Thanks again for the nice comments! Little comment to this chapter: I know the thing with the door is a bit … but think about Danny's situation in "Trapped". I just didn't want the classical 'trapped in an elevator' and even a snow storm wouldn't have kept them inside for long enough ;-)
Hope you enjoy this one as well – please read and review!
Chapter 3
"He denies that there was another person with him in the room at all," Stella finished her report on the interview with Thomas Browning at the hospital. "He claims that he's been there alone."
"Figures. And the scarves and fluids have been left by the previous inmates and have just been forgotten or missed by the cleaning crew?" Mac leaned back in his office chair.
"Maybe she was married? Or they had to keep it a secret because she was white? Or…"
"Well, his problems are bigger than being with a married woman or whatever," Mac answered.
"How's that?"
"They found a body in a side street, couple of blocks from the Bedford. DNA matches the samples that you collected from Browning's hotel room."
"Oh. Well, that … But he couldn't have killed and dumped her, he was unconscious – so what happened?"
"Might be an OD, we have to wait for autopsy results. Still that doesn't explain why she was at the hotel with him, why he was found unconscious and why he denies that she was there at all…"
Mac's cell phone started ringing. After a look at the display, he rolled his eyes. "Damn it! Portland again…"
"DA?" Stella wondered, anticipating nothing good.
"Taylor, hello John… Wait, you can't… We'll be right there." He put the phone back into his pocket.
"We got ourselves an appointment with the DA at his office," he announced.
"Joy…"
XXXXX
"I can only please one person per day. Today is not your day. Tomorrow isn't looking good, either," Stella snapped. "If you insist on prosecuting based on the incomplete evidence we have so far, please. But I promise I will testify for the defense based on what I know so far. We have NO evidence that Browning has anything to do with the death of this woman, NO evidence that the cocaine we found was his, he has NO injection marks, NO marks of usage in his nose or throat, drug test of blood and urine came back negative, there wasn't even trace of cocaine on his hands or clothes. On what do you wanna base your prosecution? Being with the victim hours before she died? Having sex with her? As far as I remember, that's not illegal – not even in New York."
DA John Portland looked over to Mac, waiting for a sign to intervene, but Mac didn't show the slightest intention to him. Of course he was the boss, but he knew well enough that nothing would stop Stella in this mood. And besides, she was right.
Finally Portland sighed. "Okay, you win. I have two other cases ready to go to court and since the guy will stay at the hospital for a couple of days, this one won't run away. I'll place a cop in front of his door, just to make sure he stays where he is. I expect to hear from you at the beginning of next week." With that, he went out without waiting for a reaction.
Stella turned to Mac with a grin. "Was it as good for you as it was for me?"
XXXXX
"So, any plans?" Stella asked while they drove back to the lab.
"Plans for what?"
"Today, this evening, the weekend… - time to go home, time for some life you know…" she replied.
"I got paperwork waiting on my desk…"
"Working hours are for everyone INCLUDING you. There is a reason that they are limited to less than 24 hours a day... You need to get some sleep, Mac! If you start with paperwork now, I'm most likely gonna find you at your desk Monday morning because you never left the building by then…"
Sometimes she was seriously concerned about him.
"What about your plans for the weekend?" he asked instead of replying.
"I'm gonna renovate my apartment, living room and hallway. You know, some new paint and so on. Time for a little change." He became quiet for a moment.
"Need any help?"
Stella looked over in surprise, his eyes were focused on the street again. "You wanna help me paint my walls?" she inquired.
"Paint walls, move furniture, whatever you need me to do… That is – unless you already have help?"
"No, no. Well, sure, why not? That would be great, thanks for your offer! Um – on ONE condition…"
"That would be?"
"No paperwork today, you go home and get some sleep!"
Mac gave her a resigning smile. "Yes, Ma'am!"
XXXXX
Mac arrived at Stella's apartment in the early afternoon the next day, exactly on time as usual. Stella smiled at him when he handed her a bottle of wine while she let him in.
"Thanks, I think I put that away for the moment, who knows what the apartment looks like if we start drinking first…" she joked. He looked tired, she was sure that if he got any sleep at all last night, it certainly hadn't been enough yet.
She had already taken everything from the walls and moved the lighter pieces of furniture. With Mac's help, they now moved the heavier items to the middle of the room and covered everything with large plastic sheets to protect it from dust and paint spatter. Then they started scraping the wallpaper off, each of them working on one side of the room, while the radio was playing.
"Okay…" Stella declared after ripping the last frazzle of paper from the wall, "I think now it's time for the more interesting part – did you ever RE-decorate a room?"
"Not really," Mac admitted with a grin, "but it can't be that difficult. You put paste on the wallpaper and stick it to the wall…"
"…and hope it stays there…" Stella added a little doubtful.
"Well, I know that you need to let the paste soak into the paper for a moment to make sure there's enough on it, so let's just start preparing some sheets – and then we see."
"M-hm."
They continued working concentrated and much to their own surprise, things went really good and they made good progress.
"Phew – done!"
Stella dropped the brush into the paste bucket with a heavy sigh. Mac finished smoothing the last piece of wallpaper and went over to her. They looked around in the newly decorated room.
"We're a pretty good team, huh?" she asked.
"Yeah, if there are no more crimes to solve, we're gonna open a business as decorators together," he grinned.
"Over my dead body," she replied quickly. "My arms are killing me…"
"Wanna order something to eat?" he asked, certain that neither of them was in the mood for cooking now.
"Yeah, good idea."
XXXXX
Half an hour later, the doorbell rang. Mac answered the door, paid for the food and took it back to the kitchen where Stella had placed some plates on the counter since the living room was a total mess.
Suddenly the lights went out.
"Great, I love New York in summer... 100 degrees outside even in the evenings, too much for the good old mains… But who needs climate control anyway?" Stella remarked and went to check for the fuse box, when she realized after a look out of the window that there were no lights on in the entire surrounding – and that was more than unusual, even for a late summer afternoon.
Uh-oh...
Then she suddenly remembered another problem.
This is NOT good…
"What's the matter, couldn't find the switch?" Mac teased when she returned to the living room.
"Got good news – and bad news…"
"Good news first!"
"Okay – this apartment has an electronic security lock – we are safe in here."
"I see. And the bad news?"
"This apartment has an electronic security lock – and … the manual override has been broken since yesterday …"
"That means… ?"
"That means in case of a power outage, since you can't open the door manually at the moment, it prevents any opening – from inside AND outside."
"Oh."
TBC