Eli sat in his car waiting for Ria to come out of the hospital. She had been in there for at least ten minutes now. He was about to go in himself to get her when an ambulance pulled into the parking lot followed by a dark blue van. He watched the paramedics pull out a stretcher and carry it inside the hospital. The victim looked around the age of fifteen. Eli sat there, wondering what had happened. Before he could think up any theories, there was a light tapping from outside the door. He turned to see Ria waiting outside. Eli quickly unlocked the car door and Ria climbed in, frowning.

"How is he?" Eli asked, guessing that he already knew the answer.

"The same." He was right. Eli's eyes lingered to the ambulance again. Wait a minute. He knew the parents of the victim.

"Isn't that the Sanfords?"

"Don't tell me their other son…" Ria strained her neck just in time to see the stretcher being pulled into the building. All of a sudden, Eli could feel his cell phone vibrating in his pocket. He pulled it out and read the caller id. Dr. Lightman.

"Hello," he said plainly.

"Loker," Lightman's voice said from the phone, "you've left the Sanford's place already?"

"Yeah, we left half an hour ago." Ria was looking at him now, trying to figure out what exactly was going on.

"There was another…development in the Sanford case. Their eldest son, Trent, he was found in his room unconscious. Their younger daughter has been taken to their grandparent's house, and the police think they're the main suspects. " And I'm guessing that means no dinner with Torres, Eli thought sadly.

"Hmm, we're at the hospital now," Eli said. "We just saw them arrive."

"Foster and I are almost finished with the case we've been working on, and we'll be coming over there soon. You and Torres should try to find out some more from the parents, for now. "

"Okay." After hearing Lightman hang up, Eli put his phone back in his pocket.

"What's going on?" she asked, staring right at him.

"Lightman wants us to go see the Sanford's again. Their oldest son seems to have narrowly escaped another murder."

"Wouldn't, uh, Kim and Rick have an idea of who was trying to kill their kids? I mean, how could the murderer attack two of their sons without them having the slightest idea who did it?" A small pause. "Unless they were the ones responsible for the deaths?" Ria turned back to Eli. She found it strange at how much time she's been spending with him. She practically spent the whole day with him, after all. That was a lot different than their usual once or twice a day encounters.

"Did you know you look extremely hot when you're thinking?" Eli remarked randomly. His radical honesty seemed to be coming back from this morning.

"I-what?" Ria put on a confused smile, not unlike the one she used when she first met Eli. What did he say again? Ria thought. Oh, right. 'I want to sleep with you'. What a nice way to introduce yourself. "Uh, shouldn't we be looking for the Sanfords?"

"Right. It might be a good idea to do that before Lightman arrives." The two got out of the car and headed inside the hospital. They didn't have to go far before they found the Sanford's in the waiting room. There were two policemen there arguing with them.

"-then who do you think did it?" the policeman nearest to Ria and Eli asked. He didn't seem to be very patient. Sort of like Agent Reynolds. "You were the only people who were inside the house at the time-" Ria watched as Rick Sanford bit his lip. He knows something, Ria thought.

"You seem to be hiding something," she said to Rick, who gave another one of his irritated expressions.

"And who the hell are you?" the same policeman asked abruptly, just noticing Ria and Eli entering the room.

"Ria Torres," Ria replied calmly. "This is Eli Loker, and we're from the Lightman Group. We're also trying to solve this case."

The policeman opened his mouth to speak, but before he could, the other policeman gave him a silencing look. "Didn't you solve that terrorist plot a few days ago?" Eli turned to Ria who's eyes had glazed over, a sign that meant sadness; she probably remembered about Dupree.

"Yeah, that was us," Eli replied.

"Was there anyone else in the house besides you and your wife?" Ria asked Rick. She didn't want to have a nice little chat with two policemen; they needed to solve the case, after all. Everyone focused their gaze on Rick, whose temper seemed to be building again.

"No." He bit his lip again.

"Who else had access to Trent's room?"

"I said that there was nobody in the house!" The sudden opening of the door caused all six of them to wheel around. Lightman and Foster had arrived.


Eli stood outside the door. He knew he shouldn't be listening in on Lightman and Torres, but he couldn't help it. If they saw him, he would just say he was looking for Torres…

"-but it was him!" he could hear Ria say, raising her voice.

"-just because you're a natural doesn't mean you're always right." Lightman said. "You want him to be the murderer, so that's what you've-" Ria stormed out of the office, nearly running into Eli, who had been standing outside.

"What the hell are you doing here?" she replied, looking at him with a shocked and angered look.

"Um, I was just wondering if you still wanted a ride-"

"I'll be fine, thanks." Eli noticed the slight sarcasm in her voice and watched as Ria stormed down the hallway, not even pausing to see if he was following her. Sighing, he walked the other way to his car before he stopped and looked behind him. Should he go after her, or would she just push him away, like always? After standing there for a minute, he hesitantly started walking, this time along the path that Ria had just took.

Author's Note: Sorry this chapter took so long; I hope it was worth the wait. It's more like another one of those chapters that is 'setting up' for an event in the next one, at least for me anyways. There's probably going to be more Eli/Ria moments in the next chapter, which will hopefully be posted soon. As always, please review! I like reading what you think. :)