Sara had snagged Brass from Warrick. With a little help from Greg she had been able to find a single distributor, in a hundred mile radius, of Carfentanil and tracked down a half dozen Veterinarian clinics that carried the stuff. The distributor had been relatively helpful supplying Sara with a list of vets that had purchased the drug over the last year.
“Well, what was that number three, “Brass asked trying to break the thick silence that hung in the air between him and Sara. The girl was in what Brass liked to call the Sara Zone. It was the same zone she got into when a case involved a battered woman or kid. It was a hyper focus that no criminal should ever want to fall under.
Sara turned her head to look at Brass an almost annoyed look on her face. “What?” she asked.
If Jim Brass was a less confident man he might have withered under Sara’s stern look but he wasn’t and what’s more he had worked with Sara long enough to know what was going on behind those dark, angry eyes. She was working the case. From every angle her mind could dream up she was working this case. The fact that it involved Gil Grissom only added to the black fire that burned behind her gaze.
These assholes have no idea who they’ve pissed off! “We’ve checked out three vets so far, that leaves three more, right?” Brass asked pulling onto a gravel drive that led to a series of horse stables.
Realizing she was frowning at Brass, Sara relaxed her features. “This is number four.” She said looking down at the paper in front of her. She knew the information by heart, having read it over and over again in the hopes of gleaning any useful information from the page but Sara needed the disruption in eye contact. She felt raw and exposed to everyone. She knew it was probably not the case but it did not make it any easier. Her emotions were vibrating, barely under check. Sara wanted to scream and weep and scream some more but knew this would not help him.
Ahh, Griss, where are you? Sara’s mind begged.
“What’s the guy’s name?” Brass asked parking and stepping out of the car. His hand instinctively tapped the badge hanging from his suit coat pocket. It was a cop habit. Check your piece, check your badge, and cover your ass.
“Dr. Esteban Molina, D-V-M” Sara replied shutting her car door and surveying the area. The place was called Enderly Stables, a posh little playground for the rich and restless. Part boarding stables, part race track with a healthy splash of country club thrown in for good measure, it was not where most people would search for a suspect in a abduction and murder but Sara knew how the real world worked. It took all sorts of sickos to make it turn round and round, even super rich ones.
Brass stopped a passing stable boy and asked him where they could find the doctor in question.
“Office is at the end of this stable here,” the lanky teen said pointing in the direction that Brass and Sara were to take.
Brass gave the kid a smile and a quick “thanks” not having much time for anything else since Sara was making quick work of the distance with her long, purposeful strides.
“Why don’t you let me handle the questions,” Brass said, knocking on the screen door to the office they had been directed to.
Sara turned her intense gaze on Brass and he was never more thankful for a pair of sunglasses then he was right then. He held up a hand in a gesture that said “don’t shoot – friend”
“Come in!”
Brass pulled the screen door open and peaked his head in. There was no outward sign of danger, so he held the door open for Sara.
The office was a simple affair. A chest high counter separated the small room with a few chairs lining the wall near the door and a desk on the opposite side of the counter. On the walls were various pictures of a man, presumably Dr. Molina, with several different horses, jockeys and owners. Some were signed some not.
“Can I help you?” said a small elderly man entering from a door behind the desk area. He was wiping his hands on a towel, having apparently just washed them.
“Are you Dr. Esteban Molina?” Brass asked the man as he pulled his notebook from his inner pocket.
The man looked from Brass, the gold shield hanging in plain sight to Sara who could have easily passed herself off as a mob enforcer, save for the vest with FORENSICS stitched across it.
“Yeeesss,” the man answered a little warily.
Don’t worry about me, man, it’s her you have to worry about!
“Dr. Molina, I’m Captain Jim Brass from the Las Vegas P.D. this is Sara Sidle from Criminalistics.”
Tossing the hand towel onto the cluttered desk, Dr. Molina stepped forward to shake Brass’s hand. “How can I help you, captain?”
Sara watched as Brass explained how they had gotten the veterinarian’s name and then proceeded to ask the man several questions that would slowly lead up to Carfentanil and did he have any? She couldn’t picture this man being able to overpower Grissom. Dr. Molina was probably on the downward slide to seventy, was all of 5 foot nothing and might weigh in at 110 pounds if she loaded his pockets with rocks. Her instincts told her this was another dead end but her training told her to exhaust every lead.
