Chapter 92

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Tim and his team were called to a new case in the early hours of the morning. A female marine was found stabbed in the stomach in an alley several hundred meters from the Navy Yard. Tim kissed a still sleeping Hadrian and left him a quick note with the time he left and where he was headed before he left to join the team at the crime scene.

Tim sketch and shoot, Ziva bag and tag, Tony canvas the area for potential witnesses. Keep an eye out for the murder weapon it would be stupid to dump it in the same place, but murderers often aren't as smart as they think they are," Gibbs ordered, examining as much of the body as he could without touching her.

Ducky arrived and began his on-scene evaluation.

"Time of Death?" Gibbs barked.

"Around midnight to one am, I can be more specific once I complete the autopsy," Ducky replied looking at the liver temperature.

"The stomach wound the cause of death?" Gibbs asked.

"Heavens Jethro, I cannot confirm that without getting the poor girl back home to do a proper examination, though it does look likely. The wound was certainly antemortem," Ducky replied.

"You can take her. This is a dump site, she wasn't killed here," Gibbs said.

"No but lividity was only partially fixed in the previous position so she was dumped soon after death, less than an hour I'd say perhaps twenty or thirty minutes though I will have to confirm that," Ducky replied. "Bag the hands," he ordered Jimmy.

"So dumped after 1215 and before 0140," Gibbs said to Tony. "That means she was killed somewhere in the DC area."

Once Ducky had cleared him to touch the body, Tim ran her ID "Lance Corporal Marina Schubert. Posted at Norfolk.

"Marina the Marine, do you think that's why she enlisted?" Jimmy asked chuckling.

Gibbs wished that he could head-slap Ducky's assistant but knew that was a line Ducky wouldn't let him cross. The young man was terrified of him enough.

"What's she doing here so near the Navy Yard then? Do you think she was coming to see us?" Ziva asked.

"Not at that time of night but perhaps she was here to meet someone from the yard. There's not much else around to bring her here, does she live in DC." Gibbs said.

"She actually lives in Fredericksburg the other side of Quantico.

"That would be quite inconvenient if she has some long-term relationship with someone in the DC area," Ziva said.

"She wasn't killed here so why dump her so close to the Navy Yard. I doubt it was for our convenience," Tony said sarcastically.

"Forensic countermeasure, it's one place that ties to the victim not the killer," Ziva suggested.

"No, this neighbourhood ties with the Navy and DC, perhaps it was a fellow marine or someone from Quantico."

-o0o-

Her parents were her listed next of kin, they lived in Iowa and Tim was quickly able to prove neither of them had been in the tri state area the night before so they were happy to let the local law enforcement do the notification, and ask her parents to come and do the official identification.

Ducky confirmed that the stomach wound was the cause of death. The weapon was a standard Marine knife, a dead end. They were issued in the thousands over the last several years.

"Was she sexually assaulted?" Gibbs asked.

"No there's minor trauma, indicative of consensual sex within the last four to six hours, I sent a rape kit up to Abby but there was no visible semen. I'd say her lover used a condom," Duck replied. "I also sent stomach contents up, she had a full meal approximately two to three hours before death."

"That all you can tell me?" Gibbs asked beginning to move towards the door.

"There's one other thing, this is a double homicide. She's eleven weeks pregnant," Ducky said.

"Did you narrow down the time of death?" Gibbs asked.

"The pregnancy may have raised her temperature slightly so 2330 to 0100. Possibly closer to 2330, which means she may have been dumped earlier too," Ducky replied. "I will have a better idea once I can access her medical records."

"Did she know?" Tony asked.

Gibbs pulled out his phone and called Tim and Ziva who were searching the victims' apartment on base. "Ziva, the lance corporal was pregnant, we're not sure if she knew," he said. "Duck needs to know her doctor's details too."

"There's nicotine patches and maternal vitamins in the vanity, she definitely knew," Ziva said.

