A/N: Thanks for all the nice feedback - I promise to try and show the characters a terrible time and you readers a good one. :) Patty, I hadn't thought of that, but it gives me an idea. I'll see if it works out in the story. I'm both a younger and an older sibling myself, so I do try to keep both perspectives in mind when I write the boys!
Chapter 3
Alan stood at the window and watched the black SUV pull away, a slight frown between his brows. Hard to know what that had been about. With Don, it was usually best to talk around a subject and let him blurt out what was on his mind, but that took time, and it was a trick he had never really mastered. Margaret had been better at it. He sighed. Women were generally better at that kind of thing, he found. Probably why Charlie was more forthcoming, more likely to answer a direct question about his well being with a thoughtful answer - he had spent so much time in Margaret's company growing up. Maybe what Don could have used was more of a woman's touch. Maybe he still could. He grimaced and turned away from the window. Not that there seemed to be much hope of that.
He saw one of the lower doors of the sideboard still standing open and crossed the dining room to close it.
Then again, maybe it was just a fundamental difference in their personalities. Charlie approached his personal worries the way he approached his mathematical problems - talked about it, drew data from various sources: himself; Larry; Amita, he was pretty sure; and now Don - analyzed it, then started the whole process over, until he found the answer he was looking for. He had even seen him put his problems into equation format, though he personally couldn't imagine how that could work.
Don seemed to prefer to put his head down and fight his way past his worries - as though pushing them aside would somehow put them in perspective, or make them go away. Maybe it even worked sometimes - but not every time. Of that he was sure. Sometimes it just seemed to make them fester.
He reached the sideboard and smiled a little at the sight of the albums lined up within. Margaret had loved to keep them. There were several of Charlie's mathematics career and awards, a few of the boys growing up - and now they looked a little lonely without the one featuring Don's baseball history tucked among them.
Well, he couldn't cling to everything forever. He should really go through them at some point, see if there were any others that should belong to Don. That was one problem with Charlie buying the house - no reason to move anything, so too much stayed intact. He resisted the urge to pull them out and bury himself in them for a few hours. Instead, he gently swung the door shut and pushed back to his feet.
Maybe Margaret was right. He was having trouble moving on.
000
Don pulled into the first available parking space he found and shut off the engine. He picked up the album and paused. No. Probably there wasn't anything in there that could help them. Or, at least, he'd like to have a crack at finding it on his own first if there was. The album felt like something private between himself and his mother, and he wasn't eager to parade it in front of everybody. He turned it over in his hands, not quite ready to put it down.
He wondered if she'd kept one on his FBI career. If she had, he'd never seen it. He had never been able to figure out whether she'd disapproved as strongly of his choice as his father had. She hadn't seemed to, but that didn't mean anything - she'd always been a little better at playing her cards close to the vest. Still, maybe she'd understood. He'd never forget the rush of surprise that day he'd found out that she'd been serious about music - that the law hadn't been a clear and certain choice. It had been like a benediction. Until then, he'd thought he was the only Eppes to flail around, trying to settle on what he wanted to do - the lost, indecisive Eppes. To find out his mother had struggled as well had somehow made it seem all right - had given him a warm rush of sympathy and fellow feeling. Funny, too, that they had both ended up serving the law. He smiled at the worn cover. Yeah, he'd definitely leave the book here. Then he frowned.
On the other hand, two other times since he'd moved back to LA he had let protectiveness for his family distract him from doing his job. Was that what he was doing this time? He hoped not. Sometimes it seemed like there just wasn't room to be a human being and an FBI Agent both. He traced the outline of the album again, then put it back on the passenger seat and reached for the door handle. Odds were the card didn't have anything to do with the rest of the case anyway.
He grimaced. Right. If only he could believe that.
000
"So, have you watched it?" Don barely broke stride as he entered the bull pen, tossing his jacket on the nearest chair and rolling his sleeves above the elbow as he approached the small screen.
"Just once."
"And…?"
Megan jerked her head toward the screen. "See for yourself. I froze it there."
Don perched on a table top and narrowed his eyes at the stilled picture. He frowned. "Can we zoom in?"
The technician obediently zoomed in on the image, panning the blood spatter on the surrounding walls and table.
Don blew out a breath. "There's no way that spatter could have hit everything else and missed that card. Do we know if there were signs of blood underneath it?"
Megan nodded to the technician, who forwarded the tape to a shot of the table after the card had been bagged.
Don was silent, then clipped, "Go back."
The tape blurred as it scanned backward, then stopped and focused.
Don studied the small card, propped upright against a blood-speckled coffee cup. He scrubbed a hand over his face. "So it was deliberately staged."
"No doubt about it. And after her death - so, unless somebody else stopped by, by the murderer."
"Yeah." The word slid out on a sigh. Creepy. He could feel Megan's eyes on him.
"Any ideas?"
"Not a clue. Unless somebody's trying to tell me I should have stuck with baseball."
"Somebody's trying to tell you something."
"I get that. But who? And what? And why? What about you? Any guesses?"
Megan crossed her arms, her mouth twisted in a frown. "Well, it's not defaced in any way - slashed or written on - not so much as a mustache and glasses added or teeth blacked out. So there's nothing to indicate it's hostile."
"So somebody just wanted to say 'hi'?"
