After Midnight: May 10, 2013
Mike and Connie entered the conference room where TJ, Morales, and Lt. Gonzales were working.
The three of them were surrounding a laptop and TJ closed it when they walked in.
"Please, sit down", Lt. Gonzales gestured towards the table across from her.
"What is going on?", Connie inquired, as Mike and Connie sat. It was evident that the group was uneasy.
Morales spoke up, "Tonight when you guys went to see White's assistant, your detail noticed someone following you on your way there. And they contacted us, and so not to spook the person, we told them not to do anything." He paused to let what he was saying sink in, "So, TJ and I went with backup and waited for him to show himself again, which he did not do until you two started to drive all over the map. We guess he thought you were trying to lose him or draw him out—or something because you were driving circles." Morales seemed to be asking a question in his least sentence.
Connie stifled a laugh.
"Who is he?", Mike asked, ignoring Connie.
"His name is Jason Greene—he's a private investigator. He says our murder victim hired him to investigate Spencer."
"And he was following me?", Connie was unsettled for this to be happening again.
"Yeah, but he said that he signed a nondisclosure form with White, so he won't tell us why. But Dekker is getting a warrant for his files", Morales said, looking to TJ.
TJ, receiving Morales' prompt, opened the laptop back up and pushed it to Mike and Connie.
"When we arrested him, he had a camera in the car, the memory card of said camera, which was almost full, had photos of you going back two weeks", TJ stated, "It wouldn't be surprising if he has been following you for longer".
Connie pulled the computer closer to her and keyed through the photos. There were pictures of her by herself, with her mom, dad, brother, uncle, Dekker, Hardin, Morales, TJ, and, in later photos, Mike.
As he looked at the photos, Mike watched Connie out of the corner of his eye. He could tell she was trying to remain passive at the overwhelming violation of her personal privacy.
"We've got the warrant to search his office and acquire any files pertaining to White", Dekker announced, as he and Hardin entered the room.
"TJ, gather some uniform officers for the search", Gonzales ordered.
He nodded his head, grabbed his jacket and left.
"What are we charging him with?", Connie asked Dekker and Hardin, "From what I see in these photos, they were all taken in public areas, where I didn't have an expectation of privacy. Thus, no crime occurred."
"Morales and TJ have him on reckless driving and resisting arrest. It's not very much but we can wait twenty-four hours before we arraign him, and pushing it into Friday night will put him with the always reliable weekend troublemakers. I bet we can get him into backlog until at least Sunday, possibly Monday", Dekker answered.
Hardin added, "It will at least give us enough time to determine whether he broke any other laws."
Later:
The private detective had hundreds of files on Kyle Spencer. Greene, fearing hackers, used paper instead of digital documentation, with exception of using digital pictures, which he kept thousands of on his computer, and only about a hundred photos printed on paper. Their once cluttered conference room, was now deluged with boxes, files and loose papers. After being ordered to remove the boxes from sight in the squad room, TJ and Morales moved a mass of boxes into the break room, which now resembled a filing room, with the addition of a coffee pot and couch.
Currently, Morales and TJ were sluggishly going through the paper work in the conference room. They respectively spent intervals of the night between four to five hours of sleep, in the bunkroom, down the hall used for overnighters, and going through the new evidence. Mike and Connie, however, did not go to the bunkroom, they worked straight through the night, pouring through Spencer's life for the last two years. Until, they fell asleep in their respective places.
Mike suddenly awoke with the loud sound of a thud. He surveyed the room slightly disoriented from sleep and the rude awakening.
"Sorry, didn't mean to wake you", TJ said, as he picked up a book and several files off the floor.
"It's fine", Mike replied.
One of the first first things Mike noticed, was the cold draft. His suit jacket had been laid across him but had slid down when he awoke.
He stared at it, "Must have been Connie...", he thought to himself. He looked around the room again, this time, for her.
"She's in the newly ordained file room", Morales broke his thoughts.
"Who?", Mike gave him a perplexed look.
"Connie. She's asleep on the new filing cabinet."
Mike stared at him for a moment, confused, "Okay…."
"There's coffee in there too", TJ added.
"Thanks", he stood up, "I could use some."
They exchanged glances as Mike left, and once out of earshot, TJ asked, "Do you think there's something going on there?"
"I don't think it's our business."
"Come on, Ricardo. He traveled three thousand miles and has been working his ass off since he got here", Morales gave him an unpleasant expression, but he continued, "Come on we're detectives, we inherently detect".
"Two things, TJ. One, need I remind you that Connie was my partner before you. Moreover, we were the people who sat and talked about how horrible office gossipers are...", he paused for effect, "Two, I can tell you as a prosecutor, when you lose a case or someone gets off on lesser time and winds up committing another crime, we tend to take it personally—no matter where the proceeding crimes are perpetrated."
"You're evading the question, councilor", TJ deadpanned.
"Here", Morales threw a folder in front of him, "Her phone records, e-mails and we have pictures from about every day, does it look like they were in contact?", Morales said, exasperated.
"You've already looked haven't you?"
"I'm done. I'm not talking to you anymore, just give me that box."
