Sin City

perhaps they even kiss. He is, after all, no ordinary customer. Jenna spins around, sits on his lap and begins to gyrate to the music filtered in through the speakers, even as behind her back, he pulls on gloves, takes the electrical tie out of his pocket, and at the critical moment, slips it down over her head, and around her slender throat.

He yanks it tight. Within seconds it cuts off the blood in her carotid arteries. She struggles to get a grip, her eyes wide with fear and pain and betrayal and sorrow; but it's too late…. Essentially unconscious, brain death only a few short minutes away, she stops fighting as the electrical tie does its terrible work. All Lipton has to do is sit quietly and watch her die.

When she is dead, dropped to the floor, he need only rise, and make his way through the bar, out the door, and into the cool night, where a new life awaits, where he will find some new woman who will not betray him with this sorry, sordid lifestyle.

'You all right?' Conroy asked.

Catherine shook herself to awareness. She hadn't even heard the detective come up behind her. 'Yeah-fine. I was just thinking it through.'

Sara strolled up in the hallway. 'Four of the girls aren't here, but they're scheduled to work tomorrow. We can go to their apartments, or stop back, then.'

'Tomorrow'll do fine,' Conroy said, as the three women confabbed in the corridor. 'We got plenty to work on.'

'You get anything interesting?' Catherine asked them.

Conroy shrugged. 'Hard to say. The dancer that spoke to you…' She checked her notes. '…Belinda Bountiful, aka Pat Hensley?'

'Yeah?'

'She brought out some things that might be worth looking into. Especially if you're still unsure about Lipton.'

'Namely that Tera Jameson is gay,' Catherine said, 'and Jenna bisexual.'

'Well,' Sara said, taking this new information in stride. 'I think we need to drop around at the roommate's again.'

'Yeah,' Conroy said. 'That's a swell idea.' The detective let loose a long sigh. 'So-should we kick Lipton, you think? Are you sure he's not the guy?'

'Not sure at all,' Catherine said. 'We've got Jenna potentially in a love relationship with her roommate, but Ty tells me Jenna was being courted by Los Angeles pornographers, offering the world to her on a blue movie platter. Other than his half-assed alibi and the security videotape, it's all pretty shaky where Lipton's concerned… and if this tech we've got working on the tape says that's not Lipton…well…'

'That doesn't really answer my question,' Conroy said. 'Do we kick him loose, or don't we?'

Catherine thought about it. Then she asked, 'How long can you hold him?'

'Without pressing charges?' Now Conroy thought about it. 'We may be pushing it already. He'd be on the streets by now, if he'd asked for a lawyer.'

Sara asked, 'Can't you hold him as a material witness?'

Conroy turned up her palms. 'How? If Ray boy wasn't here, then he can't be a witness…and if he was here, that makes him our number-one suspect. Ladies, you better talk to your videotape expert, and find out where we really stand.'

A little over half an hour later, with Detective Conroy's blessing, Catherine was back in an interview room with Ray Lipton. A lidded medium-sized evidence box was on the table before her.

The construction mini-magnate looked like hell. The last forty-eight hours had seemed to chew him up pretty bad, his eyes red and puffy and locked into a vacant, not-quite-there holding pattern. He hadn't shaved or bathed and he carried the heavy, sour scent of sweat that came from living in the same clothes in the same small cell for way too long. He sat alone at the table, his head hanging. Though physically much smaller, the CSI towered over him.

His voice was low, strained, as if he hadn't taken a drink of water since the last time they had seen him. 'I need a lawyer, don't I?'

'If you want one, you have every right to make that phone call.' In her one hand, Catherine held a fax from Jennifer Woods of the ESPN legal department. Along with a stern reminder to make sure the letter was in the mail, Woods had sent a log of all programming from noon until midnight, October 25, 2001; a videotape had been Fedexed.

'But before you make that call,' Catherine said, 'I'd appreciate it if we could talk, just a little more, about your alibi.'

'I don't have a damn alibi.' He shook his head. 'I told you, Ms. Willows-I was home alone, watching a football game.'

'That's my point, Mr. Lipton. The football game can help give you an alibi.'

He looked up. 'You're shitting me, right?'

'No-not one iota, Mr. Lipton. It won't clear you, but it would be a good start. Now…what time did you say you started watching the game?'

Lipton shrugged. 'Game started at five-thirty. Got home about seven, took a shower, nuked some dinner, probably sat down just about seven-thirty. Second half had started. Like I told you before, Peterson kicked a field goal; then this guy I never heard of ran the kickoff back for a touchdown.'

Catherine checked the sheet in her hand. According to the ESPN log, Dominic Rhodes ran back a kickoff for a touchdown with 4:50 left in the third quarter. The action occurred at 7:34 P.M. Pacific Time. 'Dominic Rhodes ring a bell?'

Lipton brightened. 'Yeah! That's the guy.'

'Then what?'

'Couple of minutes later, the Chiefs scored a touchdown. It was a hell of a half-I think there were four touchdowns in the fourth quarter alone.'

'Do you recall how many were made by each team?'

'Two,' he said, with confidence. But then his expression dimmed a bit. 'Now…can you tell me something?'

'I'll try.'

'How does this help me?'

'The game was broadcast live, right?'

'Yeah. Of course. I don't care about that tape-delay shit.'

'Did you tape it?'

This had apparently not occurred to him. Lipton shook his head.

'I'm pretty sure of that myself,' Catherine told him. 'There was no tape in your machine, and we've checked every videotape in your residence, and the game hadn't been recorded on any of them. You would have had to tape it, watch it, and dispose of the tape before the police arrived. More importantly, you'd have had to anticipate we would ask you specifics about the game, and you'd have to be ready for our questions. Not impossible, but in real life, in the time frame we're talking about, highly unlikely.'

His eyes had come alive. 'Does that mean I'm finally free?'

Catherine gave him a 'sorry' smile, and shook her head. 'Not just yet. We're still working on the security videotape.'

The contractor retained his hopeful expression, nonetheless. 'I'm not worried-that's not me on the tape, 'cause I wasn't there…. And you don't think it's me on the tape yourself, do you, Ms. Willows?'

With a quick glance at the two-way mirror where she knew Conroy and Sara were watching, she said, 'This isn't about my opinion, Mr. Lipton.'

'Sure it is. You can't tell me you people don't look at this evidence from some kind of point of view. Everybody knows that instincts are just as important as facts.'

Gil Grissom would disagree, Catherine knew; but she said, 'Let's just say I'm not entirely convinced one way or the other.'

That took some of the air out of him.

'Also, I need you to explain these.' She took the lid off the box that contained the evidence bags from the