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A/N: For Anita and Mersey. Thanks for reading!

Chapter Five

Knowing that Gil Grissom was not a man that would sit idly at home while there was an intriguing case to be solved, Nick didn’t bother to call ahead before heading to the crime scene. The lone pair of officers left behind to guard the crime scene against looters and curious onlookers barely gave him a second glance after he flashed his CSI badge.

He heard someone rummaging around in Rebecca Warren’s apartment, and was not surprised at all to discover that Sara was already on the scene as well. She was carefully packing up the files and papers from the victim’s desk.

“Hey,” he greeted, acting casual. He wasn’t sure he wanted the rest of the team to know about the phone call he’d received yet. Of course he planned to tell Gil immediately, and probably would call Jim Brass as well, but he didn’t want the others to worry unnecessarily.

“Hey, Nick,” Sara replied, not looking up from the files she was going through. Curiosity got the better of him and he peeked over her shoulder to see what she was studying. “Seems like she had an awful lot of money to be throwing around for a cocktail waitress,” Sara mused as she set the receipt she was looking at into one of two piles she’d made. The receipt was from the Jameson Gallery for a piece titled ‘All That Doesn’t Glitter’ for just over eighteen hundred dollars. Nick let out a low whistle. “No kidding. This whole stack,” she indicated one pile, “is just like that.”

“She come from a wealthy family?” Nick asked, hoping there was an innocent answer to source of the money.

“Not especially. Not exactly poor, but not wealthy enough to plunk down a couple thousands of dollars for art every month.” Sara sighed. “Which begs the question: How else was she making money?”

Nick nodded. “You seen Grissom, yet?”

“I think he and Catherine are up in the Blacks’ apartment.”

While Nick wasn’t surprised at all that Sara and Grissom were on site, it did surprise him that Catherine had come in to work early. She usually spent every moment she could with her daughter, Lindsey.

“Know if anyone’s located Marshall Black yet?”

“Don’t think so. They haven’t found Morris Pearson, either,” Sara updated him absently as she continued going through Becky Warren’s records. He wasn’t even sure she noticed his farewell on the way out.

As Sara had suggested, he found Catherine and Grissom already upstairs in the Black apartment.

“…was pretty heavy into debt,” he heard Catherine’s voice coming from the other room. He headed down the hallway to the master bedroom.

“So, where was the money going?” Gil asked, rhetorically, knowing that Catherine did not yet have an answer. They were slowly going through and packing up the items from a desk belonging to either John or Marsha Black.

Nick hesitated in the doorway, not wanting to break up their conversation just yet.

“Blackmail?”

“That would explain why the large cash withdrawals.”

“But why blackmail the Blacks? They weren’t particularly wealthy…” Catherine looked up and spotted Nick. “Couldn’t stay away, either?” she greeted.

“Uh…yeah. Actually…” he faltered for a moment, trying to decide whether to let her in on the conversation or not. He didn’t want to worry her by telling her that one of their prime suspects had managed to track him down. On the other hand, he supposed she would probably find out sooner or later, anyway. “I got a phone call from Morris Pearson,” he admitted, not meeting her eyes.

“What?” He immediately became the focus of Gil’s meticulous attention.

Nick quickly filled them in on the phone call that he’d received, leaving out all references to himself that the psychic had made. He didn’t want to worry them unnecessarily. Besides, if Grissom knew that he was being threatened in some way, he’d probably be taken off the case.

Grissom frowned as Nick finished his tale. He studied the younger man for a few moments, suspecting that Nick wasn’t telling them everything. He decided not to press the issue for the moment, but would definitely have to talk to him about this later. Privately. What bothered Grissom most, though, were the questions of why Pearson had chosen to go to Nick, and how he had managed to contact him at all. At home, no less.

That question was brought up by Catherine, too. “How did he know to contact you? Have you talked with him before?”

Nick shook his head. “No. I remember you all telling me about him, but I never met him during the…uh…Crane case.” He avoided looking at either of them, still embarrassed about how he’d been caught off guard during that one.

