Chapter Three: Out of the Frying Pan and Into the Fire
The murkiness of the locker room eased Greg's nervous jitters slightly as he strapped on his blue CSI vest. He looked at himself in the small rectangular mirror hanging on the inside of his locker. He saw a tired and strained man that Greg barely recognized as himself. He rubbed his bloodshot eyes to try to make them a little less groggy, but the effort was futile, it only made him more tired.
Out of frustration he pushed his locker shut rather too harsh causing other lab workers in there to look at him oddly. He smiled embarrassedly at them.
"It's going to be one of those days," he whispered to himself as he exited the locker room. He gave a hardy push to the door and a busy lab met his ears. "Home sweet home."
Greg didn't waste anytime heading over to the lab he and Sara were using for their case. He didn't want her to be even more pissed with him for being late; for some strange reason, Greg felt like giving up on even trying to impress her. He felt like being his old self, not CSI level one Greg. When he was a DNA Analysis technician, he was much more goofy and loveable and, well, happy. At least he thought so and people perceived him better then and hopefully still do.
He walked passed Warrick and Catherine's lab; they were working on a theory one of them came up with probably because they were working with a glue stick, helium, and dry ice- lots of dry ice. Greg smiled at them as he passed and they waved back towards him and then tediously getting back to work again. Just a few more steps and Greg was in the doorframe of his designated lab.
Sara, of course, was already in there looking over the file at the table, which was covered with the crime scene photos once again. When she must've heard his footsteps coming towards the table, she looked up from the file and at him.
"Hey," Greg said solemnly, taking a seat on the opposite side of the table. Her eyes followed him over there.
She looked back down at the file and flipped a page before finally greeting him, flatly at that, "Hi."
Greg just nodded his head and tried to get over her blatant insensitivity. He strained a smile as if saying he didn't hear her venomous tone. "Um, how did you sleep- you look, well, tired."
"I could say the same thing about you, too," Sara said sitting up and grabbing a photo of Johnson hanging from the stairwell. She studied over the picture and then handed it to Greg. "What do you see in the photo that's odd?"
He slowly took the photo from Sara and looked at it. Johnson's noose was a sheet that was twisted tightly around his neck. The knot that kept it in place and from Chris from falling was tied from the front. The door was right behind him, making an accessible escape hatch for the killer to leave through. He stopped his analysis when he heard Sara impatiently tap her nails against the table. Greg tried to control his irritation quickly, "Well, the door-"
"Look past that," Sara said.
"Look past the door? I don't have Superman vision, you know." Greg said laughing.
Sara looked ticked now, "I mean get away from the door and move onto another thing you saw."
"Oh, right," Greg said blushing. "Well, ugh, the sheet used to hang him was twisted tightly."
"And?"
"And the knot was tied in the front?" Greg asked, not rhetorically either.
Sara nodded, "Right, so that means the killer had to flip the body over to tie the sheet around his neck."
"Yeah, we already knew he was hung post-mortem," Greg said throwing the photo back onto the table.
"Yes, but that didn't explain why there were two separate blood stains on the left side of the bed and on the floor of the right side without blood stains linking either pool," Sara said sliding three other photos toward Greg.
One was on the left side of the bed, where the attack happened. The second was how the right side of the bed didn't have any blood whatsoever. Then the third photo was of the second pool of blood on the floor next to the right side of the bed. Greg slid all three of the crime scene photos back to Sara.
"So you're saying that Chris was on top of the bed, probably sleeping, when he was murdered. Then he must've been picked up- not rolled- and placedonthe floor next to the right side of the bed?"
Sara only nodded and stood up.
"Why?"
"Why what?" Sara asked picking up the case file and bagging it in her kit.
"Why pick up the vic and put him on the other side? That doesn't make a whole lot of sense."
Sara looked over at Greg, "Well the killer wasn't that smartanyway because they didn't wear gloves- I found a partial on the sheet in blood." She placed the strap of her kit on her shoulder and looked down at Greg, "Are you ready?"
"Oh yeah, I'm ready." Greg said standing up and walking over to get his kit off of the floor where he had placed it yesterday afternoon.
"Good," Sara said heading out.
Greg had to hurry to catch up with her head start. "So, ugh, how late did you stay here last night?"
