Chapter 2.
The corner of Mac's desk had become Stella's spot over her most recent years at the crimelab. No one batted an eye at finding her seated there with crossed legs dangling off the edge. That morning was no different. While Flack had opted to plop into one of the comfortable chairs in Mac's office, Stella sat on her corner of the desk with folded arms. Mac had chosen neither, and stood by the end of his desk, rummaging through the all but empty Davies' casefile.
"Laura hasn't lived with her foster parents for over two months," Flack pointed out, as Mac for the second time that day suggested Laura might be involved. "Why would she go back now? She's not like that."
"I know you care about her," Mac said. He put the file back in the box, pushing it a few inches further onto his desk. "but getting caught for an ATM robbery on the same day someone tries to rob her foster family? This is no coincidence."
"I'm not saying it isn't weird," Flack said, looking ready to leap out of his chair in defence of Laura. Of course, he didn't. "But I'm telling you Mac there's no way she's involved in murder."
"Maybe murder wasn't their plan," Mac said. "she needed money, she's proven that herself. The foster family might just have been the perfect opportunity."
"Come on," Flack said. Stella got the impression that he had to stop himself from rolling his eyes, knowing Mac wouldn't take kindly to that. "Laura's misguided, she's not cold blooded."
"How many deaths have we investigated, that were caused by misguided teenagers?" Mac asked. She didn't like it, but Stella had to admit he had a point. She'd dealt with her fair share of them.
"What happened to innocent until proven guilty?" she asked, shoving her sleeves up her arms. "Everything points to our perps being men."
"Laura has a boyfriend, doesn't she?" Mac asked.
"Mac…" Flack said with a loud sigh. He was losing his patience with Mac real fast, and Stella understood why. Once Mac set his mind to something he could be a pain.
"I'm not saying she's involved," Mac said. "But the fact remains that the timing is off and we need to talk to her."
"I'll do it," Stella said, before Flack had a chance to react to Mac's tone. There was no way Mac would let Flack do it, he wouldn't believe a word of that conversation. But maybe Stella had a chance to get her to talk. If Mac went in treating Laura like a suspect, there was no doubt she'd act like one.
Laura didn't look like a kid who was capable of murder. That thought had struck Stella the minute she stepped into the interrogation room, and it had stuck with her since. Hell, Laura barely even looked like a kid who could pull off an ATM robbery, which, Stella guessed, was why it had failed.
From what she'd been able to gather, Laura had tried to rob a young woman, but the woman had fought back and taken off. She'd found a nearby police officer, who had taken Laura into custody.
It wasn't surprising that the woman hadn't considered Laura a big threat. She was barely 5'3" and had only been wielding a pocketknife. Sitting across from Stella in interrogation, she barely looked a day over 15.
"How long have you been living on the street?" Stella asked. She rested her forearms on the table, her fingers intertwined. Normally she'd have a case folder in her hands and exact questions to ask, but Laura wasn't a suspect. Not in her book, anyway.
"I haven't," Laura said. She sat with her arms crossed in front of her chest and her legs stretched out under the table, so far that Stella had to mind where she put her feet, to avoid kicking her.
"Where were you living then?" Stella knew she was going to have to step very carefully to avoid Laura shutting her out. It seemed like Flack was the only cop she trusted, and his absence wasn't making anything easier.
"With my boyfriend," she said. Her attention shifted from the table to the mirror behind Stella. "Where's detective Flack?"
"He's on another assignment," Stella lied. Flack was watching from outside the room, he'd demanded to be allowed to do so. "Who's your boyfriend?"
"That's none of your business," Laura shot at her. Clearly being the concerned detective wasn't working, maybe she should've brought Mac with her to act 'bad cop'. The thought almost made her smile, so she pushed it from her mind and decided on a different approach, to talking to Laura.
"How about I'm honest with you?" she asked, leaning back in her seat.
"Please," Laura said, all but rolling her eyes, much like Flack had earlier. It was no wonder she trusted him.
"Your foster dad, Tommy?" Stella said, waiting for any hint of recognition from Laura, but she didn't look away from the mirror. "He was murdered yesterday."
"I know," Laura said. Her attempt at playing it cool cracked for half a second as she brought her hand to her face and sighed heavily. "Flack told me."
"We have reason to believe you're involved," Stella said.
