Tortured Reasoning
Authors: Mossley and Burked
Summary: It's a Thanksgiving to remember when an investigation into a brutal serial rapist becomes personal for Sara and Grissom.
A/N: Potential spoilers through the current episode. Thanks to Marlou for her beta services and support. Any remaining mistakes aren't her fault.
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: We pooled our resources, and we still don't have enough to buy CSI, so we're just going to borrow some of their characters for a bit.
Chapter 4 – The Evidence Of Things Not Seen
With an effort, Sara snapped her eyes away from the flayed corpse. She scanned the area around her feet, looking for a place devoid of gore where she could safely set her kit down. While slowly retrieving her equipment, she used the time to bring her breathing back under control.
After a moment, Sara opened her eyes and swung her flashlight over the walls and ceiling of the motel room. Streaks of blood and bits of flesh were strewn around the area in a pattern consistent with the back swing of a whip.
With a wince, she turned her attention back to the body. The damage was extensive. The killer had been driven by some intense emotion. Perhaps revenge. Could Heather have been involved? Brass was certainly working on that assumption – among others.
"What makes you certain this was the I-15 Rapist?" Grissom asked the question before she could.
"Look on the table," Brass directed. "Keys to a Porsche. In this neighborhood, I'm betting they go to Zoe's. The same type of knife that was used in the attacks and a bandana. Fits the M.O."
Sara looked up as Brass moved to her side.
"And David said he's got a dog bite on his ass," he said, winking at her. "The dead guy's ass. Not David's."
She flashed him a grateful smile. His avuncular concern was touching, and unlike Grissom's attentions, there was no question that it was genuinely heartfelt and not fleeting. "Good for David. To quote Greg, that's something I wouldn't want to see."
"Greg's quotable now?" Brass said in mock-horror, holding his hands to his chest. "When did that happen? Oh, man, something is not right in the world."
Across the room, Grissom observed the exchange thoughtfully. While they commonly used humor as a way to deal with the job, he found himself wondering if Brass was deliberately trying to distract Sara from the savagery around them.
Moving to the bedside table, he frowned. The items Brass described were there, very neatly arranged. His eyes swept across the room. Clothing stuck out of drawers and carryout containers littered nearly all the flat surfaces in the room. This man wasn't neat.
"These are arranged. Probably symbolic," Grissom announced.
Sara walked beside him, swinging her flashlight over the tabletop. "Someone wanted us to know why this guy was killed," she agreed.
"Oh, I think we all know why he was killed. And the how, when and where. Give you three guesses on who," Brass intoned dryly.
"What makes you so sure Heather was involved?" Grissom asked irritably.
Sara cocked her head to get a better view. She knew part of his short temper was due to her. She'd tried to put Grissom at ease earlier, but she doubted how effective she'd been. The conversation had been unrehearsed. She never expected him to be so direct or to refuse to back down.
"Heather's daughter was attacked. That's motive. And this guy was killed sadistically. She's a sadist," she pointed out, giving him an almost-apologetic shrug.
"And it's not like Vegas has a Whips-R-Us outlet," Brass added.
Grissom looked between them with a frown. He didn't correct Sara's assessment of Heather's inclinations; it was hair-splitting and he suspected coming to Heather's defense wouldn't help him with his dealings with Sara. But they were jumping to a conclusion.
"You can order whips online, and there are a number of shops in town that carry them," he told them.
"I won't ask how you know that," the detective said.
Grissom gave him an impatient stare over the top of his glasses as he knelt down to examine the table in closer detail. "I know all kinds of things. And it shows that Lady Heather isn't the only person in Vegas with access to whips."
"And has motive to kill the man that probably raped her daughter?" Sara asked.
"Hey, it's not rocket science. Zoe wouldn't go through the courts. Heather took matters into her own hands," Brass said.
"Why?" Grissom asked without rancor. "It was Zoe who didn't want to cooperate. She supported her daughter's decision."
"Come on. What choice did Zoe have?" Brass countered. "Think about what Heather does for a living."
"Most rapes go unreported because the victims don't think they'll be believed. Living with the attack is hard enough without having to relive it on the stand." Sara said quietly, straightening when Grissom turned to gaze at her intently.
"Defense attorneys look for ways to shift the blame to the victim," the police captain added. "They use anything questionable in the woman's past. Growing up in a sex club would give them all kinds of ammunition to use against Zoe."
