I'm withholding chapters, you guys. I fully admit it, I need comments. How else can I know what works and what doesn't?
Keats laid low in her car. She was at the warehouse that had once been empty during the daytime, but was now miraculously filled with boxes and several men handling said boxes. She pointed her camera and zoomed in as far as she could, snapping a picture as quietly as she could manage.
"Morgan, damn you." She whispered. Morgan's deal was something she could never talk about. She'd broken so many ties because of him just so she wouldn't have to lie. And it was so essential that she keep everything a secret.
She wanted to call backup desperately, but knew they'd be too late. As it was, she wasn't exactly supposed to be staking out the warehouse anyway. She'd be demoted before she'd get the chance to be a hero.
'Dare I go in?' Keats thought to herself. She was wrestling against the idea. She had tried to do the stupid but brave thing too many times and it had gotten her into more trouble than she could stand. But it seriously affected her to just walk away and let Morgan's boys get away with smuggling stolen weapons.
Weapons that they'd eventually use to stage coups and other scummy things.
Keats exited her car and carefully closed the door, feeling for the gun at her hip. As she extracted it from its holster, she felt a hand enclose over her arm. She immediately panicked and gave her unknown assailant a swift punch in the nose.
"Jeez, Keats." Ryan muttered under his breath, holding his nose with one hand.
"I'm so sorry. What are doing here?" Keats rasped, trying not to alert anyone else to their presence. They heard several shouts and before Keats could react, Ryan had grabbed her and dove under her car.
Keats was lying on top of Ryan, feeling his broad chest and his strong arms around her waist. She was overwhelmed by him. In an effort to save herself the pain of remembering how good it felt to be in his arms again, she got up. She leaned against the car and peered over the side, her weapon in hand.
"Keats…" Ryan began. Keats looked over at him questioningly.
"We're too late. Everyone's clearing out. And they're taking the stuff with 'em." Keats said with a sigh. Her window of opportunity to close this up had passed. Maybe it was fate that Ryan intervened. Otherwise, she probably would have gotten herself killed this time.
"Keats, look at me." Ryan said, taking her chin in his hand. She gazed into his beautiful brown eyes and was once again taken in.
"Don't. You just got through telling me how happy you are with Olivia." Keats said, pulling his hand away. It made her sick to do it, but damned if he wasn't making everything extremely hard on her.
"I know that Morgan leaned on you to break it off with me."
"What? That's ridiculous. I would never have let someone else make me break up with you." Keats said.
"Tell me the truth." He snapped. Keats was frightened. She just couldn't. It wouldn't change the past and it certainly wouldn't change things now.
"No. Don't you understand, Ryan? Remember when you told me about your mom? And the fact that you had no control over what happened? This situation is something neither of us have control over. Let it go." Keats said, rising to her feet.
She opened her car door and was about to get inside when Ryan stepped in front of her.
"I think you're lying. But don't worry, Keats. I believe in you. And I'm going to find a way for us to be together." He said, moving aside to let her past. He walked on toward the parking lot and Keats stared after him, bewildered.
--
Keats tossed and turned during the night. Morgan's words were always with her. She'd had a dream of that fateful day when she'd confronted him at his apartment.
"He doesn't trust you. How can you love a guy like that?" Morgan asked.
"I don't know. But I trust him. I know things will be all right. I'm sure there's a good reason." Keats said somewhat lamely. Morgan laughed at her.
"I think you underestimate the power that I have and what I could do to him." Morgan said.
"Leave him alone. You're mad at me, not him." Keats tried to reason with him. Morgan was hardly finished throwing his weight around.
"I don't want anything to happen to you, Keats. I think Ryan is bad news. I don't want you to see him anymore."
"I don't take orders from you, Morgan." Keats said.
"You don't have a choice."
He'd gone on to name drop. Erica Sykes was always looking for a good story, and bonus points if it was about an old flame. Ryan's career would be worthless after Morgan was finished with him.
Keats woke up drenched in a cold sweat. The horrors of that day were probably directly responsible for the loss of her baby. She'd ignored Morgan's warnings at first, thinking that Ryan's love for her would weather through anything.
But losing the baby made her lose faith in everything.
"Can't we just go back to the way things were? Why is everything so complicated?" Keats cried. Kiddo had woken up and was struggling to reach her face so that he could lick it dry. Keats laughed through her tears, but was only mildly comforted.