Catherine nodded, sympathetically. She could see how uncomfortable Nick seemed and decided to busy herself with the contents again. She opened the next drawer and smiled as she picked up a folder of childhood artwork from the Black children. Things that had probably once been hung with pride on the refrigerator, now treasured in their mother’s desk drawer.

“Did he say why he called you?” Grissom asked.

Nick knew he wouldn’t be able to lie to his boss, but he didn’t want to divulge the whole truth either. “I guess he just wanted to warn us.” He swore he could feel Gil’s gaze boring into him and almost blurted out the rest. Fortunately, Gil didn’t ask anything more.

“Why don’t you head on in to the lab,” Grissom suggested, mulling over the situation. “Check out the nightgown he mentioned, see if you can find anything unusual about it. Then why don’t you check in with Doc Robbins and see what he can tell you about the autopsies. Give me a call as soon as you get t--"

He was cut off by Catherine’s gasp as she dropped the stack of papers she’d been going through, holding onto a single drawing as the rest fluttered to the ground. Her hand was trembling slightly. Nick and Gil exchanged worried glances before quickly moving to see what had caused such a reaction in her.

It was the overly simplified drawing of two stick figures--a woman and a little girl, both blonde. They stood before a house and were surrounded by flowers of all sorts of colors. A crudely drawn sun shone on the scene. There was nothing upsetting about the picture that Nick could see. He looked at Catherine, who was still staring at the drawing as though it were the sign of Armageddon or something. “Cath?” he asked gently, stunned as she looked at him, her eyes glittering with a mixture of fear and anger.

“Catherine?” Gil reached out his gloved hand to take the picture from her, hoping he’d be able to tell what the problem was. She didn’t relinquish her hold on the picture, but moved her hand so they could both see what bothered her about it.

Scribbled in the corner in the large scrawl of a young child was the artist’s name. Except for two letters, the name on the page would have been expected.

But the name on the page wasn’t Lindy.

It was Lindsey.

Nick looked at Catherine with wide eyes. “Lindsey? That wasn’t Lindy’s full name, was it?”

Catherine shook her head, still mute with the shock of the situation. Even if the Black daughter’s name had been Lindsey, it didn’t matter. She recognized this picture. It had been on her refrigerator at home for a while, even. One day she’d come home to find that Lindsey had drawn a new decoration to hang it its place, and she’d thought nothing of its disappearance. Pictures came and went all the time. “It’s my daughter’s,” she informed them keeping her voice as calm and steady as she could.

“But…how? Why would it be here?” Nick wondered if this was one of the “gifts” that he was supposed to find. “Did you know them? Did Lindy…babysit for you or something?” He knew he was grasping at straws, but he wanted very badly for there to be a logical explanation for the drawing’s presence at the crime scene.

Catherine shook her head, closing her eyes. “Someone…must have been in my house.” She suddenly felt very cold. And violated.

Grissom carefully took the picture from her and deposited it into a plastic evidence bag. He then handed it to Nick and nodded toward the door. Nick knew that was his cue to head back to the lab to start processing, but he wanted to make sure that Catherine was okay, first.

“Don’t jump to any conclusions,” Gil cautioned. “Are you sure that it was in your house? Could you have had it at the lab? In your locker maybe? Or maybe Lindsey threw it out and it was outside in the garbage?”

Catherine looked ill. “Someone going through my garbage is supposed to make me feel better?” She rubbed her temples as if relieving a headache. “So…maybe it’s this Pearson guy. He obviously knew how to contact Nicky,” she spared him a glance. “Maybe he’s been checking us all out?”

“It’s a possibility. Though for what reason?”

“Maybe he’s trying to get us all thrown off the case,” Nick suggested. He licked his lips nervously, trying to figure out how to make his point without giving away the information he’d withheld about the call. “Calling me outside of work. Getting something from Catherine’s hous…garbage that would tie her in with the crime scene.”

Gil looked thoughtful. “You may be on to something.”

“So…am I off the case?” Catherine asked, unsure which answer she’d prefer to hear.

“Do you want to be off the case?”