"And there are people out there that would believe it. They don't get that rape isn't about sex; it's about violence. I don't care how strong you are; that would be a bitch to go through. Zoe's smart; she'd know what she'd face at the trial."
"So Heather carried out her own sentence," Brass concluded.
Grissom nodded. They both raised valid points. Heather had the means and the motive to carry out this attack. At the very least, they had to consider her a suspect.
"I'll get a warrant," Brass sighed as he headed for the door. "I wonder if we can get a revolving door account for the domain."
Without conscious forethought, Grissom took Sara's elbow in hand as he pushed open the morgue doors. At the far table, they could see the medical examiner with something small in his fingers. He held it appraisingly in front of him, then leaned over the body, scanning intently. With a self-satisfied smirk, he placed the object on the corpse's back.
He stood and put his hand into a small bucket, pulling out what the two CSIs finally recognized as a strip of flesh. Again, he studied the fragment before placing it on the body.
"Albert," Grissom said in greeting.
"I always did enjoy jigsaw puzzles, but I never did like the ones that were all one color," he said, a scowl of frustration on his face as he searched for a likely origin for the small piece of flesh he was holding.
Grissom peeked inside the bucket to find a mass of skin soaking in saline solution to keep the pieces hydrated.
"David said that it took hours for him to document and collect all of those," Dr. Albert Robbins said, nodding toward the bucket.
"They were scattered all over the room," Grissom acknowledged.
"Walls. Floor. Ceiling. Everywhere," Sara added, wrapping her arms around herself to ward off a shudder. With the blood cleaned off, the marks on the body stood out in sharper contrast, highlighting the viciousness of his execution. The I-15 Rapist was a beast, but she couldn't condone anyone taking him down like a rabid animal.
"I'm trying to reconstruct the skin on the back so that we can count the lacerations, but I don't hold out much hope of getting a definitive number."
"With this many, a definitive number probably won't matter in court," Sara said.
"I can tell you that it was significantly more than the traditional forty lashes," Robbins said. "Many of them delivered postmortem. He no doubt lost consciousness after the first few, so it's possible that the perpetrator didn't realize the victim was dead."
"What about the tox screen?" she asked.
"Still pending, but there's no obvious signs that he was drugged or hit over the head to subdue him, if that's what you're wondering," Robbins said, carefully placing the strip of skin on the back before picking up the nearest wrist. "The depth of the ligature marks show he was trying to get free, at least at first."
"He was aware of what was happening, or going to happen, to him," Grissom noted.
"Makes sense. What's the point of torturing someone if they won't feel it?" Sara asked softly, taking a small step to the side when she realized Grissom's attention had once again shifted to her.
"Hmm," Robbins said distractedly, flipping a fragment of skin around as he tried to line it to a wound. "David sent the ten-card to Jacqui, but the bite on your John Doe here matches the mold taken from the dog that bit the rapist. Unless the dog likes to chew on backsides, I'd say this is your guy. Gil, hand me another piece."
"I don't suppose there's any good way of telling exactly what sort of weapon did this," Grissom posited as he retrieved another strip of flesh.
"I'd say a single-tailed whip or something like it," Robbins answered. "While most of the lacerations are the same general orientation, that's to be expected if the attacker stood in one spot during the whole attack. But they are overlapping, crisscrossing in several places, several different depths – which tells me that it wasn't likely something like a cat o' nine tails, which would form more of a parallel, though slightly fanned, pattern of lacerations all the same depth."
"Something like a bullwhip?" Sara asked, naming the only other whip name she'd heard other than the infamous cat Robbins had mentioned.
"Similar, though shorter, I'd imagine. Bullwhips take a lot of open space to use effectively."
"The motel room was sixteen-by-twelve," Sara recounted.
"Bullwhips are not generally weighted, and are effective only if you have the room to stand away from the target and snap them on the skin. They tend to leave shorter lacerations. They're designed to make noise and a small bite. They aren't designed for flogging, probably because they don't inflict enough damage and they take a lot of skill to use."
"Albert, should I be concerned that you know this much about the subject?" Grissom asked with a wry grin.
"A few years back a ranch hand landed on my table that had been hit a few times with a bullwhip."
"That killed him?" Sara asked incredulously.
"No. A .30-.30 shot to the head killed him. The disagreement over the ownership of a saddle escalated pretty quickly."
"What century do we live in?" Sara murmured.
"So we're looking for something shorter than a bullwhip, but probably not a flogger," Grissom synopsized.
"Correct. But I'm far from an expert on what your choices are from there. My report will simply state that he died from exsanguination from multiple lacerations and shock. Manner of death is homicide. Beyond that, it's up to you."
