CHAPTER 10: Wild Fire

"I was at this casino minding my own business, and this guy came up to me and said, "You're gonna have to move, you're blocking a fire exit."
As though if there was a fire, I wasn't gonna run. If you're flammable and have legs, you are never blocking a fire exit." - Mitch Hedberg

November 11th, 1942

12:30 pm

"Did you honestly need to bring a kerosene lamp? Wouldn't matches have been enough?"

Smiling slightly at the memory of how exactly he came to own this specific lamp, he told Derek, "You use matches to set a fire and we're not doing that."

"Wait! What do you mean we're not setting this place on fire?
That's what we agreed on. You can't just go changing plans like that.
Now I see why you get under Rossi's skin so bad!" Derek stated loudly as he stopped abruptly, his anger starting to show.

"First off, SHUT UP!" Eliot replied fiercely even through his whisper.
"You want to announce it to the whole building that we're about to commit arson?
Secondly, this whole thing is going to be an accident. Or at least that's what the fire inspectors' report will say.
Thirdly, I did my research. The old woman that lives next door to Anderson goes out with he daughter every day for lunch.
When I talked to her the other day I found out she was impartial to electricity."

"Oh" Morgan replied slowly starting to understand.
Resuming his walk down the hall, Derek continued Eliot's line of thought.
"So no one would suspect anything if a little old woman, stubborn in her ways forgot to put out the flame in her lamp."

"Exactly my friend," Eliot swung his free arm around Morgan's shoulders. "It's all just an accident see? All we gotta do is make sure things run smoothly."

"And if they don't?"

Smiling brightly Eliot swiftly pulled something from his pocket, "Kerosene burns like a bitch, but if that doesn't do the trick this sure will."

Staring at the corded type of string Eliot was dangling in front of his eyes he decided
to venture a guess and asked, "Is that..." but was cut off by Eliot's sardonic reply.

"Let's just say it's a fuse of sorts."

Not sure if he liked just how much Eliot seemed to be enjoying the task at hand Morgan quickened his pace; he just wanted this part of the day to be over.

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Las Vegas Police Department

12:35 pm

"So you say Anderson works for Rossi?" Nate asked between bites of his sandwich.

"Yeah, but we believe that there's more to it than that.
We think he headed the finances for some of Rossi's shadier dealings." Fornell answered casually sipping at his soda.

"What kind of dealings are we talking about here?" Munch asked casually.

"Well we haven't found it yet, but reportedly his wife manages a brothel he owns." Gibbs answered haven skipped lunch in favor of a strong black coffee.

"His wife? Well what do they claim she does?" Nate leaned closer becoming curious.

"It's said that she runs a talent agency of sorts. I've never come across it though.
We had a stake-out planned; we were going to send someone in, see what we could dig up. Our tip fell through though
turned out we were given a fake number and address." Gibbs voice got colder at the end showing just how angry he was at having been lied to.

"Hey Nate" Munch said eagerly his food completely forgotten.

"Yeah" Nate asked just as eagerly knowing by the look Munch had just gotten in his eye that he had clearly uncovered something important.

"Where's Ashley's employment history?"

"I think Cragen has it, why?"

"Well go get it and I'll tell you."

"I'm going."

"What?" Fornell asked not putting the pieces together like Munch had.

"Our victims!" Munch excitedly started, pulling out the older victims' files.

"The point Munch." Gibbs roared clearly annoyed that he was out of the loop this time.
"We're not mind readers and I sure as hell wouldn't want to be reading yours."

Too proud of himself to bother coming up with a retort to Gibbs' remark, he instead pulled the retrieved employment history and quickly glanced through it.

"I knew it!" he said after a moment.

"SPIT IT OUT." Gibbs growled, patience gone.

"I didn't think of it at first. Young girls in the city, it's a common way for them to bring in the money.
You see at first I thought our killer was after models, but then the third girl hadn't modeled a day in her life so that
theory went out the window. If you look at all their past employment histories together though you end up with two models,
an actor, and a dancer. Now do you see?" Munch paused, hoping they were finally catching on.

"I don't know what you've been drinking John, but you clearly need to..." but before Fornell could finish Gibbs interrupted.

"Your victims are talented." Gibbs said with a smirk.

"Did you two share a bottle or what? I still don't..." but Tobias was once again cut off.

"Fornell where do you go when you're talented and looking for work?" Nate asked him hoping he would finally catch on.

"A talent agency. But I... Oh!" he breathed out finally catching on.

"How much are you willing to bet, if we tried hard enough all our girls could be traced back to Mrs. Rossi?"

"Oh, this is good. That is way too much to be a coincidence." Nate was ecstatic.

"Rule 39." Gibbs swiftly replied.

"Excuse me?"

"Oh don't get him started." Fornell interrupted them both.

Rolling his eyes Gibbs grabbed his coat and headed for the door."I think it's about time we visited the Rossi residence."

The other three were soon on his heels.
It wasn't as planned but maybe they could nail Rossi yet.

A good investigator doesn't sit around. He assumes everything he's been told is false until it checks out.
I want you to check out every possible lead, every possible angle. (GIBBS- NCIS)