A Killer's Law

A Killer's Law

A/N: Wow. This makes three chapters written in one day. I'm on a role!

Disclaimer: I only wish I owned CSI: Miami. If I did, I would deoverdramatize everything (That totally wasn't a word…) and return CSI: Miami back to its fabulously written roots.

I forgot: This takes place sometime after Natalia joins the team and goes into the field and sometime before Ryan is um… on "vacation". Oh yeah, and no ships in this fic! Sorry, but only friendship.

Chapter Seven:

Eric read the note again, not believing his eyes. The killer had actually written them a note. He took pictures out of habit, his mind wandering. Why would the killer do something so stupid? Did he want to get caught?

He sealed the evidence back up and initialed the seal. He shook his head as he removed his gloves and headed out to find Horatio.

CSIMIAMICSIMIAMI

Calleigh was pacing in the DNA lab, waiting for the results of the epithelials on the cloth used to subdue Laura Lockhart. Maxine Valera watched her nervously as she tried to work on other cases. Eric opened the door to DNA as Calleigh finished her fiftieth circuit around the DNA lab.

"Hey, have you seen Horatio?" Eric inquired. Valera shook her head.

"Yeah, I saw him a few minutes ago. Did you get somethin'?" Calleigh left DNA with Eric trailing behind her. She had seen him head towards his office.

"Yes, our killer left us a note." This had Calleigh stopping in her tracks, her expression shocked. "That's what I thought too. It was left downstairs in an unmarked envelope." She opened her mouth to ask a question but he stopped her. "It was typed on generic paper and had no fingerprints on the inside. The fingerprints on the outside are being run through AFIS and any other database I could think of."

Calleigh nodded and continued to Horatio's office. The blinds in Horatio's office were drawn and the lights were off. Calleigh knocked softly. "Horatio?"

"Come in."

She opened the door to see Horatio doing paperwork. That was normal. But, what surprised her was that Natalia was sound asleep on Horatio's couch. Horatio put a finger to his lips in order to silence the two CSIs who had just entered his domain. "What do you have?" he asked in a whisper.

"I found a note, H." Eric's voice was equally quiet.

"Show me."

Eric walked over to Horatio's computer and plugged in a drive. Pictures of the note popped up. Eric clicked on one to expand it. Horatio and Calleigh read the note in silence. They finished within seconds of one another. "We have to warn all the cops," Horatio said. This was a direct threat to his "family".

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He sat on a bench in the shade. It would be summer soon. He could smell the rain that would come. He had watched the sun turn the sky red. He knew that in a twisted way the sky mimicked his girl.

That's how he thought of her. His girl. She belonged to him. All of the prey belonged to him from the moment he laid eyes on them. They were dead the instant he chose them. Like Laura.

She had been the best so far. She had tried to reason with him until her hope died. He loved watching them give up. And he loved watching them ask him to kill them with their eyes. Debbie had been disappointing. All she had done was scream. He finally had to tape her mouth shut.

But Laura had conversed with him. She had intrigued him. And he was now following the woman who he had noticed before. And she was in the right place.

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Ryan Wolfe was waiting in trace. They were running trace on the paper that the note was written on. And he was twitching with anticipation. He moved his foot steadily and annoyingly only to receive a glare from Eric.

He was tired of waiting for the Mass Spectrometer to decide which elements were in the paper. He thought about how it worked. A Mass Spectrometer uses the atomic mass of the components of a mixture, compound, or gas in order to determine what it is composed of. But, that was the easy part.

The hard part was putting together those elements and decided what they made. Or if they were even related to each other.

CSIMIAMICSIMIAMI

Horatio and Calleigh were in the captain's office. Calleigh was there for moral support more than anything. Horatio hated talking to the captain almost as much as he hated Rick Stetler. But, he had to tell the Captain of their progress.

"Captain, we have reason to believe that a killer is targeting female police officers. We have to warn them and we are asking your permission to do so," Horatio said respectfully as his captain looked at the evidence.

"Lieutenant, I see that you have almost no evidence. How do you plan on catching this killer?"

Horatio and Calleigh exchanged glances before Horatio responded, "Our first priority is to make sure that the officers of the law are protected first. We suggest that the officers are always accompanied by at least one other officer, such as a partner. And, we are about to head out to an address suggested by the killer that we visit."

"Miss Duquesne, what do you think of this?"

The captain surprised Calleigh by addressing her by name. "Well, I agree with H—Lieutenant Caine. We should think of the safety of these women first and then catch the killer." The captain nodded.

"Dismissed," he said. As Calleigh and Horatio left, he added, "Miss Duquesne, you know that applies to you, too." Calleigh and Horatio turned. "Horatio, make sure she's with someone at all times." He knew that Calleigh was stubborn. He had seen her at crime scenes refusing to give up. This quality had pros and cons.

Horatio nodded and led Calleigh out of his office. The captain turned to face the window and watched as the sun was consumed by clouds.

CSIMIAMICSIMIAMI

Like he predicted, the sun was being covered by storm clouds. The electricity in the air excited him. He knew that they had gotten his note. All the female police officers were looking around, nervous. And, they were all in the company of at least one other person.

Oh well. He could still catch his prey.

After all, this just made the catch just that much more satisfying.

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Natalia slept in Horatio's office. She had been asleep for the past hour and a half and knew nothing of the danger she could possibly be in. Horatio's door opened and Alexx walked in, looking at a file. She looked up and was surprised to see that Horatio was gone.

