Dedicated to baby K. Sleep tight, little one.
For lack of any better place to be, Eric Delko found himself arriving at the lab early this morning. His meeting with Daniel giving him more than a few things to think about. The arson investigator assumed that he was the one Calleigh had been dating when they spoke yesterday and it hurt to put into words how that was no longer the case.
He'd messed things up royally when it came to her. He'd had his chance and blown it, with no one left to blame but himself for his inability to grow up and finally settle down with a good woman. But Calleigh was not just any woman, she was tough and ballsy, strong yet achingly beautiful. She knew what it meant to be a cop and understood the demands of the job more than anyone he'd ever dated. He'd had everything he'd ever wanted yet threw it away and all because the thought of commitment and emotional intimacy scared him.
His ability to engage in physical intimacy had never been an issue. He was confident in his own sexual prowess and virility when it came to attracting members of the opposite sex. Yet the moment any of his conquests demanded more than just his body, he had pulled away from them, fearing the loss of his freedom and independence.
It had been a traumatic journey that his family had made when they entered the country illegally from their native home in Cuba. Maybe it was because he had an understanding of how precious true freedom was that he was so afraid of losing it. He liked women, he loved spending time with them, yet he couldn't find it within himself to let go of his heart when it came to them.
Calleigh had come the closest to taming his wild ways and he'd envisioned a future for them together. Yet it never seemed to be the right time to settle down with her, just as he thought he could commit, something would spook him and cause him to pull back. Even though he knew she'd soon tire of his games, he chose to convince himself that she loved him and would forgive his skittish behaviour regardless.
By disillusioning himself he had ended up disappointed and alone, having to watch on ruefully as the woman he loved got closer to his own brother-in-law. He loved them both, but couldn't help the twinges of jealousy when he saw Horatio touch Calleigh the way he still longed to.
Just as he thought he was moving on from the bitter disappointment, Daniel Sparks had arrived on the scene, all machismo and charm. His appearance set alarm bells ringing, the beefy fireman making his intentions towards Calleigh clear. It was naïve to think the man wouldn't at least try to make a move on her at some point.
He'd tried to warn Daniel off, to make him aware that she was spoken for, yet he knew Daniel would not be easily discouraged by the revelation. Things had been strained between Calleigh and Horatio for a while and he was well aware that her head was not exactly in the game right now.
Now Horatio was out of the picture – albeit temporarily – would Daniel see it as his chance to swoop in and sweep Calleigh off of her feet? Was Calleigh so emotionally conflicted that she would fall for his charms?
Whichever way Eric looked at it, Daniel and Calleigh spending any significant time together was a recipe for disaster, but would either of them see that before it was too late?
From what he'd heard, the arson investigator had done as much as he could at this stage in the investigation but would no doubt be called upon later to give his opinion on the case. His only hope was that Horatio would be back by then and make it clear to Daniel that he was crossing a dangerous line by continuing to pursue a woman who was already spoken for.
It seemed to take forever for the paramedics to arrive as Jeff knelt by Sally's side, smoothing blood-soaked hair from her face as gently as he could.
"Nearly there, Sally. Help will be here soon, I promise you."
He could feel his hands shake as he desperately tried to keep his own composure. Yet it was impossible to do so when his eyes fell upon her beaten and bruised body. Knowing that he shouldn't, his eyes cast further down her body and found the clothes she'd been wearing pulled open and ripped.
It didn't take a cop to work out what had happened to her as he felt a surge of pure anger wash through his body. The rapid rise in blood pressure causing a rush of blood to the head, momentarily stupefying him with rage. He had wanted to hit out, seeking vengeance against the barbaric monster who'd hurt his friend so badly.
Getting angry would not help Sally. He took a couple of deep breaths, utilising the meditation techniques Christina had insisted he learn, and willed himself to think rationally.
