Title: Hearsay
Author: Jeanine (jeanine@iol.ie)
Rating: PG
Pairing: Sara/Warrick
Spoilers: Slaves of Las Vegas
Feedback: Makes my day
Disclaimer: If it was in the show, it's not mine.
Archive: At my site Checkmate () , Fanfiction.net; anywhere else, please ask.
Summary: Lab gossip is a terrible thing…
Notes: So, am I the only one who looked at the scene with Warrick and Sara and Amy in the lab and got the subtext? Yes? OK then.
***
Warrick is sitting at the table in the break room finishing off his mug of coffee when Nick comes in, looking as frazzled as Warrick's ever seen him look. "Tell me there's more coffee in the pot," he pleads, not bothering with hellos, and when Warrick nods, he follows up with another plea. "And tell me it's the good stuff."
"Sanders's private stash," Warrick confirms, looking up at him. "What has you so wound up?"
Nick rolls his eyes, sits down beside him. "This case," he says, leaning in, dropping his voice conspiratorially. "It's like a twenty-four hour freak show or something man… you should see this place…"
Warrick snickers, because he got some of the more prurient details from Greg earlier. "I heard," is all he says at first, and he really did intend to leave it there. However, the devil in him has him adding, "Ladies' man like you, I didn't think there was anything could shock you…"
He lets his voice trail off teasingly, but Nick looks anything but amused, holding his hands up. "Hey, I'm nobody's prude," he says, and from the evidence so far Warrick would beg to differ, but he doesn't say so, letting Nick continue uninterrupted. "But this is sick. Besides, can you imagine having to talk about that stuff with Grissom?" He shudders exaggeratedly, and this time, Warrick can't say that he blames him.
He can still laugh at him though, and does. "Rough gig," he commiserates, hiding his chuckle by raising his coffee mug to his lips, even if there's barely the dregs remaining.
"Says the guy who got a straightforward robbery." There's acid in Nick's tone, and Warrick shrugs his shoulders indifferently.
"Wasn't so straightforward," he points out, thinking that there had been a few twists and turns in the case, especially with their innocent victim not being so innocent after all.
His ruminations come to an abrupt halt when he realises that Nick is chuckling now, and he's got the strange feeling that it's at his expense. "So I hear." But he's pretty sure that Nick's not talking about the case, and Nick's next words bear that out. "You've been holding out on me."
Warrick's guard goes up immediately. "How so?" he asks, trying to buy time, hoping that if he gives Nick enough rope, he'll share what he knows, or what he thinks he knows.
"Don't give me that man," Nick says, still laughing. "I heard all about you and your little fan club."
Warrick's got a pretty good idea what he's talking about, but he plays dumb, just in case he's wrong. "You've lost me," he says, shaking his head in apparent mystification.
Nick throws his head back and laughs out loud at that, all sense of annoyance with his case gone. "I'm talking about the fact that you've got a secret admirer…or not so secret admirer. Come on, you can't have missed it."
"Must have." He's lying through his teeth, and he knows Nick knows it too. "Though you know you shouldn't believe all you hear."
"Our new lab tech, Amy? She's big time making eyes at you."
Warrick shakes his head, trying to give the impression that Nick's lost his mind. "You're trippin'," he says, but it's not the first time that he's heard that this week, not even the first time today. Sara's told him as much, several times, but she never did it with that kind of smile on her face. In fact, Sara didn't think it was a laughing matter at all, nor did she appreciate him telling her what he's just told Nick, that she shouldn't believe all she heard.
"You're blind," Nick counters. "She's all over you every time you go in there, and I'm not the only one who's noticed…put it this way, I think Archie's a bit jealous."
His coffee cup empty, Warrick stands, shaking his head again. "Right," he says, putting the subject to rest with that one word.
Nick sees that, raising his coffee mug in surrender. "Have it your way," he says. "Just don't say I didn't warn you." Warrick says nothing, so Nick adds, "You heading home?"
