Warrick grunted and strode over to the Tahoe.
Within an hour later, the piece of taillight plastic had been collected and bagged; dental stone was setting up in the footprints; and-with the ambulance crew hanging around and looking grumpy, but knowing enough now to stay away from Grissom-Warrick finally got back, a black body bag under his arm.
The purple of the red and blue of flashing lights had finally given way to the purple and pink smudging the horizon, courtesy of the morning sun, parting the darkness.
"What took so long?" Grissom asked.
"Hey, imagine the song I had to sing to sell them," Warrick said. "Starting with the guard at the entrance, then his supervisor, then the M.P.s, then the officer of the day, and the officer of the watch and God only knows how many more-I lost track. I'm lucky I'm not in the brig, or on my way to the Middle East."
"But is it a new bag?" Grissom asked, eagerly.
"Bran' spankin'. Doesn't take much to please you, does it, Gris?"
"I'm a simple soul," Grissom said, taking the body bag in his latex-gloved hands, while Warrick and Sara exchanged wide-eyed reactions to this remarkable statement.
Using the ambulance crew for assistance, the CSIs carefully laid the bundle inside the white sheet, wrapping it up as best they could; then they put the whole package into the body bag. The ambulance crew placed the body bag onto the gurney and rolled it back to their vehicle. Once loaded, they took off, the siren off now-no reason to rush with this patient.
While Warrick finished removing the casts of the partial footprints, Sara took more pictures, this time of the ground beneath where the carpet-wrapped body had been. Grissom spent the time surveying the area, looking for anything that might have come loose when they were moving the body. He found nothing, but that didn't worry him. He had evidence, lots of it, waiting back at the lab…
…and, for once, the killer had even been kind enough to gift-wrap it.
Dr. Al Robbins was waiting for them in the morgue. A good twenty to twenty-five degrees cooler than the rest of the labs, the morgue always gave Grissom both a feeling of calm and of purpose. Something about the change in temperature made the room seem more peaceful to him, the very crispness of the air inherently reassuring. The atmosphere seemed somehow…scientific. Here, Dr. Gil Grissom felt insulated from the chaos that brought him his "patients": the victims who needed him. This was the last place where Grissom saw most victims, in the flesh at least, so it became a place that filled him with a deep sense of purpose. A morgue was a kind of church to Grissom, the autopsy tray a sort of altar; but these victims were not to be worshipped, nor were they to be sacrificed. They had come here, albeit against their will, to ask him to do right by them.
To find justice for them.
And their killers.
The gurney bearing the body bag containing the carpet-wrapped corpse had been drawn up next to the metal table over which Doc Robbins spent most of his time. Grissom, Warrick and Sara had all pulled on blue lab coats and latex gloves. Robbins stood leaning against the table in his usual surgical scrubs, his metal crutch propped in a nearby corner.
"And what have you brought me today?" the coroner asked, his eyes on the body bag.
With the slightest twinkle of humor, Grissom asked, "Why, you didn't look inside?"
Robbins smiled. "Nope-just finished some reports and got in here myself. I found this waiting for me. I figured you wouldn't be too far behind."
"We don't know what it is ourselves, for sure," Grissom admitted, "other than a body that didn't die today." And then he proceeded to fill Doc Robbins in.
"So you've brought the crime scene to me, for a change," Robbins said, opening his eyes wide.
"A big part of it," Grissom said.
"I have to admit I find that somewhat…exciting."
"Why?"
"Why do you think our resident lab rat, Greg, is so eager to get out in the field? To be in on the discovery. To be part of the process from the beginning. The chance to be Sherlock Holmes, and not Doctor Watson. To have the feeling that you CSIs have when you find that crucial piece of evidence, on the scene."
Grissom shrugged a little. "You often find the crucial piece of evidence, right on the corpse. Or in it."
"True. But there's something about a crime scene that's inherently more exciting than the lab."
"I disagree. I find them equally stimulating."
Neither Grissom nor Robbins saw Warrick and Sara exchanging rolling-eyed glances at this exchange.
"Well," Robbins said. "Let's have a look."
Grissom stepped over to the bag and unzipped it. All that was visible through the opening was the white sheet. He spread the sides of the bag and Warrick pitched in to help him slide the bag down over the sheet; then carefully, Grissom peeled back the sheet and revealed the carpeting, the package still sealed with duct tape.
"I don't suppose Cleopatra's in here," Robbins said.
"Let's see," Grissom said.
3
IN JANICE DENARD'S OFFICE, COMPUTER WHIZ TOMAS NUNEZ sat at the desk while the assistant herself and Catherine Willows occupied two chairs against the wall. Nick Stokes hovered just behind Nunez, who was on his cell phone.
"Round up the whole crew," Nunez said into the phone. "Yeah, Webster and Wolf too-everybody but Bill Gates. This is gonna be a big one, my brother. Lemme tell when you get here-time is precious."
Listening again, Nunez spun toward Nick and seemed to glower at him, but it was intended for the party on the other end of the line. "No way!" the computer expert said, his voice louder, edgier. "That won't do at all. I need you all here an hour ago. Two words: kiddie porn."
This time the response seemed to please Nunez more and he almost smiled. "I knew you could make it happen." He ended the call and grinned up at Nick. "Cavalry's on the way…. Now, where's that sergeant of yours?"
"O'Riley's in the lobby with Mr. Newcombe," Catherine said.
A few minutes ago, the detective and Ian Newcombe had gone out to the lobby so the agency's co-owner could do his best to explain the situation to his staff. Janice Denard had stayed behind, and still seemed shaken. Catherine reached over and patted the woman's hand.
"I know you feel invaded," Catherine said. "Even violated. But that's part of what this is about-someone who violated this agency's trust. Someone working in this building who used your company's computers to do something that doesn't have anything to do with advertising."
"I know," Denard said, but the words didn't exactly ring with cognizance.
Of all the CSIs he might have been teamed with on this call, Nick was relieved, even glad, to have Catherine Willows at his side. When it came to crimes against children, Catherine had a definite mean streak…as did most cops, truth be told…but with her daughter Lindsey on her mind Catherine would, Nick knew, give every ounce of her skills, talent and energy to get a conviction on this one.
As would Nick.
The abuse Nick Stokes had suffered as a child was something he had dealt with. He knew the experience had played a role in his choosing law enforcement as a career; he knew, too, that he had a craving, even a need for justice exceeding the norm. Nonetheless, he prided himself on his professionalism and tried not to carry any remnants of the victim-getting-even syndrome into his work.
He was well aware, and in certain moments even relished, the opinion shared among many of his co-workers that, for all his sunny disposition, he was hardnosed and a workaholic; he knew, if they didn't, that he also strove to be fair and objective.
Still, there could be no question that his history made these cases more personal to him than the average crime, that such a case increased his thirst for justice to the level of crusade. That whoever was behind these wretched photos would not be allowed to walk. No way.