Chapter 14

The reported information turned out to be wrong. The body wasn't near a storm-drain, but in one. Retrieving a body from a drain or sewer was anything but easy. It was almost inevitable that you would cause some post mortem trauma yanking it out of the man-hole. But Sara had a lot of confidence in the skills of their pathologists to limit those to the minimum. Regardless, she inserted both hands of the victim into plastic bags and secured it with elastic bands in an attempt to retain any evidence on them. The fact that the body was dumped down a sewer would also mean that the decomposition rate would've been accelerated. A red baseball cap with a black logo of a rearing dragon on it lay on top of the body, probably tossed in afterwards. Sara photographed then bagged it and send it up to a waiting Detective Vega on the surface. There wasn't much room down the sewer, so when they were ready to hoist the body up, Sara crawled on her hands and knees into one of the tributaries to get out of the way. This part of the sewer had small tributaries leading off in various directions. Every one of them were covered by a grill. Sara crawled into all off them to collect detritus. It was mostly dried plant material, and other rubbish washed down the drain. It hadn't rained in a long time and the material on the grill was unlikely to be connected to the case at hand but Sara was nothing if not thorough. The thought of having to revisit the sewer later was more than enough incentive to be extra thorough the first time. When she finally climbed out, Detective Vega came over to her.

"That cap you found? It's part of the uniform of the Chinese Take Away over there," he indicated to a place across the street. "One off their waiters hasn't shown up for work tonight. A kid named Paul Grant. I phoned his folks, they haven't seen him since yesterday and he never came home from work so they just assumed he crashed at his girlfriend's place. Apparently he did that if his shift ran late. When he didn't come home from school, they phoned us. "

"Who found the body?"

"Street maintenance workers doing a routine check"

"They check-out?" Sara asked.

"So far, I told them to stick around anyway." He eyed her up and down "Doc Robbins just phoned to confirm ID. I was going to ask if you want to come with me when I speak to the parents…"

"But I need to shower first." Sara finished for him with a rueful smile "Don't worry, I am fully aware of the fact that I just spend the last 3 hours down a sewer. Besides I want to have a look around the outside of that Chinese restaurant first."

"Ok." Vega waved a couple of uniforms over. "See you later then," he said with a smile.

A teenaged boy wearing jeans, white T-Shirt and a white apron was busy emptying buckets into a dumpster at the back.

"Whoa, stop, stop!" Sara shouted, spotting him as she jogged over.

"It's just cooking trash, lady." The boy said as he picked up several empty buckets. He was wearing a red ball cap with the same logo found with the vic. It seemed Vega's assumption was right.

"We're short tonight so, if you don't mind…" He turned to leave.

"Yeah, you're short because Paul was killed last night."

"What? Really? That's totally messed up." The boy turned his ball cap to face backwards and Sara was reminded of Grissom. He also tended to do that sometimes.

"Timothy! I don't pay you to loaf!" An elderly Chinese man stuck his head out the open door. "And how many times have I told you to wear your cap on straight?"

"Sorry Mr. Chang," Timothy mumbled and slouched back inside.

"Excuse me, are you the owner?" Sara asked the man before he could disappear.

"Yes." He answered suspiciously, eyeing her dirty appearance and the two uniforms with her up and down. "What you want?"

"Paul Grant was killed last night. Is there anything you can tell us about that?"

"What these damn kids do when they leave here, is none of my concern." Mr. Chang snapped.

Sara felt her hackles rising.

"Mind if I poke around then?"

"Knock yourself out. Just don't break anything." He shouted over his retreating back.

"Thanks for your co-operation," Sara said under her breath as she started looking around.

There was a dark brown stain on the ground, right next to the dumpster, with what appeared to be blood spatter on the sides of the dumpster. Phenophyline confirmed that it was indeed blood, and a further test proved that the blood was human. Sara told the uniforms with her to cordon off the area as she took photos and collected samples. This was probably the primary crime scene. Next Sara glanced into the dumpster. It was almost full.

"Well lucky me, a sewer dunking and dumpster diving on the same shift."

