Title: Blood Ties (2/?)

Disclaimer: Don't own anything to do with CSI: Miami, and all you'd get if you sued me is a laptop and a couple pairs of really nice shoes. Hardly seems worth it, right?

Rating: Still R in this chapter…

Pairings: Eric/Maria (OC)

Feedback: Please! But be nice. If I wanted to be criticized, I'd call my sister ;)

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"So, what do we have?" Maria asked. She was trying to sound calm, but Eric could see she was anxious.

"Two bodies, a male and a female." Horatio replied as they reached the open front door of the apartment.

"Gunshot wounds." A uniformed officer added. "Their roommates found them like this about half an hour ago." He stepped out of the doorway to allow the team to see into the apartment.

Maria's breath caught in her throat. The TV and couch were visible from the doorway. And on the couch, the bodies of a couple who looked like they couldn't have been out of their teens. The next thing that registered in her mind was the blood. It had soaked their clothes and hair and the couch, and pooled on the floor. The rancid stench of congealing blood and dead flesh hit her full force, and she grabbed onto the nearest thing she could find, which happened to be Eric's shoulder, for support.

"You okay?" He asked, although he could guess the answer. He'd seen that look before.

Maria nodded, taking a deep breath. "Yeah...I think...no..." She let go of his arm and bolted down the hallway, only making it about twenty feet before she doubled over and retched in a potted ficus plant.

"Oh, shit." Eric winced, going to help his new colleague.

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"Feel better?" Calleigh asked, handing a bottle of water to Maria, who was sitting on the front steps of the apartment building with Eric.

"Thanks." Maria said. She took a sip of water and grimaced. "Aside from wanting to crawl into a hole and die, yeah."

"Don't worry about it." Eric said, patting her shoulder. "It happens to everyone."

"Yeah right." Maria mumbled.

"No, he's right. Everyone embarrasses themselves somehow on their first day." Calleigh sat down beside them. "Hell, at least you got far enough from the scene first."

Maria's eyes widened. "You're kidding."

"I wish." Calleigh sighed. "All over myself, a detective, and half the evidence. Alexx told me she cried for three hours after her first post. Tim actually screamed like a little girl."

"Speedle? No way." Maria said incredulously. "You're kidding."

"Not kidding. And Delko-"

"I don't think she needs to hear that one." Eric interrupted.

"Oh, you're blushing." Maria teased. "I have to hear it now. Come on, really, what did you do?"

Eric looked at the ground and muttered inaudibly.

"What?" Maria leaned closer to him.

"He fainted!" Calleigh said, a little too loudly.

"Thanks, Calleigh. Really, thanks a lot." Eric groaned. He looked at Maria, who was biting her lower lip. "Go ahead, laugh."

"Maybe later." Maria said, suddenly serious. She winced slightly as she glanced at the apartment building behind them. "They're just kids, aren't they?"

"Jessica Billings, nineteen, and Kyle Eden, just turned twenty last month." Calleigh confirmed. "Turns out their roommates are her twin brother Matt and his girlfriend, Lisa Denton."

"Come on." Maria said, standing up. "You can fill me in while we get back to work."

"You sure you're ready to go back in there?" Eric asked.

Maria took a deep breath and nodded. "Yeah."

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"All four of them are sophomores at Florida State." Horatio told Maria. "This is their first place off campus, they moved in two months ago."

Maria nodded as she took off her olive green khaki jacket and tied it around her waist. "Jesus, it's like a damn sauna in here."

"Air conditioner's been broken since Thursday." Horatio explained.

"Which explains the state the bodies are in." Alexx added, swatting at the flies that were buzzing lazily around the bodies. "And the smell. I'm placing time of death between midnight and one AM on Saturday."

"Which happens to be around three hours after Matt and Lisa left for a hotel for the weekend. Apparently the air conditioner wasn't going to be fixed until this morning, and they decided they couldn't handle a weekend without it."

"Didn't seem to bother these two." Calleigh said, indicating the victims. Kyle was only wearing white cotton boxer shorts, and Jessica was in a short silk chemise. On the table next to the couch were several empty condom wrappers.

"So, Matt and Lisa didn't think it was weird that they didn't hear anything from Jessica and Kyle all weekend?" Maria asked.

"They said they hadn't expected to." Horatio replied.

"How about other friends or family members?"

"I can answer that." Tim said as he came out of the kitchen. He held up a Post It note. "Looks like Jessica was supposed to meet someone by the name of Clara for lunch yesterday afternoon." He held up a small address book and pointed out an entry. "Clara Billings. Older sister. Detective Hagen says they've been trying to reach her all morning, but no luck."

"Sounds like we need someone to pay a visit to Clara." Horatio said.

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Eric and Maria drove from the apartment building to the college campus in silence. What was there to say? They were about to tell a young woman that her only sister had been murdered.

"This is it." Eric said finally, looking up at the sorority house. "You ready?"

Maria nodded. In vice, she'd rarely had to deal with bereaved families. But even those few times had been more than enough for her. It broke her heart to see the look on a family member's face when they heard that someone they loved was dead. "I feel guilty." She said out loud. "Like somehow it's my fault."

"I definitely know what you mean." Eric told her as they climbed out of the Hummer and started up the front steps. "I've always figured that there are certain things we're not supposed to ever get used to, and if we do, it's not a good sign. Like how some people think that getting used to seeing horrible things happening on the news can make you desensitized to violence."

"I don't see how anyone could ever get used to this." Maria sighed as she rang the doorbell.

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TBC...