Third chapter only so far… I knew it wouldn't be easy to write this fanfic, but I hadn't expected myself to be on the verge of a writer's block! Ah well… I'll pull through!
Disclaimer: Don't own CSI, obviously.
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"Have you - ?" Josie started as she entered the DNA lab, only to be harshly interrupted.
"No, I have not," Marina Garret, the DNA lab tech interrupted aggressively. "So help me, Pacelli, if you come in here one more time in the next hour, I will handcuff you to your desk and gag you!"
Josie at least had the grace to smile sheepishly. "I know, but I'm impatient."
"Well," Marina said, dragging the word out as she kept her eyes locked on the computer screen, pushing her glasses up her nose. "I might be good, but I'm not that good. Now, go to the break room, get yourself some coffee and relax."
Josie rolled her eyes good-naturedly. "Yes, mother." She smiled sadly at the petite lab tech. "You know, you're the mother I should have had."
Marina smiled back. "I know, baby. Now get."
Josie chuckled and made her way to the break room. She knew the forty three year old lab tech really would handcuff her to her desk and gag her until she could get her work done. She also wished that Marina really was her mother, and all of her other siblings' too.
She reached the break room and made a beeline for the coffee machine. As she poured herself the coffee, her cell phone rang. Putting the coffee pot down, she checked the name on the screen before answering it with a smile.
"Hey Eli," Josie said.
"Heyya lil sis," Elijah Pacelli, Josie's eldest brother and the eldest Pacelli child answered. "How're you doing?"
Josie laughed. "God Eli. Your accent is so thick."
"You try coming back home some time instead of going to other crime labs out of town," he said. Josie could tell he was rolling his eyes. "Danny misses you."
Shaking her head, Josie sat down. "Are we talking about the same Danny who tripped me in the cafeteria on my first day of high school?"
"The same Danny that cried at your graduation."
"We must be talking about different Dannys then. He didn't cry at my graduation," she snorted.
"Yes he did, baby girl. We all did," he said softly.
"Not mom."
"You don't care that she didn't cry. None of us did. If she had, one of us might have clocked her. Mama Messer definitely would have."
"I can totally see that happening," she laughed, before sighing softly. "I miss you. All of you."
"Great," he replied. "Pack up your things, get a transfer and get your ass back home."
"You know I can't do that."
"Yes, you can. You just don't want to."
"You're right," she replied, rolling her eyes. "Eli, I just got settled in. I don't want to have to relocate already."
"Fine," he sighed. "Just don't wait too long to come back home, okay baby girl? We all miss you, believe it or not."
"I'll try. Give Ellie and Brian my love."
Josie hung up the phone and sighed. She missed her family. She really did. She just didn't know what was stopping her from moving back to her hometown. Well, actually, she did.
Her mother had been the perfect mother, up until Josie's younger sister, Emilia – or Mia, as she preferred to be called – was born. Josie had been about fourteen when her father had attempted to kill her mother.
As the door creaked open, Josie shook away thoughts of that night. She wasn't fourteen anymore. She was a twenty seven year old woman who was capable of taking care of herself and her family.
"I heard Marina kicked you out of the DNA lab," Stokes commented.
Josie shrugged. "More or less."
They sat in silence for a moment. Josie simply couldn't sit still. If she wasn't tapping her fingers against the table, she was checking over her notes again. When she started tapping out a rhythm as she read through her notes, a hand covered hers.
She looked up. Stokes was looking at her, irritation plain on his face. His hand covered hers, pinning them to the table.
"Would you quit that?" he snapped.
Josie glared at him. "Deal with it, cowboy."
"Cowboy?" he snorted. "That's the best you could come up with?"
"I'd say pig-headed moron, but it's a bit of a mouthful."
"So is stuck up prick, but you don't see me stop myself from calling you that."
"No you don't, do you? You can't seem to censor yourself."
"I don't see why you should."
"What is that supposed to mean?"
They were arguing again. The two of them always seemed to argue whenever they were put in a room together. Sometimes the others found it amusing, other times they found it annoying. They couldn't figure out why those two seemed to argue so much.
Their dislike had been instantaneous, yet they were more alike than the other could have guessed. If they could only put their differences aside, they would have found that they were quite alike. Perhaps it was because they were both strong-willed and stubborn.
