The title-There's no place like home

Result: Our Experiment was a success!
Wow, I want to thank everyone who helped write our Sunday Scribblings story!
I am so happy that so many had fun doing this. I think it is a pretty good story. Here it is all together. I tried to separate each comment, so you can tell where the author changes. Hope you re- read it. Tell me what you think.


As Kristen was driving home from work, she just couldn't get the memories of her childhood home out of her mind.
Selling that place last year was the most difficult thing she had to do after burying her cherished mother. She had wanted to drive by the old house so often, but couldn't bring herself to go there. It was too emotional. 31 out of her 32 years were spent living there alone with Mom. The word home would always bring her mind back to 333 Shamrock road. Oddly today, She was able to push Her emotions aside. The house was calling her to visit. She got off at the old exit and took the familiar short cuts, just to take another glimpse and perhaps reminisce some more. As She approached the street, Kristen saw police cars everywhere. She noticed yellow caution tape surrounding her old home. She hesitantly stepped out of her car....
She felt her heart beat speed up and a sense of dread flooded her mind. Oh my god she thought, the young couple who had bought the home seemed so nice and particularly devoted to each other. Oh no she thought, I hope nothing has happened to either of them.
Before she could take a step toward the commotion in the front yard, a man walked up to her. Though he was not in uniform, something about him screamed to Kristen that he was a cop. She didn't trust the police since what had happened to her dad so long ago. And she never would. He was a slight man and had close-cropped red hair. Approaching her, he removed a pair of very dark sunglasses to reveal cold, steely blue eyes. Without extending his hand, he said in a monotone voice, "I am Lieutenant Horatio Caine, CSI, did you know the deceased?
He didn't want to be attracted to him. She didn't trust him, that's for sure. Yet his blue eyes seem to read her soul. Kristen was a little freaked out, not just from the police cars but from this officers steady gaze.
She knew right then the officer was a Scorpio. These days Kristen seemed to be surrounded by them, with their piercing eyes following her everywhere. Bummer, not another one, she thought to herself.
She was a bit confused when he showed her his shield, which read Miami CSI, since they were standing in Hempstead, Long Island. "Aren't you a little out of your jurisdiction, Detective?" she asked. As he put his glasses back on, even though it was night, he answered in the same measured tone, "I have a personal investment in this case."
Just then they were approached by one of the uniform officers on the scene...
"You are going to have to step back folks.. We need to secure the scene." he said as he shuffled them back toward the sidewalk..
kristen could tell from the manner in which he herded them both out of the way of the investigation,, that the uniformed officer had no clue that the mysterious miami detective was a detective at all...
come to think of it,, other than "the shield" he had produced for her eyes only,,, neither did she..
Kristen held up her hand as if to warn him she was unstoppable. She walked right up to the yellow tape and limbo'd her way under it and into the yard. She heard the detective stuttering and stammering behind her as she moved faster.

The front door gaped a black hole in the dead center of the wraparound porch.
As she moved toward the open door she could hear music playing in the back of the house, in the kitchen, where she spent Saturday mornings dancing with her mom.
Odd she thought, this music wasn't familiar at all, it was Celtic music, the high-pitched fiddling sent shrills down her back. Is this a sign she wondered.
She sensed someone behind her, the hairs on the back of her neck and the goose bumps rose, she gasped at the feel of a hand in the small of the back. The breath in her ear made her stomach lurch as the halitosis wafted, she struggled to decipher the whispered words over the din, the room plunged into darkness, then ... silence!
She had watched a lot of television and did not understand why the crime scene would be dark. Then she realized what had happened. Son of a bitch! she was blind. Then she realized the words that were whispered, "Hey lady, you are standing in my crime scene. Are you blind?" It was the red headed stranger, but though his breath smelled like she imagined Willie Nelson's would, it was the Miami detective's unmistakable voice.
No, no. None of this could be right, she thought. Maybe that little snort of brandy in her last coffee at work had combined with daily dose of Benadryl to make her confused-- wobbly-- and... Strangely short of breathe. She reached out her hand expecting to come in contact with the disturbingly attractive detective but instead she felt something soft. The air suddenly seemed to fill with the haunting scent of gardenias wrapping itself in cloying fingers around her slim neck. She gasped, her eyelids fluttered and suddenly the blinding infusion of sunlight stung her eyes.
Lieutenant Horatio Caine put his hand on her shoulder and asked "Are you okay Miss? What are you doing here?" Kristen felt the room spinning, She said "Im sorry, This was my home, What has happened here?"......
The local police had a call from one of the neighbors informing us that they had heard two people yelling at one another and then followed by gunshots. I was listening on the police scanner in my home and recognized the address.....333 Shamrock....." replied the terribly sexy CSI Miami police guy.

"Someone was MURDERED???!" asked Kristen with shock in her voice. Quickly she added...."Why is this address familiar to you?? I live here for over 30 years, and I don't recall ever meeting you. Should I know who you are?"
"I can't go into details, Ma'am," the detective replied. "Let me walk you to your car. This isn't MY crime scene. As I mentioned, I have a personal interest in this particular location."

