AN: Here is crime chapter I am not really good at these but it is important to the story and you'll know why later. Thanks for the continued support and here is your next chapter.


Chapter 9: First Victim

When they got to Lake Mead, Nick parks the SUV and they both got out then grabbed their kits and when they turned to walk to the yellow tape they were greeted with detective Hart, Nick looks at him and said. "What are you doing here?"

Peter smiles and said. "I was asked if I wanted to be moved to day shift and so now I am, you got a problem with that?"

They both shook their heads and Nick said. "No problem man, it would be nice working with you, just remember you're a detective and not a CSI anymore."

Peter just shook his head and said. "I will never live that down will I?" Six years ago when he started his new changed job, he started to act more like a CSI then a Detective. Greg and Nick shake their heads and Peter continues. "Well I know what I am doing now."

They chuckled for a second then when they started walking to the dead body, they got into serious mode and Peter started talking about the victim. "We found her ID, Her name is Natasha King, she is 5'2, just turned 21 and came from Arizona, the coroner told me that she has been dead two hours and I think it was a body dump."

Nick and Greg nodded, when they got to the body, they set the kits down and took a closer look, she had blonde and blue eyes and her throat was slit. While Greg started taking pictures, Nick stands up, looks at Peter and said. "Do we know anything else?"

Peter looked at his notes and said. "She came here with three of her friends yesterday and last night went to the new bar that just opened, two of her friends called it a night early and the friend that stayed with Natasha said that a man tried to hit on them but didn't get very far. Soon after, Natasha and her friend went back to the hotel. Before they all fell asleep Natasha was in her bed and when they woke up this morning she was gone, they thought that she was already at the lake since they had plans to go today and when they showed up they saw her like this."

Nick nods, sighs then said. "ok, I'll finish up here and we'll go talk to a few people."

"Alright."

"Thanks peter." Peter nods and pats him on shoulder then moves so Nick could get to work, Nick sighs again and then helps Greg out, they took multiple pictures of body, got evidence off the body including a piece of a shaggy seat cover, they got pictures of shoe prints and any other evidence that they could find.

Once they collected everything they packed up and walked to the SUV, they put the evidence in the back and Greg's kit, then Nick looks at Greg and said. "You take the stuff to the lab, Peter and I are going to do a little talking."

Greg nods and takes the keys from Nick and they go their separate ways.

When they get back into Vegas to head they headed to the newest bar that just opened a few weeks ago. They pulled into the parking lot and there was only a few cars there, which wasn't a surprise since they don't start getting the business in until sometime after work hours.

Peter and Nick walk in to the empty bar, a middle aged bartender looked up from cleaning the mugs and said. "We're not serving drinks yet."

Peter and Nick walk up to the bartender and Peter said."Well that's good because we're not here to drink." He pulls out his badge and said. "I"m detetcive Hart and this is CSI Nick Stokes and we would like to ask you a few questions?"

He nods and waits patiently, Peter continued. "Do you know who worked here last night?"

The man nodded and replied. "you're looking at him, the name is Lee Jackson, How can I help you?"

"Did you see this girl with three of her friends last night?"

Peter hands him the picture, the bartender wipes his hands from the towel that was on his shoulder, grabs the picture. He grimaced at seeing the dead body, nodded and as he was handing the picture back, he replied. "Yeah, they were here for a while but then two of them left early, I could tell it wasn't there scene."

Nick starts talking. "Was there anybody hanging around them?"

Lee thinks for a minute then nods and replied. "yeah after the two girls left, a regular customer, Mathew Pearson tried picking them up." He stops to shake his head and replied. "Poor man, he didn't get very far."

Nick watched Peter write the new information down and asked about his description of the guy.

"Probably about your guy's height maybe a bit taller, skinny, late 20's, clean shaven most nights, he has brown hair and he is always wearing some kind of ball cap."

The guys nodded and while Peter finished writing the information down Nick asked another question. "And do you happen to know where this Mathew Pearson resides?"

Lee shock his head no but then replied. "you can talk to him later, he usually comes in for the lunch crowd, then comes back later in the evening about 3 times a week."

Nick and Peter nodded then said. "Thanks Lee."

