“You’re not saying she was senile, or that Alzheimer’s was setting in—”
“Oh, no! Far from it.” The attorney sighed. “But Vivian could be very stubborn. Hell—bullheaded is more like it. She liked the people at Sunny Day, though—the nurses, the other residents, those Gossip Club ladies. She thought of them as friends, and even Doctor Whiting she actually even liked. She just thought he and the other Sunny Day doctors were, as she put it, overrated quacks.”
“Frustration with doctors is common for patients enduring long hospital stays.”
“No argument there. But you should’ve tried to tell Vivian that.”
Catherine couldn’t think of an easy way to ask the next question. “Pardon me for asking, and this is strictly off the record…but was Vivian’s lawsuit frivolous?”
The attorney sat back a little, possibly trying to decide whether to be offended or not. “I didn’t think so or I wouldn’t have taken the case. She had back trouble from the accident and that’s always a touchy area. She said Whiting had added to her pain and suffering by not listening to what she had to say about her condition.”
“Did he know she was considering suing him?”
“Of course,” Pauline said. “He thought he was doing the best he could with her. They had a couple of confrontations.”
Catherine wondered why Whiting had neglected to mention this little fact. Trying to cover it up, or just an innocent omission?
“All right,” Vega said. “Let’s move on…. Did she have a will?”
The attorney seemed a little alarmed. “You think Vivian might have been killed for her money?”
Vega shrugged. “We’re not ruling out anything—not the doctor, not the money, nothing.”
The attorney’s eyes glittered now, anger replacing sadness, at least momentarily. “She was in a full-time care facility. She should have been safe there. What the hell happened?”
“She was murdered,” Vega said.
“You said that before, Sam. How?”
Catherine gave it to her straight: “Someone gave Vivian a syringe full of air creating—”
“An embolism.” The attorney’s exhale had controlled rage in it. “Yes, I could see how someone thought they might get away with that. And you think Doctor Whiting did it?”
“Please!” Catherine said, holding up a hand. “We haven’t found the killer—we haven’t even ascertained a motive yet.”
Best not to trust the lawyer with the theory that they just might be dealing with a serial killer….
“But the potential motive you’re exploring,” the attorney said, “is money?”
Catherine shrugged. “When people are murdered…unless the killer’s insane, the four main motives are money, love, sex, or drugs. Do any of those fit Vivian?”
“I see where you’re going,” Pauline Dearden said. She leaned down to withdraw a file folder from the bottom right-hand drawer of her desk, then scanned the folder’s contents quickly. “Vivian did have a will and she changed it recently.”
Catherine and Vega exchanged glances.
The CSI said, “Changed the beneficiary, you mean?”
The attorney nodded. “Originally, her estate was going to go to several charities. In the end, she gave it all to something called D.S. Ward Worldwide.”
“Never heard of it,” Catherine said, and Vega nodded the same.
“Neither had I,” she said. “According to Vivian, it’s a charity that feeds children overseas. Possible, I suppose, but I did some digging anyway.”
“What did you find?” Catherine asked.
“Not a thing.”
“Nothing?”
“At all, and when I look, Catherine, I look hard. D.S. Ward Worldwide doesn’t even have a damn website.”
Vega said, “Even scam charities have websites.”
“Exactly,” Pauline said. “That’s what sent my red flags flying.”
Catherine asked, “Did you discuss this with Vivian?”
“Till I was blue in the face. She refused to listen to reason. I said it before—a nice woman, but stubborn.”
“Did she tell you how she’d come to hear about this D.S. Ward Worldwide?”
“No. And I asked repeatedly.”
“She didn’t mention a contact with the charity, who’d approached her?”
“Well, she did tell me a friend had told her about the cause, but she didn’t want to elaborate. Someone had prepped her, apparently, that I might give her a bad time. She kept saying she had a right to do what she wanted to with her estate. Which of course she did. And since she had no close surviving relatives, well…”
“Was this advisor a friend at Sunny Day?” Catherine asked.
“I gathered as much, but I can’t confirm it. But I do know, this hunger charity talk all started after she landed in that place.”
“What about the disposition of the estate?”
Picking up the file again, Pauline read the top page, then flipped it over and took in the next page quickly. “Once the house is sold, I’m to cash in the entire estate…roughly a quarter of a million…and, after taking my fee and expenses, I forward the rest in a certified check to D.S. Ward Worldwide.”
Catherine asked, “How are you supposed to forward the money?”
“Certified check sent to a PO box in Des Moines, Iowa.”
“Can you give me the address?”
Pauline Dearden wrote down the address. “Think you can get a line on these people?”
“Good chance,” Catherine said. “I’ve got a CSI friend in Des Moines. Can you stall the disposition of the estate, at least until we can get a court order to stop it?”
The attorney’s scarlet mouth formed a sly smile. “I’m not in any hurry.”
7
THE DOOR TO KATHY DEAN’S room was closed.
Though she knew the bedroom had been compromised as a crime scene in numerous ways, Sara Sidle slipped on latex gloves before gingerly opening the door onto darkness relieved only by a fraction of afternoon sun filtering in pale blue curtains.
