Chapter Seven

Ritual Murder—What's your hobby?

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ LibriCon 2014 ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

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Saturday early morning

Patrice was sprawled on a webbed lounger in the fenced off hot tub area. "Another guest was going to unlock the gate, saw the victim on the lounge and the blood running into the drain. Checked to see if the victim was alive—" Wow. Most people would run, screaming, into the night. "She went to get the manager—" Mrs. Islington is going to get a voodoo doll in my image.

Cilly was listening to Gibbs give us the rundown, her face impassive. Blank. Too blank. Her train of thought hadn't derailed, it never left the station. Mr. Rubio and DiNozzo had been searching Lulu's room—she was along as a representative of the convention. Mr. Rubio called Gibbs to advise they found an envelope with $9741 in cold hard cash, only to be told of the second death. A little jurisdictional discussion and they opted to seal and sign the envelope and put it in the hotel safe.

"Victim's keycard was used to enter her room at 11:42," Mr. Rubio said, having called the security office. "She was discovered at—"

"12:10," Mrs. Islington murmured.

"That's a tight window, especially since she had to change and make her way back down—" Mr. Rubio shook his head.

"When she was—uh—talking to Lulu, she mentioned she was going to hit the hot tub after midnight," I volunteered. "She was hoping to—uh—" I hunted for a delicate way to put it.

"Anyone she was... 'meeting?'" Gibbs asked.

I sighed. "She was hoping to… 'meet'... McGee. But I'm sure he doesn't 'date' outside his species," I added at McGee's appalled look.

"No witnesses. Nobody in the area," DiNozzo said. "Except for the off duty EMT who found the body."

Ah. That explained the lack of panic.

"And—how odd."

"What, Duck?"

Having been given the okay by Gibbs, Ducky was doing a little poking and prodding in advance of the night crew coming to collect the body. "The area is tiled, no landscaping..."

"Plays havoc with the drains," Mrs. Islington said.

"Of course... but there are very small clumps of dirt in the wounds and caught in the blood. Dirt."

Almost as though we were directed, we all glanced around. Trees, grass, border plants— I gasped. The others turned toward me.

"Yes?" Gibbs puts a lot in a single word.

I turned to Mrs. Islington. "Back when we did the walk through, I tripped on a hose—"

She immediately followed my train of thought. "Agent Gibbs?" She led him to the nearby border.

Gibbs squatted next to where she pointed and pulled out a hose guide. "Yeah, this would make a great weapon. McGee, David—"

They looked at what he held up and split off in opposite directions, poking about in the nearby shrubbery. "Perp could have taken it with him—" DiNozzo started to say.

"Or not." McGee looked up from where he had parted some shrubbery. Ziva came over and shot several pictures of what he had found. "Nothing with it. Looks like it was just tossed aside. But, yeah, blood on the tip."

"Bag and tag," Gibbs said, probably out of habit. He stared across the way at the bank of rooms: Regency, Renaissance, and Georgian—or, crime scene, access, and interrogation, if you will. "Room's still open…"

Not for long. The last of the waitstaff rolled a cart through the door, and security locked the door firmly behind them. Gibbs loped over, conferred with Mr. Rubio's minions and came back with a look of mild irritation on his face. "Room emptied right after we left, area was clear. Nobody was outside of the room to see anything."

"Boss…" Tony said slowly. "Everyone we've talked to says the first victim shouldn't have been a victim. Nice girl, kind of boring, but nobody would have wanted to kill her. But this one?"

I suddenly felt guilty about the concom meeting Thursday night, wishing that Patrice could be our murder mystery victim.

Of course, I hadn't been alone in my thoughts. My guilt disappeared.

"And?" Gibbs prompted.

"Well, what if someone mistook Louise for—her?" Tony suggested, stumbling for a second as the name escaped him.

"Patrice," I supplied. "Patrice Ingram-Ashcroft. Ingram-hyphen-Ashcroft."

Gibbs didn't roll his eyes, but it was a close call. "They don't look alike. Not even the hair color."

"But if someone just said, 'kill the assistant' and didn't point her out—" Tony argued.

"Not likely. But—not impossible," Gibbs conceded.

"Once you've eliminated the impossible whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth," I half-mumbled.

Tony's face split in a wide grin. "Spock! Star Trek 6!" He's not a big s-f fan, but he's the walking trivia book for almost any movie.

"Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Sherlock Holmes," I corrected.

"Hey—Spock said that quote was from an ancestor, you think—sorry, Boss." He broke off when Gibbs gave him a glare. (He saves head slaps for when they aren't in public, I've noticed.)

"What's the story on the money you found in Ms. Weiss's room?"

DiNozzo shrugged. "Envelope, white, business. Unsealed. No markings. It was in the dresser drawer, sitting on top of a pile of t-shirts. 97 hundreds, two twenties and a single. If she was killed for it, they didn't get it, and it wasn't exactly hidden. Room was neat, didn't look like it had been searched for anything."

"Patrice said Lu was 'really happy,'" I said. "Because she got the money? Or because she was using the money to get something?"

"Good question. Got an answer?"

I didn't get my feathers ruffled by Gibbs' comment. "No, but Janet might have one. Want me to ask?"

He thought a moment. "Keep it general."

I pulled out my phone and sent a fast text. You up?

After a moment I got an answer. No, this is a recording. I may never sleep again. What's up?

PIA said Lulu was really happy today. You know anything about it?

Not sure. Something to do with her idiot ex.

Thx.