Sara looked over at him curiously, "Probably till eleven or so. Why?"
"No reason, I just don't want you to feel that you have to do all the work, you know. After all I'm here now to help, too." Greg said politely as he nodded to a passing lab technician.
"Right," Sara whispered harshly to herself.
Greg looked over at her irritated, but didn't say anything. He just bit his tongue from making any comments just yet. He needed to be rational when he confronted her; he didn't want to add anymore fuel to the fire as is.
They walked out to the back parking lot where all of the Lab's transportation vehicles were parked. Sara led the way over to a black SUV and got in the driver seat.
"Shot gun!" Greg said merrily.
"Greg," Sara said impatiently, "no one else is here to beat for the front seat, only yourself."
"Yeah, I know. It's just more fun this way," Greg smiled opening the door and plopping himself in.
"Right," Sara huffed out of disbelief and started the ignition.
The drive up to the university was awkward, boring, and really long. Greg tried a few times to make some small talk, but Sara quickly shut him down when she told him to be quiet for once in his life or to just shut up. Even though he was frustrated and pissed off by now, he was also a little hurt, too. It seemed like she wasn't just trying to be standoffish, but also a real bitch. Thinking of it just caused Greg to become guilty; he never liked thinking badly of others even if they were being rather rude towards him. What made it worse was that it was Sara. Even if Greg denied it to many of his colleagues and to himself, Greg liked Sara in more than just afriendor apartner type of way. But he shook himself of that thought each time in surfaced in his mind and hid it into the deepest depths of his mind and heart. He wasn't going to let a little, useless crush like that get in the way of his work.
Sara pulled up in front of a tall housing complex, one of the university's dorms, dedicated to Lucy Barbs. A couple of armed police were waiting for them near the doors; they always had to have police officers with them on scene. He and Sara got out of the SUV and walked over to the officers with their kits along with them.
"Hey guys," Greg greeted shaking each of their hands, smiling.
They both shook his back and returned his greeting. Then Sara followed greeting them both. By the way both of their faces looked when they finally looked at her better, Greg had no doubt in his mind that they both were physically attracted to her. Sara, of course, either didn't notice it or chose not to notice it. Jealousy soon coursed through his veins like a poisonous snake bite.
Sara smiled, "Well, we only need one of you, really, to come with us."
"I will!" The officers said in unison and then both blushing in turn. One of them stepped forward, the younger one, and said, "I would come along today, if that would be alright."
Greg was about to speak when Sara cut in, "That would be fine, thanks." Greg just stood their mute with his mouth hanging open slightly.
The cop turned back to his partner and smirked, "I'll be seeing you, Hudson."
His partner, in turn, patted him on the back, "Right."
The younger, now the new police escort for them, turned back around to the two focusing on Sara. "Well, I'm really excited about working on this case with you," he paused making eye contact with Sara, "two."
Sara smiled shyly, but didn't say anything.
Greg laughed overdramatically, "I bet you are," he read the flamboyant officer's name, "Rogers."
Both Rogers and Sara looked at him as if he were ruining the moment. Nonetheless, the interruption caused them both to be reminded where they were. Sara fixed her kit's strap, "Ugh, well I suppose we better head up to Johnson's dorm room first."
"Right," Greg and Rogers said at the same time. They both looked at each other menacingly.
After they made it to the eleventh floor of fourteen, the team stopped in front of the taped off door. Rogers edged closer towards Sara, but Greg stepped in. "Sorry, we," he said giving emphasis to he and Sara, "need to search around a little more." Greg looked up and down the somewhat busy college dorm hall. Students were rowdy until they passed by the solemn door, then he looked back at Rogers, who looked taken aback. "You can stand here, by the door to make sure than no one tries to pull anything. Okay, buddy?"
Rogers looked at Greg dangerously, "Whatever."
Greg smiled slyly as he turned away from Rogers, his new threat no doubt, and walked into the dingy dorm room. He looked around curiously trying to find any new evidence that might've been overlooked the first time Sara was there. Speaking of Sara, he turned around to see her working over near the pool of blood next to the bed, but was looking at the wall instead.
He slowly walked over there and kneeled beside her, "What did you find?"
