Pure and Simple
Chapter Two
Dr. Warner's Office
Morgue
12:30 PM Saturday
Elliot and Olivia walked through the doors of the morgue and immediately, their eyes beheld the body of young Sherona Anderson. Dr. Warner had already done the full autopsy, and she emerged from the back with her report in hand.
She looked upon Sherona's body, and cast a sad look at the young woman.
"So sad," she muttered before she approached the detectives with information. "Well, cause of death was a blow to the head. Her skull was cracked in several places, and most of her front teeth were broken. Several cheek and jawbone fractures, her nose broken. The bastard did a number on this poor girl."
"At about what time would you say she died?" Olivia asked.
"Most likely within minutes of the initial attack," Warner estimated. "As far as the hour, I'd say around one thirty."
"Did you do an assault kit?" Elliot asked.
Warner cast him a grave look.
"Well, I was going to save this for last, but I may as well inform you," Warner said, opening up the file. "Sherona wasn't sodomized. She had some inflammation around the anal area, but there was no evidence of deep penetration from sexual contact."
Olivia and Elliot looked at each other, stunned and angry.
"Her skirt and panties were bunched around her ankles," Olivia pointed out. "If she wasn't sodomized, then what the hell did he do to her?"
"After I did the rape kit, I sent a blood sample to tox to screen for any evidence of drugging," she explained slowly. "The results came back positive for cocaine."
"Cocaine?" Olivia asked.
"That's not all," Warner continued. "I found evidence of cocaine in the rectal area, and according to tox, the cocaine was ninety five percent pure."
"Wait, hold on a second," Elliot broke in. "What are you saying? Sherona was a mule?"
"All I know is that with this grade of cocaine, Sherona must have crossed somebody," Warner said.
Olivia and Elliot were both stunned at the new development.
"Well, I guess Sherona wasn't as innocent as we made her out to be," Elliot said. "Looks like it's time to pay mom another visit."
Sherona Anderson's Apartment
South Side
1:45 PM
Elliot and Olivia knocked on the door to Sherona's apartment. They both felt badly that they had to visit the mother again after what Munch and Fin told them from earlier in the morning. But in order for them to catch Sherona's killer, they had to get the facts straight in order to know which path to follow and what decisions to make.
Helen was in the living room watching cartoons with her granddaughter when she heard a knock on the door. Irritated at the disturbance, she huffed a breath and went over to the door. She looked through the peephole and saw two people that were not familiar to her.
She opened the door as far as the latch would allow.
"Yes?" She asked.
"Hi, are you Ms. Anderson?" Elliot asked.
"Yes, what do you want?" Helen inquired.
"I'm Detective Stabler, this is my partner Detective Benson," Elliot introduced. "We're sorry to bother you but-"
"No, I've already talked to you people," she said defensively. "Instead of harassing me, why don't you go find the person that killed my daughter."
"Ma'am, we understand your frustration, but in order for us to catch the person who did this, we need the truth," Olivia said in a compassionate tone. "We're sorry for you loss, and with your help, we can get this guy off the streets."
Sensing Helen's calm, the detectives implied that they had her approval.
"Alright," Helen resigned. "Just let me get my granddaughter into her room and we can talk."
Helen allowed Olivia and Elliot into her home.
India stood up and she looked at the detectives with wide brown eyes. Olivia was immediately taken with the little girl.
"Hi," Olivia greeted the little girl with a smile. "What's your name?"
"India."
"That's a pretty name," Olivia commented the little girl. "I'm Olivia and this is my partner Elliot."
India grinned a little before she let it fade.
"Did you find my mommy?" The little girl asked.
Helen intercepted before the conversation went any further. She scooted India into the bedroom they shared.
"India, grandma has to go talk to Olivia and Elliot for a little bit," she said softly to the little girl. "Why don't you get ready for a nap?"
India was a quiet little girl. She was very much aware of her surroundings most of the time, and she was smarter than most five year olds. She loved her mother very much, and she was close. Not seeing her mother for a day scared her a bit; she knew that her mother had gone to a party last night, but she should have been home right now.
Parties don't last that long, India thought to herself. Mommy would get sleepy.