What's up? She repeated. Any idea who… OMG was it jerkface?

Don't know. Promise, I'll tell you what I know when I can. Laters.

I gave Gibbs a rundown of the text messages. "McGee. That—projectionist. He said he hadn't seen Ms. Weiss since about 1900 Thursday."

"Right, Boss."

"Did he say anything about planning to see her later?"

McGee shook his head. "He's probably still in the film room, he's working the night shift—"

Gibbs jerked his head toward the main building. "Victim was 'happy' and it supposedly had something to do with the ex."

"On it." He hustled off toward the main tower.

Gibbs continued to stare down at Patrice. "If the first victim hadn't been holding McGee's book… I don't know that this one…"

"Better safe than sorry," Ducky said, straightening up. "Dr. Parrish and Ms. Thomas will be here shortly to pick up our new guest—we are…?"

Gibbs nodded. "I don't like coincidences."

"The universe is rarely so lazy." I was in a Sherlock Holmes mood.

He gave me a flash of a smile. (Well, his lips twitched.) "I like it."

"No charge," I said with a sigh. "Gibbs… I don't like to speak ill of the dead, but if anyone was asking for it, she was. She and Moira are cut from the same cloth—same nasty attitude, same desire to know all the dirt on someone. Only difference is, Moira makes money at it—and she's a better actress. Pat has—had—no problem letting her inner bitch show through. And I could tell you stories all night." I jerked my head toward Patrice. "I probably only know one one-hundredth of the dirt about her."

Gibbs cocked his head and started off. "So if there was any scuttlebutt—" He nodded toward Patrice. "—or Ms. Weiss…"

I knew where he was going. "Moira would know. For sure."

He scribbled a note to himself. "We should talk to Mizzzzz… Devereaux… again."

"Lucky you."

He smiled faintly. "I'll take backup."

"Take a taser," I muttered.

McGee returned in about ten minutes with Kyle in tow, almost colliding with Dr. Parrish and Kelly Thomas as they arrived with a gurney for Patrice. Kyle stood at the edge of the group, looking more and more uncomfortable as the minutes passed. (Being stared at by Gibbs can do that.) Finally McGee said, "Boss, this is Kyle Cooper."

Another long silence. "You sent a lot of… unfriendly messages to Louise Weiss."

He hadn't had enough time to look at her cell phone or track down her email; he was using Janet's comments for a stab in the dark.

The stab hit. Kyle turned a mottled scarlet and stared at the ground. "I didn't—I mean, I wasn't—she just—it's—we—uh—"

He not only couldn't complete a sentence, he couldn't get one started. Gibbs just stood there and stared.

"I'm stupid," Kyle finally blurted. "I'm a fucking idiot. I made a mistake, Lu found out about it and that was it. She walked out."

"Mistake?" Gibbs prompted blandly.

"I, uh—cheated on her," he admitted. I'll give him points, he didn't try to gloss it over. His gaze flicked toward the lounger where they were transferring Patrice's body to the bag.

"With Patrice?" I blurted. Gibbs didn't say anything. Euuuuu. She slept with anything mammalian. God knows what strains of creepy STDs he'd been exposed to.

"Yeah. Last year at the con. Lu found out about six months ago. She didn't know who—"

Yeah, or that chat with Patrice would have been a lot louder.

"But she knew. And that was it."

"Straw that broke the camel's back?" Gibbs murmured.

Kyle's blush had been receding. It came back with a vengeance. "Yeah."

"And you thought harassing her would make her come back?"

He looked Gibbs squarely in the eyes. "I got caught. I was mad—at myself. So I did some stupid things. You ever do something stupid? Sir?"

Gibbs though a moment, then gave a small nod. "Yeah. Yeah, I have."

"Well, everything I've done for the past year has been Darwin Award stupid. But Lu was helping me out of a jam. She was paying off the car we bought together and I was turning it over to her."

"Cashier's check?" Gibbs asked oh-so-nonchalantly.

Kyle looked uncomfortable. "No. Cash."

Gibbs gave him an astonished look. "Cash? Untraceable, unaccountable-for cash?" A little hammy, but it got the point across.

"My, uh, creditors don't take checks."

Bookies? Pushers?

"So she gives you cash, can't prove she paid you, and gets screwed again?"

Subtle, subtle.

"No." He looked almost defiant. He opened an envelope and took out a couple of papers, unfolded them and held them up for Gibbs to see. "My dad signed for the car when we bought it. Here's the contract giving her ownership for the $9741 balance—and the title. It's already been signed over. Dad was going to bring it over tomorrow morning."

In my book, that puts him at the bottom of the suspect list. To Kyle, Lu was worth more alive than dead—$9741, to be exact.

But… if his little one convention-night-stand with Patrice put his relationship with Lulu into the septic tank, maybe—

Yeah. I almost snorted aloud. When, in between movies? Running the film room—35mm, video or DVDs—means sitting by the machine while the whole movie plays, watching or reading a book until the movie ends. Or until the system screws up… which is why you sit by the machine. Film ops means potty breaks between films, unless you're lucky enough to have someone extra to cover for you. If you run out during the movie, Murphy's Law guarantees the system will screw up right then. Kyle had either drafted someone or was sweating blood right now, envisioning all sorts of SNAFUs.

Dammit. I was missing American Dreamer!

I folded my arms and tried not to glare at the hot tub. Gibbs hadn't cleared Kyle, but I had. Which put everything back to square one.

Who killed Lulu? And why?

And who killed Patrice? (Why not?)