"Yeah. You?"
Nick rolls his eyes. "I've still got some paperwork I want to finish. I'll catch you later."
"Later." Warrick begins to make his way to the locker room, thanking his lucky stars that he'd got out of that so easily, if a little surprised that Nick had dropped the matter so quickly. Evidently, his case is affecting him more than Warrick realised. Before too long though, he realises that if the powers that be had been looking out for him in one way, they've evidently decided to balance up the cosmic scale somewhat; he's hardly taken a couple of steps down the corridor before he's joined by the very woman that he and Nick had been discussing.
"Hey Warrick." Amy falls into step beside him with a smile that Warrick returns, glancing around him surreptitiously to make sure that no-one's looking at them. The last thing that he wants is for any rumours to get started. Not that that seems to concern Amy at the moment, because she's looking up at him with a distinctly flirtatious tilt of her head. "Heard you got your man."
He nods, seizing on the safe territory. "Sure did. And a bonus collar too. Good day's work."
"The first case I helped solve," she tells him happily, and he can't help but grin at that, remembering how good his first solve felt. He can still recall every detail of that case.
"You never forget your first," he tells her, but when he realises how that sounds, he wants to bite his tongue off, even more so when she looks down almost shyly, tucking a strand of hair back behind her ear.
"So, I was wondering…" she begins, and just like back in the break room, his guard goes up, because he knows what's coming next. "Maybe you'd like to go out for a beer or something…help me celebrate?"
He looks down at her, all wide-eyed and hopeful, then looks around them, to see if anyone's looking at them. No-one is, but just in case, he knows that they're only a couple of steps away from the locker room, so he jerks his head in that direction. "Come in here," he says, breathing a sigh of relief when he finds that the room is empty.
He lets her in first, closes the door firmly behind him, and when he looks back at her, she's standing in between the lockers and the bench, arms crossed over her chest. "This sure doesn't bode well" she begins, and he holds up a hand.
"Amy, it's not what you think-" he tries, but gets no further, not with Amy in full flow.
"Look, Warrick, I'm not some lunatic stalker type who's going to follow you around the lab from now until the end of time," she tells him bluntly. "But I'm into you. I'd like to try things out, see what happens." She shrugs. "That's all."
He sighs, rubs a hand over his forehead. "Amy, I'm flattered," he begins, and he knows he's said the wrong thing when she throws her hands to the ceiling, rolling her eyes.
"I don't need to hear the but," she tells him, taking a step towards the door, but he blocks her way.
"Amy, it's not like that," he says, deciding that one of Grams's maxims is going to hold true on this, and honesty is going to be his best policy. "There's any number of guys in this place would jump at the chance to date you…"
"But not you."
Her gaze is almost angry, and he wishes that she'd stop interrupting him and let him finish. He's never said this to anyone before, and he thinks it might be easier if he could just get the words out. "I'm seeing someone," he says, dispensing with beating around the bush, and he can see her jaw drop in surprise.
"Oh," she says, her gaze dropping to the floor. "I didn't know."
Which, loosely translated, means the rumour mill didn't tell her that, which means that all is as it should be. "No-one does," he tells her gently. "It's new…and you'll find out pretty quickly what this place is like when it comes to your personal life…" Based on his conversation with Nick, she's going to find out in pretty short order, but he doesn't tell her that. "I wanted to figure out where it was going before I let anyone here know about it… you know what I mean?"
He can hear the sincerity in his voice, and she must too, because she looks at him, giving him a ghost of a smile. "Yeah…I know what you mean." Her voice is very quiet. "It sounds like you're serious about her."
He nods, picturing her in his mind's eye, the image bringing a smile to his face. "I think I am," he replies, and Amy nods, reaching out to lay a hand on his arm.
"Well then…" she says. "I hope she knows how lucky she is."
