Thank you all for your comments on the last chapter! Sorry for taking two months to update...sometimes RL kicks my butt.

In case you forgot what happened in the previous chapters ;), here's a quick recap! The story picks up about a month or so after the finale. Stroh is still out there, Julio is still angry, people in LA are still getting murdered, and Sharon really needs a vacation. But you all know me, so I'm sure no one's surprised that instead of a vacation I gave her a murder that landed in Major Crimes after spanning FID, Robbery-Homicide, and Traffic, two dead bodies, a city attorney on the warpath, and probably high blood pressure.

Phantom Hazards (3)

Lieutenant Provenza was putting crime scene photos up on the murder board when Sharon stepped out of her office again.

That could only mean that SID and FID had finally sent over the remaining evidence. Good. Time wasn't on their side, here.

She wondered if along with the photos they'd finally gotten a name for their mystery victim. As she walked over, she squinted at the board to check – and felt an involuntary grimace of sympathy at the grisly images of the beaten-up body in the trunk. A young woman, in her twenties at most...

Some parts about working Major Crimes never got easier.

"...that explains why Farris drove off when Traffic pulled him over, at least." At her desk, Amy was browsing through what looked to be more crime scene photos. "He didn't want to be caught with a dead body in his trunk."

Flynn scoffed. "Yeah. And getting in a car chase with the police was a great way to avoid that."

"Well, now, Flynn... if all criminals were smart," Provenza drawled as he pinned up another photo, "think of how much more the city would have to pay us." After waiting for the obligatory grin of approval from his partner, he went on, "What I'd like to know is, what makes a guy who's so far only been involved in petty thefts and small-time fraud suddenly jump to murder?"

"Bad fight with the girlfriend? Drugs?"

Provenza only grunted under his breath, a sign that he didn't think much of either theory.

As she closed the remaining distance to the murder board, Sharon confirmed that there was still no name next to the photos. "No ID on our victim yet...?"

"Ah. Captain." Provenza turned at the sound of her voice. "No ID, no official cause of death yet from Morales... and since we can't look into Farris's personal life without stepping on FID's toes," (he gave her a pointedly grumpy look) "we still have no idea why he killed her. In other words, we're still on square one, and I'm going to have to cancel my dinner plans soon." He heaved an irritated sigh.

"Maybe he didn't kill her," said Amy.

Provenza rolled his eyes. "Thank you, Sykes. I suppose it is possible that that young woman broke half her own bones, and then climbed into that trunk voluntarily."

But Amy shook her head, unfazed by the sarcasm. "I mean, maybe Farris didn't kill her. He could've been getting rid of the body for someone else." She shrugged at the lieutenant. "It fits the profile better... small-time crook, Robbery-Homicide suspected him of helping out in another big case, but they had no evidence... maybe he's on someone's payroll."

At his desk, Andy lowered the file he'd been reading, and looked thoughtful for a moment. Then he gave a lopsided nod, and arched his eyebrows at Provenza in a way that clearly said 'actually, that makes sense'.

Sharon agreed. "It's worth considering the possibility," she nodded. "Let's look into Farris' finances and see if there's..." Suddenly she trailed off, her lips pursing in displeasure.

Confused, Amy directed a questioning look between her Captain and the two lieutenants. Unlike herself, they both seemed to understand what the sudden shift in mood was all about. "...Uh...Is there a problem with that...?"

Provenza turned to pin one last photo to the board. "Ohh, some folk who don't know better might call it a 'problem', sure," he said drolly – then he turned back around, eyebrows rising: "But around here, we prefer to think of it as the … gratifying adventure, that is trying to investigate a murder while our prime suspect is a 'victim' in FID's case."

Sharon shot him a wry look.

He shrugged back. It wasn't as though he was lying.

Her narrowed eyes informed him that she did not appreciate his entirely accurate explanation of their current difficulties.

"We can't get any warrants to look into Farris' life, or finances, or anything, until FID files their report on his shooting," Flynn explained, for Sykes' benefit. "And after that, the case goes back to Robbery-Homicide...and meanwhile, we're sitting here trying to figure out the victim in the trunk with our hands tied behind our backs!"

