Chapter 1: Coffee and Crossword Puzzles
Gil Grissom could hear laughter as he approached the community break room at CSI headquarters. He carried the day's newspaper in his hand and he perused the headlines on the front page as he wound his way along the main corridor past the fingerprint, DNA, ballistics, and layout labs before finding himself subconsciously smiling at the scene he was walking into. The rest of his teammates on the graveyard shift were having a great time retelling the stories of some of their more amusing cases, taking every opportunity to rib Greg Sanders, their eccentric youngest friend. Greg turned shades of embarrassed pink and laughed along with them as they recalled walking into the lab to the sight of Greg wearing a latex glove on his head, goggles over his eyes and a standard white mask with a mouth full of fangs drawn on it. He had been jamming to a metal song on the stereo and imagining the instruments in front of him to be a drum set. Former dayshift supervisor Catherine Willows was laughing so hard tears fell from the corners of her eyes. Grissom poured himself a cup of coffee and absentmindedly continued to read the paper as he sat down in an empty seat beside Sara Sidle as if she had been saving it for him.
Until his arrival, Sara had been watching and listening to the conversation, laughing along with them. When Grissom sat down, Sara sat back and draped her right arm over the back of Grissom's chair and languidly leaned over and pressed a kiss to his shoulder, slowly becoming engrossed in the crossword puzzle she was solving over that shoulder.
"Twenty-six across, 'not mysterious'," Grissom murmured. "Apparent?" Sara shook her head slowly and replied, "Obvious." Grissom turned his head to smile at her in unhurried affection and lightly kissed her lips.
"Hye guys, what's up?" Captain Jim Brass called as he entered the room with a dossier in his hand and a smile on his face. The group greeted him as he walked to the side of the table closest to the window and presented his reason for coming: he had a job for them. Catherine's blonde hair fell over her shoulder and into her face as she took the folder and opened the cover to browse through the contents as Brass prepared to explain. Grissom allowed the newspaper to fall forward, revealing his quizzically raised brow and Sara sat up, leaning forward in interest to see what Catherine was looking at.
The victim was female, early thirties, attractive, and middle class Caucasian. At first glance, 32 year old Kelly Garfield was no different than the thousands of other women in Las Vegas, but Kelly is missing, lost in the shuffle of Sin City for the past two weeks.
"Get lost on the way to missing persons, Brass?" teased CSI Warrick Brown.
"I wish. We believe Kelly is the forth in a string of kidnappings that we've been monitoring. Each victim has vanished on the twentieth of the month and none of them appear to have much in common," Brass said.
"I still don't know what this case has to do with us," Greg added as he looked up at Brass from the other end of the table.
"I'm not done yet. Victim number one, Renee Dixon, has been missing since February 20th and she just turned up dead," said Brass. A tense silence hung in the air for the space of a few seconds before Grissom spoke. "Catherine, I'm making you the lead on this one."
"You got it, boss," Catherine replied, standing and finishing her soda before tossing the can in the recycle bin.
"Warrick, go with her," Grissom added.
"Roger," Warrick replied, getting up to follow Catherine. As the team dispersed, Grissom took the folder and headed for the layout room, where he made copies of the photos and information that they already had and organized it on the large corkboard in the room from left to right according to victim. As he finished the display, Grissom stood back and his mouth fell open in surprise: he was beginning to differ with Brass's assertion that these victims had little in common. Each missing woman was brown haired and brown eyed, single, attractive and within a ten year age bracket of 25 to 35 years of age. Grissom silently began to process this information as Brass entered the room and came to stand next to him.
"I thought you said that these victims didn't have anything in common?" Grissom said in disbelief.
"They don't really," Brass explained. "None of them knew each other or worked together. They weren't in the same profession. None of them were neighbors or even the same blood type."
"Did they all attend the same college or graduate from the same high school? Did they all use the same gas station or grocery store? Had they all used the same ATM recently? This kind of physical resemblance in the victims suggests that the suspect is pedantic, analytical, and probably stalked these women, studied them, before the actual abduction. Kidnappers usually derive pleasure or satisfaction from the power they hold over their victims. We're probably looking for a white male, mid to late thirties, strong enough build to be able to subdue a woman, but common enough where he wouldn't stand out in public," Grissom explained. After a moment he added, "We'll know more when Catherine and Warrick get back."
"I'm on it," Brass said softly. He nodded and then left the room. When Brass was out of sight, Grissom took a deep breath and placed his palms flat on the smooth work surface of the table. While the investigator in him was eager to begin solving this case, the man in him was growing more concerned about a particular brown-eyed brunette who figured very prominently in his thoughts as of late. As if she had heard her own name echoing in his mind, Sara Sidle was the next to join Grissom in the layout lab. Grissom sank into a chair and removed his glasses.
"How's it going?" Sara asked, looking at the corkboard and folding her arms across her chest.
:Not enough information to begin drawing workable conclusions," Grissom replied. Sara looked over the materials spread out over the table.
"Want me to start questioning the victims' families?" Sara offered.
"No," Grissom said more forcefully than he had intended. "No," he said a bit more gently. "Let Catherine and Warrick do it…thanks." Sara's stance relaxed and she seemed to intrinsically understand the fear that he was trying so hard to hide from her. She took three more steps and Grissom stood as she came to stand in front of him. Without a word, Sara lifted her hands and began to massage his temples. Grissom closed his eyes and relaxed under her ministrations, letting her sooth away the tension headache he was afflicted with. As the pain waned, Grissom took Sara's hands gently in his own and slowly pulled them down until she took the initiative to wind her arms around his torso and embraced him. Grissom wrapped his own arms around her in return and held her close. He rested his head on Sara's and took a deep breath.
"Stop worrying…I'm here—I'm safe—I'm not going anywhere, Gil," Sara murmured.
"I love you," Grissom whispered. Sara looked up, smiling, and stroked his beard affectionately.
"I know that. I love you, too," she replied. "Are you going to be all right?" Grissom nodded and Sara indulged Grissom one warm, soft kiss before she returned to her duties. Grissom replaced his glasses on his face and smiled softly. Suddenly, he was feeling much better.