Killing Game

By Kadi

Rated T

Disclaimer: This is only a sandbox that I like to play in. Sadly, it is not mine.

Chapter 7

It felt odd being back in the Elliot home. It was somber and quiet, and despite knowing better Sharon still expected Matthew to be there. That was nothing at all compared to what his wife and children were feeling. She pushed it all aside after Lisa left them alone in the small office that she and her husband shared. The small room was at the back of the house, on the first floor. The curtains were open, sunlight spilled into the room, giving a sense of false cheer to the day. Sharon sighed as she stared at the safe that Lisa had opened for them.

It was a small chest safe, fireproof, and positioned in a corner of the room. Sharon knelt in front of it with Andy beside her and took photographs of the contents. There were papers and folders inside, and a couple of flat, square jewelry cases. It was the sort of safe that most people kept for important concerns such as insurance forms, wills, and keepsakes. The interior of the safe was made up of two shelves. The file that Lisa called her about was lying on the top shelf. It was a brown, expanding file folder, and looked to be close to bursting at its seams.

Sharon took several pictures of the safe's interior and waited as Andy did the same before she slipped on a pair of black, sterile gloves and reached into the safe to pull the file out. They did not know what was in the file, but they preserved chain of custody just the same, and so while Sharon carried the file to the desk that was situated to their left, Andy set his phone's camera to recording. Sharon opened the folder carefully and over the next several minutes she pulled out each piece of paper, including an envelope with her name on it, and documented each one of them.

It was only after they had completely emptied the folder that Andy stopped recording and put his phone away. He slipped on a pair of gloves and stepped up to the desk alongside Sharon to begin sorting through the records that Sergeant Elliot had obtained and compiled. There was a lot of data in front of them, and singularly, it did not make a lot of sense. The Sergeant seemed to have been doing an audit of more than one division, and all of it off the record as far as his current caseload was concerned.

Andy nodded to the envelope that Sharon seemed to be avoiding. "You should open that," he said quietly. "We can dig through this all day, but we may not know what it all means until you read that."

"Yes." She wasn't necessarily avoiding the letter as she was delaying the inevitable. Sharon kept her gloves on as she reached for it. She held the envelope at its edges and opened it carefully to preserve any prints that might be on it. Inside of it Sharon found a single folded slip of paper. The handwriting was familiar. She would recognize the messy, slanting scrawl anywhere. She let Andy take a picture of the letter before she lifted it to read.

Sharon,

I really hope that you are not reading this. Things are starting to get pretty sketchy, though. I knew I was going to need to leave a record of what I have been doing, along with an explanation, just in case I do not get the chance to speak to you about this in person. The more that I have hoped that I am wrong about everything, the more I keep finding out that I'm right. I could really use your advice right now. I don't like what I'm uncovering and if anyone could make sense of it, that would be you. This can't be right, but everything that you ever taught me is telling me that it is.

You always told us that we should follow the evidence first, but not to discount our instincts. You said that our instincts are important, that they are the difference between white and black. They are the gray area that keeps us from crossing lines that we can't jump back across and ringing bells where no alarm is needed.

Right now my instincts are telling me that I stumbled into a big heap of trouble. Maybe I should've stopped while I was still behind. The thing is, I wouldn't exactly be doing the right thing if I did that. I would be part of the problem, and you taught me that we needed to be part of the solution.

So here is the thing. I had an officer out of Narc get into a fist-fight with a suspect a few months ago. There were plenty of witnesses, both on the street and from Narc and all of them said the same thing: the suspect started it. It should've been a pretty easy case to close, and for the most part it was. While I was poking around, though, I saw some stuff that bothered me. I didn't like how uneasy a couple of the guys got about having me nose around their division. No one likes us poking around, and that's just the way it is. These guys were really uneasy though, Sharon. It wasn't the usual, oh great here comes FID, kind of uneasy either. These guys were Grade-A nervous.

I could've let it go, and part of me wishes that I had, but something about it just bothered me. So after I closed my Force case, I decided to do a little extra checking. I didn't want them to know about it, so I did it off the record. I don't like anything that I found.

