Disclaimer - Sadly, I don't own CSI.

N/A: Thanks again for all my reviews and thank you to those of you who have read all my new oneshots. This chapter is from Nick's POV. Enjoy!

20 Questions

I pulled up in front of my house for the first time in a long time, too long in my opinion. I mentally kicked myself as I got out my car, Sara's car was still there.

"She must be running late," I thought.

I walked towards the front door. Despite what Sara had said I was going to knock anyway, I didn't really care if she was still home, I wanted to see my kids and of course her too.

*Knock, knock*

"Isla, will you get that please," I heard Sara shout from inside.

"Daddy!" Isla screamed when she opened the front door and saw me smiling back at her.

"Hey kiddo," I said as she ran into my arms.

I picked her up and walked inside. I saw Sara walking towards us out the corner of my eye.

"Hey," she said as I slowly put Isla back on the ground.

"Hi. Look, I'm sorry. I know you said to come once you'd gone but I thought you would've already," I tried to explain.

"No, it's okay, I'm just leaving," she said.

"Cool. So, how've you been?" I asked.

"Not bad, you?" she asked awkwardly.

"Same," I smiled. "You look good."

"Thanks," she attempted a smile back.

"The kids okay?" I asked.

"Ava, Dylan," Sara shouted. "You can see for yourself."

"What?" Ava sulked as she lingered round the doorway. "Oh."

"Hi dad," smiled Dylan.

"Hey little man," I smiled back. "You gonna say bye to your mum now?"

"Bye mummy," smiled Isla.

"Yeah," Ava waved.

"Wait where's Maddie?" I asked.

"Oh she's not really been herself the past couple of days. I think she's coming down with a cold or something," Sara explained.

"Oh right, thanks," I smiled.

"I'll see you later," Sara smiled as she put on her jacket.

"Yeah, but I'll make sure I'm gone by the time you get back," I said.

Sara nodded slowly.

She opened the front door and left. We heard the car drive out of the driveway. I sighed as the kids walked away and got back to what ever they were doing. I was quite impressed, they just got on and acted like normal, guess they had become use to it.

I flopped onto the sofa and smiled when I realised the Discovery Channel was on the TV. I guessed I'd brain washed the kids into automatically watching it. I watched the programme for a few minutes until Ava came through and slouched down next to me.

I switched the TV off and turned to face her.

"So, you listened into any good phone calls recently?" I asked sarcastically.

"Just the one," she smirked.

"Ah. Learn anything interesting?" I asked.

"No, not really," Ava smiled.

"Cool. So have you studied for that maths test that you've got tomorrow?" I questioned.

"Yeah," she said as she stared off into space.

"So when did you study for this test?" I asked.

"Yesterday, I forgot to mention it," she explained.

"Oh right. Who helped you?" I asked.

"What is this, 20 questions?" she asked sarcastically. "It doesn't matter who helped me study as long as I've done it."

"Okay, there's no need to for you to be so defensive, I was just curious. I haven't seen you in over a month so I'm just interested," I reminded my 10 year old.

"And I did it by myself, if you must know," Ava lied.

I nodded and looked straight into my eldest daughters eyes.

"What?" Ava asked.

"Why are you lying to me?"

"I'm not," she protested.

"Ava, I know a liar when I see one, and you just lied to me," I explained.

"I'm not lying to you dad," she protested again.

"I just want to make sure you actually have studied, so who helped you?" I asked calmly.

"I'm not a suspect you're interrogating, so stop treating me like one," she demanded.

"Well stop lying. I thought your mum and I had raised you better than that," I said firmly.

"Fine, Uncle Greg helped me. Happy now?" she asked sarcastically, her voice was a little raised. "He's been more of a father to us than you have."

"Excuse me? What did you say?" I snapped.

"You heard me," she glared.

"I'm not in the mood for this. And you need to get an attitude adjustment young lady," I said as I stood up and began to walk to the stairs. "I'm gonna go see if the twins are ready for bed."

"You walked out on us, you don't really care," Ava sniffled as tears began to form in her eyes.

"That's not true Ava, you know it's not. You heard the argument," I protested as I turned back round to face her.

"Yeah, you cheated on mum," she nodded.

"No, I didn't," I argued.

"Only a guilty man would have left," she stating.

"Your mum wanted me gone, I thought it was for the best," I tried to explain.

"You thought it would be best to leave your kids?" Ava asked.