"Thanks, Doc," Sara said on the way out of the morgue.
She headed for the stairwell quickly, hoping to avoid another confrontation with Grissom. Her ability to mute her reactions to cases was faltering. That was beginning to frighten her; at this rate, it was only a matter of time before she totally lost it. Something had to be done, but she had no idea what.
Grissom lengthened his stride to keep up with her, taking the opportunity to observe her closely. What he saw didn't put his mind at ease. There was a tightness to her posture, and he could tell she was avoiding his gaze.
"Did Brass get the warrant yet? I can work on the samples taken from the motel room. That's going to take…"
"Sara," he interrupted gently, "what's wrong?"
"Nothing."
"I'm not blind."
"None so blind as those who won't see," she muttered under her breath before looking back over her shoulder. "You handling the warrant?"
His eyes narrowed slightly. "Yes, I will. Stop changing the subject."
"I'm not. I'm trying to get back to work. We went from having a psycho rapist to a psycho murderer. Not much of an improvement," she snorted, picking up her pace.
"I think there's more to it than that."
Sara bit back an angry retort. Snapping at him would only make things worse. His curiosity wasn't helping; in fact, it was adding to her pain. It was taking all her control to keep her body from shaking. She needed to get away from him, but he wasn't backing off.
"You don't want to get involved," Sara stated forcefully when he moved to her side.
He stopped her forward progress by taking her arm in his hand. When she didn't turn to face him, he moved to stand in front of her, putting on his best friendly expression. "I think that's for me to decide."
"God, Grissom," she sighed, dropping her head to stare at her boots. After a beat, she looked up and shook her head at him disbelievingly. "That wasn't a warning. It was a statement of fact."
"I don't follow you."
"It's simple," Sara said, her eyes showing the depth of her remorse. "You didn't want to get involved with me. On a personal level. Fine. You aren't involved. So my personal life is off-limits to you."
Grissom's hand fell slowly as the meaning of her words sank in. Something was wrong, even if Sara tried to deny it, and that was making him wary. But had he pushed her so far away she wouldn't accept his assistance?
"I want to help," he tried, his voice softening as he stepped closer.
She gave him a determined stare. "It doesn't work that way."
"Then tell me what does."
"You really don't get it, do you? It's a package deal, Grissom. All or nothing. You can't be 'concerned'," Sara said, making quote marks with her fingers, "and expect me to open up only when it's convenient for you."
"Tell me what I can do…"
"No," she said, pulling out of his grip and mentally counting to ten to calm down. When he followed her, she changed tactics. Turning around, she stood with her hands on her hips, facing him directly. "This act of yours, being concerned for a little bit of time? It's not cute."
"It's not an act," Grissom said defensively.
"Whatever. It still hurts. You push me away, but then you'll offer me enough to trust you again. Then you back off. I'm tired of it. I'm not playing anymore. I don't care if your ex-lover has you feeling guilty."
Grissom removed his glasses, letting out a long huff. He recognized Sara's anger was probably due to the stress of the case, and he'd hurt their friendship more deeply than he realized. That was a painful insight; it hadn't been a conscious attempt to drive her off, but the end result was the same.
And his brief relationship with Heather apparently was a sore spot. He watched as she stood staring irritably at him. This wasn't like Sara. She was direct but never cruel.
"This case is bothering you. I don't want you to risk your career by working something you aren't ready to handle."
"Help my career? You?" she asked incredulously. "You mean like putting a requirement to see a PEAP counselor in my record? That happened on my free time. It had nothing to do with work, Grissom, but now it does. It's going to be on my record forever. Hell, even Ecklie brought it up."
"I didn't know," he said softly.
"Why didn't you ask me what was going on?" she asked, the pain in her voice coming through strongly.
Grissom leaned back against the wall, his hand rubbing his temple wearily. "That last case got to you. Everyone could see it. I thought you were going through burnout."
"It wasn't. You never once asked me what happened. Not on the ride back to my place. Not later. You didn't care until Heather brought it up to distract us from Zoe. I think I have reason doubt that you really care what's going on."
"I'm trying now. You're not exactly being cooperative," Grissom said, closing his eyes at the sharp edge that made his comment more biting than he intended.
"Like I said, your choice. This is what you wanted."
"No, Sara, it's not," he insisted.
"Doesn't make any difference. My personal life is that – personal," she said, turning around abruptly. "I have work to do. What's going on with me has nothing to do with you or with work."
