Here we go again! Have fun!
"It's her word against yours," Nick's lawyer said to him as they were sitting in Brass' office. Brass and Russell were present as well.
"But Greg can verify that she wanted me to have the pictures," Nick explained. Mrs. Douglas claimed the nude pictures she sent Nick were stolen from her bedroom while he was working the case in her home. "She gave them to him."
"He's a useless witness."
"...Excuse me?"
"Who's gonna believe a witness who doesn't even remember what happened when he was being kidnapped?" The lawyer was obviously talking about the Neil Novak incident and how Greg pretended not to remember most of the time he was being captured. Except for Nick and Russell, no one found out he lied, they all believed he didn't remember.
"What kind of lawyer are you? This has nothing to do with what happened to him weeks ago!"
"I'm only saying what Mrs. Douglas' Lawyer will tell you. He's not a reliable witness and they won't accept his testifying for a friend."
"What about Hodges? He saw Greg handing me the envelope," Nick said confident.
The lawyer gave Nick a look. "That's not enough. It's like I said. Your word against hers. It's best to settle this out of court."
"...Settle?! No, I want to fight this. She won't just get away with this."
"Maybe it's best just to settle..." Russell suggested.
"What?! You can't be serious!"
"Come on, Nick, we all know you're innocent. She's a crazy woman. No one would win in this if you'd drag this into a courtroom."
Nick shook his head. "Settling out of court is like saying I did it. I don't want anyone to believe these rumors!"
"Settling this would only mean that you're smarter than to let your pride get in the way of your career. Be smart, settle this."
While Nick had some time to think things through, Greg was dealing with a different kind of trouble. Mrs. Douglas was, once again, locked inside her bedroom. She cried quite loudly. "Mrs. Douglas, please come out of there!"
"When is Nick gonna come here?!" she yelled from the other side of the door.
"He... can't come, he's..." Greg tried to find an excuse for his friend. He didn't plan on calling him again to get this crazy woman out of her bedroom. Especially not since she started telling lies and sending Nick nude pictures. Instead, he contemplated calling for some backup. As he grabbed his cell phone he wandered through the house. He stopped dialing when he noticed something. "Mrs. Douglas..." He picked up a few news articles that had been printed out from the kitchen counter. "Have you been looking into..."
She opened the door. "What are you doing there?"
Greg turned around. He had a rather angry, but also confused, look. "Did you collect news articles about what happened to me?!"
"I want to see Nick now!" she yelled, fiercely pointing a gun at him.
Mrs. Douglas commanded Greg to sit down on the couch in the living room. "Here, call him and tell him to get here." She handed him his cell phone.
The front door opened. For a second, Greg put on a hopeful smile, thinking someone might come to his rescue. He watched a stranger walk in. "Hey Cheryl. What did you want me to help you with?" He asked as he walked into the living room. He stopped when he saw her pointing a gun at Greg. "...What' going on?"
"Randall, thank god you're here!" she exclaimed.
"Who's this? ...Did he try to hurt you?"
While she nodded, Greg quickly tried to explain. "No, I'm working with the crime lab and..."
"That the one you're suing for sexual harassment?!" The man quickly walked over to Greg and punched him in the face. Mrs. Douglas didn't stop him at first, she just watched as Greg tried to fight the man off. Neither did he get a chance to fight back, nor to explain what was going on. The man pulled out a syringe from a sideboard and stuck it into Greg's neck.
Nick was on his way to a crime scene not too far away from Mrs. Douglas' house. He had a lot on his mind and didn't feel too comfortable being near that woman's home. But he tried to keep it together, keep his emotions in check. He felt mostly anger, anyways, and this was never helping him with anything. It was hard not to let the anger get the best of him, though, since he was trying to contact Greg for almost three hours now. He wanted to tell him about the sexual harassment suit. "Come on, man, pick it up!" he said while he kept trying to reach him. He threw his cell phone on the passenger seat quite angrily when, again, Greg didn't pick up.
Greg was AWOL for almost three hours. Neither Russell nor Nick were worried about that since they thought he was at Mrs. Douglas', working on the case. They had no idea what actually happened. He slowly opened his eyes when the drugs he had been knocked out with wore off. He had no recollection of the last few hours and was therefore quite surprised and confused when he woke up in his car without remembering getting in. Looking around quite confused, only now was he noticing the stinging pain on his face. He looked down on his shirt to see some blood stains on it. Carefully touching the hurting area, he found this was not where the blood was coming from. Instead, it was his bleeding nose.
Outside his window, he noticed where he was, a really shady part of town. He also noticed that the trunk was open, as well as the right door in the back of the car. Inside his car was nothing but himself. Everything he kept in here had been stolen. He patted himself down to find his cell phone and wallet gone. Helplessness and fear quickly crawled up on him in this strange, confusing and scary situation. He had no idea what happened and how he was supposed to get home. He knew driving wasn't an option with the state he was in, but he also knew walking around in this neighborhood at night was not a smart idea, either. As he tried to calm down and think of the safest way home, Nick drove up.
He saw Greg's car parked in this shady neighborhood he was just driving through. "What the hell?" He stopped and got out. "Greg, what are you..." When he noticed all the blood, the bruises and that a window of the car had been smashed in, he realized something was wrong.