She stepped inside and flipped the light switch, illuminating a blue-and-white room that immediately invoked memories of childhood friends with similar adolescently feminine quarters: a double bed with a floral bedspread and frilly pillows in the midst of which a big brown teddy bear wallowed; a poster, looming over the bed, of Justin Timberlake in concert; and a small white nightstand with half-a-dozen book-ended horror paperbacks (Stephen King mostly), as well as an alarm clock and a remote control for the 13” TV sitting atop a dresser on the wall opposite.
Above the TV and dresser, a UNLV pennant slanted; nearby was the girl’s desk, a two-section corner affair whose nearest section—over which loomed a poster of long-distance runner Mary Decker Slaney—was empty but for a plastic file organizer with a dictionary and thesaurus leaning against it. The other section was home to a computer monitor with keyboard, speakers on either side, sub-woofer on the floor, printer on a raised triangular shelf. Farther along that wall was the window and, beyond that, a bookcase crammed with paperbacks and hardbacks.
Although the room appeared spotlessly clean, gaps stood out where the original investigators had taken certain items, and not yet returned them, most obviously the computer tower that went with the monitor/keyboard/speakers/printer.
Judging by the severe angle of the dictionary and thesaurus, Sara surmised the absence of another book. There would be other missing stuff, too, as Conrad Ecklie’s dayshift CSIs had already been through this room…meaning ninety-nine and-a-half percent of anything useful would already be in the evidence locker.
Her job would be to find that final half percent; but first, a call to Nick at HQ seemed in order. She got out her cell.
“Stokes,” Nick’s voice said, after the second ring.
“It’s me…. Listen, I’m in her room, Kathy’s room.”
“And you’re looking for what Ecklie’s people missed.”
She grinned in spite of herself at
Nick’s cocky assumption that nightshift could always find something at a crime scene that dayshift overlooked.
“No,” Sara said, “actually, I was thinking that we should get the evidence they took…and go through it?”
“Once again, CSI Sidle, I’m a step ahead of you. Already got the box right here.”
Shaking her head, grinning again, Sara said, “Okay, smart-ass—what have you found?”
“Hey, nothin’ yet. Even miracles take time.”
“But have you been through the stuff?”
“Just in a cursory way, making sure everything is there.”
“Still…spot anything good?”
“Haven’t studied it; just verified the catalog.”
“Everything’s in order?”
“Yup,” Nick said. “No puzzle pieces missing…unless you find some missing ones.”
“Hey, uh…is there a diary, a journal…?”
“I don’t remember seeing one.”
Sara made a click of frustration in one cheek. “Something missing on her desk…next to her dictionary and thesaurus? And I was hoping it might be another book—diary, maybe.”
“There’s an address book. Ms. Sidle, you betray your age.”
“I do?”
“Diaries are so last century. If you were a high school girl, keeping a journal today, where would you keep it?”
Her eyes moved to the vacant spot where the computer had been and she nodded. “Yeah, yeah, you’re right—electronically. Anything of interest in the address book?”
“Haven’t looked yet. I figured we’d go through it when you got back.”
“Ah. CSI Stokes, where would you be without me?” Sara clicked off before Nick could answer, and her smile faded as she went back to searching the dead girl’s room.
She began with the dresser, going through the drawers and finding nothing but clothes of Kathy’s: underwear, T-shirts, jeans, socks. Next, she checked under the TV; then flipped the pages of the dictionary and thesaurus. The file organizer held no clues, nor did the single drawer in the desk have any revelations to share. Nothing on or under the bed.
She thumbed through the pages of the novels on the nightstand and found nothing. The bookcase and a double-door closet were all she had left when Brass came in, an alertness in his eyes telling her something was up.
Something big.
He said, “Guess who Kathy Dean was babysitting for the night she disappeared? Dustin and Cassie Black.”
Sara’s head reared back. “Whoa…. The mortician you and Grissom went to see?”
“One and the same.”
Her eyebrows rose and she exhaled. “Now that’s interesting. So, I’d guess you kinda wanna go back and have another talk with him…?”
“Kinda.”
Nodding, Sara gestured around her. “Can it wait forty-five minutes or so, till I’m done here?”
“No need. You’re on your own. Grissom’s on his way here now to pick me up.”
“Why’s that?”
“He was with me last time I talked to Black. Wants in on it. He’ll ride with me, and leave the Tahoe for you.”
“It’s a plan.” She moved to the closet.
Brass said, “I’ll wait downstairs—let you know when Gil gets here.”
“Sure,” she said with a shrug.
The closet held nothing of interest and she finally turned her attention to the monster bookcase in the corner, five shelves high and brimming with books. The CSIs before her no doubt had gone through each volume, but she would do the same. Tedious work, and after three shelves of nothing, she was expecting to end this exercise disappointed.
Then a small slip of paper tumbled from the pages of the book she was fanning through. It wafted back and forth, feather-like, before coming to rest on the floor.
With a pair of tweezers, she picked the paper up by its edge, a folded note from what looked like a restaurant receipt pad. Resting it on the desk and using a second pair of tweezers (so as not to damage any possible fingerprints), she carefully unfolded the note.
