"I haven't seen you since you got back. I'm glad you're feeling better," David said with a nervous smile as Sara entered the morgue just after eleven that night.
"Thanks, David. It's good to be back."
"You here for Grissom's heart?" he asked.
At Sara's raised eyebrow, David realized the awkwardness of his question.
"I mean, the heart that Grissom gave to Doc."
"Yeah. Grissom will be here in a second. The secretaries are getting better at tracking him down, and one has him cornered, making him sign some purchase orders."
"I don't mind paperwork," David said confidently. "I find it to be a relaxing diversion. And, of course, it's essential for everything to be properly documented."
"Of course," Sara said, smiling.
"Sara, if you're through flirting with my assistant, I need him to give Mr. Robeson a wash," Doc Robbins teased as he hobbled in.
"Kill-joy," she teased back.
"You here about the heart?"
"Yes. Grissom will be here in a ... oh, here he is," she said as the doors burst open.
Grissom was frowning and murmuring as he stormed in.
"I need a clone to do nothing but sign crap all morning long so I can get some real work done," Grissom groused.
"Heavy is the crown," Robbins jibed.
"Okay, Albert, you've had long enough with the heart. What do you know about it?"
"Let's see," he said, flipping open the file, even though it was doubtful that there was anything in it that he couldn't relate off the top of his head.
"I think it is a female, probably near middle age, judging by size and the extent of atherosclerosis. No cardiac abnormalities. Histology doesn't reveal anything other than the fact that the heart had been frozen."
"Frozen," Sara repeated.
"Which explains the lack of decomposition during its time in the mail."
"One day," Grissom added.
"Yes, but one day in Las Vegas heat in a plastic bag could have been very unpleasant. Instead, the heart was relatively fresh."
"Did you send DNA to Greg?"
"Yes, and blood samples from what was still in the chambers."
"There was still blood in the heart?" Sara asked.
"Yes, apparently the heart was removed, but not drained. It appears to have been bagged and immediately frozen. The blood in the bag was diluted, but there was still plenty of it in the chambers."
"Diluted with what?" Grissom asked.
"Water. Maybe it was packed in a few ice cubes. Or it may have been frozen wet."
"So the psycho wanted us to receive it in pretty good shape," Sara noted.
"Evidently," Grissom agreed. "Which means that the killer wants us to be able to determine who the victim is."
"Which means that the identity of the victim has some significance for the killer," Sara said, following his train of thought.
"Yes, which also means that this probably isn't the last we'll hear from this guy."
* * * * *
That damned whore!
She slammed her hand into the dashboard of her SUV, swearing angrily as Sara and Grissom left the lab together. Their discrete nods as they headed towards their respective vehicles didn't escape her notice.
You think you're so smart. Harvard! Like that's any accomplishment. The grade inflation there is famous. All Mommy and Daddy had to do was write a check to get you in. It's not like you ever had to work.
She'd spent considerable time and effort ensuring that all the pieces of her well-crafted puzzle arrived in the right sequence, and to the right location. Things had to follow, or the pattern would be destroyed.
They were messing up her plan. Well, the whore was. It wasn't Gil's fault. He would never treat her so disrespectfully. It was the influence of that bag-of-bones brunette, she realized with a sad sigh.
I know you're lonely, Gil, but the whore's using you. Can't you see that? You're a step for her to use on her way up. Once she has what she needs from you, she'll abandon you.
I won't. My love for you is pure. Why else have we both been alone for so long? We were waiting for fate to bring us together. I remember that first night we met. The sparks flew immediately, and I knew you were the one. Patience, my love. If you had only waited a little while longer.
She waited until the two vehicles left the crime lab parking lot before putting her own SUV in gear. Maybe they would go their separate ways. The harlot needed to go to her apartment, and soon. After a few blocks, it became clear the two CSIs were heading towards the same destination.
Damn her! She's messing with his head – both of his heads! If she ruins this plan, I'll make her pay dearly.
The Angel of Death chuckled mirthfully. The whore was going to pay anyway. She was dangerous to Gil. The poor man was in over his head; she was using his own hormones against him, making him behave in a way that was contrary to his nature.
Why else was he smiling like a fool as that tramp got out of her car and into his, once they had reached his townhouse? Where were they going now? Surely he's not going to take that slut out in public!
Precious Gil, don't you realize a man is known by the company he keeps? I won't let her hurt you. I won't let anyone ever hurt you again.
* * * * *
"What's this?" Grissom asked as they approached Sara's apartment door.
"I don't know. I don't remember ordering anything lately. See who it's from," she answered, unlocking the door.
"Mushroom Mania, it says. You didn't order more psychedelic mushrooms, did you?" Grissom laughed.
