A/N: seriously thank you so much for my reviews!!!
Chapter 9
The team members were all in the bull pen when Adam and Kat showed up. Kat immediately sat down at the spare desk and started to go through her notes of all three crime scenes.
Peter March 45 shot small caliber then bludgeoned. Tortured. Thomas Gentry 45 shot small caliber then bludgeoned. Both clean no gang affiliations, but a gang member was seen on video at the house of the first murder.. Second murder gun shot seen in video. John Malone 45 same as previous cods. Defensive wounds on his hands and arms . No family for any of the victims. "Hey did we get anything back on the video of the second murder?" she posed the question out loud for the group but aimed it at Ruzek.
"Oh, yeah. The cleaned up video shows the flash at 2 am, and the time of death came back on that murder as anywhere from 1 to 4 am." He pulled up the video on his tablet and set it down in front of her so she could watch.
"And you didn't see anyone leave or enter the house? At all?"
"I watched starting at 10 pm the night before, and I didn't see anyone enter or exit the premises by the front or back door except the victim."
Kat slammed her hands down on the desk causing the entire bullpen to look at her. "This is a human being that is committing these murders, not a ghost , yet we can't find a single shred of evidence as to who they are or why they are happening? What the hell?! How are they disappearing??" she shoved the chair away from the desk and stormed off.
The Intelligence members lobbied whether to go after her or not and decided it was better if she was left alone for a bit. As they continued to work and pull backgrounds on the latest victim and the construction crew Antonio and Hank showed back up. The tension in the room was thick and both men knew something had happened while they were gone.
"Where's Kat?" Antonio asked looking around the room.
"She went to blow off some steam. " Jay pointed in the direction she had last disappeared to. Hank and Antonio shared a look and Antonio went to find her.
Kat was in the garage, beating the hell out of the punching bag that Antonio had installed after a particularly bad case for the team to use whenever they needed it. She didn't have gloves on nor had she wrapped her hands, she was just hitting it bare knuckled. Antonio could hear her stream of obscenities coming out of her mouth before he ever stepped into the room. As he approached he made sure she knew he was there, he didn't want her turning on him. "Hey…"
Kat turned and glared at him. "Can I help you Detective?" she turned back and punched the bag again.
Antonio could see her hands were going to bruise, there were red marks already forming on them. "Kat, stop. I taught you better than this, you're hurting yourself. " he grabbed her hands and pulled her away from the bag. "Your hands are going to bruise if we don't get ice on them."
She jerked away from him. "I don't care. Let them." She moved back towards the bag but turned back to him instead . "Why Antonio, just tell me, why? Why did you treat me like shit? Why the drunken voicemail? You never call me Kitty… what was that about?"
Antonio looked down at the ground, embarrassed. "I was jealous…" he started softly.
Kat sighed, she was afraid that was the case. "Go on."
He took a deep sigh and continued. "Kat I've loved you since patrol. We used to have so much fun together, hanging out , going undercover. We clicked… and when I saw you again , all those feelings just resurfaced. Before, I never said how I felt because of Laura. Now?" he crossed over to her, looking into her bright blue eyes "I felt like maybe it was the right time. And I went about it completely wrong I know. I was an ass, and I'm sorry." He leaned down and kissed her softly before pulling back and wiping the tears that were rolling down her cheeks with his thumbs. "Can you forgive me?"
Kat sniffed and nodded. "Tony I love you too, but you should know… Hank and I…."
He held up his hand "I already know." He wrapped his arms around her, relieved to have gotten it all out. He smiled when he felt hers follow suit. "I really am sorry Kat. I would love for you to stay with me while you're here , but I understand if you don't want to." He kissed the top of her head and they stood there for a second before breaking apart.
"Hey guys sorry to interrupt…" Adams voice broke the silence, they hadn't even seen him come in. "We got the backgrounds back on all our construction crew and the latest vic if you wanted to join?"
The two looked at each other smiling and nodded , following Adam back upstairs. First stop Antonio made was the break room for ice and a towel ignoring Kat's protests . Then they sat down and listened to the team going over everything while Antonio iced her knuckles.
"Okay so Vic 1- Peter March 45 shot small caliber then bludgeoned. Tortured. No family , lived alone. Vic 2- Thomas Gentry 45 shot small caliber then bludgeoned. No family, lived alone. Vic 3- John Malone… this one was brutal. He had defensive wounds, he fought back before being shot and bludgeoned. ME is still working on the TOD, and like our other two victims had no family to speak of and lived alone." Jay handed out papers to each person and tacked the picture of the third victim up on the board.
