Disclaimer: No infringement of copyright is intended. All characters originated with CSI:NY. Poetry not otherwise referenced is original.

A/N: When several people commented on the last line of the previous chapter, I read it over and realized I had ripped off a line from one of my favourite ff writers, so I apologize and thank theheathen42 for writing a sentence so perfect it has a life of its own! Those comments rightly belong to her.

Spoiler Alert: Spoilers for Seasons 2 & 3, up to and including "Silent Night".

Dress Blues and 3 Volley Salutes

Cold winter wind cuts through blue serge

Like a sword through flesh.

Grey skies weep in angry sorrow

While men and women parade through the town,

Following the hearse

Following the dead.

Uniforms blue as the mountains he loved,

Red as the blood he lost,

Green as the cool forests he protected.

Brothers and sisters in arms,

In dedication to an ideal

That the weak deserve protection,

Even when they turn like animals at bay.

Strong shoulders deliver

The burden of grief to the graveside.

As the words are spoken, as the coffin is lowered,

Guns are raised in crisp unison

And the sky is shattered.

The heart is shattered.

SMT2007

Chapter 19: Facing Forward

The church was full, and over-full, with camera crews and reporters camped outside. The service was solemn and too short to celebrate a life. Mr. McKim sat alone in the front pew, until Lindsay moved away from her family and stood beside him as the first prayers were said. He grasped her hand as if it were the only thing anchoring him.

The coffin was carried out of the church on the shoulders of fellow officers into the hearse. A solemn procession started down the main street: police officers in dress blues from all over the country; Royal Canadian Mounted Police from Alberta and British Columbia in red serge; Forest Rangers from the state parks in green. Stores were closed; the street was lined with the town's people: men with their hats over their hearts; women standing tall with tears streaming down their faces; children held silent by the incomprehensible weight of adult emotion.

At the graveside, impossibly green artificial turf covered the hole in the ground. The coffin was carried to the grave, flowers placed on and around the coffin in a grotesque parody of a garden. Lindsay silently took a place beside Mr. McKim again while the pastor spoke, while the flag draping the coffin was removed, ceremoniously folded, and presented to the father of the fallen hero. She felt her throat tighten unbearably when he clutched it to him like a swaddled babe.

Five armed policemen stood at attention. On the command of the sergeant, they shouldered their shotguns and fired three volleys in unison across the coffin, acknowledging the sacrifice of their fellow officer.

It was a pageant, a spectacle, meant to honour the dead and awe the living, meant, she thought bitterly, to convince people that the loved one had not died in vain, that some good had come from that sacrifice.

Lindsay remained at the graveside, looking small and tidy in her dress uniform, shivering slightly in the bitter wind coming down from the mountains. She couldn't make her feet move. She knew that Danny was waiting for her, leaning patiently on her father's truck. He had stood beside her at attention, saying not a word as she moved from his side to support Mr. McKim. He had neither touched her, nor reached for her hand, respecting her withdrawal. She didn't have to look at him to know his eyes would be hooded, lips tight with pain. She didn't have to ask him to know that, unless forced, he would not leave until she did.

And yet she could not make her feet move. She kept going over it in her head, again and again. How could she have changed this? When could she have stopped this? At what point did she miss the important clue, the one that would have solved the case, made everything clear? Kept people she loved safe?

Finally, when the cold had seeped into her bones almost all the way to her heart, she felt a hand on her shoulder. She stiffened, ready to argue, ready to pull away, but it was Ted standing beside her, arm wrapped around her; it was Ted who led her back to the truck. "You have a plane to catch, Peanut," he said quietly.

She turned and saw that virtually no one was left in the cemetery. As she walked away with her father, she heard the roar of the backhoe behind her, preparing to fill in the grave.

Danny was no longer standing by the truck, and she turned to Ted with a question in her eyes.

"I sent him with Mick, Lin. He was losing steam, and you still have a long flight home." If Ted's heart broke a little on that word, his voice remained strong and sure.

"Daddy, I'm sorry."

"What for, baby?" He buckled her into the front seat, as he had since she was a toddler following him around, rubber boots flopping, jeans covered in grease and mud.

"For everything. For leaving Bozeman in the first place. For coming back and bringing this all on top of us again. I'm sorry for not telling you and Mom about Danny. For going back to New York. I don't know. I'm sorry for everything." Her words had run like water filling a spring, but dried up as her father took her face in his broad, weathered hands.

"You don't have to apologize for anything. Do you know how proud we are of everything you've accomplished? How proud we are that you are doing so well in the city? You've made a life for yourself, Lindsay. You're doing what you are good at. Do you think we wanted you to stay here, to never experience anything bigger than the life we gave you?" He gave her a tiny shake, his eyes smiling. "What parent would begrudge his child a better life than he had?"

She hugged him hard, whispering against his cheek, "Thank you, Daddy."

He said nothing on the drive back to the ranch until they were very close. Then he cleared his throat and said, "This Messer."

Lindsay hid her smile, looking down at her intertwined fingers. "Hmm?"

"Your brothers seem to think he's okay."

"Uh-huh?"

"Your mother likes him."

"No. My mother loves him."

Ted shrugged, "He lets her feed him."

They shared a grin.

"You good with him?"

Lindsay couldn't help the flush of heat that rose at the comment. She was nearly sure Ted had not been asking about the sexual chemistry between Daniel Messer and her, chemistry she was desperately trying to keep under control for fear of just dissolving altogether. "Very good, I think."

"You love him?"

She looked out the window and nodded her head. Ted could just see the movement in the side mirror.

"He love you?"

