A/N: I am so sorry. My parents wouldn't let me within five feet of my computer until I pulled my Algebra II grades up. That also meant no LO:CI. The only new episode I've seen was Blind Spot. Okay pity party over.

Spoilers for Blind Spot.

Also, Lauren gets a bit mouthy to Captain Ross for a bit. I swore to myself that I wouldn't let my personal feelings get in the way with my writing, but I just can't stand him. "Your partner tends to over think things. Keep an eye on him." I yelled at the TV at that point. Yeah, so this chapter reflects my intense dislike for Ross.

Due to the fact that I started writing this before Blind Spot, I have Alex living in apartment not a normal house. I intend to keep it that way so it doesn't ruin the story line.

Chapter 4

Carrie Walker was in a bad mood. Forget the fact that she just graduated high school and was going to NYU in the fall, her mother hired her a math tutor. A math tutor! It wasn't enough that she was going to be a European Literature Major, no.

"Math is important, Caroline," she muttered to herself in a mocking imitation of her mother's voice as she started to pack her room up. "You need math in the real world, Caroline." She slammed a pile of clothes on the bed. "Oh yeah? When am I going to need to factor polynomials? When I'm writing character notes in the margins?"

The doorbell rang.

Her mother's voice floated through the house. "That must be Ms. Wallace. Can you get that Caroline?"

Carrie groaned, "It's Carrie!" she called back as she walked to the door. She opened the door to face a petite blonde woman who looked to be in her early or mid thirties. "Ms. Wallace?" she asked. The lady nodded. "Please, come in." Carrie turned around and walked back into the house.

She never saw the knife coming.

Darkness… a cold, feminine laugh… Mary Grant gazing wide-eyed at nothing, lying in a pool of her own blood…Bobby comforting a crying Alex…then they disappeared.

A hand shook Lauren's shoulder and she awoke with a scream.

"Shh," Alex soothed, taking Lauren into her arms. "It was just a dream."

Panting, Lauren tried to catch her breath. "Just… a dream…" She leaned into Alex's embrace, fighting off tears. Suddenly a wave of nausea hit her.

"Bathroom", she muttered, lurching to her feet.

Alex got up and went to the kitchen to make some tea for Lauren. She sighed as she heard the sounds coming from the bathroom. The nightmares happened at least once a week, and they all ended with her screaming, then heaving in the bathroom.

She looked at the clock. It read 5:30 a.m. No point going back to sleep.

Lauren emerged from the bathroom, pale. Alex handed her the tea. She took it was shaking hands and sat down.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Alex asked, sitting down next to her.

She shook her head. "Not really."

Alex rested her hand on Lauren's shoulder. "If you want to talk about it, I am here."

"I know."

It was a slow day at Major Case. Well, slower than normal anyway. There were only three open cases: the ambassador' s daughter who was tortured, a body that was fished out of the Hudson, and an arson that killed seven people. Three cases. A slow day.

Getting up for coffee, Lauren made her way over to the pot. She started pouring herself a cup.

"Hey."

She sighed. "Not again, Logan."

Mike adopted an innocent expression. "What? I just want coffee." He poured himself one while Lauren took a sip, rolling her eyes. "Sure."

There was a flurry of motion by the door. They turned to see what was going on. A man flanked by another man and a woman strode in.

"Who's that?" she asked, curiously.

Mike turned. "Him?" He nodded in the direction of the man. "That's Danny Ross, Captain Deakin's replacement."

Lauren scowled. "Right." She was very much against the former captain's resignation as he was the reason why she was at Major Case.

Logan saw the look. "Yeah. Before coming here, he headed a money laundering task force."

"Money laundering?" she asked incredulously. "Is he ready for homicide?"

Mike chuckled. "Well, the brass approved of him."

As they walked away from the coffee, Ross emerged from the office and called out, "if I could see Lauren Grant for a moment?"

Lauren looked to Mike. "Hmm… I wonder what that's about."

Pushing her for a little, he responded, "There's only one way to find out."

She shrugged, squared her shoulders and entered the office.

