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by LSI |
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Chapters: Prologue 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18
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Chapter Twelve When your name is Sara Sidle and you’re two minutes late for work, you’d think the world has come to an end. “What?” Sara asked as three curious sets of eyes turned to her when she walked in the break room on Sunday night. Nick and Catherine made a production of looking at their watch, which irritated her to no end given that the two of them were notorious for being late. Warrick only met her eyes briefly then went back to tapping the eraser end of a pencil on the table. Grissom, by all appearances, was either off in his own little world, or it was the first time he’d seen an assignment slip. Sara took the only empty seat at the end of the table between Grissom and Nick. No sooner had she pulled her chair in that Nick leaned over to her. “Hey, baby-doll…nice of you to join us,” he drawled. “What did you call me?” she asked just before making the connection with her run-in with him and Greg the previous day. Heat rushed to her face. “I don’t believe you,” she rasped, pinning him with a glare. A big naughty grin creased his cheeks, bracketing his mouth. “Aw, c’mon, Sar…evening gown, sexy lingerie, late for work…” A wave of disappointment washed over her. “Some friend you turned out to be,” she said, hurt that he could so callously disregard her request for privacy just for a laugh. “Hey, I’m just teasing. Don’t you want to tell us about your big date?” “Shut up, Nicky.” Everyone’s attention jerked to Grissom. His deep scowl silenced them all, dared anyone to question his command. Then his gaze narrowed on Sara, and she wanted to crawl under the table. Nick might have irritated him with his pestering, but there was no mistaking who directed his anger. As if I’m responsible for the disruption! she thought as her temper rose. But, she bit her tongue. Antagonizing him further would only make an already embarrassing situation worse. Instead, she met and held his gaze. “Do you have anything new for me?” she asked, wishing her voice was steadier. “No.” “Okay.” She pushed her chair back from the table and stood. “I’ll be in the layout room going over inventories.” As she headed for the door, she felt that uncomfortable tingle at the back of her neck, that sixth sense that told her they were all staring after her. She squared her shoulders and quickened her step and didn’t let out her breath until she disappeared beyond the glass wall of the break room. *
* * * * After Sara left the break room, Gil wasted no time handing out assignments. He gave Warrick and Nick a stabbing at the Tangiers, and reassigned his case to Catherine. He ignored her reproachful look and left the room before she could question his decision, which he had no doubt she would do anyway. Back in his office, he could finally breathe a little easier. He wearily worked the knots at the back of his neck with stiff fingers, trying to release a day’s accumulation of tension. But what he really needed was sleep. Warrick had left his place at five in the morning after countless games of honeymoon Bridge. By that time, they’d killed a forty-ounce of Scotch—well he’d done most of the killing since Warrick had limited his alcohol intake to three drinks. He’d fallen into bed and managed an hour of sleep before waking with a start, in a sweat, with a pounding headache and a nagging feeling that something was not as it should be. Then, it had all come back to him and the pain in his gut had started all over again. As hard as he tried to shake it, still tried, he couldn’t. Seeing her tonight had only made it worse, if that were possible, shifting that pain up to his chest, making each breath difficult to come by. Yes, handing the case off to Catherine had been the right thing to do. Staying away from Sara right now was the best thing for both of them. But Catherine, it soon became apparent, wasn’t going to accept it without an explanation. Gil had no qualms about the reason for her visit when she sauntered into his office a few minutes later and closed the door behind her. She wandered by his shelves, stopping every now and then, showing uncharacteristic interest in his jarred specimens. She even tapped on the terrarium to get his tarantula’s attention. “What’s on your mind, Catherine?” he asked, feigning interest in the contents of a file he’d picked up from the pile on his desk when she’d entered his office. “First you ignore her; then you bite Nick’s head off for a little teasing, and then you assign me to the Lion case…” her voice trailed off as she dropped into the chair across from his desk. He looked at her blankly. What could he say? “Care to explain?” she pressed on. Gil leaned back into his chair, reflecting for a moment on her observations. “Well first of all, I did not ignore her; I just didn’t have anything to say to her. And, second, Nick’s comments were inappropriate. This is a place of business, or am I the only one who still remembers that? And, finally, I assigned you to my case because it’s the best thing for the