MIAMI : ONE YEAR, ELEVEN MONTHS AGO
Horatio and Eric waited at the receptionist desk. Horatio saw a doctor coming down the hall and turned to face him.
"I'm Doctor Milner," he said as he stopped in front of Horatio.
"Doctor Milner," Horatio presented him with a warrant. "This is for the patient records of a one Chrissie Mandais and to search the room she occupied when she was here."
He took the warrant and skimmed over it before responding. "Until I can have our lawyer look over this warrant, I'll only let you read the records in my office, Detective Cane."
"I would appreciate that. Meanwhile, I'd like my CSI to have access to her room."
"She left here six months ago."
"We'd still like to see it."
"Let me make the arrangements to have the current patient removed from the room."
Horatio watched him head back down the hall.
"H, if she left here six months ago, what am I looking for?" Eric quietly said.
"Calleigh said there was a shrine at Chrissie's apartment. An obsession like that doesn't happen overnight. Look for anything that would indicate her obsession that the staff may have covered up."
Eric nodded.
#
Doctor Milner glanced up, watching Horatio walk up to him. He looked back in the patient's room that Eric was searching.
"Our lawyer said the warrant is valid, so I'll have my nurse make copies of the records," Milner told him.
"I appreciate that. I have a question about the records."
"What's that?"
"I see that Chrissie had an obsession with someone. Do you recall who that was? Did she ever mention this person's name?"
"No. She only called him 'her pet,' and it didn't start until a year and a half ago."
"The day she escaped?"
"Yeah. She was high, stole a car and was caught speeding. The officer that pulled her over brought her back in the middle of the night."
"Did you look at any articles about the person she was obsessed with?"
"No."
Horatio cocked his head to the side, looking sidelong at Milner. The doctor was lying, he could hear it.
"Not a single article? No photos? She never mentioned the name Ryan Wolfe?"
Milner frowned. "She only cut out pictures of this person, and yes, she did mention the man's name a few times. She was convinced he was her boyfriend."
"So you knew this was a real person she was obsessed with?"
"Yes."
"And you never thought to contact the police about it?"
"Detective Cane, if I called the police with every patient that came here obsessed with someone who really existed, the jails would be full of my patients."
"The night she was returned, she was brought in by patrolman Ryan Wolfe. He happens to be my CSI now. And he is also the object of her obsession, Doctor Milner."
Milner looked at him. He was a bright man and he understood what implications were unspoken.
"Has she hurt him?"
"We believe she kidnapped him, we don't know if she's hurt him yet or not."
Milner covered his mouth for a second. "I thought we'd moved past it. I didn't think she was even interested in him anymore."
"Why is that?"
"I ordered her to take down all of her pictures. She'd completely covered this room with pictures of him. She had several fits before she finally did as I asked. I never saw another photo or heard his name or her reference 'her pet' again."
"Horatio!" Eric called.
"Perhaps next time a patient is obsessed with a policeman, you'll contact us."
Horatio walked into the room, seeing Eric standing with one foot on the toile back and the other in the sink. He'd pulled off the bathroom vent cover and had pulled out a dusty shoebox. He handed it down to Horatio and then climbed down.
Horatio opened it and hundreds of pictures of Ryan Wolfe stared back at him. Eric looked from the photos to Horatio.
"We're never going to find him, are we, H?"
Horatio picked up one that had a heart draw around his face with smeared lipstick. It was pure hope that made him answer yes, while in the back of his mind he was telling himself no.