CHEAP SHOTS
Chapter 1: "Five Times"
Spoilers: "Strip Strangler" (122)
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"Is this him?" Special Agent Rick Culpepper asked of Catherine as he leaned over the body of Syd Goggle.
Catherine answered in the affirmative, her eyes still on Grissom, who was holding his wounded shoulder. "Y'alright?" she asked him again tenderly, reaching out to touch his arm.
"Yeah," he nodded. "Thanks to you."
"Willows..." Culpepper murmured, crouching by the body...
"What?"
"Exactly how many bullets would you say it takes to incapacitate a dangerous suspect?"
With a shrug, she replied, "One or two... why?" She furrowed her brow, not understanding the relevance of such a question.
"Well," he sighed, his tone holding an air of arrogance, "You unloaded five into the suspect, not only incapacitating him, but pretty much causing imminent and immediate death."
"It was self-defense," Grissom chimed in, frowning at Culpepper.
"Really? So the suspect was coming after her?"
"No, he was going after Gil," she corrected him. "It's our job to protect one of our own if they're in danger."
Grissom snipped, "He was a serial killer. What's your point, Culpepper?"
"My point is, serial killer or not, this man was an officer of the law, and therefore an investigation is pending."
"What?" She stared dubiously at him. Now she could see why Gil thought he was such an ass... "He was just a security guard!"
"No matter how low on the law-enforcement totem pole, Miss Willows, he was still an officer of the law." He nodded toward Sheriff Mobley. "Take her down to the station."
"What?!" Grissom and Catherine exclaimed in unison. Grissom shook his head in disbelief. "You can't be serious, Culpepper..."
"Mr. Grissom, when it comes to killing an officer, I'm dead serious."
"Gil..." Catherine called over her shoulder, worry now clouding her eyes as Mobley led her away by the arm.
"Don't worry Cath, I'll be right behind you!" he assured her, then shot an evil glare at Culpepper before following her.
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Catherine sighed as she sat primly in the hard chairs of the interrogation room, staring down at her lap as Culpepper and Brass entered the room. Brass laid a supportive hand on her shoulder, and she glanced up at him, attempting a smile that ultimately came off as weak when he looked down at her.
Culpepper's voice broke through the heavy silence. "Alright, let's go over this again..."
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"This is crazy," Nick drawled, shaking his head as he crossed his arms over his chest, standing just behind Grissom on the other side of the two-way mirror.
Though the room was dark, it was certain that everyone's eyes were centered on Catherine. Sara stood toward the back with Sheriff Mobley, leaning against the wall with her hands clasped behind her back, and Warrick and Nick stood on either side of Grissom, both of them leaning their butts on the table, legs stretched out in front of them. Grissom held the position closest to the glass... directly in front of it... his hands in his pockets as he stared intently at Catherine.
"They shouldn't be questioning Catherine," Warrick sighed, "They should be closing up the case and gettin' the Feds outta here."
"This is ridiculous," Sara added from the back. "She didn't do anything wrong. She saved Grissom's life."
Softly, Grissom told his 'kids,' "They're just following protocol. When an officer is shot... any kind of officer... they need to do an investigation."
Outwardly, he seemed cool and composed, but inwardly he was terrified for Catherine. Knowing Culpepper, he'd dig into Catherine's past and make her look foolish. He'd strip her of her pride... and of all the daily irritants in his life, someone belittling Catherine Willows was the one thing Grissom would absolutely not tolerate.
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"So you went to Mr. Goggle's apartment..."
"Yes," she replied in a low voice. "To look for Gil."
"And why would Mr. Grissom even be there?" Culpepper asked, leaning on the table. "If I remember correctly, he was suspended from the case." He smiled to himself. "And also, if memory serves correctly, the rest of you followed his lead, and went on a little 'strike'... right?"
"We went 'civilian,'" she explained, "But we didn't stop working the case."
"Ah. I see."
"What're you gonna do? Have us all fired for doing our jobs?" she snipped. "If it weren't for us... if it weren't for GIL, for that matter, you wouldn't have even HAD a suspect. You'd still be conducting your frivolous little 'decoy' experiments."
Brass smirked at the venom in the senior CSI's voice, and laid a hand on her shoulder once more. "Cool it, Cath," he reminded her gently.
"Sorry," she apologized in a whisper, her eyes downcast on the table.
Brass nodded in acknowledgement and glanced up at Culpepper. "Just get to the point Rick, hmm?"
"Fine," he sneered. "So you went to Mr. Goggle's apartment looking for your supervisor, or GIL, as you seem to be comfortable calling him..."
"Jim..." she murmured, glancing over her shoulder for assistance.
"Rick!"