A sound from the hallway had initially caused him to tense and ready himself to fight off any would-be attackers who had come to finish the job on Sally. He let out a sigh of relief as he found himself face to face with two police officers, one of whom he recognised from the siege at his office a few days previously.
The sound of radio chatter filled the air as the male officer spoke into his handset, signalling that it was now safe for the paramedics to make their way into the building and up to the apartment. Turning his attention back to the prone woman on the floor, Jeff spoke softly to her, "Just a few more minutes and they'll be here, ok?"
The blonde female officer cleared her throat. Jeff looked up at her slowly, almost dazed by the frantic turn of events that had unfolded this morning.
"I take it you're Dr Pearce - you made the call?"
Looking down at his hands briefly, Jeff was dismayed to find them covered in blood – Sally's blood. "Uh….yes…that's right."
Jeff stepped aside as he saw the paramedics standing in the doorway, allowing them full access to the woman who was in need of their services. He was grateful for the glass of water the male officer handed to him and did his best to hide the tremors that seemed determined to wrack his body.
"I'm CSI Duquesne and this is my colleague, CSI Wolfe. Do you mind if we ask you a few questions?"
His head shot up at the mention of her name. He'd recognised the male officer straight away and knew him to be one of Horatio's team of investigators. The way the blonde woman was looking at him, as if she were mentally assessing him through sight alone, made it clear she knew of him, even if he didn't know her.
And then it clicked.
The woman standing before him was Calleigh, the woman Horatio seemed so enamoured with. The woman he had left behind while he made his way back to New York. Jeff's eyes wound their way up and down her figure and it seemed strange to finally put a face to the name he had heard spoken countless times in his sessions with the lieutenant.
"Dr Pearce, are you ok?" she asked, her eyes narrowing at him. She knew exactly who this man was and didn't much care for the way he was looking at her.
It was as if he were trying to pass judgement on her. Just what had Horatio said about her in his sessions with this man?
The doctor shook his head. "I'm fine, I'm just concerned about Sally," he replied, watching the paramedics go about their work.
"What's your connection with the victim?"
He flinched at the clinical way she spoke, hating to view Sally as a victim of a crime. She deserved so much better than a life that seemed intent on throwing one curveball after another at her.
"She's my receptionist…..she's also a client, too."
"Any idea who might have done this to her?"
The male officer looked at him pointedly, standing with his hands on his hips.
Letting out a shaky breath, Jeff did his best to answer with the little information he had. "She's been having a few issues lately…..I'm not quite sure what about….she was reluctant to tell me."
"But you said she's a client of yours too, she wouldn't have spoken to you about what was troubling her?"
The condescension in the female officer's tone was clear, Jeff felt his hackles rise at the unspoken accusation. "I don't make my clients reveal anything to me until they're ready."
If she seemed perturbed by his acerbic response she didn't outwardly show it.
"Have you noticed any suspicious behaviour from Miss Keats recently?"
"She didn't bring this on herself if that's what you're suggesting, CSI Duquesne."
Before the conversation could get any more heated, the paramedics bustled their way through the crowded room with their patient in tow. "Anyone coming with her?" one of them asked.
Jeff didn't need to think about it; of course he was going to go with her, there was no way he wanted her to wake up alone. Moving towards the door, a woman's hand stopped him in his tracks.
"Not so fast. We need to process your hands, you may have evidence on them."
His patience with this woman was wearing thin. He commanded himself to get a grip on his emotions and not allow his feelings to dictate his behaviour. He held his hands out from his body, palms upwards. "Get on with it then. I have to go with her."
"Can you account for your whereabouts last night?"
His eyes shot to the female officer again as her colleague ran some type of cotton bud over his hands before sealing the cap and placing it in his metal case.
"You think I'm a suspect?"
"Until we know more, everyone is a suspect. Can you account for your whereabouts yesterday evening?"
"Yes," Jeff responded firmly, not having the time or inclination to play games with the police. "I was on the phone to a client and then I went home to my wife."
