"Wolfe. Got a minute?" Natalia sauntered into the lab. Ryan closed the file on Casey Delveccio and turned to face Natalia.
"What?" He asked. He gazed at her with mild impatience.
"Can you tell me what's going on? I see K.J. on the phone crying hysterically-"
"She went back home for the funeral. There's nothing else to say." Ryan interrupted her.
Keats had long since forgiven her, but Ryan still associated Natalia with the stigma of nearly losing the love of his life. He found it very hard to take the high road.
"How is she now? Is she better? Is she coming back to work? What?"
"I haven't talked to her since she left. But before she left, she said she'd be back to work by tomorrow afternoon…satisfied?"
"Ryan, aren't you the least bit worried about her? You seem to be taking it pretty well considering K.J. almost had a nervous breakdown the other day."
Ryan took a deep breath and controlled a fierce urge to shout.
"You think I don't want to be with her right now? Not that it's any of your business, but…the only thing I can do for her right now…is give her some space." Ryan seemed to be having trouble saying the words.
Natalia nodded, pursing her lips together.
"Ryan…I'm sorry. I didn't realize…" She began.
Ryan turned back to the case files and browsed through them, unceremoniously ending the entire discourse.
"I guess I never told you while you were alive, but…you meant so much to me. But you probably knew that all along.
I mean, I love Grammy Remington and Sloane and all…but you were my family, Peanut Butter. You helped me more than you would ever know.
I love you, Patty. Always." Keats placed a single rose near the marble headstone marked, 'Patience Brooke Barrington.'
She placed her fingers on her lips and touched the grave, feeling a swell of optimism rise through her.
Patty would be so proud of me if she knew that I was 'getting my shit together.' She may have been my life a long time ago, but I have a new life now. With new friends, and a wonderful boyfriend. I know she'd be happy for me.
Keats said her goodbyes and took an earlier flight, anxious to get back to her life in Miami.
"Horatio, this poor baby may have been clean on the outside, but she's all messed up inside. Take a look at these scans from her intestines." Alexx pointed to her monitors.
"They look swollen." He said, trying to figure out an explanation.
"The gastrointestinal tract, the kidneys, and even the brain hemorrhaged. Which indicates she had a case of toxic shock syndrome. Significant tissue and organ damage has been done…I think she was poisoned."
Alexx typed in a few chemical notations into her computer and pressed enter. Her eyes scoured the list of results.
"Just as I thought. Arsenic trioxide: the most lethal form of arsenic. The average human ingests a few milligrams of non-toxic arsenic a day through meals. But this…this was no accident."
Alexx stroked the side of the girl's face, marveling at how peaceful she looked. Though her internal injuries no doubt made her last living hours pure torture.
"Knock knock." Keats said, peeking into the DNA lab. Valera and Natalia looked around and smiled when they saw their friend waving gaily at them.
"K.J. Are you all right?" Natalia gave her a quick hug, stepping back to let Valera embrace Keats.
"I've been better. But it's early." Keats replied sadly. Valera nodded sympathetically.
"Ryan said you wouldn't be back until tomorrow." Natalia added.
"I wanted to come home. I'm still needed here. Personal tragedy or not, crime never stops, right?" Keats was waning on her hopefulness. It was understood that there would be good days and bad days, but she hadn't wanted to return on a bad day.
Everyone would look at her like she was a ticking time bomb.
"We're glad you're back, K.J. It hasn't been the same without you." Valera said, interrupting Keats' thoughts.
"What's new in the Lab?" She wondered after they'd greeted each other properly.
"A beauty queen was murdered in her bedroom. The only suspect so far is the brother, who lived with her. But he has a fairly solid alibi." Natalia said.
"I can work with fairly solid. Fairly solid is good. They get a sense of ease…they get a little careless…we take advantage of their sloppy cover and nail them at their most vulnerable." Keats had dearly missed her job, and knew she'd done the right thing coming back early.
"I bow to the master." Natalia teased. Keats rolled her eyes playfully. And it was then that she truly knew she was going to be okay.
"June. We keep meeting like this, don't we?" Horatio said, placing a warm hand on her shoulder.
The humor in his eyes made Keats feel extremely welcome. Despite her behavior the other day, it seemed no one held it against her or thought her crazy. They were incredibly understanding. It was nice.
"By the way, where's Ryan?" She asked. She wanted to thank him for his kind words and his support.
"His shift ended a few hours ago." Horatio said. Keats nodded, listening intently as he gave her closer details of the murder case they were currently involved in.
"Did the girl have a spouse or boyfriend?" She asked Horatio.
"As a matter of fact, she did. Do you want to question him?"
Keats stood over the table in the interrogation room and handed Jimmy Grayson (the potential perp), a photo of Casey from the crime scene.
"Is it just a coincidence that you've been reported as ordering several vials of arsenic from a chemical laboratory in town?" Keats asked right off the bat.
There was no need to waste time in the matter. Especially when Keats was aching to deliver some justice.