“Yes, I have Carfentanil” Molina gestured for them to follow him. “It is a tranquilizer.”
Brass and Sara followed the little man through the door that he had entered. Adjacent to the tiny office and on the backside of the stables was a paddock for the horses and an examining area.
“What’s through those doors?” Sara asked pointing to a set of double white doors with small darkened windows.
“Operating room,” Dr. Molina answered as they came to stand in front a set of heavy metal cabinets. On the front of the cabinets some one had fabricated a two inch wide, half inch thick metal strap with a place to put a heavy padlock. Pulling some keys from his khaki slacks, the elderly man opened the metal cabinets for Brass and Sara to inspect.
“I keep all my pharmaceuticals locked here and I or one of my assistants takes inventory once a week.”
Brass was impressed and it showed with the arch of his brow and the twist of his lips.
Dr. Molina saw his expression and added, “Rich kids- you wouldn’t believe what they’ll try for a high!”
Sara tilted her head to one side in a silent agreement. “The Carfentanil?” she asked.
“No and I just recently had to use one on a mare, not more than a week and a half ago.” Molina scratched his head in thought. “You know…”
Sara stopped her “CSI stalking” at the doctor’s unfinished sentence. “Yes,” she tried to miter her speech as to not seem to impatient.
The little man pushed the silver framed glasses high onto the bridge of his nose, he was obviously trying to recollect some tidbit of information but Sara was close to violence. WHAT, DAMN IT!
“The Carfentanil, in fact all my tranquilizer stock has been untampered with since last summer but I did have a shortage of Naltrexone about three month ago.”
If she hadn’t had the dark sunglasses on the two men would have seen the spark go off in her dark brown eyes. “Naltrexone that’s like Naloxone, right?”
Dr. Molina smiled at her, obviously impressed by her knowledge. “Yes, very much so. Carfentanil is 10,000 times more potent than morphine, very dangerous stuff, that is why it is not meant for humans but accidents can happen so that is why I have the Naltrexone.”
Sara’s mind was racing. The perpetrators may not have gotten their tranquilizers from the good doctor but may have gotten their just-in-case antidote. Greg was right, Good boy Greg, Sara silently sang a thousand praises for the young CSI.
“Could we get a list of all the staff and employees that may have had access to your facilities doctor?” Sara asked bluntly.
Brass pursed his lips and gave a nonchalant nod. It sounded like Sara was on to something, so a list sounded good to him. “If you think we’ll need a warrant doc…” Brass let the sentence die off but the meaning was clear.
As it was, the elderly veterinarian was more than willing to facilitate their request. “I don’t see a problem with that. I take it you will want the list to go back as far as the missing Naltrexone?”
Brass winked at Sara, “That would be just fine doc.”
Sara left Brass to hunt down the list with the doctor as she made her way back to the car. She needed a moment to catch her breath and collect her thoughts. Investigations were a lot like a crazy game of Red Light-Green Light. Sometimes it was go, go, go and some times it was a lot of stopping and starting or as Grissom said, running to stand still.
Sara opened the passenger side door and threw her folder onto the seat. She felt like she was pulsating with pent-up energy and sitting would not help.
Had it only been three days ago that she and Grissom had thrown her sleeping bag on her living room floor, ate popcorn and peanuts, drank beer from plastic cups and watched the Oakland A’s and Yankees battle it out on the diamond. Most men rooted for a favorite team, Gil Grissom rooted for baseball as a philosophy.
Sara had laughed at him, with his rapt expression as a graphic filled the screen relating all the statistics of the teams. For her transgression he begun tossing popcorn at her. Sara, never one to shrink from battle, matched him kernel for kernel until the bowl was empty. She had laughed until her eyes had been ensnared by his and then all thoughts of popcorn battles and baseball games were lost in an incendiary frenzy of lips and limbs.
With every passing second that Grissom was missing, Sara felt as if her heart was becoming heavier exponentially. Most of the time she felt as if her autonomic system had failed her and she had to think to breathe and have her heart beat. Sara was not known as a sleeper and could count on one finger the number of hours she had slept since she had walked into Grissom’s townhouse two nights ago and eating, well who knew.