He nodded and right as they were going to turn around Lee speaks again. "I did see the poor young girl around 6 O'clock this morning, she had forgotten her phone and I saved it for her."

They turned back to him and Peter asked suspiciously. "So you were the last one to see her?"

Lee caught the tone of his voice, he shakes his head and said. "I didn't touch her, you can check the tapes from the camera's, I swear."

The guys nodded but Nick asked. "Can we have them?" They felt that they believed him since he did offer up the information himself but they wanted to be absolutely sure. Lee nodded and went to get them, he came back a few seconds later and hands them two tapes, one pointing to the bar and the other one outside of the building.

Nick takes them and with another Thank you and mentioned they will be back later they turned and left the bar.

As they were walking to Peter's vehicle, Peter looked over at Nick and asked. "I think he is telling us the truth."

Nick nodded and replied. "I get that feeling too." They each put their sunglasses on and get in the vehicle and Peter takes them to their next destination, the girl's hotel.

When they got there and up to the floor the girls were staying on, they walked to their room and Peter knocked on the door, a few seconds later the door opened and a bathrob clad, blond haired, brown eyed, 5'5, medium sized build, beautiful woman said. "it's about ti..." she stopped when she noticed it wasn't the room service guy. But then smiles a flirty smile to the guys and asked. "yes?"

Peter and Nick smile their polite smiles and Peter said. "Hi Lauren, remember I am detective Hart." Lauren nodded in recognition she talked to him at the crime scene then she looked at Nick and Peter continued. "This is CSI Nick Stokes, we would like to ask you some follow up questions." The girl nodded and stepped away from the door so they could walk in and they did just that.

When they were in the nice, two king sized bed, hotel room one of the girls, that had red hair and hazel eyes looked up from her phone and the other one with brown hair and brown eyes looked away from the TV to look at them.
Lauren walks over to the bed and sits down. All three of them look at the guys and they could tell they were very heartbroken about their friend.

The guys mentally sighed feeling very sad for the girls then Nick asked his first question. "Lee, the Bartender said a regular customer by the name of Mathew Pearson came up to one of you and Natasha and tried picking you up, is that correct?"

Lauren looks back at her red haired friend, Katrina and she nodded then replied. "Yes after Lauren and Maya left, there was this guy that came over to the table but we didn't catch his name."

After she described him, it was the same looking guy the bartender described, Peter looked at Nick and he does a short nod, then looked back at the girls and Nick continues. "how did he act after you turned him down?"

Katrina continued. "He just turned and walked away, it was really a shame though now that I think about it, he was kind of cute." She gives Nick a flirty smile.

He just nods and Peter asked a question. "What has been your transportation since you've been here?"

Maya, the brunette haired women answered. "A Cab." Peter nodded and wrote the information down.

Nick spoke again. "Thanks Ladies now one more question we would like to see your shoes."

Lauren raised an eyebrow and asked. "You don't think we had anything to do with killing Natasha do you?"

Nick was about to open his mouth when Maya spoke. "It's Protocol Lauren." Nick and Peter look at her and she smiles at them both and said. "oh, I watch those crime shows." They smiled and nodded.

Lauren gets up and walks to the closet door, opens it and moves out of the way.

Nick and Peter walked up to the closet and on the shoe rack was filled with multiple shoes for every occasion they shake their heads, they couldn't believe they would need that many shoes for a weekend trip but nonetheless they needed to be looked at.

Nick goes over them all and when he was satisfied, he stands up, steps away from the closet, leans toward Peter and whispered. "The size's are too small and there is no match, they are clear." Peter nods.

They turn towards the girls and smiled politely then Peter said. "Thank you girls for your time, I am sorry for your loss."

They nodded and as they were turning around to walk out of the room, Katrina talks. "Do you have a number?" they turn to her and she continued. "you know, just in case we remember something else?"

Nick nods and hands his card to Lauren since she was still standing, the girls said thanks then finally the guys turned and walked out of the room. When the door was shut and as they were walking, Peter looks at Nick and said. "It must be a pain to be you sometimes."

Nick looks over at him and said. "what do you mean?"