Ross had his head bent over a piece of paper, pen in hand.

"You wanted to see me, sir?"

He looked up. "Ah, yes. Lauren, please have a seat."

Getting a strange feeling, she denied the request. "With all due respect, sir, I'd rather not."

Ross sighed. "Very well. Now, to the point of why I asked you here." He paused, and Lauren held her breath, not quite sure why.

The new captain looked back to the paper he was previously writing on. "I expect your letter of resignation on my desk no later than tomorrow morning."

"Excuse me?" Lauren asked, outraged.

"Miss Grant, you are not a detective, nor are you a police officer. You are a civilian. You have no business here."

Lauren made no response, silently fuming.

Ross looked up, expecting her to say something. She stood stock still, biting her cheek.

When Lauren continued not to speak, he asked, "Are you deaf?"

"No, are you stupid?" Lauren snapped.

Ross stood up. "Miss Grant, I do not know what privileges Captain Deakins has afforded you in the past, but let me make myself clear when I say that I will not continue them."

"Let me ask you something, Captain." Lauren spat his title out like it was a curse, "do you know who organizes reports for the DA?" She didn't wait for his response. "Do you know who catalogs the evidence? Do you know who types the suspects' information into the system?" She took a few purposeful steps towards the new captain. "I do."

Lauren plowed on. "ADA Carver has not once complained of my work, and he has, in fact, complemented me a few times. If Mr. Carver is happy, then the DA is happy. If the district attorney is happy, then the Chief of Detectives and Police Commissioner are happy. In turn, if they are happy, the mayor is happy.

"If you are planning on firing me, I want to see a letter of complaint from every officer and detective in the squad, and I want Arthur Branch, Charles Sanders, and Jeremy Klein to come here and tell me to leave." She knew it was an outlandish request, but it felt good to vent. After the nightmare, it felt good to release her tension. Ross just happened to be on the recieving end of it.

Ross sucked in an angry breath. "I could always arrest you or file a restraining order," he suggested, fingering the handcuffs on his belt.

Lauren closed the distance between them so that there was only less than a foot of space. "You do that, and I will fight so hard, your head will spin, then I will sue your ass from here to Washington," she hissed.

"Is that a threat?"

"No," she said in an innocent voice. "It's a promise."

She spun on her heel and exited the office. Emerging, Lauren noticed that all work had stopped and all eyes were on her. She scowled and stormed past Bobby and Alex who were talking by their desks.

Closing the door to the interrogation room for Bobby had previously comforted her, Lauren slumped to the ground and dissolved into furious tears. This was too much. The stupid nightmare and now THIS? It was not her day...

It wasn't until she felt one person on either side of her, that she realized she was no longer alone. A pair of strong arms enveloped her and someone else started to rub her back.

Lauren sobbed into Bobby's tailored to suit. "What's wrong?" he asked, concerned.

"He's… he's making me leave!" Her response was muffled.

Bobby tensed and Alex's expression was on of displeasure. The big Detective moved to get up, but Lauren's hand stopped him. He turned back to his niece.

"Please, don't risk your job on my account," Lauren pleaded. "I can always get a job at Millstone Books."

Her uncle set his jaw. "He needs to fully understand why you are here." Getting up, Bobby strode purposefully out of the room.

Lauren looked back to Alex. "I need to take a walk. Care to come with?"

With a smile, Alex got up, reached a hand to Lauren, and said, "Why not? It's my lunch break anyway."

Anger radiating off him like heat off a sidewalk in August, Bobby marched straight to the office formerly occupied by James Deakins.

Knocking on the door and without waiting for an invitation, he strode right in.

Ross looked up, surprised. "Detective, what's the meaning of this?"

In a dangerously low voice, Bobby answered, "I want to know why you are firing Lauren."

"Detective Goren, and she has no place here. She is not trained to handle the situations that you and I are," Ross said as if talking to a child.

"No, no, see that's where you're wrong, Captain," Bobby replied, pacing. "Lauren has been training in fencing since the age of seven and studying archery since ninth grade. Also, Alex Eames and I have been taking her to the firing range since she came here."