His explanatory tone had quickly degenerated into something closer to indignation. Sharon acknowledged it with a quiet sigh, "I'll talk to Chief Taylor." She glanced at the board again. "What else do we have?"

Andy pointed to the file he'd been reading. "We confirmed that the car was registered to Farris. And Mike found his prints all over the trunk...so whether he killed her or not, he probably did put the body in there."

"Morales sent us a couple more photos of her face," added Provenza. "Buzz is cleaning them up for a DMV search. Oh – and the doctor also found what he thinks are defensive wounds on her hands," he pointed to one of the photos on the board, "...so since we're asking our fearless leader to give us proper access to evidence, we might consider including access to Farris's body in that deal."

"So we can check if he has any wounds that match the defensive wounds on the victim," Sharon followed his train of thought. "Good point. I'll add that to our list of requests for the Chief. Did Dr. Morales confirm time of death?"

"Not yet," said Amy. "CI's initial report put it at twenty to thirty hours."

Sharon frowned. Ten hours was a long window for time of death, almost too long to be useful. She hoped that Dr. Morales would have it narrowed down by the time he was done with the autopsy.

"Alright," she murmured thoughtfully, and took a step back from the murder board. "I'll go talk to Chief Taylor about running our investigation in parallel with FID's... In the meantime – let's ask for warrants for Farris's financial records and phone records, and start making a list of family and friends who might tell us what he was doing during that ten-hour time frame. I'd like us to have a better handle on his whereabouts and activities, before we go home tonight."

As everyone went back to their tasks, Sharon let her gaze roam over Julio on her way to the door. That was another issue that she'd meant to tackle before going home that day, but that wasn't looking likely to happen, now.

The detective had been conspicuously quiet. She imagined that he wasn't much happier with her than she was with him. That had hardly been a pleasant conversation that they'd had earlier. Nor had it been particularly productive: other than confirming that Julio didn't see much value in the group anger management sessions, which Sharon had already suspected, it had taken them nowhere. And they were running out of time. Taylor wanted Julio in his office the next day, to meet with all of them and explain himself. Sgt. Staples wanted him to take the anger management more seriously. The city attorney wanted him suspended, and Julio himself wanted God-only-knew what.

Sharon only wanted a break, at this point.

For the hundredth time in the last couple of weeks, she wondered how many vacation days she had accumulated. A lot, probably. With the exception of the three days after Christmas that she'd spent with her children, she couldn't remember the last time she'd had time off. No...she'd taken Rusty to Santa Barbara for his birthday, last April. And they'd gone to King's Canyon with Ricky for a weekend in May...

It had all been less than ten months before, but it felt like ten years.

With a sigh, she dropped that train of thought. It was moot anyway, since she wasn't going anywhere. These days, she counted herself lucky if she could get a few peaceful hours on a weekend morning. It was fortunate that Rusty wasn't much of an early bird, she supposed... Saturday mornings when he inevitably slept in had quickly become her favorite times of the week. Knowing where he was and that he was likely to be there for the day, that helped loosen some of those coils of painful tension that systematically built up in her stomach over the rest of the week.

God help her, she'd gone through a good number of decades of her life without hating anyone, but she wasn't sure she could say that anymore. She'd never wanted someone dead as much as Phillip Stroh.

It was not a good feeling.

She walked the distance to Taylor's office at a deliberate pace, as she doubted that the conversation with the Assistant Chief would improve her mood. Years of experience told her that they'd never get permission to talk to anyone close to Farris until FID filed their OIS report. The risk of a lawsuit was too great if his family heard that they were looking into the man as a murder suspect, right on the heels of him being shot by several officers. But she'd ask, anyway... who knew, maybe Taylor was in a generous mood. He did want the case closed quickly.

At worst, she'd have to listen to another condescending lecture on the best and proper way to conduct investigations. It would hardly be her first – the Chief loved to hear himself talk, every bit as much if not more than his predecessor – and Sharon suspected that she was too tired to even get worked up about it, so it didn't really matter much.