"No! I'm almost afraid to eat the button mushrooms from the grocery store now. I keep imagining I'm getting flashbacks, and then feel an overwhelming desire to listen to Pink Floyd. Why don't you open it for me while I gather up some clothes? I've got to do some laundry soon or I'll have to go to work naked."
"That could be distracting," Grissom mused, pulling out his pocketknife to slit the packing tape. "You can do your laundry at my house, you know. I do have a washer and dryer. All the modern conveniences."
"Really? I've never seen anything but the bedroom," she teased.
"Well, all the good stuff happens there, so you're not missing much," he said. "Maybe we should wait and open this at the lab. It could be contaminated as well."
"I doubt that. They're probably just replacing the other kit," she offered. "After you called and raised so much hell over the psilocybe mushrooms, I wouldn't be surprised."
"I didn't raise hell. I merely requested that they provide me with all the data regarding their quality control."
"You have a way of 'requesting' that sounds amazingly like raising hell," she teased.
Grissom huffed, as he pulled a styrofoam container out of the box. "Did the other kit come in styrofoam to keep it cool?" he asked, slicing through the tape that secured the top of the container.
"No. Definitely not," she said, her curiosity overwhelming her. He'd set the styrofoam box on the breakfast counter to open it. Sara came up behind him, peeking over his shoulder.
"Did you by any chance order a brain?" he asked, peering down into the box.
"I'll get some gloves," she said, dropping an armful of clothes. "Here," she said, handing him a pair.
Pulling on both gloves, Grissom slowly lifted the freezer bag holding a graying brain. There was a two-inch puddle of water in the bottom of the box, obviously from melted ice.
"Wonder how long it's been out there," Sara mused. "I haven't been home in a couple of days."
"Postmarked two days ago, so probably just one day," Grissom surmised. "Got a grocery sack I can put these in?"
"You're kidding, right? But I've got a trash bag," she said, popping the bag open with a flick of her hands.
"A heart. Then a brain. Is he just sending random organs? Or is there a message there?" Grissom wondered aloud.
"What I want to know is why he sent it to me," she said.
Grissom had been so entranced by the organ that he had forgotten where they were. He whipped his head around to look at her worriedly, then instinctively began to scan the small apartment.
"Call it in," he said, slowly easing towards the only room not visible, the bathroom.
"Wait for the cops," she said, reaching out to grasp his arm. "Or I'll tell your boss," she quipped to break the tension.
Sara soothingly stroked his arm as she relayed the information to Brass, never taking her eyes off Grissom. He was clearly upset, and pulled away from her to check out the closet and bathroom before she could stop him.
"Brass is sending over some uniforms. Says they'll be here in a minute. He'll be here in 10."
"Good. Sara, I don't want you coming here by yourself any more until this is over. It's not safe. He obviously knows where you live and something about you. What does it tell us that he used Mushroom Mania as a return address?"
"You're right! So maybe this guy is the one who messed with my mushroom kit," Sara deduced.
"It would seem so. Can you think of anyone, anyone at all, who might have it in for you?" he asked.
"Enough to send me body parts? Not to mention sending me on a couple of psychedelic trips. No, I can't think of anyone."
"Have you met anyone new lately? Has anyone asked you out recently that you've turned down?" Even asking the questions sent a brief wave of jealousy coursing through Grissom, despite the fact that she had obviously chosen to spend her time with him.
"No. Not other than Greg. And this doesn't seem like his style," she said, hoping Grissom hadn't thought she meant to implicate Greg.
Grissom answered his cell phone and exhaled deeply.
"Okay. I'll be there in a few minutes."
"What's going on?" Sara asked, seeing the concern and conflict in Grissom's eyes.
"A leg just appeared at the lab. Wasn't mailed this time, but was left in a clear plastic sheet in the parking log."
"You better go have a look. I'll wait for Brass."
"I don't want to leave you alone here. It's not safe."
"Grissom, have you thought this through? What are you going to tell them you were doing here in the first place? You better cut out before the cops get here."
"I'm not leaving you here alone. You can tell them you called me," Grissom said firmly.
"And you got here before the cops did?"
"I happened to be in the neighborhood," he ventured.
"In this neighborhood? What were you doing, slumming?"
"I was on my way home from the lab."
"You live the other direction," Sara laughed.
"Nothing escapes your razor-sharp intellect," he huffed.
"They should be here any minute. Just go. I'll lock the door. I'll be fine," she said, incredulous that he thought she needed his protection.
"You better be, or I'm going to be really pissed ... at both of us," he added.
"Go, damn it!" she laughed, pushing him out her door.
"There's not much use in my leaving," he said, a flash of reality hitting him squarely between the eyes. "My fingerprints are all over the box and the styrofoam."
