Chapter 6: DON'T TREAD ON ME
The next day Grissom put Catherine in charge of his team for the remainder of the investigation. She had them all regroup back at the lab in the break room to further discuss matters. It felt vastly different to Catherine calling a meeting without her supervisor's leadership. Everyone seated at the table including, Sara, Greg, Nick, and Warrick looked to Catherine for guidance.
"I guess I'm as ready as I'll ever be," states Catherine. "Let's get started."
She seats herself, but before she can begin, Hodges walks into the room with an announcement.
"Grissom, I got a hit on..." Everyone directs their attention towards Hodges, who appears confused. "Where's Grissom?" Hodges's confusion is understandable. He wasn't aware of what happened.
Nick looks to Catherine. "Do I tell him, or should you?"
Catherine opens her mouth to speak but is interrupted.
"I'm right here," says Grissom walking into the room seating himself at the far end of the table.
Everyone appears shocked, including Catherine. "Don't take this the wrong way, Gil, but should you even be here after what happened?"
"I'm not here to work just to observe," insists Grissom.
"What about..." inquires Catherine, but he cuts her off.
She was going to ask about the doctor's orders until Grissom pulls out a pill bottle from his jacket pocket. Sara gets up from her seat and heads to the water cooler. She pours her supervisor a cup so he can take his medicine. In the meantime, Catherine fills Hodges in on what happened.
Grissom pops two Topamax in his mouth as prescribed by his doctor. He takes a swig of water and swallows. "Continue. Wait. Hodges."
Hodges observes that every seat at the table is taken. "I can't; there isn't an available chair."
Grissom clarifies. "I wasn't implying that you join us. I was hoping you could indulge us all by sharing your findings."
"Oh, right, yes. I got a hit on the prints you wanted me to lift from the bottle of antifreeze."
"Antifreeze?" asks Sara. "Is that what that yellow bottle was that I gave you?"
"Yes," replies Hodges. "I lifted three separate sets of prints off of it."
"Well... who do they belong to?" inquired Catherine. Hodges hands over the paper to her so she can see for herself. "One set belongs to our victim Matt Whitman. The second set belongs to Miles Gardner."
Nick points out, "Of course, Miles prints are going to be on the bottle; it's his truck. If he were low on coolant, he'd be the one to refill it."
Sara argues, "Not necessarily. If he got the truck serviced, someone else could have done it for him."
"GUYS!" scolds Catherine, not wanting to let Grissom second guess putting her in charge. "Anyhow, moving on. The third set of prints belong to..." Her eyes scan the paper in search of the results."
"Larry Waters," answers Warrick.
"How did you know that?" asks Hodges.
Everyone at the table directs their attention to Warrick.
"Hey, I know what you're all thinking, "If you knew that the whole time then why are you just now telling all of us." But I only just learned that myself. I got a hunch regarding the receipts. I remembered the confusion over the beer and where or not it was stolen or purchased. So that got me thinking to go back over the rest of the receipts. From there, I looked back through them and noticed something. With the help of Archie, I reviewed the security tapes from Larry's store."
"Without me?" said Nick. "Where was I?" he wondered, feeling a little hurt.
"In Goodsprings with Sanchez," replies Warrick adding, "I noticed on one of the tapes that Miles purchased the antifreeze from Larry's store prior to the night Matt was killed."
Greg admits, "I don't know if I'm following all of this correctly or not."
Grissom clarifies, "This means we know our victim was poisoned, and we have two potential suspects."
Catherine is confused. "Wait, Matt was poisoned and not run over?"
"Actually, he was both," corrects Grissom. "But Doc Robbins said it was the antifreeze that killed him. Now, all we have to do is learn who did it and why."
Larry slept as well as one could expect in a temporary holding cell. He awoke with a stiff neck and a pain in his lower back. Swinging his legs off the side of the ⏤ let's call it a bed, he arose, yawning and stretching.
Brass stood just outside of the convenience store owner's cell. "They say only guilty men sleep in jail."
Larry sighs at the remark. Brass signals for an officer to release him.
"You're letting me go?" asks Larry.