What made her smile was the fact that Natalia was sleeping peacefully on his couch. She looked so young in her sleep and it brought out the maternal instinct in Alexx. She took the blanket that she knew Horatio kept in a filing cabinet and covered the younger woman with it.

Alexx smiled and left.

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Horatio and Calleigh sat in the Hummer, heading towards the Everglades. The killer had "suggested" that they look there, so they did. They drove in silence before Horatio spoke.

"Do you think that Laura is dead?" he asked softly, as though afraid to say it out loud.

Calleigh was silent for a moment before replying, "I think she is. He did say 'was' in his letter. And, we should assume the worst…"

Horatio only nodded and focused on the road. She sat next to him, wondering about the killer and what he wanted from these women.

CSIMIAMI

Andrew the tech sat at his computer. He read the letter again. To him, it seemed that there was something about him "trying" other professions. So, he searched the databases all over the country for similar crimes. He found some in Georgia where lawyers were killed, some in South Carolina where judges were killed, some in North Carolina where housewives were killed.

His brilliantly blue eyes widened as he continued to read. Six women were killed in Virginia. They were all CEO's of major companies. Three women were killed in Washington D.C. Three were reporters. And one was a cop.

Knowing that he had stumbled upon something important, he grabbed his phone.

"Horatio," was the answer from the other end of the connection.

"Horatio! I think I've found something!" Andrew said, eagerly explaining what he had found.

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He watched her get in the car with the redhaired man. She looked almost angry. But, he couldn't be happier. She was a cop! Just like she was… And they looked so much alike. But her hair colour was off by a few shades. No matter. She was the closest he had come to finding her.

And he followed the Hummer to the Everglades, knowing exactly where they were going.

He smiled as he watched them speed down the dirt roads. He followed several blocks away, following in their wake. A Hummer kicked up more dirt than an ordinary car and that made it painfully easy to follow.

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"Slow down, Andrew," Horatio said as the tech talked faster than humanly possible. He switched the phone on speakerphone so that Calleigh could listen too.

Andrew took a deep breath and explained what he had found. "All the victims were shot in the temple with a gun. Most of them were shot with their own guns and if they didn't have one, the killer found a clean, unregistered gun."

"Go on," Horatio encouraged.

"He has been traveling South. He started in Washington, D.C, and moved south through Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and now Florida. In D.C. there were four murders. Three were reporters and one was a cop. I looked her up. Her name was Sofia Gregory. She was a D.C. cop and the first victim with this M.O."

He hesitated for a second. "But, Horatio, the thing is, her killer is in jail."

Horatio frowned. "What do you mean?"

"He was a drug dealer. They found his DNA on her. He spat on her. And, his fingerprints were on the gun. It was an airtight case."

"Have everyone go over the case files for each victim. Maybe we can put something together and catch him."

"On it." With that, Andrew hung up.

CSIMIAMICSIMIAMI

He followed them. They were getting closer to the shack. It excited him to think that they were soon going to walk right into his trap. And, they had no backup. He smiled broadly as the entire sun was smothered by black, angry storm clouds.

CSIMIAMI

Horatio stopped at a shack just as the light disappeared. Calleigh and Horatio exited the Hummer. "Damn it," Horatio muttered. "No signal." His phone had no service.

Calleigh pulled her kit out of the trunk and headed to the shack. She knocked loudly and announced them. "Miami Dade PD!"

There was silence. She knocked again and the door swung open. She moved the beam of her flashlight around the shack. It was a one-room shack with a few dirty windows. She gasped as she saw the blood on the wall. The colour drained from her face as she looked at the body of Laura Lockhart.

Like Debbie, she was duct taped to a chair. But, her mouth was not duct taped. The floor around her was a puddle of blood and brain matter was on the floor and on the wall. Apparently, Laura had carried a .45, one of the largest handguns in existence. It lay on the floor next to her.

What disturbed her the most were the words on the wall where Laura's blood was cleared away. It read:

"Greetings, cops. I hope you find her before she decomposes too much. I left you a clue, so you should figure it out soon. And, I'll see you at the next crime scene.

"Killer"

Horatio entered the shack and covered his mouth with his hand as he surveyed the scene. She was dead. And the killer was still taunting them.

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He drove over to the shack just as the rain began to fall lightly. He ran to the Hummer silently, watching the cops stand in the doorway of the shack. He pulled out his knife and slashed the tires on the left side to avoid being seen. He had hidden his dark coloured car in the bushes.

He crouched behind the Hummer and watched their legs. The red haired man turned back to the Hummer, clearly looking for something. He moved around the front of the Hummer while the officer went to the truck. He knew he had to act. And fast.

He ran up behind the blonde, already holding his cloth. He covered her mouth and grabbed her flashlight, which he quickly turned off. She struggled violently, trying to claw at his hands. But, he was wearing thick leather gloves. She fainted after a few more moments. He picked her up and ran into the Everglades.

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Horatio stood next to Calleigh and told her he had to get his kit. He went back to the Hummer and grabbed it. It took no more than half a minute. He looked over at the shack just as a man picked up Calleigh.

"Calleigh!" he called, running after the man. He pointed his flashlight at him and saw that he had light skin and light hair. He ran around the shack and the man disappeared with Calleigh.

The Captain had told him to keep her safe. He had failed.

A/N: I take it back, this is the longest chapter. Wow. It's is almost five and a half pages in word… It's really long… I hope you enjoy! Please review! Please? I love reviews and I spend countless hours waiting for an email saying that someone reviewed my story… Please review? I don't care if you just write one letter, it makes me feel special if someone takes the time to read my story…