Here you go, guys. Sorry it's late.
Read, smile, review... and repeat!
3. Man Behind the Curtain
"Three things cannot be long hidden; the sun, the moon, and the truth." – Siddhartha Gautama (Buddha)
There she was, barely a foot in front of him, her brunette tresses teased by a breeze that he could not feel. She smiled and moved forward, pressing herself against him, green eyes practically boring holes in him with their intensity; her matching dress was tight-fitting, and ye the bond between them was tighter. The magnetism built, a simple unexplained bliss that doubled as she leaned in to whisper playfully in his ear.
"Don," she addressed him, kissing him on the cheek.
"Katherine," he returned finding her smile contagious.
Stepping back, her brow wrinkled, and when she spoke next, her voice was not her own. "No. I'm Liz."
Confused, he blinked, and the lovely scene disappeared, the mysterious black emptiness of the background replaced with a less than inspiring view of the office, and the woman replaced with a puzzled-looking Liz. Still groggy, he lifted his head off his desk. His cheek felt strange; his exploring fingers found several square indents in the skin there, only explained when he looked up to find his computer screen filled with gibberish. The word document was seventeen pages long, a faithful record of exactly which keys he had been napping on for – he consulted his watch – the last twenty minutes. Rubbing the last blurriness of sleep from his eyes, he turned back to Liz, who was watching him with a mix of concern and suspicion.
"You okay?" she questioned.
"Wouiwgjkbjebcnioakmaoihenoanviosih," suggested the computer helpfully.
"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine," he answered hastily. "I must have just… dozed off there."
"Right." She gave him a worried once-over and shrugged. "At quarter to one in the morning, I'm not all that surprised. It looks like you need it."
"Bliewfoipejknieugqwjebljdbcoehwqnix," agreed the computer screen.
"I guess." His gaze fell on a packet of papers in her hand, and he jumped at the chance to change the subject before she started asking him questions. "What have you got?"
"Oh, right," she jumped in, handing him a folder off the top of the stack. Flipping it open, he was immediately presented with a rather unflattering photograph of a familiar cadaver on a brightly lit exam table. "Autopsy report. They faxed it over about a half an hour ago."
Don sighed at the broken man on the table. With the harsh lighting, he appeared even paler, a bloodless, alien thing that just happened to look like Billy Cooper.
"Ah, Coop," he muttered quietly.
It was at this point that Liz started in. "They estimated that he'd been dead at least four hours when narco found him. At the scene, they assumed he was killed by an overdose of something."
Don nodded. "We found a pharmacy on the bedside table."
"And you were right," she conceded, making his heart sink. "He did die of an overdose, but the problem is, none of the drugs they found at the scene match the ones they found in his system."
He looked up sharply from the macabre slideshow before him. "What?"
"There were three antidepressants and two varieties of sleep aid at the scene. They cross-referenced the chemical signatures to the foreign substance in his bloodstream, and it didn't match. In all likelihood, he never even touched those medications."
Sitting up in his chair, Don found himself suddenly very attentive. "Do they know what it is?"
"Apparently, there were multiple signatures floating around. They're still working on the others, but they identified one immediately."
"And?" Don prompted.
"Sodium pentathol," she answered, pulling from the stack still in her hands a lab sheet and pointing out the name and the computer's assurance that the results were 99.9 accurate.
"Hang on a minute, isn't that—"
Liz nodded. "Truth serum. And judging by this report, your friend had enough of it to make even a politician spill his deepest, darkest secrets."
Don just stared as Liz continued.
"The guys also found several abrasions on his ankles and wrists that had been hidden with makeup – supposedly, it came from a high-tension cable, the kind they use to build support systems for bridges. In addition, they found some freshly healed cuts and bruises on the head and chest, also hidden." She leaned against the desk, setting in front of him the diagnosis sheet she'd been consulting.
"Restraint marks, old wounds, and truth serum," listed off Don. "Coop didn't kill himself; he was tortured."
The word hung in the air for a moment, making the silence all the more awkward.
"So, what do you want to do?" Liz asked finally.
"I'll have David head over to that motel and pick up the security tapes; Colby can go over them to see when he came in. I need you to head over to the coroner's office and call me when they figure out what else was in his system. Megan can probably trace the stuff back to a manufacturer."
"At one in the morning?" Liz countered incredulously.
"Call it overtime," he said, flipping open his cell phone. "Serious overtime."
"And you?"
"I'm not sure," he admitted. "I'll see what needs doing when they get here."
His phone gave an angry beep, as if on behalf of the three people who were about to be rudely woken up. Looking down, he squinted to make out the text that notified him he had a message. Speed dial nine was his voicemail; the automated voice grated on his nerves when it answered.
"You have two… new… messages," it said painfully slowly.
The first was Charlie. "Hey Don, just sitting here with a kitchen full of food and no one to eat it with. Dad bailed on me too, I guess, so—"
He shook his head. Crap. He'd forgotten.
"Left on Sunday… October… twenty-first… at… seven… fifty-five," concluded the machine. There was a click, and the next message began, turning his stomach as a familiar voice started to speak in an inappropriately casual, joking tone.
"Hey, Don. This is Billy Cooper. By the time you get this message, I will be dead, so you don't have to worry about calling me back..."