Ross looked confused. "She has reason to how to learn how to shoot a gun. Why take her to learn?"

Bobby sat down and rested his head in his hand. "I think, sir, that it's time for you to know the reason why Lauren came here in the first place."

He stood up and resumed his pacing. "First, I, uh, would like you to know that she is my niece. Her mother was murdered a few months ago and Eames and I caught the case because her uncle by marriage is a powerful CEO. We then learned that a woman named Nicole Wallace was behind the murder to get to me." He said this as if reading off a report.

He continued. "Lauren's life is in constant danger because Nicole will stop at nothing to, for lack of a better word, pursue me. Because of this, everyone decided that it was in her best interests to work here where she is protected. She lives, depending on the day, with either myself or Eames. This way, she has a police detail on her 24-7."

Ross sighed. "Thank you, detective. I think I understand now. I will consent to have her work here until this Wallace woman is caught. Afterwards, if I find her work to be sub-par, I will have no choice but to ask her to leave. However, if I find her work to be efficient, I will allow her to stay on.

"I am just curious, how far does her schooling go?"

Bobby turned to look to him, "She has her high school diploma but hasn't gone to college."

The captain looked curious, "Why hasn't she gone to college yet?"

His response was, "She can't afford it and doesn't want to ask for a loan. She has said that when she makes enough money, depending on the job she already has and whether or not she likes it, she will apply to whatever college she sees fit to go to."

Ross still needed something to be cleared up. "She's 19, right? Didn't she graduate high school this past June?"

Bobby sat down again. "Her mother sent her to preschool a year late and she failed the test that allowed her to move on to first grade. If I may leave now?"

Ross nodded. "Yes, you may."

As he left the office, Alex and Lauren walked back into the squad room. Lauren sat down at her desk and Alex walked over to Bobby. The two detectives then walked into the conference room where a young woman with cropped blond hair sat waiting.

The phone rang.

Picking it up, Lauren answered, "Major Case."

The man on the other end responded, "Is Robert Goren there? He's a detective."

She glanced behind her to where she saw Bobby embrace an older man. "I'm sorry," she said, "but he's unavailable right now. May I take a message?"

In reply the man said, "Will you tell him that his brother called?"

Why that ungrateful son of a –

"Yes, sir, I will pass along the message," she replied in a happy- to- oblige voice.

"Thank you." The line went dead and Lauren hung up the phone. Letting out a deep breath, she leaned back into her chair.

She looked back to her uncle and his friends. Catching her eye, Bobby motioned for her to join them. She did.

Excitement evident, Bobby said, "Lauren, I would like you to meet a very important person. This is Declan Gage. He was my mentor when I served in Korea. Declan, this is my niece, Lauren."

She extended her hand. "It's very nice to meet you, sir."

Grasping her hand, Declan gave it a firm shake. "Likewise."

The day went by quickly, and before long (or so it seemed) Alex got up to go home. "Want to come home with me tonight, Lauren?"

She looked up from the papers she was working on the conference room to look at Alex. "Actually, tonight I'm supposed to stay with Uncle Bobby, but since it looks like he will still be here a while, I'll stay."

Alex nodded, "All right then. I'll see you tomorrow."

After she left, Bobby looked to Lauren and suggested, "Why don't you lie down?"

"You know what? I think I'll do just that." She replied.

And lying down, she was out like a light.

The next morning, Lauren was awoken to someone shaking her. It was Mike Logan's new partner, Megan Wheeler. "Hey, wake up. Everyone is here. Do you have a change of clothes?"

Groggily, Lauren answered, "Yeah, I do."

"Why don't you go change?"

Nodding, Lauren walked to her locker to get her spare set of clothes. Emerging from the bathroom, Lauren noted that while she slept on the floor, she was surprisingly well rested. She sat down at her desk.

All of a sudden Bobby, grand squad room, panicked. "He's got Eames! Sebastian's got Eames!"

The squad room erupted into simultaneous movement. Looking back, Lauren could never remember once Ross's orders were, but she did remember diving into the bottom drawer of her desk and pulling out the service piece and Kevlar vest she was given in case of emergencies. Donning the vest and strapping on the holster, she ran over to Bobby and Ross.