"Shit. Some hot-shot criminalists we are! Still, there's no reason for you to wait around here. I can hold down the fort until the cops get here. I'm not some helpless female."
Giving in to her, Grissom stood on the porch until he heard the deadbolt slip into place. It went against every instinct he felt to leave, but he knew it was a battle he couldn't win with her. But he wasn't beyond fighting a little dirty.
Looking around, he located a spot in the courtyard that he could see from her porch. He made his way down quickly, watching her door from his vantage point until he saw a police cruiser pull up front. Smiling, he circled around to the parking lot, pulling out just as Sara was opening the door for the officers.
* * * * *
Damn it, Gil! Do you have any idea what you are doing? What danger she's put you in?
The Angel of Death shook her head sadly as she sipped her coffee. The slut was going to get him in trouble. As supervisor, he'd be the one punished when their affair became public knowledge. He had to know that, but there he is, watching her apartment.
Did he really think that skinny bitch would stand up for him?
Hell, the whore will probably claim she was sexually harassed. That he made her do it to keep her job. Her career would be intact, and she'd get a nice cash settlement from the lab to keep it quiet. They'd probably fast-track her for promotion to keep her happy and out of court.
Well, dead women tell no tales.
She turned her head to watch as Grissom got in his car and drove away. Letting out a disappointed sigh, she pulled into traffic behind him. He was acting so typically male, as if his intellect couldn't overrule his hormones.
It's not his fault. The whore's preying on his loneliness, his weaknesses. I'll have to get rid of her before she really blows this. Don't worry, my love. I'll take care of it. I'll take care of everything.
* * * * *
"I'm told this may belong to you," Dr. Telgenhoff, the day-shift medical examiner said to Grissom as he blew through the morgue doors.
"Not me personally," Grissom answered in mock-seriousness.
"So you don't have a third leg," Telgenhoff said, an eyebrow raised.
"Not literally," Grissom laughed. "And I'm not missing the one I've got."
"I heard you guys got a heart last night. Did someone realize none of you had one?"
"You should take your act on the road," Grissom said distractedly as he began to examine the severed leg.
"Well, what we have here is an obviously female left leg. By the looks of her, she's relatively young, probably in her late 30s or early 40s. Decent shape, but not a runner or anything like that."
"You went to medical school to learn that?" Grissom teased. "My A/V tech could have told us that with one look."
"Well, tell him to bust it down here, then, 'cause I'm ass-deep in bodies. I could use the help."
"Was it frozen?" Grissom asked, guiding them back on track.
"Not all the way through; the outside had been, but not the inside."
"Like it wasn't in the freezer long enough to freeze all the way through. That's interesting. The heart last night had been frozen."
"The leg is too thick to freeze very quickly. Guess he was in a hurry to get it to you. Good thing someone found it pretty quickly. There's virtually no decomposition."
"Where's the plastic it was in?" Grissom asked, looking around.
"Sent it to Trace," the coroner answered.
"Damn. I'd rather my people work it."
"You should put out a memo stating that all random body parts belong to graveyard. I'm sure no one will mind shirking the work," Telgenhoff laughed.
"Like you would read a memo," Grissom grumbled on his way out.
"Like you would write one," Telgenhoff shouted back over his shoulder.
* * * * *
He had too many irons in the fire, and he knew it. A few weeks ago he would have sworn that dating Sara would have complicated things even more. But in only a little over a week, he'd come to realize that she helped him in ways he could never have imagined. He hadn't thought about how much energy he had been devoting to fighting his feelings.
Sometimes they talked. Sometimes they made love. Sometimes they lay tangled on the couch, watching old movies and eating popcorn. But no matter what they did, he found that he felt better, more alive, just being with her.
On the drive back to her apartment to pick her up, he began to do the math, and he didn't like the answer. Sara had been poisoned. She had been at the lab when the heart was delivered. The brain had been sent to her house. A hard lump of fear was beginning to grow in the pit of his stomach.
As if there wasn't enough to be concerned about, the Sheriff's thinly veiled threat needed to be addressed. If it wasn't soon, Grissom had no doubt that Atwater would find a way to get rid of her. For a brief moment, that didn't sound like such a bad idea to Grissom. If she left, she'd be safe.
He suddenly jerked back to reality. There was no guarantee she'd live that long, if the killer had her in his sights. And no guarantee that he wouldn't follow her, wherever she went.
Ignoring the time, Grissom dialed Catherine's cell phone.
"This better be good," Catherine groaned in greeting.
"Catherine, the sheriff is threatening to cut Sara loose over the Rodgers homicide. I need for you to look into the case again. Go to his house. See if you can find anything that establishes a time of death."
"First of all, it's noon, when all decent graveyard shift workers are fast asleep. Second, I'm handling all these other cases while you and Sara work the heart. Why can't you do it?" she growled.