case.” “You’ve been on this case from the beginning…it doesn’t make sense to hand it off at this point. Besides, I already have my hands full with that burglary/murder.” “Sara can bring you up to date on the Lion case, and I can take over yours if you don’t have time to handle both.” “You told me once that you never screw up your cases with personal stuff—“ “I’m not screwing it up.” Catherine let out a frustrated sigh. “Right,” she said sarcastically. “Listen, I could sit here and pretend to buy everything you’re trying to sell me, but I’m not going to do that. If you and Sara can’t stand the sight of each other, one of you will have to leave or this tension between you two will destroy the team.” She stood, laid her hands flat on his desk and leaned forward. “I’m not taking over your case.” He’d expected her to object, but he hadn’t expected this hard stance. He scowled at her. “I’m still your boss,” he reminded her. “Then, fire me.” She straightened and headed for the door. With her hand on the door handle, she turned. Her features had softened. “Gil, you’re a smart man, maybe even a genius. But I’m not so sure that’s true when it comes to her. Do you even know what this is about?” The fight went out of him, and he sighed. “I know what it’s about,” he said, his voice sticking in his throat. Much to his horror, his eyes filmed over. He closed them rapidly, shoving his chair back. The file in his hand didn’t need filing, but he filed it anyway. Dammit! Exhaustion, emotional turmoil and Catherine’s sympathy were turning him into an emotional wreck. He blinked quickly and swallowed past the tightness in his throat. I
have to get out of here. When he turned back to his desk, Catherine was still standing by the door. “I’m sorry, Gil,” she said softly. “If you need to talk…” He felt stronger now, the momentary crisis having passed. “I’m fine. But thank you, Catherine.” He watched her leave. Standing in the middle of his office, alone, he felt a little lost. This is ridiculous, he thought. He couldn’t remember ever having been so unsure about anything. Even otosclerosis hadn’t given him this feeling of being suspended in space and time with no clue what to do next. He grabbed his keys and left the lab. He didn’t know where he was going, only that he needed to be alone, where he wouldn’t be interrupted. He needed to think. Get some perspective. * * * * * “I’m really sorry, Sar.” Sara looked up at Nick. He stood for a moment in the doorway, looking at her, a rueful smile on his face. She didn’t smile back. “Didn’t Grissom have a case for you?” she asked, returning to her work on the inventories. She felt his approach. He came to a stop on the other side of the layout table. “Yes. I wanted to see you before I go, to…to apologize.” “Apologies. Ugh. They don’t erase what’s done, Nick.” “I was just teasing, Sara—“ She looked at him then. “You don’t get it do you? Is my personal life a joke to you?” She saw his Adam’s apple move as he swallowed. “No.” She shook her head and went back to her work. “Aw, forget it.” When he didn’t move, she looked up again. “Go Nick. There’s a crime scene waiting for you.” “I am sorry, Sara.” “Yeah, you already said that.” He nodded faintly and left the room. Sara dropped her pencil on the table and sat back, folding her arms across her chest. She let out a long sigh. Her thoughts immediately drifted to Grissom. He was angry with her, which should make her mad as hell, but it didn’t. What made her mad was the guilt gnawing at her gut. She’d tried to rationalize it all day. He screws around with my head, my emotions, and I end up feeling guilty. It didn’t make sense. But
she couldn’t shake the image of him standing at her door, so obviously
hurt. She’d tried to
convince herself it was just a bruised ego, but it had felt like more.
Or was I just seeing what I
wanted to see? She shook her head and picked up her pencil. That man had always confused her. * * * * * Gil
drove to a lookout on the shores of He closed his eyes. He could so easily nod off, but this wasn’t the time. He had to think, to find a way to get his emotions under control before he totally lost it and made a fool of himself. Most men experienced these emotional highs and lows for the first time early in life. He hadn’t. Within the space of twenty-four hours, he’d felt both elation and despair such as he’d never known. And he hadn’t known how to deal with either. He mulled over the events that had brought him—them—their relationship—to this painful conclusion. Last night at the Mayor’s mansion, with Doc, he’d downplayed the significance of their early encounters. But he hadn’t fooled the good doctor; he’d only managed to fool himself. He’d done that quite well for years. His mind wandered back six years to San Francisco, to the girl who’d been so eager to learn, she’d followed him around like his shadow, questioned him incessantly, hung on to his every word. He’d fancied himself in the role of mentor, and had welcomed the opportunity to shape what he’d recognized even then as a brilliant, analytical mind. But there had also been something else. For all her unworldly, unsophisticated ways, she’d stirred him in a way no other woman ever had, before or since. “Dr.