Josie just found Nick Stokes extremely annoying. She didn't like his condescending attitude towards her. She had worked her ass off back in Seattle to earn the respect of her co-workers. Being the only woman on the CSI team had taught her that it didn't do any good to show weakness in front of her co-workers. She had to work twice as hard to earn half of her co-workers respect.
Maybe she was a little too hard on him, but he wasn't exactly trying to make friends with her either. Josie didn't see why she had to be the one to extend the olive branch. She had tried that with her mother and got bitch slapped for her troubles.
Marina entered the room, seeing the two CSIs arguing with each other again. She shook her head. Those two could argue about the sky being blue and the grass being green. She spotted their intertwined hands on the table and smiled softly.
She hadn't known Josie for long, but in the time she had known her, she found that Josie had kept walls up around her. She had a feeling that if anybody could break down her defenses, it would be Nick. She didn't know how, but she knew that he would.
"Sweetie, I have you results," Marina called out. They stopped bickering and looked over at the lab tech. Josie stood up, her hand sliding out from under Stokes'.
Josie had to suppress the blush that was threatening to colour her cheeks. She hadn't realised that her hand was under his. Her hand was tingling and she scratched at it absentmindedly.
She smiled at Marina, taking the results from out of her hand. "Thanks."
"I paged you, but you didn't answer," Marina said, her eyes twinkling.
Josie checked her pager and, sure enough, Marina had paged her. She was so caught up with arguing with Stokes that she hadn't realised. "Oh. I'm sorry."
"It's okay. I can see that you were a little busy."
Josie didn't know why, but she could feel blood rush to her cheeks. She coughed, looking intently at the results in her hand.
"Right," she spoke to the pieces of paper in her hand. "Thanks. Again."
Marina smiled knowingly at her before leaving the break room, leaving Josie to read the results in her hand. A frown creased her forehead as she read.
When she finished reading through it, she sighed, running her hand through her hair.
"Nothing," she muttered. "No foreign DNA, no foreign prints. If I didn't know any better, it'd look like she killed herself!"
"What do you have there?" Stokes asked, frowning over at him. Josie almost snapped at him to mind his own business before remembering that he was working the case with her. She almost sighed when she remembered that, but stopped herself before it could escape.
"It's clean," Josie sighed, passing him the results. "Either he's really good, or we're really bad. I really hope it's the former."
Nick pressed his lips together, his eyes scanning the sheet of paper quickly. She was right, not that he really doubted it. In the time that he had worked with her, he had to admit that she was good at her job. He would never admit that to anyone out loud, however, least of all to Pacelli herself.
"We'll get him," he said finally. Josie eyed him skeptically, but refrained from saying anything. She could see that he was trying to convince himself as much as he was trying to convince her.
"Hmm," Josie hummed. Sighing slightly, she turned to her coffee and drained the mug, going to the sink and rinsing it. "Well, I'm going back to work."
Without another word, she left the break room, leaving Nick standing there, frowning at the piece of paper in his hand.
She shook her head as she made her way to her office to go over the case file again. It seemed that she and Nick had a somewhat civil conversation. What had the world come to?
"Our first truly puzzling case," Josie sighed as she slowly brought herself back to the present. Riley looked at the older CSI. She could see her eyes were slightly glazed over as she saw in her mind the events playing. "I wasn't used to letting a case go unsolved, but I had to let that one go. There was nothing to convict anybody. I had to leave it."
Nick chuckled. "You were so upset."
"So were you," she reminded.
"Yes, but I didn't try to punch out my locker."
"Punch out your locker?" Riley asked. She was learning things about her senior that she never knew before.
Josie smiled sheepishly. "Well, you know how we New Yorkers are. Especially someone with Italian blood. Hot headed bunch, we are."
Josie leaned her head against her locker, replaying the conversation in her head. She banged her head lightly against the locker, sighing.
*flashback*
"Josie," Grissom called. Said CSI looked up from the dress she was examining. She tilted her head, indicating that she was listening. "Meet me in my office in twenty minutes."
Her brow furrowed, but she nodded. She started placing everything back into an evidence bag and putting it into the evidence box. She wondered what Grissom could probably want from her. Staring at the box in her hands, she sighed.
She had been going over the evidence collected with a fine-toothed comb for the past two hours, but couldn't find anything incriminating. The Alyssa Montague murder was really eating away at her. There wasn't anything to suggest that there was anything that wasn't supposed to be there.