"We need to find out who the father was, he's the main suspect, unless she was a surrogate for someone in which case it could be a jealous lover who either couldn't cope with her carrying someone else's baby no matter how nonsexual the circumstances or who didn't believe she was a surrogate and thought she'd cheated on him." Tim said.

"She wouldn't be a surrogate, look around, her whole life is the marine corps, she wouldn't jeopardize her career like that she was too ambitious, she wouldn't have taken herself out of the running for advancement or an overseas posting like that," Ziva replied.

Tim looked around and had to agree. There was no photographs or anything in the apartment which indicated a close sister or best friend for whom she would surrogate for personal reasons and the money offered for such services wouldn't be enough to compensate for the damage it might do to her promotion prospects.

"You're right, so we're looking for the baby's father," Tim replied.

"Is that like Tony's insistence that the wife did it?" Ziva scoffed.

"Unfortunately not, Ziva. Timothy is correct the largest single cause of death in pregnant women is the father of the child," Ducky said sadly. "Especially since the wounds penetrated the uterus. I've sent samples to Abby so we can match paternal DNA once we have suspect."

"There's no sign of a man living here," Tim said. "No men's toiletries or a change of clothes. There is an empty drawer in the bathroom and the bedside drawers on the left are also empty and there is a gap in the wardrobe. Two brands of cigarettes in the kitchen. A second person might have stayed until recently but there's nothing here to ID him. I'll track her calls and email and see if we can find him that way."

"If she used a condom does that mean the man she was with didn't know about the baby?" Tony asked.

"She may have told him afterwards or if she isn't his only partner it could be for protection from STD's or he could already have intended to kill her and known we'd check for sperm DNA," Gibbs replied.

"So you think whoever he was, could have spent four or five hours having sex and then a meal, like a normal date. Without her getting suspicious?" Ziva asked.

"Not everyone is trained by Mossad or from growing up in a guerilla war zone to look for threats even among trusted friends and allies," Gibbs reminded her.

"I'll ask her commanding officer if he knows who she was seeing, he'll be available in an hour," Tony said.

"Okay, head back here, and start your searches into her calls and financials. If she is a surrogate there has to be legal paperwork somewhere and it should show up in her financials. You'll know better than I do what payments to look for. Tony and I will head to speak to her CO and whoever she was close to at work," Gibbs ordered.

Tim ran financials and went through the call logs on both her home phone, personal cell and external calls placed and received by her work extension line going back one month and then two without finding anything but then nine weeks ago there was a change in her habits. There was a number of calls every day to one cell number and several charges for room service charges in various DC motels, once or twice a week, never the room itself always room service or the minibar. He ran a trace on the number and found that it was a burn phone there was no way of tracing the owner without physical access to the phone but he was able to hack the carrier, accessing the call logs. The phone had been used for approximately three months before being turned off 9 weeks earlier. The majority of the calls were to Marina Schubert but also several to various motels in the area matching the list of motels that showed up on Marina's credit card a day or two after the call had been made, likely reservations. This all pointed to two things, firstly the relationship was clandestine on his part, the man had something to lose if it became public, though it was obvious that Marina hadn't been content with the secrecy, and secondly he had decided to end the relationship and cut off contact nine weeks ago, possibly before the Marina had found out she was pregnant or possibly right at the same time. He knew Tony would assume that meant the man was married, and either did care for his wife or the wife was the one with the money or there was a damaging prenup if he was caught cheating. Not being obsessed with sexual motives or in the habit of automatically blaming wives for everything, Having grown up as a navy brat and familiar with the rules about dating in the services Tim also considered that it could also mean that this man was a Marine, and in a position of power over their victim possibly in her direct line of comand. So, he started researching who those men might be.

Tim asked Ziva to start filling out applications for the security footage of the motels on her charge card for the days in question. A man careful enough to use a burn phone wasn't likely to be stupid enough to use a credit card to pay for the room but he still had to enter and leave the hotel and not everyone was good at spotting and hiding from security cameras while they were distracted.