Sara watched an antsy colt pass by the front of Brass’s car, the girl holding the lead trying desperately to calm the animal. I know how you feel buddy!
“Here’s the list,” Brass said waving the piece of paper in the air. “For an old coot he’s got a pretty good memory, probably got twenty-five names here.”
Sitting down in the car Sara said “Twenty-five names?”
Brass looked at Sara and turned the ignition on, “Yea, gave me vets, techs, assistants, delivery personnel, drivers, the works! When we get back I am going to have Sofia help us run some of these names down”
Sara simply nodded. At least she felt like there had been some forward momentum in the case and that was a hell of lot better than the entire lateral moving they had been doing on this case.
*******
Grissom sat in the darkness, his ears straining to hear any movement or sound. His best calculations he had been in his prison for four to five days, depending on how long he had been out of it in the beginning. He still had no recollection of how he had gotten to this little corner of hell and on his list of questions he needed answers to it was down a ways. Any information would be helpful of course but most of his top priority questions involved how to get himself lose and away from his captors.
As far as he had seen, there were six of them but he knew there was at least one or two that had remained out of sight. Grissom wasn’t complaining, he thought the six that did come and visit him were six too many. His tormentors had set up a nice little schedule for him to follow and the short version was his ass got kicked regularly. Early on he had figured out that they would lay in wait until he succumbed to his exhaustion and then burst in with fists swinging and boots kicking. They had given him water, sparingly, but had yet to bring him any food. Grissom surmised this was to keep him in a weakened state and for fatigue to set in more regularly.
It’s all mind games, Grissom had guessed early on, not very imaginative but effective. His mind although tired was still sharp but his nerves were starting to fray. He found himself jumping at the slightest sound and occasionally he would catch himself twitching for no reason. To help calm his nerves he would try and think up complex problems for his mind to work on as a diversion in between thoughts of escape and the mystery of why he was there.
If his nerves were shot his body was not in much better shape. Grissom was pretty certain he had swelled into one giant bruise by now. He had a number of cuts to his face and hands, the two smaller toes on his left foot had been broken by a stomping combat boot and he was fairly confident that he would be urinating blood before long. All in all I can honestly say I want the hell out of here! Grissom thought.
It was night; he knew it because of the total lack of any light. During the day, light shone dimly through the joints in the metal roof above and under the door that remained agonizingly out of his reach. He also knew it was night because the temperature had dropped drastically. While the suns rays oozed into his prison through cracks and crevices so did the sweltering heat. Sweat would plaster his clothes to his body and drip from his forehead to mix with the dried blood caked to his face to make tiny rivulets of pale red.
Leaning his head back against the wall he was resting on, Grissom sighed. His fatigue made his thoughts disjointed. He had tested the length of his chain during the day and had not been able to reach anything that he could use to extricate himself. That could change, he reminded himself as he ran his hands through his dirty hair.
I wonder how the team is holding up. Nick’s kidnapping had really been difficult. Grissom thought about Nick, buried in his transparent coffin. At least I’m not buried, he thought thankfully. His mind called up the faces of his coworkers, his friends and he smiled in the dark only to be reminded of his split lip.
Catherine is probably doing a George Patton on the whole lab. Cracking heads, saying to hell with names and getting the job done. How could he have ever known that the brash, strawberry-blonde former stripper-turned lab tech-turned CSI would end up becoming his closest friend? They were as different as any two people could be. He was a creature of the lab; she was born of the world and all its wonderments. Catherine had kept him tenuously connected to life over the years and she generally did it by being up in his face. He, in turn, had become her mentor in all things CSI and her rock of stability.
Catherine had been the one to wait for him while he had his surgery, to tell him that he was part of the CSI family whether he liked it or not, and she had been the catalyst for the plant. Sara, her face came crashing through his mind like she had through all his emotional barriers. What are you doing now? Probably drinking gallons of coffee, not sleeping and not eating, he thought in rebuke. How many times had he chased her out of the lab with the command, “go home and get some sleep”?
Ah Sara, his Sara. Had he ever had a chance to withstand her? No, he’d been lost from the moment she had walked into Vegas and all his resistance began to fade away the moment that he held her as she cried for a childhood lost. It wasn’t one event that had brought them together but a culmination of several. The Debbie Marlin case, Sara’s near DUI and run in with Catherine and Ecklie had all chipped away at his resolve. But the precipice from which he knew his heart could never com back had been on a stormy night, when a psychopath had held her life in his hands and he had watched helplessly locked away from her.