"The blueprints , the ones the building department were sending to us. Did we ever get them?" Kat asked, sitting back in her chair, wheels turning . What if the first two murders were just to throw us off track for this one, the more violent one. But why would they have tortured the first victim ?
"Right here." Ruzek walked over and showed her on his tablet. She flipped through the documents, waiting for something to click. Then she saw it, spots in each house that appeared to be dead space... perfect for "A safe!" She could have smacked herself on the forehead for not catching it sooner. "We need to go back and check each crime scene, these were robberies!"
"I've got background on the construction crew." Ruzek announced. A group of 10 along with the foreman , he ran through them pretty quickly, most were clean with no warrants or past trouble. That was until he got to the foreman, Malcolm White. "White is a ghost, no pun intended. " as he grinned at Kat referring to her earlier comment who smiled back. "He has no records going back past 2 years ago. Social pulls up a completely different name, Brad Waters, deceased around the same time our friend Malcolm showed up."
The group looked at each other completely confused. "So we have a possible robbery and murder suspect that might have also committed identify theft? " Hank mused. "Split up between the crime scenes and search for the safes, then report back here. I want to know exactly what we are grabbing this guy up for before we make a move."
Before they left Hank pulled Kat aside, raising his eyebrows at her hands and she just shrugged. "I'm fine, they'll heal." Hank couldn't help but grab her hands and raise them to his lips, ghosting them over the injured knuckles, then sharing a look with Antonio.
The team split into 3 groups- Jay and Hailey taking the first house, Kevin, Kim and Adam taking the second, and Antonio and Kat taking the third . They all had copies of the blue prints on their phones, so the searched the houses until they found what they were looking for. The two groups took photos of their finds, a space in the victims bedrooms that were built into the wall, almost like an extra closet. Instead they were floor to ceiling safes, like the size of a gun safe. Since the victims had no family there was no way to know what was missing from them. The team met up outside the third victims house to go over their findings, waiting for Antonio and Kat who were still inside.
Kat was reviewing the blue prints of the house they were searching, and along with the space in the bed room she found something else strange in the hallway. "Hey Tony, this wall shouldn't be here. It shows it's open back here…" she pushed around until the panel moved, revealing a staircase.
"Guys we found something ,you might want to come in." Antonio called over the radio, and they were joined by the remaining team members shortly with guns drawn. They descended the stairs to find an alternative route out of the house through a side panel invisible to the outside unless you knew what to look for.
"This is how they were getting in and out with no one seeing!" Ruzek exclaimed "The sides of the houses aren't covered by any camera. They could have gotten in and out undetected at any time of day."
The team had called Hank at the precinct to let him know what they had found.
"Okay so we need to check the rest of the blue prints , and pull in all the remaining neighbors. See if they all have these extra rooms and exits…" Hank ordered and the team went their separate ways, knocking on neighbors doors and pulling them out of their sleep.
By the time they had rousted all the neighbors and gone through statements it was almost noon. The team was dragging , and ready for a break. Hank ordered them to take a mandatory hour off before returning to the precinct to compare notes, so they split up and went to eat. Kat and Antonio decided to grab coffee at a local diner, where they could sit and sort things out without the rest of Intelligence butting their noses in.
"Hey Sugars, what can I get you?" A sweet woman with a southern accent saddled up to their table when they sat down , and the pair shared a smile.
"Coffee please." Kat and Antonio asked at the same time, causing the waitress to grin.
"Well aren't you two in sync? How cute! Now I know you aren't coming into my diner just to have coffee. Tell you what, I'm going to grab you a piece of my deep dish blueberry bacon pie." And she was off before they could react.
"Well that should be interesting…" Kat giggled. Antonio's heart swelled, he adored hearing that noise come out of her mouth. He remembered the day he first heard it.
Flashback
Antonio Dawson was fresh out of the academy, ready and eager to start patrol duty. He was assigned a spirited lady, Trudy Platt, as his partner. And for the first 6 months the job was everything to him. He worked hard, and was becoming a shining star on patrol. Then one day he came to the precinct to report for duty and he saw her. A tiny thing, 5'5 maybe? She couldn't have been more than a buck 20 if that… she had pale skin, almost ivory, and her hair was blonde, the color of corn silk. She had it pulled back in a tight pony tail that swished when she walked, and when she breezed past him he could smell apples. He grabbed Trudy by the arm "Platt, who is that?"