"So, you're finally admitting that something is wrong?" he called out, noting that Sara momentarily froze, but never answered.
Outwardly, Grissom was calm as they approached the door, but inside he was torn. Besides his ongoing clash with Sara, there was this case. He didn't want to investigate Heather again, but like the last time, he was only following the evidence. That didn't make the task any less unpleasant. Considering her a murder suspect had cost him her respect; how would she react to being accused of being a sadistic torturer?
When the dominatrix opened the door, her eyes swept over Brass before locking on Grissom's with a coldness that made it easier to believe she could have killed the rapist.
"Lady Heather. We've got to quit meeting like this. People will say we're in love," Brass said with an insincere smile.
Not responding, Heather fixed her eyes on him with a look that somehow balanced ferocious intensity and complete ennui.
"Seems like I come here every year, investigating a murder."
Heather shook her head in mock-disappointment. "That's hyperbole, Captain. It's been two years since you've been to my humble home," she quipped.
"Yeah, but the last one was a two-fer, so it covered two years."
Heather's gaze was unwavering as she stared him down.
After a moment's pause, Brass continued, "I think you've been a bad, bad girl." He held up a large manila envelope as though it held the story of her life.
"You don't know the half of it," Lady Heather scoffed, stepping aside so that they could enter into the foyer.
"Oh, I think I do," Brass said, a malicious grin pulling at the corners of his mouth.
"I doubt it. But for a thousand dollars, I could show you just how bad I can be," she said, her voice as deep and inviting as the first kisses of foreplay.
"Alas, they don't pay me enough for that," Brass said, shrugging.
"That's a pity," Heather said dismissively, turning to fix her glare on Grissom. "You seem intent to find me guilty of some crime, Mr. Grissom. Why is that?"
"Serious crimes seem to keep happening around you. Why is that?" he countered.
"I was cleared of any involvement in the crimes for which you deemed me a suspect," she answered, a hint of bitterness playing under the words.
"And I hope you're cleared of this one, too," he said honestly.
They stood there, neither speaking and neither willing to end the standoff first.
"Can we go somewhere to talk?" Brass finally asked, breaking the tension between the two.
"We can use my office," she exhaled, leading the way.
Heather sat behind her desk, offering chairs to the two men. Grissom demurred, picking up his inspection of her office that began years ago. As Brass opened the envelope and spread the photos out in front of her, Grissom seemed preoccupied with each of the tools of her trade, turning them over in his hands, making mental pictures before setting them back in place.
"Are you showing these to me for my professional opinion?" Lady Heather asked, picking up each photo, examining it closely before returning it to the desk.
"Sure. Why not? Tell me what you see in them," Brass said, knowing that an appeal to the vanity of some perpetrators would often yield better results than a frontal assault.
Lady Heather shook her head in near disgust.
"Amateurish. No control whatsoever. Whoever did this has the tools, but doesn't know a damn thing about how to properly use them."
"Educate me," Brass said, leaning forward on the desk.
"Look at the whip marks on the back. There are dozens of them, all inflicted at about the same time. No one could survive that; the blood loss would be too great."
"Speaking from experience?"
"From historical knowledge. Would you rather Mr. Grissom explain it to you?"
Brass turned to his colleague with a curious expression.
"To ensure the greatest suffering, punishments by whipping were traditionally spread out over time. It doesn't take long before a person passes out from pain. And it doesn't take much longer to kill them."
"Maybe the person who whipped him didn't want him to survive," Brass countered, smiling humorlessly at Heather.
"Then shoot him and be done with it," she snapped, tossing the photo back at him.
"Do you know who that man is?" Grissom asked, turning toward her, holding a cat o' nine tails in his hand that had been hanging on the wall.
"Should I?" she asked. "I typically remember our clients, and I don't recognize him."
"He's not a client. We believe he's the man who attacked Zoe."
Heather's only reaction was an indifferent shrug. "Hmm. Well, since I didn't witness the attack, I could hardly have recognized him. But if it's the rapist, he died too quickly. He should live as long as his victims do, suffering every minute like some of them will."
"You wanna know what I think? I think that you put the word out that you wanted to find this guy. I think that someone gave him up, and that you or one of your followers whipped him to death. For revenge." Brass added the last two words with an almost melodramatic flair.
"Revenge? That's not revenge," Lady Heather hissed.
"He died."
"Which is my point."
"Not much avenging in letting the bastard live."
