Mortenson moved toward the door, but before he could close it, Nick-at the man's side-was pointing into the garage at a white appliance against the back wall. 'That a chest freezer?'
'Yeah.'
Boldly, Nick stepped through the door out into the garage. Voice pinging off cement, he said, 'I've been thinking about getting one…. This baby expensive?'
Mortenson followed the CSI. 'Not that much-less than $500.'
Nick whistled. 'Hey, that's not bad at all.' He gave Mortenson the look you give a used-car dealer. 'Has it been good to you?'
Mortenson nodded, shrugged, then glanced back in the direction of the living room, mildly imposed upon, but not knowing what to do about it. 'Had it three years,' he said. 'Not a lick of trouble.'
Nick stood studying the freezer, admiringly. 'Doesn't hurt it any, to be out in the garage?'
'Naw,' Mortenson said, getting sucked into the seemingly mindless conversation. 'Runs a little more, but there's nowhere in the house for it. This works fine.' He opened the lid so Nick could peer inside.
While proud homeowner Mortenson droned on, Nick checked out the freezer, though not for the reason the other man likely thought. Three-quarters filled with white-butcher-paper-wrapped packages with very clear dates printed in Magic Marker, the Mortensons' freezer was better organized than Nick's office. Beef on one side, chicken and fish to the back, pork to the right and vegetables in the front. Though only about eight or nine cubic feet-and stacked with enough food to keep a homeless shelter going for weeks-the freezer did appear big enough to hold Missy Sherman's body. A small layer of frost coated the walls, but Nick could still see every seam and the smoothness of the surface along the back.
What he did not see was something that could have made the round mark on Missy Sherman's cheek.
Nick asked, 'How often do you have to defrost one of these?'
Mortenson shrugged. 'Once a year, maybe. Not so bad-there's a drain plug in the bottom. Some of the more expensive ones coming out now are frost-free.'
'Sounds good. Looks like you defrosted yours, recently?'
'Yeah-maybe three weeks ago.'
Nick looked from the bottom of the freezer to a floor drain in the center of the garage floor. Pulling a plastic bag from his pocket, he asked, 'Would you mind if I lifted a sample from your drain?'
Mortenson looked at him like he was crazy, then slowly, the man's eyes narrowed. 'Why?'
The best Nick could come up with was, 'It might be helpful. You said you wanted to help.'
'In Missy's murder investigation.'
'Right.'
'In my garage.'
'Uh…yeah.'
'Which, means…what?' The eyes on the little face over the big body tightened; the goatee was like dirt smudged on his chin. 'You suspect me of Missy's murder?'
Shaking his head, Nick said, 'I don't suspect anybody yet…. I'm just doing my job.'
'And here I thought you were just this nice guy interested in buying a freezer.'
Risking Brass's ire, Nick revealed: 'Missy Sherman was frozen.'
Mortenson frowned. Trying to make sense of it, he said, 'She was frozen to death? In Las Vegas? How the fuck cold was Lake Mead that-'
'No. Frozen. As in a freezer.'
'What, now you suspect us? Are you high?'
'No. I'm just a crime lab investigator who needs to check that freezer.' And Nick pointed to the appliance.
His voice rising and bouncing off the enclosed space, Mortenson yelled, 'Alex told me you took his place apart, too! You really don't have any goddamn decency, do you?'
Nick glanced toward the house, afraid that the man's voice would carry and bring out the wife and Brass.
'Sir,' Nick said tightly, one ex-jock getting into the face of another. 'You said you wanted to help. I need to have a look at that freezer.'
Looking down at Nick, noses almost touching, Mortenson blared, 'There's some murdering lunatic out there, and you people come around and bother us! The people who knew and loved Missy! Isn't it enough that we lost our friend, that Alex lost his wife?'
Regan and Brass appeared in the doorway off the kitchen.
'Brian, what's wrong?' Regan asked, her voice rising, ringing off the cement, making her sound a little like Minnie Mouse in an old movie house. She rushed to her husband's side.
Brass trailed after, shooting a look at Nick, who could only shrug and nod toward the freezer.
The detective got the significance at once, and turned to Mortenson, who seemed just ready to launch into the next wave of his tirade.
Cutting him off, Brass said, 'You're right, Mr. Mortenson, there is a lunatic out there, a murderer, and we don't have any idea who it is…so we have to suspect everyone, if only to start ruling people out.'
Trembling, the big man said, 'You have no right, no right at all…'
'We can do this now,' Brass said, 'and you can cooperate…or we can get a warrant and do it later. Either way, whatever evidence my criminalist wants, he's going to get. The question is, do you want to slow us down, or not? You choose.'
Mortenson seemed to shrink a little, from King Kong to the son of Kong, his wife slipping an arm around his waist.
She said, 'Just let them do what they want to do, Brian, and get them out of our house.'
He gave her a sick look. 'This guy says Missy was frozen, that somebody stuffed her in a damn freezer or something. They think…' And he looked toward the appliance.
Regan paled, horror-struck, but nonetheless said, 'Don't make them come back here-I don't ever want to see these terrible people again. Please, Brian, I'm begging you-just let them do what they want, take what they want and leave us alone.'
'All right, baby,' he said with a sigh. Then he looked from Nick to Brass. 'Do what you have to…then get the hell out of my house.'
Brass stood in the garage with the Mortensons, trying to make peace with them, while Nick went to the car, got his camera and his silver toolkit. When he returned, the husband and wife stood watch accusingly, near the door to the kitchen. Brass had parked himself close by, but no further words were exchanged with the couple.
Nick snapped off several shots of the freezer from both a distance and up close, concentrating particularly on the seams and side surfaces on the inside. When he was done, Nick set the camera aside, pulled on latex gloves, bent down to the floor drain, removed the cover and fished out whatever he could from the shallow trap; then he placed his findings in the bag. The tense silence in the room and the eyes of the Mortensons boring into his back as he worked weighed on him and he wished Brass would say something to break the hush, but the detective seemed content to stand by without comment.
Nick sealed the bag, replaced the cover on the drain, rose and nodded to Brass. He ended by taking another half-dozen photos, this time of the drain. Without a word, Mortenson pushed the button on the wall that activated the garage door opener. As the double door whirred upward, the detective and CSI took the hint and walked out into the evening and down the driveway to the Taurus at the curb.
Nick glanced back and saw Regan Mortenson silhouetted in the corner of the doorway, while Brian walked out of the garage onto the driveway, stopping next to his wife's Camry. Mortenson stared at them until the car pulled away.
'That went well,' Nick said.
Brass said, 'You know, outside of Grissom and Ecklie, I don't know anyone who pisses people off like you do. At least they have an excuse, they're supervisors, they're supposed to piss people off. But you…'
'Some people like me,' Nick said, mildly amused by this rant. 'Some people love me.'
'Probably not the Mortensons.'
Nick hefted the bag of slime and grinned. 'But I did win their door prize.'
Nodding toward the bag, Brass asked, 'And if that turns out to be nothing?'