"Not exactly," replies Brass.
Officer Carter lets Larry out, closing the cell door behind him. He takes out a pair of handcuffs, ready to place them on Larry, but Brass stops him.
"That won't be necessary, will it?" Brass looks at Larry.
"No," Larry warily replies.
"Alrighty then this way," says Brass.
Part of Larry wanted to peek into Miles' cell to see if he was still in there or not, but Officer Carter ushers him away before Larry had the chance. Brass leads them past the front desk and down a hallway. Larry takes in his surroundings. The hallway was considerably wide enough so that four people could pass by without rubbing their shoulders. He watched as officers escorted a hooker away, and Larry wondered what had to go wrong in a person's life for them to resort to turning tricks.
As they continued, they passed by flyers and posters that hung on the walls of Most Wanted People and Missing Children. The smell of commercial cleaning products hung heavy in the air, Larry noted. It isn't until then that he is reminded he's in his stocking feet as Larry practically slips on the freshly waxed floor.
"Easy!" says Officer Carter trying to prevent Larry's fall.
Brass turns around to see what the hold-up is.
"Sorry," replies Larry hanging his head.
Carter looks down at Larry's feet, shooting him a look of confusion. "Hey, Brass, this guy isn't wearing any shoes." Carter's radio goes off as he's called in. He spots Sanchez chatting in the hallway and asks him to help out.
"Sure, Carter, you go on ahead," says Sanchez taking Larry by the arm.
Once Larry's seated in the interrogation room, he can't peel his eyes from Sanchez's face. He's in shock and awe from his appearance; the last time Larry saw him; Sanchez didn't have a broken nose.
"Mister Waters?" calls Brass. "Have you been listening to a thing that I've said?" His eyes follow Larry's gaze. Brass sighs. "Sanchez, would you mind stepping out?"
"Sure thing."
Sanchez steps just outside the interrogation room.
"Now that we're alone..." begins Brass.
Larry interjects, gesturing to his nose. "What, uh, what happened to him?"
"Your pal Miles Gardner took a shovel to his face," replied Brass.
Larry takes offense towards Brass's implication. "I told you before we aren't associated with one another. I didn't even know Miles or Matt for that matter until they walked into my store!"
"Which was when exactly?" wondered Brass.
Greg and Catherine stand in the observation room watching through the two-way glass as Brass interrogates Larry.
Greg mentions to her, "I'm new at this, so maybe I've got it wrong, but it seems to me like Brass is treating Larry more like an informant than a suspect."
"You're not wrong," replies Catherine. "At most, Larry is guilty of attempted assault, but that's only because he was caught on tape. As for the hit-and-run, we were able to rule him out as a suspect. Larry's shoe impression didn't match the one Nick lifted off of Miles's cousin's screen door. Although Larry's fingerprints were a perfect match to one of the sets Hodges lifted from the bottle of antifreeze, we were able to determine it happened from Larry stocking the product on his shelves."
"Okay, so why not just let him go?" asked Greg.
"Because we're hoping we can use the information that Larry tells us to lead us to the real killer," says Catherine.
She and Greg exit the observation room and leave the precinct. On their way back to the lab, Catherine decides whom she'll send to retrieve surveillance footage from a traffic camera. Something Larry mentioned to Brass during the interrogation made her want to follow up on a hunch. She passes Nick and Warrick in the hallway choosing to send them.
"Nick, Warrick, I'm glad that I caught you..." Catherine begins.
Nick cuts her off, objecting. "Huh-uh, no way."
"No way?" says Catherine. "You don't even know what I'm going to ask."
"He doesn't speak for me," chimes Warrick. "Whatever it is, I'll do it."
Nick gets defensive. "If it's to make a fifth trip out to the desert, you can forget it!"
His refusal was understandable to Catherine. Nick had been out there the most. The first time was when the team got the call about the hit-and-run. The second time was to collect the security tapes from Larry's store. The third time was to investigate Miles's cousin's place, and the fourth trip Nick made was to compare shoe impressions. Nick begins to walk away, passing Sara as he does so.
