A/N: Thanks for the nice and inspiring reviews…Sorry, it took a while before I updated again…I've revised this chapter like millions of times, and I'll probably end up revising and editing it again, there's something that makes me edit this chapter over and over again and I don't know what it is…
Anyway, enjoy this new chapter…it will probably take a while before I've finished chapter 4, since the second semester has begun and my teachers are constantly giving new essay and research assignments…but I will finish this..
CHAPTER 3
After lunch Flack notified Lindsay immediatelyabout the situation. The worried look on her face was something he hadn't expected from the young female CSI. Stella, on the other hand, had a very casual reaction; just like Mac she couldn't think of a reason why Danny wouldn't be at home.
Flack's feelings were somewhere in between. Although he couldn't think of a reason why Danny hadn't shown up yet, he just wouldn't believe he wasn't at his apartment at this moment.
Traffic was increasingly getting worse; earlier that day Flack could drive almost non-stop to his destination, at midday almost half of New York was stuck in traffic.
It was half past two, and Mac had already called twice, which started to freak Flack out. It wasn't Taylor's style to be so overly concerned. He turned up the volume of the radio. "Time is Running Out" by Muse blasted through the speakers.
Flack sighed, he had hoped he would be able to clear his head a little from all the fuzz that was going on about Danny's sudden "disappearance", but instead he was constantly coming up with theories as to why Danny hadn't called anyone yet. Flack had already tried to call his friend several times since Mac gave him the order to check up on him. Voicemail over and over again.
It started to worry Flack, like it wasn't something for Mac to check up on his staff, it also wasn't Danny's style to stay away from work without any information on his whereabouts.
After what seemed like hours Flack finally arrived in Danny's neighborhood. Looking for a safe parking spot, he decided he probably wouldn't be out too long and parked the large SUV in front of Danny's apartment building.
The tall detective got out of his car, closing his long coat to block the cold wind that was blowing around the high buildings. Flack pushed one of the doorbells on the outside of the building. No reply. Flack pushed the button again. Still no reply. He shrugged his shoulders and pushed against the door, which opened pretty easily.
"Why bother having doorbells on the outside of the building if the door's open?" Flack muttered while getting in the elevator and pushing the button for the sixth floor.
The building seemed empty when Flack reached the sixth floor and stepped out of the elevator. No sign of neighbors or Danny whatsoever. He knocked on the door of Danny's apartment, already knowing that his friend would probably not be in there. Don waited several minutes, repeatedly knocking on the door. The unanswered knocks gave the New York detective a very bad feeling, and after almost fifteen minutes he finally gave up and grabbed his cell to call Mac Taylor.
"What do you mean, he's not there?" Mac said in an almost angry voice through the phone. "He's supposed to be there, where else could he be?"
"Exactly what I thought, but there's no sign of Messer here," Flack replied. "What should I do now, Mac?" he continued, "I could try to ask around, maybe someone here knows where he went or where he is now."
There was a short moment of silence. "Yeah, you go do that," Mac finally said. "I'll take Stella and Lindsay with me and we'll be there as soon as possible."
Flack nodded, knowing Mac couldn't see it and hung up.
Questioning the neighbors sounded easier than it eventually turned out to be. Most of the people didn't even want to talk to the tall detective, keeping their door as closed as possible. "We don't know that guy," was the most commonly heard argument for not knowing what happened to their neighbor. Luckily, there were still some people willing to give more information, but nothing useful. Most of them hadn't heard anything the day before or noticed anything unusual.
Flack sighed and thanked the last female neighbor after questioning her. She smiled and closed the door again. Flack looked at his notepad, realizing that Danny probably hadn't been in an argument with someone, and if something terrible had happened to him, it most definitely didn't happen here in his apartment.
Mac, Stella and Lindsay arrived when Flack was about to call them again.
"Sorry, traffic is horrible at this time a day," Mac explained. "So, have you found out anything?"
Flack shook his head "Nothin'. If something happened, it didn't happen here."
Mac looked at the undisturbed door of Danny's apartment.
