ANEverything's starting to come together, folks! Thanks for the awesome reviews. This chapter has sort of become my "Tanglewood 2". I hope it doesn't disappoint…Again, lynching is only permitted AFTER I finish, okay?

Ideas for the ending are welcome!
:oP Nevermind

P.S. I think I said this once already, but I'll say it again – there is no owning going on here! I am simply borrowing some of my favorite characters from CSI:NY and plopping them into a situation I have created for them.

I don't remember how I got back to the lab. I must have taken a cab or something. At least, I hoped I had because I had no idea where my car was.

My first order of business was coffee. I went into the break room and chugged three or four cups straight up before setting out to find Adam.

He was plugging away at his computer, processing surveillance video from something or other. Needless to say, he was a little surprised to see me.

"Are you drunk?" he asked.

"Yes, you gotta problem with that?" I wanted to know.

"No. Just never seen you come into work drunk before."

"Well, I'm not working, so it doesn't matter now, does it?"

"Uh…I guess not."

"I need to see the tape of the interview." I was so tired and still pretty drunk and Lindsey was a really good kisser. I needed to focus.

"Which interview?"

"Mac's with Maria Santonelli."

Adam's eyes got really wide. "No way, man. I'm not losing my job over you."

"Come on. I swear I won't let it get back to you. I just – I really need to see it."

"Yeah right. Mac knows everything, man. He'll find out it was me."

"I'll tell him I forced you to show me."

I could tell he wasn't totally convinced. I found a chair and pulled it up next to him. "Look, if you thought you'd been betrayed by your best friend, but maybe there was a chance you hadn't, wouldn't you go out of your way to find out?"

He looked at me for a long time, weighing his options. He finally relented. "Fine. But if this comes back to me…"

"It won't, I promise."

He left the room for a few minutes, giving me a chance to rub my temples to ward of the headache I knew was about to erupt in my skull. When he came back, he had a tape in his hands.

He shoved it into the machine and found the beginning of the interview. He turned up the volume and left the room, wanting nothing further to do with my improprieties.

I watched myself stand up, shove the chair across the room and look angrily at Stella. "You happy now?" I asked and stormed out of the room.

Stella began to follow me, but Maria held her back. "Wait. That's not what I came here to say."

Stella retrieved my chair and sat down. Mac entered the room then too. Maria looked imploringly at him. "Is he gone?"

Mac nodded and sat down himself.

Maria sighed heavily. She looked so tired. "I don't really know where to start."

"Why did you lie to him?" Stella asked gently.

Maria's smile was rueful. "He would have liked the real version way less."

"How so?" Mac asked.

"The first time I dated Sonny was a long time ago. Danny was pretty deep into Tanglewood by then but he and Sonny were butting heads all the time and things were getting really tense. That and Danny's baseball career had reached a dead end and he was getting antsy to find something else to do. When he started telling me he was interested in forensic science, we both realized he needed to be free of Tanglewood to pursue that. He was afraid Sonny would never let him out. I waited for a few months to make sure he was gonna follow through with the whole thing before I approached Sonny. We made a deal. I become his girlfriend and he lets Danny out of Tanglewood."

"Did Danny know about the deal?" Stella asked.

"No. Danny assumed I had finally succumbed to Sonny's advances. God, we fought. I didn't think he'd ever forgive me for that."

"But you and Sonny didn't last," Mac prompted.

"Once Danny was out and his career well on its way, I didn't see the need to stay with Sonny any longer. It wasn't the worst relationship I've ever been in, but Sonny's almost incapable of loving anyone but himself."

I stopped the tape for a minute. Fuck me. All this time I thought… Fuck. I ran a hand over my face and pressed play again.

"What made you go back to him?" Stella wanted to know.

"Louie."

"Danny's brother?" Mac asked.

Maria just nodded. "I'm not entirely sure why, but Sonny never really got over me. I could hardly date anyone after I broke up with him. He would call and threaten them or find out where they worked and threaten them there. It was ridiculous. I was just about to finally get a restraining order against him when Louie told me he was finally read to cut his ties with Tanglewood."

"Why did he stay so much longer?" Mac wanted to know.

"The Messers are loyal to a fault. Danny's got a pretty good head on his shoulders, so he can figure out who he should be loyal to and who he should avoid. Louie wasn't born with that ability. Besides which, he was always a trouble maker."

"You have a history with the Messer family?" Stella asked.

"A long and complicated history, yes. They became my family when my own fell apart," she summarized.

"So you wanted to help Louie the same way you helped Danny."

Maria nodded. "I went and talked to Sonny. This time the deal was me be his girlfriend and the cash to cover Louie's debts. My grandmother left me a lot of money after she died, so I used that to cover the debts."

"So what happened? Why did the deal not work out the same way it did the first time?" Stella asked.

I didn't think Maria's shoulders could slump any further, but they seemed to. "Sonny got himself arrested. Cocky, arrogant, stupid bastard."

"We pulled security tapes from Attica. You only went to see Sonny once," Mac said.

"He wanted me to convince Danny to get the charges dropped. It wasn't part of the deal."

"On the tape, you two had an all-out fight."

Maria grinned. "I almost wasn't able to sweet-talk my way out of being banned from there forever. Not that it would matter that much, but I'll never be sure I won't have to visit someone I care about there."

"And the rape?" Stella asked.

Maria's smile faded completely. "It's funny, you know. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I really was convinced that as stupid as Sonny was, he cared about me somehow. That he would never hurt me. The really dumb thing is that if Carlos had kept his big mouth shut, I probably never would have thought Sonny had sent him."

"And yet, we couldn't get him to say a word," Mac said.

"You weren't coming at it the right way. Carlos is under the deluded impression that Sonny has some sway over this department because of me and Danny. Tell him you know everything. He'll crack, I promise."

"Would you be able to do one more thing for us?" Mac asked.

"Detective Taylor, if there is anything I can do to get Sonny out of my and my family's life for once and for all, I will do it."

"Can you get him to confess to our murder on tape?"

"Yes," she said without flinching. "I'll do it tonight."

"What about Danny?" Stella asked.

Maria's smile was so sad; it nearly brought tears to my eyes. "Danny and I have been headed for a breakup since the day we met. It didn't happen quite the way I planned it, but at least it's out of the way now."

The tape ended, but I couldn't move. I felt like the building had fallen down on top of me. All this time…

What do I do now?