Sara glanced at him, "Just a smear of blood I missed last time," she said creeping closer to look at the mark.
Greg did the same thing she was doing until she stopped and looked at him directly. "Greg, what are you doing?"
"I was, um," he pointed at the smear, "just taking a closer look, too."
"I think I have it covered, thanks," she said protectively.
Greg stood up angrily, "Right." He walked around towards the other side of the bed now. "It looks like the sheet made that smear."
Click
Sara's camera captured the blood stain. "Yeah, it looks that way." She turned back around and looked at him, "How could you determine that from only looking at it for a few seconds?"
Greg rubbed his face tiredly, "Well, I reviewed a case that had a blood smear on the wall before," Greg said standing over the left side of the bed where the first blood was. "And I saw after a few minutes of analyzing the smear that a piece of cloth or a sheet for instance, would make that smear."
"Wow," Sara said quietly, as if she were saying it to herself.
Greg smiled to himself and looked at the stains more closely. "Well there was definitely a struggle, but it happened too late, obviously."
Sara kneeled down next to the bed and looked at the floor closer, then under the bed.
"Did you find any more blood stains?" Greg asked, his curiosity getting the better of him.
"Nope, but I did find a journal or ledger of some sort," she said rising from the floor. "Here, help me lift this," Sara said lifting the mattress slightly.
Greg grabbed the mattress and raised it higher for Sara to get the book. She grabbed it while Greg eased the mattress down carefully. Waiting for a minute after she found the book, Greg asked, "What is it?"
She turned around, "I think this isn't his, but someone else's because if Johnson wrote this, he would be using third person, which is highly unlikely because this is a diary."
"So it's a girl's, then?" Greg said stepping closer to Sara to get a better look at the diary.
"I suppose it is, but the writing seems a little masculine," Sara said seriously.
"Maybe it's a transvestite's," Greg said trying to lighten the mood.
Sara looked up at him disgusted, "Nice one, Greg." She irritably closed the diary and bagged it. "We'll run fingerprints on it when we get back to the lab."
Greg grimaced at her reaction to his little joke. "Okay," he whispered glumly.
"Well," Sara said looking around the room a little more, "after we search around here some more, we can head over to the stairwell."
Greg only nodded and kept looking around the room.
After an hour or so looking thoroughly through the room, combing through boxes and on Johnson's computer, and finding nothing more intriguing or odd, they both decided they should head towards the stairwell.
Rogers and Greg walked behind Sara on their way over towards the opposite end of the hall. "Huh."
"Huh, what?" Sara said looking over her shoulder at Greg.
"Well, isn't a little weird that the killer carried Johnson through this hall, a dormitory hall which is even busy in the early morning?" Greg said looking around at the passing students.
Sara seemed to be deep in thought, "Yeah, so it would have to be an empty hall on a quiet night, like all of the students we interviewed said, or someone saw something, but they're afraid to say."
"Right," Greg said as they started to walk again.
He expected her to compliment him on his common sense, she obviously missed the first time, but it didn't come. Greg ran his hands through his hair in frustration and brushed the hurt attitude out of his thoughts.
They finally reached the stairwell door, but this time Rogers stayed at the door without being told. Greg and Sara entered the bright stairwell and immediately got to work. They found nothing else out of the ordinary or any extra evidence after a very anal search. Both of them were rosy-cheeked from going up and down flights of stairs again and again by the time Sara declared that they should head back to the lab to analyze the diary and blood smear on the wall.
Greg didn't object as he made his way towards the door and held it open for Sara to go through and then going through himself. "Thanks," she said as he came back into the hall.
"Don't mention it," Greg smiled as he adjusted his strap.
As they made their way back through the noisy and crowded hall, Greg noticed Rogers didn't waste anytime to begin charming Sara. He gave her the right compliments without making them cheesy or overused; heck if Greg were a girl, he would've fallen for them, too. Nonetheless, it hit close to home listening to Rogers and Sara carry on jovially, each flirting, both loving it. Greg accidentally walked into a student in the hall causing him to trip slightly.
The student stopped, "Oh, I'm so sorry, man."
