Part 6
Grissom was standing by the truck talking on his cell phone when Sara walked around to the front of the house. He ended his call just as Sara approached.
"Hey Griss, get any interesting answers?"
"Hop in, I'll tell you on the way to the lab." Grissom got in the driver's seat, and Sara went around and got in the passenger's side.
"He admits to being in her apartment the day she was killed, but he says that he didn't do it. According to him he had gone over to her apartment to discuss the possibility of getting back together. He says that he went over in the morning; they both work nights so they met for breakfast. They went back to her apartment, ate, and things got amorous. Somewhere in the middle of the disrobing she wanted to stop. He admits to getting very angry and hitting her. That would account for the fresh fractures and bruises, and likely also the semen you found on the Vic's jeans. But he says when he left she was crying and upset, or as he put it she was 'a sniveling mess,' but she was very much alive. Since just being there was a violation of the restraining order, we can bring him in and hold him. I just got off the phone with Brass, he is going to press for a warrant so we can get a DNA sample to run, and he wouldn't give one willingly. You find anything?"
"I talked to a neighbor. Friend of the Vic. Benny Holstein. He confirmed that Mr. Barker used her for a punching bag for a long time. He said that she was thinking of taking him back, but he hadn't talked to her in a few days. He got an e-mail from her the morning she died saying she was going to meet Aaron, that's the last he heard of her. He is going to call if he thinks of anything else."
"So what do you think, Sara? Call it."
"I think that Aaron talked Mara into seeing him so he could apologize, and he went to her apartment and killed her. She had been trying to break up with him. If he couldn't have her, no one else could."
"So how do you explain the rope, the sword, and the pieces of armor we found?" Grissom asked.
"Who knows? She was posed; the rest of the scene was probably set, too. Just to throw us off the trail, make it look like something more complicated than a deadbeat guy killing his ex-girlfriend." Sara was getting visibly upset talking about this. Grissom was glad Aaron was in the cop car behind them, Sara might have gone after him if he was near them.
"I still think something is off, something doesn't feel right. If he killed her it would have been more like a crime of passion. Here she was posed, and the scene was set to look a certain way, that speaks to premeditation."
"So he planned to kill her, big deal, he's still guilty."
"Perhaps. But it is also possible that we are chasing the wrong man. There is no doubt that he is not a nice man, but I am not so sure he killed her. We need to look at all of the evidence, not just the pieces that point to him."
They rode in silence for a while, Sara seething in anger and Grissom lost in thought. When they arrived at the lab Sara moved to get out of the truck, but Grissom stopped her.
"Wait Sara." Sara looked over to Grissom, wondering what he wanted. His voice sounded odd, something was wrong. "You need to rest. Why don't you go home and get some sleep. It will be a while before Brass gets the warrant for his DNA, then Greg will have to run that and his prints against the evidence you got from the scene. There is nothing that you need to be doing right now, and you really need to sleep."
"Are you insane? I'm not going home until we nail this guy to the wall!! That bastard beat the shit out of his girlfriend for years, and then killed her when she tried to get away. I am not going home until I know we have him for this." Sara's anger was shifting from the case to Grissom, how dare he try to send her home when they were about to nail this guy?
Grissom looked over at Sara. She looked like hell. She had been up for two days straight, her eyes were puffy, and she really looked on the verge of collapse. Still, he could see the steely resolve in her eyes; she was not going to back down. Man that woman had passion. Grissom felt an odd stirring in the pit of his stomach.
"Ok, how about we make a deal. You can take over my office and take a nap on my couch. I promise I will wake you up if we get something hot. Otherwise, you need to get some rest or you are bound to collapse partway through next shift."
Sara felt her anger at Grissom melt. She knew she needed to sleep, she felt like hell, and she probably didn't look so hot either. She could see it in his eyes. He was normally so wrapped up in science he wouldn't notice if the lab was falling apart, and here he was, worried that she hadn't slept enough. It was so sweet.
Grissom saw Sara relax and was relieved; she wasn't going to kill him after all. At least not right now. She was so passionate about some cases; it really took a toll on her. He wanted so badly to help her, to make her see that she couldn't keep doing this or she would burn out. What he really wanted was to take her in his arms and hold her and tell her everything was going to be ok, but that he wouldn't even admit to himself, much less to her.
"Ok Griss, you win, I'll sleep in your office. But if I find out you didn't wake me up for important news, don't think I won't kill you."
Grissom smiled to himself as he and Sara got out of the truck and headed into the lab. It was not often someone won an argument with Sara Sidle.