"I thought love could do anything. I thought love was all anyone really needed. How could I have been so freaking wrong?" Keats muttered, crying angry tears. Kiddo sensed her pain and yowled.
Keats matched his wails and the two of them howled into the night.
--
"Mr. Wolfe. I heard it was urgent. Is anything wrong?" Horatio Caine walked over to the water fountain in front of the M.D.P.D. where CSI Wolfe was waiting impatiently.
"H, it's Remington." Ryan began. Horatio gave a nod.
"I'm listening, Mr. Wolfe."
Keats had gone to work that morning with little fanfare. She hadn't experienced insomnia like that since she first broke up with Ryan. Her eyes were swollen, but she managed to cover up most of her splotchy face with makeup.
She got in her car with a weird sort of feeling, but continued to drive as though nothing was out of the ordinary. And for a while, nothing was.
Keats eventually looked over at her rearview mirror and saw a strange black car following her, tailgating her. Keats nervously sped up.
After turning onto the street where the Miami Dade Police Department was located, the car suddenly disappeared. Keats shook her head and wondered if she wasn't just overly stressed.
On her way to the parking lot, Keats noticed Ryan and Horatio talking together in front of the water fountain. It had been months since she'd seen Horatio. She'd desperately missed him.
"If she's in danger, Mr. Wolfe, then we need to make sure she's protected." Horatio said, putting his hands on his hips and smiling a knowing smile. Ryan nodded and knew what Horatio expected of him. And after being away from Keats for so long, it would certainly be his pleasure.
"Ugh." Keats said as she stepped out of her car. She had started crying again after seeing Horatio, and her nose was starting to run.
"Here." Ryan said, handing a handkerchief to Keats. Keats looked up at him and wanted to kill and kiss him at the same time.
"Why are you waiting here for me?" Keats asked, dabbing the hankie around her eyelids and then blowing her nose.
"Telepathy. I knew you were crying over me, so here I am." He said with charm. Keats laughed and shook her head.
"Some telepathy. I was actually realizing how much I missed Horatio and working at the Lab." Keats admitted.
"It's because of me. Don't deny it, Keats. You're just as in love with me now as you were half a year ago." Ryan said with a smile. Keats giggled.
Olivia DeLuca stood near the elevators on the ground floor of the parking deck. She noticed Ryan and was about to walk over to him and tell him that he'd left his Lab Pass over at her place, but she saw someone else standing beside him.
Her hair was different, but there could be no mistaking that it was Ryan's ex.
"I don't think anyone could be in love with you as much as you already are with yourself." Keats chuckled. Ryan noticed Olivia through his peripheral vision and immediately stiffened.
"I was just kidding, jeez. I laughed at your jokes." Keats said. Olivia wrapped her arms around Ryan in the next second and made a big show of kissing him right in front of Keats. Keats was stunned.
"Baby, you left a few things over at my place last night. I thought you might need them." Olivia slipped a few things into Ryan's pocket and whispered a few erotic nothings in his ear. Keats was livid.
Olivia smiled at Keats as though she were some pathetic little insect and she pushed her aside as she went back to the elevator. Keats turned on her heel as well, ignoring Ryan's protests.
--
"What have we here?" Horatio asked, examining a body that had just recently come ashore. Alexx shook her head and extracted most of the kelp and excess sea crap that had attached itself to his body.
"I'm not sure what killed him, but I can tell you he didn't drown. It was like he was dumped for convenience." Alexx said, looking for wounds and perforations but finding none.
"The body was identified by witnesses as Leroy Kramer. He was the Space Coordinator of these warehouses." Detective Tripp added, reading from his notepad.
"Space Coordinator? What the hell is that?" Alexx asked, finding the body absolutely unharmed from the outside.
"He arranged who rents what unit and when. He had every single key to every single lock in this compound." Tripp explained.
--
Keats pressed her hand against the glass as Morgan sat down across from her. She lifted the phone from its cradle and sat down to have a chat with her demented guardian angel.
"Did you come as a cop or as a visitor?" Morgan asked. Keats bit her lip.
"Visitor. I'm on my lunch break." She said. Morgan gave an accepting nod.
"I didn't tell him anything." She added. Morgan said nothing, but continued to stare at her.
"I'm not worried about him. I'm worried about you. If I'm in prison, then that means my boys will assume you know too much." Morgan said after a time. Keats gave a hearty smile.
