Chapter 27 - Leave Out All the Rest

Two weeks later

On my way to an arson case, I got stuck in traffic. Deciding to spend the time being productive, I called the chapel Anna wanted to use to check on reservations.

"Little Chapel of the Flowers. This is Olivia."

"Olivia, this is Nick Stokes. I'm with the Vegas Crime Lab."

"Yes sir, how can we help?"

I switched the phone to my other ear so I could hit the signal for a lane change with my left hand, "I need to check on a date to see what availabilities you have for my wedding."

"Certainly." I heard keys typing as Olivia checked, "What date did you need to check on?"

"May 10th."

After a moment of silence, she came back to the phone, "Now were you wanting a chapel with the web cam in it for the Internet broadcast?" I told her I was and after more keystrokes, she spoke again, "At this moment, we have four times available. We have one at ten in the morning, one at noon, one at three and one at six. Would one of these times work?"

"I'm sure one of them would but I'd need to ask my fiancée. It's her wedding and she's at work and I'm on my way to an arson call."

"I tell you what." Olivia went silent as she started typing again, "I'll block off all of the times for you. The Vegas CSIs have always been helpful to us and it's my pleasure to return the favor. Do you think a week is sufficient time for a decision or will you need longer?"

"I'm sure we'll have a decision in a couple of days. I'll call you back before the end of the week with a definite answer."

"Excellent and congratulations. My name is Olivia Jacobs. Just ask for me. I'm here Monday through Friday and I work the night shift."

I told her thank you and hung up the phone, smiling to myself at being one step closer to having an actual wedding planned out. My happiness was soon put on hold as I got closer to the scene. Slowing down once I got to the end of the cove, I saw the flashing lights of the emergency vehicles. "Damn." As I tried to find a place to park, I got a good look at the house. Half of it was gone with the other half heavily damaged by the fire.

After finding a place to park, I radioed into dispatch that I was on scene as I turned my truck off and started to walk up to the yellow crime tape that was strung out between a telephone pole and a side view mirror of an LVPD squad car. "Hey Mitch."

The seasoned officer returned my greeting as he lifted the tape, "Gil is already inside. You'll need to stop and talk to the IC with the fire department and check in."

"Thanks." I left him where he was and approached the incident commander's vehicle and got out my crime lab ID to show him. "Nick Stokes. I'm with the crime lab. I'm looking for..." I saw Grissom coming out of the burned house, "Never mind. I see him. Thanks."

I started to walk off when the incident commander I was talking to stopped me, "Hold it. You'll need this." I looked down and he handed me a yellow fire department helmet. "Engine crews are inside doing overhaul. Safety measure. Put it on and if one of us catches you without it, we'll bring you out and banish you from the scene." After he took the blue scene tag off the back of the helmet, I signed the log sheet he had and took the helmet from him as he continued, "Safety precaution only. Your friend over there was given the exact same lecture."

"Thanks." I adjusted the plastic sizing strap to fit my head and put it on. After putting my field kit down, I tightened the chin strap and snapped it. I had tried Anna's helmet on before and had forgotten how heavy it was until now. "Grissom?"

"Nick. According to what the police said, DB inside in the master bathroom. One of the engine crews found her when they were doing overhaul and had the unis call us. They didn't realize she might be related to the other case. Vega went in with Vartann and said it's all there. The flower, the card, everything. Catherine and Warrick are on their way here. Greg and Sara are at the lab going over evidence from the last case to see if there's a connection but until then, treat this as a separate case."

"We got an ID on this one?"

"Not yet." Grissom pointed towards a Ford Expedition parked in the driveway as we got closer to the house, "RO is Melissa Steel. She's a cocktail waitress at the MGM Grand. There's a parking permit and an ID badge inside the truck. Her prints should be on file. We'll have Robbins get hers at autopsy to see if it's her. Vega is running down the info to find out the owner of the home right now."

"I don't get it. Why up the ante?" I stepped inside what was once the front door with Grissom behind me. "He's gone from murder to murder and arson?" I turned around to see where Grissom went and saw that he had wandered off to the other side of the house and was interested in something on the ground. "What is it?" He didn't answer and I could tell by the look on his face that he was lost in thought.

"Aggie, I can only hope that in our lifetime, some day, science is gonna isolate and destroy the gene that makes people think it's okay to barbeque indoors."

"Oh come on Frog, why? That'd take away all our fun."

I recognized the voices as Anna and Bryan's and started to look to see if I could spot them after getting nothing out of Grissom. Looking over at a group of firemen, she was the only five foot tall person in firefighter turnouts and was easy to spot. "Anna?"

Anna was smiling as she turned around, wiping soot off her face, "Nick."

"Y'all catch this?"