His partner wasn't one to get into gossip, she hated it actually but she liked her partner so she indulged him. "Her name is Katherin, she just got out of the academy, and is being assigned to patrol here. Hey, how's Laura doing?" she looked at him with a glaring look and Antonio just ignored her.
"Katherin…" he said it quietly, just saying her name was enough for him at the moment. A few weeks later Trudy was shot, and Antonio needed a new partner while she recovered. The fates intervened and assigned Katherin to him . To be hospitable he invited her over to dinner one night with his family, his wife Laura and their daughter Eva, so his two lives could have some coexistence.
Kat stood outside Antonio's door, debating on whether to knock or not. She had been partnered with him for a few weeks, watched as he broke the jaw of a suspect in his previous partners shooting , and now was at his house for dinner. She had enjoyed their time together, he was a good cop and she knew he was going to go places in his job, but she also was developing feelings for him, and she knew that needed to stop. So she knocked, and waited.
The front door opened and Kat looked down to find a little girl peeking out from behind it. "Well, hello there. And who are you beautiful girl?"
"Eva. I'm not supposed to talk to strangers."
Kat giggled "Well, technically I'm not a stranger. I'm Katherin, your dad's partner at work." She could hear footsteps approaching and smiled when she saw Antonio standing there.
"Hey, sorry about that. She knows she isn't supposed to open the door but she gets excited for company. Come on in." He stepped aside and let her in. "Let me take your coat. "
She slipped it off and handed it too him as she stepped inside . "Oh no worries, Miss Eva and I were just getting acquainted. " She smiled at the child who grinned and ran off, causing Kat to giggle again.
Antonio's heart leapt to his throat. "Holy shit, that sound…" he thought before shutting the door and hanging up her coat. "Come on" he motioned to her "I'll introduce you to my wife."
As they made their way to the kitchen Kat took a deep breath in and sighed. "Wow, that smells amazing whatever it is!"
"Thank you, that's the pie I'm making for dessert. You must be Katherin." A mid height dark haired woman came around from the stove to greet her. "I'm Laura, Antonio's wife. It's so nice to have you in our home." She stuck out her hand and Kat immediately shook it.
"Please, call me Kat. Thank you so much for the invitation! I've heard so many wonderful things about you from Tony."
The trio talked and laughed for hours, and started a friendship that would last through the years.
End flashback
Antonio was shook out of his thoughts when the waitress came back with their coffee and the pie. "Here you go darlings, enjoy!" One piece of pie, two forks.
Kat laughed and grabbed a fork "I get the last bite!" calling dibs knowing they always fought for it, before taking the first bite. As it hit her tongue she let out a moan, and clapped her hand over her mouth when Antonio started laughing at her.
"That good huh?" he followed with his own bite, and almost made the same noise.
"I haven't eaten today, but yes, this pie is delicious!" Kat waved the waitress down and asked for a second slice knowing they would eat both fairly quickly.
After the initial shock of how good it was, the two settled in to their conversation. "Did Hank tell you why I'm here?" Kat asked after taking a sip of coffee.
Antonio nodded. "He said you're looking to relocate to Chicago… that you were injured in your last assignment and you were going to ask to come home." He gave her a look she couldn't quite read. "Was it… are you okay?"
He does care. He's worried about me, even now. "I'm not going to lie, it sucked. Being stabbed and left for dead isn't something I suggest to people, but I got through it."
"Where was it? I mean I kinda saw most of you the other night when you were changing, and I didn't see any scars." he grinned at her.
Kat laughed. "You wouldn't have. It was down below my… my lower abdomen, left side." Her face tinged pink. "Anyway, are you okay with it?" He gave her a look like he didn't understand. "Are you okay with me coming back here? Being in Intelligence? "
"Why wouldn't I be? Because of Voight? Kat I was jealous yeah, but I would never stand in your way of living your dream. You deserve this." He grabbed her hands across the table and squeezed gently, avoiding injuring her knuckles more.
They finished both pieces and their coffee and had enough time to beg the waitress for the recipe (unsuccessfully) before riding back to the district.
