Thanks to everyone reading and reviewing. You wanted Mac action, here it is.

Disclaimer: Nope not mine.

Chapter 8

The team was spread out through the house, analysing the entire place. Danny was in the basement with Mac, Flack and Adam. The parents of Farrah Vaughn had been found in a freezer in the basement. It meant their bodies were perfectly preserved and so the cause of death was evident. Two neat bullet holes stared up at Mac from the foreheads of Mr and Mrs Vaughn, like two third eyes.

It made Mac angry to see the bodies squashed up in the freezer, put into storage like old meat. It made his hatred for Ged stronger. Mac knew it was going to be difficult to get them out of the freezer and he decided he wasn't in the right mood to be there when that happened. This whole case made him more and more angry by the second. He wasn't sure how much more he could take before he could no longer keep his temper under control.

He headed upstairs and caught up with Lindsay and Hawkes who were processing the main bedroom. Hawkes was in there whereas Lindsay was paying most attention to the panic room. It made her uneasy being in it but, as usual, she stayed professional and got on with her job.

She picked up a blood stained rag and studied it for a moment. Dozens of ideas of how it could have become blood stained ran through her head, all of them involved Jo having been injured, thanks to Ged. She looked up when she saw Mac looking around the small room.

"This is the sixth rag I've bagged. I'm gonna take a guess and say the blood all belongs to Jo. This room would have been the perfect holding cell for Ged to keep her in."

Mac just nodded, she was right. He saw a bloodied handprint of the wall and walked over to it. He knew just looking at it that it was Jo's hand print. He loved her hands, they were so delicate and the touch that came from them was always so caring. He wanted to put his own hand against the print, try to send some sort of message to Jo that he was thinking of her, but he knew better; it was evidence.

He turned to see Lindsay looking at him, a sad smile on her face. "I hope she's punched him so hard in the face." she suddenly said.

Mac laughed, "Knowing Jo she has. In one way I hope she hasn't, it would be in her best interest not to piss him off but…"

"Jo will give as good as she gets." Lindsay said for him.

"I'll let you carry on. I'll catch up with you later." Mac said and walked out.

Lindsay nodded and shuffled over to the mattress and noticed the blood smears on that, she thought that maybe she noticed something else as well on the grubby mattress. She reached into her kit and pulled out a UV light. She put on some goggles and shone the light over the mattress, her fears were suddenly confirmed.

She put the light away and began taking swabs of the stains.

~0~0~0~0~

Ged pulled up at a gas station and filled up the red truck he was now in. He had dumped the sedan in the woods and lit the sucker up. He'd stood watching for a while before he'd left it. He'd found the keys to the truck in the kitchen cupboard, where they were always kept, and had left the cabin. Jo wouldn't be going anywhere while he was gone.

He walked in to pay and walked around the snacks section. He grabbed some snacks and shoved some more in his pockets. He walked over to the counter and placed the snacks in his hand down. The guy behind the counter was too busy watching the game on a small TV to pay much attention to him.

"Gas too." Ged said. "Give me two packs of Marlboro."

The guy did, all without taking his eyes away from the TV. Ged glanced at the TV and saw the news reel that ran across the bottom of the screen. "CSI's have discovered two more bodies in the Cullen case. They are thought to be the parents of a previous female murder victim found." He chuckled and slapped some money down on the counter. The guy shoved it into the till and sat down and began watching the game again.

Ged made his way out, stuffing some more snacks in his pocket as he did, the guy behind the counter was too enthralled in the game to notice.

Ged climbed in the truck and threw all the snacks onto the seat next to him. He lit up a cigarette and pulled out, heading out of the mountains and back towards the city. He had someone to see.

~0~0~0~0~

Lindsay was sat at her desk, leaning back in her chair as she stared over at Jo's empty desk. It had been cleared out some day before Jo's funeral had taken place. She hadn't been around or else she would have insisted it had been left as it was, after all no one else had filled Jo's position at the lab yet. No one could.

She sighed heavily as she continued looking over at the sparkly clean desk. It was so damn organised, too organised. It was like Jo had never been there. She pushed herself up in a hurry, sending her chair soaring across the room. She gathered whatever useless paper she could find and scooped it up into her arms. She walked round to Jo's desk and dumped it all down and spread it out in a very unorganised manner. She grabbed some pens and pencils from the container off her own desk and dumped them on there too. Then she walked round to her desk drawers and pulled out a couple of packs of post-its. She began peeling various colours off and sticking them around the computer screen, again in an unorganised manner.