They both looked at her like she was some undiscovered species. "What? Would you rather I stay out of your range of vision?" Noticing her uncle's face, she answered for him, "I thought not."

As they ran towards the garage to Ross's car, the captain asked Lauren, "How's your aim?"

She looked at him. "Not meaning to brag, but, Captain, I have won many, many archery competitions. My accuracy with this service piece is just as accurate as with a crossbow or longbow."

They got to the car and sped to Alex is an apartment.

After breaking the door in, they began to search the apartment, weapons drawn. Lauren looked around, starting and feel sick. If I had gone home with Alex last night, would I still be here?

Noticing her uncle putting his weapon back into its holster, she did the same.

"She's not here. She's not here," Bobby muttered despairingly.

Giving a look to Ross, Lauren motioned for Bobby to step outside. Once outside the apartment teeming with cops, Bobby leaned against the wall and slid down to the floor, staring blankly at nothing. Lauren had never seen him like this and was extremely concerned. He looked lost. He looked as if the world had ended. Lauren was worried. In the relatively short time that she truly knew him, he never let his emothins run himself like they were now.

Sitting down next to him, Lauren pulled him into a hug. For minutes they just sat there, holding each other. No words were needed because they both knew the acute pain that the other felt.

After what seemed like an eternity, Ross came out. They stood without a word. The captain looked to them, sighed, and said, "There is nothing here to indicate where he might have taken her."

Bobby nodded mutely and Lauren felt her eyes begin to sting.

Continuing, Ross said, "I'm putting as many people as possible on this. Right now, Pennington and Michaels are going to talk to the neighbors. Goren, we're doing all we can to find her."

Drawing a shaky breath, Bobby said in a low voice, "If you even think of pulling me off this case…"

"I wouldn't dream of it," Ross said reassuringly.

"Good."

Lauren drew in a shaky breath and looked to Bobby. "I think I'll call Cap… uh… Deakins."

He nodded. "He has a right to know what's going on."

She walked away from the group. Pulling out her cell phone, she dialed the former captain's number.

A woman's voice picked up. "Hello?"

Lauren introduced herself. "Mrs. Deakins? It's Lauren Grant from your husband's old precinct."

Angie recognized her. "Oh, Lauren! It's so good to hear from you. How are you?"

Taking a deep breath, Lauren answered, "Actually, that's why I called. Is your husband home?"

"Yes, he is. I'll put him on."

"Thanks."

Angie Deakins handed the phone over to her husband. "It's Lauren Grant. Such a nice girl… She needs to speak with you."

James Deakins picked up the phone, "Deakins."

He heard Lauren's voice on the other end. "Captain, it's Lauren.'

"Lauren, I'm not your superior anymore. You don't have to address me as such," James said with a chuckle.

"Umm… Well, old habits die hard. Actually, there was a purpose to my call. Do you think that you could make it down to the precinct?"

The former captain thought to his suddenly free schedule. "Sure, I can come down. Why?"

He heard Lauren hesitate. It seemed as if she didn't want to tell him…

"It's, uh, not something I can say over the phone."

Immediately the pit in his stomach dropped. Something was wrong. "Lauren, what is it? What happened? Is everyone all right? Is it Nicole?"

James knew it. The minute he retired, something just had to go wrong. "Lauren, tell me what happened." He scrambled for his jacket and keys while his ear was still attached to the phone. He ignored his wife's questioning look.

"Not over the phone, sir. Can you meet us at the precinct in half an hour?"

"I'll be there." He hung up and raced to his car.

A/N: This chapter is huge. I had to divide it into two. This time, I promise that chapter 7 will be up soon. I am so sorry that I made you all wait. I hope the characters are still in character. Please review! Constructive criticism is always appreciated, and flames will be used to burn the Algebra tests that forced me away from the fandom.

Disclaimer: I do not own Law & Order: CI. It belongs to Dick Wolf along with the other half of the world that doesn't belong to JK Rowling.