Peter shakes his head and said. "All you have to do is smile and they are putty in your hands."

Nick shakes his head with a small laugh and said. "What about you? it's not like they were giving you the cold shoulder,
I saw a few looks your way." Peter just laughs it off with the shake of the head, Nick looks at him when it got silent and said. "you know she would want you to be happy." Peter looks at him and Nick continues. "Ana and heck even Sara, that's all she ever wanted."

Peter nodded and replied. "I know and I am getting there, really."

Nick nods, Peter had defiantly came along way from when he started living out here, then he smiles and said. "well when you do get there and ready to mingle, any woman would be lucky to have you."

Peter smiles, looks at Nick and said. "Thanks man, that means a lot."

Nick nods again with a smile of his own and they walk the rest of the way to the vehicle in silence, but when they got to it, Peter looks over the hood of the car to Nick and said. "Nick, I want to thank you for how nice you have been to me when I first moved here, I know you must have felt that I was a threat but it really means a lot to me that you looked past that."

"I just wanted Sara to be happy and I knew how you still felt about her." Then he smiled and said. "But really who could blame you for holding on to those feelings, she was, is and always will be a wonderful, beautiful woman."

Peter raised an eyebrow at that and asked. "you?" He got a sense on how Nick was talking that he had more than platonic feelings for her at one time, he never knew that.

Nick puts his sunglasses on walks to his side of the car, opens the door, looks back at Peter and said. "That was a very long time ago, way before a certain bugman entered her orbit."

Peter nodded with a small chuckle, He opens his door and gets in. Once both men were in, Peter puts the keys in the ignition, looks at his watch and saw it was lunch time. He looks at Nick and said. "I think it's time to talk to our lead suspect." Nick nods, Peter started the car and drove back to the bar.

When Peter parked in the parking lot, there was still the same amount of cars in the lot when they were here before, so they decided to sit it out and wait for him to show up and thankfully they didn't have to wait very long, but unfortunately
they were a little disappointed when the man that they were looking for got out of a two door, small car.

They sighed and got out of the vehicle, they still had to quesiton him. They walked up to the building and passing his car along the way, Nick looks inside and stopped.

Peter looks at him and asked. "Nick?"

Nick waves him over to the car and Peter walks over to him and Nick points and said. "Doesn't that seat cover look familair?" it was the same type that was on Natasha's body.

Peter nodded and said. "Yeah, but the vehicle doesn't look very big to fit a body."

Nick nodded and they still proceeded to the bar, they get in, look toward the front where the barstools were and sees the man they were looking for.

When they got closer, Peter speaks. "Mathew Pearson?"

The brown eye, brown haired, clean shaven, ball capped man turned around in his barstool and said. "yes."

Peter speaks again. "I am detective Hart and this is CSI Nick Stokes and we would like to ask you some quesitons." Mathew nodded and Peter continued. "Did you see this woman last night?" He holds out the photo of Natasha.

Mathew takes it, he also grimices at the photo and said. "yes but not looking like that." He holds the phot back to them.

Peter takes it back and continued. "So how did you feel when she and her friend turned you down? did you get angry? want Revenge?"

Mathew shook his head and replied. "No, of course I was diaspionted but they weren't into me so I moved on, why waste your whole night trying to get one women to like you who clearly dosen't, when there was plenty around, right?"

The guys chose not to answer but Nick asked "We found a fiber on her, that match's your passanger cover seat, can you explain that?"

He shook his head and replied. "No, but I did see my car window busted up last night, I didn't see anything taken, I mean there wan't much to take anyways, I had a friend fix it this morning."

Nick and Peter look at each other thinking this case was turning a little weird, then looked back at him and Mathew started speaking again hoping they weren't thinking he was making it up. "Here take my keys, check the back seat or whatever you have to do, I swear I didn't do it." He grabs his keys from his pocket and holds them out.

Nick grabs them and replied. "We will do jsut that." Mathew nodded and the three of them walked back outside.

Nick grabs his kit and set to look over the whole car, while Mathew looked over Peter's shoulder watching him.

When Nick was done, he put his equipement up, walks up to them, hands the keys back to Mathew, looks at Peter and shook his head then said. "No blood present and no sign of clean up, I don't believe that this is the vehicle that transported her body."