It was amazing how easy they had segued from one type of relationship to another. But then it had always been there just under the surface, that constant crackle, that magnetism that kept them continuously orbiting one another. At times he felt completely exposed and was certain everyone in the lab could see right through him and Sara
They had kept their personal life and their professional life completely separate. Partly because he and Sara were both two very, intensely private people but also because it made work easier. There were no unwarranted comments about him playing favorites or of Sara trying to sleep her way to the top. Grissom had laughed at the last when Sara had brought it up, if anyone was delusional enough to think they would get to the top by sleeping with me, they were in for a rude awakening! I barely keep myself from committing professional suicide most days.
His body was sore and his mind was becoming duller as the exhaustion took its toll. To comfort himself he thought of happy times and his team; Nick and Warrick razzing Greg, Catherine playfully giving him a hard time and Sara. Grissom suddenly wondered what day it was. He and Sara had planned to go to the lake for the weekend. Was it Friday night? Grissom tried to recollect what day it was that he was kidnapped. Tuesday, maybe? Yes, Tuesday morning.
Grissom sighed for his and Sara’s lost weekend. Sara was going to help him frame the wrap around porch on the house that he had been in the process of remodeling for ten years. He remembered when he had come out to re-roof the house the previous summer. It had come up in a casual conversation between him and Sara and what he had wanted to do for the weekend. When Sara had offered to help, Grissom had accepted just so he could spend time with her. When he realized she could moonlight as a roofer as well as a mechanic, he knew he’d have to keep a closer eye on her. No man in the world could resist a beautiful woman that could swing a hammer or rebuild a chevy 350 in a weekend.
He smiled wanly with his thoughts of Sara as he tiredly pulled on the chain attached to his ankle. It was simple defiance born on hope that maybe the next time would be his lucky break. Sometimes that is all anyone has, a lucky break.
*******
Passing the layout room, Catherine noticed Greg hunkered over the long, rectangular table that took up the center of the room. He was lost in thought as he studied his evidence, not noticing Catherine enter behind him.
“Greg, what ya have?” Catherine asked sauntering up to the table to look at what had the young man so preoccupied.
On the table Greg had tacked a map of the greater Las Vegas area. Circling the map he had begun to place various 5x7 photographs, connecting them to the map with black lines made by marker.
“Based on description, time and location I was able to come up with four vans that might be our suspect or” Greg ran his hand through his long locks in partial frustration “has nothing to do with anything.”
Greg had numbered the vans one through four and color coded them as he had mapped their movements using the traffic cameras that littered the various intersections of Las Vegas.
“Van number one shows up at Dorchester and Nimble, I think it may have come from the Gas and Sip so I will check them out after I am done here. The van follows Dorchester east until LaPrada, disappears for six blocks and then show up on east Sahara.” Greg followed the van’s route along the map on the table with his forefinger. “It looks like the driver did some gambling, got on I-15 south and I lose it shortly after that. The plus to van1 is that Archie was able to pull a license plate number for me. I checked on the number and it belongs to a water softening company AquaSoft, Sofia’s checking it out.”
Catherine poked out her lower lip as she nodded her head, impressed at Greg’s tracking skills.
“What about the other vans?” She asked pointed to the picture of the van labeled number two.
“Two is a dry cleaning van, Vega checked the business out and the owners and it looks like it is on the up and up. This one” Greg pointed to van number four’s picture “is a plumber by the name of Jorge Magee.”
Greg caught Catherine’s dubious gaze out of the corner of his eye. “I know but I swear that’s the dude’s name,” Greg grinned having thought the plumber’s name sounded like a trendy bar.
“Does Magee look clean?” Catherine asked as she began checking out van number three’s route on Greg’s map.
“Yea, he was doing work a couple blocks from Grissom’s, putting in a hot tub for some couple.” Greg tapped the picture of the remaining van. “This is the one that I can’t get any info on. Archie was able to pull the first two numbers off the license plate off of one of the camera shots but hasn’t been able to find anything else. I checked with DMV and there are sixteen possibles that match the make, model and have a license plate that starts with QF.”