"When is mommy coming home grandma?" She asked, making Helen's eyes water.
Helen placed a hand on the little girl's cheek.
"Get ready for a nap you," she chuckled slightly.
Elliot and Olivia sat on the couch, patiently waiting for Helen's return.
"Cute little girl," Olivia commented. "So pretty."
"Yeah, she is a beauty," Elliot agreed, looking at a picture of the family.
Helen emerged from the back and she sat across from the detectives in an arm chair.
"What do you need, detectives?" Helen asked.
"Ms. Anderson, has your daughter been acting strange, lately?" Elliot began.
"Like I told the other two detectives here earlier," Helen huffed. "Sherona was just fine."
"Ma'am, we spoke with our coroner," Olivia began slowly. "Cocaine was found in her system."
Helen's face registered shock, then she sighed and looked away. She had to face what she knew in her heart about her daughter.
"I had a feeling that she was taking something, I just didn't think it was that," she sighed as she got up and went over to her window. "Sherona's been dealing with depression since she was fourteen. After her daddy just up and left us one day, she just withdrew further into herself. Before I knew it, she was violent, threatening to hurt herself…she stayed a little while at the hospital, and she's learned how to manage and live with it. But it got worse when she had India. She was eighteen when she got pregnant with India."
"Ms. Anderson, has your daughter ever mentioned any unfamiliar names, or places?" Elliot asked.
"No," Helen said. "Sherona was a very private person. You have to understand what she went through on a daily basis. Not knowing what's going to set her off, unsure if she'll get up out of the bed in the morning. I told her to take her medication, but she's typical: when she feels better, she stops taking them and goes months without refills. She'd stop teaching for months at a time. P.S. 123 is her third school."
"Did Sherona have any close friends, people that she really trusted?" Olivia asked.
"She has two from the school," Helen answered. "Margaret and Yvonne. They teach fifth grade. They go out for lunch sometimes, but I wouldn't call them her best friends. She did trust them with India though."
Olivia nodded and jotted down the names.
"Last names?" Olivia asked, and Helen shook her head and shrugged.
"When you find who did this to her, I want to see his face," Helen requested. "And then I want you to make him pay."
Elliot only nodded as he and Olivia let themselves out.
They headed down the hallway to the elevator.
As they rode the elevator down to the first floor, Olivia looked over to Elliot, who looked deep in thought over something.
"You're unusually quiet today," Olivia commented.
He sighed and shook his head.
"I'm just thinking about my kids," he began. "I mean, how they're dealing with the separation and all."
"El, I think you underestimate your kids," Olivia grinned. "They'll be alright. You're a great father, Elliot. Kathy's a great mother. They love you both."
Elliot sighed.
"Hey, do you want to come over for dinner tomorrow evening?" Elliot offered. "Maureen's home this weekend from school and she wants to have a little get together tomorrow and cook."
"Um, sure," Olivia said, surprised by the invitation. "I guess. Are you sure that I won't be interfering or anything?"
"No," Elliot insisted. "Kathy's dropping the kids off tomorrow. She's going to stay for little while. It'll be nice for her to have a little girl talk and some adult stimulation. She told me that the kids have been running her ragged this week."
Olivia still felt slightly bothered at the dynamics going on with Elliot and Kathy. They seemed like the perfect couple, at least from her perspective, but who knew that a twenty year marriage would come down to this? As long as Kathy didn't keep Elliot away from his kids, Olivia surmised that things would always stay civil between them. Elliot loved Kathy fiercely and he loved his kids that much more.
She felt awkward about dinner because she knew she'd have to face Kathy.
They walked out into the bright sunlight, and Olivia bitterly thought: how ironic, it's a beautiful day and there's a sadistic killer on the loose. Sometimes Olivia wondered why she did this job; she knew deep down that really, she didn't know anything else. Her whole life she watched as her mother struggled with the daily pain from being raped…from having her. Olivia still remembered her mother's pained face every time she looked at her, and part of her knew that her mother's memory inspired her to keep going. To be aware, to help people in need, and to not become a victim herself.
