Courtney and Sara were barely speaking by the time Sara was getting ready for work again that evening.
"You know, you should do something with your hair," Courtney muttered from the sofa where she had been sat sulking for at least an hour. "You could look real pretty if you tried."
"Courtney, I'm going to work," Sara sharply reminded her, already losing the nonchalance tone she had hoped would sustain.
"I know that," she replied, standing up and walking to behind where Sara was stood brushing her hair in front of a small mirror. "I just think that you could…maybe try a new style?" she piled a section of Sara's soft brown hair on top of her head to demonstrate. "What d'ya think?"
"I think," Sara snapped, quickly brushing her hair back down "that the way I choose to do my hair is nothing to do with you."
Courtney held her hands up in mock-surrender "Okay, okay, it was just a suggestion."
"Well I'd appreciate it if you'd let me get ready for work." Sara turned, picked up her jacket and rummaged in the pocket for her car keys.
"You sure you couldn't use the help?" Courtney, now styling her own hair facing the mirror, asked casually.
"You mean hair tips or at work?"
The blonde turned to smile at her "I'd be happy to give both."
"Well, uh, we're not really supposed to bring friends to work."
"Hmm," Courtney replied as she dabbed a make-up sponge across her cheek "but I wouldn't really be there as your friend would I? I'm a perfectly qualified CSI level three." She added proudly.
Sara couldn't really think of a reason to not allow Courtney to come with her. She knew the rest of the team probably wouldn't like it but, in honestly, she'd rather have everyone else mad at her than have Courtney mad at her.
Giving a defeated sigh, she agreed to have Courtney come along.
Wearing her visitor sticker as though it was a gold medal, Courtney followed Sara into the break room where Nick, Warrick and Greg were sat. Catherine was already on a case apparently. Sara had being hoping for the duration of their journey there that it would not be allowed for Courtney to accompany her at work, CSI or not. But it seemed that a visitor with Courtney's qualifications was very welcome to help out should her help be required. She then began to hope that it would not be required, but in the city that never sleeps she knew it was unlikely.
The two women sat down. Courtney then proceeded to shamelessly flirt with all three men, only receiving a real reaction from Greg. (It seemed Nick had obeyed when Sara asked him not to flirt with her friends)
Warrick was quick to hand out cases, pairing Greg with Sara, which meant Courtney went along too. As they left the room, Sara gave Warrick her best evil stare for subjecting her to hours of Courtney and Greg flirting while she, most probably, did all the hard work.
"Have fun!" he called out after her, as if confirming that the pairing had been selected so to annoy her.
Their crime scene was a young female DB. She lay, stripped of her clothing in a dumpster with a knife wound to her lower abdomen.
Sara gave a sad sigh. She always hated cases like this because of how involved she became with it. After she had taken a few pictures and David arrived, apologising for his lateness, Greg seemed to realise that Sara was upset by the case and took over as best he could.
"You know, we had a case like this one over in San Francisco," Courtney commented "Eighteen year old girl raped and murdered in her own home. Turned out it was the boyfriend."
Sara didn't say anything.
"Hey, Sara," Greg, who had assigned himself to the nasty job of checking the garbage, called to her.
She walked toward him to see him pull a purse from the rubbish and watched him open it.
"ID," he said, removing a driver's licence from the purse "Cara Woods."
Already Sara's eyes were on the remaining contents of the bag and she was glad when Greg began to look those over too, commentating to her while she listened intently, hoping that the contents of her purse would help find her killer.
"Cash, keys, pager…I don't think that robbery was the motive here."
"No," Sara agreed, though she had figured as soon as they had arrived that this was not about robbery. Still she stared at the purse suspiciously, stopping herself from grabbing it from the grip of her co-worker. "You got anything else in there Greg?"
"Nope," the younger man turned to look at David who was stood awkwardly beside the dumpster. "TOD was about 3 hours ago, right?"
"Yeah, give or take," replied David.
"Okay, well let's get this body moved and we better keep checking the dumpster," Greg said, gesturing for Sara to join him.
She smiled, happy to see him taking charge. He really had matured a lot since he started doing field work.
"You want to help, Courtney?" Sara asked "We got a lot of rubbish here," then upon seeing her reluctant expression she added "There are some spare gloves in my kit."