In hindsight, it might not have been the best idea to look so pointedly at the female officer when he explained that he'd been dealing with a client, for she knew exactly which client that was. They both knew who the other was, and rather childishly perhaps, both wanted to gain the upper hand in this particular duel of words.
Jeff could tell his words had hit home as he saw her flinch briefly, a look that wasn't lost on her colleague either. Even though he knew it wasn't his place to pass judgement on the loved ones of his clients, there was something about Calleigh Duquesne that didn't sit all that well with him. For all of his promises to Christina that he would take an emotional step back from his clients, he found himself yet again getting involved in things that were better left alone.
"Now if you don't mind, I'm going to the hospital with Sally," Jeff told them, marching from the room.
"Hey, Delko, you seen Wolfe this morning?"
Good morning to you too, Frank...
Turning away from the microscope slowly, Eric gave the detective an amused grin. "He's on a callout with Calleigh. Something to do with that shrink and his receptionist." He shrugged his shoulders, not considering the connection between Horatio and the psychologist.
It was not lost on Frank however. The less he knew about the whole situation the better. If Horatio wanted to keep secrets then that was up to him, he'd promised himself he wouldn't pry.
"Wanna come and squeeze some juice in the Costa case with me?"
Pulling off his latex gloves, Eric nodded his head in agreement. "Are we going anywhere in particular?"
"Our vic Mr Costa has an office in Miami Springs. Uniforms ran the address last night, thought it might be worth having a nose around to see what we can find out."
"Sure. Better than being stuck in here."
"Any luck with that hocus pocus stuff you lot do?" Frank asked as he waved his hands in front of him, emphasising his point.
Eric gave him a rueful smile. "It's not really telling us anything new at the moment. We've ID'd the vics, narrowed down the type of accelerant used, have a rough time of death. Until we've got someone to tie all of that physical evidence to it's useless. I guess we'll have to go back to old fashioned police work."
Frank smiled. "Just the kind I like, Delko."
The two men had been content to keep to themselves on the long drive over to Miami Springs, both clearly having something on their minds that seemed to keep their attention away from each other.
It wasn't like Frank to make a road trip in a CSI vehicle and it occurred to Eric that perhaps the detective had something on his mind yet was unwilling to speak of. The way Frank sat fidgeting and huffing told him it wouldn't be long before the big Texan would blurt something out.
"You heard from Horatio?"
The detective kept his gaze out on to the road as Eric pulled the Hummer to the right sharply and down a side street, causing Frank to grab on to the door handle on the passenger side of the car.
"Nope. You?" Eric kept his eyes to the road, hoping the small flinch at the mention of Horatio's name went unnoticed by his passenger.
"Horatio's not the 'ring up and have a chat' kind of guy, Delko. I just thought you two being so tight and all…."
The way Eric's hands tightened on the steering wheel had probably given away the fact that Frank had struck a nerve with his last comment. If he were being honest with himself he would admit that he and Horatio had drifted apart recently. The ties that had bound them tightly for so long were loosening - as was his grip on the man himself.
The way Horatio had taken him to task for his treatment of Ryan still stung painfully. The man all but telling him that he was disappointed in him. Those words had cut him deeply, yet Eric knew they were no more than he deserved for his childish behaviour. Since then, Horatio had appeared to place distance between them and now the very real fear that he was losing his brother in law began to gnaw at him.
Horatio had left without even telling him and it was something he'd had to find out through a clinical and cold memo left in his pigeon hole. He and Horatio had gone through so much together and, arrogant or not, he felt as if he deserved to be kept in the loop as to what was going on with him.
When he'd spoken to Calleigh about it she had been evasive at best. All she'd told him was that Horatio had returned to New York for an unspecified amount of time. He'd tried calling him twice now and had received no answer. It had crossed his mind to leave a tersely worded message on his cell phone, until his own experiences of being in New York came to mind.
