She was in shock, and that was putting it lightly. She'd been tempted to call in sick that day, once she'd heard the news, but she couldn't. And now, she stood in front of Kaye's office, staring at the crime scene tape that blocked off the door, so no one could go in.
"What happens now?" she asked, turning to face Trevor, who'd somehow appeared behind her. "She was the second partner…it'll take a while to find someone to replace her, not that we really can replace her, but we still have to…"
He cut her off, gently. "You're rambling, Anna," he said, quietly, "I know." He trailed off for a long moment and then went on. "She'd want you to do it."
Anna shook her head. "No," she said. "No, I couldn't. I just…She…we used to joke about it, but I didn't ever think anything like this would happen…" She cut herself off, upset, and reached up to wipe at her eyes. "Look at me, I'm a mess."
"The police will find out who did this to her," said Trevor, "You know they will. It's only a matter of time."
Anna nodded, but barely heard him. She was too focused on the office, too focused on thinking about the person who should've been sitting in there, the person who she'd confided in throughout this entire mess that she found herself in.
"I've got a case," she said, remembering suddenly, as she turned to head to her office, "I…ah…well, I'll keep you posted if you want to know, but I'm not sure it's going to go as well as I thought it was…"
She was rambling again. Falling silent, she walked into her office, still feeling numb, and closed the door behind her.
When she was sitting at her desk again, she leaned forward on her elbows and buried her face in her hands.
They'd interviewed most of the people that worked for the law firm by the time evening came. None of them had much to say on the negative side of Kaye, it appeared as if everyone had truly cared about her.
"We've only got one person left," said Nina, looking at the list. "Anna Flynn. Otherwise known as Kaye Henshall's best friend in this place."
"She's not in her office," said Ed. "Langan said she left a while ago. Hasn't heard from her since."
"I'm not surprised; I wouldn't want to be here, either," said Nina. "We still have a list of people we need to talk to as suspects, though."
"Old cases," said Ed, shaking his head. "Lot of people outside this place had a problem with her."
"She was one of the best defense attorneys in the city. Of course a lot of people had problems with her. Cops, prosecutors, families of victims…" Nina trailed off and sighed. "This is going to take a while. We have two defense attorneys dead, a psychologist, and a doctor. Talk about high profile."
"You'd think they'd have pulled Major Case by now," Ed said dryly. Nina rolled her eyes.
"It keeps going like this, they might," she remarked. "We're looking at a serial killer here. Four victims, little if any evidence…"
"Maybe this will be the lucky break we needed. You can't tell me this person's gonna go forever without slipping up."
"We still haven't talked to McCoy, by the way. We should probably head to the District Attorney's Office and try to catch him before he leaves."
"CSU's been backed up. They're supposed to get back to us on that last murder, and hopefully they'll be able to get back to us on this one pretty soon." Ed reached into his pocket for the keys, and sighed. "DA's office, then?"
Nina nodded. "The sooner we clear him for this, the better," she said. "I'd hate to see what the brass would have to say about us going after a prosecutor."
"I'd hate to see what DA Branch would have to say," Ed replied dryly, as they exited the building. "That's one place I'd rather not go."
They got into the car and drove off, completely unaware that they'd been being watched the entire time.
The District Attorney's office was quiet, for the most part, because it was that time of the day when everyone was going home, and no one was there.
"Heard Anna Flynn is taking over all of Kaye Henshall's case files from here on out," Connie remarked, as she entered Jack's office. He looked up at her and sighed.
"Yeah, I heard that, too," he said. "This shouldn't have happened to her. You'd have thought…"
"Police are saying this guy doesn't really care what job his victims are doing, so long as they're someone involved in a case that was acquitted," said Connie. "Which reminds me, this case we're handling now…"
"Isn't going so well. I know. I've already had a chat with Branch about it. Ms. Melnick's already filed a motion to exclude the confession."
"Detective Roberts and Detective Taylor have anything to say about that?" Connie asked.
"They're insisting they didn't do anything wrong, and I don't know what to tell them. I don't even know what argument Danielle's got this time."
"Probably another coercion thing. Knew I should've headed down there when they called over here."
"You didn't?"
"I was trying to find that other file you'd asked me for, but it wasn't anywhere to be found. I'd have thought Lieutenant Van Buren would supervise them."
"She probably did. I'll have to head over to the two-seven and see about that…" Jack looked at the clock on his desk and sighed. "You should head home; you look exhausted."
"Nothing a cup of coffee won't fix," said Connie dryly, but he shook his head.
"Just go," he said. "I'll probably only be a little while longer." She gave him a skeptical look, but nodded and turned to leave.
"I'll see you in the morning, then."
And then she was gone. The silence was almost comforting, and Jack looked down at the files he still had to go through, debating on whether or not to leave them. The office door opened again and he looked up.
"Detectives," he said, slightly warily, "What can I do for you?"
Ed and Nina walked into the office and closed the door behind them.
"We need to ask you a few questions," said Nina, and Jack stared at her.
"About what?"
They took him to the two-seven, because by that time, CSU had gotten to the last murder they'd been called in on and Lieutenant Van Buren had called them back. So they'd brought Jack along with them.
"The evidence points to him," said Anita, looking into the interview room where they'd left him. "The letter from the first attorney's murder, fingerprints from the first two murders…"
"So they finally ran them through the system?" Nina asked dryly. "I'm half-tempted to ask what the hell they're doing over there."
"This city's got more murders than I can count in a single day," said Ed, "Why d'you think there are so many homicide units?"
Nina sighed. "So, we question him, then. See if he has an alibi. There's got to be something there that'll get him out of this."
"Tread lightly," Anita told them, "I don't want this coming back to blow up in our faces."
And with that, the two detectives walked into the interview room. Jack eyed them for a long moment and finally, Nina spoke.
"These murders," she said, and set the files she was holding in front of him. "Evidence in three of them points to you."
"I had nothing to do with this," Jack insisted, "This is ridiculous; why on Earth would I want to…"
"Because these cases they were involved in all ended in acquittals, putting criminals back on the streets, which is exactly what the three of us don't want," Ed replied. "Neither of us want to think you did this, but what can we do? The evidence says what it does."
"So, according to you, I'm responsible for killing three people I didn't even really know, not to mention someone I did know, and was actually rather close to," Jack said dryly. "Lovely. What theory are you going to come up with next?"
Neither detective could really blame him for the sarcasm, though it was getting annoying. Nina gave an exasperated sigh and started to pace the interview room.
"All we need is an alibi," she said. "Someone who saw you, something you did, someone who might remember you from someplace on any one of these nights…"
"I know what an alibi is," Jack said flatly. "Let me see the files, so I can get the dates and tell you, since it's obvious you want to know."
They gave him the files. He looked at the first one and sighed. "Medical examiner says this one died at least twelve hours before she was found, at six in the morning," he said. "I was still in the office. ADA Rubirosa was with me; you can ask her."
"One down, three to go," said Nina, dryly, and Ed gave her a look. It was definitely going to be one of the longer nights.