"Or somebody wanted to make sure you were on the case. Or wanted you to know that they knew something about you. Or both."
"Yeah. Okay." Don hopped down from the table top. "That's getting us nowhere and we've still got a dead witness to worry about. Let's find out what Colby has to say, then we'll put that angle aside for now and focus on her life and not mine. Where's David?"
"He's had that phone growing out of his ear all morning. Don - " When Megan didn't continue, he turned to look at her with raised brows. "Just - keep alert, okay? There's nothing to say it's hostile. But there's nothing to say it isn't, either."
"Don't worry." Don caught sight of David and gestured him over. "If you're worried that I'm being complacent, believe me, I'm feeling anything but."
David still had the phone pressed to his face as he greeted Don.
Don gave an appreciative whistle at the sight of the thick file in his free hand. "That all from this morning? Nice work."
David nodded, depressing the button on the small handset to break the connection. "Yeah. I've got a lot of info. I don't know how helpful it is, though."
"Yeah, well, okay - tell me."
David flipped open the folder. "Dorothy Meyers was one of thirty-two witnesses in the ValCom case. She was an ex-employee, rather than an expert witness. She wasn't scheduled to testify for two weeks and, near as I've been able to find out, there's nothing especially unique or important about her testimony - it's just corroborative. Her basic profile isn't that different from the other witnesses, except that she's one of the few that's single and lives alone."
"So she was vulnerable."
David shrugged. "I was thinking maybe we're looking at one of those crazy-for-publicity types? Maybe saw her name in the paper and asked her out - wanted to try and get closer to her as a way to catch the edge of the spotlight? Wouldn't be the first." He glanced questioningly at Megan, and she nodded.
"Could be. Could account for your place in the mix, Don - could have gotten your name out of the paper too and done some research - wanted to create a simulated bond with you, too."
Don shook his head. "Meyers I can see. But me? LA is crawling with FBI Special Agents. Why focus on me?"
"When's the last time you were in the paper? If you and ValCom were in at the same time, it could have caught somebody's attention."
"I can run that one down," suggested David quietly. "As long as I'm already warm on the research trail."
"Okay. Good." Don acknowledged David's wry smile with one of his own. "Thanks." David had worked with him longer than anyone, understood that action was the thing that was going to make this bearable for him. Hard to believe now that they had had such a rocky start. But David had originally seemed like nothing more than Merrick's mole and Don had trod a stiff line for a while, trying to find his balance between showing respect for Merrick's leadership and needing to establish his own leadership with his own team. He smiled to remember that he had once actually asked David point blank where his loyalties lay. There was sure no question about where they lay today.
Colby materialized at his elbow, his hands jammed deep in his pockets. He didn't wait for Don to ask. "Nothing unusual about the way that call came in or was dispatched that we can tell. Looks like a coincidence."
"Yeah?" Don raised a skeptical brow. "We're really racking up those coincidences, huh?"
"Yeah." Colby shifted, looking unhappy. "Um - Merrick wants to see you in his office, too."
Great. Don tried not to let anything show on his face, gave a brief nod instead. "Okay - thanks. David, you keep digging. Megan and Colby, see if you can find out what the hold up is with the ME's report. I'll see what's up with Merrick."
He didn't bother with his suit coat, his mind buzzing with preoccupation. What the heck could Merrick want this early in the game? Had they been sloppy? Careless? Unnecessarily rough with a witness?No matter how carefully he walked back through the morning's work, he couldn't come up with a thing.
He reached Merrick's work area and knocked lightly to get his attention. Merrick looked up and there was - something - in his eyes that started an itch at the base of Don's spine. "You wanted to see me, sir?"
Merrick gestured to a chair on the opposite side of the desk. "Have a seat, Eppes."
Don lowered himself cautiously into the chair, trying to gather clues from the smallest facial expression or hint of body language.
"Agent Gretski's team caught a case about an hour or so ago that looks like it could be related to yours."
Don's insides chilled. Had he been too slow? "Another ValCom witness?"
"No." Merrick made a steeple of his fingers, then collapsed them into a loose hand clasp. Don's brow furrowed. Merrick sure looked uncomfortable. "No, the victim profiles are very different. This one was a retired ATF Agent - Ron Alderman. But some of the methodology was similar - both bludgeoned to death with items found in their own homes; both left with sound blaring, the television in this case. Both lived alone, both found by neighbors."
Don's frown deepened. "An ATF Agent. What was the murder weapon?"
"A golf club. Left next to the body, just like the wine bottle. Alone in the apartment, like Meyers."
Don shrugged lightly. "We can work them both, if that's what you're asking, and yeah, I see the similarities, but I gotta say, the connection doesn't look all that strong."
"There's more."
Don sat back slowly, a little unsettled by Merrick's peculiar expression. "Okay."
Merrick opened his desk drawer and pulled out a plastic evidence bag, pushed it across the desk to Don. "That look familiar?"
Don stared, the odd stomach lurch he'd experienced in the small hours of the morning back and intensified three-fold. He picked up the evidence bag gingerly, his heart beating double time. If this is a dream, somebody please wake me up.
"Yes, sir." His voice came out sounding surprisingly normal this time. "That looks a whole lot like the photo page from my college year book."
TBC