Across the top were stamped the words Habinero’s Cantina. The message—hastily scrawled in pink ink on the light green lined sheet—was both simple and cryptic: FB @ your place, 0100, A.
Sara had no idea what this meant, nor when Kathy might have received it. But the note must have been meant for Kathy, or at least held significance for her, otherwise why would she have folded it up and stuck it away? Question was: What did the note mean?
And when had Kathy received it? Could’ve been the day she disappeared, or (considering how long she’d worked at Habinero’s) any time in the last two years.
She went to heft the book that had held the missive and checked the spine—Lady Chatterley’s Lover, D. H. Lawrence.
Sara half-smirked to herself—a classic all right, but probably not on the preferred reading list of Mr. and Mrs. Dean….
She placed the book in an evidence bag, then carefully did the same with the note.
Grissom appeared in the doorway, Brass in the hall.
“Anything of note?” Grissom asked.
“A note, in fact.” She held up the bagged evidence.
Grissom took the bag with the note and read it through the plastic, handed it to Brass.
The detective asked Sara, “Mean anything to you?”
Sara shook her head. “I’ll run it past the parents before I leave.”
Grissom glanced around the bedroom. “How close are you here?”
Sara shrugged. “Half an hour?”
“Good work,” Grissom said, and he and Brass were gone.
Downstairs, twenty-five minutes later, Jason and Crystal Dean—seated in their kitchen having coffee—read the note, then gave each other a puzzled look.
“So,” Sara said, “neither of you know who FB might be?”
“No,” Dean said.
“Or A?”
They said, “No,” at the same time.
“Are you sure? Could you think about boys she was seeing, or even was just friendly with?”
Dean gave her a cross look. “Young lady, I told you, I told all of you, a hundred times—our daughter had different priorities. She wasn’t seeing anybody, wasn’t dating anyone.”
Sara suddenly realized it was time to take off the kid gloves and give Kathy Dean the informed investigation she deserved.
“Mr. and Mrs. Dean, your daughter was pregnant when she died.”
Mrs. Dean’s face was a white mask with huge eyes. Her husband’s face reddened.
“That’s a goddamn lie,” he said. “That’s impossible!”
“Impossible…” the mother moaned.
“No,” Sara said, “it isn’t. The coroner’s report has confirmed this. Her pregnancy may well have been a factor in her murder, so it’s imperative for you to try to recall any young men who may have been friendly with Kathy.”
The father’s mouth was a harsh straight line; his eyes quivered with dampness. “You don’t have any right to call her by her first name.”
“Mr. Dean. I am only—”
“Leave. Right now. Leave us alone.” He was comforting his wife, an arm around her shoulder.
He still was, when Sara went out.
Brass had parked in the Desert Haven Mortuary lot, and he and Grissom were just getting out of the Taurus when a late-model Cadillac Escalade pulled past and took the lot’s prime reserved space.
Dustin Black, again in a well-cut gray suit and tie, emerged from the shiny new car, not noticing (or at least not acknowledging) their presence, as he headed into Desert Haven. The detective and CSI entered the funeral home perhaps thirty seconds behind the tall, bald mortician.
Fewer people milled in the lobby of the mortuary today and Dustin Black himself, and not one of his assorted flunkies, was the greeter who held out his hand as they entered.
When the mortician recognized the representatives of the LVPD, his mouth dropped open, and that hand hung in space awkwardly until Brass shook it, sm
iled, and said, “We’d like a private visitation, Mr. Black…with you.”
Eyes wide, mustache rabbit-twitching, with a furtive glance around at mourners heading in and out of doorways, Black said, “Right this way, gentlemen.”
He led them through the same side door as before and down the corridor. The young greeter they had met on their last trip here was sitting at a desk in the office opposite Black’s. He was eating a sandwich, reading a magazine and—judging by the way his head was bouncing to a private beat—listening to music through the earbuds of a pocket gizmo. The boy—his own gray suit coat over the back of his chair, his tie slung over his shoulder while he ate—did not notice their presence. Seemed lost to the world.
“A moment,” Black said, frowning to his guests.
The mortician went to the office, rapped loud on the open door, and the young man sat up, mildly startled, and took out his ear pieces.
“What’s up, Mr. Black?” the boy said.
“Jimmy, if you’re going to eat lunch in, keep your door shut.”
“Oh. Sorry.”
“I could have been coming through with clients, and music and fast food don’t suit the mood.”
Black returned to open the door to his office for Brass and Grissom, who went in. Black watched reprovingly as the young man across the way shut himself inside.
“What are you going to do?” he said, and closed his own door. He waved a hand toward the chairs in front of his desk. “You know how kids are these days.”
Brass and Grissom sat.
“Yeah,” Brass said. “Imagine you do, too—you’ve got two of your own, haven’t you?”
Black appeared puzzled by the remark, his eyes moving to the framed family photo on his desk, then back to Brass. “Yes, I do.”
Brass referred to his notepad. “David and Diana, right?”
The mortician shifted nervously in his swivel chair. “How…why would you know my children’s names?…And what on earth could it have to do with anything?”
Brass folded his arms. “You remember of course that we told you the body in the coffin was not Rita Bennett’s?”
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