Besides, regardless of whether he'd allow them to talk to Farris's associates, Taylor was likely to grant what they really needed, the permission to get the man's recent financial and phone records. Between that and Robbery-Homicide's case file, it was enough for her team to go on before the next day. Sure, they were all still stuck working after hours on another division's case and for essentially no benefits...but at least they'd be able to do it in an efficient manner.

Lemons and silver linings and all that.

In fairness, there was one positive aspect about the situation. Having an active investigation would buy her some more time to handle the crisis with Julio. Since an ongoing case took precedence over meeting with Sgt. Staples and the city attorney, she could send Julio out the next day and get that meeting postponed. Of course, stalling wouldn't be much use if she still couldn't get through to him, but at least she'd have a few extra days to try...

...though what to try, Sharon didn't know.

She did know that she wanted Julio on her team. It wasn't clear that he still wanted to be there, and if he didn't, it wasn't clear to her why, or how to help, or...anything, really – but she was done letting things unfold on their own on that front. She might've dropped that ball once, but she fully intended to pick it back up...

...somehow.

With a sigh, she checked her watch as she closed the distance to Taylor's office.

Tomorrow, she swore to herself. Tomorrow she'd think of a better way to talk to Julio. For now, she needed to focus on the case, and go over the list of things she needed from Taylor and the best way to ask for them. That by itself was sure to be an unpleasant enough conversation. She wasn't asking him for any favors, not exactly – not this time – but either way the Assistant Chief was sure to posture and puff a good amount before giving in.

Sadly, she was in no position to be anything but accommodating to his posturing. She had to keep him happy. She knew that. Taylor knew that. And they both knew that the other knew that, so at least there was very little room for misunderstanding.

Sharon sighed again, and knocked on the office door.

The best that could be said about the conversation with Taylor was that it had been short. Less than ten minutes later Sharon was back out in the hallway, with the permission to get the records she wanted and the strong desire to go home and call it a night.

Since the latter wasn't an option until she checked back in with the team and signed all the warrant requests, she decided on a brief detour by the break room, instead. Five-thirty p.m. wasn't too late for caffeine. Not with her job.

She'd filled the electric kettle and set it to 170F by habit, before remembering that she'd run out of her favorite green tea. She kept forgetting to bring in a new box from home. Though she must've made that mental note half a dozen times over the last couple of days, it just didn't seem to stick. Her concentration was fickle, lately.

Well...Lipton wouldn't kill her. With a small eyeroll, Sharon reached up into one of the cabinets to get a teabag, then she leaned against the counter as she waited for the water to boil, and she closed her eyes.

She had no idea that someone else had come in until an unexpected voice startled her:

"Long day, huh?"

She jumped slightly and half-turned, in time to see Andy raise his hands in an apologetic gesture: "Sorry. Didn't mean to sneak up on you. I thought you were still in with Taylor."

Sharon gave him a smile that she hoped didn't look as strained as it felt. "It was a quick meeting." A moment passed in silence as she rearranged her thoughts – the temptation to take advantage of his friendly ear flickering briefly in her mind, before she slipped into her professional tone and asked: "Any progress on ID-ing our victim?"

Andy hesitated. For a second it looked like he wanted to say something else, but in the end he just cleared his throat. "Uh...yeah. Actually. Buzz's reconstructed photo got us a hit in the DMV database." He saw her reach to turn off the kettle, and hurried to preempt her. "Hang on. Julio's cross-referencing the DMV entry with her prints, to confirm the ID, before he pulls up her history. That'll take a couple of minutes." He picked up one of the clean mugs and set it next to the kettle for her, "Besides," he smiled, "it's not like any of us are going anywhere before Morales sends up the official autopsy results calling this a murder. What's the point in hurrying? You'll just get to hear more of Provenza's complaining about his missed dinner plans with Patrice."

The corners of Sharon's lips twitched. "I see." He did have a point about having to wait on the ME's report, and she was more than happy to have an extra two minutes to make her tea. She reached for the empty mug, then tore open the teabag. "Was there any obvious connection to Farris...?"

"What? Oh. The victim. No," the lieutenant shook his head, refocusing, "at least not from her name or address. We'll see what Julio's background check turns up, I guess. Any luck, she'll be the guy's girlfriend and we'll be done with it."