Peter nodded looked back at Mathew and asked. "Is there anybody who can verify your whereabouts?"

He nodded and said. "I'm staying at my friends house and he was home all night."

After Peter wrote down his name, Nick asked one more question. "Are there any enemys that would hold a grudge on you?"

Mathew thinks for a minute then said. "I don't think it's enough of a grudge to kill somebody and blame me for it, but I can think of a few people were we had a few problems."

Peter writes those names down, then looks at Nick and he shakes his head with no more quesitons, then Peter looks back at Mathew and said. "Thanks for your time we will keep in touch." He pulls out a card and Mathew takes it with a nod.

Peter and Nick turn from him and walk away and as they were heading to the vehicle, Peter looks at Nick and said. "Frame Job?"

Nick looks at him, nods his head and said. "That's what I am thinking, wheter it's Random or not remains to be seeing."

Peter nods and they get back into the vehicle and he drives them to the lab. When they got there Nick walks in the lab while Peter followed up on the leads that they got.

Nick walks into the break room and Greg was just sitting down, he watched Nick walk in and said. "so what do we have?"

Nick sighed and sat down then said. "we talked to the suspect, Mathew Pearson, he has a vehicle that couldn't be the transportation but it did match the fiber on Natasha and he mentioned that his car was broken into but nothing was stolen."

Greg looked at him strangely and said. "so some one broke in just for a piece of the seat cover so it looked like he was the one that did it?" Nick nodded and Greg said. "Is there any connection to Natasha or an old enemy of Mathew who wanted revenge?"

Nick shrugged and said. "I don't know, he may have just picked a person by random to frame, Peter is following up on those leads and more as we speak, but right now we have somewhere to be." Nick holds up the tapes.

Greg smiles and said. "AV lab?"

Nick nods and replied. "AV lab." They both got up from their seats and went right back to work.

Hours later they were ruling out the suspects one by one and when they ran out of leads two hours past shift, they concluded it was a random frame job and the killer was still out there.

Sitting at his desk, Nick shuts the file and looked at Greg. Greg looked back at him and asked. "so that's it?"

Nick sighed he hated it when cases became like this, he nodded and said. "yeah we turned every stone, I wish there was more but right now we don't have it."

Greg sighed and replied. "I guess your right, I just hate cases like this."

"I know me too." It was a few minutes of silence then said. "I guess we could head home."

Greg nods and they get up from the their seats then Greg said. "So how are you going to tell Catherine about your mandatory conference and Brooke going along with you."

Nick groaned and said. "Thanks for reminding me." Greg smiles and Nick continues. "I'll just tell her it's something I have to do she'll understand."

Greg nodded and said. "yeah she will, so when are you leaving?"

Nick gathers his things, looks up at Greg and said. "Tomorrow after shift, I am putting Warrick in charge for the weekend shift can you handle that?"

Greg nods and said. "yes boss, I'll see you tomorrow."

"yeah see you man and tell Karen hi from her favorite uncle." Nick knows that Karen must feel like crap after her going through her second treatment today, so he wanted to make her feel better.

Greg mock glares at Nick and said. "I'll tell her uncle Nick said hi but I don't know if your the best uncle she has." he smirks. He likes it when he gets to pick on him.

Nick just shook his head, rolled his eyes and said. "ok whatever just tell her I said hi will you?"

Greg nodded, smiled, said bye again, left the room and headed out of the lab so he could go get his kids from Amanda's place since the kids get to visit him this weekend.

Nick watches Greg leave then sighs one more time, he totatlly forgot about the conference and really since he cleared everything up with Catherine she shouldn't be the problem it was Brooke who was the problem but he will set her straight if she tries anything.

With that in mind, he turns off his lamp that was on his desk, grabs his coat, the files he wants to take with him to view, he walks to the door, turns out the light, walks out the door, locks it then walks out of the lab and into his vehicle to head home to his wife and three kids.


AN: Hope it wasn't to boring. Coming up next chapter: The conference, One couple's secret is about to be revealed to two people and someone has news they would like to share, is it good or bad? we will see. Please review and you'll find out.