Implied Connections
Chapter 19 – Location, Location, Location
By: Braidless Baka
Disclaimer: Hmm… owning Rachel here… that's about it… O_o;;
A/N: Almost at the end, and I finally know how it's all gonna work out ^_~ As always, muchos thanks to my wonderful betas RainbowsnStars and Krazykid197. And also, just to tell you I wasn't kidding when I said updates would become erratic. But, rest assured, it shall be finished ^_^;; I'm a few chapters away from the finish now.
~~~
"What do you want?"
Grissom's voice was cold. And harsh. A complete contrast to what it was mere seconds ago. Chillingly, Warrick's words came back to him: She's got him drugged up to the eyeballs. By the sounds of things, Warrick was right.
"What do I want?" The words were indignant. Almost as sharp as Grissom's own.
Almost.
"That's what I said. I can't meet demands if I don't know what they are."
He heard her laugh at the other end, and the sound of a car door slamming. She was probably back in the driver's seat. Could Greg hear her from where he was? It had sounded like a slamming trunk when Rachel had taken the phone again.
"My 'demands' are fairly simple Mr. Grissom. And frankly they aren't that demanding either." She paused thoughtfully. She was probably examining something. It was interesting, thought Grissom, how people always make a show of examining things, like their nails, to avoid saying things to people. Even over the phone. He'd done it himself often enough. "All I want," she said, "is to talk to you."
"So talk."
"No," she said, her voice fluid. "I want to talk to you, in person. Alone. And unarmed."
"Where?"
She chuckled gently. "I'll be there for a day. No more, no less. If you don't come, I'll assume you're not coming and just kill him. Dump his body somewhere for you to find."
"Just one day?"
"Just one."
"And if I come," said Grissom slowly, his mind racing a mile a minute. "If I find you and come, you'll let Greg go?"
"I never said that, did I?" She laughed callously for a moment. "However, playing nice will increase your chances tremendously. Just remember that much."
"Why?"
"Don't ask stupid questions." She paused for effect. "We'll be waiting."
The dial tone was the coldest sound Grissom could imagine hearing, and he lowered the phone from his ear, staring at it dumbly. Then, suddenly, he sprung into action. The dirt. They had to process the dirt. It would tell them where she was going, he was sure of it. She had to know he'd get there, or she wouldn't have said it. And now the stakes were getting higher.
If you don't come, I'll assume you're not coming and just kill him.
~~~
Grissom and Warrick practically collided in the corridor, Warrick coming out of one of the labs with a couple of sheets of paper in his hand. "Oh, Grissom," he said, surprised, raising the paper. "I've been looking into the dirt."
"Good, that's our most important lead right now."
Warrick paused then, tilting his head a little at the words. "Did she…?"
"Yes, she did. What've you got?"
"Well…" Warrick mumbled, glancing through his papers. "It's not from any plant common around here. But we already knew that." He held up a sheet for Grissom's inspection. "Now we know that it only grows in rural areas."
The supervisor took the sheet, the paper making a snapping sound as it was snatched from Warrick's grasp, and looked at it.
Frowning, Warrick continued. "What did she say?"
"We have to find out where this dirt leads, and go there in twenty four hours. Or rather, I do," Grissom paused. "Because she's shy."
"Tight ship."
"Tell me about it." Grissom handed the sheet back. "You keep working on this, I'm going to get Brass. We need more than that APB now, we need a search party."
Warrick nodded, moving past Grissom to continue in his previous direction. Then he stopped, turning. "Apparently, it's sort of fresh."
"Sort of fresh?" The words were confused. "And what does that tell us?"
"We found it on the Hodgeson's doormat on the 11th. It's now the 16th. The tech told me it's, at most, a week old." Warrick paused for effect. "That gives us a day window. Wherever she got it from, it went from there to here in a day or two."
"But a person can travel miles in a day!"
Warrick shrugged. "Don't shoot the messenger, man."
Grissom paused, thinking about this. Could they pinpoint her location on the day of the 10th, or even the 9th? If they could, they would have a better chance of working it out. No airplanes. "Thanks Warrick," he said then, pulling himself from his own thoughts. "Keep working on it."
"Aye aye, sir," mumbled Warrick, giving a half hearted, and rather fake, salute and moving off again.
As Warrick moved off, Gil imitated the motion, powering down the corridor with one thought in his mind. Was Rachel Simmons anywhere near Vegas on the day of the homicide? Credit cards were the most likely thing to check up on, and surprisingly, he hit a match. Most likely on the drive to her new job, she'd stopped at a gas station to buy, of all things, gas. Surprise, surprise. However, at this point, Gil didn't care too much about what she'd bought. The fact that she'd been there was enough. And that eliminated their mystery plants from, say, London or Paris. This plant had to be local, within two days. And she couldn't have driven for a solid two days without sleep. So, it made sense that she drove straight through from buying gas. That made their search area a lot smaller. Because, wherever she stopped for the night, that was likely to be where she was headed now. Quietly, Grissom glanced at his watch. She could even be there now.
She'd killed five people, seemingly without motive. Then one more to prove a point. Tried to kill three more, and abducted another. She was already looking at death when they caught up with her.
What did she have to lose by killing just one more?
Gil really didn't know. He wasn't really a 'people person', nor did he ever pretend to be. But he wasn't inhuman. He cared about what happened to Greg, a lot more than most people might give him credit for. He was always the man to look at things objectively, but he finally knew what it meant to know a victim. Funny, he thought idly to himself, how Greg was 'Greg' when he was thinking about the person, but 'the victim' when he was thinking about the case. They were one and the same… weren't they? Or maybe he just wanted them to be separate people?
Or maybe he was just thinking too hard about things that could wait. He had a CSI to harass about plants.