Grave Matters

green slacks and a black silk blouse.

Grissom extended his hand as Brass and the woman approached where he stood next to the truck. The woman's eyes remained locked on the vault on the back of the vehicle, the two CSIs still plugging away with the pry bars.

'I'm Gil Grissom from the crime lab,' he said, his hand still hanging out in space.

She finally tore her eyes from the vault, looked for a moment at his hand like she couldn't understand why it was there; then, with a visible flinch, she focused and shook it.

'Sorry,' she said. 'Rebecca Bennett…. I guess I wasn't prepared….'

'As an abstraction, exhumation is just a word,' Grissom said. 'The reality is…sobering. You don't have to stay long.'

'No, that's all right,' she said, her voice cold, detached now, an attitude she assumed like a cloak she'd suddenly gathered herself in. 'So that's Mother?'

'Yes. We've already started working on the vault, but it's sealed…so it's going to take a little time.'

She nodded, her eyes returning to the vault.

At that moment the epoxy bond was broken and the vault settled back onto the truck bed, the shock absorbers and springs grunting as it did. The noise made Rebecca jump a little.

Brass walked the woman to a chair across the garage.

'Easier than I thought,' Sara said, mopping her brow with her hand.

Nick gave her a sarcastic look. 'Piece of cake.'

Sara looked at him, smiling, but hard-eyed. 'Nick…tell me you're not creeped out by this….'

'What? Gimme a break. I'm a scientist, too, you know.'

'Scientists have feelings, remember?'

'After all we've been through? Don't insult me.'

Sara made a shrug with her face. 'I wouldn't dream of it…but we all have our little, you know… bugaboos.'

Nick grunted a small laugh. 'Yeah, well help me open this one.'

Rita Bennett had only been buried about three months and remarkably little odor crept over the sides of the vault and down to the trio on the floor.

Using the crane, Nick set the vault lid off to one side.

Brass walked over and asked, 'How's the casket look?'

The two CSIs glanced down into the vault at the same moment.

Sara spoke first. 'Looks good, surprisingly.'

'Like brand new,' Nick added. To Sara under his breath, he said, 'Only one owner….'

'Not much smell,' Sara said quietly.

Their comments were sotto voce, to keep them from the daughter seated across the room.

Turning to Brass, Grissom said, 'One of the good things about living in the desert-things decay slower, here.'

'Personally,' Brass said, 'I'm decaying pretty damn fast these days, this heat.'

Next, Nick and Sara worked straps around the casket and Nick used the crane to lift it out of the vault and swing it over the side of the truck. Lowering it slowly, Nick set the casket gently on the floor not far from Grissom and Brass.

Brass turned to the seated woman and said, 'Ms. Bennett-if you'd join us?'

She did, and the five moved to the oaken box; then Grissom, Brass, and Rebecca watched as Sara and Nick released the locks and flipped up the lid of the coffin.

Within, Grissom had expected to find Rita Bennett looking much as she had when she'd been buried, just three months ago. The dress would be tasteful, her makeup in place but slightly over the top, like it always had been in her TV spots for the car dealership, and her hair would be dyed platinum blonde.

Looking into the casket, Grissom felt his stomach lurch a little.

He saw tennis shoes, jeans, a Las Vegas Stars T-shirt, painted fingernails, pierced ears, pink-glossed lips, and auburn hair surrounding a face that had to be younger than twenty-five. The young woman in the casket, younger than Rebecca standing next to him, looked very peaceful indeed.

She just didn't happen to be Rita Bennett.

Rebecca's hand shot to her mouth and her eyes opened wide.

Sara was the first to find her voice. 'Uh…oh….'

She looked at Nick, whose slack-jawed, wide-eyed expression mirrored her own.

'Gris,' Nick said gingerly, 'this doesn't look like a heart attack.'

'What have you people done with my mother?' Rebecca demanded. She turned to Grissom and said, 'Where is my mother?'

The shift supervisor turned to Brass, who seemed suddenly about three inches shorter, an invisible and very heavy weight having settled across his shoulders.

Sheriff Atwater was going tolove this….

Grissom faced Brass and asked, 'We double-checked the grave location-right?'

'I went to the office myself,' the detective said, his voice wavering between anger, confusion, and frustration. 'And the damn headstone is even in the truck! Everything matched.'

Holding up his hands, Grissom said, 'No need to get defensive, Jim…just checking.' Grissom turned to Sara and Nick with renewed energy. 'If our paperwork was right, and the cemetery staff took us to the correct site…all of which seems to have happened, then we have ourselves a brand-new crime scene.'

Rebecca Bennett got between them. 'I'm thrilled for you! But where is my mother?'

Grissom raised a palm, as if trying to stop traffic. 'I don't know, Ms. Bennett…but I can promise you we're going to do everything we can to find her.'

'This isn't happening,' Brass said, and sat on the bumper of the truck. 'We come in to do a simple exhumation, and now we have a murder?'

'Not necessarily,' Grissom said. 'Could be a simple mistake.'

The dead woman's daughter managed to open her eyes even wider. 'Simple mistake?'

Covering his eyes, Brass was calling for a dispatcher on his radio.

'Forgive me, Ms. Bennett,' Grissom said. He began to lead the stunned woman away from the casket. 'We, as criminalists, have to approach this as a problem that needs to be solved. But we don't really mean to be callous.'

'My mother, what the goddamn hell happened…?'

'You have my word, Ms. Bennett-we'll solve this. All your questions will be laid to rest.'

'Like my mother was?'

Grissom didn't have an answer for that.

Sara approached and said, 'We're very sorry about this awful turn of events. This has been a terrible traumatic thing, but please believe me-we're going to help.'

Grissom watched as a uniformed officer entered. Brass joined Grissom and the distraught young woman, showing up at the same moment as the uniform man.

'Ms. Bennett,' Brass said, 'I'm afraid we're going to have to ask you to step out now.'

'Are you people trying to get rid of me now?' she asked, her voice, practically a shriek, careening off the cement walls.

Grissom stepped up. 'No, Ms. Bennett-we're trying to preserve evidence. We have to find out what happened to the woman in your mother's casket.'

'What…about…my mother?'

Shaking his head, Grissom said, 'The only clues we have to what happened to your mother are inside that casket with this girl. You need to let us do our job.'

Rebecca obviously wanted to put up a fight, but Grissom could tell she saw the logic of his argument; he read her as a strong, intelligent young woman. Hanging her head, sighing in defeat, she allowed the uniformed officer to lead her out of the garage.