A/N: Okay, so I'm a horrible, horrible person. RL just got the better of me, I guess. Anyways, sorry about the wait, but the chapter is finally here. This should be the second last chapter (I hope) but then it was going to be the last chapter so really, who knows? I still don't own anything to do with CSI: Miami. And once again, thank you for all the reviews!
Chapter Six
"Okay, O'Keefe, so let me get this straight. Last week, you just up and decided that you needed to go on a road trip, giving no return date to your office, and not telling a single one of your friends that you were leaving. Oh, and you also didn't feel the need to pack any of your stuff. Is that right?" asked Eric. Frank had just brought in O'Keefe, and Eric could already tell that this interrogation was going to be awfully short. This guy was quite the change from the usual self-assured, arrogant bastards that they so often dealt with.
"Yeah, yeah, that's right. I, uh, really needed to get away for awhile. You know, get back to nature and all that," replied O'Keefe, who was sweating bullets, despite the unseasonable rain that was pounding down outside. The usually bright windows in the interrogation room were showing nothing but grey today.
Eric looked at Calleigh, to see what she made of this guy. Despite everything that had happened in the past week, Calleigh looked as calm and collected as ever, her even stare sizing up Walter O'Keefe.
"Well, Mr. O'Keefe," started Calleigh, "What I'm interested in is discovering how your gun managed to shoot Nolan Waters, when you claim to have been out of town. You did hear about him, didn't you?"
"What? Nolan?" O'Keefe's eyes widened with surprise so fake that Eric was tempted to roll his eyes. "Wait, my gun… How the hell can you know that my gun was the one that killed…" O'Keefe clammed up, probably realizing that he had just said too much.
"So you confirm that it was, in fact, your gun that killed him?" questioned Calleigh.
O'Keefe just gave her a mute stare, seemingly determined not to say anything else that might incriminate him. He had waived his right to a lawyer for God knows what reason, because by the looks of it he sure could have used the help.
"Okay, let me explain something to you. Do you know what ballistics is?" Calleigh asked, though she really doubted that this guy had ever even heard the word before. He mutely shook his head. "Okay, well, quick lesson. Loosely speaking, ballistics involves the study of firearms and their projectiles. We studied the bullets fired at the party; the general markings on them were a match to your gun's make and model. Then, while you enjoyed Detective Tripp's lovely hospitality for an hour or so, I test-fired your gun. Turns out that the marks on that bullet were an exact match to the marks on the bullets found in Nolan Waters. The external portion of a fired bullet is like a fingerprint, unique to the gun that fired it."
O'Keefe just gaped at her, seemingly surprised that all of this information could come from a small projectile. He quickly sagged under Calleigh's and Eric's stares.
"Wow, okay, yeah, I guess I did shoot him. But you don't understand, you've never met the guy. He's not a nice guy."
"That may well be true, Mr. O'Keefe, but you can't go around shooting everyone that isn't nice," Tripp said, externalizing Eric's inwards eye roll.
"No! You really don't get it!" shouted O'Keefe, his voice quickly rising. "Bet no one ever told you what he did after work, huh? Did you talk to his wife? She seem like a nice, well adjusted individual, who dearly missed her husband? Well, let me tell you something. Nolan Waters was a wife-abusing, mean, unrelenting drunk! Sure, he put on a nice face while he was out in public, and he'd be damned sure that his wife did the same, but behind closed doors… Well, that was a different story all-together."
Eric felt Calleigh stiffen almost imperceptibly beside him at the mention of the word 'drunk', but a quick glance showed no change to her outward demeanour. He paused, but ploughed ahead anyways. "And how do you know this, O'Keefe? From what we gathered, you were friends with Nolan, but no one mentioned that you ever had anything to do with his wife."
"Well, until a couple of months ago I didn't. I was over at his house one night, we'd had a couple of beers, you know, nothing too serious. Just a couple of guys hanging out. Well, I popped out for a smoke – Anne hates it when I smoke inside – when I start to hear yelling. Well, that don't sound like normal, so I head inside, and just as I'm rounding the corner, I catch a glimpse of Nolan with his hand still raised, and poor Anne on the floor. Nolan went back to watching TV like nothing had ever happened, and never saw me there. Well, after that night I took to checking in on Anne when Nolan wasn't around. Turns out, the bastard had been beating her for a couple of years, seemed to think that she made a nice punching bag after a few beers and a long day at work."
Throughout Nolan's story, Eric could feel Calleigh get tenser by the second. Using the cover of the table, he snuck his hand onto her leg, which seemed to calm her a bit. Detective Tripp, sensing the tension coming from his side of the table, took over the questioning.
"Alright, O'Keefe, so what happened next?"
"There was one night, about two weeks ago, I hear a knock on my door about 11:00. I go out, and Anne's standing there, looking half-dead. He was smart enough not to hit her on the face, or where anyone could see, but the rest of her… I just couldn't take it any more. I had been listening to the radio – you know that song, 'Goodbye Earl'? I got the beginnings of a plan. Now, you have to understand, this was not Anne's idea. It was totally me; I figured that if I was to shoot him while Anne was out, we couldn't be caught. I mean, I had no motive, as far as anyone knows, and she had a solid alibi. It was the perfect crime. I didn't realize that you could trace the bullet back to my gun though, that's crazy. I figured that if I disappeared for a while, it would just blow over, and Anne would be safe."
Detective Tripp, Eric, and Calleigh sat there somewhat in shock. Eric and Tripp had never even gotten a hint of abuse from Anne, and Calleigh just seemed to be in her own world.
Looking at all of them, O'Keefe spoke up again. "You can do whatever you want to me, I don't care. That bastard deserved what he got. Any person that beats his wife, and uses alcohol as an excuse, deserves to die."
That was the last straw for Calleigh. She rose from the table, managed a short 'excuse me', and disappeared out the door. Eric looked over at Tripp, and getting a nod from him, he turned to O'Keefe and said, "Thank you, Mr. O'Keefe. Detective Tripp here will help you with some necessary paperwork, and then will escort you to booking." With that, Eric turned and headed out after Calleigh.
AN: Goodbye Earl is also not owned by me (obviously) and is performed by the Dixie Chicks. If you haven't heard it you really should, it's quite good.