Chapter One
If there's a chance, I would take it
This desire I can't kill
Take my heart, please don't break it
I will crawl to your foothill
I'm frightened but I'm coming
Please, baby, please lay still
Oh no, oh no
I'm not coming for the kill
-- The Tea Party, "The Messenger"
He stood in the doorway, watching her, fighting the smile that caused his lips to twitch. She was engrossed in what she was doing, completely wrapped up, as far as he could tell. Painfully blonde hair caught the light as she moved from one eyepiece to the other of the comparitive microscope, fiddling with knobs the entire time. He cleared his throat to announce his presense, listening to her sigh. "Yes, I know you're there, and no, I don't have your results for you." She finally looked up at him, blue eyes tired and red. "Gang war downtown this morning. As much as bullets is my thing, I could do without the amount of casings and strays that they brought me."
His eyes betrayed the stoicism stamped on his face, letting her know that he was sympathetic. He walked further into the room and looked over at the stack of firearms evidence boxes sitting on the table. "How about I make you a deal?" Tim Speedle asked, coming to stand behind her chair as she scribbled something on a legal pad. "Are you interested yet?"
"I'm interested. Go on."
"I'll take these evidence boxes up to be fingerprinted...if you can get me the results by the end of shift."
She shook her head. "Not good enough."
"I'll make dinner, too?"
A smile started to spread on her pretty face, and she tipped her head back, looking at him upside down. "That sounds a lot better. I'll probably be here longer than you, anyway. It'll take me hours just to go through this." She sighed again, and dipped her head back down to the microscope, fiddling with it. His hand dug into his pocket and pulled out a tiny bottle, putting it beside her. "Eyedrops. You sure know that way to a girl's heart, Tim."
He tugged on the end of her sleek ponytail and then went to stack the boxes in his arms, walking back to the door and pushing it open with his hip. "Thanks, Calleigh, you're the best." He left her, thick soled black shoes whispering through the corridors as he went back up the stairs to the main level and made a quick stop in the identification lab, leaving her boxes with one of the technicians there and taking a printout for himself. He read it as he made his way to the break room, dodging people with an unconscious grace.
Another woman was waiting for him there, this one brunette instead of blonde, but one who knew him just as well. "So, what did Calleigh say?" she asked, before taking another bite of the sandwich she was holding, flipping a page in a file with her pinkie finger.
He shrugged and handed her the printout, going to fix himself a cup of coffee. "She's backlogged, but she'll get it to us by the end of shift. You just have to know how to ask nicely, Megan." He sat down across from her as she handed him the other half to her sandwich. He examined it carefully before taking a bite. White bread, ham and white cheddar, lettuce and tomato. "Fingerprints matched, though, so it's enough to get a warrant," he said.
"First, chew with your mouth closed. Second, don't talk with your mouth full," she teased him, leaning back in her chair. "You're right, it'll do for now, but I'd prefer to have all our ducks in a row before we do anything. Which is why I wanted ballistics now, not at the end of our shift."
Speedle sipped his coffee. "Best I could do. Best she can do, for that matter. We'll run with what we have. Look, it's enough for a warrant, it's enough to bring him in for questioning, and when we get the ballistics report, we can add that to the list of charges. Don't get your panties in a bunch."
Megan Donner glared at him, brown eyes flashing. "I give you half my lunch, and this is how you treat me? This, I could do without today. I can do without the sarcasm, the sardonic wit...all of it."
"I can either be sardonic or sarcastic, but not both. Take your pick."
The balled up napkin hit him square on the chest.
There was a heavy, comforting weight resting against him, and he recognized at once the smooth leg that was pressed against his, the head that was laying on his chest. He stifled a yawn and kept his eyes closed, wondering what had woken him up. He felt her body tense against his, as she fought her way through sleep, blinking her eyes slowly before they met his. "Answer the phone," she mumbled, closing her eyes again.
He reached out blindly for the offending noise, picking the handset up off of the base. Thumb pressing the talk button, he brought it up to his ear. "Yeah?" Calleigh's hand lifted and fell back down on his stomach, letting him know that she disliked the way he answered his phone. "Hello?" he finally asked, listening to the silence on the other end. He shut it off and hung it back up, finally letting the yawn escape. "Must have been a wrong number," he told her, but she was already asleep.
I dialed the phone.
He answered.
I hung up.
What were the two of them doing, I wondered, as I readjusted the neck of the nondescript black sweatshirt I was wearing. Were the two of them curled up in bed together, his arms around her, his face buried in her hair. Or were they sleeping at their own places that night. It did happen occasionally, I knew that. I knew that because I had followed one of them before. Every now and then, they go their seperate ways, but not often. Usually, they go to his place, and neither of them leave until the morning. She must leave clothes there, because she never stops at her apartment on the way back. I've stayed outside that tiny beach house that he lives in before, for hours on end, one time I stayed all night.