“Sixteen!” Catherine leaned a hip against the table and looked at Greg incredulously.
“Tell me about it,” Greg complained “the one good thing is that seven of those vans belong to a discount flooring business, Warrick is checking on the business, owner, employees.” Greg rocked his head back and forth as he listed off the various and obvious leads that Warrick would be checking on.
“That still leaves nine,” Catherine said, still not believing there could be that many similar vans.
Greg sucked in a weary breath, letting out slowly as he got ready to map van number three’s known route. “The closest traffic cam to Grissom’s townhouse is Mayhew and Valencourt,” Greg pointed to the intersection. “The interesting thing is that the van actually shows up two days before Grissom disappearance and is seen there every day, including the day Grissom disappeared but is not seen anywhere in the area after that day,” Greg raised an eyebrow at Catherine that was disturbingly a lot like Grissom. Catherine had to actually do a double take to make sure Greg had not grown salt and pepper curls, blue eyes or a world weary smirk.
“What’s its route?” Catherine asked as she studied the map on the table.
Using his index finger Greg traced what route they did know along the roads of the map. “I can’t find it again once it hits I-15,” Greg informed her dejectedly before perking up “but I can tell you there are two guys in the van. One looks to be short and stocky, the other one seems tall, average build.”
Catherine didn’t feel like bursting Greg’s momentary bubble so she did not mention that the description was pretty slim, instead, “Well, it gives us a little more to go on. Good work Greg, why don’t you check with Warrick and get back to me when you know something.”
Greg gave her a quick nod before bouncing out the door to head out and meet up with Warrick. Catherine wasn’t going to hold her breath on flooring company vans. Her gut told her the van that had slipped through their investigation thus far was the one piece of evidence they were looking for. Glancing at one of Greg’s photos, Catherine looked at the grainy faces of the two unknown men. Could Grissom be in the back of that van? Catherine wondered as she stared at the photograph. With a heavy sigh she decided to check up on Nick and see where he was at on the investigation.
*******
Markus Bathory folded the piece of paper he was reading and placed it gently upon the table in front of him. He had read it many times in the year since he had received. He really did not know why he even pulled it out and read the thing since he could recite it verbatim. It was the last letter his brother had sent him before his conviction, before he had been taken away from him, locked behind stone and steel.
Markus knew what it was that Richard had been accused, arrested and convicted of. He even knew that Richard was guilty, guilty of that crime and many more like them. But Markus did not care about guilt or innocence for that matter, he cared for Richard, everything else was superfluous motion and noise like a gentle breeze through tree tops-there but not there.
Richard could not help who and what he was anymore than our mother could, Markus had long ago rationalized. Of course if Markus was honest with himself, which he generally was, he’d have to admit that he had enjoyed some of Richard’s “games” as well. He wasn’t into the cult of personality that Richard enjoyed with his followers but there were other attributes to Richard’s proclivities that Markus found very enticing.
Markus was well aware of his sadistic leanings and penchant for young women. When he was a young boy he had enjoyed watching his father operate on animals, had been fascinated by the shiny sterile tools, the thrashing of the animal and the fear in their eyes before the sedatives would take effect. Once he had purposely given a wounded dog a saline solution rather than the pain killer his father had requested. When his father cut into the unlucky animal Markus had used is well practiced look of detachment to hide his enjoyment of the animals suffering.
Like Richard, Markus enjoyed control. Unlike Richard, Markus practiced it. It was lack of control and discipline that first put Richard on the police radar. He had allowed his obsession to control him. Instead of turning his eye to another girl or boy he had hyper-fixated on Jessica Fielding and that had ran them full speed into the realm of Dr. Gil Grissom.
Richard was the most intelligent person Markus had ever known. At thirty-four he was certain that with Richard’s mind and his special talent at controlling the outcome of their escapades they would forever avoid detection, eleven years later he knew differently. Richard’s ego had gotten the better of him once he had met Grissom. Nothing Markus could say or do would make his brother act with caution; instead he baited Grissom into mind games that ultimately got him caught. But not before he had almost destroyed Grissom, mind and body, Markus sneered at the memory.
