Grave Matters

On the way out, Catherine said, 'Wow, very thorough…that exchange of phone numbers. You're really trying to stay on top of this.'

Warrick gave her an uncommonly shy grin for such a confident man. 'Cath-don't even go there.'

Her chin crinkling with amusement, she raised her hands in surrender as they walked out of one Sunny Day into another.

At the office, they split up.

Vega went right back out, this time to interview Mabel Hinton about her visit to Vivian Elliot the morning she died. While the lab techs worked on the evidence, Warrick and Catherine, each pursuing separate courses, concentrated on doing background checks on the doctors and nurses who worked at Sunny Day.

Catherine had been at it for hours when finally Greg Sanders interrupted. Probably the brightest among the rising stars of the crime lab, Greg was young, ambitious, if sometimes scattered, his streaked blond hair giving him the appearance of a man who had just stepped off a Tilt-A-Whirl.

'Hey, Catherine,' he said, hovering over her desk, his hands behind his back.

Catherine scooted her chair back and looked up at him. 'So Greg-spill.'

'I…found…your…murder weapon.'

She grinned. 'Really?'

A quick nod, and Greg explained: 'We went through everything in the biohazard bag you brought in.'

'We?'

He gestured with a thumb over one shoulder. 'I had help from a couple of interns. Just a small tip? Any time you gotta go through the contents of a biohazard bag? Call an intern.'

'Noted.'

'When your vic coded, they gave her a thrombolytic agent.'

Catherine nodded that she understood. 'To break up a clot if there was one.'

'Exactly. Streptokinase, in this case. They also gave her dopamine and nesiritide-Natrecor as it's called.'

'Natrecor?'

'It's a vasodilator. It's the synthetic version of BNP, a hormone manufactured in the heart.'

She'd followed this for a while, but now was lost. She'd become a CSI, not gone to medical school.

'Oh-kaaay,' she said finally. 'So the murder weapon was…?'

'After going through all the different syringes,' he said, 'I found this homeless puppy.' He produced a plastic evidence bag from behind his back.

She took the bag from him. Within, a large, nasty-looking syringe looked as clean as when it had come out of its protective wrapper.

'How can you know it was this specific needle?' she asked.

Greg held up one finger, said, 'Ah!…That's why you come to an expert for an opinion. Because you'll get an expert opinion.'

'Greeeggg…?'

'There were traces of both blood…Vivian Elliot's, by the way…and saline from her IV on the needle.'

'And on the inside?'

'Not so much as a molecule of dust-not…a…particle.'

Catherine frowned. 'But there should have been traces of something, right?'

'There were in all the others,' Greg said, with an affirming shrug. 'And in every syringe I've ever looked in. This one? This one has never held anything more than…air.'

'Fingerprints?'

'Not on the plunger, not on the tube, not on the needle, nothing.'

Catherine said, 'All right-maybe we can track it some other way.'

'Just let me know if you need anything,' Greg said. 'Always happy to solve your cases for you.'

'Do you want me to say it?'

'I wish you would.'

'Greg-you're the best.'

He was gone less than a minute when Warrick rolled in, Catherine still staring at the plastic evidence bag.

'And what have we here?' he asked.

'You know that old cop expression? All we've got in this case is a pound of air?'

'I've heard it.'

'We've got it…only we're happy to have it.'

She held up the bag and explained what Greg had said.

'Murder weapon,' Warrick said. 'Always nice to have.'

'So far it's a dead end, though.'

'Plenty other leads.'

Catherine nodded. 'So. How go the background checks?'

'Kenisha Jones came up clean.'

Catherine laughed once. 'And Warrick Brown's heart skipped a beat.'

'Cath…I said don't go there…. As for Kenisha, she went to UNLV, put herself through school. Hard worker, and never so much as a parking ticket. What'd you come up with?'

'Meredith Scott?' Catherine said.

'Third shift nurse?'

'Right. She wasn't so lucky.'

Warrick pulled up a chair, his eyes perking with interest. 'Really?'

'Really. Got busted just after high school for shoplifting. Then, while she was still in college, there was a petty theft beef with the boss of the restaurant where she worked. He said she was pocketing money out of the register.'

'How did that one turn out?'

'Scott pled to misdemeanor theft, repaid the money. At the time, she claimed she'd intended to pay the money back. Just a youthful error of judgment. And truth is, other than that, her jacket's clean. Since college? Solid citizen.'

'How about Rene Fairmont?' Warrick asked.

'I'm passing her off to you. Plus, you've still got the doctors to do, right?'

'Yeah, but now that we established my plate's full, what are you gonna be up to?'

Catherine leaned back in her chair. 'I'm taking that proverbial fine-tooth comb to Vivian Elliot's finances…. If our killer is picking these people because they have no family, to me that signals a financial-gain motive.'

Warrick nodded. 'Can't argue that. What about the other vics?'

Catherine heaved a sigh. 'Bodies long gone, crime scenes cleaned up past the point of no return. Only thing left is the records of those that have died over the last eight months. Vega's over there picking them up for me now. Once I've gone through Vivian's finances, I'll start on those.'

'Never a shortage of fun things to do around here,' Warrick said, putting his feet up on the edge of her desk. 'How do you like dayshift?'

'In this heat? Is it fair to have an opinion?'

Warrick, staring at the ceiling, said, 'You've seen the security out at Sunny Day.'

'Yeah-Deputy Dawg. Not exactly the vault at Mandalay Bay.'

Warrick looked at Catherine. 'What if our killer's not one of the staff?'

Shaking her head, Catherine said, 'Then he or she better screw up soon, or we're gonna have trouble making a collar. If this isn't about money, how does the killer pick a victim? If it is about money, and the killer's not one of the staff…the neighbor, maybe…she or he's got to have an accomplice on the inside.'

'You sure about that? An outsider with medical knowledge might've shot that air in that IV, right?'

'I don't think so. This syringe matches the ones from Sunny Day…. Maybe somebody doesn't like old people…and their hobby is taking one out every now and then…and I don't mean for lunch.'