Now wasn’t that just like Grissom? Answer a question with a question. Catherine almost smiled, but instead focused on coming up with an answer. “Not really, but…I think maybe I should take myself off it. Conflict of interest. This could be seen as evidence placing me at the scene of the crime.”

Gil nodded seriously. “It could.”

She hadn’t really expected him to deny it, but she was still disappointed that he didn’t try to assure her that it wouldn’t be seen that way. “So…that’s it, I’m off the case. I’ll…head back to the lab, I guess. See what other cases have come in.” She felt strangely lost as she turned to leave the scene. It wasn’t that she’d never been taken off a case before, but this time was different. And she was completely thrown by the idea of the murderer having been in her house. Having been near her daughter! That’s what was the worst part about it. One thing was for sure, she wasn’t going to let Lindsey go back to the house until this creep was caught. They’d stay in a hotel maybe.

“Hey, Catherine,” Nick called after her as she started out of the apartment. She paused and waited for him to catch up. “I’ll head back with you. I can drop you back off here at the end of the shift.” She really didn’t feel like driving at the moment, so she agreed. They remained silent until they were in the car.

“You want to talk about it?” Nick asked, making no move to start the car.

Catherine shook her head at first, but after a moment she relented. “What if someone was in my house when Lindsey was home?” she voiced her fear. “She could have been hurt. Worse.”

“She wasn’t, though,” Nick reminded her gently. “I think whoever did this is just trying to scare us.” Warning us off the case, he added silently.

“They succeeded,” she let out a humorless laugh.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” He frowned as he made a realization. “We need to check out your house as a possible crime scene.”

For some reason she suddenly felt a little bit better. Crime scenes she could deal with. Detach from the emotional, focus on the scientific. That put it all in perspective. “We’ll want to dust the refrigerator for prints. It’s probably too late to find much of use, though,” she added. “I think that picture was taken off the fridge about a month or so ago.”

“You think our guy took it off your fridge?”

“I don’t know. I’ll have to ask Lindsey if she remembers taking it down, or what she did with it.”

Nick started the car. “Our shift doesn’t officially start for another couple hours. You want to stop by your place now?”

“No. You need to get to the lab and find out what you can about what Mr. Pearson told you.”

Nick felt another pang of guilt at the fact that he’d kept so much of what Mr. Pearson told him from the others. Especially since Catherine had taken herself off the case. As he probably should have done.

They drove several minutes in silence before Nick opened up the lines of communication again. “You going to be okay staying there?”

Catherine smiled at the concern in his voice. “I think we’ll be staying at a hotel until we figure this one out.”

“I’ve got a spare bedroom,” he offered. “You and Lindsey could share, or I could set up a cot in my office…”

Coming from just about any other man, Catherine might have assumed he was coming on to her, but Nick was so much like a little brother to her that the thought didn’t even cross her mind. “I think that’d be a bit of an imposition.”

“Not at all,” he replied sincerely. “Warrick’s coming over to watch the game on the big screen tomorrow, but if you can put up with us blowing off a little steam, the spare room is all yours. As long as you need it.”

It would be a lot less expensive than a hotel. “Thanks, Nick...I’ll think about it and let you know.” She looked out the window as they pulled into the parking lot for the lab. The parking lot was quite full considering the hour, which meant that part of the day shift was probably still there in addition to the evening shift, and probably most of the graveyard shift was putting in overtime on the Walnut St case.

“Stoges!” someone called out only moments after they’d entered the building. Catherine and Nick both stifled groans as the day shift supervisor made a beeline for them. Catherine gave Nick a sympathetic look, but didn’t stick around to find out what the man wanted.

“What’s up, Ecklie?” Nick asked, trying to sound cheerful. His eyes widened as he saw how miserable the man looked.

“What the hell were you thinkig leabing a cat here? Do you have any idea how much evidence that furball could combromise?” After a moment he got to the real point. “And I’b allergig to cats dambit.”

Nick winced. How come he was being blamed for the cat? He’d sent it back with Greg. But he didn’t want to get their lab tech into trouble, so he’d take the blame. “I’m sorry, sir. He’s…evidence…from the apartment fire.” It somehow seemed wrong to be counting a living creature as evidence, but it was fact. “We’ll process and…I’ll take care of him.”