She let out a disdainful sneer. "Revenge would be keeping him chained to a wall for the rest of his life, making him suffer a little every day. Revenge would be flailing a thin strip off of him, then rubbing salt in the wound to disinfect it. Day after day, night after night. Until his body was nothing but a grotesque mound of scars. There's no revenge in a quick death, Captain Brass."
"Maybe you got angry, couldn't control yourself," he posited, shrugging innocently.
"I never lose control," she answered, as hard and as cold as a block of steel.
"Never?"
"Never. Captain Brass, the only reason you suspect me is because he was whipped, which brings to mind my profession, right?"
"It stands to reason," he said with an amiable shrug.
"Exactly. So give me credit as a professional. I could make him suffer for the next forty years, if we both lived that long. But I can assure you that I would have done everything possible to ensure his longevity – so that he could feel every slice of the blade, every bite of the whip."
Brass raised his eyebrow as he folded his hands over his belly. "You're not doing much to give me a warm fuzzy about this."
"You'll never understand. How about you, Mr. Grissom? Do you think that this looks like my handiwork?"
"On first blush, it fits," he offered half-heartedly.
"We're past first blush. Well past it," she said suggestively.
Grissom cleared his throat, feeling the heat of embarrassment creeping up his neck, across his cheeks, and up to his ears.
"First of all, if I put the word out, as Captain Brass suggested, I'd be announcing my intentions. That would be foolish. Second, if I were going to kill him, I'd hardly use a whip to do it. There are so many more effective ways that are less identifiable. Besides, a man did this, not a woman."
"How can you tell?" Grissom asked.
"Look at the number and depth of the wounds. Someone whipped him with a lot of force, and a lot of blows."
"There's not much in the world as vicious and as dangerous as a woman protecting her child," Brass suggested.
"That's true," Lady Heather nodded. "And if someone had delivered him to me in handcuffs, I'd love to prove that to him as well. Every day of his miserable existence."
"So let me get this straight. You're telling me that you can't be the killer because you would have tortured him instead? That would be an interesting alibi to present in court."
"If there is even one mother on the jury, I think I could sell it. But, to be truthful, I'd probably do neither. Despite the assumptions that you two seem to constantly make, I'm a law-abiding citizen. If he had shown up at my doorstep, I'd have called the police. Let him rot in prison."
"He wouldn't have gone to prison. Zoe didn't let us collect the rape kit," Grissom said gingerly.
"There were other victims, from whom I assume evidence was collected. And you did take skin scrapings from Zoe."
"Juries are funny things," Brass said. "Without an eyewitness, there's no guarantee they'll convict."
The two men turned around when Heather looked towards the door and stood up quickly. Zoe entered the room and walked straight to her mother's side. Her face was swollen and bruised from the attack, but she carried herself with determination. Grissom noted that Heather intercepted her before she could see the photos on her desk.
"What's going on, Mom? He was at the park after…"
"Hello, Zoe," Grissom said delicately, "we need to ask your mother a few questions."
The young woman looked at him for a moment before turning her attention to Brass. "You have a badge. You're not with the Crime Lab."
"No, I'm not. This won't take long. Why don't you wait outside?"
"That's Captain Brass," Heather stated when her daughter turned back to her with a curious expression. "He's with homicide. He and Mr. Grissom think I killed the man who attacked you."
"He's dead?" she asked quietly.
"We're still waiting on final confirmation, but yes, we think so," Grissom said.
"Guess I don't have to talk to the artist then," Zoe replied, leaning softly into her mother's side.
Heather raised an eyebrow when they seemed confused. "Didn't Ms. Sidle tell you? She came to ask Zoe to talk to a forensic artist. We had a very interesting conversation."
"No, I didn't know," Grissom said, his mind immediately beginning to consider what that dialogue had consisted of.
"Zoe, why don't you run along now?" Brass suggested again.
"No. Why would you think my mother had anything to do with his murder?"
"He was whipped to death," Heather explained when neither of them answered.
"That's crazy. Mom wouldn't do anything like that, " Zoe said, rolling her eyes in disgust. " You don't get what goes on here."
"Unfortunately, I spend more time here than I want. Your mother whips people for a living," Brass said. "I think that's why you didn't want to press charges against your attacker. You didn't want that fact made public."
"I'm not embarrassed by what my mother does for a living, Captain. And it's no secret what goes on here."
"Hey," he replied kindly. "It's one thing when you're driving around town in a sports car and joking with all your friends about what she does. It's another when a defense attorney uses it against you at trial."