Sharon hummed. "Maybe." Somehow, she doubted it would be that easy. Statistically speaking, the cases that ended up on their roster never were. She allowed for another moment of silence as she poured the steaming water into her mug, then raised her gaze to him, questioningly, "Would you like some...?"

He shook his head. "Thanks. Still trying to stay off caffeine...you know," he gave her a lopsided nod,"Nicole's been on my case about the blood pressure..."

"Ah." She replaced the kettle on its stand.

"I guess she's right," Andy added after another second, "it uh, helps with the stress and all that..."

The pointed pause that followed his statement was just unsubtle enough to make her almost-smile.

She acknowledged the hint with another hum. Yes, it probably would help to reduce her caffeine intake. If she could remember, she'd bring some herbal tea to work the next day, instead of the green. But she very much doubted that that would make a significant difference to her blood pressure. Not when she spent ten hours every day wondering if that was the day that Stroh would come after Rusty.

She wrapped both hands around the mug and tried to think of something else.

Unfortunately, the only things that occurred to her were more problems that needed to be handled. Julio. The case. FID.

Andy was right, it had been a long day.

As he walked over to pick up a water bottle from the vending machine, Sharon used the opportunity to let her eyes close for another moment while she inhaled the scent of the tea. Only when she heard the bottle being dispensed did she open them again, and reluctantly decided that her short break was over.

The lieutenant must've reached the same conclusion; he took a couple of steps toward the door, then paused and held out a hand out for her to pass first.

"Listen, Sharon..."

She looked up as she walked by him.

"I know I'm probably starting to sound like a broken recording here, but you know that if you need anything..."

She smiled; he had said that to her a dozen times over the past month. "I know. Thank you."

"Yeah..." He sighed, and gave her a sympathetic look before they both stepped out into the hallway. "Alright...Let's see if Provenza's done complaining yet."

"No connection?" Indignation was causing the lieutenant's voice to take an uncharacteristically high pitch. "We've been sitting here for hours – with no overtime, mind you – waiting to figure out who the heck our mystery victim is so we can finally wrap this up... and now you're telling me that there's nothing at all that connects her to Farris?"

Julio shrugged. "Nothing so far, Sir."

"Ye gods."

Sharon shook her head to mirror his frustration. "Lets go over this again," she requested. "From the start. We might be overlooking the connection."

Julio nodded. He was still avoiding her gaze, she noticed.

"Victim's ID came back as Regina Thompson," he recapped. "Twenty-year-old sophomore at LA City College...also working part-time at a car dealership on Fountain Ave, in the sales department. Her family lives a couple of hours up north, near Bakersfield; her roommate's listed as the emergency contact."

"But there's no missing person's report," Sharon clarified.

"No, Ma'am."

"Could be that the roommate didn't know she was missing," suggested Tao. "CI's report puts TOD at thirty hours max..."

Sharon let her gaze drift to their victim's name on the board. Her lips twisted grimly, "Thirty hours is a long time to be missing."

No one disagreed.

A brief, pensive silence fell over the room, but Sharon only allowed it to go on for a moment before slipping back into her Captain's tone:

"Let's have a patrol car go to Ms. Thompson's address and check that her roommate's alright," she instructed. "Discreetly – I don't want them making any notifications. But I'd like to make sure that we only have one dead body to deal with." As everyone nodded and Amy reached for the phone, Sharon took another moment to mentally review their information. "Alright...so how did this young woman end up in our Johnny Farris's trunk? Julio –" she glanced back at the detective, "you said that she had no criminal record, correct?"

He nodded. "No criminal record, no arrest record – nothing in her background indicates she was involved in anything illegal. And there's nothing there that links her to Farris, either, at least not yet."

"Could've been a wrong place, wrong time kinda situation," Andy mused. "She stumbles onto one of Farris's illegal deals, he has to get rid of her before she goes to the cops. Kills her and puts her in the trunk, gets stopped by Traffic before he can dump the body."

"He was headed west on I-10 when Traffic pulled him over," nodded Mike.

Andy made a 'see, what did I tell you' gesture. "Probably to the PCH," he guessed, "and from there he could've dumped her anywhere."