Grissom,” her
voice echoed off the concrete walls of The memory made him smile. “Sara,
do you think you could call me something other than Dr. Grissom?” he
asked as he crouched down close to her.
The old prison was damp and cold, chilling him to the bone, but her presence in the
dark and decrepit
cell had ignited a spark in his groin the moment he’d entered it.
She
smiled prettily, a devilish gleam entering her chocolate-brown eyes, and
with all the boldness of youth, said suggestively, “I can think of a
thing or two I’d like to call you, but what’s your preference, Dr.
Grissom.” “Gil,
Grissom…up to you,” he said quickly, alarmed by the heat that was
spreading like wildfire through his body. She
thought about that for a moment. “Mm…not
quite what I had in mind, but Grissom it is,” she teased. He’d stopped himself from asking what she had in mind. Up until then, she’d only flirted with her eyes, or the occasional brush against him that he doubted was always accidental. All very innocent, he’d thought, yet they had awakened an awareness of her he’d known wise to suppress. He
climbed out of the car, and made his way in the dark to the belvedere
perched on the edge of the cliff overlooking “Got
any plans for your last night in He glanced at her briefly but long enough to see the expectant look in her eyes. He crunched up the empty hot dog wrapper in the palm of his hand and pitched it in a nearby waste bin. “Nothing
special,” he said, gazing back at the “Would
you like to have dinner with me?” she asked tentatively, and seemed to
hold her breath for his answer. He
looked at her. “Sara…“ “To
celebrate,” she added quickly. “You
cracked that case for us. The
least I can do is treat you to dinner before you leave.” ‘Nice
try, Sidle,’ he thought. What
had started as light flirting had progressed to something much more
overt in the last couple of days. He
knew she had a bit of a crush on him…he could see it in her eyes every
time she looked at him, and hear it in her voice every time she talked
to him. The problem was that
he wasn’t immune to her and it would be entirely too easy to take
advantage. “Do
you think that’s a good idea, Sara?” She
looked at him hesitantly at first, and then a smile lit her face and
everything else around her, as if the sun had suddenly pierced through
the fog. She leaned closer
to him where they stood at the boardwalk railing at pier 39, and
playfully shoved him with her shoulder.
“Don’t you trust me, Grissom?” He
pursed his lips and looked away, suddenly fascinated by the sea lions at
rest on the docks. “Perhaps
I don’t trust myself,” he answered quietly.
After
a moment of silence, he looked at her and almost wished he hadn’t.
Her smile had faded, her face was flushed, and her eyes had
darkened seductively to almost black.
The invitation in them was unmistakable. His
brain battled with the growing desire in his groin.
She was so young. How
would she react when he left in the morning with no intentions of seeing
her again? Would she be
hurt? Would she feel used?
Hate him for it? As
tempted as he was to blindly follow her where she might want to lead him
tonight, he couldn’t ignore the warnings in his brain.
This could become way too complicated. “I’d
better go,” he finally said, ignoring the flash of disappointment that
crossed her face. He
straightened from the railing and turned to her.
“It was nice seeing you again, Sara.
I enjoyed working with you.” She
smiled sadly. “Yeah…I
enjoyed working with you too.” She
took a deep breath and stuck out her right hand.
“It was fun,” she said lightly as he took her hand.
“If you can call a bug-infested, decomposing body and hours
holed up in a smelly, old prison fun…” “Best
time I've had in years,” he quipped, but then realized it was the truth.
These past few days in He
held her hand a moment longer, strangely reluctant to let it go.
She stared at him, her smile gone, but her eyes…her eyes!
Damn, when she looked at him like that something surged in his
chest…excitement, fear? He
didn’t know what it was, only that his inner battle was now raging war
inside him. In the end
however, reason won out. But
she was the one to walk away.
She
slipped her hand out of his gently.
“Goodbye, Grissom,” she said with the same gentleness in her
voice before hurrying to the street and hailing a cab.
