Nick went with Warrick and the officers who went to pick Thomas Jamieson up. He caught between the need to see this man and revulsion he knew he would feel. It was a nice, neatly kept house. It was probably his imagination, but Nick thought the front garden even looked obsessive, too controlled.
Bradly knocked loudly. A man in his early fifties opened the door.
"May I help you, officer?"
"We have a warrant for your DNA, and to search your house," the officer said, handing over both pieces of paper, "May we come in?"
Thomas stepped back to let them in, reading the warrants. Nick and Warrick brushed past him and separated to cover the house. The house was as ordered as the yard and it didn't take much effort to go through everything. There was not much evidence of anything in the house; there was only one photo, an old wedding picture; nothing was out of place, Warrick was surprised that anyone in fact lived there at all.
"Who's this?" he asked, picking up the photo.
"Me," Thomas answered, "Janine and I on our wedding day. We swore to be true till death did us part," he murmured angrily.
"What happened to your wife, sir?" Warrick asked.
"She left about twelve years ago," he said the anger was gone but Warrick thought he looked strained at the effort.
Nick came out from the back end of the house. He was carrying two sample bags. One held a long length of white, cotton rope, the other a bottle of perfume.
"Do you have a girlfriend, Mr Jamieson?" he said.
"No, I— Why?" Thomas asked.
"Care to explain a nearly new bottle of perfume in your bathroom cabinet?" Nick asked.
"It was my wife's favourite. I keep some to remind me of her."
"We'd like you to accompany us, sir," Nick said.
"I don't have to, do I?"
"No," Warrick said, with forced calmness, "But we can arrest you, and then you would have to. We also need you DNA, Nick?"
"With pleasure," the younger CSI said.
Nick explained the procedure to Thomas Jamieson in an insultingly simple way. The old man took it well and submitted to the swab. He came with them to 'help in their investigation' without them having to arrest him.
Sara had insisted on coming in. And despite all of Grissom's protests, she had insisted on driving herself. She'd won him over with the argument that if she had her own car she could leave early.
So Sara arrived back at the lab at the same time Nick and Warrick were bringing in the samples.
"Sara, can you come with me?" Nick asked.
Sara followed him. Grissom watched her leave sadly. Nick sat Sara down on a stool. He pulled out a pair of gloves and set the evidence bags on the bench. He took the perfume bottle out.
"Sara?" he asked tentatively, "Can you smell this for me?"
Sara just nodded.
Nick opened the bottle and held it out for Sara lent forward to smell it.
She nodded again.
Nick squeezed her shoulder and began to put the perfume away again.
"Nick," she said.
"Yes?"
"I know," she said.
Nick didn't understand but he didn't ask. He knew he could work it out without troubling her. He didn't say anything as she followed him to the interrogation room. She met Warrick and Grissom outside. Without any protest, she went into the observation room. There was no way she would have been able to get through the wall that the three men made across the door. She didn't want to anyway.
Grissom had technically handed the case over to Warrick and Nick. In any other circumstances they wouldn't mind him taking an interest, but there weren't going to let him here. They couldn't trust even Grissom not to over react.
"You've got your own crime scene, Griss. Help Catherine out."
Grissom was a bit put out by the abrupt way they were getting rid of him. But he also knew they were right so he went off to find something else to do.