"What?" Laura seemed genuinely shocked, Stella would be the first to argue that point to Mac. The young girl's hands had paused in mid-air, slowly sinking to rest on the table, her attention jumping around the room. "No, I wouldn't, I could never…"
"The ATM robbery says otherwise," Stella pushed. "Laura, if you know anything…"
"Well I don't!"
"Fine," Stella said through her teeth. "If that's how you want this to be, let me put it in terms you can understand."
Laura said nothing.
"Having a crap time in the foster system, is not a free pass for crime," Stella said. "If you act like an adult, expect to be treated like one. That means facing the consequences of your actions. No bleeding heart detective can protect you, if you're tried as an adult."
"I don't know anything, detective," Laura said, her voice much quieter as she considered what Stella had said.
"I don't believe that," Stella said, opting to give the concerned detective angle a last chance. "Laura, I really want to help you, but I need your help too."
"I can't help you," Laura said.
"Okay." With that Stella got up and left the room, careful not to look back. That girl was definitely in over her head, but until she grew up and accepted their help, Stella didn't see what they could do. Damn it.
Flack was waiting for her in the next room, picking at the thin windowsill as he watched Laura through the window.
"Thanks for not being too hard on her," he said, still looking at the young girl in the interrogation room. Stella cast a glance through the window, Laura hadn't moved at all. "I know she can be… tough."
"I don't blame her," Stella said. "Being a kid in fostercare is hard, but she's not a kid anymore. She needs to grow up."
"I spoke to the DA," Flack said. He was finally able to move his attention from Laura. "They will try to make a deal, and get Laura some help - get her on the right track instead of in juvie."
"That's good," Stella said, but Flack didn't exactly look like he agreed. "Or not?"
"She'll be going to a group home tonight," he explained. "If she really knows something…"
"She wont be safe there," Stella said. "How much time do we have?"
"It'll probably take them a couple hours to set it all up, not much more than that."
"We need something to move on," Stella said, partly over her shoulder as she turned to leave. There had to be something they'd missed. "I'll call you when I have something."
Stella shut the door to Mac's office behind her, annoyed that the glass doors didn't allow more than a soft clink as it fell closed. That conversation warranted a proper slamming of the door. One that rattled every test tube in the damn lab.
To be called into the office, by word of Danny, and scolded like she was some school child… Mac should know how that pissed her off. And for such a minor misstep.
Yes, technically Laura was a minor and Stella had no business interrogating her without a guardian, but it hadn't been an interrogation, not really. She was trying to help.
However, Mac didn't allow any shades of grey into his perception of right and wrong. He had given her his usual spiel about consequences and desk assignments and a firm warning to tread carefully if she wanted to stay on the case.
She had, somehow, managed to keep her anger under control. To Mac, it had been an official interrogation, while Stella had seen the conversation with Laura as just that - a chat. That made him right, at least about protocol. But how he could insist that Laura was involved in the robbery-homicide was beyond her.
Laura hadn't had a fighting chance. She didn't have a kind stranger show up and pull her out of the system like Stella had had. And while her feelings towards professor Papakota had changed drastically in Greece, it didn't change what he had done for her when she was a teenager.
Wanting to shake any thoughts of the professor out of her mind, Stella hastened her pace toward ballistics, only barely avoiding walking into an unfortunate lab tech as she passed him.
"Should I get out of the way?" Danny asked with a smirk as Stella marched into the ballistics lab.
"Depends," she said. "Do you have good news for me?"
"Not exactly," Danny said, taking a big step to the side, which Stella chose to ignore. Much to Danny's disappointment. "But it's not a complete dead end."
"I'm gonna need more than that," Stella said, taking the file Danny handed her. At first glance, the gun was another disheartening dead end. "Stolen?"
"Yeah," Danny said. "Along with seven other weapons, reported stolen from the same shop this year."
"Eight stolen guns?" Stella asked. "Seems like a lot."
"The owner claims his shop is in a bad neighborhood," Danny said. "There's a file on him. We think he's been selling weapons to local gangs and reporting them stolen, to keep the head off himself."
"Wouldn't surprise me," Stella said. "But why would a gang rob a family in Queens?"
"Guess we just figured out who Laura's afraid of," Danny said, a sense of smugness in his tone, even though his attention was briefly diverted by his phone on the table. An annoyed sigh later, he rejected the call and slipped the phone into his pocket.
For a moment, she was tempted to ask if it had been Louie again. But she didn't. Something about Louie Messer made her feel uneasy, and she didn't want to share that feeling with Danny.
"Look, I gotta get a hold of Flack," she said instead. "Run this by Mac, will you?"