"What do you guys say, would Danny mind if we took a peek?" Mac asked, flashing his light at the door, and looking at his colleagues. Not waiting for an answer, Mac already walked to Danny's door and started working on the lock. Lindsay and Stella exchanged looks but kept quiet, both too worried to object to Mac's decision.
The lock wasn't too hard to open, Mac cracked it within two minutes and pushed against it, entering Danny's deserted apartment.
Mac looked around, immediately realizing his CSI wasn't anywhere here to be found. He sighed and looked at the floor where a pile of unopened mail waited to be read. "Be sure you wear your gloves," Mac said, getting the mail and moving further into the apartment.
"Mail's from yesterday and today," Flack said, looking over Mac's shoulder at the stamps. "Means he hasn't been here yesterday after work."
Mac looked at the stamps on the envelopes in his hands. "Stella, Lindsay, you go check the bedroom for any evidence or leads on where Danny might be. Flack and I are going to check the rest of the apartment."
The team split up, each carrying their kits to the room they were supposed to examine.
"Weird, isn't it?" Lindsay said, looking with her flashlight for anything unusual in Messer's bedroom.
"What is?" Stella asked, going through Danny's organizer.
"I mean, what if Danny's just out of town and forgot to tell us."
Stella smiled encouragingly at Lindsay, deep down inside hoping that her suggestion would prove to be the truth.
"Danny would never go out of town without telling Mac," she said with a sigh. "But if he did it might need some explanation as to why we're here."
Lindsay smiled. "There's nothing here," she said, closing her kit again. Stella nodded, following Lindsay's example. "Neither is here, Danny sure didn't use his organizer much, I wonder why he even had one. Let's see if Mac and Flack found something."
The two men already stood in the hallway outside the apartment, looking grimly at the unopened mail.
"We need to get back to the office," Mac said flatly. "See if we can get some fingerprints or DNA off these letters, that might help us to understand what happened."
Stella looked surprised at Mac. "You mean, we're not going to wait, I mean, Danny could be anywhere."
Mac looked at her. "There was plenty of food and drinks in his refrigerator, he sure wasn't planning on leaving, Stella," he said seriously to explain his moves.
Stella nodded and didn't object anymore.
Arriving at the office, Flack immediately offered to question people in the building, to see if they had seen anything unusual at the time of Danny's disappearance.
Lindsay and Stella agreed on investigating Danny's mail in more detail, while Mac would try to call Danny's cell for the thirtieth time that day.
CSI – Crime Scene Investigation
The door slammed again, heavy footsteps approaching the weary CSI, still weak and desperate for answers. Danny could hear the man was frustrated, his breaths were short and quick like he had run a mile before entering the room. Suddenly a hand got hold of his throat and tightened its grip within seconds, thereby closing off his trachea, making it harder for Danny to breathe.
Danny, surprised and caught off guard by this sudden action, hysterically tried to keep his breath under control, to keep it at normal speed. He didn't have time to clearly think about his moves, when he felt his normal breathing turning into hysterical gasps for air. The attacker laughed raucously, holding his tight grip on Danny's throat.
"Try all you want, you're not getting out of here, Messer" the attacker said with a heavy New York accent.
Danny's insides turned, hearing the perpetrator calling his name made him realize he probably knew the ones who were behind this.
"We're gonna have so much fun with you," the man continued. He let go of Danny's throat and got something from the floor. Danny coughed, thankfully filling his lungs with the cold air again, he felt his blood pumping at full speed.
"Brought you some food," the attacker said grumpy, violently forcing Danny with one hand to open his mouth, pushing his fingers in Danny's mouth to force him to open up. Danny, disgusted by the filthy fingers that tried to open his mouth tried with all his strength to keep his mouth close. "Dammit, Messer!" the man yelled, using more force to open Danny's mouth, but Danny beat him by forcefully biting his finger. He tasted the metallic taste of blood in his mouth, realizing this probably wasn't a good plan.
But he sure as hell wasn't going to let the man feed him, not knowing what he would get for dinner. Although his body was screaming for water and food, he wouldn't want to risk the chance of being poisoned or drugged, how ridiculous that sounded to himself. If they had wanted to kill him, they'd probably not poison him, why bother, they probably had guns and knives all over the place.
