Disclaimer: I don't own.

A/N: Jelly... I think you said earlier that my readers were on angst overload? ...In that case, I apologize ahead of time for this chapter. :)

Btw, I love, love, love hearing you guys speculate on who did it and why and what it all means... :) Pleeease keep it up!

Oh, and because I've had several reviewers mention that my Sara and Grissom are OOC, even if I think it's only slightly so, I know others respectfully disagree sooo... I'll go add that to the story description. :) Better?

Enjoy!

Chapter Seventy:

Jace called us again, on the drive home… he was taking all the money we had in savings, which was rather a lot—since we'd moved to Boston, I had mostly avoided the man except when we were both with Ayla. I no longer told him what to do with his excessive salary—but it was nowhere near ten million. He said he thought it might be just under one, all combined…

He was going to the bank to get as big a loan as he could, and then he was going to meet with the CEO of his company, to see if the man would loan him the rest of the remaining dollars. He was fairly sure he would, it was just a matter of finding the right bargaining chip—calling it an advance of wages or Jace's bonuses for the next ten years or promising to pay it back with twenty percent interest… but whatever it took, he was going to get the money.

This reassured me, a little—if whoever had my baby was really a professional, or at least someone with enough influence to make it look like a professional job, then paying the ransom might be the only way to get her back. …Hell, if that was the only way, I'd work for defense attorneys defending big criminals to point out mistakes made in the labs prosecuting them, simply to pay back the debt. …It was against anything I'd ever believed, but nothing mattered more than my little girl.

When we came back, Jace was heading out the door, anxious to have the money by midnight. He had time to tell me that he'd sent a driver to pick up his mother and that she'd be arriving at the house sometime in the next hour. He rushed out, and Gil and I stepped tentatively in. The living room was full of tech equipment around the phone I was supposed to answer should our kidnapper call. I had someone drag me over, explaining what I should or should not say, to try to keep the guy talking when he did call.

When they finally let me go, Gil was nowhere to be seen. I took the pink fleece blanket from the dining table where I had held it previously and forgotten it in the rush to get to the lab. Cradling it against my chest, I moved down the hallway, my heart hammering in my chest as I neared Ayla's room, suspecting I would find him there. When I glanced past the yellow Crime Scene tape, however, I found the room pristine. Her blanket and teddy bear were gone… they must have been taken as evidence. They had been points of disturbance, after all.

…When we got her back tonight, she would want her Princess Bear. I felt tears pressing against my eyes that I wouldn't be able to give her everything she'd asked for after her terrible ordeal. I turned away from her room, my eyes falling on my own across the hall. Gil was sitting on my bed, a picture frame cradled in his hands, not bothering to wipe the stray tear from his weathered cheeks as it slid slowly into his beard.

I stepped in, clutching her blanket closer to me for security's sake, and sat beside him. He must have heard me long before I came in, because he did not glance up when I did. The picture in his hand was of Ayla in the park. She was wearing a little blue dress and white sandals, sitting in the sand. Her dress had ridden up, her diaper sticking out, and her halo of curls was wind-swept around her chubby, happy, dimpled little face. She had darker skin than either Gil or I—the Italian in Jace coming out, making her look perpetually sun-kissed. But it was the smile on her face, I knew, that had Gil weeping… She was the picture of innocence with her pink little lips and mouth revealing the teeth she had already, the cheesy grin betraying no sense of impending doom… no inkling that she knew what the world had in store for her… the someone so menacing could even exist.

It was beyond her.

I felt the tears in my eyes took and impulsively I let her blanket fall to my knees and wrapped my arms around him, knowing that his grief was my own and trying to put the past behind us. No matter how he'd hurt me, his loss in this moment was as great as mine… it would be petty to hold it against him while he sat and cried. I held his shoulders tightly, our chests flush together, my cheek brushing against his scratchy, whiskered one, the bow of his glasses pressing in to the side of my head.

After a long moment, his head pulled back a little, as if in surprise, and his gruff voice came beside my ear, "…Sara?" It was uncertain… questioning. I pulled back.

"What?"

His eyes flickered down to my chest, and I followed… "Oh god!" I jumped up. I was leaking through my nursing bra. It hadn't even occurred to me that she hadn't nursed all day, because she'd be needing to less and less now that she was eating table foods. I'd been planning to wean her when she turned a year and started milk… "Shit!" I wailed, feeling like this was just one more straw on this camel's wavering back. "I… I'm sorry, Gil. I didn't even realize…"

I moved over to my dresser, pulling out a clean bra. "She's been on table food so she doesn't nurse nearly as often and," I pulled out a clean shirt, setting both items on my dresser, my back to him. "It just didn't occur to me." I pulled my shirt over my head and felt my heart rate pick up as something else occurred to me. "…They've got to be feeding her, right?" I unsnapped my bra, sliding it down my arms, and picked up the clean one, "I mean, having her all day… they would give her something to eat, wouldn't they?" I snapped the new one into place, picking up my t-shirt. "Even if I can't nurse her, she's eleven months… if they gave her milk, she'd be fine. …She's not a picky eater… she'd eat what they gave her, right?" I turned as I was pulling the shirt the rest of the way over my stomach.

