Carolyn POV


Liz called before we got to 1PP and asked us to take a detour by the morgue.

"I found something that may interest you," she said.

"That's great, but…what are you doing there?" I asked her. "I thought that you were going to take the day. What about your hand?"

"I took care of it already. And I needed to work," she said. "You can understand that."

I didn't argue with her.

I could understand it.

I also had a feeling that she and I should sit down for a heart-to-heart chat as soon as we resolved this case.

Surely she could use a friend right now and honestly, I owed her.

She'd helped me out quite a bit after that whole Taggart incident.

And she'd shared with me a story that I doubted anyone else knew.

I mean, Ross probably did. Maybe. But that was about it.

And knowing that story slightly changed the effect that this most recent attack may have on her.

"We'll be there in ten minutes," I said. I hung up the phone and told Mike that she had something.

"Why is she at work?" he asked me in concern.

And I loved him for that being his first question.

Not what did she find. But why was she working.

"She needed the distraction, I think," I replied. "It'll help to get some time between the attack and the present. Then she'll be able to deal."

He nodded thoughtfully, but didn't say anything more until we got to the morgue.

"If you need to spend some time with Liz…alone, I mean…just let me know. I'll chase down whatever lead she gives us. You just make sure that she's okay."

I squeezed his hand and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek and then we headed into the building.

"I'm Suzi and I'm a chocoholic," Liz announced when we walked into her autopsy suite.

"I knew about the chocoholic thing, but you're changing your name now?" Mike asked her with a half-grin.

And to my surprise, he crossed the room and gave her a hug.

"How're you doing, Doc?" he asked her affectionately when he released from his embrace.

She managed to look startled and touched and embarrassed all at the same time.

"I'm okay," she said.

"Good. So what's this about you being Suzi?"

"That's the nail polish from your suspect," she replied. "I went by the lab when I got in and found a few things with your name on them. Where did the fingernail come from?"

"We had a break-in last night at the office," I explained. "It doesn't look like anything was taken, but someone sure had a good time making a mess of things."

"Well, your perpetrator has nine lovely nails painted with a unique shade of polish. And the one that she was kind enough to leave behind provided us with a DNA sample."

"Did it match up to something we have on file?" Mike asked hopefully.

"No. But get this. The lab also pulled DNA from a substance that was on the fingernail."

"A substance. You mean like skin cells? Like she'd scratched someone before the nail broke?"

"It could've been that. Only it wasn't. This substance was semen."

"Ew. Okay. Um…huh."

"Carolyn, you're tongue-tied. That doesn't happen very often," she said with a smile.

"I just wasn't expecting that. Okay, so did we get a match?"

"Yes we did," she said with a nod.

"If it's Harker, I'm gonna have to kiss you," Mike told her.

"Ah, well, I never was lucky in love," she replied with a dismissive wave.

"It's not Harker?" I asked in surprise.

"It's Peter Boyer."


Liz POV

It pained me to even say the man's name, but I was still convinced that working today would be therapeutic.

And finding out more about what kind of man had attacked me could only help.

Because knowledge was power, right?

So I'd convinced Danny that I was okay to work, and I'd jumped into the case with both feet. I'd gone by the lab to find out about the gloves and then I'd run across the fingernail, complete with results.

I also had the preliminary results on the gloves that Pebo had been wearing. There were trace amounts of blood that matched up to Barry Brubaker.

"So Pebo definitely killed Brubaker," I told them. "And he was having some kind of a sexual relationship with the woman who broke into your office."

"And that's Hemmings," Mike said. "But I would've sworn that she and Harker were an item."

"Does it matter?" I asked him. "I mean, does it change the theory?"

"Not really," Carolyn said with a shrug. "I mean, we know that they're working together, but as friends or lovers, it doesn't really matter. We still need to find that missing piece of the puzzle. Everything you have is great, and it'll help us get arrest warrants."

"Well, for Hemmings at least," Mike interrupted. "We still have to pull the call logs on Harker to get more proof that he's involved."

"Having his number in the murderer's phone doesn't give you some kind of probable cause?" I asked him.

"We need more or he'll skate," he replied.

"I wonder what Lupo's guy got off that data stick," Carolyn said to Mike.

The two of them began a hushed conversation in which they seemed to leave out key words and they were saying more with looks and nods than with their voices.

I watched in amazed amusement for a couple of minutes and then I finally had to interrupt.

"You guys have been hanging out with Bobby and Alex for entirely too long," I told them.

"Oh, sorry, we're…" Carolyn began distractedly, and then she shook her head. "I'm sorry. That was rude."

"It's fine," I insisted.

Because it really was.

I enjoyed seeing the two of them working so well together.

And it made me miss Danny.

It made me realize that I needed to open up to him and tell him what was on my mind rather than closing off and keeping it inside.

Last night, when he'd found me in the bathroom, he'd held me for the longest time. And then I'd taken a shower and we'd gone to bed.

But silently.

And it felt like there was a gaping chasm between us.

It almost felt like Marcus all over again, and I couldn't let that happen.

"It's fine," I said again. "But you didn't let me tell you the best part."

"What's that?" Mike asked.

"The letter," I stated. "The lab found trace evidence of fingernail polish on the paper. On top of the ink," I said pointedly.

"Fingernail polish," Carolyn said. "As in…I'm Suzi and I'm a chocoholic?"

I gave her a nod of affirmation, and we all wore matching smiles. It was exhilarating when things started to come together.

"So all we have to do is confirm that the nail belongs to Ms. Hemmings and we'll have our mysterious author," Mike stated.

Then he turned to Carolyn and said, "Sweetheart, I don't know about you, but I'm ready for a round-up."


Lupo POV

Mike called me as we neared 1PP.

