Binding Ties

hostage.'

A heavyset woman in white was framed in the reception window. She had bottle red hair and a hard, dark glow about her, as if her displeasure with her lot in life had turned radioactive.

'May I help you?' she asked. It seemed more a warning than an invitation.

This was the intercom voice.

Catherine said, 'We're the LVPD personnel to see Dr. Jennifer Royer?'

They stepped forward and held out the IDs on the necklaces.

The reception nurse leaned forward, read them. Looked up, blandly skeptical. 'Do you have anything else?'

Dutifully, they showed the gatekeeper their wallet IDs, as well.

She gave them a smile that seemed to say, Congratulations for meeting the admission standards, but don't get cocky: You still have to get out….

Or maybe Nick was just feeling a little paranoid.

'Down the hall on the left,' the nurse said, not looking at them any more, 'third door.'

The third door on the left was open and Nick knocked on the frame.

A woman of about forty, her red hair-not from a bottle, short but not mannish-looked up, seated behind a desk cluttered with files. She apparently did not avail herself of the Vegas sunshine much, though with her fair Irish complexion, that might have been self-protection. She had a narrow face with a long straight nose, blue almond- shaped eyes and a wide mouth-unusual but attractive features, the intelligence behind them apparent.

'Ah,' she said, her voice carrying the hint of a Southern accent, 'you're the Crime Lab people. I got your message, but haven't had the chance to return it. Glad you went ahead and came out anyway…. Sit, sit.'

Two metal-frame chairs were waiting opposite the desk, and the CSIs took them.

The office was small and neat, except for the desktop, indicative of a perpetually busy occupant. The desk itself was metal as were the two file cabinets that ran along the left wall. The doctor's chair looked comfortable but not overly so. Nothing elaborate at Sundown-but sufficient. And not one thing more….

'I'm Catherine Willows and this is Nick Stokes.'

The woman smiled and it seemed genuine, one professional to another. She had small, straight, white teeth. 'I'm Dr. Jennifer Royer, the head doctor…. You can fill in your own joke.'

'We'd like to talk to one of your patients,' Catherine said.

'Congratulations,' the doctor said, with just a faint trace of amusement. 'That makes you part of an elite group.'

Catherine frowned. 'Excuse me?'

Dr. Royer's smile pursed. 'The patients housed at Sundown generally don't receive visitors of any kind, not even from the LVPD.'

'How about family?' Nick asked.

'That varies from case to case,' Royer said. She sighed, and shook her head; her dry good humor was clearly her way of dealing with this depressing place. 'Patients are sent here for diverse reasons, at least in the sense that there are countless but myriad ways the words are written down. But in reality? There's really only one reason our patients are within these walls: Someone, or perhaps everyone, wants them locked up.'

'Warehoused,' Catherine said.

The doctor-her frankness refreshing if surprising-nodded and said, 'Exactly-shoved out of sight.'

'But once they're here, you try to help them.'

Royer's smile froze-it was almost a grimace now. 'We try.'

Nick asked, 'How's your success rate?'

With a self-deprecating shrug, the doctor said, 'We prefer not to share that information-this is, after all, a private facility.'

Nick exchanged glances with Catherine-a success rate so low, it wasn't available to the public?

Catherine said, 'Surely a significant percentage of your patients leave, and return to a normal life.'

'Some do. Most of them go out in a way that I'm sure your crime lab is familiar with…Now how exactly may I be of help to Las Vegas law enforcement?'

Shifting in the hard chair, Catherine said, 'As we indicated, we'd like to talk to one of your patients.'

'Which one?'

'Jerome Dayton.'

Dr. Royer didn't hesitate. 'No Jerome Dayton here.'

Catherine winced, perhaps thinking she'd mis-heard. 'I'm…sorry?'

Shaking her head now, Dr. Royer said, 'No one here by that name.'

Nick said, 'You're absolutely sure of that?'

'I should be-I'm the attending physician for every patient at Sundown.'

Catherine glanced at Nick, who could see his partner was getting irritated. To Royer she said, 'We had information Dayton was a patient here.'

'Well, he's not a patient now.'

Nick noted the ambiguity of that and pounced. 'But he was? Jerome Dayton was one of your patients?'

The smile was long gone. Dr. Royer's face had turned stony. 'There are just around one hundred guests here at Sundown and none of them is named Jerome Dayton.'

'Did he go out in one of those body bags you mentioned?'

The doctor thought for just a second, then said, 'I don't think I can be of any help to you. Very sorry.'

Catherine pressed: 'Could you check your records?'

'No.' The finality in the previously pleasant doctor's voice was unmistakable. 'That would be a violation of the patient's right-to-privacy.'

'But if he's not a patient…'

'The privacy of former patients is also a concern.'

Shaking her head, smiling in a forced manner that had little to do with the usual reasons for smiling, Catherine said, 'Dr. Royer, this is a murder investigation. We just got word of our third murder in a little over one week.'

The stony face remained such.

Nick said, 'Jerome Dayton was a major suspect in the CASt case…perhaps you remember it? And if he's not a patient in this hospital…then he's a key suspect in the series of murders occurring in Las Vegas right now.'

Dr. Royer did not seem terribly impressed by Nick's impassioned statement. She merely said, 'That doesn't give either the Las Vegas police or, for that matter, myself any authority in a matter of violating this patient's rights.'

Catherine nodded icily. 'You have a point. So we'll get a court order.'

The doctor shrugged, then jotted a number on a business card and handed it to Catherine.

'That's our fax number' she said. 'Have the court order sent here. In the meantime, let's see if we can track down Mr. Dayton's records.'

Catherine blinked, and her expression would have been no different had Dr. Royer slapped her. 'You're… going to help us?'

'Call for your court order,' she said crisply, 'and we'll look while we wait.'

'I don't understand….'

'Of course you do. You're both professionals. I can see that. Well, so am I…and I'm a stickler for the rights of our patients, Ms. Willows.'

Catherine seemed almost embarrassed as she said, 'Of course you are.'

'Is there any reason to think you won't get your court order?'

'No. That will be easily obtained.'

'All right,' the doctor said. 'Then if this man is a killer, there isn't a second to waste.'

While Catherine made the cell phone call, Nick watched Dr. Royer search through one of the file cabinets. Apparently Sundown hadn't converted their older records to computer files as yet-not surprising.