"Right?" I asked him, desperate for some reassurance that when—not if, when—we got her back, she wouldn't be starving and dehydrated.

He had his mouth open, staring at me, and I blinked in confusion. What?

The phone rang then, interrupting my thoughts, and we both sprinted out to the living room to the phone I was supposed to answer. I put my hand on it, while the man running held up a finger, telling me to wait for one more ring… and then he gave me the go ahead. I swallowed hard, my stomach feeling like an empty pit… like it was gnawing on itself, consuming me from the inside out.

"H-hello?" My voice was shaking.

"Mrs. Wendt?" The voice asked. It was altered, so I couldn't tell anything but that it was male… probably.

"Y-yes." Gil took my trembling hand in his and I gripped the phone with a sweaty palm.

"I know you've involved the police… not very smart." ppft! click. "Tell your husband I will tell him, and only him, the location for the money to be paid… and if he comes with the police, your daughter dies." ppft! click.

I swallowed convulsively. "How… how do we know she's still alive?"

"…Would you like to speak to her, Mrs. Wendt?" ppft! click.

Tears fell down my face. "Y-yes. Yes!"

There was a strange muffled sound and some shifting of the phone, and then I heard crying. Ayla's cry—I would know it anywhere. A second later, it was close enough to indicate that the phone was up to her ear.

"Ayla! Ayla baby, it's Mommy!"

A pitiful whimper, "Mama?" Then she wailed.

"Ayla! Mommy's coming! You'll be home soon! I promise! I love you, Ayla!" I was crying and screaming into the phone, and when the man spoke, the distortion was back.

"…Tell him." ppft! click. And then he had hung up.

Shaking, I let the phone fall back on the receiver, and fell into Gil's arms, sobbing. "She's alive… she's alive and she's scared, Gil, she sounded so frightened!"

His arms wrapped around me, holding me tight, keeping me in one piece while I dissolved. He spoke over the top of my head when my sobs were slightly quieter. "…They were on for a long time. Were you able to track the signal?"

I glanced up. The man he was talking to—the same one who'd directed me when to answer the phone—had a cell phone to his ear. He was nodding. "Yeah, they're tracking it… we've got unis on the way."

He nodded, against the top of my head, and I hiccupped, hope bubbling up in me unexpectedly. Maybe this guy wasn't as good as we'd thought… maybe I'd have Ayla in my arms within the hour… I let myself feel elated. Science always won… I knew that. They were going to catch this son of a bitch and this nightmare would be over.

I hugged Gil desperately, tightly, needing to feel something solid to hold on to until the good news was delivered and I could have Ayla in my arms. He tensed, not when I hugged him, but a moment later… which caused me to look up in surprise again. The man was shaking his head.

"…Phone is still turned on in a garbage can in a park… We've got guys canvassing the area, but a woman at the scene said she saw a black car speeding away from the area only about a minute ago… We don't have video surveillance there, but we're hoping to catch it speeding away from the area on traffic cams…"

I felt the hope fly out of me. I felt tiny… like I'd lost several feet of my height. Gil saw the look on my face and cupped my cheek, turning my eyes back to his. "Hey… this is better than we had, Sara. The woman will give us description, we'll find the car on video surveillance, get a license number and a general direction… and from there we can figure out who this asshole is and where he's taking her… Okay? We're getting closer…"

I drew in a deep breath, nodding, wanting to scream out 'But she doesn't have her car seat!' and refraining, because I knew that that was the least of my worries at this point. I leaned my face into his hand and stepped close again, keeping my body in contact with his, taking in his warmth to keep me going. Keep me functioning and standing and breathing.

"…What's going on here?"

Once again, I lifted my head from Gil to look… My mother in law was standing in the doorway of the kitchen and dining room, staring at the flurry of activity surrounding Gil's and I's still and silent moment of despair. Gil had tensed as soon as he saw her too, and I knew he was uncomfortable. I swallowed, trying to come up with something to say… unable to find myself even concerned that she was watching me in the arms of a man who was not her son, but still feeling like I had to respond in some way…

I didn't have to—Gil did it for me. His tensed body released mine in shock and his eyes were wide and staring. His words though… they sent my world spinning.

"…Susan?"