It looks like a couple of guys from Narcotics have been taking kick-backs from looking the other way on some arrests and busts that should go down. That is bad enough, and it's just the kind of thing that people always think happens in Narcotics. The only problem is, both the guys involved are transfers from Robbery-Homicide.

Is your stomach hurting yet? Mine sure is.

I had to check that out too. Seems they learned how to look the other way from inside the Department. Captain Garring was letting them, and another officer, bust guys for fencing stolen goods. They were only logging half of it into evidence; the rest was being sold on the street. It's been going on for years, Sharon. I can't believe that we never heard about this before. I can't believe that they never got busted. These jokers aren't that smart.

That's where it gets even worse. They did get busted. I'm in some real trouble here. I dug too deep and I'm starting to feel the heat. I haven't been able to prove it yet, but I think one of the bungled Narcotics busts got a cop killed last year. The shit is really hitting the fan now, as your boyfriend would say.

I want to talk to you about this in person. Maybe I'm wrong, but the evidence speaks for itself. I'm breaking rule number one. I'm taking this entire file home and I'm locking it in my safe there. I made a copy of this letter and I mailed it. You're going to think I'm nuts when you get it, but I'm pretty sure that I am being followed. If something happens to me, get the file. I have everything that I think you need to blow a full audit wide open, and you are the only one that can do it; even if you have gone over to the dark side.

With any luck, we'll be able to do this together. If not, do me a favor. Nail these sons of bitches to the wall.

~Matthew

Sharon let Andy take the letter when she was finished reading it. She turned away from him and faced the windows that looked out into the Elliots' backyard. She pressed the back of her hand against her mouth and closed her eyes. The Sergeant had stumbled on to something quite by accident and neither his instincts, nor his sense of duty, had allowed him to ignore it. Now it looked like they had at least two dead police officers and several others that were culpable in the crimes. She was concerned enough by that, but also bothered by the fact that Matthew alluded to the idea that these officers had already been caught doing these things. Her stomach was hurting. It clenched painfully. That meant that someone inside Professional Standards was involved. It wasn't only someone on the force that was responsible for Sergeant Elliot's murder, but someone that he had worked with every day, someone that he, quite possibly, saw or spoke to was behind it as well.

Yes, Sharon thought. Matthew was right. The shit was definitely hitting the fan now. She turned again when she heard Andy curse. He was looking at her, eyes dark and burning with the same anger and determination that she felt. "That letter is dated two days ago," she said. "This means that the copy he spoke of is probably in my mailbox right now, or in the mail that Rusty picked up yesterday that I haven't looked at." Sharon shook her head; it was unimportant and could not change the events as they had unfolded. She would not have received the letter in time to save the Sergeant's life. "Matthew knew that he had something big."

"And he knew that he couldn't trust just anyone with it." Andy folded the letter and carefully placed it back in its envelope. He shook his head. The copies and notes that were in the file were making sense now. They were exerts from other case files, evidence logs and financial records. There were some names that were sticking out, and that was making the hair on the back of his neck stand on end. Andy ground his teeth together. "What do you want to do, Sharon?"

Her gaze dropped slowly to the documents on the desk. She rubbed her lips together while she thought through their next steps. "We take it in. We go through it," she said quietly. "We figure out what he had and where he was with it. I am going to finish what the Sergeant started."

"Not alone." Andy shifted where he stood. The muscles in his upper back tensed. "Once we figure out all this," he waved a hand at the stack of papers, "we're gonna have to take it to the Chief. It needs to be solid before we do that, and you're going to need help. You can't break open an entire division on your own."

Her brow arched. "I have done it before." She understood where he was going with this, however. Sharon shook her head at him. "Andy, we are talking about investigating three different divisions, at least. There are several officers involved, and we do not know who inside Professional Standards was helping them. For that reason alone I will need to take this to the Chief just as soon as we are back in the office."

"We don't know yet," he said, "but we will. That is exactly why we do this inside of Major Crimes. There is no one there that is on the take…"

"I know that!" She walked over to the desk and began sliding the documents back into the folder. "That is nowhere near being an issue. We are talking about investigating other officers. Andy, you do not know what that does to your career. It can make you a pariah with the very people that you need to have watching your back."