Courtney shrugged, watching as the body bag was zipped up. Then she surprised Sara by pulling her hair off her face and taking a confident stride to where she had left her kit. The invitation to help had originally been intended as a joke, but Sara knew that Courtney was a good CSI, and as she was willing to aid them in their job, this extra help would benefit both her and Greg in finding evidence and having the time to look over it.
After hours of rubbish sorting, the three of them agreed that there was nothing of interest to their case in there and collected their things to head back to the lab with.
Sara went to see what DR. Robbins had collected from the body, allowing Courtney to help Greg contact the girl's family. Even though she was impressed by how much use Courtney had been to them, she still considered it best to keep out of her way for as long as possible.
The coroner had been about as successful as the CSIs in finding useful evidence. He hadn't done a full autopsy as of yet, but did say that cause of death appeared to be several deep knife wounds, causing her to bleed to death.
"No signs of trauma," he said, showing Sara her pale, flawless skin. "No defence wounds or ligature marks."
At the crime scene, this point had been observed by Sara herself but she was too sure of it being a sex-crime to let go that easy "Maybe she was drugged?" she suggested, pausing before adding "And maybe bruises will show up later." though she knew that the absence of bruises was not the only inconsistency. The lack of evidence for any kind of wound, defence or otherwise, was ruling out Sara's theory faster than she liked.
"Always a possibility," the coroner said, though he didn't seem to agree himself "I'll run a tox screen and let you know my results."
"What about rape?" she asked, assuring herself how unlikely a pretty young girl found stripped of her clothing had been left untouched.
"Well, no trace of semen or vaginal tearing, but I did the best I could. Sent finger nail scrapings over to DNA."
"Right," Sara nodded "thanks Doc." She walked slowly towards the door, desperately searching her brain for reasons why a girl she was convinced was a rape victim had no evidence on her body of such a crime taking place.
"Oh...there was one other thing," he said, causing her to stop and turn around as she headed out. "Some sort of impression here on her neck."
Sara looked closer "Looks like she had something pressed against her throat. Could you photograph this for me?"
"Sure," he said, as she left the room to find out what Greg had come up with.
Greg and Courtney had managed to contact the girl's parents. They were going to come down for questioning and to formally identify their daughter.
"Robbins come up with anything?" Greg asked.
"Doesn't look like it. All we got is an impression made on her neck. It doesn't even look like she was raped." Sara supplied, suppressing the disappointment in her voice to a minimum. Grissom had always taught her not to manipulate evidence into fitting a theory before all the facts were there.
"Well I'll take Courtney with me to see her parents," Greg said as if it was oh so much of a burden for him "You should go back over the crime scene photos."
Sara nodded, on a case like this she didn't mind being told what to do. At least it kept her occupied. She trudged to the layout room and went over and over the same things she already had done back at the crime scene and again in the morgue. There has to be something on Cara that tells us who did this!
Courtney came in to see how she was doing a little while later.
"Greg's still talking to Mr and Mrs Woods. How are you doing here?"
"Not so well," Sara admitted, a little annoyed that Courtney was acting like she was a big part of the case "I really don't think we've overlooked anything."
Courtney walked over to stand next to her and took another look at the photos. She frowned and pointed at the one DR. Robbins had taken. "That the impression in her neck?"
"Yeah," Sara nodded "I can't work out what it is."
"A ring," the woman next to her said so quickly it gave no time for Sara to think about it.
The brunette stared at her "You sure?"
"Yep, her father's got one on just like it. We could compare?"
"You think the father did this?"
"Sara, we've got nothing else to go on. I know this doesn't prove he killed her but it's a start, right?"
Sara shrugged, her feelings somewhere between annoyance that Courtney could have just cracked the case, and disbelief that a father could murder his own daughter. Then again, both women had seen worse on this job.
"The doc sent everything he could over to DNA. I guess if there was anything to go on the results will tell us," she said distantly.
"I'll go back ad tell Greg," Courtney said, heading towards the door. Then she stopped and turned to look at Sara. She seemed sad, lost, maybe feeling that she should have been the one to find the vital piece of evidence. "You coming?"
The two women soon caught up with Greg.
"Greg! We need Mr Woods's ring!" Courtney said quickly.
