A/N: A new chapter- thank you to those who read and review! Please let us hear your thoughts! Love live GSR!

Lying Alone

Chapter 2

Sara knew her husband was in the house—or had recently walked through it—even if his shoes had not been sitting in the middle of the living room, even if the mail wasn't scattered from front door to kitchen counter. Even without the shoes and the strewn envelopes and magazines, she could sense his presence. When the dog did not meet her, she headed to the back yard.

She smiled.

A back yard. Their first back yard. Their first house. She smiled again when she could see the back yard. When she had found the house, vines and shrubs had been left to riot, but they—she and Gil—had worked to restrain and tame, cut back and brought things to order. Not a clipped, sterile garden but a place for Hank to wander and rest in shade, for bee hives and nectar flowers, a place for enjoyment, a place for the future. For Sara, she felt a new kind of ownership in the physical work she'd done in the yard and in the house.

Her eyes moved back to the porch that extended across the back of the house. Her husband considered the covered terrace a sanctuary for his insects, host plants and special feeders. She'd learned to keep her hands from swatting at bees and hummingbirds that zipped around the yard and porch.

Gil Grissom sat in the porch swing, one foot slowly tapping the floor enough to move the swing back and forth; their sleeping dog was curled in another chair, and neither knew she was anywhere near.

She had found the house while he was still in Paris and within a month of his return, the condo had sold and they'd moved into the house. For both of them, the cleaning up and painting, furnishing and decorating of the house and yard had served as an unexpected distraction. While Grissom waited for his grant to work its way along the layers of bureaucracy, while they went through a battery of fertility testing that had, so far, resulted in no positive results, they had shopped for appropriate furniture, painted walls, refinished floors, and restructured the yard. Today, Sara knew Grissom had spent most of the morning working on two on-going projects: his bee hives and a solar-powered, re-circulating water pool in the back yard.

The Gil Grissom she'd met all those years ago had been a man of precise habits, a man of routines and standards. The condo they had shared had been home, but it had been his house and his hobbies and his furniture before she had moved in. The house was truly theirs; she had loved it and passionately wanted it. Yet it was Grissom who had grown to love the place in a satisfying way, to be comfortable with everything about the house and its surroundings.

She smiled; he looked younger—a decade younger than when he had arrived in Costa Rica. His body was relaxed; his arms were tanned and his hair, longer than usual, had curls that took years away from his face even as the color was changing to silver-white.

Sliding the door open, man and dog looked up, surprise registering on both faces. Papers fluttered like confetti as her husband stood.

"You're home! Why didn't you call?" He took her into his arms for a hug.

Resting her head on his shoulder, Sara said, "We finished up—I didn't even return to the lab—just came home."

She told him of the dead body found after a fire—a woman who had been killed by her lover and left in the house for two days before burning the house.

"Enough of that," she said. "Let me get a shower and join you." She kissed Grissom's cheek and added, "What's in the mail that had your attention so intensely?"

"Later," Grissom said. "Shower and I'll fix tea for us." Kissing her lips before she turned away, he patted her butt as she stepped into the house.

But the letter was forgotten; the tea postponed. She could have been in and out of the shower in ten minutes, but by the time she'd turned on the water, Grissom was standing behind her, pulling her jacket off her shoulders, tugging her shirt over her head. Relaxing in his care, she watched his face, sensing there was a multitude of things he wanted to tell her.

Mist and steam obscured her husband's face for a few seconds as she entered the shower; a moment later, he joined her. His movements were deliberately slow as he soaped and rinsed her body until she was pink and glowing. Finally, taking his soap, she did the same to him, unable to resist a smile as she soothed a hand across his wet back before kissing the back of his neck.

As he dried her, saying softly, "Lift your arms," she could not keep a smile from her face. This extraordinary man loved her—she would never be certain how she had won his well-guarded heart.

Then his voice, tenderly near her ear, whispered, "Bed, dear."

"You, too—for a while. I'll sleep better." Her words were deep, husky, sexy, inviting.

Her response made his laugh. For months, they'd had sex in a very methodical, scheduled way based on timing of fertility drugs but they had called a halt—a rest stop—to decide what they would do next.

Wrapping a towel around his waist, he kissed her, gently yet in a hungering way that made Sara want to touch every inch of his body. In a quick pounce, they were across the floor and tumbling, rolling into bed, laughing between kisses.

Sara knew the side effects of the drugs had taken a toll on her body; her breasts no longer felt tender. Her belly had lost some of its distended swell. And—they were free to have as much sex as they wanted.

Grissom lowered his mouth to her shoulder, murmuring "Not too quickly—we don't have to rush."

Another giggle broke out as Sara wrapped her legs around his thighs. She said, "If you don't do this, I swear, I might have to break something—of yours!"

Easing her onto her back, he laughed. "We've got plenty of time."

Sara nodded, aware of the difference in their excitement. He was able to restrain his intense passion, whereas she was always overwhelmed, impatient for the ecstasy that he would give her.

One of his palms slipped along her spine while his lips feasted on her chin, her throat, back to her mouth. His hands seemed to be everywhere, cradling and caressing, stroking and fondling her so her entire body tingled in a deep, pleasurable ache.

When she touched him, he drew away, held her hands, slowing her touches even as his kisses made her groan as his tongue moved down to her breasts, touching her nipples with fleeting strokes of his tongue. She was flushed, trembling, breathing in gulps as his fingers explored the tangle of curls between her thighs. When he parted the peak of her sex, gently, teasing with gossamer-light caresses, her hips jerked hard against his hand.