"Fine!" he hissed again. "You went to Goggle's apartment looking for Mr. Grissom. Did you go inside?"
"No," she replied. "I was about to, but something told me to check the laundry room first, so I headed down there."
"Alright, and when you arrived at the laundry room, what did you see?"
She sighed, staring at the surface of the table as if looking through it, reliving the horrible occurrence from earlier. "From the top of the stairs I saw Syd hit Gil on the shoulder with a wrench, and then Gil fell to the floor. When I saw Syd reach for the shovel I grabbed my gun, headed down the stairs, and shot him."
"But you didn't stop with one shot..." he needled her. "You pumped five bullets into him. Why?"
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Nick shook his head, frowning at the scene taking place on the other side of the glass. "Man, that guy's an ass..." he murmured, more to himself than anybody else, but everyone caught it nonetheless.
"He's one of the best Special Agents the FBI's got, Stokes," Mobley reprimanded him from the back of the room.
"I don't care how good he is," he shot back in his thick Texan accent... "He's got no reason to speak to Catherine that way."
"Dude, be cool," Warrick chided him. "I don't like the way he's talking to Catherine anymore than you do, but he is using normal interrogation tactics."
Nick grumbled something that skirted along the edges of everyone's hearing before turning back to what was happening in the interrogation room.
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"Actually, let me back up..." Culpepper sighed. "A day or so ago, Sheriff Mobley offered you the position of supervisor of the CSI night shift. Why was that?"
She shrugged. "Because Gil refuses to play political games..."
"And you don't?"
"No." Once again, an indifferent shrug rolled off her shoulders. "I scratch Mobley's back, he scratches mine."
"I see. So, after your supervisor was suspended from the case, you were given the chance to take over... but you declined. Why?"
"I didn't want the promotion. It was offered to me for the wrong reasons."
"Okay. So you don't exactly mind being second-in-command here, do you?"
"No. Less paperwork," she replied cryptically.
"Where are you going with this, Culpepper?" Brass asked, his eyes following the Special Agent as he paced back and forth on the other side of the table.
"I'm just trying to get a better idea of Miss Willows' motives, here, Captain Brass... relax."
Catherine narrowed her eyes at him as he paced, her full lips set in a firm scowl. Culpepper continued. "So you were offered the position of supervisor but turned it down because it wasn't what you wanted."
"Yes," she hissed through clenched teeth, already hating where this was going...
"So, if your supervisor were to be injured, let's say, or killed... just by rank you'd be forced to take his place?"
"Yes."
"But you wouldn't want that..." he murmured, his tone taunting her, like that of a bully taunting his victim on the school playground. "So, in order to keep your job as second-banana intact, you did everything you could to ensure that you wouldn't have to take over, and that meant nailing Goggle with five bullets."
That was the last straw. She slammed her hands down on the table and stood up forcefully, knocking her chair back as she did so. "I didn't do it to protect my job, okay?!" she yelled, "I did it to protect the man I love!"
A shocked silence filled the room. Culpepper and Brass exchanged a look, and Catherine sat back down in a huff, placing her elbow on the table and covering her eyes with her hand... disbelieving the incriminating statement actually tumbled from her lips.
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On the other side of the glass, each CSI wore a different expression: Sara stared open-mouthed, her brows furrowed in a scowl, shocked and slightly put-off by what she'd heard. Nick still held his stance with his arms folded across his chest, his eyebrows now raised to their highest point on his forehead, lips pressed tightly together. Warrick's stance mirrored Nick's, though his expression was more knowing... as if Catherine's confession came as no surprise to him. He merely nodded, pursing his lips.
And then there was Grissom... standing inches from the glass that separated him from the strawberry blond, his jaw dropped in a mixture of awe and surprise, his eyes glazed over with a far-away look. It was a look that Catherine herself had once referred to as the 'dopey look in his eyes.'
Sheriff Mobley stepped up to Grissom, gaining the attention of the younger CSIs as he did so. "Gil? Were you aware of this?" he asked.
Grissom didn't respond... either not hearing the question or choosing to completely ignore it, his expression never faltering. Nick smiled just slightly at this, glancing toward the sheriff. "I think Grissom's brain has temporarily vacated the premises, sir."
"Then that answers my question," he sighed, "And we now have something entirely new to investigate." He nodded toward the door when he saw Brass and Culpepper leave the interrogation room, and the three junior CSIs followed him out.
Grissom could only stare at the strawberry blond on the opposite side of the glass, sitting forlornly in the interrogation room by herself. He gulped slowly as her words sunk in, and the only sounds in the room were those of the ticking clock on the wall, and his rapidly beating heart...
------------------------------TO BE CONTINUED