"That was right after he moved here," Judy said. "But we must have overstepped, somehow."
Grissom frowned in interest. "Why do you say that?"
The woman shrugged. "Well, he hasn't invited us back since."
"You notice his video equipment," Gary said, "when I tried to talk to him about it, he got kinda close-mouthed and said it wasn't any big deal. Most people with a hobby, you know, if you're into something, you usually you wanna talk about it. Try to get me to stop talking about the Dodgers."
Grissom smiled. "I've been a Dodgers fan my whole life…and I see your point."
Warrick and Sara traded glances; Grissom connecting with a human being was always worth noting.
Grissom was asking, "Could you give us directions to David's cabin?"
Judy shook her head. "I'm directionally dysfunctional. You remember the way, Gary?"
"We only went that one time," her husband said, "but I think so…if you don't arrest me, if I steer you wrong…."
Brass jotted the route down.
"I hope David's not in some kind of trouble," Judy said. "He's nice, in kind of a quiet way."
Yes, Warrick thought, the rule of the "nice, normal" serial killer next door always seemed to pertain….
But then Gary Meyers contradicted it: "Yeah, honey, but to be honest with you? He's got a streak. Guy's an oddball. Not that that's against the law. Has he done something?"
Brass said, "We don't know yet. Just following up on a lead."
"Must be some lead," Gary said. "You busted down his door."
"Thank you for your help," Grissom said, bestowing his fellow Dodgers fan a curt smile, then turning his back on them.
Dismissed, the couple headed to their own homestead, and the CSIs and the detective huddled in the street, between parked vehicles. Brass got on his cell and called to post a patrol car to watch Benson's residence while he and the CSIs took their excursion to the country and the cabin.
Then Brass suggested, "Let's take one vehicle."
Warrick opened the driver's side door, saying, "Always room for one more, Captain."
"Why don't I drive," Brass said, holding his hand out for the keys. "I'm the one with the directions."
"You can navigate."
"Warrick, I've seen you drive."
Shaking his head, Warrick got in back with Sara.
They were at the far north end of the city; Benson's cabin was south and west out Blue Diamond Road, down some back roads, almost to the county line. After a stop downtown at the courthouse for a search warrant, the drive took the better part of an hour; but it was time well spent, much of it on their various cell phones.
Grissom talked to the County Recorder and discovered that Benson had purchased both the house and his cabin about the same time. This also provided them with an exact address, which seemed to fit the neighbor's directions.
Warrick leaned up from the back. "Why is this guy so flush all of a sudden, Gris?"
Grissom said, "See what you can find out, Sara."
And Sara got a dayshift intern to help her dig into Benson's records to find out what else they had missed. The intern told her that an aunt of Benson's had died and left him a good chunk of money, explaining his sudden move from renter of a nondescript apartment into multiple-property owner.
Warrick phoned Benson's place of employment, Double-O Gadgets, and spoke with a receptionist who seemed more than happy to talk about Benson, as long as she mistook Warrick for a security-system client.
After he clicked off, Warrick said, "Our guy's on vacation this week, and they have no idea where he is."
"On vacation at his cabin?" Sara asked.
"Didn't know. He could be in the Bahamas, or in Cleveland."
Sourly, Brass said, "Or on the run."
Grissom shook his head. "No reason to think he's made us, Jim."
Brass ground the wheel to the left and everybody leaned to one side, comically, as they headed up a dirt inlet that seemed to Warrick more like a path than a road. The Tahoe jumped and bucked and a cloud of dust that could be seen in Arizona trailed them like a jet plume.
"Really sneaking up on the guy, Jim," Warrick said, still nursing hurt feelings over the general disregard for his driving abilities.
Half-smiling into the rearview mirror, Brass said, "Still a couple more miles before we're even close enough to worry about it."
Grissom looked back at Warrick. "Consider this an intervention, Warrick-where we demonstrate what it's like to be driven by a maniac."
Brass flicked a frown at Grissom, obviously not liking the sound of that any better than Warrick.
But any criticism of Brass's driving did not prevent the detective from jostling them around several more times before turning off onto another dirt road, this one even more dubious and less forgiving. Then, once he'd made the turn, Brass took what seemed like a firebreak at a more manageable speed.
They were winding up into the foothills now and-despite what Benson's neighbors had said about the cabin being more a second home-Warrick began conjuring visions of this trip ending outside a rundown, ramshackle tacked-together hovel purchased from the Unabomber.
When they popped up over a rise, however, and got their first look at Benson's "cabin" in the distance, Warrick's notion of a shack dissolved and he realized that couple back on Roby Grey Way had not exaggerated. The house perched on a low hill to the west, a long, low-slung stucco ranch-style with a typical Vegas-area tile roof.
Grissom said, "Most people have a cabin to 'rough it,' get away from civilization. Why does David Benson need two houses, roughly the equivalent of each other, only miles apart?"
Sara said, "Do I have to answer that?"
Their supervisor went on: "He's not next to a stream, for fishing. There's nothing to recommend this location, other than its…"
"Splendid isolation?" Warrick offered.
Grissom nodded.
Only one way up the hill to the house: a curving dirt driveway that-no matter how slow they took it-would give Benson ample opportunity to spot them coming. Nonetheless, Brass took the hill slowly, kicking up a minimum of dust, though if Benson was home, they were made, no question.
They pulled up in front, in a small graveled area extending from the garage's gravel drive. A propane tank sat off to one side of the house, and next to it a large generator chugged right along, little wisps of exhaust disappearing skyward.
"Okay," Grissom said, almost to himself. "So he's a survivalist-that's one reason to have a second house, in the boondocks…."
They got out and no one made a move to unload the Tahoe. Unholstering his sidearm, Brass gave the CSIs a look that had all of them-even Grissom-unhesitatingly unholstering theirs.
Even if David Benson wasn't their homicidal necrophiliac, he was a loner in the security business who had the earmarks of a survivalist, and when the cops showed up, that type of individual sometimes…overreacted.
They went to the door, with its cement-slab stoop, the detective in the lead, Warrick right behind him, feeling beads of sweat on his brow, and not just because they were no longer in the air-conditioned vehicle.
Brass tried to peek around the curtains of the front window with no success, then turned and gave Warrick a had-to-try shrug.
Poised at the front door, with Grissom and Sara off to the sides of the stoop, weapons in hand, Brass signaled Warrick to go around back.
Which Warrick did, the gun heavy if reassuring in his hand as he skirted along the side of the structure. With no lawn out here, the desert floor seemed to crunch under his feet like broken glass, as if the ground itself were a security alarm. With his left hand, he rubbed the perspiration from his face, particularly away from his eyes, drying his hand on his shirt, and crept along. Three windows on this side-as heavily curtained as the one in the front.