Moving to Gibbs' computer so he didn't slow down the searches his own was already doing, he then started hacking into various hotels where there victim had made room service charges, she hadn't paid for the room on the off chance that her partner had been careless enough to use a credit card, and hacking into the victim's phone's GPS history to try to find what other cell phones had been in the vicinity at the times she was at one of these motels. Hopefully, the man had had his real phone on him at the time and hadn't turned it off while he was with his mistress.

"Tim, Gibbs is going to kill you for sitting at his desk?" Ziva exclaimed.

"He's given me permission to run searches on his computer to speed up an investigation before. Gibbs and Tony will be arriving at Norfolk any minute now and if the murderer is one of Lance Corporal Marina Schubert's superior officers then they need to know as soon as possible," Tim replied, his fingers still flying over the keys as he set up more searches.

"He gave you permission to sit in his chair and go use his computer?" Ziva asked astonished.

"Yeah, I'm not Tony, he knows I won't use the privilege to snoop, besides Gibbs hates computers he doesn't use this one for anything personal. Well actually he didn't give me permission to use his chair just the computer but I don't think he'll mind so long as I don't readjust his settings," Tim replied.

He got the results he needed and hurriedly contacted Tony.

"Tony it's her CO. Commander Robert Carter. He's the man she was having an affair with. He's the leading candidate for baby daddy and prime suspect," he said quietly.

"Are you sure?" Tony asked.

"That he's potentially the father, definitely. I have his phone pinging in multiple motels at the same time as hers. That he's the killer, no but he's married. His wife was a Farrer her people are multimillionaires and he worked hard to keep the affair quiet. Nothing on his credit card, burn phone for all calls. She was less discrete, room service charges on her card at every motel. The affair ended 9 weeks ago," Tim reported.

"Thanks," Tony said ending the call.

The commander had already denied knowing Lance Corporal Marina Schubert very well. "She did her job efficiently with minimal fuss and kept her personal life out of the office," he'd said. "They were welcome to talk to his other staff but he'd be surprised if they knew anything."

He made a hand signal to Gibbs to put him on alert and then turned to the Commander and asked

"Sir where were you last night between 2200 and 0300?"

The Commander stuttered. "W-what?"

"According to her file, Marina Schubert's hand to hand skills were above average but she didn't have any defensive wounds. She was killed by someone she knew, someone she trusted. So, until we can discover a motive, we will be asking everybody we know she had any sort of relationship with their whereabouts at the time of the attack," Tony said.

"I was at home in bed," the Commander said.

"Anyone who can verify that?" Tony asked, smiling vacantly. "Got to cover all the bases you know. We won't be checking alibis unless we find something that indicates you had motive to kill her. It just saves time you know.

"I was home with my wife," the Commander replied unwillingly.

Gibbs interrupted growling at Tony in irritation before the Commander gave the address. Tony knew it was only for show to put the man off his guard, his address would be in his military file but he had to admit it was very convincing.

"Sorry about that, he gets a bit over enthusiastic," Gibbs apologized. "We've taken up enough of your time, please call us if you think of anything you think we should know."

They didn't get much from the colleagues there that day, Commander Carter was right in one thing. Lance Corporal Schubert didn't confide in her co-workers, none of them had any idea who she'd been dating in the last six months, or who her friends were outside of the marine corps.

-o0o-

"Tim identified Commander Carter as a previous boyfriend and the likely sperm donor," Tony told him.

Gibbs nodded and called Tim to get the information directly from the source.

"Tim report," he ordered putting the phone on speaker.

Tim ran through the evidence he'd managed to collect. "I also have security footage at one of the last motels they visited. Facial recognition definitively identifies Robert Carter and Marina Schubert. We got lucky it was a regular meet up place of theirs and the security cameras were new, in every other motel he's done his homework and is careful to look away from the cameras but the clothes and build are similar, the lab is running biometric data in case we need it for evidence."

