She has the feeling that she is being watched. Her cop senses were on full alert. She scans the area around and she notices a man stop and looks at her and he stays motionless for all of twenty seconds. He gives her a small nod of his head before moving on towards his car. There's something about him she can't place but then it hits her. They have both lost someone that they cared about deeply. Sure she lost her somebody a while ago but the pain is still fresh and no matter what, it will always be there. She can tell that he has lost someone recently because of the way he carries himself. She rises from her position at the foot of the grave and marvels at the headstone they had installed for her. Knowing that she has done all she can at this gravesite in the form of cleaning it up, she walks the short distance to the other grave that is just opposite to the one she just left. She reads the inscription on the headstone and she is still in awe of the words on it.

"Vincit Omnia Veritas"

To this day this saying still grounds her. Her mother was her best friend and they did everything together. But sadly there is someone here to keep her company now. Her father is with her in eternal rest as well. As far as she can tell he just gave up. The stress of him going on after she was murdered was too much for him. He tried to be strong for her but she could tell that the fight in him had left and he had just lost all interest in living in this world without her.

His official cause of death was organ failure. But she knew in her heart that his death was caused by a broken heart. Even though he lasted eleven years after his wife had died she still knew the truth.

She was essentially an orphan. But she was an orphan who has a job as a detective with the NYPD. She thought that avenging her mother's death would be easy but as it turns out her case was much harder to solve than she ever imagined. After going down the rabbit hole one too many times she completely lost track of her own reality. So after countless hours of therapy, she permanently shelved her mother's case never to look at it again. What was the sense anyway?

She cleans up her mother's gravesite and leaves a souvenir that she hopes her mother will appreciate. The small teddy bear that she propped up against her mother's headstone is looking directly across to her father's headstone. And her father's headstone has Woody and Buzz from Toy Story sitting looking at the teddy bear. He loved that movie so she figured that he would love the toy figures she got him.

Always looking to satisfy her curiosity she rises from her mother's grave, turns, and walks the way the man left twenty minutes ago. She doesn't know exactly where he was standing but she will try to figure it out. She walks about seventy-five feet before she realizes that this was the general area where he had been standing while she was looking at her father's grave. She reads the first couple of headstones and by the time she hits the fifth one she realizes that this was the one he was standing at. She takes in the headstone that must have been specially ordered because her fathers took four months to get placed once she finished ordering it. The one he ordered or had ordered is already in place and etched. She reads the inscription on the stone.

Martha M. Rogers
Loving Mother, Sister, and Friend.
11-18-1942 to 2-12-2011 You are Forever in Our Hearts

Now she knows for sure that he lost someone he deeply cares about. She turns and leaves but at the same time, she wonders how he is doing.

Xx

She watches from her desk as Esposito and Ryan try to make plans for Valentine's Day. Esposito is doing it very, very late in the game and can't get a reservation at a decent restaurant. She knows Lanie and if she knows one thing, she knows that Lanie will be very upset if he can't find a decent place to eat.

As she watches the looks on their faces from the rejection that she is seeing she can tell that they both strike out, then she thinks about her own loveless love life. She compares herself to the ugly duckling. She knows that she will be desirable to someone out there someday but as it stands now she has yet to find him. But when she does she will shed her ugly form and become the beautiful swan she knows she is. Her mind thinks about the man in the cemetery and she wonders how he is handling the loss of his mother. She had looked into Martha M. Rodgers and found out that she had a son. The vague description that came with the newspaper article she read fits his description. She doesn't know why but she's drawn to him for some strange reason. Maybe it's because they both lost someone they really cared about. Her desk phone rings pulling her from her daydreaming.

"Beckett"

She takes the information that is given to her by dispatch and looks to the boys after she hangs up the phone. They have a new case to respond to. She can only imagine what the story is behind this murder because where they're going to is a very rich and affluent neighborhood on Manhattan's Upper Westside.

When she gets out of her car after pulling up behind the boys she can still hear them arguing about what is the best Valentine's day present. Ryan is getting Jenny chocolate but he forgets to realize that she is planning a wedding and is going to need to fit into a dress so chocolate is out. Esposito is going with the traditional route and is buying Lanie a bracelet and necklace and maybe a pair of earrings. If those bozos only took the time to think about what they were doing they would understand that not all women want the same thing. These guys will never learn.

The team of three arrives at the house of Damien and Victoria Westlake. The patrol cop gives him a rundown of what happened inside the house when Mr. Westlake came back from playing a quick game of basketball with his friend down the street. At that time Kate had asked the patrol cop her basic information gathering questions and then she saw the body of Mrs. Westlake. Nails were sticking out of her forehead, throat, and chest. She was killed with a powerful construction-type nail gun. She looks at the bloody paw prints on the carpet and makes the following statement to the patrol cop.

"The Westlakes had a dog and maybe someone heard it barking during the time of the murder." Kate states.

"The witnesses that I interviewed told me that nobody heard the dog barking. But the M.E. puts the death at between 4:30 and 6 pm."

"So she could have been dead before Mr. Westlake left for his basketball game. Where is Mr. Westlake right now?" Kate asks.

The patrol cop points to the closed doors that lead to the living room.

Kate moves towards the living room and hears hushed voices talking. Thinking that the person is on the phone she announces herself as she enters the living room.

"Mr. Westlake, I am detective Kate Beckett and I need to ask you about..."

When she looks at the two men talking together she stops in her tracks….

Xx

Rick received the call around an hour ago. By the time he had arrived Damien had already called 911 and reported what he found when he got back home. But as of yet the police have not arrived. He knew that his good friend was innocent of murdering his wife because he had a solid alibi. They go way back to when they went to school together. They would hang out after school together until Rick had to do his act on the fairway. After he left for his show, Damien would go and watch his parents perform. Damien and his parents were with the carnival up until his father and mother were both killed in a freak accident. They were the motorcycle duo who rode their bikes inside the globe of death. That is until one of the pieces of globe fell away and his father ran over his mother then he fell through the hatch decapitating himself on the small trap door to enter and exit the globe. His mother was rushed to the hospital but by the time she arrived, she was pronounced dead on arrival due to all of her internal injuries. In less than five minutes Damien had become an orphan and homeless.

Xx

They tried to keep him at the carnival with everyone taking a turn to care for him. But as fate would have it social services had got wind of the accident and launched an investigation into the next of kin for Damien. The only problem was that the carnival needed to move to the next city and DCS would not let him go with the carnival. He was told to gather all of his possessions and the social worker who was assigned to his case would bring him to her office until a proper foster home could be found.

He had never seen his friend again. Rick and Damien had kept in touch. When Damien found out that Ricky had his first book finally published they reminisced about their old days at school. And this is where they are now. Just as Rick was going to ask his friend a question, someone announced that she needed to ask something and then stopped talking. The second she entered through the doorway Rick remembered her. She was the woman from the cemetery. At that point, he was at a loss for words….

A/N: Sorry for the late delay, worked super late tonight.