We all headed home after that to get some sleep. I finally got to meet Sara. We hit it off immediately. She got me set up in her spare bedroom and we both hit the sack. My alarm went off too soon and I got in the shower. Once we were both ready, we headed out to the lab. We pulled up about the same time as Mike did. He jogged up beside me and we walked in together. "Hey, you want to help me look for a case?"

"As in, case file?"

"Well, yeah."

"Sure. What's the case number?" He gave it to me as we went through the door into the filing room. We went to the nearest drawer and discovered that they weren't organized by case number. I sighed and asked, "You knew it was like this, didn't you?"

"Mmmaayyyybe." I punched him in the shoulder and he just laughed at me.

We were still going through them an hour later when a guy walked in. "Hey, Mike…and someone I don't know."

I spun to face him with a smile. "Hi. I'm Sierra."

"Oh! The Miami girl. I'm Warrick."

Mike came in as if nothing had been said. "Have you guys ever organized your files by case number?"

Warrick chuckled and answered, "In a perfect world. We hired this knucklehead named Honie. He had this dyslexic filing system."

"So, what do you think? Does the dyslexic atheist not believe in dog?"

"What?"

I stopped what I was doing and looked over at him. "What?"

He pulled out the file we were looking for and looked over at us. Warrick half-way chuckled and said, "I get it."

Mike looked at me expectantly, but I still didn't get it, so he said it again. "Does the dyslexic atheist not believe in dog?"

"OH! I get it," I said slightly embarrassed. Mike grinned to himself and shrugged. "Hey, sometimes it takes me a minute."

"I didn't say anything."

"No, but you thought something."

"We're all entitled to our own thoughts."

I couldn't really come up with a comeback and I was a little too embarrassed to care, so I said, "Yeah. You're right." He nodded and motioned for me to follow him.

We went into the hall and he leaned down to whisper in my ear. "Catherine approved the plan."

"So, we're going with the reversal?"

"We are."

"And I'm in on it. Great."

"You were there when it was discussed. You had to be in on it, or you would've noticed something."

"Mike, these guys are going to notice something. They're good CSIs. And they're going to know if we're acting weird."

"This has to work. Just try to do this."

"I don't feel right betraying them like this when they took me in so openly and warmly."

"Sierra, please…"

His voice was so smooth and he was so close that I was afraid I might faint if he had to say anything more, so I said, "Fine. What do you want me to do?"

"We need to set up a lab that the others don't use, and we need to cover the glass with opaque tarp. Find Catherine, ask her which lab would work best and get a hold on the tarp. Call me when you're prepared and I'll come help put the stuff up."

"Ok."

We parted ways discreetly and I went about doing what he said. Catherine met me with some tarp at a lab that wasn't very traversed and I called Mike. "Mike, we got it."

"Where?"

"I can see you down the hall. I'll wave." I did so. He caught sight of me and walked over. I slid my phone in my pocket and nodded at him. We got to work putting up the tarp. While we were working, Sara passed, saw us, and came back to eye us questioningly.

"What's going on?" she asked.

"Uh…nothing I can talk about," Catherine answered as Mike and I silently kept working. "Keep me posted on the 419. Greg's going to meet you at the scene."

"…ok."

Catherine came through the door and quietly shut it. We got all the files out and started assessing them. "Zamesca was shot 3 times with a 9 millimeter. 2 sets of shoe impressions. 2 sets of tire impressions. A plastic jumbo cola cup. Drugs, found in Zamesca's car in plain view, but his tox was negative."

"The drugs were planted," I said.

"Crime scene was in a remote location."

"Well, that's in our favor," Mike added.

"The car was a bloody mess."

"Our victim was kind enough to donate a pint of his blood."

"We have a victim?" I asked.

"Yeah, Brass got us one."

"So, Brass is in on it too."

"He was at the table as well."

I shrugged and looked at the bag of blood he was holding. It read Ezekiel Holstein. "Did Mr. Holstein also donate his brain matter and bone fragments?"

"Brass got him off the street. Under cover cop. He opted to keep his brains intact," he answered with a smile. "The killer's a low level dealer looking for a new life, which we offered to him in exchange for this little favor."

Catherine said, "Without actually shooting the guy, this scene is going to be less than perfect, but with just us out there…"

"No! There has to be a fourth person processing the scene to make it look kosher. Someone who's not in on it."

"Well, if we use one of my guys," Catherine said, "they're going to figure it out."

Mike shrugged and responded, "Keep them away from the car," as he handed me the spray bottle filled with the blood of the "victim".

I looked up at him and said, "I'm not used to faking, Keppler."

He leaned a little closer and grinned. "When was the last time you had to?"

