ones. ;)