The cop gave her a sympathetic look as he helped her into the dumpster. It was mostly filled with kitchen waste and empty food carton holders. She shoved those aside, but then she saw something much more interesting.

A golf club.

With blood on it.

The autopsy report was already waiting when she got back to the lab. Sara had spent so much time at the crime scene, she totally missed the post mortem. Grabbing a quick shower she got to work. According to Doc Robbins COD was blunt force trauma to the head. The golf-club was most likely the murder weapon. Sara was just waiting on DNA to confirm it.

She was dusting the handle of the golf club for finger prints, but could only find smudges and partials. Down on the shaft she found a partial palm-print.

"Hey, heard you had one smelly customer today," Greg popped his head in.

Sara gave him a smile. "And I heard you guys had a nice jewelry store break-inn" she said with a smile. He returned it but stood there, awkwardly shifting his weight.

"Look," he said finally. "I'm sorry about earlier"

Sara looked at him surprised and confused.

"Sorry for what, Greg?"

"For whatever I said to piss off Grissom so badly."

Sara sighed. "No Greg. It wasn't your fault. But for once, I'll be glad when my shift is over" she turned back to the golf handle.

"Some nice activities with Chris to look forward to?" He asked with a grin and she smiled, remembering her play.

"More a case of getting away from people. But yes, that too." She answered mysteriously.

"Ok. Shout if you need anything."

Sara went off in search of Vega. She passed the break room where Grissom and Sofia Curtis were sharing some private joke. Her heart gave a pang but she firmly told herself that she wasn't interested in what they were talking about. Who Gill Grissom decided to spend his time with was no concern of hers.

She met Vega half-way to PD.

"I was just coming to get you. Kid just walked into PD saying he killed Paul Grant. But get this, he says he did it to protect this girl whom Grant was harassing."

"So he hit him with a golf club and shoved him down the sewer?"

"That's the story. He even brought the clothes he wore with him. Says he didn't think we'd find the body so fast. Come and have a look."

Peter Ross was sitting in one of the interrogation rooms. His father had shown up with a lawyer, and they haven't allowed Peter to say anything else. He was a scrawny teenager, wearing glasses and a face full of pimples.

Vega handed Sara the plastic bag that Peter Ross had brought with him, it contained a bloody t-shirt and a pair of faded jeans.

"Says he was acting on behave of a Jane Turner. They're bringing her in now," Vega told Sara.

"But what you need to know is: Is this victim blood on the clothes, right?"

"Yes please." Vega smiled at her.

Sara quickly walked back to the lab, she almost had more evidence than she had time to process it. She was so absorbed that she almost ran into Grissom.

"Sorry Griss." She wanted to keep on moving past him, but he wanted to talk to her.

"Doc Robbins tells me you missed your case's autopsy, Sara." His voice was neutral, but his eyes were sharper than she'd have liked.

Sara could feel her anger, which had been simmering just below the surface the entire shift, beginning to boil.

"I was in the field, processing the scene Grissom. Where did you think I was? You needed Greg and everybody else on other cases, remember? You send me out there alone!"

She turned around and walked away before she could say anything else and he could reply. She wanted to continue but she knew that Ekclie was circling for a reason to fire her. All the more so after the show down with the poaching case. Grissom watched her leave with his mouth open.

She put a rush on the DNA from the clothes Ross brought in and it was a match to Grant. She phoned Vega and he told her to meet him at PD as Jane Turner had just been brought in. Watching from the observation window Sara had a good look at the girl. She wore a smug smile and way too much make-up for her age. Sara would be the first to admit that she was no expert, but the clothes the girl wore was clearly expensive. Her nails were neatly manicured and she was studying them intently, trying to look nonchalant. Clearly she was enjoying this.

Vega had already started the interview.

"I don't have control over what boys decide to do to each other on my account." She was saying her tone as smug as her smile.

"So you did not in fact ask Peter Ross to kill Paul Grant for you?"

"I would never do such a thing."

She was lying and Sara could feel it. All her instincts were screaming it at her. This girl was at the head of a puerile game. She walked to the other room where Peter Ross was still being held with his father and lawyer. She took a seat and faced Peter, talking to him directly.