Layer upon layer, sensation upon sensation, her heartbeat launched into an urgent beat; parting her legs, pushing her knees up, she found what she desired and placed his hard penis into her intimate flesh. He was so hard, above her, inside her that nothing could stop the thick, heavy slide nudging into her. A pleasured rhythm developed, stroking, pleasing, deliberately pushing both to the edge of orgasm until she shuddered in pleasure. A moment passed; she was aware of his climax—her body responded with a wave of contractions as a deep growl came from his chest.

Feeling drained and nearly unconscious, Sara shifted and pulled her husband into her arms as he attempted to slide beside her.

"Will you stay," she asked.

His contented murmur was enough to cause a deep sigh as she fell asleep.

Sara stayed in bed the rest of the afternoon and into the night, waking just enough to find herself enveloped in the warmth of Grissom's body and the soft layers of bed coverings. She knew her husband woke and let Hank into the room because she felt the heat from the animal around her feet.

Much later when she woke again, a thin pale color of early morning light had managed to edge around the window and the bed had been vacated by man and dog. Bleary from undisturbed sleep, she tunneled beneath covers, pulled Grissom's pillow with her and inhaled the slight scent left by his body. Love, she thought, did strange things.

It was not in her nature to lie alone in bed and after listening for sounds—hearing none—she stretched and managed to put her feet on the floor. After finding a note on a tea cup—a one word message of 'walk' which they reused and kept stuck to the refrigerator when not needed—she made tea and toast and went to the terrace.

The mail from the previous day had been neatly stacked on the table where she placed her tea cup. Underneath, open, unfolded was an off-white piece of paper with a letterhead showing a tiny blue butterfly; she recognized it immediately—the group she'd gone to Costa Rica with had the same logo. With two fingers, she carefully pulled the letter free and began to read; a smile spread across her face.

She looked up to find Grissom standing near her. Hank still wore the leash. The letter was in her hand and she realized what he had been reluctant to tell her last night.

"We'll go," she said, softly. "We'll go!"

An offer to work for four weeks chasing butterflies in far away Indonesia; an area neither could place on a map until they found the globe and then they needed an atlas to find the specific mountain island of rare butterflies.

"What about work?" He asked.

Sara chuckled, saying, "I'm temporary, interim until another person is hired—you know how Ecklie is—if he has a warm body, he'll never look for a real replacement." And maybe, she thought, this is what they needed. A place entirely foreign and strange, working with delicate insects until exhausted. And, at the end of a month, they would receive extremely generous compensation for their work.

Grissom said, "We could use the money—for—for—you know."

Sara nodded. It was exceedingly difficult for either of them to put into words the failure they suffered with infertility. And the expense of the next step seemed like a concrete wall. She smiled and said, "Butterflies—it'll be fun."

…She had not expected to like the place; thinking everything would feel alien, strange and perplexing but the island city of Makassar was one of the largest cities in Indonesia, historic and modern. They were there only two nights before traveling to a mountain village where the research center was located in a red building with a long residential wing for visitors.

Miquel Cruz, the research director they had worked with in Costa Rica, met them as old friends, delighted to have two experienced researchers on his team. He showed them to their accommodations, a bedroom and sitting room-office and a private bathroom. High, wide windows covered with screens and rain shutters, ceiling fans moved cool yet humid air, wicker chairs, several tables, and a bed covered in brilliant white sheets; this would be their temporary home for a month.

"We eat together," he explained. "Local women take care of cooking—Sara, you'll enjoy the vegetarian dishes—and cleaning, laundry."

The next morning, they headed out on a narrow path climbing higher with the simple supplies and equipment, a jug of water, and a small box containing lunch. They circled rice fields before getting to the jungle area and the mountain altitude where butterflies seemed to be hanging from every leaf. They saw many butterflies before one of the other researchers gave a cheery whooping call.

"Found one—Papilio blumei!"

The group of six gathered around to observe and admire the prize—wings of black velvet with a stripe of peacock blue—it looks like a jewel to Sara.

"A female," someone says. "A male will be near."

So they waited and watched; it was Miguel who pointed to a flicker of blue high above their heads.

The male was unlike the beautiful female. It glittered in the light, not one color but many, changing colors as it moved, depending on the light. Then, quickly, a diaphanous net shot out and captured the male. Everyone celebrated for ten seconds before someone else removed it from the net and placed a tiny lime green sticker, no larger than a pencil eraser, on the lower wing.

As the butterfly was held, Sara realized some of the color had disappeared. She said, "Like trying to hold a rainbow, isn't it?"

A couple of people looked at her as she explained, "The beauty is in the sky—the colors disappear when it is caught."

A minute later, after tagging and measuring, the butterfly was set free, fluttering into the canopy of the jungle. Grissom marked the grid map, smiling at her words.

This was the first of many—brightly colored butterflies, gold and black, green and blue, all the colors of the rainbow represented in delicate wings. Every day, the group of six waded into a jungle that made Sara think of a natural Christmas tree, dripping with droplets of water that twinkled like white fairy lights and butterflies hung like precious ornaments.

The month passed as a reprieve of the happiest kind, providing a temporary relief from her work, from Grissom's daily routine, a postponement of their hopes. Days drifted by, lazily, humid, where no one seemed to rush or have a life broken by tragedy. Each day the sunlight lingered near the equator before dropping over the edge of the earth giving a quick twilight that went from gold to red to purple in minutes.

On several occasions, they returned to Makassar to wander streets made exotic with people and animals, beggars and babies, went into temples and walked around mosques, heard enchanting bells and chanting voices, and ate food that was sweet, spicy, and smoked. She would remember this place for years as a time where they were happy, content.

Sara and Grissom had packed to leave; she had tears in her eyes all the way to the airport. She had not expected the beauty, the sense of fragility of the place, the national park where they had lived, loved at night and tagged butterflies during the day. Grissom, sensing her feelings, having unacknowledged his own thoughts, held her hand until she fell asleep on the plane.

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