Meanwhile, she was missing out on other parts of her life that she wanted: she wanted to get married, have children, buy a house. But the fear that it would all fall apart scared her the most, and she kept men at a significant distance. Maybe all of that wasn't in the cards for her, but she did wish for it to happen someday.
"Penny for your thoughts?" Elliot asked her and she grinned.
"Not enough," she quipped as they climbed into the squad car.
Hanson's Market
Lower East Side
2:30 PM
Munch and Fin walked into the restroom in the back on Hanson's Market. The assistant manager called it in.
There was a male victim found in a pool of blood and, like Sherona, his pants had been pulled down around his ankles.
"Same guy, same MO?" Fin asked as he inspected the scene before them.
"So, what? These are drug related killings?" Munch suggested.
"Well, the doc did say that she found coke in Sherona's system, this must be the same case," Fin said as he stepped over the body.
He leaned down and looked at the man's face.
"Damn, he was beaten to a pulp."
Munch talked to one of the other officers.
"The guy's name was Greg Thomas," the officer informed Munch. "He was the assistant to the city manager."
Munch nodded at the information and went back over to Fin.
"Detectives," Dr. Warner called. "Look what I found."
She held up a small bag of cocaine.
"I found a piece of the seal sticking out," she explained. "Looks like the killer was interrupted."
"Detectives!" A cop called. "The assistant manager took off."
"What?" Fin asked. "Did you see where she went?"
"No sir," the cop said. "She must've taken off when we weren't looking."
"Oh really? What was your next guess?" Munch snapped angrily. "We need to find her. If she's a witness, then she needs to come forward so we can catch this son of a bitch."
"She's the assistant manager right?" Fin asked. "Let's just look her up on a schedule or health form."
"The owner's on the way," another officer said. "He asked when we're going to get the hell out of his store."
Munch snorted.
"He's more concerned about this dump than he is about a dead man in his restroom," he snipped.
"Capitalism at its worst," Fin muttered.
1-6 Precinct
SVU Squad Room
4:00 PM
Olivia and Elliot traded files to gather more information and notes across their desks.
Munch and Fin were giving them a run down on what happened at the corner store.
"We don't even know where to begin to look," Olivia sighed. "I mean, Sherona Anderson and Greg Thomas have nothing in common except the drugs, otherwise, we have no idea about the kind of company they kept or where in the HELL they got the cocaine."
Elliot tapped his pen on his desk, with a doubtful look on his face.
"Are you sure this can't go to narc?" He asked. "I mean, the victims weren't raped and this is definitely a drug related case here. We can't do our jobs without previous knowledge."
"That's why I'm here," Fin said with a grin. "Down in narc, we only saw this grade of cocaine being carted around in high priced, crowded nightclubs. You know, the ones run by smart bangers who like riding the fast track instead of earning a real living."
"That's all fine and good, but still my question is," Olivia snipped. "Where the hell do we look for this bastard? I mean, there's gotta be hundreds of clubs in this city."
"Well, unless the assistant manager of Hanson's decides to give us something, we've hit a wall," Munch commented.
Mindy Varlos's Apartment
West Side
5:45 PM
Mindy Varlos came home to the sound of her eight month old son screaming his head off, and the babysitter asleep on her couch. Unsure of how long her son had been without attention, she picked up her baby boy Peter and cuddled him as she went over to the babysitter, her younger teen sister.
"You dumbass little bitch!" Mindy yelled, waking her sister Serena up.
"What Mindy?" She mumbled, sleep laden.
"How long have you been letting Peter cry like this?" Mindy asked as she went into the small kitchen and retrieved a bottle for the little boy.
"Sorry," Serena apologized. "There's no need for name calling."
Mindy sighed.
"You can be so irresponsible sometimes," Mindy chastised. "Listen, pack your things, we have to go."
"Go?" Serena asked, sitting up from the couch. "Where? Why?"
"I can't tell you right now," Mindy said, heading to the bedroom she shared with her son. "Just pack enough to get through the week until I figure out where to go next."
Serena huffed a breath and did as her sister told her.
Mindy knew that if she didn't make sure that at least her son and her sister were safe because if they stayed at her apartment, they would all be dead for sure.