DISCLAIMERS: I do not own any of these characters. They belong to Jerry Bruckheimer and the wonderful writers for CSI: NY. Any resemblance to scenes from the episodes is included for clarity and continuity and I do not claim any of those as my own work. However everything else is mine.

The Bozeman Files

When they walked into the briefing room, Danny saw 7 boxes sitting on the conference table, one for each victim and one for the suspect. As Lindsay walked over to the first box, she began listing details about the first victim. It sounded so robotic but Danny noticed her hand trembling as she lifted the lid. She pulled out the file, took out the morgue picture of the victim and handed it to Danny. He fastened it to the board, picked up the marker and began writing down the details. He could see her through glass pinup board and he noticed that she never looked at the notes in the file she was holding. He could go back later and check the details she was telling him against what was in the file but he knew they would match exactly. This case really had Lindsay in its grips.

On the last victim's box, Lindsay's hand rested on the lid for a full minute before she opened it. She pulled the file out very slowly, opened it and stared another full minute at morgue picture clipped to the inside cover before she shut it quickly, placed it on the table and said very faintly, "I'm sorry, I need to take a break. Excuse me." She walked swiftly out of the room. Danny didn't know whether to go after her immediately or give her a few minutes. Remembering the other instances when things had gotten to her and her need for space at those moments, he decided to give her a few minutes.

In the meantime, his curiosity piqued, he strode over to the table and flipped open the file. It was always a little unnerving to see a morgue picture. You never really got over seeing them, and you never really forgot one, they just became further recessed in your mind behind other morgue pictures that you saw as you continued to do the job day after day. So it was no surprise when this one appeared hauntingly familiar. He couldn't put his finger on it exactly but there was an unnerving familiarity about it. Probably just a fluke resemblance to some other person he'd seen at sometime or other. You know they said that everyone had at least one twin in this world. He decided to go ahead and post this case instead of waiting for Lindsay to come back. It would save her some angst even though he knew she had this case burned into her memory just like all the others.

Mac came into the room and surveyed the board. "Have you got anything yet?"

"No, not really, just finishing the posting." Danny replied thoughtfully. "But you know this last victim in Bozeman fit the profile of all the other victims even the one from here, except that she was married, although only for 9 days. It just seems rather odd. Maybe the killer didn't realize she was married but he seemed so methodical in all other aspects of choosing his victims. How would a detail like that go unnoticed?" He mused on that last detail more to himself than to Mac.

"Well you know what they say. The answer lies in the smallest details." Mac replied sagely.

Danny glanced at Mac, "Never truer words spoken, Mac. Never truer words spoken."

"Where's Lindsay?"

"Um, went to get coffee," Danny said a little uncomfortably.

Mac looked at Danny for a second then said "Okay, keep me posted."

Mac passed Lindsay on the way out of the briefing room. Noticing only a file folder in her hands he said, "Did you forget the coffee?"

"What?" she asked him blankly.

"Never mind," he said with a small smile and continued on his way.

"Montana, please tell me you got good news." Danny said as gestured to the folder in Lindsay's hands.

"Well it depends on how you look at it," Lindsay said nervously licking her lips. "This is the DNA results on the semen we pulled from the victim here. Why don't you pull the Bozeman file on the suspect and see if we have a match." Her head felt a little light with the thought that it might be the same guy. Wasn't that what she wanted? She surely didn't want two guys out there doing the same horrible things to these young women. But if it were a different guy maybe Laurel's killer was actually already dead. But she couldn't be sure either way. And could she live with that unknown? Her head started to spin. She was driving herself crazy with all this conjecture. The only way to find the answers was to look at the evidence.

"Bingo," said Danny as he found the page with the DNA results for the Bozeman suspect. "Okay let's have a look see," as he took the file on the NY suspect from Lindsay's hands.

"Well I'll be… " Danny started.

"What, what, WHAT?" Lindsay interrupted.

"Our Bozeman killer is the same as our NY killer." Danny whistled through his teeth.

Lindsay's hand gripped the back of the chair she was standing next to. She felt out of breath and then her body went cold.

She willed herself to speak. "Danny, Adam got some inconclusive results on one of the samples that we sent him so I'm going to go back to the lab and prepare another sample."

"Do you need any help?" he raised his eyebrows at her questioningly.

"No, no," she pushed a strand of hair behind her ear tiredly. "I got it. Since I've seen all these cases, why don't you stay here and start going through them in depth to see if you can unearth anything useful."

That was Lindsay, always taking the most efficient and logical path. "What did you mean about the good news?" Danny asked her as she turned to go.

"What do you mean?" she asked him with a blank look on her face.

"You know the DNA. You said it could be good news depending on how you looked at it."

"I don't really know anymore." Lindsay replied distractedly and she left.

He thought about calling her back and making sure she really was okay but he knew he'd probably get nowhere with that. Plus he was anxious to mull through the Bozeman files in depth and try to get some more insight into this killer's mind in order to help catch him.

Since he had what he thought was a telling discrepancy on victim number six, he decided to start with victim number one and see if he could eliminate that discrepancy as irrelevant based on the details in the other five cases.