"Please. She told me she had a problem with fire ants in her yard, so I bought arsenic and a couple of other things to mix up in order to exterminate them. She couldn't afford a professional."
"Are you a chemistry nerd or something?" She asked. Jimmy nodded, his eyes confident and self-assured.
"Chemical engineering was my major in college. But I shouldn't say that, right? It might make me seem guilty." Jimmy gave a handsome smile. He was trying to flirt with her in order to get her to ease off.
"Fire ants, huh? That seems pretty plausible. So who do you think committed the murder?"
"It could have been her brother. They had a sick relationship. Or it could have been some twisted attempt at getting my sympathy." Jimmy rubbed his well-coiffed goatee.
"You think she committed suicide by ingesting arsenic? There are easier ways to do that. Poison is painful."
"What can I say? She wanted me back. We broke up like months ago, so she moved out here to be closer to me. Only, I started going out with this other girl. Is it my fault that she couldn't handle it?" Jimmy shifted in his chair.
"If things were completely over between the two of you, then why did you take care of her fire ant problem?" Keats was determined to cut through all the bullshit.
"I'm a nice guy. She may have been my ex, but she was still my friend. I help out my friends when they're in trouble."
"This sick relationship with her brother…would you care to expound on that?"
"We went to couples' therapy last year. She had several…reservations, I guess you could say…about sex. She was…inhibited.
Anyway, after three weeks of sessions, the therapist got to the root of her problem. Casey had done some things with her brother when she was a kid. Her parents found out and they sent the brother packing to a boarding school.
She felt guilty and it transferred into her sexual identity. Clinically speaking, that is. I don't usually talk that way." Jimmy finished with a satisfied smirk.
"You don't think your current girlfriend is a suspect?" Keats wondered. Jimmy frowned and shook his head.
"She doesn't even know that Casey exists. Or existed, as the case may be."
Keats struggled to suppress her nausea. Delveccio may have been a slime, but Jimmy was far worse.
"Be ready to answer more questions when I get the full results of the autopsy." Keats managed to say, leaving the room in a hurry.
She stood next to Horatio on the other side of the wall and took one last look at Jimmy Grayson as he was escorted out the door.
"H…may I go investigate the crime scene?" Keats asked hopefully. Horatio hid a smile and nodded.
"You don't have much time, though, June. The cleaning crew is getting ready to go over there." He said, taking off toward the morgue.
Keats lingered for a moment, making a mental note to hug Horatio the next time she saw him. He was terribly good to her, and she was extremely grateful for him.
The bedroom obviously belonged to the brother, Keats noticed. There was a stack of Playboys under the bed and dirty boxer shorts all over the floor. Unless Miss Albany happened to wear men's underwear, it was definitely Tony Delveccio's room.
Amidst a bunch of beer cans and bottles of wine on his desk and nightstand, Keats discovered a very expensive, half-empty bottle of champagne. It was easy to miss, as it had been shoved between his mattresses.
Keats sniffed around the bottle opening. She then placed it in a plastic bag to take back to the Lab. She then poked around his closet, stepping far away from where Casey's body had been found.
The closet was full of smelly shoes and old shirts, but Keats was certain there was something useful around, just waiting to be noticed.
She picked up a red stiletto heel on top of the pile of Nikes and nodded to herself. She began to walk out of the closet, but was angered to find one of the buttons on her shirt caught on a wire hanger.
"Ooof." She mumbled as she tugged the shirt loose. She fell backward on the pile of footwear and was thrown against the wall. The wall creaked and gave way, opening like a door.
"A secret passage? How sinister of you, Mr. Delveccio…" Keats murmured, staring up into the darkness. She was at the top of a long, narrow flight of steps leading down into a basement-like room.
Keats grabbed a flashlight from her kit and walked down the steps, making as little sound as possible. She shone her light over several pieces of rope, each strand frayed at the edges.
She noticed an abandoned 'cat o nine tails' lying next to a few leather belts. Keats raised her eyebrows incredulously.
"Maybe 'sick' wasn't the right word…" She muttered to herself. She placed several samples of her findings in plastic bags, packing them away in her kit.
When she was satisfied that she had seen all she needed to see, she took another glance at the room as she retreated up the stairs.
"You forgot to tell me you were coming here."
"Arrrggggghhhh…Berkeley, you ass! Don't do that!" Keats screamed. She had just bumped into Jake Berkeley, her so-called superior and the only human occupational hazard at M.D.P.D.
"If you'd followed protocol, I wouldn't have had to sneak in here. Find anything interesting?" He asked, grabbing her flashlight from her. She glared at him and tried to get it back.
"Just some suspicious S&M type objects. The boyfriend said that the brother was having an incestuous affair with the victim." She grunted, trying to reach her flashlight. Berkeley held it high above his head, dangling it in front of her.
She jumped up to catch hold of it and unwittingly fell into Berkeley's trap. He held onto her tightly, kissing her with rough yearning. She was so warm and well worth the wait.
Keats pushed him away, breaking into a run. She flew up the stairs and didn't stop to look back.