Anna pushed the pike pole up in the ceiling, "Stand back and yeah." With one swift pull, a four foot section of ceiling and insulation fell to the ground. "Hot spot." She stepped back and brushed more soot off of her face but only succeeded in smearing it around, "We've been here a couple hours. One hell of a blaze. This whole side of the house was engulfed when we got here. This is a whole new level of tired for us. I can almost puke now. We've been running since you dropped me off yesterday."

"So CSI Man, Aggs tells me you set a date?" Bryan stopped the overhaul to look over at me. "When?"

"Yes. May 10th. Schedule clear that day?"

Bryan smiled, "It is now. I've already put in for my time off for that week and so has Cathy. One detail down, a million more to go."

"Nicky and I have two details worked out, thank you kindly."

"Oh really?" Bryan looked skeptical. "What? Day and your dress?"

"Three, hon." I stepped back again as Bryan pulled a chunk of the ceiling down, "Little Chapel of the Flowers has four openings that day. We just need to decide on a time. Since I am who I am and we've worked several cases for them, they're holding all four times for us until we decide."

"Nice." Bryan wiped soot off his face, but just like Anna, only succeeded in smearing it across his forehead, "What's the third detail? Got the dress or something?"

I smiled as Anna shook her head, "Nope. I want Twinkies served in lieu of a wedding cake."

"Aggie." Bryan let his pike pole hit the floor, "Seriously?"

She smiled, "Yep. It's my wedding and I want Twinkies."

Bryan started to protest at Anna's choice, "CSI Man? Please tell me you object to Aggie's culinary choice for her own wedding or I will on moral grounds since I am the honorary matron of honor."

I shook my head, "Oh no. I told Anna it's her wedding and she can have whatever she wants at the reception. The only detail I insisted on is that I'm the one she's marrying. Every other detail, that's hers and hers alone to work out."

"That won't be a problem." Anna jumped back as another chunk of the ceiling fell on its own. "Another hot spot."

I watched as a fireman I didn't know came over with a low pressure hose and doused the smoldering insulation, "Did one of you find the body?"

Anna shook her head, causing her red scene tag that was hanging off her helmet to hit the side of it, "Nope. My crew has been up here the whole time." She shoved the pike pole into another section of the ceiling and pulled down again, "I heard about it on the radio. I think Engine 17 caught it." Anna let the pike pole slide out of her hands until the bottom of it hit the concrete, "Where's 17?"

Someone answered that they were in the garage and I told Anna I'd check on her later and went to find Grissom and talk to one of the crew members that found the body.

By the time I found Grissom, he had already gotten the information on who found the body before I got back and told him. He was talking to the firemen on the engine Anna had told me about, "Where's the body?"

One of the firemen Grissom was talking to pointed over his shoulder, "Back of the house. Only part of the house not touched by the fire. We got here with Engine 44 and Ladder 7. 44 was doing hot spots with 7 downstairs and IC told us that we were headed in to do overhaul upstairs. We got up there and kicked the door in and saw the body." A piece of charred debris fell from the ceiling as he spoke, "And that's why you need a helmet. Anyway, we saw the body and called you guys. Watch your step. Floor is charred so try not to fall through."

Adjusting his own helmet, Grissom took a step back and put his foot on the bottom step, "We'll try not to but thanks for the warning. Any prelim on how or where it started?"

"Battalion chief said in the kitchen. Homeowner was cooking. Looks like a grease fire but that's why you're here, right?"

"Partially." Grissom and I left him where he was as we took the stairs one at a time, being careful as we went. The stair railing was gone and the wooden steps were wet from the fire and littered with debris. As we made our way upstairs to where the body was, I saw that part of the ceiling had collapsed on the east end of the house. "We need to get the coroner in here now before this whole house goes."

Getting no argument out of me, I went to work. Grissom had his camera out and was taking pictures as we walked, "David's on his way. Fire department will send him in. Until then, you know the drill."

"Yeah." I moved around Grissom as he stopped to scrape something off of the door leading into the bedroom. The windows in the room had melted and warped like putty. Turning to my left, the master bathroom and the victim came into view. "Grissom? Found her." As I moved a splintered piece of wood from the doorway out of my way with my foot, I immediately saw the tulip with the yellow satin ribbon. "You're number two."

"We don't know that yet, Nick."

"Oh come on, Griss. Look at her. Same flower. Same card. If this isn't related to the first, then who is it? You gonna tell me it's not the same as Carol Kirby?"

"You're a grown man, Nick. Stop whining."

I looked at Grissom to argue that I wasn't whining but his attention was turned to something on the floor and he wouldn't have heard me anyway. I heard a siren outside and looked out the window and saw Anna's engine company leaving the scene of the crime we were at.

Grissom and I started in processing around the woman's body until David came and got her and told us Doc Robbins would be working on the post by the time we got done here.