"As long as Ryan's okay, then I'll be fine." She said. Morgan frowned heavily and knocked at the glass with his fist.
"Why are you acting like such a fool? If you just give me the word, I'll make sure he takes the heat for this instead of you." Morgan struggled not to yell. Keats shook her head vehemently.
"I know what I'm doing. Ryan has a life now. A life without me. I want to keep it that way." Keats said, replacing the phone in its handle. Morgan shouted after her that he wasn't finished. Keats had reaffirmed Ryan's safety, and that was all that mattered to her.
Keats walked out into the bright Miami sunshine, feeling wonderful and strangely content. It made her feel great to know that Ryan was going to be spared further pain at her expense. In some small way, she was trying to make amends for hurting him so badly before.
She began to cross the street over to the parking lot when she saw that same black car that had been following her earlier. It had just bound the corner and was approaching her fast.
"Shit." She mumbled, running as fast as possible just to make it to the parking lot. She had made it across the street safely, bounding into the parking lot in a panic. Her heart was beating abnormally fast, but she was also relieved.
She raced to her car and got in, backing up and pulling around to exit the Dade County Jail Parking Lot. As she turned a few corners, she noticed all of the gates were closed off. There didn't seem to be a way for her to leave.
"Don't panic…it's probably just closed for lunch…" Keats said to herself, dialing Jake Berkeley's cell phone number. He was her partner for the case and he was probably close by.
Keats glanced over in her side mirror and felt a jolt at seeing the ominous black car coming from her left. They were driving way too fast and showed no signs of slowing. She'd be sandwiched between the black car and the wall. She'd be dead.
Keats crept out her car from the passenger's side and kept on running, watching in horror as the black car swerved just before impact. The black car had changed direction and was now hot on her trail.
Up ahead, Keats could see the gap between the gate and the wall of the parking lot. A tiny little sliver of freedom. But if she had misjudged the width of the gap, then she'd be trapped like a raccoon.
Keats made a flying leap for the gap, squeezing and struggling against the wired fence. She finally eked through and tumbled across the street right into oncoming traffic. Keats felt too sore to move, but she rolled toward the gutter with one last burst of energy.
A sea of honks and screeches sounded all around her as she blacked out.
--
An EMT finished wrapping Keats' hand while she sat in the back of the ambulance, feeling uncomfortable for causing so much trouble. Again.
She'd been through much worse, so she was extremely grateful that a sprained wrist was her worst injury of late. She noticed Berkeley ducking into the ambulance holding up his phone with a smirk.
"If you were going to visit the guy, you should have had me come along." He said, hopping into the seat beside her. Keats rolled her eyes.
"Then I'd have had you to worry about, instead of just myself." Keats said somewhat grumpily. She was still extremely sore.
"But you're being followed." Berkeley added with more than a hint of concern.
"I'm taking care of it. As soon as this case is over I won't have to worry about it anymore." Keats shot back with defiance. She knew where Berkeley was headed.
"And if you die before it's over? What then?" Ryan Wolfe was standing in front of them with his arms crossed over his chest and a grim look on his face. Berkeley took this as his cue to leave. For once, Keats hated to see him go.
"Get bent, Wolfe. Mr. 'I left my boxers over at my girlfriend's place.' God, you make me sick. You're playing us both at the same time. If I don't work out, you'll have Olivia to crawl back to?" Keats sniped, exiting the ambulance and facing Wolfe with intense animosity.
"I guess I deserve that. Look, we'll talk about this later. I need to know everything about Morgan and the people he worked with." Ryan began, his tone insistent. Keats began to shrug but Ryan grabbed her shoulders and shook them.
"This isn't a game. I want you alive."
"I don't know anything, damn it!" Keats exclaimed, releasing herself from his grip. Whether or not Ryan believed her, he didn't say. He stopped asking her, though.
In truth, Keats didn't really know anything. All she knew was that she was under Morgan's mercy and that she'd had to give up Ryan for his own safety. And she could not under any circumstances tell him, or Ryan would be at Morgan's mercy as well.
"Why can't you just accept that I don't love you?" Keats said. She hoped her last attempt at keeping Ryan safe would work.
"Prove it." Ryan said, smiling wryly. Keats gave a gruff sigh.
"If you have any love left for me, then you'll let me go." Keats said. Ryan nodded, slightly miffed that she didn't believe he could save her. He decided to play along with her little lying game.