She stepped back once the desk looked like a bombsite again, but there was something missing. She leant over the desk and grabbed one of the pictures from off her own. It was a group shot of them all. She placed it gently down on the desk and smiled. "Perfect." she muttered to herself.

"Not quite." Mac said as he walked in and placed his empty cup of tea down. "Now it's perfect." He said, having been watching her and so understanding what she was doing

Lindsay laughed but Mac could see the tears she was forcing back. "I never thought I'd miss this. Stella always kept it so organised and then Jo was the total opposite, but the truth is it's been bugging the hell outta me since it was cleared."

Mac smiled, he liked that it looked like Jo's space again, but he found that he suddenly had a dull aching in his chest. He looked around, expecting Jo to come prancing down the corridor with her huge beaming smile. She didn't…and the corridor remained empty, silent.

"I finished testing the samples I collected from out of the panic room." Lindsay suddenly said, bringing Mac out of his thoughts.

"The blood?" he asked her as she sat down behind her desk.

"It was Jo's. We all got pretty bad burns and cuts from the explosion, I can only imagine Jo did too. I also matched the finger prints in the hand print on the wall to hers. " she said trying to explain all the blood.

Mac nodded. "Anything else?" he asked.

Lindsay looked up at him, hesitant to say what she had to say next, it was the thing that had brought her to her office, needing a minute or so to clear her head. Finally the words began to come out, "I collected a semen sample from off the mattress in the room. There was also a blood stain containing vaginal epithelial cells. The semen came back a match to Ged Cullen's DNA. The blood and the epithelia's came back a match to Jo." she said sadly. "He raped her in that room." she clarified, not that she needed to.

Mac wanted to say something, anything, but he feared if he opened his mouth he would actually throw up. A moment of silence passed before Lindsay decided to give him some space. "I'm gonna go check on what Adam's doing." she said, using any excuse to get out of there.

She left Mac standing there but the moment he was gone he leant on Jo's desk, suddenly feeling very unsteady. After talking a moment to force the feeling of queasiness back down he glanced up at the photo Lindsay had put on the desk. In it, he was stood next to Jo. Her arms were wrapped around his neck, his around her waist, their faces so close they touched. Her smile was so warm and big, he doubted that smile would exist in her anymore.

~0~0~0~0~

Jo was tied to a chair in the basement of the cabin. The rope Ged had used was sharp and cut into her flesh. In her mouth was a gag that tasted as dusty as it smelt. It took everything she had in her not to throw up just from the taste it left in her mouth.

She had tried getting free from the ropes and it had done her no good, just caused nasty rope burns around her wrists. She could feel the blood oozing from them, dripping down her hands and off her finger tips onto the floor.

She sat there now, rather calmly so and could do nothing but think about what she had been through, a thought that had her suddenly struggling to hold back tears.

~0~0~0~0~

Mac had decided he wanted to come back to the house, the crime scene, alone. It had finished being processed but was still a closed scene for now. He had told the officer parked out front that he was just coming to check some things over and they hadn't bothered to argue with him.

Of course once inside the dark house he had travelled straight upstairs. The only light that poured in was from a few street lights outside and the moon which shone brightly in the starry night sky.

Seeing a starry night sky could sometimes prove to be a rare thing in New York, but he knew how much Jo loved them. He remembered back to a time not so long ago when he had found her up on the balcony in the lab, staring out at a beautiful starry night.

He walked over to her and leant against the railing with her. "See something you like?" he asked her.

Jo smiled at him and said, "The stars. I always see them and wish that I could just reach on up there and pluck one of them right out of the Heavens."

To Mac, that seemed like something a child would say but Jo could get away with it too. God it made him feel for her even more so. "They are particularly bright tonight." he said.

"Back home, when I was a kid, I used to sneak out of my bedroom window at night and lay out on the porch roof looking up at the stars, trying to count them all."

"How far did you get?" Mac asked with a smile.

Jo just smiled sheepishly at him, "Dunno, I always fell asleep." she confessed. "My Momma used to scream and shout at me when she would find me out there the next morning. She used to think I'd get kidnapped or something…but I told her, so long as those stars are up there I'm safe. They'd look after me, they'd protect me, and not let any harm come to me…and they have." she told him.