Liz had matched the nail polish from the break-in to the Dear John letter.

"We need to bring her in," Mike said.

"Hemmings?"

"Uh huh."

"Yeah, that's a great idea," I agreed. "So where is she?"

"I've got a theory about that," he said. "But I also have an idea about Harker, and I can't do both. Where are you two?"

"Almost back," I told him. "And my guy, whom we are apparently going to start calling Mulder, got miles of stuff off that data stick. Interesting let's-fuck-him-over kind of stuff. So me and Bernard were thinking it was time to pick up Harker."

"If you're near 1PP, do me a favor. Check out Harker's personnel file before you go get him. I'm thinking that the answer to our C-Dog question is in there somewhere."

"What makes you say that?"

"A hunch. And the dynamic of his relationship with the others."

"No problem," I agreed. "We were going to wait for the phone call anyway. So we'll check into Harker while you two follow your gut on Hemmings. I'll call Connie and let her know that we'll need an arrest warrant soon so that she can have it ready. If you find Hemmings, just sit on her, okay?"

"Oh, now what fun would that be?" he asked me.

"Mike."

"We won't do anything stupid. But we may have a little chat. And I'd love to get a closer look at her manicure."

I hung up with Mike and filled Bernard in on the latest.

"He's not going to get carried away is he?" he asked me.

"Mike? Possibly. But that's why he and Carolyn make a good team."

"She reels him in?"

"No, she's smart enough to provide a good cover story," I joked.

"Speaking of making a good team…did I hear you say that you need to call Connie about a warrant?"

"Yeah, so?"

"So make a date."

"We live together. We don't have to make dates."

"Lupes. Make a date. And tell her that you have something important that you want to talk with her about."

"Why?"

"Because if you say that, you can't chicken out. She won't let you."

I thought about his statement for a minute. He had a point.

But it was a very un-Bernard like thing to say.

"Why do you care?" I asked him carefully.

"Because we're partners," he replied, as though I'd just asked the dumbest question in the world. "We watch each other's back."

"Okay," I said with a slow nod. "I hear you."

So I parked the car in the garage at 1PP and then stayed in my seat while I dialed Connie.

And maybe it would be unprofessional of me to ask her on a date while I was also giving her a heads-up for an upcoming warrant request, but oh well.

It was just me and Bernard in the car, and apparently he had my back.

"She's probably in court," I told Bernard as the phone rang. "I may have to call Cutter about the warrant instead."

He just shrugged and sat back in the seat. I was getting ready to hang up when she finally answered in a hurried voice.

"Rubirosa."

"Oh, hey, I was expecting to get your voice mail," I said. "Aren't you supposed to be in court?"

"Don't ask," she replied in irritation. "It's been one thing after another this morning, and then the judge decided to toss the whole damn thing. Can you believe that? He dismissed. Without prejudice, but still…he tried to say that the prosecution had failed to meet the burden of proof, but I've got the damn proof. And if he'd given me ten minutes to tell him what I had, then he would've realized it, but no, he couldn't do that because he and the defense attorney are old golfing buddies, so it's wink-wink, nod-nod and good-bye trial. And does Jack support me in this? No. He says, well Connie if you'd been better prepared then something like this probably wouldn't have happened. Better prepared? Does he really think that I wasn't prepared?"

She paused for a moment, presumably to breathe after that lengthy tirade, but since the break was also at the end of a question, I thought that maybe I'd better answer it.

"I'm sure he doesn't."

"Doesn't what?" she barked out.

She was clearly in a bad mood and maybe this wasn't the best time to suggest a date. I glanced at Bernard, and of course he was watching me intently, and he gave me an encouraging nod.

"Um…I'm sure that he doesn't really think you weren't prepared."

She took another deep breath and then said my name on a sigh and the sound of it instantly restored my confidence.

It was the same sound she'd made last night when I'd pushed her to the brink of sanity.

"I'm sorry," she said quietly. "I'm sure that you did not call so that I could yell at you."

"I did if that's what you needed," I replied.

"You are so sweet," she said. "I can never stay in a bad mood around you. So what can I do for you?"

"Uh, I'll probably want an arrest warrant today for Anna Janelle Hemmings. Mike and Carolyn went to see if they could track her down. Liz found some hard evidence that can potentially tie Hemmings to the break in as well as the attack on Liz, so I was hoping that you could have it ready."

"Sure. No problem."

"Great. Thank you. And I'm sorry about the trial. That judge is an idiot."

"You don't even know which one it was," she said, and I could literally hear her smiling.

"I don't have to. If he treated you like that, then he's an idiot."

Bernard chucked me in the arm and motioned for me to get to it.

I waved him off and then pointed for him to get out of the car. I appreciated his encouragement, but I didn't need him eavesdropping.

"Hey, if we can finish up at a decent hour tonight, I'd like to take you to dinner."

"Yeah, to make up for Saturday night," she said quickly. "Sure, that sounds great."

"Good," I answered, for some reason relieved even though I had to know that she'd be willing to go to dinner.

I mean, we were living together.

"You know what?" I continued. "Even if it's late. Whatever time we finish, I'd like to take you somewhere. I have something that I…something that…I just really need to talk with you, okay?"

"Is everything okay?" she asked immediately.

"Yeah. Yeah, everything's fine. I just…is that okay?"

"Sure," she replied hesitantly.

"Okay. Good. I'll call you later."

I hung up and got out of the car where Bernard was lurking, waiting on me.

"Everything okay?" he asked me. "Or did you wuss out?"

"Everything's fine," I said firmly. "And hey, don't say anything to anyone else about this, okay?"

"Of course not."

"Okay. Let's go pull Harker's file and see if Logan's hunch is on target."

TBC...