"At three-thirty p.m. on a weekday?" Provenza sounded doubtful.

"Hey, you said it, if all the scumbags were smart..."

"Yeah," scoffed the older lieutenant, "well there's 'not smart', and then there's 'trying to dump a body off the PCH during rush hour'. Besides, LA City College is in East Hollywood..." he frowned, and peered at the Robbery-Homicide file on his desk, "and Farris's address and all his buddies' hangouts are in Compton. That's almost twenty miles – long way for this young lady to go to 'stumble onto' him."

Sharon found herself inclined to agree. "I'd like to look for their connection a little longer before we start thinking about this a crime of opportunity, yes. Let's get Regina Thompson's detailed records – including her school records, and rosters for her classes," she added as an afterthought. "As well as a list of employees from her workplace. I want to get a better idea of her social circle. Maybe one of her classmates or co-workers leads back to Farris."

"Or to someone in his circle," said Mike. "We still don't know for sure that he killed her." He paused, then amended: "Technically... we don't even know for sure that she was killed, yet."

Provenza let out a warning sigh, "Tao..."

But Mike's reply was interrupted by the sound of footsteps in the hallway outside; a moment later, Dr. Morales's head appeared in the doorway.

He swept the room with a quick glance. "Ah – good, you're all still here."

Provenza rolled his eyes.

"There's nothing 'good' about that," he grumbled under his breath.

"I thought maybe Chief Taylor had changed his mind about the 'great urgency' behind this case," the ME commented as he walked in properly. "When I called Robbery-Homicide a few minutes ago to ask for your suspect's medical records, everyone involved in the case had gone home."

Flynn snorted. "Why doesn't that surprise me?"

Provenza's look could've soured milk. "Well, as you can see, doctor, we're all still diligently manning the lines here," he said irritably.

"Hey, I'm a little short on sympathy at the moment. This was supposed to be my day off." Morales glanced at the board as he walked closer. "Oh good, you found a name."

"Did you find a cause of death?"

The doctor's eyebrows rose. "Is it me, or are you feistier than usual, lieutenant?"

"Happens when I have to work for longer hours and less money than usual," Provenza informed him.

"Ah. Yes, I'd heard that no one was getting overtime on this one because of five different divisions being involved." He ignored their displeased looks. "Anyway – yes, I do have a cause of death, as a matter of fact. Congratulations – it's a murder."

Provenza rolled his eyes again. "Shocking."

"You are in a good mood," noted the doctor.

Flynn cut in before his partner could further demonstrate his discontent: "Murder, how?"

His question caused a subtle shift in the atmosphere. Everyone's expressions grew serious, as they knew that the ironic banter was over and they were about to get significant details about their victim's death – details they'd repeat over and over from now on, until they solved the case.

With a nod, Morales slipped into his professional tone. "There were multiple contusions and abrasions on this young woman's head, face and upper body, all of it consistent with a severe beating. She had three fractured ribs, both wrists broken, probably from defensive wounds, some internal organ damage from the force of the trauma – but what actually killed her was the head injuries. Several of the hits she took caused acute subdural hematomas...she might've survived longer if she'd gotten immediate medical attention, but...not much longer."

Sharon crossed her arms as she listened. "And there's definitely no way that that kind of trauma could've been caused by some sort of accident."

"None. All her injuries are consistent with someone beating her. A lot," the doctor emphasized in a grim tone. "Angrily. Punching, kicking, you name it...whoever did this wasn't holding back."

Sharon sighed, her gaze flickering involuntarily to the gruesome crime scene photos. It was hard to imagine that someone would want to do that to the smiling young woman in the DMV shot.

She swallowed hard and looked back to the ME. "Were you able to find any evidence that it was Farris who did it?"

"Ah...and there comes the bad news." Morales grimaced. "The answer's no. Actually – and keep in mind that I haven't performed his full autopsy yet, because even I'm not that good at multitasking... but, from a quick glance...I'd say it's pretty likely that your suspect didn't do it."

Provenza pinched the bridge of his nose. Sharon shifted slightly on her feet, trying to mask a similar display of disappointment.