Danny heard the man scream, pulling his hand away from Danny's mouth and dropping whatever he was holding in the other.
"What the fuck, you son of a bitch!" the man yelled at the top of his voice. "You asked for this, I'm not in the mood for games," he said threateningly, immediately followed by a hard blow in Danny's stomach.
Danny collapsed forward in agony as far as his body would go, feeling he overstretched his spine. Heavy pains almost caused Danny to throw up. He closed his eyes and tried to regain his strength.
"You gonna eat now?" the guy asked provocatively with the same angry voice. Danny, painful as it was, managed to sit up straight again, showing almost no sign of pain or emotion to his attacker and keeping his mouth closed.
The man sighed. "Fine! Starve to death if you like!" he finally yelled.
Danny heard the heavy footsteps leaving the room again, followed by the sound of the door being violently slammed shut.
He sighed, spitting out the blood. He leaned back in the chair, face up to the ceiling, trying to control his breathing again. Adrenaline was still pumping through his body. "Not a good move, Danny," he muttered to himself. "Definitely not a good move."
It wasn't long before the footsteps returned, only the breathing was slow and heavy this time and the footsteps weren't as loud as usual.
Danny sat up straight again, listening closely to the sounds. This clearly was another man entering the room. What happened next Danny only experienced in a blur. A cloth was suddenly firmly held to his face, covering his mouth and nose. He struggled to fight the firm grip of the attacker, but he was quickly overcome by the fumes from the cloth and all turned to black again.
CSI – Crime Scene Investigation
"Detective Taylor?" A young man with blonde hair stood in the door opening of Mac's glass office looking puzzled at him.
"You're Mac Taylor, right?" he asked again.
Mac, distracted from his work, irritably looked up to the unknown man. "Yes, that's me, who wants to know?"
The man hesitated. "There seems to be a parcel for you downstairs," he said slowly, trying to sound as professional as he could.
Mac looked at the man again, "A parcel? For me? From whom?" he asked directly.
"Er, I don't know, sir. It just got in with the afternoon mail, it's addressed to you so they ordered me to tell you," the man said uncomfortably.
Mac, without saying a word, immediately got up from his chair, quickly grabbed his jacket and a pair of gloves, leaving the man completely in the dark of what was going on.
"Sir?" he said, but Mac didn't reply, quickly exiting his office heading for the elevator.
Lindsay, who hadn't been able to fully concentrate on her work, saw Mac's odd behavior from the corner of her eye. Her thoughts were immediately with Danny. Putting her work down she exchanged a look with Stella, who also started to look worried.
"What do you suppose that's all about?" Lindsay asked. Stella shrugged her shoulders, leaving her work untouched for a moment.
"If it has something to do with Danny we'll hear it soon enough," she said, returning to her work.
Lindsay nodded, but couldn't get back to work. Her eyes were constantly drawn to elevator door Mac had just entered, her stomach filled with nerves of fear.
Mac had just got in the elevator and waited impatiently for it to reach ground level, his hands in his pockets and his gaze at the door, waiting for it to open at the right floor.
Usually it wasn't a busy hour at the office, but this time it seemed like everyone in the building suddenly wanted to take the elevator, making stops at almost every floor.
Mac nodded at a few people he knew who entered or exited the elevator, keeping a close watch on everybody he didn't know. A habit he had picked up while being a marine.
Finally they reached ground level and Mac hurried out of the elevator, looking for the mailroom where he could get the parcel.
He knew it had to be somewhere close. Mac never went to the mailroom, usually all mail was distributed, and brought to them by men like the blond guy he met just a minute ago. There had to be something special about this parcel, to send someone up to get him.
It took Mac only a few minutes to locate the mailroom, quickly entering it.
"Where's the parcel?" Mac said in a hasty voice to the first employee he laid eyes on. The man, clearly surprised by this uncommon visit from the CSI, kept silent but pointed at another man, probably head of the department, who stood just a few feet from him.