Catherine spots her. "Fine, I'll send Sara instead."
Sara looks up. "Where? To do what exactly?"
Knowing Nick is still in the earshot of their conversation, Catherine says it loud. "You can go with Warrick to the Nevada Department of Transportation. I need someone to retrieve some surveillance footage from a traffic camera."
Nick, having heard what Catherine said, heads back towards them. "I can do that," he says.
Catherine smiles at him. "That's what I like to hear."
Sara continues on her way in search of Hodges. "Hey, will you come with me for a moment? There's something that I have to do, but I don't want to do it alone."
Hodges raises an eyebrow feeling flattered. "Really?"
"Stop it! It's nothing like that! Would you just come with me, please?"
While standing off to the side out of sight, Sara shoves Hodges in the doorway of Grissom's office. She encourages him to get Grissom's attention somehow. Grissom sat at his desk staring at a pile of paperwork, including evaluation forums he'd completed but yet to hand in. Despite Grissom's door being wide open, Hodges bothers knocking on the doorframe.
Grissom motions for him to come in but quickly realizes Hodges isn't alone as Sara follows behind him. Grissom feels a twinge of panic, hoping she's real. All the while, Grissom goes back over the list of side effects in his mind printed on the warning label of his pills hoping hallucinations aren't one of them. Both Hodges and Sara are seated in chairs in front of Grissom's desk. Hodges spots the evaluation forums on the desk, and Grissom quickly covers them up.
"Hodges, if this is about you wanting to go out in the field, you can forget it." Hodges tries to interject, but Grissom continues. "Besides, you're too valuable an asset in the lab. I don't care what Greg told you or how glamorous you think it is, and I thought I reminded you the last time we discussed this that you get paid less in the field than you do in the lab."
Sara speaks up." That's not what this is about; he's just here to prove a point."
Grissom got the just of what Sara was attempting to do. Hodges is present to prove Grissom isn't hallucinating, nor is he the only one who can see Sara.
Hodges tries to get up. "I feel like I've done that, so I'm just gonna..."
"Stay seated," warns Grissom.
"Yes, sir," replies Hodges, quickly re-seating himself.
Sara continues. "The doctor told me that I was the center of your hallucinations." Grissom leans back in his seat, hanging on her every word. "I'm here to tell you that I'm real, and I heard you ⏤ what you said both times. I understand now why you didn't have the audacity to tell me."
"I did," argues Grissom. "I just didn't know it wasn't really you. The truth is, I was seeing you everywhere. In my Denali, in my office, in the coroner's office. I even saw you in my room at the hospital."
"That was me," says Sara.
"Forgive me if I don't trust my eyes," replies Grissom.
"If you don't trust what you see, then trust what you feel," says Sara emerging from her seat.
She approaches Grissom behind his desk. He watches as Sara makes her way over to him, grabbing either side of his face kissing Grissom passionately. Hodges clears his throat, shifting uncomfortably in his chair, and feels awkward towards still being present.
"So you do love me?" asks Sara breaking the kiss.
"I..." Grissom searches his mind for the right words. "I care very deeply about you, yes."
As they head through the double doors of the entrance to the Nevada Department of Transportation, Warrick asks Nick to remind him why they're there.
"We're following up on a hunch Catherine had from Larry's interrogation," Nick explains.
"That's reassuring," comments Warrick taking off his sunglasses upon entering.
Both men approach the counter, presenting their ID badges and state their business to the employee working at the front desk.
"Hi, I'm Nick Stokes."
"And I'm Warrick Brown."
"We're CSI's from the Las Vegas Crime Lab," explains Nick adding, "here to retrieve surveillance footage from the traffic camera of the intersection. Specifically, Nevada State Route 161 leading out to Goodsprings Valley. We believe the gentleman in the footage is a prime suspect of a hit-and-run we're currently investigating."
The guy at the front desk was so engrossed in his work; he didn't even bother looking up from what he was doing. Until the words, hit-and-run registered in his mind. The guy stopped what he was doing immediately.
"Yeah, I heard about that. What a tragic act of stupidity."
