Thanks to everyone for the reviews…
CatherineLouise – Thanks for the review! I don't mean to make Greg a twerp, I think he is a brilliant character and I want to make him the light relief in this story ;-)
krysalys73 – Me have danger?… Well you'll have to read down the page to find it out! Thanks for your review!
Charmin-Lady – Thanks for the review!
crazy-4-csi – That's so true! Thanks for your review!
A Christy – Thanks for your review!
dark syrinx – Good to see you have a pen name, does this mean you'll be writing fanfiction? Anyway thanks for the review!
Well, here's the next instalment…
Chapter 11Katie had just finished yet another hectic shift at the crime lab when she was in her way out to her car. She suddenly heard her cell phone ring and fished it out of her pocket to answer it.
"Hello?... hey Grissom… yeah I've just finished now… sure I'll be there in a minute." She hung up the phone and headed back to the lab, walking at a quick pace as she sensed the urgency in Grissom's voice.
When she reached the door to his office she saw through the glass a sombre-looking Grissom sat at his desk. Knocking on the door, she went inside and stood in front of her boss.
"Hey. You wanted to see me?"
"Take a seat." Katie sat down quickly and waited for Grissom to start.
"I was mailed a package. When I opened it I found these inside." Grissom passed her a pile of photographs. Confused, Katie started flicking through them and slowly realised what they were. Numerous photos of Nick shopping, walking to his car, driving, at work outside the crime lab and at crime scenes lay in her hands. The final picture had her and Nick in an embrace outside a local grocery store.
"Oh my God," she whispered.
"There is someone stalking Nick. They also left this in the envelope." He passed her a piece of paper that had a message on it -
'You should really watch out for him,
You don't know what may happen.'
"When did you get this?"
"This morning. I have told no other person besides you. How long have you and Nick been dating?"
Katie stared at the note for a moment before replying, "Uh… a few months. We wanted to keep it low profile. Does Nick know about this?"
"No. I want you to work alone on this. I want fingerprints, anything at all that can give us a lead. If anyone asks I'll say you are working on a high-profile case that has a privacy issue."
"Do I tell Nick?" Katie asked.
Grissom shook his head, "No, I want to eliminate the crime lab before we tell him and a few others."
She widened her eyes, "You think this might be an inside job?"
"I don't want to over-look anything. We will start with the lab and see what turns up. Nick is a popular guy with the females and he may have angered anyone connected to one of them. We cannot miss anything."
"I know. Oh God, do you think he's in danger?"
Grissom took his glasses off and sighed, "Honestly, I don't know."
"Ok, I'll get started right away. I can't go home now."
She left Grissom's office and headed to a private evidence room towards the end of the hall. She shut the door and started to lay the 20 photographs and the note down on the lit table, carefully examining each one. She used a magnifying glass to see if any reflective surfaces had caught a reflection of the photographer. Nothing.
She dusted each photograph for fingerprints and managed to retrieve a few. One was hers, another was Grissom's and the third set was of an anonymous person with no hits in AFIS.
She was starting to get frustrated and decided to scan each photograph into a computer to help her take another look.
4 hours later and Katie was working on the final picture of her and Nick together. As she yawned loudly, she was unaware of Grissom behind her.
"How is it going?"
She jumped and let out a slight scream, "Oh my God, you scared me!" Grissom sat down beside her, looking at the now enlarged picture on the screen.
"Jumpy?"
"Yeah, I guess. I feel so weird now I know someone has been taking pictures of Nick and I. I have no idea how Nick's going to feel."
"I'm sure you will help him through it. He's lucky to have someone like you."
"I think it's the other way round as well. God, I can't find anything!"
Grissom smiled, "Every crime has evidence, you just have to look carefully. Let's have a look." He put on his glasses and studied the picture in front of him for a moment before pointing something out. "What's that?" he said.
Katie zoomed in on the pane of glass just behind Nick's head and saw a blur. Zooming in revealed the figure of a man taking a picture - the camera lens obscured his face.
"See, you just have to keep looking. Why don't you go and have a few hours sleep and come back later."
Katie stifled a yawn, "I'm fine."
"If you're not 100 then you are no good to Nick. Go home and try not to think about it too much." Grissom patted her on the back before leaving. She agreed with what he said so she collected all the evidence together in a file, printing out the zoom of the man and finally managed to drive home.
"Dad, I'm home!"
Katie called out to her father as she opened the front door to her house. She went into the living room and put down her bag on a table and proceeded to the kitchen where the noise of rustling forks was heard.
As she entered the room her heart sank; her dad had left many of the cupboards open and numerous broken plates were on the floor. He was so consumed with fishing something out of the cupboard that he did not notice her standing in the doorway. When he looked up to see her she closed her eyes at the look he gave her.
"Who are you?"
Katie took a deep breath before opening her eyes, "I'm your daughter."
Tom looked puzzled for a moment before turning back to the cupboard, "Oh, I want some food." She walked to the microwave to see a can of tomato soup turning on the ceramic dish, cooking away. She immediately opened the microwave door and grabbed the can with a dishcloth, throwing it into the sink.
"Are you crazy? You will set the whole place on fire! You know you're not supposed to put metal into the microwave!" she exclaimed.
"I was hungry." Katie instantaneously wished she hadn't made such an outburst as her dad looked at her with such an expression it made her heart sink and she cursed herself.
She went over to him and gave him a hug, "I'm sorry I snapped at you. It's just been a hard day."
"What happened?"
"It doesn't matter," she said, pulling away from her father. "Why don't you go and watch TV and I will make you some fish fingers and chips."
As her dad went into the family room she collapsed into a chair in the middle of the room and started to quietly sob. 'I can't cope anymore. What am I going to do about Nick? I can't do it', she thought.
She continued to cry for a moment before wiping her tears away and pulling herself together. She had to be strong. For her dad and Nick.
She quickly prepared a meal for her dad and served it to him before going back into the kitchen to look at the photos of Nick. As she thoroughly looked at the zoomed-in image of the photography she noticed the car he was sitting in, which she assumed was his, the license plate was visible but she would need the zoom of the computer software to make it fully clear.
She made a note to search for the license plate when she went back to work. She noted down all the places the pictures were taken, hoping she could see some sort of pattern, before deciding to take a nap for a few hours before she went back to work.
Chapter 12 should be up soon. It would be interesting to hear what you all think I should do about this stalker...