"Thanks," Mac said quickly without looking at the man again.
"Ah, Detective Taylor, there you are, William Blake, nice to meet you!" the man said happily when he saw Mac approaching him, grabbing his hand, shaking it enthusiastically.
William Blake was a man of about forty years of age, a little shorter than Mac and at least several inches wider.
"Been a long time since we've seen you 'round here," William said with a kind smile, but Mac wasn't up for happy chit-chats and kept silent with a serious look on his face.
It took Blake a while to understand why the CSI acted so coldly, when he remembered the strange package they received earlier.
"Ah, that's right," Blake said, nervously looking around, locating the parcel. "There's your parcel," he said, walking towards a box in the corner of the office. "I put it aside for you so it wouldn't get lost and all."
Blake was about to grab what looked like a normal cardboard box, when Mac suddenly stopped him, quickly walking to the chubby man and grabbing his arm, shaking his head.
"Let me," he said kindly, putting on his rubber gloves.
"Who of you touched this box?" Mac asked, looking around and seeing no one responding.
"Er, only me," Blake said in embarrassment, slightly raising his hand.
"Oh," Mac said blankly, "we're probably gonna need your prints, so you can follow me upstairs."
And with these words Mac left the mailroom again, followed by a slightly nervous William Blake who kept making funny noises with his hands.
"You can go there for prints," Mac said when they reached the fifth floor, pointing at one of the labs. "Just tell them it's an emergency, and that they need to send them to me as soon as possible."
Blake nodded, and quickly ran off, glad to be away from the slightly intimidating but intriguing CSI.
"Nothing! There's absolutely nothing." Flack walked up to Mac making slightly desperate gestures with his hands. "I don't get it," he said, "I've asked everyone who worked with him yesterday evening, but no one noticed anything strange or different."
Mac sighed and looked at Don Flack.
"I'm afraid we don't need the statements anymore," he said, showing Flack the box. "I have a feeling the content of this box might say more about Danny's whereabouts than any employee ever could."
Mac looked at Flack and ordered him with his eyes to follow him. Mac took the parcel into his office, where he put it on his desk.
Flack took a seat on one of the chairs in the office. Mac looked at the box for a while, trying wrap his head around it. It looked normal, the address was a printout and the stamps were normal. There was nothing suspicious about this parcel, at least not on the outside.
Mac wondered why they had called him down to accept it in person. He turned the box upside down, hearing several items rolling from one side to the other. Nothing on the bottom, he concluded.
"What is it?" Stella's voice sounded less worried than she actually was. She and Lindsay had decided to see what was going on and stood at the doorstep of Mac's office.
"I don't know," Mac said, "could you close the door, Lindsay?"
Stella took a step forward and Lindsay closed the door behind them, while Flack got up from the chair.
"There's only one way to find out," Mac said, getting a knife from one of the drawers in his desk. Flack and the two women moved closer, while Mac carefully cut the adhesive tape on top of the box, trying to minimize the damage, in case it was evidence he wouldn't destroy too much of it.
Mac put the knife aside and carefully opened the parcel, exposing whatever was inside of it. Mac took a step back in shock when he recognized the first and most obvious item in the box. There in the middle of the box it was, damaged but still very recognizable.
Both Stella and Flack, surprised by Mac's reaction, took a step forward to see what was in the box. Flack leaned over Mac's desk and gazed at the content of the box. Stella gasped, clutching Mac's shoulder in support. Flack slammed one hand on Mac's desk, starting to swear under his breath in reaction to the content of the box.
Lindsay, terrified by the reactions, didn't dare to look inside the box. "W….what is it?" she stammered, trying to read the answer in Mac's eyes. Mac didn't answer but took a deep breath, reaching into the box to grab the thing that shocked his team. Lindsay's eyes widened and she gasped when Mac showed her the severely damaged badge with Danny's number on it.
Mac took a close look at the badge, he knew the scratches he saw on it could only have been caused by a lot of force and friction, to either the badge alone or to the one who carried it. Knowing Danny always carried his badge on his jeans, he had either lost it, or someone had dragged a probably unconscious Danny several feet. The deepness of the scratches on the badge immediately made Mac realize they were caused by dragging, they were too deep.