What is he talking about, Kristin thought. I've lived her most of my life, and I've never seen him before! What interest could he have in MY home?

Something about this situation just wasn't right. It didn't add up, but the investigator in Kristin reminded her that SHE would find out what the connection was. Why was he so... familiar? Intriguing? And what had happened in HER home? Were the man and woman who bought the place the victims? Victims of whom? She had hundreds of questions racing in her mind.
She allowed the detective to escort her outside, but once on the sidewalk, she mumbled a thank you and hurried alone to her car to watch the action.
As she sat in car a lady came up to her window. She recognized her as Mary O'Reilly from across the street. Mary said, "Hi Kristen, what is going on? I just got home and saw all the commotion. I knew something bad was going to happen in this house. Something was going on with that couple. Hey, what is Horatio doing here? I haven't seen him in town since........."
he was busted for pirating Gucci purses. Don't be lured in by that guy Kristen he is so smooth, I was once beguiled by his charm." just then one of her kids hollered for her, she quickly bolted saying her good-byes on the run.
Kirsten put the key in the ignition but couldn't bring herself to turn it. Sitting there she tried to absorb all that had just transpired....hmmm she thought for a second ....the Celtic music, Horatio, the handsome detective with the red hair. Then she remembered the person in the green suit. He was peeping in a a basement window just a few houses down. She spied him as she drove into the neighborhood.
Or could it have just been a kid conversing at the window to another. But why would a kid be bending down by a window in a suit at night she wondered.
Could it have been a shrub, she began to doubt whether she'd even seen a person in a green suit. She was pretty emotional driving into the neighborhood, with all the memories of her childhood flooding back. It had been a long hard day at work. She was worried she may have misconstrued the vision.
But she desperately wanted to speak with the hunky detective again. Should she continue on or tell him what she thought she saw. She paused for a moment to get her faculties then.... Kristen decided that since there was little if any suspicion on her it'd be best if she just left the scene now. The nice handsome widower would call her when the coast was clear and she'd be able to move back into HER house!
She couldn't believe it. He'd actually gone through with it.
She'd felt an immediate attraction to him from the first time she showed her house to Nate and his wife. She knew he felt it too. On the pretext of discussing a new offer on the house, they met for coffee. Coffee led to a motel room. The motel room became a fixture on her weekly calendar. But now, he'd done it. His wife was out of the way.
Just then, Kristen's cell phone began to vibrate inside her back pocket. Then the opening bars of Clapton's "I Shot the Sheriff" began to play.
The music jolted Kristen to her senses. She looked up suddenly to see the detective peeking in her window.
"Gee, I wonder if he heard that," she wondered. She made a mental note to change her ring tone, first chance she got.
"Got a minute?" he asked. "I have a few more questions to ask you.”
Kristen began to tremble. There was something eerie about this detective with his dark glasses. Who wears dark glasses at night? What was he trying to hide, or was this just another ploy to confuse her and intimidate her? Was this some sort of experiment in new police procedures? Fine she thought to herself. Two can play this game. She quickly reached into her purse, pulled out her D&G sunglasses and slipped them into place.

Gracefully she turned, opened her car door and stepped out onto the pavement.

"My pleasure detective. Ask away. Anything I can do to help, you know I'm agreeable."

Detective Caine looked at Kristen in her sunglasses and thought.....
. . she's used to charming her way out of anything. The pretty ones always do.

Caine took off his sunglasses, eyes piercing through the darkness of Kristen's shades.

"I was just wondering how long you've driven that car."
Kristen Shaw Knew he was side stepping his real question. She said "What do you really want to know detective?"He thought- "I know this beautiful chick is trying to hide something"... He tried to sound casual but he abruptly asked " Tell me, how well do you know the victims husband... Nate?" Kristen felt the blood rush to her face, she wondered where Nate was right now? Memories of her Mom floated into her head, she wished she had her pills with her... Detective Caine impatiently pressed her for an answer....
She debated whether being honest would be in her best or worst interest.
"Uhhh, well, why does that matter?" she asked with a feathered blink to her lashes.

"You know as well as I do, you were always the most coveted girl in town, don't pretend. Now, answer me how WELL did you know him?"

Kristen stood in a state of paralysis, staring at the floor. The detective reached out grabbed her chin and made her face him. He leaned in real close. Close enough to rub his words right up to her ears. He pressed hard and repeated his question so as to wake her from her stupor. He was intoxicating, yet Nate's memory was haunting her. It would be a relief to reveal it all right now.
The bright sunlight streamed in and she woke up shocked and shaking. She couldn't separate this nightmare from her reality. She reached over to the nightstand and clumsily found her medication. Kristen then proceeded downstairs, down into the dark unfinished basement that used to scare her as a small child. Her cherished mother used this damp dark cellar as a punishment for little crying, misbehaving girls. Kristen spent much of her precious childhood terrified here. Now, In her mud caked nightgown from the night before, she began again.... Shoveling dirt over and over onto the experimental grave of her recently bludgeoned buried mother.