The Willows woman had a checkered past, Brass knew, but her experience had made her a valuable counterbalance to the overly cool Grissom. Brass had less confidence in Sara Sidle, despite her status as a former Grissom pupil handpicked by Gil for the job. Sidle seemed to be a Grissom-in-the-making, similarly obsessed with work-and with people skills rivaling those of her tactless mentor.
Grissom filled his people in, quickly, on the contents of the tape and the potentially missing woman.
"So we have a verbally abusive husband," Grissom said, tone as tight as his eyes, "who threatened his wife with dismemberment."
"But we're pretending to help him out," Warrick said.
"I didn't hear that," Grissom said, sweetly.
Warrick, Nick, Catherine, and Sara rode in the Tahoe, Grissom rode with Brass in the detective's Taurus. Just before midnight, they arrived at the castle-like house on the impressive sloping lawn, lights shining out downstairs windows, sending sword-like shafts of light into the dark.
Brass and Grissom led the way to the front door. The detective rang the bell and had to wait only a moment before the door opened to reveal a muscular man in dark slacks, black T-shirt, and black loafers, dark hair peppered with gray. The man stood before Grissom like a mirror reflection-only, Brass thought, this was Gil Grissom on steroids.
Brass smiled, mildly. "Mr. Pierce?"
The man nodded. He seemed anxious. "You're the police?"
Touching the badge on his breast pocket, Brass affirmed, "We're the police-sorry it took us so long to respond to your call…. We had to round our people up."
Grissom flicked Pierce an insincere smile. "We're a full-service operation, Mr…. Pierce, I assume?"
Still not inviting them in, Pierce nodded.
Grissom lifted the necklace I.D. "Gil Grissom, Las Vegas Criminalistics. This is Captain Jim Brass, and this is our Criminalistics crew."
Pierce regarded the considerable assembly overflowing his front stoop. "Then…you haven't found my wife?"
"No, sir," Grissom said, "I'm sorry, as yet we haven't."
Pierce shook his head. "I don't understand what you're doing here. I gave all the information to the officer, on the phone. Shouldn't you be out looking for Lynn, Detective…Griswald, is it?"
"It's Grissom, Mr. Pierce, only I'm not a detective. I'm a supervisor of Criminalistics." He flashed another empty smile. "And we are out looking for your wife. That's why we're here. You see, we handle crime scene investigation."
A puzzled look tightened Pierce's face. "Crime scene? I don't understand. This isn't a crime scene-my wife walked out on me."
"Sir, my understanding is, you don't know that for sure. She might well have been abducted."
"Well…that's possible. Maybe I hadn't wanted to…admit that to myself."
Grissom nodded in supposed sympathy. "Also, there's the matter of the Blairs."
"The Blairs."
"Yes. Your wife called them in the afternoon…said she would come by, never materialized. They said they spoke to you."
Pierce sucked in air, his expression turning sheepish. "Oh. I see…look, when they came by, I was embarrassed. I told them that Lynn went to visit her brother to, you know, get rid of them."
Frowning, Brass asked, "You wanted to get rid of them?"
"They mean well, Detective…Brass?"
"Yes. Brass."
"They're kind of busybodies, Detective Brass. Judgmental types-Bible beaters? And the wound was fresh, Det…uh…Mr. Grissom. I needed to be alone while I sorted some things out."
Grissom shrugged one shoulder. "Then why did you telephone the police?"
He shrugged both his. "I wanted someone to help me find her. I thought maybe Lynn and I could find a way to work out our problems."
"So, then, you really don't know where she is?"
Pierce shook his head. "Nope, no idea."
"And you weren't here when she left?"
"No. I was at my office…my clinic."
"That makes abduction a real possibility, Mr. Pierce. And that's why we're here."
He frowned. "Just because I have no idea where Lynn is? And because she made a phone call?"
"Yes, sir." Grissom's expression turned almost angelic. "We want to help you. Maybe we can find a clue as to what happened to your wife."
"But," Brass said, with half a smile, "we can't help you out here on the stoop."
Pierce sighed again, shrugged with his eyebrows this time. "Well-if it'll help find Lynn…of course, come in."
The response surprised Brass a little, and he exchanged glances with Grissom, who the detective figured had also been expecting objections from Pierce, not cooperation-particularly if a crime had gone down within these castle walls, earlier today.
Pierce stepped back inside and held the door as the group trooped in, moving through a small entry way into a larger anteroom of a home whose walls were cream-color stucco with dark woodwork. A winding staircase disappeared up a landing at left, and a hallway was at left also, with the dining room visible through one arched doorless doorway, in the facing wall, and, to the right, a living room yawned through another archway. The furnishings were colonial, tasteful enough, but a bit at odds with the castle-like architecture.
Brass asked, "Is there anyone else in the house, sir?"
"Just my daughter."
Grissom asked, "Was she here when your wife left?"
"No. I'm afraid not."
A teenage girl stepped down the winding stairs into view. She wore Nikes, nice new jeans, a big white sweatshirt, with her long blonde hair pulled back and held in place with a blue scrunchy. Her pretty face-she resembled her father, though the eyes were wider set-was well scrubbed and her bright blue eyes were rimmed red. She glanced down at the contingency in the anteroom, and froze on the landing.
"This is my daughter," Pierce said, "Lori."
The girl gave a barely perceptible nod, then turned and disappeared back upstairs.
Pierce sighed again and said, "You'll have to forgive her, please. This has been hard for both of us, but especially for Lori. She's taken it pretty hard, the idea of her mother…abandoning us."
Brass nodded. Grissom was looking around, taking in the framed wildlife artwork.
"Will you have to…" Pierce looked for the words. "…disturb Lori, when you make your search?"
Brass glanced at Grissom, who gave a little shrug.
"I don't think so, sir," the detective said. "We'll leave her alone for now…though it's possible we might have some questions later."
"I understand."
Grissom approached Pierce, standing a little too close, as if having a better look at an insect specimen, and said, "Mr. Pierce, if you and Captain Brass will wait in the living room, we'll get to work. Then we'll talk to you when we're finished."
"All right."
For the next two hours, the CSI crew-in latex gloves but wielding little else of their elaborate equipment-crawled over every inch of the house, examining everything from the basement to the garage, speaking to the teenage girl only to ask her to step out of her bedroom for a few minutes. When they had finished, they conferred in the kitchen, careful to keep their voices down as they discussed what they'd found, and hadn't found.
An eyebrow arched, Catherine said to Grissom, "There are gaps in the closet. Some clothes and shoes gone, apparently."
"Consistent with Lynn Pierce packing up and leaving," Grissom said.
Catherine smiled humorlessly, nodded.
Sara was nodding, too. "Yeah, and there's a row of suitcases in the basement, with a space in it-so maybe one of them is gone. Space on the shelf above, where a train case could've been."
Warrick piped in: "Only one toothbrush in the master bathroom. Some empty spaces on her makeup table, like she took perfume, makeup, stuff like that."