"All right. You win. Game over." Ryan said. Keats had expected him to fight a little. He knew she was lying, but he was probably tired of hearing the lies. In some strange damsel in distress kind of way, she hoped that he would be able to 'save her.'
"Did you get a license number on that black car?" Ryan asked, changing the subject.
"Nah. I was kind of busy running for my life." Keats said coldly.
--
"I've seen something like this before. But he rose from the dead, if you recall." Alexx told Ryan. They were in the autopsy room looking over Leroy's cadaver.
"Tetrodotoxin. It's over a thousand times more potent than cyanide. His killer was hell-bent on being extremely thorough." Alexx continued.
"Tetrodotoxin from a puffer fish?"
"It's a delicacy in Japan. But they have to be prepared carefully." Alexx added.
"Obviously. Cause of death?" Ryan asked, taking a photograph of the deceased.
"Ironically, suffocation. His diaphragm muscles were paralyzed. I'm guessing the person who prepared Leroy's last meal knew exactly what he was doing."
--
Keats knocked on the door with her left hand. Her right hand was out of commission for the next few weeks. What a pain in the ass. Or wrist.
"Mrs. Kramer?" Keats asked as she saw a flicker of movement from inside the house. A tiny, frail little woman peeked around the door.
"Who are you?"
"Detective Remington. I'm here about your husband." Keats supplied, holding her badge up. The woman gave her a nasty glare.
"I've already spoken to several of you cops. I don't want to speak to any more." She said, slamming the door.
"I can get a warrant in five minutes, Mrs. Kramer. Make it easy on yourself and just let me in. It won't take long, I promise. And it could help me find your husband's murderer." Keats said.
After thirty seconds, Keats almost gave up. Mrs. Kramer then decided to open the door and let Keats inside.
"How can I help you find Roy's murderer?" Mrs. Kramer asked, settling on her couch like a frightened mouse. Keats glanced around the living room, noticing numerous pictures of fishing adventures and boating events. Leroy seemed to take to the water like a fish.
"Did he often eat lunch near the docks?" Keats wondered, admiring a spotted bass mounted across the mantle.
"He usually brings his lunch. I fix him a sub sandwich every day." Mrs. Kramer admitted. Keats shrugged her eyebrows.
"But he liked to eat fish."
"Yes. Sometimes. He only ate fish that he caught himself."
"Are you sure?" Keats asked, trying to link up every piece of the puzzle.
"Well…if it was imported, he ate that too."
"And yesterday. What did you make him for lunch?" Keats wondered.
"They already asked me that. I told them I fixed him a salad and a sandwich like always."
"Did you know he ate Fugu instead?" Keats asked, finally turning to face Mrs. Kramer.
"Fugu…how in heck would he get his hands on Fugu in Miami?"
"Exactly." Keats said.
Keats walked closer to Mrs. Kramer and sat down beside her on the couch, holding onto one of her hands with her uninjured wrist.
"Can you tell me a little about the people Mr. Kramer worked with?" Keats asked.
--
"All this stolen weapon crap and the whole Fugu death thing makes me think that the Yakuza must be in on this." Keats said to Berkeley.
They were on their way to the Crime Lab and Keats was incredibly nervous. It had been a long time. Keats dealt with the stress by cracking unfunny jokes.
"Why would the Japanese Mafia waste their time smuggling weapons over here? Don't they have better places to be?" Berkeley asked. Berkeley, Keats understood, was not very bright at all. Observant, but not bright.
"To kill us with their specialized dishes…I was kidding, Jake. It's a defense mechanism to hide my insecurities about coming back to the Lab." Keats explained. They were now in the elevator and Berkeley was giving her strange looks.
"Jake? You've never called me Jake before. Are growing fond of me?" Berkeley asked, driving Keats crazy with his obscenely insincere smile. Keats made an ugly face.
"No. In fact, it's more a lack of respect. I consider you the younger brother I never had and never really wanted." Keats snapped.
"Ouch. I'll let it slide right now, but don't talk to me that way in front of other people, 'kay? They'll think we're in love."
Keats stifled a laugh and the door elevators opened. Keats remembered the last day she spent in the Lab before her transfer. It was a sad, depressing day. She'd said goodbye to everything down to the plastic partition in the hallway.
And here it was, just as she'd left it. Nothing had changed. Not really.