The mere mention of the name John Kelly had caused Andy to react in extreme anger. The more he'd questioned the retired detective, the more obvious it became that Horatio had got himself into something so deep that it defied the imagination. He'd received short shrift himself from the people he'd come across in his brief trip to the city and had no doubt that Horatio's journey back home would be a challenging one.
The man probably had more on his mind than the neediness of his brother-in-law and so Eric had settled on sending a brief text message instead:
Hey man, just wanted you to know I'm thinking about you. Call me when you can.
Judging by recent events, it was unlikely that Horatio would call him back any time soon. It wasn't much, but it was a start in trying to mend some of the fences he'd broken with his own foolish behaviour. Horatio needed to know that, he for one, still cared about him and was thinking of him in what was bound to be a difficult time.
"Don't you think you were a bit harsh with him?" Ryan asked, making his way around the bedroom of their victim, Sally Keats. Torch in his latex-gloved hands, he scoured the area for signs of trace evidence that might lead them to her attacker. The look Calleigh gave him made it clear that she was not willing to discuss the matter.
"Have you found anything yet?"
Her reply was terse as she kept her eye on the hive of activity going on in the apartment. She'd placed a call into Dispatch as the paramedics left with their patient in tow, requesting for further CSIs to help process the scene.
One look around showed that the attack hadn't been confined to just one room. There were signs of a struggle in both the lounge and the bathroom, the door of the latter looking as if it had been kicked in with some force. Whoever the assailant had been, they'd not had the presence of mind to wipe their shoeprint from the door before they left.
It had always been department policy to clear the scene before paramedics were allowed to enter, and she had seen first-hand the force with which Sally Keats had been attacked. Her clothes were ripped and skewed, leaving Calleigh in little doubt that the attack was somehow sexually motivated.
The visual injuries that she catalogued as they waited for medical assistance to arrive made it clear that this had been a crime of passion. It was improbable that Dr Pearce, the man who had found her, was responsible for such a vicious assault. His hands had been covered in the young woman's blood, yet there were no wounds to speak of on them. More than that, it didn't fit the pattern of a sexually motivated attack for the perpetrator to hang around afterward, unless they were particularly twisted in that way.
But she had been aware that their only witness – and so far only suspect – was a psychologist who probably knew how to make something appear as if it were not. Could the doctor have been able to fake his shaken reaction at seeing the victim in such a state?
Perhaps it was her own dark mood that caused her to see the psychologist as a suspect - was she unconsciously seeking to blame him for Horatio's leaving?
It made sense when she thought about it. Although her lover had not gone into any great detail about his sessions with the doctor, it was obvious that the man was having an effect on him. Even she had to admit that Horatio had taken some significant steps forwards in regard to his recovery under the guiding hand of the doctor.
Maybe it was her own ego talking when she considered how much stock Horatio had begun to put into the therapist's words. she found herself feeling unreasonably jealous that her lover always seemed more relaxed and at ease after a session with him. How many times had she tried to do the same thing for him and failed?
She had imagined Horatio's therapist as being many things but had never actually set eyes on the man until today. She found herself surprised by his appearance, not really considering what he might have looked like before now.
The doctor was slightly older than she'd imagined, with lines on his face that told of struggles of his own. It was likely that she had caught the man at a bad time, but there was something about the way he looked at her that didn't sit right with her. It was almost as if he were appraising her, judging her and the way she had treated the man she loved.
And how had she reacted? With anger of course. Had it only been a few days ago that she'd promised herself to separate her heart from her head? Yet at the first sign of trouble she had reverted back to her old ways, causing herself even more grief.
The doctor had to be trustworthy for Horatio to place so much faith in him. It didn't make any sense that Dr Pearce could be anything other than a good man. Horatio was a fine judge of character and wouldn't have continued to see the therapist otherwise.
Realising that damage limitations were in order, Calleigh ordered Ryan to continue processing the scene while she made her way to the hospital to catch up with Sally and Dr Pearce, hoping to repair some damage to her own pride in the meantime.