"Get the warrants to back up the information," Gibbs ordered.

"I already have warrants for the security tapes and since receiving them I have applied for warrants for Commander Robert Carter's cell phone records and financials," Tim replied.

Typically, Gibbs grunted instead of saying 'good work' and asked Tim and Ziva to track down the wife and confirm Carter's alibi.

Veronica Carter was a sweet woman, chatty and a little naive she initially backed up his alibi but she suffered from chronic back pain and had taken a sleeping tablet the night before. She confirmed that Robert had gone out for a business dinner but returned home just before she went to bed at ten o'clock, he had brought her her tablets and a cup of tea in bed but she'd taken the pills and admitted that she'd been asleep by ten thirty and didn't wake until eight next morning when Robert had brought her breakfast in bed before leaving for work. She didn't think he'd left the house but had to admit that she wouldn't have known if he had. They slept in separate bedrooms because he was afraid of waking her or hurting her back as he moved in bed.

Tim set to work checking traffic cameras around the dump site and in the Carters' neighbourhood trying to break his alibi. He also applied for a warrant for the GPS all cars owned by Robert or Veronica Carter, and for Robert Carter's DNA.

-o0o-

Marina's parents, Chris and Peggy Schubert arrived that afternoon and made the formal identification Ducky needed to sign off on the Autopsy paperwork. They were upset to find that they couldn't take their daughter home to bury until the case had either been solved or gone cold and Gibbs gave Ducky permission to release the body. Unfortunately, they had little to add to their knowledge. Marina hadn't mentioned being followed or feeling worried about her safety. She hadn't fought with anyone that they knew and she didn't have any enemies.

Her parents also hadn't known she was pregnant and had no information about who she'd been seeing. "She did say she was seeing someone a while ago and she hoped it was her forever love but she said it was too early to really talk about it but she wanted me to know. Then she was heartbroken about two months ago when they were having difficulties but they must have sorted things out because she's been much happier lately," her mother rambled.

"She never mentioned his name?" Tim asked.

"Rob or Bob, or Rick, I think, perhaps," her mother said hesitantly.

Tim sighed. There was no sign of someone new in her life and from what her mother said it seemed to him that Marina had been hoping the baby would help them get back together or even persuade Robert to leave his wife for her.

It was confirmation they were on the right track but it wouldn't stand up in court.

"Can you tell me who her close friends are, perhaps she confided in them or they noticed something when they were out together," Tim asked.

Unfortunately, Marina's mother was only able to tell them about friends from high school and college, not current friends and admitting she didn't know caused her mother to cry and Tim quickly turned her into her husband's arms to calm down while he tried to identify her friends in DC and Quantico.

He had more luck in using her call log to identify the five most frequently called numbers on Marina's cell phone and Tony took Ziva to meet with them.

The third number led them to Lisette O'Malley, who was home when Tim and Ziva arrived having worked the night shift. She was a paramedic, and immediately recognised That they were law enforcement bringing bad news.

"Who?" She asked shakily.

"We are investigating the death of Lance Corporal Marina Schubert, who was found murdered in the early hours of this morning. You are one of her most frequently called numbers and we were hoping that you might be able to give us some information on who she might have been having difficulty with, or who she was dating recently," Ziva said.

"You don't want me to come in and identify the body?" Lisette asked.

"Her parents came to do that already but she didn't confide in them very much about her personal life," Tim replied gently.

"You want to know about the baby's father?" Lisette said.

"Yes, I'm assuming from the complete lack of evidence of him in her apartment that it isn't a current relationship," Tim replied.

"They broke up a couple of months ago but there was never much sign of him. He was married. I told her that he wasn't going to leave his wife but she wouldn't listen," Lisette said. "I don't think he ever came to her apartment."

"Do you know his name?" Ziva said.

"Don't you?" Lisette asked surprised.