Warrick looks down, shrugs his shoulders. "I don't know about that," he demurs, but Amy's eyes are firm when she nods once more.
"She is." She goes to step by him, and this time, he lets her, before something occurs to him.
"Amy?" She turns back to him, one hand resting on the handle of the door. "Look…I'd appreciate it if this stayed between us…what I just told you I mean."
He's worried that she might take offence at that, but she just laughs, and the sound reassures him. "Trust me," she says, "I'm not spreading this around. My lips are sealed."
He grins back at her. "See you later," he says, and she gives him a wave before leaving, closing the door behind her. Warrick stands, just looking at it for a long moment, feeling as if he's just dodged a bullet, and he jumps when a voice comes from behind him.
"I told you she liked you."
Not sure whether to grin or shoot her a disgusted look, the way he looks at her when he turns is probably somewhere in between. "How long have you been standing there?"
Sara has the grace to look abashed, holding up her hands as if in surrender. "Someone moved the trashcan around the corner," she tells him, craning her neck back as if she can still see it from where she stands. "I wasn't trying to spy on you or anything."
She hasn't moved, and neither has he. "I know that," he tells her, because that's not Sara's style. "So, you heard all that then?"
She nods. "Enough to know that I was right."
She's completely serious, and not a little jealous, but he looks down at the ground, biting his lip to keep back a chuckle. They've had this conversation before, most recently on the way to the fibreglass manufacturers, when they'd come from the lab, Amy having told them about the BFK and the fibres they'd found. That, Warrick knew, would go under one of the more uncomfortable moments that he'd ever had within the walls of the CSI building, him in the middle, Amy and Sara on either side of him, one openly flirting, the other inwardly seething. He hadn't had to look at Sara's face when she'd told Amy to tell them something they didn't know to guess that she was smiling through gritted teeth, and if Amy had noticed, then she'd been wise enough not to say anything. He'd also been wise enough to keep his face carefully neutral, betraying no emotion, and he'd tried to do the same in the car, keeping his eyes on the road, not allowing them to stray to Sara for a second.
"We've had this conversation Sara," he reminds her now, chancing a look up at her. She's standing with arms crossed, one hip slightly forward, her "I mean business" stance. "You've got nothing to be jealous about." He takes his life into his hands with that statement, and he knows it, but he likes seeing her eyes widen, likes seeing her bluster the way she does when she's completely caught out.
"I'm not jealous," she protests, but no-one, not even Nick, would be gullible enough to believe her, not when she's using that tone of voice. "You can flirt with her all day if you want."
He sighs, shaking his head tiredly. "You heard her Sara," he tells her. "She was flirting with me, not the other way around." He takes a step towards her, and it could be wishful thinking, but he thinks he can detect a slight softening of her features. "Besides," he continues, taking another step. "If you were listening, you also would have heard me tell her that I'm not available."
She looks down then, but he doesn't miss the smile tugging at the corners of her lips. "I heard that." Her voice is so quiet that he would have missed it, even in the silence of the room, were he not listening for it. "You almost sounded like you meant it."
He's close enough to touch her, and he does, cupping her chin in one hand, tilting her head up towards him. "I did," he says simply, before bringing his lips to hers for a brief, chaste kiss.
When he pulls away, she's looking up at him again, and her eyes are shining in the dim light of the room. "You heading home?" she asks him, her face breaking out in a wide and genuine smile.
"I'll see you there?" It's a question, but it's not really, and he's not the least bit surprised when she nods.
"Count on it." Grabbing her stuff from her locker, she walks out of the room and he does the same, heading for home with a smile on his face, even though he knows that he's going to have to listen to her reminding him many times that she was right and he was wrong about Amy. In fact he realises, he was wrong twice; because he told her not to believe everything that she heard.
He's glad she didn't heed that piece of advice and, remembering the look in her eyes and the feel of her lips against his when he kissed her, he really wouldn't mind being wrong more often.