Nick and Warrick exchanged looks of confusion.
Warrick requests, "We're gonna need to see the tape and or tapes."
"Sure," replies the front desk clerk, "you boys got a warrant?"
Nick whipped out the warrant that Brass signed off on presenting it to him. The guy behind the desk took a quick glance at it before signaling for them to follow him. He led them to where they keep all of the surveillance videos.
"Take your pick," remarked the front desk clerk laughing, heartily while walking away, leaving the CSI's to do their job.
Neither Nick nor Warrick got the joke until they saw what he meant. There were stacks of unorganized tapes everywhere.
"Aw, man!" said Nick. "Surely not all of these are footage of that one intersection."
"Hey, man, look on the bright side," comments Warrick.
"Is there one?" asks Nick, who began sorting through the tapes.
"Yeah," replied Warrick. "At least they're labeled," he said, picking one up to show him.
After spending more time than anticipated simply collecting tapes, 50 to be exact, Nick and Warrick decide to just bring them all back to the lab.
"If anyone can figure out a way to determine what's what in these tapes, it's Archie," says Nick grabbing one of the many boxes they'd take back with them.
Back at the lab, he and Warrick struggle to keep their eyes peeled while reviewing the tapes with Archie.
"I give up," comments Warrick. "My eyes burn," he says, rubbing his eyes after looking at what felt like hours of endless footage.
They watched as vehicle after vehicle drove through the intersection. Some had local license plates, some were from out of town, but none of them was Miles's pickup.
"What kind of vehicle does this guy drive again?" asked Archie.
Nick lets out a sigh before replying, "A red 2004 Toyota Tundra with Texas plates. Number VFG 8194." He leans his head on his hand to support his head from falling asleep on the table. "How do you do it?" asks Nick to Archie.
"It's my job," replied the A/V Technician. "How do you do what you do?" Archie asks in return. Seconds later, he rejoices, having spotted Miles's pickup in one of the videos. He also puts together a timestamp using cab and bus schedules to pinpoint the time the photo was taken.
Brass brought Miles back in for the second round of interrogation. They had enough evidence to prove he did it but knew that he was innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Brass got his paperwork in order glancing at it once more before handing it off to Sanchez. Catherine sat in on the interrogation too. Meanwhile, Grissom watched from behind the two-way glass in the observation room.
"Miles," began Brass. "Out of curiosity... what type of vehicle do you drive?"
"I drive a pick-up truck," Miles replied imperiously.
Brass could tell Miles was going to be difficult. He got up from his seat, approaching him angrily, slamming both hands down on the table in front of Miles causing him to jump in his chair.
"Listen, I know how long you waited before. I could just as easily have an officer stick you back in that cell and swap you out for another competent person who I guarantee won't waste my time like what you're doing now."
Brass composes himself. "We can do this one of two ways; the easy way or the hard way. Which is it going to be?"
Miles uncrossed his arms, sitting up a little straighter in his seat before replying. "I drive a 2004 Toyota Tundra. Why? Do you know what happened to my truck?"
"Oh, drop the act!" comments Catherine.
Brass meets her gaze, shooting a stern look before making his way back to their side of the table, reclaiming his seat. "As a matter of fact, we do," he replied. "Tell me, how much alcohol must a man consume for him to kill his best friend? Rather how stupid must he be to drink antifreeze?"
"I don't know what the hell you're talking about," says Miles.
"Let me tell you a little story," begins Brass. "Once upon a time, there were two guys from Texas; one of them was named Matt Whitman, and the other was named Miles Gardner. They both decide to take a trip to a magical place called Sin City. Little did one of the guys know that the other would die tragically. You and your buddy Matt have a night of drinking, enjoying yourselves with a six-pack. Somehow you end up all the way out in the desert." Brass leans in close. "How do I know this... because you ran a red light at the Nevada State Route 161 intersection that leads out there." He pauses to see if Miles will react to what he has said so far.
Catherine continued. "The surveillance tape pulled from a traffic camera proves it." She slides the photo across the table in front of Miles so he can see for himself. It shows him driving with Matt in the passenger seat.