Greg looked confused at the two before him. He had become used to cases moving fast but he had no idea what had been found out involving the ring.
"Am I missing something?" he asked, not afraid to let his confusion seep into his voice.
"The impression on her neck could..." Sara began to explain, but Courtney cut her off impatiently.
"Just please get us the ring Greggo."
The cutesy nickname she used made Sara shudder. Since when did she call him Greggo? But the damsel-in-distress voice seemed to fire Greg in to action and he rushed off to be of assistance to her.
"Kind of cute, isn't he?" Courtney swooned in a voice that was enough to make Sara gag.
She was still thinking of an appropriate answer when Greg returned, holding out the ring which he had collected and sealed in an evidence bag in a very proper fashion.
"Here you go," he handed it to Courtney rather than Sara "I still don't see how this helps us."
Neither female acknowledged his hint to tell him what exactly they were doing.
"Make sure Mr Woods stays right here, won't you Greg?" Courtney called, heading off with Sara chasing after her.
"Hey! I am a part of this case you know!" he yelled in the hope that one of them would turn around and fill him in. Neither woman even stopped.
"We'll need to take a mould of this later," Courtney said as though Sara was uneducated in working in a forensics lab. She held the ring over the photograph of the impression "but I'd say that we've got enough of a match to hold Mr Woods for further questioning."
Sara gave her a faint nod, expression a slight irritation that the visitor CSI was getting further than she was. She felt detached from a case that belonged to the LVMPD- her and Greg were the CSIs from that department, not Courtney. She knew that without Courtney's help, the same conclusion would have been drawn from what little evidence they had. She had the ability to solve it just fine and, though a newer addition to the CSI team, Sara had every confidence that Greg was just as able too.
"Sara? Did you hear what I said?"
"Yes. We could really use Captain Brass right about now."
Courtney shrugged, "I'd be happy to talk to Mr. Woods if there's going to be a hold-up."
"Fine. Whatever. You're leading this case now, Courtney," Sara said, finally snapping at how willing and helpful her friend was trying to be. She was probably being unreasonable. But why should she have to watch someone else walk all over her case? She was annoyed with herself as well as with Courtney and decided she should go see Greg and fill him in on what had been left blank to him previously.
The ex lab technician was leaning against a wall in a jaded manner when Sara reached him.
"Hey, you going to tell me what's going on?" he asked, his voice sounding more enthusiastic than he looked.
Courtney rounded the corner at that moment and paused as though she was deciding whether to turn back or not. Eventually she paced over to them and said to Greg, "Still holding Mr. Woods?"
"Yeah but we can't keep him much longer by rights. Is anyone going to tell me what this is about?" he replied.
His response came in the form of Courtney holding the picture of Cara's throat up and then the ring, sealed back in its evidence bag.
Greg seemed to realise what she meant by this and nodded at the interrogation room door. "He's in there if you want to do the interview. Or I could call Brass…"
"Its fine, I'll do it."
Sara followed her inside, whispering "It will look better in court if I supervise the interview."
Courtney nodded, set the evidence down on the table and sat down. Mr. Woods swallowed and asked if there was good reason to be keeping him there. The grief-stricken woman -Sara presumed to be Mrs. Woods- leaned against the bulk of her husband. He was a large, well-built man. A small-framed girl like his daughter had been didn't stand a chance against someone like him.
"We found this indentation on your daughter's neck," Courtney explained calmly "It matches the pattern on your ring. Could you explain that?"
"Oh God…" the small, shy looking woman whispered.
Mr. Woods drummed his fingers nervously on the table, "I…no…I can't explain that."
"And you also cannot explain how your daughter came to be stabbed to death, am I right?"
The stocky man looked outraged "What? Of course I have no idea what happened!"
"The evidence is not looking good, sir," she pointed out.
"Do I need an attorney?" he responded dryly.
She shrugged, "Do you?"
"If you're going to charge me with the murder of my daughter I'd say I do, yes."
"No-one's accusing you of that, sir."
"Then what the hell are you accusing me of?"
Courtney glanced at Sara. Both CSIs knew that they did not have enough evidence to file a murder charge.
"Mr. Woods if you could just help me out here…" Courtney pushed the photograph closer to him, causing the wife to press her face into his shoulder as though she was too afraid to look. "You say you have no idea how that mark got on her neck?"
