Title: Daddy's Little Girl

Author: Emrys

Rating: I'm going to say for mature audiences since I've got a couple of nasty things planned in later chapters.

Warnings: Language, adult themes in later chapters

Spoilers: Grave Danger, Stalker, Overload, maybe others in later chapters

Summary: Kelly Gordon smiled at the end of Grave Danger.

Disclaimer: CSI and its characters belong to CBS. This is just a bit of fun and speculation. I'm a high school chemistry teacher getting paid peanuts by my school district, so please don't sue me!

Author's Note: I KNOW NOTHING ABOUT PLANTS! Additionally, I live in New York, so the Nevada climate is also an unknown for me. I have spent the past two days doing copious amounts of research on plants that can grow in Las Vegas, but there's a good chance I have and I will make mistakes. I hope that you can all forgive me.

Also, this is the first time in a while that I've decided to post a fic a chapter at a time. Hopefully I won't shoot myself in the proverbial foot by doing this. :)

Any comments and constructed criticism are welcome! No flames please.

Daddy's Little Girl – Part 1

Kelly Gordon breathed in deeply, and the pungent smell of mulch mixed with the cleaner scent of sandy earth wafted across her senses. She surveyed her expansive garden from where she knelt beside a row of tomato plants and grinned happily at the lushness of the greenery around her. In the harsh Las Vegas climate, maintaining a garden was difficult, but she was a hard worker and understood the earth and plant life well enough to have met with success where others would surely have failed.

She stood up slowly and began walking the perimeter of her property while absently brushing away loose cedar chips and soil from her pant legs. Looking up at her small, but perfect house, she allowed her grin to broaden into a genuine smile. Despite his failings, her father had provided well for her. So well, in fact, that she had managed to pay for this house in cash upon her release from prison.

At the thought of that place, Kelly's smile faltered a bit. Unconsciously, she rubbed her desecrated left hand with her right and stumbled. Aggravated with herself for allowing her good mood to become weighed down by useless thoughts of her past, Kelly forced herself to walk quickly past new blooms of purple oleander and the last vestiges of the scarlet vinca flowers that had blossomed so nicely in the spring. With relief, she placed a hand on the bark of her small peach tree and managed to find her smile again.

And really, she did have a lot to smile about. She had been released from her nightmare a year earlier than expected due to her good behavior. Additionally, her year's probation had just ended yesterday. Today was her first day away from prying eyes, suspicious questions, and legal requirements.

Kelly was pleased by the peach tree's progress. As expected, it had taken a full year before the tree would produce fruit, and this was the first time that golden orbs dangled between the woody branches. The peaches were small, but that was to be expected. Besides, she wasn't really all that interested in the fruit.

She sat down beneath the low branches of the tree and stared up into the hazy Nevada sky. It was going to be hot today, she realized. Then again, it was early summer in Las Vegas, and heat was to be expected. But the morning was not yet hot, only pleasantly warm, and Kelly allowed herself some time to relax beside her favorite plant. This tree. This wonderful tree that was going to be her salvation, her soul's true freedom.

She remembered his face on that day that he had come to visit her. It had been a beautiful face, marred only by tears and grief. She remembered seeing her own reflection swimming on the Plexiglas between them, transposed over his. She remembered thinking that they both had a lot in common.

"Don't take it with you."

The words, spoken in his tight and broken voice, had haunted her throughout the remainder of her prison sentence; haunted her even now.

At the time of their first utterance, she had wanted to smash through the Plexiglas divider and scratch his eyes out so that he would no longer be able to look at her with that grief-stricken yet condescending expression. She had wanted to pull his tongue from his throat so that he would know that not only did he not have the right to tell her how to feel, how to think, but that he never would be able to do it again.

Instead, she had somehow found the strength to look at him unhappily and ask him if he was done. She hadn't been able to keep her voice calm; in fact, had hated the tremulous quality to it. But she had succeeded in ending the conversation before allowing her rushing thoughts to get the better of her. Distracted by the pounding realizations and the barely contained ideas that had been swimming through her mind, she had barely acknowledged the walk back to her prison cell.

She had a face! A face and a person to blame for her awful journey through hell. At the time, she hadn't cared to recall, but later, after careful research and study, she had placed a name to the face.

Nicholas Stokes.

The small part of her that remained sane knew that blaming this sole man for her bad experiences was actually insane. But she rationalized her doubts of punishing this man for his crime, by telling herself that she would also be justly punishing others. She had read the newspapers of the events that had been precipitated by her father's attempt at retribution for her and had observed in grainy photographs the obvious looks of anguish and disbelief on the faces of the crime scene and police investigators. Had seen that same look of anguish reflected in the eyes of that bitch who had come to the prison with her unflappable cop friend to ask stupid and meaningless questions.

Kelly Gordon wrapped a small arm around the trunk of her most precious possession and breathed deeply.

It would all end soon.