Broken Silence


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Amazingly, I still - still! - don't own CSI or its characters. I'm just letting them out for a run.

Just as I finished the story and started on this little blurb, my computer crashed - and crashed hard. I blame it on this story heating up the processor.

"This is NOT a songfic! It's NOT a songfic!" Sara just happens to sing - you heard her. The song is Amanda Marshall's "If I Didn't Have You" - http://www.poplyrics.net/waiguo/amandamarshall/005.htm for full lyrics.

Sequel to 'Theory of Independance'.

A Sara/Grissom fic. No spoilers. Rated R for language and sexual situations.

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Things go bump in the night. That was the first rule of working all alone in the lab; you will hear noises, and they will freak you out when you're hunched over a set of epithelials.

Nevertheless, Sara Sidle was on her third slide.

Tinkle, tinkle.

Make that fourth slide.

She sighed as she slid the cells under the 'scope. It was one thing to work all night - it was quite another to work all night in an eerily deserted CSI unit.

I can't believe it - I even miss Greg!

All the techies and coroners, as part of the same union, were on their second day of striking; the backlog in the lab was mounting to truly catastrophic proportions, and she couldn't remember the last time she'd been in her apartment.
For once, both dayshift and nightshift were in agreement - this was enough, and enough was too much.

And Greg keeps calling and apologizing and offering to take me out to dinner.

She straightened up and huffed.

Where does Greg keep that portable stereo? Never mind...I know where he keeps his MP3s.

She scanned through the lab computer's playlist, snickered, and hit random/play.

"I was alone in the silence/till I was hearing your voice/I couldn't see my way clear/until you parted the clouds/and you gave me a choice/I couldn't pick up the pieces/till I was falling apart/I didn't know I was bleeding/till your love fixed this hole, baby/here in my heart..."

She sang along - loudly - adjusting focus and magnification on the 'scope.

So there is something to be said for an empty lab.

"Not very empowering."

She jumped.

Tinkle, tinkle.

Damn.

Grissom leaned against the doorway, a true man in head-to-toe black. Sara swallowed abruptly, remembering the previous 'moment' they had shared - Grissom had pulled out of the kiss just when she was wondering if she ought to get up and lock the door. She hadn't had 'personal time' with her supervisor since.

"It's just random play," she said defensively.

"Greg's selections."

"Yeah."

"Still, I wouldn't think it was to your liking. The artist loses herself to her lover completely."

Sara shrugged, and thought yeah, and there's something to be said for loving someone that deeply.

But she actually said, "You have...nothing...better to do than to bait me?"

Grissom actually grinned at her.

"Remember that Seattle conference?"

"Sure."

"Do you know why I was going?"

"I don't think we discussed it."

Grissom uncoiled from his stance and took a seat beside her at the microscope.

"Guide to Mass Spectrometers 101."

Sara laughed out loud. Grissom's mouth thinned to a hard line.

"Sorry. I'm sorry, you don't..."

Grissom's eyebrow went up.

"No."

"You've been here..."

"I never had to learn it before. And I was only going to the conference as an excuse to meet up with several fellow entomologists."

Sara turned her head back to the 'scope, hoping that Grissom hadn't seen the brief flash of jealousy that had burned through her chest and made her cheeks flare.

"Male entomologists."

She looked up, incredulous. Grissom was smiling his distinct "I know you know I know" smile, and for a second - half a second - all she wanted to do was... She dropped her head to the 'scope again, and felt a gentle touch on her shoulder. She refused to look up this time.

"Sara-"

She assiduously adjusted the focus of the microscope. He kicked the base of her chair, sending her spinning away from her task with a surprised yelp.

"Now, then. Finished sulking?"

Sara stopped her runaway chair and glared at him. Ass.

"You scare me, Sara."

She stopped glaring. What??

"You're totally without detachment. You're so far out in front of the cases, carrying your Banner for Humanity, that I can't even catch up and slow you down. Every time I think I've got you cornered, you lash out and break a piece of me open again."

She turned her head away slightly, to evade Grissom's taut, hard expression.

"I do fine without the normal human interactions. I never need anyone for anything; I carry myself within myself, and I'm glad of it. And then you come back in from San Francisco, and now I'm trying to keep from..."

He took a deep, ragged breath.

She nodded once, sharply, and kicked off the floor - sending her chair spinning across the room until it gently connected with Grissom's. His face still read like anger, except for the hot confusion in his eyes.

She took his head in her hands and kissed him more deeply then she had ever wanted to kiss anyone else, bar none; comparisons flew out of her mind as Grissom slid his arms around her, pulling her onto the chair. She leaned back, and Grissom's mouth found her throat instead, and she could feel his muscles tense under her.

"God, Sara..."

She jumped up quickly, before she could lose her resolve. She whirled around and ran for the door before the hurt look in Grissom's eyes could register.
And then she locked the door, turned around, and grinned. Grissom was up off the chair and across the room before she knew it.
He moved close to her, pinning her against the door; she could literally see the tension in his body, feel it at every point he touched her. He was willing to be vulnerable for her; willing to allow her body and mind in where he had fiercely fought incursions before.

"Don't do that again."

She leaned forward and kissed him, and again; she could feel Grissom's body winding up with each intimation. She pulled back to gauge his reaction, and he lifted his head slightly, lust in every line and curve of his face. A faint smile touched her face.

Finally, broken silence.