Author's Notes: I hope you enjoy.
Disclaimer: Still not mine.
Gassed
Chapter 11
Stella and Adam stowed their kits in the back of the Avalanche and then climbed in. While Stella pulled out, Adam was busy making notes on a pad of paper, his brow furrowed in concentration. As Stella turned on to the next street, Adam snapped his fingers. "That's what they were trying to hide."
Stella looked over at him. "What, Adam?"
"It wasn't what was in the fridge that they were trying to protect but behind it. I knew something seemed weird about it but I just did the calculations and the math doesn't lie. The dimensions of the interior of the fridge is smaller than the outside by about two feet. I think there might be a secret panel in the back. You know, like a hidden drawer. We've got to go back and check it out."
Stella shook his head. "We have a possible homicide to investigate first. We'll go back after we finish at the new crime scene."
Adam shook his head. "That may be too late, Stella. Hell, it may be too late already. Every other incriminating piece of evidence we've found has disappeared. We can't take chances of letting more get away. The possible murder at the Klondike Club isn't going anywhere. Can't Flack and the other officers secure the scene until we get there? Or let me out here and I'll check out the townhouse again on my own."
Slowing the Avalanche, Stella checked the traffic before making a U-turn. Once the vehicle was heading back to the townhouse, she glanced over at Adam. "Call Flack and explain what we are doing. I hope you are right about this, Adam."
A slow smile of relief broke out over Adam's face as he realized Stella was trusting his judgment. He took out his phone and made the call to Flack. The detective wasn't happy with their decision but agreed to keep the scene secured until they arrived. He warned them to be careful. Adam hung up the phone as Stella pulled back in front of the townhouse. Less than ten minutes after they left the kitchen the first time, Adam was once more standing before the fridge studying it and the surrounding space carefully. One side of the fridge was butted against a cabinet, access to that side would be extremely limited. The other side however had a space of about three feet between the fridge and the wall. He wedged himself into the space so he could carefully examine the appliance. Nothing on the side seemed to indicate anything out of the ordinary but once he looked at the back of the fridge, he saw a button that wasn't standard issue on any refrigerator he'd ever seen.
"I think I got something." He was about to press the button when Stella stopped him with her voice.
"Adam, are you sure that's smart? It's probably protected by some sort of trap."
Adam shook his head. "I doubt it. So far, both traps we've found would be easy for the people who planted them to avoid. Know how high to step over a beam and the carbon monoxide isn't released. Don't open the fridge, no bomb goes off. This secret compartment is there for a reason; the people who know about it would need a way in."
Stella acknowledged the wisdom of his statement but she still felt uneasy. "Maybe, but I would still feel better if you could press that button remotely while we were both a safe distance away."
Adam nodded, his mind already thinking of possibilities. He grabbed the extendable, flexible mirror that they used to look under cars or doors. Pulling tape and a small block from the kit, he started to fashioned a device that would accomplish what Stella wanted as Stella watched him, impressed with his ingenuity. He grinned back at her when he was finished.
"Okay, back behind the island." Once they had a barrier between them, Adam extended his makeshift device, using the mirror to see what he was doing. Once he had the block lined up with the button, he pulled it closer until it pressed the button. There was no explosion but the back portion of the stainless steel box started to slide open. The two investigators left their spot behind the marbled countertop and walked toward the opening. Only one person could fit in the space and Adam allowed Stella to go first since she was the senior investigator. She shone her light inside and then turned to look at Adam, an expression of confusion on her face.
"What the hell?"
- CSI: NY - CSI: NY - CSI: NY -
"What the hell?" Jordan Dillon had been completely surprised when Adam and Stella had returned but had been powerless to do anything to stop them. If anything, she had expected that maybe they would find the camera inside the fridge but how in the world had they figured out about the secret compartment? It was supposed to be undetectable. But the man had gone almost straight to it like he'd known it would be there.