If only we could just find the murder weapon, she thought exasperatedly.
None of the blades found in the house matched any of the cuts on Alyssa, indicating that the murderer either brought his own blade or brought it back with him.
She frowned. She doubted it was a blade from the house. It was obvious that the murder was premeditated and was planned to the finest detail. What disturbed Josie the most was the alpha that was carved onto the poor woman's abdomen. Other than the fact that it was done peri-mortem, it was so precise and deep. It wasn't exactly a small carving either. It spanned from just below her breasts to about two inches below her bellybutton.
It infuriated and sickened her that someone could have done that to an innocent person. Alyssa Montague had managed to get an internship at Colton General, one of Las Vegas' top hospitals. She was going to become a trauma surgeon. She was working at the nearby diner so she wouldn't have to depend on her father so much. She was a young woman with so much potential, and now she was just another body on the coroner's slab.
She scowled, placing the box back in its place a little more forcefully than needed. She glanced at her watch, seeing that it was time to see Grissom in his office. She hung up her lab coat and made her way to the familiar office. She knocked on the door, hearing a faint 'come in'.
She opened the door and Grissom took his glasses off, motioning for her to sit down. She sat down a little wearily.
"You wanted to see me?" Josie asked.
Grissom sighed, making her frown slightly."Yes." He placed his glasses on the table and placed his fingertips together, making Josie think of Sherlock Holmes and Dumbledore. "You are a wonderful CSI and I know you're used to closing most of your cases, but the Alyssa Montague case…"
He trailed off, causing her to sit up straight. "What about it?" she questioned, a slight frostiness in her tone.
He took a breath, nodding slightly as if he was trying to reassure himself that what he was doing was right. "I'm taking you off the case."
"But, Grissom – " she protested, standing.
He raised a hand, cutting her off sharply. "My decision is final." He looked at her mournfully. "I can't waste anymore resources on a case that's going nowhere. I'm sorry."
He looked regretful, but Josie was too furious to see it. she just stared at him for a moment before walking out of the office. She knew he was right, but she felt like she should have done something. She shook her head, walking to the locker room. It was about time she went home anyway.
*flashback*
She kicked her locker viciously before kicking again when her frustration didn't disappear. She banged her fist against the locker, startling when she heard someone clear their throat.
"You might not want to dent that," an unfortunately familiar Texan voice said. "You won't get a new door for weeks."
She scowled. "Buzz off, Stokes."
"Nice comeback."
Josie didn't reply. She merely sneered at him, pulling her locker open with so much force that it banged against the locker next to it.
"I see Grissom pulled you off the case," he commented. She glanced at him sharply. He was leaning against the entrance of the locker room. Josie contemplated throwing something at him, but she couldn't find anything appropriate. She rummaged through her locker, getting her bag and strapping her gun onto her belt.
"Buzz off," she repeated, slinging her bag onto her back.
"I'm not happy about it either," he continued, as if she hadn't said anything.
She glared at him. "I don't care. Now get out of my way."
He stood in the doorway, blocking her exit. "I'd rather not."
"Why not?" she asked angrily, trying to push him out of the way. He grabbed her wrists, stilling her hands.
"Because you're angry, and when people drive angry, bad things happen."
"I can handle myself just fine," she sneered, wrenching her wrists out of his grip. She didn't like how he could keep touching her so comfortably. She didn't even like him, damn it! She didn't really like being touched, let alone by Stokes.
He just stared her down, his arms crossed tight against his chest. They stared each other down, waiting for the other to crack.
"I'm not angry," Josie finally relented. "I'm just upset." She pursed her lips, a little annoyed that she had given up to him so easily. "Now, get out of my way before I show you what angry really looks like."
He moved out of the way, letting her walk past him. He watched her walk away, feeling a little concerned about her. Nick shook his head. Josie Pacelli was a stubborn woman. She also knew how to take care of herself, as she had just told him. So why did he feel so protective over her?
He shook his head. He didn't want to think about it. All he wanted to do was go home and get some well deserved sleep.
The last thing he wanted to think about was the fiery blonde New York native.
So why couldn't he stop thinking about her?
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A longer than usual chapter for you guys, coz the school year has started and I might not have as much time to write, so the next update might be a while. I'll try hard to update soon though. Just remember, grades come first!
As usual, please, please, please review!
~Alex