Chapter 3

Nick was being rather pensive at the moment, sitting on the cot with his back against the wall. 'Why is it always me? Murphy's law, I guess. That Murphy must really like messing with me.' He knew that his friends were doing everything within their power to get this situation settled and him out of here. As he thought of his friends, one person's reaction just came to him out of the blue, and made him smile. Greg Sanders would think that he was in heaven, the only man surrounded by at least 20 women. But Nick didn't think it was so wonderful because some of these women were darn heated about being in this facility, not even taking the current situation into consideration, and that might not be good for him.

"Nick?"

"Yeah?"

"Are you okay? Would you like something to eat or drink?"

"If you have any apples and some water, I would appreciate it."

"Sure, I happen to have both right here." She said as she handed him a Granny Smith apple and a bottle of water.

"Thanks, Erin."

"Can I ask you a question?"

"Sure."

"Are you in counseling for what happened to you, with the coffin and all?"

"Yes. Are you?" Trying to turn the question back on to here and away from something he really didn't want to talk about.

"Yes. It really helps a lot, doesn't it?"

"Sometimes."

"Why just sometimes? Why not all the time?"

"Well you only have control over yourself in most situations, and sometimes my co-workers get a little too much into the mother hen thing."

"I can understand that must be frustrating."

"Can be, I just have to work through it."

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"Not really. Sorry."

"Don't be, I understand." And he could see that she did, in some fashion. It was there, written on her face.

"I was thinking, maybe I can help my friends and yours while I'm here. Do you think that Jen and a couple of the other ladies would be willing to talk to me about what is going on around here?"

She smiled at him. "I don't know, but it couldn't hurt to ask."

"I just need to be doing something. Just waiting here, in this cell is…"

"I know. Let me check with Jen."

Gil Grissom decided that for news like this, it should be delivered in person, so he walked down the hall to Ecklie's office, knocked on the door, and waited for a response from the person at the desk to notice him.

Ecklie looked up from his report and waved Gil in. "What can I do for you, Gil?"

"We have a situation at the women's correctional facility."

"What kind of situation? Who did you send on that?"

"I sent Catherine and Nick. Det. Vega went with them."

"Did they find something unusual?"

"You could say that. Evidently the inmates pulled a coup, and took a hostage."

"Was it one of ours?"

He nodded. "Nick Stokes."

"Of course. What are you doing about this right now?"

"Well the inmates gave Catherine their demand, which was to look into their complaints on their care at the facility. They say that some of the recent deaths there are more than they seem. We're having someone look into that. Vega is in with the Warden and her staff to keep in the loop for what their plans are. I assume that he will call the Sheriff soon enough to get his input since Nick is involved."

"I hate to give in to any demands made by someone holding a hostage, but if we look at this as an official complaint then we should look into this. Whatever you need, let me know. Within reason, of course. I'll notify the Sheriff from our end."

"Thanks, Conrad. I'm going to go check in with my team to see if they have anything so far." He left the office to go check with Sara on the case reviews. He found Catherine in with her reviewing what looked to be about 7 different case files.

"What have you found so far?"

Catherine spoke up, and from the tone of voice being used, it wasn't good. "Well, first of all, I am so glad that Ecklie fired Ted Smart, because he certainly didn't live up to his name. How could he miss that this woman, Karen Huddleson, did not hang herself? The knot is backwards for a person who is right handed. She didn't do that herself. Idiot!"

Sara broke in, as a voice of reason for the moment. "From what we've seen so far, these four here look to be just what they are, at least we can't see anything right now to refute the findings, or justify looking further into them. However, these three, including the one that Catherine just mentioned, look a little suspicious."

"Okay. Well, do what you can with those. Farm them out, and share the wealth if you need to. Ecklie said if we need anything, to just ask." Sara nodded in response, but Catherine seemed to be ignoring him for the moment. He was about to repeat himself when she spoke up, although he wasn't sure if she was addressing them, or if she was just talking to herself out loud.

"Why is it always him? He's been through enough in his life." Then she lifted her head to address the other occupants of the room. "We have to get him out of there."

"We will, Catherine. He's strong, he'll be fine."