She couldn't stop them from collecting what they discovered in the secret compartment. She had to sit there and watch as the woman carefully transferred the contents to a special airtight cooler for transfer to the crime lab. She was powerless at that particular moment to do anything but watch and hope her partner managed to eliminate his mark in time to shake them all up enough that he would be able to slip in and retrieve the container.
- CSI: NY - CSI: NY - CSI: NY -
Danny was in the process of devouring a rather bad example of hospital meatloaf like it was going out of style when there was knock on his room door. He invited the person in as he made a stab at the rather bland vegetables next to the meat. When he saw Freddy entering the room, he dropped his fork back on the tray and looked at the older man in fear.
"Montana? Is she…"
Freddy shook his head, realizing what Danny was worried about. "She's taking a nap and wanted me to check on you. She's always been a little self conscious about people watching her sleep. I see they switched out your oxygen mask for one that's a little smaller."
Danny reached up to touch the nasal cannula they had switched him to when he came back up to his room. He grinned slightly. "That IV bag just wasn't cutting it anymore keeping my hunger at bay. I may have told the nurses something along the lines of either figure out a way to feed me real food or I'd make a meal out of the next person who walked through the door. I must have looked pretty serious cause they delivered the tray before they switched my masks."
Freddy grinned as he settled into a chair next to Danny's bed. "The joke's still on you; they brought you hospital food. When I was in the hospital after my heart attack, I ate so much jell-o that I threatened bodily harm to anyone who even mentioned me eating again. Of course, what's the first thing Lindsay makes when she moves in with me? Lime jell-o."
Danny laughed. "And let me guess, you ate every bite."
"Damn straight. She turns those chocolate eyes on me, bats those eyelashes, and reminds me that my cardiologist wants me to watch what I eat."
"Boom, one container of lime Jell-o is history. She's used that look on us at the lab a time or two. Got me to carry her across a rooftop to check foot impressions one time, I was dead tired from measures I had to take to get witness statements on my own case but there I go carrying her like a groom carrying his bride across the threshold. She even got Mac to try this smell-altering gel to demonstrate something in a case once. Just puts it on him with no warning. Any of the rest of us had tried that with Mac and he'd been on our cases for weeks afterward but not with Montana."
"Connor is the only one I know of that's immune to it; probably because he's just as gifted at it as she is. It's probably also the reason why he's on the fast track to being the youngest DA in Bozeman's history, maybe even the whole state of Montana. Linda bragged once that Connor could just about look at a jury, tell them the defendant is guilty, sit down, and still win the case."
"You told me earlier about her many trips to the emergency room." Danny observed with a grin. "I bet she was a real hellion growing up."
Freddy laughed. "That's an understatement. She definitely kept her guardian angel busy growing up. Her mother stayed on her case all the time that boys wanted to date young ladies, not some rough and tumble tomboy but she never listened."
"I would have hated to be a teenage boy coming to her house to date her. I bet her dad had a shot gun all shined up and waiting." Danny admitted and then wondered where the hell that observation had came from.
"Doug didn't need a shot gun, not with her five older brothers around." Freddy admitted. "When she was a freshman in high school, this senior who was a classmate of Jeremy, invited her to the prom. She was so excited; the only one of her friends to get an invite. Still, much to her mother's dismay she spent all day out on the ranch with her father and me helping to replace fence posts. She was a mess when she came back to the house to get ready and Linda show she'd never get her all cleaned up and presentable in time but boy howdy did she. She was a royal knock out when she came back down those stairs with her hair all curled up and piled loosely on her head, a royal blue short shiny dress and heels that had to be five inches high. Then the guy didn't show up. Doodlebug was devastated, ran up stairs in tears. Doug had the shot gun out ready to go hunting for the little cuss. Connor and Dougie, who were home from college for the weekend, told him to let them take care of him."
Danny couldn't imagine anybody standing Lindsay up on a date. What was the idiot thinking? He hoped the boys rearranged his face when they found him.