“Just have him out of the lab by mornig.”

“Yes, sir.” He tried not to smile too much at the man’s misery. As Ecklie stomped away, Nick went directly to the lab area to check up on the kitten. To his dismay, it was nowhere to be found. Nor were either of the evening shift lab techs. He figured they had to be in the break room, so he headed there to ask the where Ecklie had stowed the poor thing.

As it turned out, the evening techs had the kitten out and were playing with it in the break room, while Greg Sanders flirted shamelessly with them.

“He’s so cute!” Gracie Jayne, the audiovisual specialist from the evening shift cooed.

“Don’t I know it?” Greg replied, feigning ignorance on the fact that she meant the kitten.

“Using a cat to pick up girls?” Nick asked, amused, as he pushed open the break room door.

Greg looked slightly embarrassed, but only for a moment before he picked up the kitten and headed over to talk to Nick. “Later, ladies. I’ve got to see a man about a cat.”

Gracie rolled her eyes, but grinned as she headed back to work, her coworker (who’s name escaped Nick at the moment…Michelle maybe?) following behind.

“So…you’re going to love this. I found out some stuff about your cat here.”

“Hit me.”

“We stopped by the animal control department on our way back here last night.”

“Okay.”

“I talked with the vet on duty. Aw man, she was hot. You would have lo…” he cut himself short as he saw the impatient look starting to materialize on Nick’s face. “Nevermind. You’ll just have to imagine that part. Anyway, she looked him over and what we have here is an approximately 3 month old male. No special breed. Just your average every day tom cat.” Nick gazed at Greg, hoping he was going to have something a little more interesting to tell him. “All right. So, they looked him over. He’s been well fed. Well groomed. No fleas. All in all, a very healthy little guy.”

“Tell me this is going somewhere.”

“Ah, yeah. Okay. So it seems your cat’s has been taken good care of, right?”

“Uh…sounds like it,” Nick responded, still trying to figure out what Greg was getting at.

“Here’s where it gets interesting.”

“Couldn’t you have started with the interesting?”

“I could, but then where’s the suspense? Besides, you didn’t want to hear about the vet lady’s hotness.”

“Just tell me about the cat,” Nick prompted, grinning despite his impatience with the lab tech’s storytelling methods.

“Someone, it seems, decided to protect their investment.”

Nick’s eyebrows furrowed. “How so?”

“There’s this program for pet owners called Homeward Bound. What owners can do is have the vet implant a little microchip in their pet that when scanned will help identify the animal should it become lost or stolen and turn up at a shelter or vet clinic.”

“The owner microchip-ed it?” They’d lucked out on this one.

Greg gave him a highly amused look that seemed to be saying, “I know something you don’t know,” but the words out of his mouth were, “Well…someone did.”

“Okay, so then what?”

“We ran the number into the pet registry database.”

“And…?”

“Meet Icarus,” Greg introduced him to the kitten, holding him out for Nick to take.

“Icarus, huh?” Nick took the cat from the lab tech. Icarus immediately began batting at the dangling drawstrings for Nick’s sweatshirt hood. “So, what can you tell me about the owner?”

Greg’s grin widened. “You’re going to love this.”

Nick waited for him to continue, but Greg seemed to be waiting for him to say something. “Share the love, Greg.”

Greg chuckled. “All right. It turns out that the owner is someone we all know and love.”

“Who? We didn’t find any pet accessories. In any of the apartments…”

“Well, I somehow don’t think the owner has any.”

Nick looked confused. “What do you mean?”

“I have the feeling that the owner has no idea that he’s the owner.” Greg looked far too amused, which confounded Nick all the more.

“What makes you say that?”

“Icarus, here, is registered to one Nicholas Stokes of 1317 Woodburn Place, Las Vegas, Nevada.”

* * * *

Thanks for reading, please review! Don’t worry, I’ll be getting to the nightshirt as well as the autopsy results in the next chapter or two! As well as a few more surprises (I hope). Later! --Chaos