Grave Matters

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, smiled, 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?'

'Yes, but I'm sorry, I'm not following your line of…I don't see how my kids…'

Grissom placed the Missing Persons photo of the deceased Kathy Dean on Black's desk in front of the mortician.

Who was pale to begin with, yet managed to whiten further; his mouth sagged open-it was as if he'd had a minor stroke. 'Oh…my God…you're not…no. This is who…?'

'Your babysitter, Kathy Dean,' Brass said, 'was the woman in Rita Bennett's casket. Yes.'

'Oh, Lord, what a horrible…Her poor parents…I knew she was missing, obviously, but I…'

'You spoke to the police when the Dean girl first went missing, correct?'

Black nodded numbly. He was staring at the photo of Kathy Dean on the desk as if she might have been one of his own kids; but he never touched the photo.

Brass said, 'You drove her home-after she babysat for you that same night she disappeared?'

'Yes,' he said, and he pried his eyes from the photo, and shrugged, his tone working unsuccessfully at playing this down. 'The Deans don't live far from us, but it was dark outside. Dangerous for a girl her age to walk home alone.'

'I guess,' Brass said.

Grissom asked, 'You didn't pick her up?'

'No,' the mortician said. 'No-Kathy had walked over, but the sun was still up then.'

Brass asked, 'Was it normal, typical…for you to drive her home?'

'Yes. She felt uncomfortable, walking alone at night. This can be a dangerous city.'

'So we hear,' Brass said. 'What time did you drop her off at home?'

He shrugged. 'Midnight, maybe.'

Brass nodded. 'You watched her walk into the house?'

'Yes,' the mortician said, with a decisive nod, 'whenever I dropped her off, I never left until she was safely inside her parents' house and had closed the door.'

'Then you went straight home?'

'Yes, of course.' Black swallowed. 'Might I ask you…how she died?'

'She was shot,' Brass said, 'in the back of the head.'

He covered his eyes with a hand. 'Oh…oh God.'

'Do you own a gun, Mr. Black?'

The mortician's hand dropped to the desk and his surprise morphed to shock. 'You can't think… I killed her?'

Brass offered the tiniest shrug. 'You said Rita Bennett was never out of your sight. This is what we call in police work an inconsistency.'

The mortician leaned back in his chair. His expression would have been no less pained had Brass just punched him.

'I'll ask again,' Brass said patiently. 'Do you have a gun?'

'No! I don't have a gun. I've never owned a gun.'

'You were aware that Kathy Dean disappeared within twenty-four hours of Rita Bennett's funeral-am I right?'

Black's eyes widened in indignation. 'Why would I ever put those two events together? This is a funeral home, Captain-whenever Kathy disappeared, I would have been attending someone who had passed.'

'It didn't strike you as odd that you were burying one woman you knew at the same time another was disappearing?'

'Please! I know a lot of people-this is a prominent business, and I have a certain prominence in the community, myself. I deal with deceased individuals who were acquaintances of mine all too frequently. Comes with the territory, as they say.'

Grissom said, 'You do understand we're raising this issue because one woman turned up in the other's Desert Haven casket?'

With a frustrated sigh, Black said, 'It wasn't like the two events happened simultaneously. Rita died on Thursday. I talked to her husband, Peter, about holding the funeral in our mortuary on Friday, Kathy babysat for us on Saturday night, then disappeared sometime after midnight. I didn't hear about the disappearance until Sunday night, when the police stopped by the house to talk to my wife, Cassie, and me about Kathy. Rita wasn't buried until Tuesday morning. Why would I assume any connection between these events?'

'Was your wife with you when you drove Kathy home?'

'No-obviously, we wouldn't leave our kids alone. When we got home, the kids were asleep on the couch and Cassie got them up and was walking them upstairs, when I left with Kathy…and when I got home, Cassie was in