He felt like rolling his eyes at her. Instead Andy reached over and laid his hand on the papers, stopping her. "I know that you know that," he said more calmly. "That is not the point that I am making. As far as I am concerned we aren't talking about investigating cops. They are criminals now, Sharon, and no better than the guys on the street that they've been taking money from and letting off the hook."

Her lips turned up in a small, but sad smile. "There are people," she said thickly, "that will say that I have been a bad influence on you, Lieutenant." Sharon laid one of her hands over his and wrapped her fingers tightly around it. The evidence lay beneath their joined hands as she shook her head at him. "The rest of our division may not agree with you." Officers were always willing to talk about jail time when it came to the criminals that walked the street, but when they learned that those criminals were the officers that they stood beside every day, those conversations became a lot harder.

Andy shrugged at her. "Then we ask them," he said easily. "This isn't the same as Gabriel running off at the mouth to his girlfriend, but they know what having one bad apple in a bunch can do to a division; they know what it can do to the department. They're gonna surprise you." Andy straightened and pulled his hand back. He picked up the folder and held it open so that she could place the documents back inside with more ease. "Besides, got news for you Captain. You ain't FID anymore. You belong to us now. You tellin' me that five years hasn't taught you that we're real good at doing the heavy lifting?"

"Hm." Sharon wanted to believe him, and there was a part of her that did. She knew her people and she knew that she could trust them to have her back on this, but she had also been on the other side just long enough to realize that it might be hard for them. She did not want to put them in the position to have to be known for taking down members of their own department. It was not an easy job to do. Even when it was necessary, it wasn't always understood. "Heavy lifting, yes." Sharon arched a brow at him. "It's the moving vehicles that give me cause for concern."

"God almighty!" Andy looked away. He shook his head at her. "You are never letting that one go, are you?"

"Nope." The word was carefully enunciated and punctuated with a knowing look. For as long as she was able, she would make sure that he never did anything that reckless again. She had come too close to losing him. "Let's take all of this back to the murder room. We will talk to the rest of the team, and go from there."

"Yes ma'am." Andy nodded. "For the record, you're the one dating the lunatic that jumped onto the moving vehicle. What does that say about you?"

"I like the hard cases." She met his gaze again, but neither of them was feeling the levity of their words. It gave them something to hold on to, though, to stay afloat with the darkness rising around their ankles. It was something to remind them why they kept fighting and moving forward. There was always light in the darkness, even when they could not feel its warmth.

MCMCMCMCMCMC

They took the file and all of its contents back to the Murder Room and placed them in Sharon's office. The rest of the team had only just started to filter back in from the break that the Captain ordered them to. Only Lieutenant Tao and Detective Sykes were at their desks when they arrived. They had to wait for Provenza to come back, but he strolled back into the Murder Room not too long after they returned.

Through the open blinds in Sharon's office Andy caught his attention and waved him over. Provenza was scowling at the both of them as he stepped inside. His scowl only deepened when Flynn closed the blinds and made sure that the door was secure behind him. "Okay," he began, "you have my attention, but just for the record…" Provenza pointed a finger at the Captain and shook it at her. "Changing clothes might be a nice cover, but you can't fool me. You didn't rest at all did you?" He shot a displeased look at his partner before she could answer. "I left you in charge of her."

"No one is in charge of her," Andy deadpanned. He rolled his eyes and walked around to stand behind the Captain's desk beside her. With his arms folded across his chest he perched on the edge of the credenza so that he was nearby, but not hovering at her shoulder.

"Truer words," Provenza muttered. He looked between the two of them and huffed a sigh. "Okay, what is the big secret?"

Sharon chose to ignore their banter, as she so often did. She placed her hand atop the thick file folder and got straight to the point instead. "Lisa Elliot found this inside the safe at her home this morning."

"Sergeant Elliot stumbled into some pretty screwed up crap," Andy explained. "He thought that someone was following him around, and he never struck me as the paranoid type, so it had to be legit. He left a note for Sharon and mailed another one to her place." They hadn't been back to the Condo yet, so they didn't know if it was there or not. Sharon had spoken to Rusty, however, and asked him to check the mail when he got home. She wanted him to bring anything that was in the box or on her desk and addressed to her straight to the murder room. At this point, if it had gone through the mail, fingerprints on the envelope wouldn't exactly matter.

