DISCLAIMER: I do not own these characters. They belong to James Duff and the Major Crimes franchise.
A/N: Thank you all for the kind reviews on this story. And now, on with the next chapter...
Chapter 7
The drive over to the Monterey Police station wasn't too long from the hotel that they all were staying at. The sun was beating down and there wasn't a cloud in sight. A perfect morning Andy thought to himself as he sat in the passenger seat of Sharon's car. Sharon would not let him drive this morning when they left the hotel. They pulled into the visitor's section of the parking lot outside the police station and saw that Provenza and Julio were already there waiting for them.
Provenza and Julio walked up to Sharon's car and waited for them to get out. "We heard from Mike this morning ma'am" Julio started as Sharon nodded to him. "He says that Acting Assistant Chief Howard wants you to check in with him once we are finished here, he didn't sound too happy over the phone ma'am" he continued. Sharon looked at Julio and said "Thank you detective" and she walked around the other side of the car where Provenza and Andy were at.
"How are you feeling Flynn?" Provenza asked Andy as Andy got out of the car. "I'm good" he said but his face told another story. Provenza looked at him strangely but Andy waved him off. All four of them headed into the police station. At the front desk is a receptionist and Provenza walks up to her. Julio looks around at all the different plaques along the walls. Andy and Sharon stand by each other. Sharon looks at him with a worried look. Andy smiles back at her and touches her arm. "Everything is going to be fine" he says as he tries to reassure her while they wait.
"We are from the LAPD" Provenza starts to tell the receptionist and shows his badge and credentials to her. "I'm Lieutenant Provenza, this is Captain Raydor, Lieutenant Flynn, and Detective Sanchez" he says to her. "We are here to see Captain Smith" he concludes. She looks at all of them, "Oh yes, he's been expecting you guys" she says and buzzes them in through the front door.
As they walk through a hallway and into the main area of the station, they see the hustle and bustle of the various officers working on what they can only assume is Stroh's case. "Ah, Captain Raydor" Captain Smith says to her as he shakes her hand. "Won't you all come back here to our conference room, there's something I want to show you" Captain Smith says to all of them. They follow him in to the room and they see evidence boxes scattered over the big table.
"We conducted two searches this morning from the tips your team provided us with" Captain Smith started to show them on a map. "One at Stroh's apartment at the Monterey Pines Apartment complex" as he pointed to it on the map. "And the other search at Don Dahvee Park" and pointed to the park on the map. Sharon nodded as the captain continued. She looked over at Julio with a questionable look. "Mike found those locations last night while we drove up here and he told us about them. After you went to the hospital, we relayed the message to the captain, ma'am" Julio said to Sharon as Sharon just nodded.
"Captain, our counterparts at the Monterey Sheriff's Office used their K9 teams to assist in the search of the missing women at that park and we did find their bodies buried there" Captain Smith stated. Andy put his head down and just shook it. "What a dirt bag" Andy muttered to himself. Sharon looked at him and then back at Captain Smith as he started talking again. "Yes, and thanks to you Lieutenant, we don't have to worry about him anymore" Captain Smith said. Andy looked at him with an accused look on his face. "We ruled self-defense Lieutenant so that part of the investigation is over" Captain Smith said as he went into one of the evidence boxes. Andy just looked at him as Sharon lightly touched his arm. "Also, the damages done at the cottage you rented will be covered by insurance so you don't have to worry about that" Captain Smith said.
"When we conducted our search in Stroh's apartment, we found something that was alarming" he says as he takes some pictures out of the box and hands them to Sharon. Both Sharon and Andy look at the pictures that the captain just handed to them. "These pictures were discovered in a small room in his apartment" Captain Smith says to them. There were four pictures all together, one of Sharon, one of Rusty, one of Andy, and one of the three of them together.
The pictures of them separately looked to be taken last year sometime. Sharon's picture was of her wearing the dress she wore when Andy took her to Serve for their date. Rusty's picture was of him walking into the PAB alone. Andy's picture was of him standing outside his old house. The picture of all of them together was taken as they went to visit that house with the black mold. Andy gritted his teeth as he looked over all of these photos. "Son of a bitch!" Andy exclaimed.