"We have a fair idea but it would be better to have confirmation," Tim replied. "We need evidence to back up our suspicion before the judge would give us a warrant for his DNA then it will take a day to run and even then a DNA match would only be proof of paternity not proof of a relationship."

Lisette nodded. "His name is Robert Carter and they worked together. I only met him once but they were together at least three months."

"And the baby was definitely his?" Tim asked gently.

"Yes, she was totally committed to him," Lisette replied.

"Did he know about the baby?" Ziva asked.

"Marina said she'd told him about a week ago and they were going to start dating again. She was sure he would choose her and the baby. I think he went to her ultrasound appointment yesterday," Lisette replied.

"Did she deliberately try to get pregnant?" Ziva asked.

"She never said," Lisette said evasively.

"But you think she could have?" Ziva pressed.

"At the end when he was talking about ending things she might have been that desperate but I don't know if she would've had the opportunity. She wouldn't have done it before then. She was talking about the two of them taking an overseas posting Hawaii or Europe," Lisette said.

"Do you have any proof of their relationship?" Tim asked.

"No, as I said I never met him," Lisette replied.

"Did she write anything about him in an email or send you a text she might have deleted from her own phone? Did she keep a blog we haven't found yet, that sort of thing?" Tim asked.

Lisette thought for a moment. "Nothing that identifies him by name but a couple of emails complaining about not being able to spend time with him at work and having to hide their feelings from their co-workers," Lisette admitted.

"Would you print me a copy of the conversation?" Tim requested.

"Certainly," Lisette moved to her desk and looked for the emails.

"What made you think he wouldn't leave his wife?" Tim asked while she was occupied, hoping she would share more if she didn't overthink the answer.

"He was too insistent on keeping their involvement secret. He wouldn't meet any of her friends or come to her apartment or take her out dinner or anything. She thought picnics in isolated places was so romantic but it seemed to me that he was just desperate not to be seen with her. People in love enough to even consider leaving their wives aren't that controlled. They take risks and he never did," Lisette said.

"Would your opinion be different if you knew he was her commanding officer and risked a dishonourable discharge if they were caught?" Tim asked curiously.

"Then he's an idiot! But no, I still don't think he would ever leave his wife for her, that just gave him more to lose. He wasn't that in love or it would've shown," Lisette declared.

-o0o-

"Hey Boss," Tim called in his report as they left the friend.

"What you got?" Gibbs demanded.

"Hearsay confirmation Carter was the father and that Marina told her friends he knew about the baby. Confirmation it was a relationship, not a one off but that's also hearsay, he refused to meet her friends. Secrecy was super important to him and he controlled every part of their relationship. He had a motive for killing her," Tim reported.

"Proof?" Gibbs demanded.

"Emails, sent by Schubert revealing her lover was a co-worker but not naming him," the friend signed verification of the printout, and she said Carter was invited to the ultrasound yesterday," Tim replied.

"He won't have gone if he was planning to kill her," Ziva added.

"No but she would have got pictures from the ultrasound and wanted to share them with him. He might have been able to make an excuse for not going to the appointment but if he hadn't agreed to meet her last night she would have been upset or angry and her friends would have known," Tim said.

"Tony check if Lance Corporal Schubert left the base yesterday and if any of her department was absent at the same time. Then start trying to find out where the ultrasound occurred," Gibbs said before he left to get coffee.

"The ultrasound was at 1700 at Walter Reed in Bethesda. The receptionist said that Schubert attended alone and the tech concurs. Carter didn't leave base until 1730. His wife claimed he was home before 1800. It's a twenty-five minute drive at that time of day, and well over an hour to Bethesda, he didn't meet her there," Tony reported twenty minutes later.

"Did we have any luck with the traffic cams?" Gibbs asked.

"It's inconclusive, he wasn't seen but there aren't many cameras in Carter's neighbourhood, it would only take a small detour to avoid them if you knew where they were," Tony reported.

