Author’s Note: So here we are again. Thank you all so much for the awesome reviews, and I really hoped you enjoyed the story.
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By the time Morgan has arrived at the station Garcia was already in interrogation with Hotchner, he had been permitted to go into the observation room and listen in. After listening for a couple of minutes he had wanted to rush into the interrogation room and beat Jameson and Reynolds both, to death for the way they were treating Garcia.
“Come on Ms. Garcia tell us the truth. You help us and we’ll try to help you.” Reynolds spoke from his stances right up against the two-way mirror while Jameson hovered over Garcia.
“But I have told you the truth,” Garcia spoke with conviction as she stared between the two detectives and then over at Hotchner who stood near the only window in the room. Hotchner simply held his usual scowl but remained silent, which only served to piss Morgan off more.
“The whole truth and nothing but the truth is that right?” Jameson asked and then slammed the folder he had been holding down atop the table in front of Garcia, causing her to jump in a fright. “Then explain how you got GSR on your hand!” He raised his voice at her and the tears instantly pour down her face and her lips began to tremble.
“I will not allow you to bully my client Det. Jameson, another stun like that and this interview is over.” Hotchner warned and Jameson threw his hands up and backed away.
“Fine, my apologies Ms. Garcia, but please do enlighten us how did you get GSR on your hand?”
“I don’t know…I don’t even know what that is?” She replied in a shaky voice.
“Is she for real?” The tall leggy blonde who stood in the observation room along with Morgan and the Precinct’s chief, spoke out and Morgan shot her a glare and locked onto her badge which titled her as A.D.A Natalie Whitaker.
“So I take it you don’t believe her.” The Chief said through a chuckle.
“That she’s been working for the FBI for how long, and doesn’t know what GSR is…uh no I’m not buying it and a jury’s not gonna buy it either. So far this looks like a slam dunk case.” Her words angered and worried Morgan but still he stood quietly.
“You work for the FBI but you don’t know what GSR is?” Reynolds asked his voice showing his disbelief.
“Ms. Garcia is only a Technical Analyst not a forensic tech.” Hotchner gave as an answer.
“Damn,” A.D.A. Whitaker cursed and Morgan inwardly smile at the blow the prosecution was just given.
“Garcia,” Hotchner focused onto her and she locked her gaze onto his steely one. “GSR stands for gunshot residue. It’s a substances that’s found on people who have handled or fired and gun. They found some on your hands can you explain how it got there, did you pick up the gun?” She shook her head vehemently.
“No, no I don’t believe in guns. I’m terrified of guns especially after being shot a couple of years ago. I hated that Kevin carried it around all the time, but he insisted. He told me once that he had been attacked, robbed, and severely beaten. He was left in a coma for 6 weeks, after that he got the gun for protection. But I never touched it I swear to God I never did.”
“She was shot?” Whitaker asked the Chief but it was Morgan who answered.
“Yeah, she was doing some side work at the Bureau, on her off time she counsels families of murder victims, and she goes over their cases and keeps them bumped up and open in the FBI’s cold cases database. Well one of the perps whose case she had come across and bumped up to be reviewed again found out what she was doing. So he persued her, pretended to like her, wined her and dined her and then shot her and left her for dead. The guy was in law enforcement, his name was Deputy Jack Clark Battle.” Whitaker groaned at hearing that familiar name, she was very familiar with his case and knew that this information could be another blow in their case against Garcia. This news and the evidence that Lynch had raped her before his death might make Garcia be seen with sympathetic eyes by a jury, and even create a good defense for ‘crime of passion’.
“I remember that case,” The Chief said. “That guy was a real whack job.”
“Garcia I need you to think really hard,” Hotchner spoke out again on the other side of the glass. “Are you sure you didn’t touch the gun or Mr. Lynch.”
“Well I did touch Kevin.” She announced and all ears inside the interrogation room and inside the observation room honed in on her every word then. “He had shot himself but he could have still been alive right? S…so…I went to him to check for a pulse. I know the neck…the jugular is the best place to look but there was so much blood…I couldn’t…so I grabbed his hand…his right hand…”
“Wasn’t the gun in his right hand?” Jameson asked and she shook her head no.
“No it had fallen from his grasp when he shot it, I think it had hit the floor before his did. I don’t know where it landed, but I never touched. I just check him for a pulse but there was none and then I called 911.”
“I’ve heard enough,” A.D.A Whitaker said. “It’s over, tell them that Ms. Garcia’s is free to go. The district attorney’s office will not be filing criminal charges against her.”
“Wait I thought you just said this was a slam dunk case.” The chief protested a bit as Morgan stood staring in disbelief and relief.
“It was until she gave a very plausible explanation as to how she got the residue on her hands, add to that the ‘evidence’ that Mr. Lynch viciously attacked and raped her…AND…she was viciously attacked and shot prior to this. All her lawyer has to say is that Ms. Garcia had flash back of her previous assault, which caused her to have a mental break after Mr. Lynch attacked her, thus leading to his death. After everything she’s already been through the jury is going to look at her and see her as the victim, hell ‘I’ think she’s the victim, so there’s no way in hell I’m gonna convince a jury otherwise. Not with the evidence you’ve given me. So unless you have something else we don’t have a case, so let her go.” With that said she flipped her perfectly styled blonde tresses over her shoulder and stalked from the room. Morgan rushed out after her and made his way to the interrogation room. He threw the door open, startling everyone inside.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing Agent Morgan?” Jameson said in an outrage.