"Ti amo. That's what he said. It's Italian. It means I love you." She could feel the blush rising from her toes to her hairline.

Ted nodded once, seemingly satisfied.

Later, on the plane, Lindsay watched Danny dozing uneasily, twitching and muttering as he fought going deeper. She took his hand in both of hers, and whispered, "Ti amo, Danny. I'm here. Calmo."

He smiled a little, muttering, "Damn, Montana – your accent sucks!"

Then he went to sleep properly.

-CSI:NY-CSI:NY-CSI:NY-CSI:NY-CSI:NY-

"Hey – I'm not in. Either that or I'm screening my calls (just kidding Mom!). You know what to do!"

BEEP!

"Reed? It's Detective Taylor again. Mac. It's Mac Taylor. I've been trying to get a hold of you since Monday. It's Wednesday afternoon. I need to talk to you about something, ask you some questions. Please, get in touch with me. Call my cell number, or call this one," Mac read out his office number. "Please call, Reed."

He hung up the phone and rested his head in his hands.

-CSI:NY-CSI:NY-CSI:NY-CSI:NY-CSI:NY-

"Hi, Tony." Flack's voice was low, as was appropriate to the hush that filled the large stone church.

The young priest turned at the sound, and his solemn face split into a wide grin. "Flack! Good to see you! What on earth brings you here?" One glance into the flat eyes had Father Tony taking a step back. "What's wrong? Is it your dad?"

Flack shook his head. "I need to talk to you, Tone. Is there some place private we can go?"

"This police business?"

Flack nodded once.

"Let's go into my office then."

"Did you know this girl, Father Reagan?" Flack handed him a picture.

Tony looked up in some surprise at the more formal address, at the notebook that had appeared like magic in Flack's right hand. Then he looked at the picture and his face went white. He groped behind him for his chair and sat in it heavily.

"That's Caitlin. Caitlin O'Leary. What happened? Is she … is she …?" He didn't finish the sentence; it was obvious that the young girl in the picture was dead.

"How did you know her, Father?" Flack's voice remained cool and inquisitorial, left hand scrawling notes quickly.

"She is a church member, one of the leaders of the young group, a Sunday School teacher in the crèche. I've known her forever, Don. You know her – her parents are Thomas and Catherine O'Leary." Tony looked up into his friend's face and saw no recognition there; he was all cop now.

"Allegations have been made that you knew her a little better than as a parishioner, Father."

"Allegations? Allegations by whom? What the hell are you talking about, Don?"

"Would you be willing to come to the police station and give a DNA sample, Father?"

Tony leaped to his feet, "Okay, now you are really going over the line, Flack. Tell me what is going on! What happened to Caitlin?"

"She was murdered, strangled, in Central Park," Flack's voice was as cool as his expression, his eyes focused on every emotion running over Tony's face.

Tony sat down hard in his chair again, the breath knocked out of him. He closed his eyes, and began to murmur under his breath. Flack allowed him a few minutes for the consolation of prayer. This is why he had insisted on being the one to question Tony.

"Father. I'll ask again, are you willing to come to the station and give a DNA sample?"

And that was why he had refused even Stella's gentle offer to come with him.

Tony sat back in his chair, eyes still closed, his face calm, but voice shaking a little. "Am I a suspect in this child's death, Detective Flack?"

"No."

Tony's eyes flew open at that, "Then why do you want my sample? Wait a minute, why am I not a suspect? For Christ's sake, Don, tell me what is going on!"

"She was strangled by Jason Johnson. He's confessed. He followed her to the Sister's Health Centre over on 57th."

"Oh dear God. Jason? He loved her. He was going to marry her – they were just waiting until he finished college. What happened? Wait … wait a minute."

Flack waited a minute for the lights to come on, which they did, quickly.

"Sister's Health Centre? Why would she go there? It's way out of her neighbourhood, Don. It's a free clinic, isn't it? But she had coverage; her father has worked for the city for years."

"She was pregnant," Flack said it bluntly.

Tony whispered, "Oh, sweet Mary. That poor child. She must have felt desperate. Why didn't she come to me, or to her parents? We could have helped them. And why would Jason kill her? He'd hardly be the first boy to make that mistake …"

Flack cocked an eyebrow as Tony's frantically whirring mind finally came to a stop. "My DNA? You don't think … Don! You can't think …" He put his hands over his mouth as if keeping himself from being sick.

"She told the doctor at the clinic it was a priest at her church. Jason and she went to this church. When he confessed, he made this statement," Flack read coldly out of his notebook, " 'She said it was Father, but she must have been lying. He would never do that. And if he did, she must have led him on. He would never do that. She must have been lying.' "

Tony grabbed on to the only part of the statement that made any sense to him. "He said 'Father'. Did he identify me by name?"

Flack shook his head, "He refused to give a name. So did Caitlin when she was talking to the doctor."

"Did she … did she have the abortion?"

Flack shook his head again.

"So you want to test my DNA against the baby's?"

Flack nodded, eyes hooded.

"You do know there are five priests attached to this church, don't you? Why me? Why do you think I'm the guilty one? After all this time, Don, you can think this of me?"

This time, Flack's eyes squeezed shut in pain, "It's because I don't think this of you that I am asking you to come down and volunteer a sample. I need to know that you are in the clear, here, Tony. 'Cause someone had sex with this girl, and at the moment everything we have points at a priest here in St Augustine's. And because that man, who ever he was, had sex with her, she's dead and a twenty-year-old boy is going away for life. I need someone to pay for that, Tony."

Tony looked at his childhood friend, slumped in the chair, his exhaustion showing through. He stood up and grabbed his coat from the rack behind him. "Let's go."