Millie Blair patted her husband's arm in an effort to calm him.
"Normally," Mrs. Blair said, "our faith discourages divorce. But Pastor Dan says, when a spouse has fallen into satanic ways, a person must protect one's self, and children."
Brass winced. "You don't mean…literally…that Owen Pierce practiced satanism?"
"Of course not," Mr. Blair said, sitting back, calmer. "But he's a…devil…a demon himself. Capable of the worst atrocities…."
For the first time, Grissom spoke. "So, then, Mr. Blair-I take it you think Owen Pierce has made good on his threat to cut her into 'little pieces'?"
Arthur Blair's eyes became huge behind the lenses and his wife's curled-fingered hand went to her mouth, where she bit a knuckle. Grissom might have slapped them, the way his words registered.
"That is what you think, isn't it?" he pressed. "Isn't that why you brought the tape to us?"
Mrs. Blair stared at her lap and covered her face with one hand and began to cry, quietly. Mr. Blair, slipping an arm around his wife's shoulders, gave a tired nod.
Yes, Brass thought, Gil really has a way with people.
Grissom pressed on. "Do you think there are any circumstances at all under which Lynn might have just…left?"
Trembling with tears, Mrs. Blair shook her head.
Calmly, Grissom said, "Mr. Pierce said his wife had a significant amount of money in her own name and could have used it to disappear."
"She had money," Mrs. Blair conceded, the tears subsiding, "but it was all tied up in investments…stocks, bonds, CDs."
Mr. Blair concurred: "None of it was liquid enough for her to get to easily."
Nodding, Mrs. Blair went on. "She complained about that. It was something Owen talked her into. Even though she had her own money, she had little cash. I don't think I ever saw her with more than, say, fifty dollars in her purse. Even though the money was hers, Owen seemed to keep her on a tight leash."
The interview continued for a few minutes, but neither Brass nor Grissom found any new ground to cover. The Blairs had been unfailingly cooperative, but they were weary, and the detective and the criminalist knew nothing more was to be learned here, at least not right now.
On the way back, Grissom rode up front with Brass.
"Do you think Owen Pierce is the devil?" Brass said to the CSI, half-kidding.
"No," Grissom said, seeming distant even for him. "But he's a hell of a suspect."
At headquarters, back from the strip club, Catherine sat down in the layout room, with a notepad and pen, the Dream Doll tapes and a VCR. Meanwhile, Sara took their findings to Greg Sanders so he could begin testing.
The tapes weren't labeled, so each one was a new adventure. The first one had been from the back right corner of the stage, the camera farthest from the door, the bar, and far to the left of the hallway. Only the chairs around the stage on the backside were visible from this angle.
No one fitting the description of Ray Lipton came into view. Catherine flew through the tape on fast forward, knowing she would view the tape more carefully later. For now, she just wanted to see what Worm, the cheerful DJ, had seen. Ejecting that tape, she moved on to the next one. This camera hung behind the left side of the bar, nearer the front door.
Halfway through the tape, Catherine was about to give up and move on, when she glimpsed, on the fuzzy black-and-white picture, a two-tone jacket. Stopping, she rewound the tape until the jacket came into view, and went in reverse, then pushed PLAY.
The guy came into view wearing the denim and tan jacket, a ball cap pulled low, dark glasses and jeans. He walked through the shot and out the other side. She rewound it, ran it again. Something on the guy's face…a beard? Worm had said Lipton might have grown his beard back; hard to tell with this tape. Popping the cassette out, Catherine went to the next, then the next-one after another, until she finally got through them all.
This Lipton guy, it seemed, had gone out of his way to avoid the camera. He hadn't walked over to the bar, for a drink; and the camera above the door had gotten barely a glimpse of him…none of the stage cameras caught more than a snatch of him. Of course, Catherine told herself, with that restraining order, Lipton wasn't supposed to be in there anyway, so maybe he was just being careful.
Only the camera at the head of the hallway got a decent shot of him, and that was of his back as he led busty, leggy Jenna through the door. Even with the poor quality of the tape, Catherine was able to make out the words Lipton Construction on the back of the jacket, as the couple disappeared out of frame.
Catherine sped the tape forward, until the figure in the jacket…bearded, all right…returned for a quick exit-alone.
"Conroy's back."
Catherine spun to see Sara standing in the doorway.
Sara ambled over to the monitor. "Anything good on?"
Catherine nodded. "Looks like Lipton was there, all right-got a good shot of his jacket going down the hallway with Jenna Patrick."
"Time on those tapes?"
"Yeah…" Catherine pointed to her notes. "Time jibes. And Lipton, or anyway a guy in a Lipton Construction jacket, comes back out of the lap-dance cubicle…alone."
"Interesting," Sara said. "But why watch TV, when a live performance is available?…Come on. Conroy's got the star of your show in interrogation."
They walked quickly down several connecting hallways and ducked into the observation room next to interrogation. Through the two-way mirror, they could see Ray Lipton, directly across from them-sitting alone, eyes cast down, the streaks of tears drying on his cheeks.
"He must've loved her," Sara said. "Crying for her."
"Love's the motive of choice," Catherine said, "of many a murderer."
Lipton's hands were balled into fists and lay on the table like objects, forgotten ones at that. The denim jacket with the tan sleeves hung over the back of the chair. He was thinner and shorter than Catherine would have expected from someone in construction, with hazel eyes, a long, narrow nose and, to her surprise, no beard.
Could she have been mistaken about what she'd seen on the video? He might have shaved, but…no, his cheeks were shadowed blue with stubble, indicating Lipton hadn't shaved for many hours.
A moment later, Detective Erin Conroy entered the interrogation room, a Styrofoam cup of water in one hand, notepad in the other. She placed the cup in front of Lipton, said, "There you go," and sat at the end of the table, giving her observers a view of both of them. Lipton picked up the cup, sipped from it, returned it to the table, then leaned his elbows on the wood, running his hands through his longish brown hair.
"I can't believe she's dead," he said, his voice quiet and raspy, a rusty tool long out of use.
Catherine looked at Sara as if to say, "What's he trying to pull?"
Lipton looked across at Conroy, his expression pitiful. "We were going to be married, you know."
"Again, Mr. Lipton, I'm sorry for your loss," Conroy said. "But there are some things we need to talk about."
Lipton looked down, shaking his head, tears again trailing slowly down his cheeks. "Can't it…can't it wait?"
"No. The first hours of a murder investigation are vital. I'm sure you understand that."
"Murder…a gentle soul like Jenna…murdered…."
"For Jenna being a 'gentle soul,' Mr. Lipton," Conroy said, no inflection in her voice, "you two seemed to fight a great deal…especially for a couple about to be married."
"But…we didn't fight," he sputtered. Then his eyes moved in thought. "Well…no more than anybody else. All couples fight."