For once, it'd have been nice to have an easy answer.

"First of all," the doctor went on to explain, "there's almost no skin damage to his knuckles...which in and of itself isn't much to go on, since he could've worn gloves while he was beating her to death, or he could've kicked her more than punched her...but, while I was looking at his hands, I also noticed some swelling and slight deformation on the some of his fingers. It was present on both hands, and on his wrists, and the location and symmetric spread kind of tipped me off."

"Ah."

Tao's knowing mutter drew everyone's eyes to him.

"Rheumatoid arthritis," he nodded wisely. "My mother-in-law has it."

Morales confirmed with a nod of his own. "That's my guess. Signs of early arthritis. It's hard to tell for sure without checking his medical records, but there's a good chance that Farris wouldn't have been able to hit your victim hard enough, or for long enough, to cause the kind of damage that we're seeing. At least, not on his own."

Sharon frowned. "Could you tell if it was just one person who beat her, or several?"

The doctor hesitated. "Not with one hundred percent certainty," he admitted. "I didn't find any usable prints. I did get a few knuckle impressions here and there, but lab's gonna have to compare them and see if they could belong to different people." He took another glance at the photos on the board as he gathered his thoughts. "There didn't seem to be multiple simultaneous hits in the same regions, and the location of most of the breaks makes me think that it was all the work of one person. And I hate to make your jobs harder... but I don't think that person's downstairs on my autopsy table."

"So Regina Thompson was in Johnny Farris's trunk, and all evidence points to the fact that he knew she was there, and most likely put her there himself...but he didn't actually kill her." Tao scratched his head and sighed. "I guess that brings us back to Amy's theory."

"That he was probably disposing of the body for someone else," repeated Sykes.

Flynn crossed his arms. "Yeah...but who?"

That, of course, was the million dollar question, but it was looking increasingly unlikely that they'd find an answer that night.

Sharon stayed quiet for a moment longer, thoughtfully cataloging the information they had so far, before she looked up again. "Anything else, Doctor? Time of death...?"

"I'd say...twenty to twenty-four hours," replied Morales. "The body's obviously been moved, so without knowing exactly where she's been it's a little tricky...but she's still in rigor, and estimating by Kendall's initial temperature readings, I'd err on the low side. Twenty-two, maybe."

Amy quickly did the math. "That puts time of death at around eight-thirty p.m. last night."

Sharon nodded, then glanced at the ME, silently asking him if there was any other helpful information he could give them.

There was. "The victim's got some defensive wounds, but whoever attacked her overpowered her pretty quickly," he told them. "Assuming just one killer... it must've been someone with a reasonable amount of physical strength. Most likely male, although I wouldn't one hundred percent rule out anything. And almost all of the injuries are on her face, chest and stomach," he added, "so she probably wasn't attacked from behind."

"Argument gone wrong...?" guessed Mike.

"Must've been one hell of an argument," Morales sighed. After a moment, he cleared his throat. "I think that's all I've got for now. I've sent some evidence to the lab for further processing, so you should hear if we get anything new. I'll let you know if I find anything else on Farris's body, too."

Sharon dipped her head. "Thank you, Doctor."

The ME hesitated for a moment; he looked back at the crime scene photos, and shook his head, "I hope you find whoever did this soon..." A pause, then he arched his eyebrows – "And when you do, you might want to stay out of range of his fists."

Without meaning to, Sharon glanced at Julio – and he caught her eye and gave her a look that was almost reproachful. She didn't appreciate it. But she couldn't blame him, either... Again, it looked like they each had reproaches to make to the other.

Suppressing a sigh, she gazed back to Regina Thompson's smiling DMV shot. The crime scene photo next to it made for a sobering contrast.

And their best connection to the young woman's killer was lying on an autopsy table in the morgue, while the killer himself was still out there. Concealed, unknown. Free.

Unpredictable.

It bothered her a lot more than she cared to think about.

She spotted her tea mug on the edge of the nearest desk, and, absently, reached over to curl a hand around it. But the warmth that had comforted her earlier was gone. The porcelain felt only lukewarm beneath her slightly shaking fingers.