I scoffed in annoyance and pushed him away a bit, then went to the car we were using as the victim's and started applying the blood spatter. Mike followed me and Catherine went to get the analysis on the drugs found in Zamesca's car. "So, do you want this sprayed any certain way? Concentrated anywhere?"

"Nope. Just spray. I'm going to go get ballistics on this gun. You good?"

"Yeah. Be careful."

He turned and looked at me a little confused. "You too," he answered.

After he was gone, I silently berated myself. Be careful? Why was I telling him to be careful? I eventually made myself believe that I meant be careful that no one catches you…but deep down, I knew the truth. Be careful that the gun doesn't backfire, be careful that you don't trip, be careful and mind the glass doors so that you don't run into one. I was beginning to care for the guy…more than just a little bit.

Later, we took all our faked evidence out to the same general site as the original and arranged our stunt victim and killer. I was taking pics of our victim with his wounds in the car when he murmured, "This is my own blood, right? 'Cause it's dripping in my mouth."

"It's all yours," I answered as I finished up. "Ok. You can get out now, detective, but…"

"I know. Don't touch anything."

"You got it. Oh, there's some new clothes for you in the back of the vehicle." He nodded his thanks and walked off. Mike came over to shut the car door while I packed the camera up. "So, Mike, you said reverse forensics didn't work in Baltimore. Why not?"

"Smart cops," he said while he busted the window out with a metal wine bottle stopper.

I watched him and noticed how well he did it. "Did you steal cars before you became a CSI?"

"Stealing cars gets old fast. I like more of a challenge. That's why I started dating."

I got up to throw the bullet from the gun Mike had tested earlier in the car and muttered, "Note to self." I flicked the bullet through the window.

Mike turned to our "killer" and told him, "You can drop that cup now."

"I'm not done," he said.

The undercover cop came over and said, "He said drop it!"

"Um, about my new identity…I don't think I want to go to Denver. I'd rather go somewhere where I fit in…Like Maui."

"Yeah. And I want a threesome with Beyonce and Scarlett Johansen. Drop the cup and get your rat ass in the car."

"Fine. I'll drop the cup." He simply let go.

Mike focused a little harder on the cup and murmured, "Casual."

"Excuse me?" Catherine said.

"Simon. The soda. He wasn't expecting trouble." He cocked his head and started to analyze his train of thought. "I get out of my car and walk over to Zamesca. I didn't come here to kill him. I came here to talk. I hand him that photo, then something doesn't go as planned. I drop the drink, grab my gun……murder was plan B."

"Plan A was the photograph. Anti-drug crusader doing lines. That's a career buster."

"Looks like he underestimated Zamesca."

I came in with, "He was a hard man to kill."

Catherine nodded and said, "Simon panicked, which explains why he left evidence behind this time."

"And why he had to disappear, and why we had to do this."

Catherine nodded again and tossed the drug samples she had in through the window. Then she looked up and said, "Let's get this underway." About that time, Brass came driving up.

Mike said, "I'll call it in." He dialed 911 and told them, "Someone's been shot. I'm about a quarter mile west of Mt. Durango. There's a man bleeding from the head in his car. It looks like a gunshot wound, but I couldn't see a gun. He's dead for sure." Then he hung up. He took his sim card out of his phone so they couldn't track it. Brass walked up and his walkie talkie started reporting the possible 420 a quarter mile west of Mt. Durango. Mike looked at Brass and nodded. "Showtime."

Brass nodded back and called in, "Patrol, this is 203 Charlie Captain Brass. I am with Charlie 04 Willows, Charlie 09 Keppler, and Charlie 08 McGregor. We're right around the corner. Our ETA is 5 minutes. We will be responding also."

Catherine called the doctor whom I had not yet met. The rest of us circled around her as she talked. "Sorry, I've got a 420. Similar MO to Zamesca. The press is all over us. I need permission to get the body out of here ASAP……Got it. Which mortuary is on call? I'll take care of it. Thanks, Doc." She then called Warrick and brought him in. He showed up and immediately questioned about the whereabouts of the body. "I called the mortuary and had them get it out of here. Gunshot victim."

"Got ID?"

"Ezekiel Holstein," Mike answered. "Local. Brass is running him now."

"Hey, Cath, didn't you find Zamesca near here?"

"Yeah."

"The jumbo cup. Shoe and tire impressions. Shot in his car…think Simon's coming out of hiding?"

"Or it's a copycat," I sighed.

"Want me to take the back seat?"

"No," Catherine told him. "Take the perimeter."

"Ok."

"Thanks, Warrick."

The three of us exchanged glances and took nervous breaths. The under-Sherriff showed up and was telling the press that he had no conclusive information, but there were similarities to the Zamesca case.

He walked up to Brass, looked around, and said, "I feel real good about this."

Mike and I stared at him, looked at each other, and simultaneously rolled our eyes.