"Your mum is amazing. I knew she'd cope," I said.

"Well she hasn't, and I'm not even going to mention how this whole thing has effected us," she sniffled.

"Ava, you don't understand. This is adult stuff. It's hard to make the right decisions. When you're a kid, your parents do that for you," I pointed out.

"Whatever dad," she sighed.

"Angel, I'm sorry. I didn't want to leave, trust me. I didn't want to confuse or upset you kids but what other choice did I have?" I asked rhetorically.

Ava shrugged her shoulders. "Fight?"

"No one can win an argument with your mother," I smiled.

"Well you could have at least tried," she suggested.

I didn't reply. Instead, I started walking towards the stairs.

"Uncle Greg really has been more of a dad to us than you have," Ava shouted.

"Don't go there, just don't," I demanded. Did she want to start a fight?

"It's the truth. He's there if any of us ever need to talk to him, mum included. He let you stay with him when you had no where else to go. And he's not judgemental," she yelled.

"You can talk to me when ever you need to," I reminded her.

"No you're not, not really," she shook her head.

I stood there, frozen to the spot. The silence was deafening. Ava was to smart for her own good sometimes. This was the first time I'd seen her in nearly 2 months, and it wasn't going to well.

"What do you want me to say?" I shouted sarcastically.

"Oh just shut up!" she yelled back.

"Stop! Stop arguing!" Maddie yelled as she walked into the room, tears burning in her eyes.

She stormed off again before either Ava or I could say anything, or hardly even register the fact that she'd walked into the room and said anything at all.

"Well done dad," Ava smirked as she started to walk after Maddie. "Definitely a gold star moment."

I sighed as Ava stomped her way up the stairs.

"She needs to understand," I told myself, as I tried to justify arguing with her.

I sat in silence again for a few minutes, watching the second hand tick on the clock. I thought about turning on the TV but I knew nothing would stop Ava's words from echoing in my head. I though about calling Sara, telling her about the argument but she'd hate me even more.

I held my head in my hands and sighed again, when I heard what sounded like someone crying. I stood up and started walking upstairs. As I got to the top step it became clear that the crying was coming from Ava's bedroom. I reached the door and took a deep breath.

I softly knocked on the door. "Ava?"

But to my surprise as I walked in I realised Ava wasn't the one crying. It was Maddie. She was sat on Ava's bed, with Ava next to her.

"What's up darlin'?" I asked as I walked over to the bed.

She didn't answer me.

"It's okay," I said as I attempted placing my hand on her knee, but she flinched and screamed.

"Don't touch me!"

I stood there, so shocked I thought I might have thrown up. I must have looked like it to 'cause Maddie started crying harder.

"Maddie, what's wrong?" I asked as I crouched down in front of her.

She wouldn't look me in the eye.

"C'mon Maddie," Ava said softly. "Tell him what you told me."

Maddie shook her head. "No."

"What's wrong?" I asked again, I was getting seriously worried. "You can tell me."

Maddie didn't seem to trust me, so she looked to her older sister for advice. Ava nodded. Maddie took a deep breath and wiped away her eyes.

"On Friday," she started. "My teacher, Mr Reynolds, tried to hurt me," Maddie sniffled.

I felt the anger fill my body, it was as if someone had turned on a tap. I gasped for air as I processed what my 8 year old had said. I thought about saying something, but what could I have said? Instead, I stood up and walked away. I picked up my phone and car keys on my way to the front door, and slammed it behind me as I left.

I climbed into my car. I didn't really know what I was going to do but I had to do something. I picked up my phone and searched for Warrick's number. My hands started shaking as I pushed the green call button.

"Brown," Warrick answered.

"Warrick, it's Nick. Are you busy?" I rushed.

"No not really, Catherine and Sara have even had time to go get the rest of us coffee," he chuckled. "Why do you ask?"

"Could you and Greg meet me outside the lab in about 15 minutes?" I asked.

"Why?" Warrick asked.

"Maddie said her teacher tried to hurt her," I explained.

"Oh God. Does that mean what I think it means?" he asked.

"I think it does," I sighed.

"Is Maddie okay?" Warrick asked.

"Honestly, Rick? No," I shook my head. "You up for coming, or what?"

"Hell yeah. Where are we gonna go?" he asked.

"To teach the fucking bastard a lesson."

Thank you for reading. I hope this isn't to much of a change of pace, and I hope it's not going to fast. And once again, it's long, sorry. Review please.