Was I the only one that knew about Tim Speedle and Calleigh Duquense? Probably, because no one else at the lab mentioned it. No one ever brought it up. And it wasn't like they were advertising the fact that they had been seeing each other for awhile. I'd never seen them touch each other when anyone else was around, only when they were alone. And I had seen them that evening, just before the end of shift, when he had gone back down to the ballistics lab, to get some results from her. I saw the way that her hand lingered against his when she passed him the paper, and the barely-there smile he had flashed back at her. They had stood there, closer than either of them would stand to anyone else, talking for awhile, before he had glanced around to see if anyone was around. He never saw me, or else he wouldn't have dropped the quick kiss on her lips, and she wouldn't have given him that quick wink before she went back to work and he left.
Calleigh and Speedle. They were two complete opposites. Him tall, dark, and inevitably rumpled. Her blonde, short, and always well put together. She barely came up to his shoulder when they stood that close. He wasn't short with people, but he tended not to talk much, not to go off on tangents like anyone else. She loved to talk, as if she loved the sound of her own voice. Did they think that it was the perfect give-and-take? He kept quiet while she talked. That couldn't last long.
No department relationships. That was the edict from the higher-ups, but it never applied to anyone. Regardless, there was always at least four people, sometimes as many as six, that worked together and slept together. The rule was never enforced. But they never let anyone know that they were sleeping with each other on a regular basis. Huh. Strange.
I checked to make sure that I had everything with me before I got out of the car. It wasn't my car, but it would suffice for now. It was nondescipt, just like the clothing I was wearing, all black. I was careful. I knew what I was doing. I even wore a wig, just in case a stray hair would end up at what was going to be the crime scene. Hell, I worked at crime scenes for most of my career. I knew how to kill soemone.
Knife in hand. Flash of metal in the dimly lit back alley. I let myself in by the back door and entered the small house. The door was unlocked, it was always unlocked. I knew what I was doing. I had made sure, watched the place, made sure I knew everything that I could. I had planned it to the last minute detail. Of course, you could never account for everything during a murder, but remember, I'm an expert.
The obese man was passed out on the chesterfield. Disgusting. Stains on his undershirt, a thin line of silver saliva on his face. Drugs and alcohol made the perfect combination for me. This is my first murder. I want it to be an easy one. I never hesitated as I pressed the blade against the man's throat. He needed to shave. He never woke up. I put as much force behind the swipe as I could, drawing it cleanly across his throat, watching the blood start to ooze. Hit the artery. Stepped back from the eruption. His eyes opened in surprise, but that was it. He was gone, that quickly.
My gloved hands rolled the man onto the floor, listening to the satisfying thud of dead weight against the threadbare carpet. Pulled the rope off from around my waist, where I tucked it in the belt loops of my plain, cheap black jeans. Pulled those lifeless arms around his back and tied his hands together deftly. Almost done now, I thought. I wiped the blood off of my knife along the back of his shirt, watching the smear. I had done well. No blood on me whatsoever. I can wear these clothes next time.
Leave the same way I came in, but this time, I lock the door before I close it. They're going to have fun with this one. No sign of forced entry, they're going to think that it's someone that he knows. But the victimology will make them think otherwise. Yeah, it'll be fun. I might even get a chance to work the evidence of the murder that I committed. Funny how things work like that. It's only two and half hours before shift started. I need to get home and change, hide my clothes and knife just in case, shower. The man's daughter, no angel herself, won't show up until around seven, and then she'll find what I left. And she'll scream at the top of her lungs, phone 911, and we'll be called out there.
I have plenty of time.
He was in the shower when the phone rang. She froze for a moment, and then shook her head, continuing to poke and prod at the omlette she was making herself. She would let the answering machine pick this one up. She had answered Speedle's phone just once, not thinking that it could be someone from work calling, and thankfully, it had just been his mother, but it was better to be safe than sorry. Calleigh transferred the omlette onto her plate and turned off the element, picking a knife and fork out of the nearby drawer as his familiar, short message played through the kitchen.
She chewed thoughtfully as she listened to their supervisor's voice, wondering if her cell phone was going to ring next. The water shut off in the bathroom, and she listened as her cell phone did ring, hidden deep within her purse. She fished it out and held a finger up to her lips when Speedle entered the room, his hair still wet. "Calleigh Duquense," she chirped, watching him drink from her coffee cup and started to eat her omlette. She flashed him the finger. "I thought you were still on vacation, Horatio," she said, shaking her head. "Right, I'll be there in two shakes of a lamb's tail. See you then."
"Being called in early?" he asked, ignoring her obscene gesture, and slid the plate across to her, so that she could finish the last half of her breakfast.
"So are you. The message is on your machine. Race you to the lab."
"You're on."
Chapter Two