“Goodbye,
Sara,” he whispered long after the car had disappeared
around the corner.
Gil
hung his head over the railing, looked down, but of course, there was
nothing to see, only darkness, except for the moon that rippled across She’d laughed the other night when he’d likened his moments of weakness toward her to battles in a war he couldn’t lose. But that’s exactly how he viewed their relationship...a series of battles he’d spent years fighting. He
hadn’t seen her again for three years after they parted at Pier 39
in She’d kept in touch, always by email, and always under the guise of their profession. Their exchanges had been professionally friendly, never alluding to the attraction they’d felt for each other that day at Pier 39, what he’d thought of without regret, until recently, as one of life’s missed opportunities. He’d been foolish enough to think he’d feel differently once she came to work for him. Relationships within the departments had always been discouraged, and boss-employee romances were a definite no-no. He’d used the rules as a shield and kept his growing attraction for her well hidden, although he’d enjoyed their light flirtations over the years, and his sexual fantasies as he’d lain in bed at night, which he’d chalked down to a healthy male libido. She was, after all, a very beautiful woman. But he’d never allowed himself to wish or hope for more. You just don’t covet what you can’t, or shouldn’t have. That’s a motto that had served him well over the years. On a sigh, Gil abandoned the lookout and shuffled back to his car. He’d foolishly believed that in time, this pull he felt toward her would pass. It didn’t. If anything, he’d only wanted her more once she was no longer available to him. “I
wish she’d mentioned her relationship with the EMT who moved the
bra.” Gil
closed the door forcefully on Philip Gerard’s voice.
He had enough tumultuous emotions to deal with…he didn’t need
to drag more out of the past.
He
turned the key and the engine purred to life.
“Relationship?” “A Hank Peddigrew. We just interviewed him. He said he thanked her for letting him move the bra back.” He
looked at her then. She
tried to deny it, but her face told another story.
He was stunned. He
was hurt. He felt her
betrayal so acutely it took him a moment to recover enough to get Gerard
out of there. It took him a while to stop behaving like a spoiled child who’d just been denied his favorite toy. She wasn’t his, had never been. He’d made sure of that. So if Peddigrew was what she wanted, who was he to stand in her way? She deserved to be happy. He’d just lost sight of that somewhere along the way. Gil let out a long-drawn breath and shoved the stick back into reverse. He had to get back to work. Damn, I’m tired. He’d worked double-shifts enough times, but they’d never left him feeling quite so drained. He rubbed his eyes and opened the window completely, letting the warm night air slap against his face and the extra oxygen fill his lungs. The traffic got heavier as he neared the city, the lights and the motions rousing him somewhat. An ambulance sped by, its siren screeching a deafening warning which quickly weakened to a distant wail. “This
is Sara’s boyfriend.” ‘I
know who he is!’
Did Catherine think he was blind?
If he hadn’t known, the way she looked at him, and tended to
him, would have given it away. He
felt a stab of jealousy and hatred for this young EMT extraordinaire
who’d stolen her adoring looks and special smiles from him.
He dragged his gaze away. The
destruction before him paled in comparison to the absolute devastation
in his gut. He was supposed
to be over her, dammit.
Nicky’s
call couldn’t have come at a better time.
He’d let Peddigrew have her, but he didn’t have to stay here
and watch her swooning over him. If
Catherine and Sara thought it strange that he would leave this scene for
a gas leak in He’d let him have her! As arrogant as that sounded to him now, there was some truth in it. He hadn’t fought for her, partly because he didn’t want her to burden herself with an aging man who was slowly going deaf. He’d let her go for her own good. And his. He just hadn’t expected it to hurt quite so much. Could he do it again? Could he just sit back and do nothing while Garrison walked away with her? He’d screwed up, but was he really too late? He increased the pressure on the gas pedal. He was getting closer to the lab, and her. His weariness was fading. His head was clearer than it had been in a long time. He couldn’t repeat old behaviors and expect a different outcome. And he wanted a different outcome…he didn’t want to have to live without her anymore. “I
trusted you tonight. I
won’t make that mistake again.” He would earn her trust again. He’d repair the damage he’d done to their relationship. He didn’t know how, but he owed it to himself to try. Win or lose, one thing was certain: he wasn’t going down without a fight.
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