Reaching forward, Richard flipped a small, silver toggle switch. With a snap, hiss of electricity waking up, several small black and white monitors came to life. Markus grudgingly gave Grissom his due. To often his opponents were not of a high enough caliber, actually none of them were ever stimulating enough to excite Markus as he had been over the past few days. Even if he had been lucky enough to find an adversary intellectually up to the challenge they usually fell short mentally or, most often, physically.
Grissom had proven himself quite tenacious. Markus had already known the man was equal to him in intellect but had sold him short otherwise. What a wonderful surprise the man has been thus far, Markus grinned as he watched Grissom on the monitor before him. He was losing his battle with fatigue. Grissom had caught on fairly quick to the rules of Markus’s game. Fall asleep and the nightmare begins. Right now Markus let the nightmare involve a half dozen easily manipulated, but brutal young people to assail their anger at the world on Grissom. Later…later we will play a harder game, Markus thought gleefully as he watched the brutish Donny and his gang blitz a very exhausted Gil Grissom.
******
“Hey Warrick!”
Warrick turned at the familiar voice calling out his name. He watched as Nick jogged through the shiny glass halls of the lab to catch up to him, which normally wouldn’t be a problem since Warrick tended to saunter more than walk but he had some interesting information that he wanted to pass along to Catherine.
“Hey Nick,” holding up the manila folder he held in his hand he asked, “Have you seen Catherine?”
“She was headed toward trace a few minutes ago,” Nick answered falling in step beside his friend. What do you have there?”
Warrick tapped the edge of the folder along the side of his index finger as he navigated the halls heading towards the Trace Lab. “I’ve been helping Greg chase down some vans that match the description that neighbor couple gave,” Warrick began as he spotted Catherine leaving the trace “Cath!”
Catherine halted her quick strides to turn gracefully towards the two men approaching her. “Hey guys, what do you got for me?” she asked returning back to her original course, the two men following along.
Warrick handed her the file he had been carrying. “Looks like one of the driver’s for the flooring place got jacked three months ago.”
Catherine glanced up at Warrick from the file she was looking at, her look one of interest.
“Jacked, as in grand theft auto?” She enquired.
Warrick gave her a broad smile as an answer.
Passing the print lab Jacqui Franco called out from her table, “Hey Cath!”
The three CSIs paused at the doorway as Jacqui stood up to meet them, her hand angrily shoving a wayward brown curl back behind her ear. “Documents was looking for you a short while ago. They left you a mountain of files in Layout 2 and” she turned back to her table and indication that Catherine should follow her “I got a hit off of a piece of plastic that Greg collected outside of Grissom’s. Matches the print on the tape” She turned her computer monitor in the direction of Catherine and the others to reveal the owner of said print.
On the screen was a young girl around thirteen years of age with short, spiky brown hair and a petulant look.
“Vonna Singer,” looking at the girl’s birth date Catherine added “this picture must be six years old.”
Jacqui shrugged, “She was printed at school for a child safe program.”
Catherine nodded and thanked Jacqui as she led Nick and Warrick from the room. For the first time in awhile she felt like progress, real progress had been made.
“I’m going to see if Brass or Sofia can find anything more recent on Vonna Singer,” she said as she began to split off from the men. “Nick, you start with documents. I’ll be in there to help you soon and Warrick let me know if you find anything on that missing van.
“Will do boss,” Nick said following Warrick in the opposite direction of Catherine.
As soon as Nick rounded the corner he groaned and rolled his left shoulder away from the room that awaited him. “Aww, man,” he muttered upon seeing the multiple white boxes sitting on the table in the center of the room.
Warrick patted him on shoulder. “Good luck,” he said as he trekked his way down the hall.
Nick paused at the doorway and watched Warrick wondering briefly at the man’s sincerity concerning the mountainous task before him. Approaching the boxes with the optimistic thought that maybe the containers were only half full, Nick flipped open one box and groaned, followed by another and another. He didn’t even bother to open up the remaining three boxes knowing what would greet him.
Starting with the box dated 1991; Nick grabbed the first of many case files and began a long and laborious trek through the many cases that Grissom had worked on over the years. Nick tried to mentally calculate just how many cases were in a single box, he ballparked it at somewhere between sixty and hundred depending on the complexity of the cases. Take that times the fourteen or fifteen years he had been in Las Vegas and… It was going to be a long shift!