"Peter, I need to know what really happened." The boy looked down at his hands. They were trembling slightly and he kept fiddling with his glasses. Like a nervous tick.

"Have you had the results of the tests back?" The lawyer snapped. Sara ignored him.

"Peter, Jane Turner is here."

At the mention of the name his head snaps up, hope sparkling in his eyes.

"She'll tell you," Peter said.

"Peter, be quiet." His father snapped.

"That's just it, Peter. She said she never asked you to do anything to Paul."

The shock and disbelief was evident on his face. "But she begged me to help her, she cried on my shoulder. She said that I was the only one she could trust."

The anguish in the boy's voice was almost painful to hear. He had gone deadly pale.

"Do you have any proof? Anything at all?" Sara asked gently, her heart went out to him.

"Proof?" Peter asked in a small voice.

"Anything that can collaborate your story. Did she give you anything? Did she text you or give you a letter or anything?"

Peter blushed. "She kissed me, I….. it was my first kiss. She said Paul was a mean brute, that he abused her. She said that if I helped her, we could be girlfriend and boyfriend." Tears were spilling over Peter's eyes and he took his glasses of to wipe his face.

"I believe you Peter. I will do everything in my power to help you."

Vega was just finishing with Jane as she stepped out of the room. He gave her a questioning glance when he realized where she had been, but didn't push.

"She manipulated him. He though he was acting in the defense of another." Sara said to Vega forcefully.

"Yes I agree with you, but can we prove it?"

Jane Turner and her father stepped out of the interrogation room

"You're letting her go?" Sara asked incredulously.

"I have nothing to hold her on." He held up his hands again in a sign of defeat and apology.

"Have a nice evening, officers." Jane Turner piped as she walked past them.

Sara balled her fists and stalked back to the lab.

Result after result failed to yield anything new. The parents and lawyers of Jane Turner refused to allow CSI to search their house and they didn't have enough for a warrant. Nothing at the Ross or Grant house yielded anything new either. There wasn't even any indication of abuse on Grant's part. There was nothing to prove that Jane Turner had manipulated Peter Ross in committing murder for her.

Peter Ross was going stand trail alone.

It was the end of shift. Sara sat with her head in her hands in the lay out room she had been using. Every lead had been exhausted. Every avenue tried. She felt that both she herself and the system were letting Peter Ross down. That they had failed. She knew she had to, but she was reluctant to close the case. She knew it would haunt her for quite a while. This would now be the second case to stall in her hands.

"I'm sorry I pulled Greg from your case. I didn't realize it would generate so much work." Grissom had silently entered and was sitting next to her. She startled up at his voice, but didn't dare look at him.

"Please don't do this Griss. I can't do it anymore"

Sara didn't look up. Didn't lift her head out of her hands.

"Do what?"

She could hear the genuine confusion in his voice. It didn't help. He was completely unaware of the pain he was causing her.

"Be you puppet on a string." She looked up and he was taken aback by the pain and resignation in her eyes.

"You're not my puppet."

It was the wrong thing to say and he seemed to realize it the moment he said it.

"The hell I'm not! You act all amicable the one case, only to treat me like hired help the next. I know you have feelings for me, and I know you have decided not to act on them." The words were out before she could stop them.

He paled at her words. They were true and they hit a nerve.

"I heard you confess it to a murderer," she clarified tiredly, realizing that there was no turning back now. "You didn't even have the decency to tell me to my face. You pull me in when it suits you, only to push me away the very next second. Then today when you found out that I may have a friend outside the department, you treat me like I'm a leper. I've had it Grissom."

She got up and moved past him as he opened his mouth to answer. She was standing in the doorway, her shoulders slumped and her eyes tired and sad. She waited for him to stop her, to say something, pleaded with him with her eyes. But he just continued to stare at her. She sighed and turned away.

"See you on Sunday."

"Sunday?" His voice was as surprised as his face.

"I have the night off tomorrow, remember? Probably not."

She grabbed her stuff from her locker and fled, not knowing that Grissom sat it the layout room long after she left.