Greg smiled agitatedly and nodded, "Sorry." The student he ran into was athletic looking, probably a jock. He seemed to carry himself well, like a confident All-American. The only thing that made his whole appearance off-balance was the black eye; he must be a boxer or a mean football player. Greg, though, kept walking to keep up with Sara and Rogers, who didn't even notice his little ruffle.
The team finally made it to the lobby of the dormitory and by then Greg felt like he would be sick with all of the fluffiness and flirting going on between Sara and Rogers. He pulled on his kit's strap to prevent himself from exploding or worse, jumping the pompous jerk.
Rogers and Sara stood there talking to each other quietly as if they didn't want Greg to over hear their 'secretive' conversation. Then Sara laughed that laugh she only did around her ex,Hank.
Finally Greg got fed up with their little forth coming and stepped in ruthlessly, "Ah, well Sara I think it's time to head back."
Sara looked a little embarrassed, "Oh right." She smiled at Rogers, "See you tomorrow, Cory."
Greg smiled at Rogers, "Yeah, Cory, see you tomorrow."
They both walked out of there, leaving Rogers standing there flabbergasted. As soon as they got into their SUV, Sara exploded. "What the hell was that, Sanders?"
Greg smiled smugly at Sara, "I don't know."
"Don't give me that crap! You know what you were doing in there," Sara said pointing at him as he put his seat belt on.
Greg only sat there, "Are you going to start driving back or are we going to sit here all night?"
Sara stared daggers at him, but didn't say a word to him the whole way back.
When they arrived back at the lab, Sara parked the car and locked the doors so Greg couldn't get out. She looked at him, "Tell me, Greg, do you have a death wish?"
Greg unbuckled his seat belt and looked at Sara with a small smile on his face. "Everyone has to die sometime, don't they?"
"Do you want to die now?" Sara asked trying to keep her cool as best as she could.
Greg only laughed. "Please, Sara, how about you just ask me less cliché questions and I'll answer them wholly for you."
Sara kept staring at him, "Okay. I ask any question I want and you'll answer truthfully?"
Greg nodded, "Uh-huh."
"Good," Sara said unbuckling her own seat belt now. "What was that whole scene back in the lobby then?"
Now, Greg wished he hadn't agreed to answer any question. "I don't know."
"You said you would answer truthfully."
"Well, I lied." Greg said trying to unlock his door.
"No," Sara said holding down the lock button. "Not until you answer truthfully."
Greg's breathing started to become ragged and his heart rate started to accelerate. He leaned his head against the head rest, "Alright."
"Go on then," Sara said interested.
"I," Greg said as his breath was caught, "I, ugh, well I don't think Rogers is a great guy. I don't think you should be flirting with that type of guy."
"What kind of guy?" Sara asked out of curiosity and out of exasperation.
"I answered you're question, Sara!" Greg said throwing his hands up in the air.
"Not wholly," Sara said determined to get the answer, the thruth.
Greg placed his head in his hands, "Because, Rogers is one of those guys who uses woman," Greg paused, "like Hank." He felt very vulnerable in this situation; he was playing with fire and he didn't want to get burned. Greg didn't want Sara to know how he really felt about, about… her.
Sara looked at him, taken aback. Her mouth was slightly open in shock, but she slowly recovered, "How would you know that?"
"I answered your question so let me out," Greg said impatiently. "Now!"
With his outburst, Sara obliged. He quickly got out of the car and slammed the door shut. Greg walked around as if pacing and rubbed his face harshly. His mind was racing with mixed emotions. He was dangerously close to exposing his well hidden, well guarded heart. Greg knew Sara wouldn't return those feelings he held for her and he didn't want to know how it would feel to finally hear her say the inevitable, not yet.
Greg started to walk off towards the staff parking lot when he heard his name being called. "Greg!" It was Sara, he kept walking determinedly towards his car, though. She must've taken the hint and didn't pursue him any further.
He hastily got in his car and sped off away from his feelings and vulnerability, away from Sara.
Author Notes:
Thanks for all of the lovely reviews! I'm very, very flattered by them and your eagerness. I'm happy you all are liking it so far and hopefully this chapter lived up to the previous two. If it didn't go ahead and tell me. Please, please, please tell me your thoughts on the chapter, the overall story, or about my writing if need critiquing. Thanks for reading!