"I've already told you that," he snapped, clearly very angry "You people should be out finding Cara's murderer, not wasting your time on me. Can't you see my wife's very upset?"
"We have to look at all the evidence, sir." Sara said when Courtney remained silent.
"Well maybe you should be out doing your job! I take it I am free to leave when I want?"
Courtney sighed, knowing this was getting her nowhere, "Yes, Mr. Woods, you and your wife may leave whenever you so wish."
"That would be now," he rose quickly from his seat, dragging his wife along with him and nearly bumping into Greg in the process.
"He not talking, huh?" Greg said, seeing the faces of the two women.
Sara shook her head "Damn that guy! There has got to be something else."
"I wouldn't be so sure it was him…" Greg said, handing her a computer print-out.
"DNA? That was quick," she said, scanning the page he had given her. Her mouth slipped open a little "This can't be right…"
"What is it?" Courtney stood and looked over her shoulder at the results "XX…a female did this?"
"Not just any female," Greg chimed in, a slightly smug look about his face "7 markers in common."
"Mrs. Woods?" Courtney said rhetorically.
"It could be a sister?" suggested Sara.
"Nah, parents already mentioned how Cara was their only child." Greg informed her.
Courtney said, "So you just let our suspect walk out of the building?" which received nothing but a blank stare from Greg. "Chase after her, Greg!"
Greg was off like a shot, causing Sara to raise her eyebrows at how bossy Courtney was being (not that it was unusual.)
"Well trained," she grinned.
About fifteen minutes later, Mrs. Woods was the one under interrogation. The woman looked frail enough to crack under sun light, never mind police questioning.
"Now, are you going to tell us what happened, or do we need to get a warrant for your DNA?" Courtney asked in the brisk, no-nonsense tone she was so fond of.
She was about to repeat the question when the woman said in a tiny voice, "Cara was my little girl. How would you react if you found out your daughter was a hooker?" her voice lacked emotion and remorse.
"I wouldn't take her life, that's for sure," Sara was unable to stop herself saying.
For a moment, Mrs. Woods took her eyes from the table she had fixed her gaze on and locked eyes with the brunette standing at the back of the room. "I loved my daughter, Miss Sidle. I just couldn't bare to see her throwing her life away," droplets of crystal tears rolled down her cheeks, though she did not sob "Some people are better off dead. Don't you think, as her mother, I knew what was best for her?"
"She didn't struggle," Sara whispered sadly "you stabbed her to death and she didn't struggle."
The woman's shoulders began to shake but Sara couldn't tell if she was laughing or sobbing. "Drugs- and no I didn't give them to her. She was already high on something. Started taking her clothes off saying she was too hot. I told you she was a damn whore!"
Courtney thought that enough had been said, she knew it wasn't her job to arrest the woman but she said anyway, "You're under arrest, Mrs. Woods, for the murder of your daughter."
Mrs Woods appeared nonchalant.
"There is one thing I don't understand though," Courtney said "What about the markings on her throat? Your husband's ring seemed to match it perfectly."
She gave her a thin smile, not a false or superficial one, just a cold, apathetic smile. "My husband and I have matching rings, you see, but I took mine off. Maybe I was hoping you'd think he did it. Maybe…I don't know. You people only see what's on the outside. You have no idea what could drive a mother to kill her own daughter," she closed her eyes for a second and then opened them, staring straight at Sara, who was crying silently now, waiting for it to be over "love."
"So…you're going back to San Francisco, huh?" Sara asked casually.
Courtney flashed her a large, but non-the-less tight-lipped, smile, "Yep, now I've seen what it's like working in Vegas."
"Take care of yourself, Court," her friend said softly.
She nodded and walked towards the door "I always do."
Sara breathed in, she had no imaged this at all and she surprised even herself by realising the words, "Courtney…way to go on the Cara Woods case, I really appreciated your help."
The blonde woman smiled warmly "Thanks Sara," then she paused, dropped her bag and looped her arms around the Vegas CSI's shoulders "I'm going to miss you, sweetie."
Sara found herself saying something she thought she never would say in response to that "You too."
That was pretty long but I'm quite proud of it actually. Let me know what you think x