Mac shuffled closer to her and she laid her head down on his shoulder. He only hesitated for a second before he rested his head against hers and they continued watching the stars together.

He tried to push the memory aside as he stepped silently through the bedroom until he came to the panic room. The door was still opened and he hesitated in the dark before he turned on his Maglite and shone it into the room. He could see a small blood smear on the wall, blood that had proved to be Jo's. An image of Ged hitting her, sending her crashing into the wall flashed before his eyes.

He turned away from it and tried to blink away the images but he found he was looking right at the mattress and different images flashed through his mind. Images of Jo pinned beneath Ged and he violated her. He could hear her begging him to stop, her cries of pain, Ged's menacing voice…it was all so clear, all of it, especially Ged's voice….

Mac suddenly felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end, followed by someone's hot breath against the back of his neck.

He turned and tried to swing his arm out at the shadowy figure behind him but they were quick and he felt something hard crash into his side. He fell to the floor, his Maglite rolling out of his hand and across the floor. The pain in his ribs was excruciating, they had to be broken.

He tried to push himself up but a heavy boot slammed into his side. He toppled over before landing on his side. Another blow came, this one to his stomach, knocking the wind right out of him. He tried to move but his attacker kicked him again. This was what happened every time he tried to move. Eventually all he could do was lay there on his back, looking up through the darkness.

"You gotta have more in you than that, Mac. I mean, Alabama puts up a better fight than you do."

"Ged Cullen…" Mac said knowingly, recognising the voice.

"It's Gamekeeper to you!" Ged spat at him as he delivered another hard blow to his side.

It was a moment before he could push the pain down enough to ask, "Where's Jo?" He was out of breath from the pain he felt.

"She's certainly not here." Ged said. "Plus, let's face it, where would be the fun in me telling you where she is now? You and your team are doing so well so far."

"What did you do to her?" Mac growled angrily at him.

Ged laughed and then with a smirk said, "She was unbelievable, Mac! I took her right there in that room, I couldn't resist. I just had to have a piece of her!" he said, sounding so proud of himself, "I'm sure you know what I mean. Maybe one day you'll have the balls to take what you want from her, just like I did."

"I would never do what you did to her!" Mac snapped.

"Because you're not man enough to do it, Mac! God, you have no idea what you're missing out on!" he yelled. "She was perfect..." he said, becoming hard just at the thought of what he had done to her, "Every single inch of her." he added.

Mac couldn't stand to hear anymore. He threw himself up and crashed into Ged sending them both crashing to the floor. It was dark and his head was spinning with pain. He could barely see what he was doing but he swung his fist and felt its painful connection with Ged's jaw.

Ged roared in pain and threw his own punch. Mac fell back off him and Ged jumped to his feet. Mac tried to jump up but he felt something come crashing down against the back of his head. Wood, he knew from the sound it made as the pieces it had smashed into hit the floor. He slumped to the ground, the feel of warm blood trickled down behind his ears and down his neck. His head felt like it might actually explode.

He tried to push himself up and follow the sounds of Ged's footsteps as he ran out of the room and away from him, but it was no good and he crashed back down to the floor. He felt like the room was spinning. "Help!" he called out, his voice weak. Nothing. "Officer down!" he muttered.

He reached into his pocket and tried to find his cell phone but it was gone. He realised it must have fallen from his pocket in the scuffle. He tried to drag himself across the floor, searching for his phone in the dark, but it became harder and harder to do so.

~0~0~

Mac didn't remember passing out but he was sure he must have, when he opened his eyes he felt nowhere near as dizzy, and as he felt his neck he realised the blood there had already began to dry. He pushed himself up, much easier this time, and headed towards the stairs, holding on for dear life as he stumbled his way down them.

He stepped out of the house, the cold night air nipping at his skin. He stumbled towards the police car that was sat right out front of the house. He walked straight up to it and ripped the door open, ready to yell at the officers. He'd nearly been killed whilst they sat listening to the radio.

However, the second the door opened one of the officers tumbled out, the dead weight of his body knocking Mac to the floor. Shocked, he looked into the car. The windows were spattered with blood and as he looked at the other officer he noticed that half his head now lay on the back seat.

"Son-of-a-bitch…" he muttered knowing it was Ged who was responsible for this.

TBC

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