"How dare …," Zoe began angrily, but stopped herself, taking a moment to regain her control. "First off, I love my mother. It has nothing to do with what she bought me, but the way she raised me. She's always been there for me. I know I've always been her first concern."
"If I thought Zoe was embarrassed of me, Captain Brass, I wouldn't dress the way I do, nor would I be in this line of work. Oh, it's been very profitable, but I have other investments; I don't need to do this."
"And a lawyer may try to make me look bad, but that could easily backfire. Juries don't like it when families are brought into cases. You're doing this because I wouldn't cooperate, aren't you?"
"No," Grissom said quickly. "We're only following the evidence."
"Why don't I believe you?" Zoe asked skeptically.
"Honey, why don't you get Andre? I suspect Captain Brass and Mr. Grissom will be getting a warrant, if they don't already have one. We'll go to lunch while they play Super Sleuths," Heather said, giving her daughter a loving smile. "Go ahead. I'll be along shortly."
"She seems to be holding up well," Grissom noted.
"And it looks like she'll get closure," Brass said sarcastically. "And didn't have to go to trial to do it."
"That was her decision, and I respect her decisions. So it's all irrelevant to me. If she felt it would ease her pain to have him punished, I would have supported that as well. It's her life and her decision. Not mine."
"That's how Zoe feels. But how do you feel ... as her mother?" Brass asked.
Heather's face shone with obvious pride. "I'm proud of how my daughter is handling this. I'm glad that she's here with us while she's healing – physically and emotionally. She's a strong woman."
She moved back to the desk, her head dropping to the side as she turned her gaze on the detective. "It's hard for you, isn't it?"
"I gotta feeling I don't want to know what you're talking about," Brass sighed with a dramatic flair.
"To believe that I have a loving, healthy relationship with my daughter. You can't accept that. Is it because it shatters your assumptions about domination? Or does it highlight the fact that you, who are what society judges 'normal', can't say the same?" Lady Heather pondered, noting the look of pain that crossed his eyes.
"And you," she said, turning to Grissom, "who are you spending the holidays with? The dead? Will you be eating your turkey and dressing at the police station's cafeteria?"
"This isn't about us," Grissom snapped back.
"Are you trying to tell me that you wouldn't have wanted this guy punished?" Brass interjected, trying to regain control over the interview.
"I'm trying to tell you that there isn't a punishment in this world that would make what he did go away. Zoe knows that. She knows that she has a choice to make – let it destroy her, or let it make her stronger."
"That which doesn't kill us makes us stronger," Grissom murmured.
"That's the basis for my whole life, gentlemen. Now if you'll excuse me, I have paying customers who wish to test that theory."
"We'll be talking to you again, Lady Heather," Brass warned.
"Same time next year?" she quipped. "I can show you to the door, but you should know the way out by now."
Brass followed Grissom to the Denali, keeping a watchful eye on Lady Heather's house.
"So what's your gut tell you?" he asked, nodding towards the building.
"I think she's telling the truth," Grissom answered simply
Brass took a slow, deep breath noisily in and out through his nose, squinting slightly at Grissom.
"You have any objective reason for thinking that?"
"Lady Heather's right. Whoever did this had no control. Lady Heather is always in control."
"Too much information, Gil," Brass quipped, adopting a pained expression.
Grissom shot back a look of barely bridled disapproval, eliciting a chuckle from Brass.
"Hey, all I know is that if it was my kid it happened to, all my control would fly right out the window."
"You say that, but you don't really know unless you're in the situation. And Heather would know we'd suspect her immediately, so I doubt she'd leave the body there to be found. I think someone wanted us to find the body. Whoever did this wants people to know that he killed the rapist."
"Maybe Heather wants Zoe to know she took care of things."
"I don't think so. It would be counter to all their beliefs."
"Rage will do that to a person."
"Yes, but we didn't see any evidence of rage, and we saw Heather right after the crime," Grissom pointed out. "Her behavior hasn't changed. It just doesn't fit."
"You think she'd have tortured him? Or turned him in?"
"I have no reason to disbelieve her when she says she'd turn him in."
Brass let out a humorless laugh. "Yeah, well, what Lady Heather says and what she does could be two different things."
"In all of our dealings with her, I've never known her to lie," Grissom said in her defense.
"And you certainly had more ... dealings ... with her than I have," Brass said, moving to his car. He looked over his shoulder to fix his friend with a pointed stare. "You shoulda stuck with the sports car."
TBC