"You can't be sure of that. Surrounded by all these women - this might bring out more unpleasant memories, when he has enough to deal with right now."

"Why would this bring out something unpleasant…"

She cut him off, realizing that she had said too much. "I'm going to call Vega to see if there is anything new from his side." Grissom just stepped out of her way as she passed him at a full speed ahead. He thought that he should check with her about this later.

"Grissom, what was that about?"

"I don't know, Sara. Let me know if you need help, or if you find anything that we can move ahead with. I think that we need to get this resolved as soon as we can."

"You got it."

"Let me have one of the three you mentioned, I'll be a second set of eyes on those." And with that file in hand, he went to one of the open labs to spread out what evidence they had so he could get the full picture.

Erin walked up to Jen at the end of the corridor and caught her attention right away. She stepped away from the group of women she was speaking with to talk to Erin. "How's our guest doing?"

"He's okay. I'm a little worried about him here, because I think that he understands my situation from more than just an investigator's perspective."

"He told you that, or what?"

"No, it's just a feeling I have. But he's going a little stir crazy…"

"That can't be helped, Erin."

"I know, but he wants to help himself by helping us. If you, or any of the others, are willing to go talk to him, he wants to hear your side of things."

"I'll go talk to him. I'll mention this to the others as well. I think that Livvy and Dawn might be willing to talk to him. Smart guy." She looked up to see one of the others standing with her back against the bars of the cell across from the one where Nick was. Rene was one that needed watching. "Why don't you go back to Nick's cell, and keep him company. I'll be there in a minute."

Catherine was relieved that she didn't have to wait too long for Vega to pick up the phone.

"Detective Vega."

"Sam, it's Catherine. How are things there?"

"Under control for now."

"For now?"

"Well a couple of the officers here are a bit hot headed, but thankfully the Warden isn't one of those. She has a couple of the others around the block to keep an eye on things."

"Good. How's Nick?"

"He's okay as far as I know."

"Can you see if you can go check on him? That woman Jen, seemed to be pretty reasonable, and may be willing to let you talk to him."

"Okay, I'll give you a call no matter what happens."

"Thanks, Sam."

"Don't worry, I'm trying to keep an eye on our guy."

"I know. Keep in touch."

Vega hung up and walked up to the Warden to get her attention. "Ms. Kessler, I would like to go down to the cell block to see if they will allow me to check on Stokes. He was unconscious the last time I saw him."

"All right. Go see Domosi, he's at the door closest to where they seem to be hanging out. It would be the best place to get their attention. And they will be able to see your approach, so you won't look to be trying to sneak up on them."

"Thanks, I'll come back and report to you once I've seen him."

"I would appreciate that, Det. Vega. By the way, I just got off the phone a moment ago with the Sheriff. He seems to trust you to handle the situation for the LVPD in his stead. He said to call him if you need anything, but to work with me."

"Of course. Be right back."

"So I hear you want to talk to me about the case."

"Jen, right?" Nick said as he looked at the tall brunette that just entered his cell.

"Good guess." Jen could see why Erin had connected with this CSI as quickly as she did. This attractive young man just exuded empathy.

"Well, I figured that if you are the one that made the demand to look into the recent deaths here, that you would be the one most willing to talk to me about it. You're head is already on the block, so to speak."

"Good deduction, Sherlock. Where do we start?"

"Why don't you tell me why you believe that there is a cover up going on around here?"

Jen took a seat on the other end of the cot from Nick. "First of all, there's no way that Janelle would O.D. She just would not do recreational drugs, it would mess up her medication for chemotherapy. I got a feeling that she was pressured into something, but she was being so secretive. But I had nothing tangible, nothing but my gut reaction. And then the investigation never went anywhere. But when I heard that Karen hung herself, I knew that something was so wrong. She had just gotten her splint off the week before, and there is no way that she could have hung herself like they said she did. She didn't have the strength to do it."