We spent the rest of the shift with Warrick and Catherine processing the house. Just the same as before, we found a single wine glass in the dishwasher. Warrick bagged it and took it back with him to the lab. The fire destroyed most everything downstairs and the water used to douse the flames destroyed everything upstairs. I found a piece of a broken mirror near the body with a partial print on it. After photographing that shard and lifting the print, I was beginning to feel frustrated as I headed back to the lab to finish up.

After getting back to the lab, Vega verified that the owner of the home was Reactive Solutions, the same company the other victim rented from. The renter of the home was the same as the Ford Expedition in the driveway. Catherine and Greg processed the truck, finding little evidence in it other than a business card for Reactive Solutions.

Finally getting to the end of my shift, I shoved everything back into the box and took it to the evidence locker. After stopping by my locker and grabbing my keys to both my Tahoe and my truck, I headed to the fire station to pick up Anna. I needed her to take my truck back home. I had been in town running errands when I got paged to come in for another case from earlier and left my truck at the lab and caught a ride with Grissom. After leaving there, he took me home to get my Tahoe. Since I needed to get my truck home, I brought Anna in to work two days ago after she said she'd bring my Tundra home.

As I left the lab, I saw the clock on the wall above the exit. It was just before six in the morning. Anna still had another hour to go on her shift, but I hadn't been by lately and I knew Anna had said Bryan missed me.

I got to the station and parked and Bryan let me in, "CSI Man. Welcome back." He left me standing in the doorway of the station, "Sorry to be rude but we're playing Doom."

"Figures." I shook my head, "Where's Anna?"

Bryan motioned over his shoulder, "She was asleep. We've been hella busy today. We all fell asleep when we got back from that field fire but she's still out for the count and probably will be until our relief clocks in." I watched for a moment after he got silent so he could maneuver his character through a maze of trees, "Oh, manners. CSI Man, this is Paul Craig and Andrew Pittman also known as Nitro and Torch respectively. You two, this is CSI Man, Aggie's fiancée."

"Just the four of you? Isn't there supposed to be more?"

"Yeah, but you just missed the ambulance crew. Guess if they miss breakfast, sucks to be them. They've eaten everything while Aggs and I have been out on a run before."

The two of them didn't even look up because of the game but did wave over their shoulders with one hand, keeping the other hand on the controllers they were holding, "Upon reflection I imagine I'm pleased to meet you both. Anna is where?"

"Down the hall, third door on your right. Tell her breakfast is almost ready and we have to eat it all before Storm and Trunk Monkey get back. The highly experimental sausage casserole is about done then I'll scramble the eggs." Bryan finally looked up when he got to the end of the forest, "I'll leave the waking up part to you. We usually use ice water and an air horn."

"I don't want to know." I left Bryan playing Doom with Paul and Andrew and stopped at the third door. The sign on the door read 'I am a closet.' Hiding a smile, I called out to Bryan, "You keep Anna in a closet?"

From the living area, he answered, "The other right, CSI Man."

"I am looking right."

"Sorry. I meant the left. Bonsai!"

"Nice shot, Frog!"

I looked back in time to see Paul's exclamation of Bryan's alien kill as I shook my head and opened the door and saw Anna stretched out on the bed. She had clipped the clear plastic clip that she had in her hair earlier to the lamp on the stand next to the bed and had one leg sticking out from under the covers. The way she was sleeping, her face was covered by her hair and her slow, steady breathing meant she was sleeping peacefully. I sat on the edge of the bed and brushed it out of her face.

"Mmmm." Anna yawned and rolled over. "Nicky."

"Sleeping long?"

She yawned again and stretched out while shaking her head as she brought her arm up to check the time, "Few hours. We left that arson call out and caught a field fire and were there for a bit before we came back and caught an alarm fire at the Luxor. All of us fell asleep after we got done." Anna kicked the covers off of her and sat up as she shook her hair out of her face, "Long day so far."

"That fire look like a barking cat to you?"

Anna yawned again, "Which one? I think we've been on a dozen calls in the past two days. You're gonna have to be a little more specific than that for me to figure out which one you're talking about."

"The arson."

"Yeah, sort of. Why?"

"Well, the Gemini murder in the back was a sign to us."

"Another? Engine 17 said it was a body but said nothing about a Gemini."

"They wouldn't have known about it being a Gemini. Same MO as the others. Single tulip with the satin ribbon and the Gemini symbol on a plain white business card, but Grissom doesn't want to call it another Gemini just yet. The bathroom door being shut helped save some of the evidence, but there wasn't much. Whoever this is, they're good. The last murder we didn't find anything. Not a single hair or a fiber or anything usable and the prints we got off that glass were unknown. If there was any evidence other than the tiny amount we got at this crime scene, the fire destroyed it or the water washed it away. Catherine found a few stray hairs in the victim's truck, but that's it." I reached over and tucked a stray strand of hair behind Anna's left ear as I gently kissed her forehead, "This is frustrating. You ready to go yet?"

