Ethanol
"What on earth are we meant to do for the next four hours?" Jack complained, scowling at the doors for good measure. An electrical fault had messed with the door mechanism, locking Nikki, Jack, Thomas and Clarissa in the lab until a technician could be called out to fix the problem, which according to the firm Thomas had called, would take approximately four hours. The four adults were all sat in the main office area, bored out of their minds. Nothing to do except wait to go home.
"I've got a pack of cards somewhere." Clarissa volunteered.
"Oh, I've got a bottle of wine in my desk." Nikki remembered, ignoring Thomas' disapproving look and Jack's incredulous one. Clarissa was grinning as though she'd expected nothing less of her. "Bottom drawer, Jack." She motioned to the forensic scientist, who was closer to her desk than she was.
Jack dutifully opened the bottom drawer, pulling out two bottles. "Uh, Nikki?"
"What?"
He held up a smaller, clear bottle he'd pulled out along with the wine bottle. "I know you can hold your drink, but why exactly do you have a bottle of ethanol next to your wine stash?"
Nikki's brow furrowed in confusion. "What?" She repeated incredulously, a sinking realisation washing over her. "Hang on, is there anything else in there?"
Jack shrugged, looking down into the drawer again before producing a small jar. "Just a specimen jar. Which really only raises more questions."
"Why don't I have a bottle of wine in my desk?"
"You just quietly swig ethanol from the specimen jars don't you?"
Nikki swore quietly under her breath. Of course, of course Harry would take the chance to set her up with her own joke. She'd not looked in that drawer since he'd left, both she and Leo using the latter's wine collection whenever they had a drink, and she'd never mentioned the wine before to anyone else. She glanced up, sighing at the inquisitive stares of her three colleagues. "Blame Harry. It's payback for telling him he swigged ethanol out of specimen jars."
"Because that makes so much more sense." Jack rolled his eyes but replaced the ethanol and jar in the drawer anyway. "Wine anyone?"