Nick just sat there quietly with the paper and pen that Erin had given him for taking notes. She was impressed that he could just go back to doing his job while he was a hostage. He must be a very dedicated investigator. Erin could see that even Jen was reacting to that expression on his face inviting her to open up to him. It was too bad she had met someone like Rick first, and not someone like him. She shook her head to clear it of thoughts like these. It did no good to dwell on what ifs, they only brought more heartache. She had done the crime for which she was convicted, and she was willing to do the time for it because her kids were safe. She looked up at the cell door when she heard someone's footsteps fast approaching.

"Jen, that cop that was with him," she indicated Nick "is back asking to talk to you."

"Tell him that I'll be right there." Jen turned her attention back to Nick. "I'll be right back." Nick just nodded and leaned up against the wall.

As she approached the bars at the end of the block, Jen addressed the officer waiting there. "What can I do for you, officer?"

"Detective Vega. I was hoping to check on my friend, to make sure he was okay."

"Why wouldn't he be?"

"Well, the last time I saw him he was unconscious. Can I talk to him?"

"Sure." She turned back down the hall. "Callie, go ask our guest to join me here."

The petite woman wandered down the cell block to bring the CSI guy to talk to his friend. "Hey Erin, Jen asked me to bring this guy to talk to his cop friend."

"Okay. I'll come too."

"Whatever." She didn't even wait for Erin's reply, but turned to walk back to her post near that end of the block.

"Ready, Nick?"

"Yea." He slowly rose and left the cell with his notebook so that he could let Vega know what he'd found out so far.

As Nick and his escort approached the door, Sam could tell that his friend seemed to be holding up pretty well. That alone brought his nerves down to a tolerable level. He nodded to Nick as he reached the door. "How are you?"

"Right as rain, Sam. I have a bit of a head ache but nothing too serious. How are you doing?"

"Getting a little worried about a few of the hot heads on the Warden's staff, but everything seems to be under control from this end."

"Hey, since I'm here on the inside I thought I'd do my part for the investigation." Sam noted that Nick didn't bother to keep his voice down, and so knew that his friend was making sure that at least someone knew what they were talking about. That should keep anyone from worrying about letting them talk to each other. "Here are my notes from one woman I've talked to so far." Nick looked to see that the guard was a little out of earshot and so went on. "She seems to think that one of the guards was involved – some guy named Cargile. So you might want to have Catherine look into him."

"Sure thing. Is there anything that I can get you?"

"You mean besides a get out of jail free card? No, I'm okay for now."

"You seem a little nervous."

"Wouldn't you be? Besides, being the only guy here, I feel a little like a piece of meat, so if you can hurry it all up, I would appreciate it."

"I'll do what I can. I'll be back."

Nick just watched the officer pull out his cell phone as he walked away down the hall. He turned to the young woman who seemed like his shadow for the moment, and spoke softly to her. "Can we go back? All this attention is making me uncomfortable."

"Oh, come on. Someone who looks like you should be used to the attention, and would like it." How had Jen missed Rene coming up behind her? She was now determined to try to find Rene something else to do, preferably away from the investigator.

"Not really, besides here I have no place to go to get out of the spot light."

Erin spoke up to try to get him out of the conversation with who she quietly refered to as 'that wicked woman.' "Give him a break, Rene. He's trying to help us. Come on Nick, let's go back to the room." She and Jen were both aware of the wolf like expression that followed Erin and Nick back down the hall.

On the phone at the other end of the hall, Detective Vega connected to Catherine's cell. "Willows."

"Catherine, Sam. I just talked to Nick, and he's okay. He's talking to a few of the women about their complaint and he has a name for you to look into. His last name is Cargile, he's one of the guards here."

"Yea, he's mentioned as being interviewed on a few of these charts. The guards aren't assigned to any specific block all the time, are they?"

"Only the ones who work with the more dangerous types in solitary. Otherwise they all rotate. Why?"

"Well, I think it's a little suspicious that for someone who rotates around, he seems to know an awful lot about what happened with each of these deaths. Thanks, Sam."

"I'm going to go check in with the Warden again, I'll talk to you later."

To be continued –

A/N – Sorry it took so long to update, I hope that this chapter was worth the wait. I should be able to update again soon. Thanks to everyone who has reviewed the first two chapters, your encouragement and comments are gratifying. I thank you sincerely. Without them, I'm not sure I'd have the courage to keep writing. Thanks again!