"Yeah I am if the other crew checked in service. We can't leave until they take over the reins from us."

Anna stood up as I kissed her, "Hungry? Want to stop for breakfast?"

"Bryan should be cooking. It's his turn and you're welcome to stay and eat with us since you're an honorary fireman and all."

I remembered what Bryan had told me when I came in and asked about where Anna was, "Yeah, he told me to tell you that the highly experimental sausage casserole was almost ready. Do I want to know?"

"It's a recipe that we've used here forever. It's harmless." After Anna put her boots back on and stuffed her dirty shirts in her duty bag, she kissed me again and we went up front. Bryan and Paul were still playing Doom while Andrew had gone in the kitchen. When Anna sat down, Bryan handed her his controller so he could finish up. "What's for breakfast other than the casserole?"

Bryan ignored Anna's question, "So let's get on to the $517 question. That's the deep discount, end of the model year recession price for the $1,000,000 question. Oh, and I had a $20-off coupon. What time is the wedding?"

Anna shook her head, "Nicky and I haven't decided yet. You're cooking what?"

"It's morning. I'm making breakfast."

"Smells good." My stomach growled as I smelled the bacon Bryan had in the skillet.

Anna looked at Bryan as she yawned, "Breakfast?"

Bryan wiped his hands on his uniform pants, "Yeah, you know in the morning when one of us cooks something that shoots out of a chicken's ass and we even have a drink that comes from fruits picked off trees that have the same name for the color and the fruit. Stuff your body digests and..."

"Bryan, I know what breakfast is. Why are you cooking? It's my turn to cook and your turn to do the dishes and before you argue, Paul cooked last night and Andrew cleaned up."

"What if I promise to cook and do the dishes later? Consider it a wedding present from us."

Anna put her controller down when she noticed Bryan reaching in the pantry for the paper plates, "Frog, you're reaching for paper plates."

"I know that. That's why I volunteered to cook and do the dishes for you. Now come on. My highly experimental sausage casserole is done as are the eggs, biscuits, bacon and gravy. Come and get it before Medic 68 gets back."

Anna took my hand in hers and led me into the kitchen with Paul and Andrew behind us, "Smells good." When Bryan started to dig in, Anna stopped him, "Ahem, guests first then ladies next. I know you have manners when you want to use them."

Bryan looked over at me as I dropped Anna's hand and went to scoop some of the casserole on my plate, "Oh hell, Aggs. He's here too much to be considered a guest. I'm sure Torch and Nitro agree."

I didn't give anyone a chance to argue, "Thanks, Bryan. Feeling the love." Anna followed me in getting breakfast and after setting her plate down, poured glasses of juice for everyone.

We ate in silence until Bryan started in on me again, "So CSI Man, we need to finish that conversation from earlier about the wedding. What times are available? We never got that far."

Anna let her fork hit the table, "Frog, really? Did you not stop and think that Nick and I may want to talk about this alone without outside help?"

"Inquiring minds want to know, Aggie." He turned to Paul and Andrew, "Right?" They nodded in agreement and Bryan looked smug, "So when? We're all gonna be there so might as well find out now so we can all be on time." He turned to face me, "CSI Man? When?"

"There is one at ten in the morning, one at noon, one at three and one at six. I planned on talking this over with Anna."

"I vote for three." Bryan took another bite of his breakfast, "Still light and you can get some great photos outside. Plus I look a lot better in the afternoon sun."

Anna groaned, "Not touching that one."

"Thank you, Anna." I shook my head at Bryan, "And now would the real Anna answer if she wants?"

With her mouth full of food, Anna swallowed as she held up three fingers. Reaching for her juice glass, she took a drink before continuing, "I was thinking four in the afternoon, but three is close enough. When does she need to know?"

"Lookie here. We have what? Four details worked out. Twinkies, the chapel, the date and time." Bryan raised his juice glass, "A toast." The rest of us followed suit as Bryan started in, "To Aggie and CSI Man. Take care of my best friend or I'll kick your ass."

Anna started laughing, "Remind me not to have you make any toasts at the wedding."

Bryan took a drink of his juice before leaning over and hugging Anna, "I may not be a Rhodes scholar but if you give me a road map and a remote, I can probably find my way to the Discovery Channel and back and I can definitely kick CSI Man's ass if he doesn't take care of you."

Anna laughed as Bryan let her go, "True, but he can make it look like an accident."

"Anna!" I coughed after I choked on my juice as I was finishing the glass, "Um there are witnesses." After I finally quit coughing I was able to finish, "Bryan, you have nothing to worry about. She knows I'll take care of her."

"Good." He took the last bite of his breakfast before he took his plate as well as Paul's and Anna's from the table, "Cause I can and will kick your ass."

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