"Sure," Danny said. "I saw you leaving his office, you two okay?"
"Oh, yeah," Stella said. She didn't really want to share that with Danny either. "Professional difference of opinion, that's all."
"Didn't know you were able to separate the two now." His words came with a smirk. Geez, how many people had Sid told?
"Funny." Was all Stella said as she slipped out of the room. She wasn't about to admit that Danny had a point about them not being able to separate work and spare time. Certainly not when it came to things they didn't agree about.
Lost in thought, she left to call Flack. Maybe if Laura knew she was about to be sent to a group home, she'd want to tell them something.
Mac had snuck out of his office while Stella had been talking to Danny. He'd been gone when she walked by, heading for the precinct. A plan had begun to form in her head, and she'd decided to go see Flack, rather than call him.
She hadn't expected Mac to actually be at the precinct talking to Flack. Damn it, she had really wanted Flack on board with the idea before talking to Mac about it.
The two were busy discussing Laura's situation again, though Mac didn't seem anymore prepared to accept Laura's innocence than Flack was to accept her guilt.
"How about," Stella said, announcing her presence behind them. Mac greeted her with a cautious smile, out of Flack's sight. "we make this conversation a working dinner? I have an idea."
"An idea?" Mac asked, skepticism oozing from his face. Oh boy, he was going to be hard to convince. Although, technically she wouldn't need his permission to go through with it.
"Mac, patience," Flack said with a quick look in Stella's direction. Thank god for Flack. "Let's all just agree that Stell's buying dinner. When we have food, you can be as doubtful as you'd like."
"Okay," Mac said with some hesitation, but Flack was already heading for his coat on the back of his desk chair across the room.
"This wasn't exactly the dinner I'd had in mind," Mac said, his voice low. Whether it was to avoid being heard by Flack, or disappointment, Stella couldn't quite tell.
"I know, I'm sorry," she said. She wanted to offer to make it up to him, but Flack was already on his way back with his coat. Instead, she smiled at Mac. "You got out of buying, didn't you?"
"That's what worries me," he said dryly, leading the way out of the precinct.
15 minutes later they were, by some miracle, seated in the restaurant, waiting for their food to arrive. When it came to it, Flack had been quite modest in his order. Just the same - it was Mac who needed persuasion, she was already sure Flack was in.
"So," Mac said after while. He already didn't seem too open to suggestions. "You had a plan for Laura?"
"Yeah." Stella made sure to sound more confident than she felt, it certainly wasn't the best plan, but it was a plan nonetheless. "She can stay with me."
"With you?" Mac asked. The corner of his mouth twitched as if he meant to laugh, it took him a moment to realize she wasn't kidding.
"Not at my place, but at a hotel," Stella said quickly, before he had a chance to say another word. "It'd keep her safe - maybe even earn her trust."
"You have no way of knowing she isn't dangerous," Mac said, though he was barely allowed to finish before Flack snapped.
"You have no way of knowing she is!" He said, gripping the edge of the table.
"She's involved…" Mac tried.
"She's a kid, Mac!" Flack said, his voice drawing the attention of a couple of other restaurant guests. Quieter, he continued. "A kid who makes dumb decisions, but there's no way she killed anyone."
"Guys," Stella said. "It'll just be for the night. If she does know something, that may be all it takes."
"I don't like it," Mac said, though sensing that wasn't enough, he added; "Neither will the DA."
"He doesn't have to know," Stella said. "She's not in custody. For all he cares, she just needs a place to stay and I'm offering."
By the time detective Bonasera finally seemed to be asleep, Laura had struggled not to fall asleep herself for over an hour. She had spent her time trying to figure out what to do. There was no right choice, and at that moment, it had been so tempting to stay with the cops, and keep herself safe, at the hotel room the detective had rented for the two of them, but she couldn't leave Emil in danger like that.
Determined to make things right, she pushed herself out of bed and very carefully made her way to the chair, where she'd left her clothes earlier. Detective Bonasera didn't seem a particularly light sleeper, but it still took Laura several minutes to change into her everyday clothes, before she went in search of something else.
She had seen Detective Bonasera pay in cash at the front desk earlier, and knew there were more in her purse. Laura was sure, that with a good job with the police, she'd be able to spare them, so Laura carefully picked the purse up from Stella's nightstand and rummaged through it, with luck. She shoved the bills into her pocket and dropped the purse back on the nightstand, before she took off in a hurry.