"According to the Sergeant," Sharon continued, while the Lieutenant processed what they had told him so far, "He uncovered some evidence that implicates the members of at least three divisions in illegal activities. We think that some of those activities could have resulted in the death of a police officer last year."

"Whoever was following him around, killed him to shut him up," Andy pointed out. "We don't know who yet, but Elliot thought that he had enough to open a full investigation."

Provenza looked between the pair of them. There was more that he was not being told. His eyes narrowed as he studied them. "So we figure out who killed the Sergeant," he said plainly, "then we turn the rest over to Internal Affairs. That's what they are there for, isn't it?" Provenza straightened. His eyes bulged with sudden incredulity. "You're not suggesting that we turn the murder over to them are you?"

"Of course not, Lieutenant." Sharon lowered her gaze to the file for a moment. "We are not suggesting that we turn any of the investigation over. In his final missive Sergeant Elliot indicated that one or more of the officers involved in the illegal activities that he was uncovering could be from Professional Standards." Her gaze lifted again and she stared back at the Lieutenant. "We cannot be certain who that is or how deeply that involvement goes."

"I don't think that we should turn any of it over," Andy shrugged at his partner. "Right now, all of that is part of the murder investigation. I think we should keep it right here. Look," he stood up and moved closer to the desk. "No one likes Internal Affairs. No one wants them circling around like vultures. That's not to say," he added, waving a hand in the air, "that they are not occasionally necessary." He turned and cast a long look at the Captain. "Occasionally," he repeated, using the same inflection on the word that she had once used on him.

Sharon returned his look with a bland one of her own. "But they are necessary," she shot back. She turned her gaze back to the Lieutenant on the other side of her desk. "This is quickly becoming a complicated situation," she continued, "I can understand that the idea of investigating another police officer is a difficult one to accept. Unfortunately, in my experience, it is a necessary evil." Sharon folded her arms across her chest. "If we proceed as a unit, there may be backlash from other divisions."

"So?" Provenza snorted at her. "Captain, I have not gotten all the way here," he pointed at the floor in front of him, as if that were the proverbial spot that his long career in the LAPD had brought him to, "by making everyone in the department like me. If that was what I was worried about I would have quit a long time ago." He shook his head and took a moment to study the thick folder on her desk. Elliot had obviously done a lot of work if the thing was almost overflowing. The Sergeant was pretty damned thorough as he recalled. "You can stand there and practice your little speech about the necessary evil of Internal Affairs all you want to, but I've heard it all before. I've seen my fair share of rotten grapes. You don't have to tell me what can go on around here. That doesn't mean that I have to like all of the red tape and rules that can tie our hands and make our jobs that much harder to do."

"Yes, of that I am aware," Sharon replied. The two of them had tangled on that subject more than once over the years. Her lips pursed while the two of them stared at one another. "We see evil in the world every day," she said. "We just like to believe, and with good reason, that it remains outside of our own walls. Our badges are shields," she agreed, "but we have them as a means of protecting the public, not as something to hide our own misdeeds behind. It is not easy to investigate our own, Lieutenant, not from a fear of being disliked, but because it is always harder to look inside of our own houses and find the faults than it is to find them outside of it."

"We are not Internal Affairs," Provenza reminded her. "Doesn't mean we aren't going to do our jobs the same way that we always do. If anyone out there," He waved a hand toward the Murder Room, "is uncomfortable with any part of this, they can sit it out and good riddance to them." He doubted that would happen. He could not think of a single member of their team that would not stand up for what was right. If members of their department had crossed the line, resulting in not one, but two murders, and any number of convictions that could be overturned, he knew that he was not alone in wanting those officers prosecuted. While the Captain had not said it, he knew that she was very aware of the fact that any death that occurred during the commission of a felony was a murder, and he had to believe that they were talking about several felonies given the gravity of the situation.

Without waiting for any further discussion on the matter Andy moved around the office to open the door. He called the others in and waited as each of the filed into the room. With the entire team assembled, including Buzz, there was barely any standing room left. Andy shut the door behind them and stood in front of it. "We've got a lead."