"They were halfway out of the door when Jeremy came down in his tux for the prom and told them not to bother. Said he had over heard some boys talking in the locker room the day before about their prom dates. One of the boys was bragging about how he planned on slipping vodka in his date's drinks all night until she was so drunk she couldn't even stand. Then he was going to take her to some cheap motel and have his way with her. Jeremy came around the corner about that time, ready to give the guys a piece of his mind for being such jerks when he realized the one doing most of the talking was the guy who was suppose to be taking his little sister to the prom. By the time he was finished, the boy wasn't even able to walk out of that locker room under his own power. Jeremy told him if he so much as talked to his sister at all, even to break the date, he'd come back for him and make this beating look like he'd been whipped by a six year old girl."
Danny's jaw rocked at the idea that anyone could even think about treating his Montana that way. His Montana? Where had that possessive come from? "Glad the jerk got what he had coming to him. Too bad Montana got all dressed up for nothing, though."
Freddy shook his head. "Who said it was for nothing. After Jeremy finished his story, he went up stairs, got Lindsay to dry her eyes and then he took her to the prom. She had so many guys ask her to dance that Jeremy barely got to dance once dance with her. After that though, Doug didn't worry too much about boys that came to their door. If they had gotten past her brothers, then they had to be pretty good guys."
The two men continued swapping stories for another fifteen minutes and then Freddy excused himself to use the bathroom. He could tell Danny was getting drowsy himself and figured after visiting the restroom, he would let the younger man get some rest and head back down to check on Lindsay. In fact as he went to close the door behind him, he saw Danny's eyes already drifting closed. Coming out he was surprised to see a man wearing scrubs and a mask standing at Danny's bedside about to inject the contents of a syringe into Danny's IV. Danny was still asleep.
"What are you doing?" Freddy asked from the doorway. He knew from his own stay in the hospital that medical personnel didn't perform any treatments on a patient without waking them first unless the patient was unconscious. Besides, what doctor on rounds wore full scrubs into a patient's room?
"Just giving Detective Messer his evening meds." The doctor answered as he moved to finish his task. Freddy stepped forward and grabbed his arm, stopping him.
"I want to see your ID before you do anything." Freddy's grip was surprisingly strong given his older age. He managed to make the doctor drop the syringe but then the doctor gave him a sudden shove away and bolted from the room.
Danny woke up at the commotion and sat up on the bed as the doctor bolted from the room. The guard stuck his head in, just as confused as Danny was. Freddy looked at him. "Chase that man. I don't think he was a real doctor."
The officer took off and Freddy explained what had happened to Danny. Danny looked around the room and saw the box of disposable latex gloves the hospital kept in the rooms for the doctors and nurses to use. He asked Freddy to bring him a couple. Once he had the gloves he slipped one on and got out of bed to pick up the syringe. He held it up and frowned. "Nothing in there but air." Danny carefully placed the syringe in the extra glove and set it on the nightstand to reach for his phone, looking at Freddy as he did so. "Thanks man, you just saved my life. I'm calling Mac to let him know what's happened. Please, get back to the hyperbaric center and check on Lindsay. If he came after me, he might go after her next. I'll be down there as soon as I can." Freddy nodded, frightened.
The cell phone rang a couple of times before Mac answered, his voice sounding groggy. "Mac, Danny. We got a problem. Somebody just tried to kill me."
- CSI: NY - CSI: NY - CSI: NY -
Mac frowned into his phone. He knew from the presence of his own guard that Flack had arranged protection for Danny and Lindsay as well. How had someone gotten past the guards? "Is Lindsay safe?"
"I don't know; I just sent her uncle back down to check on her. As soon as I can get dressed and get a nurse in here to take this IV out, I'm heading down there myself. I'll wear the damn oxygen mask down there if I have to but I'm not going to let her out of my sight while someone is trying to kill us. I don't know if we can get prints off the syringe but I have it protected. Can you send someone to pick it up?"
Mac threw off the covers on the hospital bed and reached for his clothes. He'd only promised to stay as long as nothing else happened. Someone trying to kill one of his team was excuse enough to call off all promises. "I'm on my way. I'll call Flack to meet me there. Be careful Danny. These guys are obviously playing for keeps."