Mike walked into the break room. He, now, understood what Morales meant by Connie being asleep on the 'filing cabinet'. She was sitting slightly slumped down, with her head between the back of the couch and her shoulder. There were at least twenty to thirty files surrounding her in different states, some were closed with pages hanging out but most were empty, the contents in several different piles.
Mike walked to the coffee pot and poured himself a cup. He remembered she had court and checked his watch: 7:45. He made her a cup and set out to wake her.
"I shouldn't of filled them so full…", Mike scolded himself, while trying to walk through the maze of boxes and papers. Once he reached her, he cleared half of the coffee table, which was in front of the couch. He laid the files on the floor and focused on waking her up.
Mike took her cup of coffee and positioned it underneath her nose, swaying it back and forth.
Connie slowly stirred. She smiled immediately upon seeing him.
"Sorry about waking you, but you have court in little over an hour", Mike said, as he handed her the coffee.
She looked at her watch, "Oh…I probably would have slept right through it. Thanks."
He sat across from her, on the coffee table, with his coffee and watched her drink.
She smiled.
"The coffee is not that good", he quipped.
Connie gave a small laugh and smiled sweetly at him, "No…you just remember how I like it."
"Of course", his voice was low.
They stared at each other.
"I'm glad you're here, Mike."
"Me t-"
Ring. Buzz. Ring.
Connie's phone interrupted him.
Looking at the caller ID, she said, "It's my dad".
"I'll let you take that", Mike said, clearing his throat and standing up.
"Hello", she answered watching him leave.
"Good morning, you didn't call me last night, I was getting worried", he sounded concerned.
"Morning to you too, and was worried?", she teased him.
"Was. Am. Is everything alright?"
"Yeah, I'm sorry things just…things got busy night and completely forgot. I'm sorry", she stood up to gather her things.
"Are you any closer to catching that creep?"
"Yes and no. We've got several new leads to follow up on…. How's Mom?", she asked, changing the subject.
"Well…", he hesitated, "She's sick with a cough, it's not too bad at the moment. But we've got a close eye on her."
A pang of worry and guilt hit Connie.
"Is she alright? Have you taken her to the doctor?"
"Yes we did, and he said she was alright, but we need to watch out for pneumonia. It's alright, darling, we're taking care of her".
"How is Maria doing with her?"
"Good, they have been doing a lot of catching up. Your mom wishes you were here too—to have her girls together again".
"I know, but I can't right now. I'm not comfortable coming to see you while this 'creep' is still out there."
"Which is all the more reason you should be with family."
She took a deep conflicted breath. As much as she loved her family, Connie has also enjoyed the distance from them over the last few days.
She did not know what to say, "Look, Dad, I have to get to court. I will call you later, alright?"
"Sure, be safe, Honey. I love you."
"Love you too, Dad, bye."
"Bye"
Mike, TJ, and Morales just finished lunch, but they were not ready to delve back into the haystack.
"This feels wrong", Morales said, gesturing around the room, "This private detective took it upon himself to violate Connie's privacy and now, by going through what he has on Spencer, we are doing it again".
"It has to lead somewhere, there's just too much here for it not to", TJ said, trying to put it in perspective.
Mike sighed.
His attention went to a pile of surveillance photos of Connie—nobody wanted to look at them, "Why would he print these off?, Mike wondered, grabbing the photos. There were at least fifty pictures in that particular pile, "Different days, places, times…."
He studied them.
"Look at this!", Mike exclaimed, as he shot up from his chair.
Morales and TJ walked over to him.
"This guy is in the background of all of these photos", Mike scattered out the pile of pictures, "There is someone else following Connie".
"We need to run this guy through facial recognition and see if this guy has a record, or is in the DMV's database", TJ stated.
"Yeah", Morales picked up a clear photo, patted Mike on the back, and began to walk out the room, "Good catch, Mike".
He did not feel good about his find. Matter of fact, he felt complete dread—there was someone else following Connie.
"I'm going to stretch my legs", Mike absent mindedly told TJ, as grabbed his suit jacket and walked out the door.
"Greene was following him following her?", Dekker asked, rather puzzled, pointing at a picture of the mystery-man.
"We don't know", Morales admitted, "And the lab is backed up so it may be a while before they run him through".
"I take it Greene wouldn't say anything about this either?", Connie asked, staring that the photos in question.
"Nope, we tried—he's not going to talk", TJ responded.
"Where is Mike?", Dekker questioned.
"He said he needed to stretch his legs", TJ relayed.
"How long ago?", Connie asked, she and Dekker were due back in court soon, but she wanted to see him.
"Probably, about an hour ago."
She was disappointed but did not let it show.
She turned to Dekker, "We should probably get going."
"Yeah", he agreed, and turned to the detectives, "But before we do, how many more files do you have to go through?"
Morales stiffed a pained laugh, "We're pretty much done. The four of us went through the bulk of it. However, the bit that is left will be sorted through by officers who volunteered for some overtime."
A/N: The next chapter was (so far) my favorite to write. But it is kind of long, and I need to rewrite small portions of it. Getting to the point, I hope to have it up next weekend, but I'm not making any promises. Through, I'll try.
Please Review.