"All right, I'll confess," asserted Miles. "We hadn't been to Vegas before y'know, but we didn't want to do nothing illegal. You always hear how people end up with prostitutes or lose millions from hitting the jackpot or..."
Brass interrupts. "Or dead."
Miles looks away from him. "Yeah, but I didn't kill Matt!"
"That's what they all say," replies Brass dismissively.
"No, honest," pleads Miles.
"We have evidence that proves otherwise," explains Catherine. "Your shoe print matches the impression on your cousin's screen door, and we lifted your fingerprints off of a bottle of antifreeze that you purchased at Larry's Liquor and General Store prior to the night of your friend's death."
"My shoe prints on the door because I was horsing around," explains Miles.
"Really?" asks Brass.
"Yeah, Matt thought it would be funny to lock me out," replies Miles.
"So," says Catherine, "you kick down the screen door until he let's you back in, and then you killed him?" She slides the photos of the shoe print comparison impressions for Miles to view.
"No!" argues Miles. "Matt and I thought we could avoid all of that if we just did what we normally do when we were in our hometown."
"Which is... what exactly?" inquires Brass.
"Driving in the middle of an open space like a field but in this case the desert because everyone knows Vegas is a bunch of hot, flat, dry, nothing," answers Miles.
Catherine releases a chuckle. "As oppose to Texas?"
Brass shoots her a look to knock it off.
Miles continues. "Back home, Matt and I'd get a couple of six-packs and some chicks and have a good time. Only being out here, we couldn't tell the real women from the hookers, so we passed on the chicks and just got a bunch of booze."
"Let me ask you something," says Brass. "Why offer to split your winnings with a convenience store owner you barely know?"
Miles laughs, shaking his head. "I didn't split nothing with Larry; there weren't no negotiating with a small businessman like himself."
"Who did you give the money to?" asks Brass.
Miles tilts his baseball cap up, scratching at his head in thought. "Some cop. We paid him off."
Catherine has an epiphany. "Sheriff Talbert?" Miles nods his head in agreement. "You meant to say you bribed him to stop going out to Larry's store, didn't you?" Miles hangs his head in shame.
"It's illegal to bribe law enforcement," states Brass.
"You don't think I know that!" Miles replies harshly.
"Did you give Sheriff Talbert $1K as an incentive to kill Matt?" inquires Brass.
"No," replies Miles. "The deal meant law enforcement stayed away if Larry made reports of theft. I know stealing is wrong, but it's thrilling, especially in a small town. I guess Vegas is different than Texas. As for the antifreeze, I purchased it I didn't steal it. My truck was low on coolant."
"So," asks Catherine. "Despite your fingerprints being on the bottle, you expect us to believe you didn't force-feed antifreeze to your friend?"
"No," replies Miles. "We drove out to an open spot in the desert. It got late. It got dark, and Matt drank the last of the beer. We were both pretty drunk, and I would have stopped him, but it was too late. He chugged it, man, the whole thing. Not that there was much antifreeze left."
"There was enough to kill him," comments Brass.
Catherine slides the autopsy photos of Miles's friend's corpse across the table. "The amount of antifreeze Matt ingested caused dizziness, headache, slurred speech, nausea and vomiting, unconsciousness."
"I thought it was 'cause of the alcohol," pleads Miles.
"What about after Matt stopped breathing, huh?" asked Brass. "Why run him over?"
Miles drew a long breath and let it out. "Matt passed out in front of the truck. I passed out in the truck. When I woke up, ⏤ I didn't mean to drive over him! I hauled ass."
"By running over your friend?" asked Brass.
Miles continues his explanation. "I backed up. I got out of the truck and saw Matt lying there. I left the keys in the ignition and fled. I didn't want to go to jail!" argued Miles."
"Well, you are anyway," said Brass, motioning for Sanchez to arrest Miles.
Catherine exited the interrogation room, joining Grissom. She shook her head in confusion, turning to look at her supervisor. "What do you make of all of this?"
Grissom turns to look at her before replying, "Don't tread on me."