“She’s been released.” Morgan announced with a huge smile.
“What?” The others in the room said in unison.
“The District Attorney’s office tossed it out, the A.D.A. said that there was no case here, Garcia was simply a victim.” Morgan couldn’t stop the gloating ‘I told you so’ tone that crept over his voice.
“You have got to be kidding me.” Reynolds said as he pushed himself from the wall as the Chief entered behind Morgan.
“According to A.D.A. Whitaker this, at the worst, would be deemed as a crime of passion and a case she couldn’t win, because the jury would be too sympathetic given Ms. Garcia’s history.” The Chief declared.
“I don’t understand…what does that mean?” Garcia asked, as she remained seated in her spot. Morgan moved to her and squatted down beside her, he reached up and stroked her cheek and she gazed into his eyes. “It means beautiful that I get to take you home and spoil you rotten for a couple of days, that is if our boss will give us some time off.” Hotchner, who had moved back to the table to gather his paperwork, placing them back in the briefcase he hadn’t used in over 15 years, threw them a smile.
“Take the rest of the week off and I’ll see you both back in the office on Monday.” He closed his briefcase and then exited the room.
“Come on Sweetness, you heard the man and you can expect nothing but pampering by yours truly.” Morgan said as he stood and grasped her cuffed hands and pulled her to her feet. “Get these things off of her.” He barked out and Reynolds first looked to Jameson who nodded, and then pulled out his keys and unlocked the cuffs. Garcia sighed in relief as she rubbed at her sore and slightly raw wrists. Morgan grasped them in his larger hands and began to rub. “Can we get her things out of holding so we can go, please?”
“Yeah we have to take her over to booking, so she can sign some paperwork.” Jameson said begrudgingly. “You can wait here. This way Ms. Garcia.” Just as Morgan was about to ask why he couldn’t join her in booking his cell rang out.
“Go ahead babygirl, I’ll be right here waiting for you.” She nodded and then followed the two detectives out. Morgan opened his phone.
“Yeah Morgan,”
“Morgan its Reid, I just wanted to let you know we’ve gone over everything evidence wise and it all looks solid. There was nothing out of the ordinary, except I did find one bit strange…Although I’m not surprised the forensics office missed it, it was so minute only a trained…”
“Whoa, slow your roll Reid,” Morgan cut into what he was sure would have been a long uninteresting educational reference that Reid loved to make, which Morgan believed Reid only did just to show off the knowledge inside of that big brain of his. “Look man, Garcia’s been release and there’s not gonna be any charges filed, the case has been closed.”
“That’s great…Guys Morgan said the charges against Garcia has been dropped and she’s coming home.” Reid relayed the message to the others and Morgan could hear them cheering in the background. “Uh…Prentiss wants to know if you’re bring her straight here, she wants us all to go out and celebrate.”
“Naw not tonight, I’m taking my girl home with me. Hotch has given us the rest of the week off.”
“What?” Reid spoke out and Morgan could almost see the childish pout that he was sure was on the younger man’s face, he even pictured Reid stomping his feet and he had to chuckled.
“That’s right, five days and four night I get to spend with my babygirl, but tell Prentiss that if Garcia feels up to a night out we’ll call you guys. And please emphasize the ‘we’ll call you’, meaning we’ll call you don’t call us, understand.” Morgan said as he continued chuckling his mood higher than it had been in days.
“Yeah, yeah,” Reid grumbled out.
“By the way Reid, you were saying that you found something odd, what was it?” Morgan asked his curiosity getting the better of him.
“Hmmm, oh yes it was the amount of GSR found on both Garcia and Lynch, it seemed backwards.” Reid furnished.
“What do you mean?” Morgan asked needing clarification as he gazed across the busy precinct until his eyes landed on Garcia who stood in the booking area talking with Jameson and signing some paperwork.
“Well, there wasn’t much GSR found on Lynch’s hand at least not the usual amounts one would expect to find on a person with a self inflicted gunshot wound, whereas Garcia had quite a lot on her hands, particularly the left one, which isn’t really consistent with someone who simply got some transfer of GSR on them. So I suspect that the forensics office that ran these test screwed up got things backwards. So I’m gonna contact them have them run it aga…”
“No!” Morgan barked out harsher than he had intended. “No, it’s over besides it’s not even our case, not even a case period so just lock the reports in my desk for me and I’ll see you on Monday alright.”
“Ok,” Reid replied as he shrugged and then hung up the phone. Morgan pulled the phone from his ear and closed it; all the while he stared at Garcia, his babygirl, and wondered if she had been telling the truth about what happened to Lynch. Had she shot Lynch, was she capable of that? The profiler in him truly wanted to solve the mystery and learn the truth but the man that he was only wanted to protect her by any means necessary. So he concluded that if she had really shot Lynch it was no less than he had deserved, no less than what he himself would have done after learning what he did to Garcia. So on Monday he intended to shred the reports, confident that there was no one on the police force with the knowledge and IQ of Dr. Spencer Reid, who could discover the same anomaly. He knew that the case would remain closed and Garcia would be safe. The intense look he had been holding on his face melted the instant he saw her looking back at him, she waved him over and with a smile on his lips and no more worries on his mind he made his way to her.
THE END!!!!