Chapter 1: Calls

Walsh groaned as he was woken by his phone ringing, he rolled over in his bed – it was cold and empty. He answered the phone with a grunt and looked at his watch it was half past five in the morning. It must be work.

"Walsh I'm outside can you let me in?" Casey's voice questioned urgently. He slurred a reply and dragged himself out of bed. He jogged though to the diner, she rushed in before he'd even got the door open properly.

"Wooo easy there tiger" He started to joke, but after locking the door he turned and saw her face. She was pale, breathing shallowly and her eyes were wide with fear. "Casey what the hell is wrong?", he stepped towards her but she backed away, so he held his hands up to show he meant no harm. She was on the verge of tears, eyes darting to the long windows to the almost empty street beyond. "Shall we go through to the back?" He suggested, she nodded allowing him to move past her to lead the way, he noticed she was shaking.

Once in the apartment – if you could call it that, Casey sat on the end of his bed, he squatted in front of her and pulled his blanket around her shoulders.

"Casey you have to tell me what's wrong!"

"I've been having these phone calls. Weird calls, and post – odd letters and gifts in my mail box. Usually the calls are in the day and they are just messages. But whoever it is has phoned six times in the last couple of hours, and..." She trailed off panicking. Walsh rubbed her shoulders

"Breathe – slowly that's it!" He encouraged.

"He phoned about twenty minutes ago – he knew what pyjamas I was wearing and he said he'd taken some stuff from my apartment. I checked and it was gone – he's been in there!" the tears spilt from her eyes down her cheeks. Jason just pulled her to him until the sobbing lessened.

"Have you tried tracing the calls?"

"Yeah – tech' said they came from an unregistered cell. I thought it was just something random, but he knows my name, address and personal stuff."

"You should have called me, I'd have come straight over"
"I just had to get out of my apartment, I pulled some clothes on and ran"

"Yeah, but he could have been" Jason stopped himself before he finished, not wanting to scare her, but she was ahead of him.

"I didn't think he could have been outside the apartment until I got here, that's why I was so desperate to get inside – in case he'd followed me!" She tried to explain, standing up abruptly. Casey rubbed her forehead with her hand, her whole body was trembling. She was used to tense and dangerous situations at work; but this was her personal life. Walsh grabbed her into a tight hug, rubbing her back and hair trying to soothe her; he had never seen her so on edge.

"I'm going to make you some tea to calm you down and then we'll have a proper think about who could be doing this before we go into the precinct." He explained, before settling her back on to the edge of the bed and heading towards the diner. He found himself casting furtive glances out of the windows, in case the man had followed her. The glare alone could have put the fear of god into most criminals. When he went back to his rooms, he found Casey curled up asleep in a ball, but her face looked anything but peaceful.

The pair had managed to get into work for just after eight; Walsh had called the tech department and asked them to trace calls made to Casey's home number after she had fallen asleep. She had managed a restless few hours of sleep, frequently starting in her dreams and mumbling incoherent words. Every time she stirred Jason moved to stroke her back or forehead to soothe her while she slept, he was surprised she hadn't mentioned the nuisance calls before now. But what surprised him even more was how much he cared about her, how angry her discomfort was making him. As the sun was rising over the city he had finally confronted the truth in his mind. He no longer cared for Casey Shraeger as just a partner.

Jason was on the phone when Casey returned from the bathroom; he looked tense as he replaced the receiver.

"They traced the last few calls made to your phone. They came from the phone box outside your apartment." He said quietly, he thought she took it quite well considering. She didn't scream or cry or shout, she just shook her head. "I think we need to talk to Sergeant Brown" She agreed. It was a strange meeting with their boss, he was genuinely very concerned. He insisted that she did not leave the precinct for any reason and that she should stay in a hotel until they had at least some idea of what was happening. Walsh readily agreed to play the body guard as necessary. Whilst other members of the team were assigned various tasks associated with finding out who was responsible for the harassment.

Banks and Delahoy returned from some enquiries just after lunchtime with a package. Delahoy walked over to Shraeger's desk and smiled awkwardly.

"We errrr, we went to the phone box, see if we could find anything. This was in there addressed to you." He handed her a brown package that had been ripped open at one end.

"So you thought you'd open it!" Walsh said raising his eyebrows angrily

"Well it could have been a bomb or anything; we thought we should check it out first. We are guessing it's yours though." Delahoy tried to explain quickly to appease Walsh who looked furious.

"Thanks I appreciate it" Casey smiled slightly, also sensing her partner's anger. She shook the contents out onto her desk. A black bra fell out along with some red and white rose petals and a square of paper that read 'I took this as well'. She gasped audibly.

"Is it yours?" Walsh added rounding the desks to stand beside her and put a hand on her shoulder. She managed a nod in reply. As Delahoy walked away, Walsh got right up to his face and whispered menacingly "If I get a whiff of any jokes about this, one sly comment about her cup size, anything. I will hurt you – do you understand?"

"I wouldn't do that man come on. She's one of us!" Delahoy emphasised. Walsh checked himself.

"No I know – I'm sorry!" Walsh conceded, running a hand through his short hair.