Apartment of Lori Michaels
Lori stirred pasta on the stove while her infant son kicked and screamed in his high chair. She heard a loud CRACK! and figured her son had snapped the tray off of his high chair like he frequently did. She heard another loud CRACK! and turned around only to see that the tray was still on the high chair.
She stood still for a moment. Then she heard a shout from the hallway- a woman's shout. "Bobby!" She slowly walked out of her apartment, leaving her son secure in his high chair. She peered down the stairs to the level below where she saw a large man on the ground surrounded by a pool of blood.
Lori screamed and ran back inside to call 911. When she got off the phone she noticed the screaming she had heard only moments before had stopped. She ran back out the door and down the stairs to the body.
She put her fingers to his neck, noticing the gunshot wound to his abdomen and his blood stained shirt. She felt a pulse- or was it her own? She put her fingers to her neck, and then tried again to feel the man's pulse. She simply couldn't tell.
She moaned exasperatedly and resorted to shaking the man's shoulders. She shook once, then twice, saying "Bobby. Bobby? Can you hear me? Bobby?" That had to be his name. That had to be his name. Bobby. Her mind returned to the woman she had heard screaming.
Lori gently set the man back down and silently pressed her ear to the door. She heard a chair scraping across the floor, and only one voice- a man's voice. The sound of approaching sirens intruded upon the noises from within the apartment.
She jumped from the door and looked over the balcony down the stairs at the approaching paramedics and policemen. "Hurry!" she shouted.
The paramedics immediately began CPR. The pulse Lori had felt was, in fact, the man's. A 'Detective Goren.' "I also heard a woman shout. I think it came from the apartment." She pointed at the green apartment door directly in front of the wounded detective, who was beginning to stir as he was hoisted onto a stretcher.
The police officer immediately told her to stand back, called for backup to surround the building, and kicked the door open, his gun drawn.
A woman, the woman Lori had heard screaming, was bound and gagged in the middle of the floor. Blood was streaming from her left foot. There was a chair by the opened window. The police officer ran about the apartment shouting "Clear!" Lori peered around the doorframe, unable to contain her concern and curiosity.
The woman on the floor looked from the man being taken away on the stretcher to Lori. "He's alive," was all she could bring herself to say. She turned. Her son had started screaming again.
Lori's fear turned from that of the horrible crime scene to her son, who she prayed was still seated safely in his high chair. But she couldn't bring herself to leave the woman until the police officer returned, which was mercifully seconds later.
Lori sprinted back up the stairs to her son. When she returned with the flushed infant on her hips, she found the scene deserted but for the officers with jackets that said "CSU."
She descended the last flight of stairs and found the woman being hauled away in an ambulance while the officer was speaking to other officers.
He turned around. "I'm officer Pino. Thanks for all your help. If you hadn't found them and called we would have lost two of the finest detectives in the city. We're going to need to speak to you down at the station. No doubt the detectives would also like to speak to you. Who lives in that apartment?"
"His name is Peter, but I don't know his last name."
"Did you see him?"
"No- I just heard the gunshots and called 911."
"Ok, thanks. Here's my card- I'm also going to need your information…"
NYU Downtown HospitalDetective Logan walked up to the hospital bed Alex was sleeping in. He coughed and Alex woke with a start.
Sitting up, she said in a hurried, tired, raspy voice, "wheresbobby?"
"Relax, Eames. He's in surgery. He's going to be ok."
"Did you catch P.K.?"
"No- re ran out the windo-"
"I know," she snapped.
"Relax, we'll get him. How on earth did you guys manage to get yourselves shot?"
"We didn't do it on purpose! We were going to execute a search warrant and he pulled a gun. Shot Bobby, then me."
"He didn't shot to kill you."
"No, he had other things on his mind, in case you didn't read the case file," she snapped back.
Logan immediately picked up the chart at the end of Alex's bed. "He didn't? Did he?"
"No," she said, not looking at him.
"Did they do a rape kit?"
"Of course," she said shortly, still not looking at him.
Logan hesitated. "Uh- Alex? Can Barak and I borrow Bobby's notebook?" he asked, though he already knew the answer.
"You'll have to ask Bobby, and until he comes 'round, the answer is no." Alex's mind flashed to the nightstand on her right, where she had Bobby's notebook safely tucked away. There may be brilliant insights to Bobby's crime solving abilities in there, but Lord only knew what else was in there. Alex never looked, and she certainly wouldn't let anybody else look. It was Bobby's. "But," she said. "You can have mine."
She reached into the drawer and pulled out her own notebook, which was placed neatly on top of Bobby's. Mike's eyes flashed when he saw Bobby's notebook.
"The answer is no," she said still more sternly. "What did you find in the apartment?" She was eager to change the subject- eager to ensure that piece of Bobby's soul remained safe.
"We got his computer, but he had deleted all of his e-mails, we've got a specialist trying to trace them on the hard drive. Uhmmm…. He's a size 36 belt, which matches the size used on the previous vics… not much else- guy's a total computer nerd. He knows his stuff."
"Did you find his trophies?" she asked.
"His what?"
"Pics of his previous victims- anything? The pics were probably on his computer with the files he deleted. Shit…"
"Mike shook his head. "Nothing on paper," he said. He hung his head, deep in thought.
The door opened. Logan and Alex turned their heads towards the doctor entering the room. Seeing the look on Alex's face he said, "He's still in surgery, but they've extracted the bullet (which I've already sent downtown, per your request). He should be ok, but we really won't know until he's out of surgery."
"And he'll be roomed with?"
"You," he replied.
Alex nodded. "How long till he's out?"
"At least another hour. They're trying to repair the damage at this point. There was a lot of internal bleeding- it's a miracle he survived."
Alex hadn't heard anything but what she repeated: "One hour."