Provenza turned where he stood and quickly filled the others in. He kept it short and to the point. Flynn cut in occasionally, and told them which divisions were involved. When they were finished, the elder Lieutenant pointed at Julio. "You take the stuff from Narcotics. Tao and I will pull the files from Robbery Homicide. Amy and the Captain can look into the information that the Sergeant put together on Professional Standards." He paused for a moment. "Anyone got a problem with that?"

He was not so much giving them a choice as he was telling them exactly what they were going to do. Sharon let her gaze move over each of her officers as they thought it through. Somehow she was not surprised when it was Julio that answered first. He looked at her before his attention moved back to the Lieutenant. He shrugged. "You know, when you beat the crap out of another person because you're pissed off, having a badge doesn't make you special. You're still an asshole. I can take Narcotics."

Tao looked at the floor for a moment. He rocked back on his heels before shaking his head. "Julio," he spoke slowly. His gaze lifted and he looked toward the ceiling above them. "No one thought you were an asshole."

Sanchez snorted. He jerked his thumb toward Flynn standing behind them. "He did."

As one everyone looked at him. Andy shrugged at them. "You know, asshole is such a strong word…"

"Okay, alright," Provenza waved his hands at them before they could get too carried away. "The Captain seems to be under the very mistaken idea that someone here might have a problem with masquerading as Internal Affairs for the duration of this investigation."

Amy and Buzz looked at one another, but it was the Detective who responded. She clasped her hands in front of her and tilted her head at the Lieutenant. "Well, sir, that Captain Raydor and her crazy ideas."

Provenza pointed a finger at her. "That's my girl!" He waved both of his hands at them all in a shooing motion. "Everyone out of here. This office is hardly big enough for the two of us," he said, nodding his head toward the Captain, "much less all of you. Let's go, back to work. Buzz, take this and get it up on the board. Amy help him. Anything you find that has to do with Professional Standards, bring it back to the Captain." Provenza reached for the folder and passed it over to him. He waited for Flynn to let everyone out of the office again before he turned back to the Captain. "See?" He held his arms out. "Nothing to it."

"Apparently not." Sharon let her arms drop to her sides. "Very well then, Lieutenant, I will trust that you have everything well in hand. I need to bring the Chief up to speed on what's happened. Rusty may drop by soon. I asked him to bring the mail. We will need to enter the second letter from Sergeant Elliot into evidence."

"I'll keep an eye out for him," Andy told her. "I'm going to go and help Amy and Buzz sort through the stuff that Elliot collected. It will go faster since I've already seen most of it."

"Thank you, Andy." Sharon spared a smile as he left them.

"You've been spending too much time with him." Provenza shook his finger at her as he made to follow. "He's been a bad influence on you. You're going to end up turning into a cynic like the rest of us."

"Ah!" Sharon rocked back on her heels. "Andy isn't the cynic, Lieutenant. He is a realist. You are the only cynic here, and I think that I am in very little danger of spending too much time with you," she quipped.

"Why not?" He made a face at her. "I still have plenty to teach you about homicides."

"I look forward to that, but for the moment, it seems that I have plenty to teach you about Internal Affairs." Sharon moved around her desk to join him at the door. "I think that you are all about to get a crash course in it."

"How hard can it be?" Provenza asked. He waved a hand at her. "Blah, blah, blah, rules, blah, blah, red tape, yadda-yadda, Flynn go to Anger Management. Believe me, Captain, I am already an expert. Go talk to the Chief. We've got this under control."

"Yes," she agreed, "I think that you do." Sharon stood for a moment, watching them. There was no hesitation as they dug into the evidence that Sergeant Elliot had collected. She found that she wasn't surprised by that fact. Deep down she had already known that this was exactly what they would do, and the small part of her that thought they might once again see her as an outsider was completely silenced. The Lieutenant was correct, she had learned a lot from him, but she thought that just maybe they had learned something from her too. It seemed that they had all been good for each other. Sharon nodded to herself and moved away from them. As she started down the corridor a heavy feeling that had nothing at all to do with her team settled inside her stomach. It was time to begin rattling the hornet's nest, and she worried that the wrong people might get stung.

-TBC-