"It's not just a heart anymore. We've got a brain and a leg. And, besides, I need for you or one of the guys to do it. I don't want the Sheriff or anyone else to be able to invalidate the evidence."
"Gil, I'm sensing a hidden message here."
"Please, Catherine. Just do it without all the psychoanalysis."
"You be careful," she warned. "This is sounding like something that could blow up in your face."
"I'm trying to be careful," he said heavily, accepting that he wouldn't have been able to hide his affair with Sara from Catherine forever.
The irony that Sara's future was in Catherine's hands wasn't lost on Grissom, but he knew that he couldn't afford to be involved with the case anymore. If news of their relationship got out, it would cast suspicion on any evidence he collected that cleared Sara.
"I know things haven't been very good between you two lately," Grissom said.
"You don't think I'd let some personal squabbles influence me, do you? Just because we've been a little snarky with each other doesn't mean I want her to twist in the wind."
"I'm sorry. Didn't mean to imply ..."
"Hey, you're upset and worried. I get that. I promise that I'll do the best I can."
"Thanks, Catherine. You're a good friend."
"I'll try to be," she promised. "Now, get off the phone and let me get my beauty sleep."
* * * * *
"Catherine, Nick, and Warrick will be working the Rodgers case," Grissom said, as they gathered around the table, five cups of strong coffee forming a ring in the center.
"Sara and I have the body parts to deal with."
"Are they from the same victim?" Warrick asked.
"We don't know yet," Sara answered. "Samples are with Greg. He's doing a preliminary standard serological screen to compare them. Should be finished in a couple of hours. He's also running the DNA. He got plenty of sample, so it should only take a few days."
"What parts have you got so far?" Nick asked.
"We've got a heart and leg that are female. The gender of the brain donor is unknown, until Greg gets the DNA back. The heart and leg were sent or left at the lab. The brain was mailed to Sara, using the same return address as the mushroom kit that poisoned her," Grissom detailed.
The implications began to sink in all around the table, with furtive glances towards Sara indicating that each had drawn the same conclusion.
"Who'd you piss off?" Nick asked jokingly.
"I piss off everybody," she said mock-seriously.
"True," Warrick said, as all the CSIs nodded in unison.
"But, seriously, can you think of anyone who would have it in for you?" Nick pressed.
"I've been thinking about it ever since the deal with the 'shrooms. We handle hundreds of cases each every year. No telling who might have taken it personally," Sara answered.
"I don't like the sound of this," Warrick said in a low voice. "You shouldn't stay at your house for a while. This dude knows where you live. That can't be good."
"You can come stay with me," Catherine offered.
"That's okay. I'm going to be staying with a friend," Sara said. "But thanks."
Though none of them could recall her ever talking about having any friends in Las Vegas outside of work, it seemed likely to them that she must after living there for three years. But it still seemed strange that she'd never mentioned this good friend before.
Grissom sighed internally, relieved to have temporarily dodged another bullet. That is, until he caught Catherine's sidelong glance at him.
* * * * *
"I can see someone else needs a lesson."
She drummed her fingers against the steering wheel as she watched the three CSIs walk towards the rundown home. It had been a lark to follow them. Her beloved and the witch who was twisting his mind hadn't left the building. In a moment of inspiration, she decided to see what the others were up to.
As always, her instincts were good. Of course, when it came to her true love, she was always correct. They were trying to clear the whore.
Gil, darling, why? You're smarter than this. Let her go before she destroys you. I'll make you happy. There's no reason to settle for her crass ministrations. Believe me, she won't be able to satisfy you the way I can.
She's not even on the same mental level as we are! Do you really think the whore could orchestrate a plan like I have? Would she deign to dirty her hands for you? I've seen her at crime scenes. The bitch is weak. Even something as natural as saliva disgusts her.
The Angel of Death shook her head in disbelief. That the brown-haired bitch hadn't been fired yet was a testimony to the evil influence she had on sweet Gil. Being high on drugs and being the only suspect in a murder should have been enough to get her out of the lab.
Of course, ruining her career was only the first step. The whore needed to be out of his life – permanently.
Heading home for a nap, the Angel of Death sighed. She was neither unreasonable nor petty. If the floozy had left poor Gil alone, she would have been content to merely destroy her career. But she had to corrupt him, and for that she would pay dearly.
Now, the blonde was getting in on the act, trying to save the strumpet's career. Why? Gil must have asked her to do it. She was his friend; it was the only reason she'd be helping the younger slut.
She'd never considered Willows a danger. She catted around with too many men for Gil to ever be tempted by her. But if she was willing to help the whore, then she needed to be put in her place.
TO BE CONTINUED ...