"And near the dump site, there's plenty of cameras in this neighbourhood," Gibbs growled.

"There are to the west and south of the dump site but not if you approach the site from the East, unfortunately. I have a car that looks like the same make and model as his caught on an ATM camera four blocks away but I can't lift the number plate, there's a car that looks like it might be the same one returning eight minutes later which could fit in the time frame of dumping the body," Tony replied.

"Is there a reason to believe that he would know where the locations of the speed cameras are around the Navy Yard?" Gibbs asked.

"He did work here in a joint operation for eight months, two years ago?" Tim said.

"If he's a serial philanderer with a wife he's committed to keeping in the dark, he'd have learned to find ways around the cameras," Tony said. "You can bet Senior could tell you where every camera in his neighbourhood is."

"Is there any evidence that he is a serial philanderer?" Gibbs asked, hiding his amusement.

"Marina's friend Lisette said he's too controlled in his interactions with Marina. She didn't believe he loved her because people in love take risks to be together and he never did. That fits with him having a regular bit on the side," Tim said.

"His wife's a bit of an invalid with her chronic back pain, I can't imagine that she's up for frequent bedroom athletics," Tony added.

"He's too careful for it to be his first time," Ziva said.

"Ziva is right. He didn't slip up and call her on his main phone or have to use his credit card because he didn't have cash, even once. Either he's done this before or he has undercover training," Gibbs said.

"There's no record of that sort of training, in his jacket, he's spent his whole career in an office," Tim said.

"Where are we at with the warrants?" Gibbs asked.

"We got the warrants for the CCTV footage at the motels, and for financial records of all her male co-workers, female too incidentally. Mainly because she was involved in some pretty sensitive information over the last six months and they'd be the only ones who knew she was the one handling it. We were declined the DNA samples and phone records at this stage," Tony replied.

"Okay is there anything more we can do tonight?" Gibbs asked.

"Yeah, the other interviews with her friends, they might be home by now," Tim said.

Tony and Ziva both groaned.

"Tony, Ziva you take Amber Houghton, and Tim and I will visit Chloe Leeman," Gibbs said.

The two interviews pretty much confirmed what Lisette O'Malley had already told them but offered no new information. Amber was worried that Marina was too fixated on Carter wanting the baby enough to leave his wife for her to see the reality of the situation, and Chloe had been concerned from the start that Carter had been using her and was going to break her heart.

Tony reported in to Gibbs as they left Houghton's house and Gibbs sent them home for the night.

"Do you want me to drop you off home as it's on my way or take you back to get your car?" he asked Tim.

"Drop me home please, I might get home in time for bedtime stories and the bus from home isn't too bad if I can't get a lift from Hadrian," Tim replied.

Gibbs sped up, he remembered how important it had been to Kelly and Shannon that he arrive home before Kelly went to bed. He must have been on time because Tim smiled when he looked up at the lit windows on the second floor as they arrived.

"Thanks Boss."

A/N: Thank you to Kourtney Uzu Yato, Lientjuhh, Melikalilly, Rainbow2007, Rori Potter, linzi, lilly-flower15, Millie072, Fyreheart, Chezakeeba, aisa.32, DarkRavie, Merlenyn, rmiser1994, xDarklightx, Village-Mystic, Selenity84, FraulCruz, mooneysfate, catspaw439, starie78, luramos, Jacqueline Sun, SpiritBlackPaw, sandipi, MageVicky, caged21hearts, buterflypuss, cyiusblack, Tetradical, Jostanos, knuckles 8, DS2010, charm13insomnia, nativelittle-fox, featherflower, acherongoddess, 777angeloflove, Beth9891, serenityselena, ldavis02.02.2015, mizzrazz72, mayawene, Fallow55, Serpent91, The View From Up Here, Silvermane1, Afrodity, tatis, Linda, Sakihinata, Sakya, hawkswench, Blosiom and all those who followed or favourited for your support.