"Looks like he was keeping tabs on you two" Captain Smith added. "We didn't know who this was" he started to explain as he pointed to the picture of Rusty that Sharon was currently holding. "He's my son" Sharon said as she cleared her throat, "and was the witness in his murder trial in LA" she continued. She placed the picture down and walked over to the windows in the room. Andy looked at her walk over there and then turned around to face Provenza and Julio. "Well someone's been keeping tabs on you, Flynn, and Rusty ma'am" Julio says. Sharon had the look of panic written all over her face. "He had to of had someone in LA take these pictures of us" she said to the group.
"We also found two handwritten notes" Captain Smith said as he handed the notes to Provenza. Provenza read it carefully and looked up. "What?" Andy questioned him. "What do they say Lieutenant?" Sharon asked him. Provenza started to read out loud what the notes stated "Per your request, here are pictures of them, will send more upon need" and then moved on to the other note "Here is an updated picture you wanted. Looks like a happy family." "Is it signed?" Andy asked him. "There are the initials at the end on both, either a G or a C, it's too hard to tell Captain" Provenza answered and walked over to show Sharon. Sharon looked at it and she couldn't tell either. "We need a forensics expert" Sharon says to him.
Sharon pulls out her phone and calls Buzz to tell him what is going on. "Bring Rusty to the PAB and stay there with him in the Murder Room" she tells him and hangs up. She looks at Andy and Andy walks over to where she was standing and places his arms around her. "This may be bigger than what we thought, Sharon" Andy said to her in a low voice. "He needs to stay safe again" Sharon said as she embraced him back.
Provenza calls Mike to tell him what they newly discovered here after the Monterey Police conducted their searches. "Mike, we've got an even bigger problem on our hands" Provenza said as he looked over to where Sharon and Andy were at. Julio gathered up the evidence and signed a chain of custody report for the items that they would be taking back with them to the LAPD. He placed them all in an evidence bag and shook Captain Smith's hand. "Thank you sir" he said. "I hope you guys catch the person" Captain Smith says as he walks out of the conference room.
"We need to get back to LA" Sharon says to Andy as Andy lets go of her. She wipes tears from her eyes, hoping no one notices and then moves forward to leave the room. Andy follows her out and stops to shake the hand of Captain Smith. Provenza follows them out along with Julio and they meet up at their cars. "We will go back to the hotel, check out, and head back home" Andy says to them and Sharon gets into the passenger seat. Andy walks around to the driver's side door and takes a deep breath. He looks up to see Provenza looking at him, he nods to him and he nods back, gets in and drives to the hotel.
Once they arrive back at their hotel room, Sharon started to pack up their bags. Andy saw she was having a hard time zipping up one of the bags and walked over to her and placed his hands on her hands to settle them down. "I'm fine" she says as she is still trying to zip up the bag. "If I didn't call off Rusty's surveillance team, they would have seen someone taking pictures of Rusty" Sharon started to say. "You don't know that Sharon" Andy said as he tried to calm her down by rubbing his hands up and down her arms. Sharon looked up at him. Andy looked back at her and she walked away to grab his duffle bag and pack that up. Andy sighed to himself and helped her.
Once they were all packed up and checked out of the hotel, they all headed back towards LA. Sharon received a text message from Mike stating that he and Amy were already starting to work on the leads and that Rusty was sitting with Buzz at his desk. She replied back to him stating that they were heading back to LA.
It was mid-afternoon on a Saturday so hopefully they would not hit much traffic heading back. Sharon was fiddling with her ring on her finger as Andy drove down the road. He was following Provenza and Julio. "We never did talk about when we are getting married" Sharon said to Andy. "Yeah, well I was planning on discussing that with you over this long weekend, but" Andy said to her and glanced at her as he was driving. "I don't want to wait Andy" she said as she looked at him. "If anything over the last couple of weeks has taught us, I don't want to wait to marry you" she said as she grabbed his right hand and held on to it. "Okay, then we will go to the courthouse after my doctor's appointment on Monday morning", he smiled and kept his eyes on the road. She held onto his hand but looked out her window at the scenery that was passing them by.
TBC