Danny had to be in serious trouble.
Mac put the badge aside, realizing there was more in the box. He carefully got a letter from the bottom of the box. It was typed out and read:
We got something you want,
You got something we want,
We make the trade or
We make the kill.
It's up to you…
Attached to the letter was an old yellowish newspaper article, which seemed to cover an old case, and two Polaroid pictures.
"W…w….what?" Lindsay said in shock, looking in horror at the two pictures Mac got from under the letter. She gasped, covering her mouth and stumbling backwards to the wall for support. Mac, who got the pictures from under the newspaper article, went quiet, all color leaving his face, his expression turning dark, looking at the two pictures. His eyes had to be cheating him, this couldn't be true. In the pictures he could clearly recognize the blonde Italian CSI, blindfolded and bound to a chair. His formerly white shirt, which he had been wearing the day before, was covered in blood. Although the resolution of the pictures was dreadfully low, Mac's observant eyes could recognize several undeveloped bruises that started to appear on Danny's face. He had been beaten up pretty bad, not to mention the state he was in right at this moment.
Stella, who hadn't reacted at first, stared in horror at the two pictures, her breath accelerating. She looked at Mac, who could see that, although she tried to act brave in front of Lindsay, her eyes were glistering with tears.
"Who could do such a thing?" she said in a hoarse voice. Mac shook his head, he didn't have an answer to that question, at least not yet.
He carefully put the things back in the box, except for the newspaper article. He looked at it for a moment, staring at the picture on top of the article, which showed the courthouse and a suspect being brought in. His mind was racing to identify the case, assuming that this might be the key.
"Mac?" Lindsay's voice could barely be heard. "What do you want us to do?" she asked.
Mac looked up from the article and stared at the young woman, who stood in front of him with a vacant expression on her face. He coughed, put the article aside and handed the letter to Lindsay. "I want you to find out everything there is to know about this letter. The ink, the paper, the computer that might have been used, anything that might help us."
Lindsay got some gloves from a box on Mac's desk, and took the letter from her boss.
"Stella, I want you to examine these pictures. Try to find out where they might have been taken, look at the state the building is in. Maybe you can come up with an architectural era in which the building could have been made, that would really help," Mac continued.
"Flack, could you.."
"Go downstairs and see if anyone knows who brought this parcel here," Flack finished Mac's sentence. Mac smiled and nodded.
"I'm on it," Flack said, grabbing his jacket to exit the glass office.
"Flack?"
Don looked at Mac, "Yes?"
"Could you please contact Sheldon, he's supposed to be at a crime scene near Central Park. I need every pair of hands we can find, he needs to be on this case," Mac said in a concerned voice.
Flack nodded, grabbed his cell from his pocket and left the office, already dialing Sheldon's number.
Stella surveyed Mac, who stared at the article.
"We're going to find him, Mac," she said encouragingly. "One way or another, we are going to find him, they are not getting away with this."
Mac nodded, handing her the picture. "This look familiar to you?" he asked.
Stella took a close look at the article, but she couldn't find anything that meant anything to her.
"Here," Mac said, pointing at a sentence in the middle of the article. "You sure as hell remember that, don't you?"
Stella's eyes followed Mac's finger and she read:
"Yesterday afternoon the New York court convicted a member of one of the new gangs of New York, the so-called Tanglewood boys. Sonny Sassone, who is said to be one of the leading members of the Tanglewood boys, was convicted for the murder of young Paul Montenassi."
Stella looked back at Mac with a puzzled look. "Do you think this means.."
Mac took the article back from Stella. "I don't know what it means yet," he said. "All I know is that I'm going to pay mister Sassone a little visit, hopefully he knows a bit more about all this."
Stella nodded. "I'm going to work," she said, carefully getting the pictures from Mac's desk. "The sooner we get these guys the better."
Lindsay got the letter from the desk and followed Stella out the office. Mac smiled, glad that his team was so determined.