Title: Journey of the Lonely Whale: Evolution (Month 12)

Author: Lisa (ljkwriting4life)

Rating: M. This story contains strong adult themes including references to violence, sexual references, and coarse language.

Pairing: Gil/Sara

Summary: One year since re-marrying, Gil and Sara return to San Diego to fulfil work commitments. While Sara becomes involved in a case that stirs memories of the past, she is also pushed by those around her to consider her future and her place in the world.

Notes: The JOTLW series aims to fill a gap between Immortality and CSI: Vegas. It does foreshadow CSI: Vegas and refers often to storylines established in the original CSI.

ELEVEN

Gil sat on the edge of the bed and pushed Sara's hair away from her face, hoping to gently wake her in the dim morning light. He did that for a minute before she sighed and opened her eyes.

"Morning, beautiful," he said with a smile.

"Am I late for work?" she asked. "You're dressed."

"No, it's still early. I just wanted to sit with you."

Sara returned his smile as they watched each other quietly. Sara soon propped herself up on her elbow and moved back on the bed to give Gil more room, and he faced her more comfortably.

"Sorry about last night," she said as she rested on her elbow. "If I had a time machine, I'd go back to that moment on the couch and I'd follow your advice and ignore my ringing phone."

"If the roles were reversed, I'd have answered it too," he reminded her. "I've been thinking, Friday is your last day at work and we haven't even really talked about where we'll go. Once we finalise the grant applications, which we can do from anywhere, we'll be in a holding pattern while we wait. Is there anywhere specific you'd like to go? We could sit out at sea, or park the boat and go inland, hire another car – a better car – and just go driving, or take the boat back to Fiji? Or Chile?"

"Maybe tomorrow," she said. "Today I'd like to drop a pin into the Pacific Ocean on the map and just disappear into it. I'm a bit embarrassed."

"Why?" Gil asked. He made sure that he did not add that he had seen her in far worse shape in the past, but he could tell from the smirk on Sara's face that she seemed to read his mind. "Do you know what I most remember from last night?" he asked. Sara just raised her eyebrows and waited. "The main thing I remember from last night, I mean, after the passion-session on the couch-"

Sara laughed and blushed happily as she looked down to the bed.

"It was listening to that woman laughing. I could hear her from the hall with the door closed. I'd been worried about her too, the condition she might be in, what had happened to her, but I heard her laugh like that and I just thought, 'That's Sara, helping this person somehow find the peace of mind to laugh'. I don't know what you said to her, but I know in that moment she had forgotten why she was there. That's a gift, honey, and I am…deeply sorry if I never gave you credit for that when we worked together, if you've been holding onto that for all this time. I always appreciated your empathy, but I could see it also came with risks, risks to our cases, and risks to you. I've always cared, very much, about what you do and how it makes you feel. Now you're that person in my life, and you can make me forget all the bad stuff, far more easily than you think. It's a gift."

He reached over and knuckled a tear off Sara's cheek as she stared at him.

"Thank you," she whispered when she was able. He offered her a shy smile. "Where would you like to go?" she asked.

"We could drop a pin in the ocean for a while. I'd like to go back to South America."

"Of course," Sara said kindly. She nodded in agreement, but she looked tired. Trying to fit so much of life into four weeks was always going to be intense, perhaps even more than they expected.

"You feel up to work today?" he asked.

"Yeah," she assured him with a certain nod. "It's only for a few hours, and we're close now. We're close to breaking the case, and you and I are close to leaving again. I want to help process the evidence before we go."

Gil nodded, and grinned when he heard the knock on the door.

Sara frowned at him curiously. No one had knocked on their apartment door for three and a half weeks. Gil held up his hands before she could say anything, and he stood quickly.

"Wait here. I have a surprise for you."

"Okay," Sara said warily. She narrowed her eyes, but Gil had already left her in the room.

He went to the front door and opened it with a smile.

"Hi Paula, thank you for this."

"Not a problem," the older woman said. They were about the same age, and her grey hair was swept back roughly, she was still in her dressing gown. "I'll pick her up on our way out, in around an hour. I'm going to go finish getting ready."

Gil nodded and accepted the lead attached to the five-year-old Golden Retriever at his feet. He gave the dog he knew well a pat as her tail wagged, and then walked her back into the bedroom. Sara had stayed in bed waiting. She was sitting up under the sheet with her knees raised and her arms wrapped around herself, with a cute, stubbornly curious look plastered forcefully on her face.

Her expression completely relaxed the second she saw the dog. Her eyes went wide, her mouth dropped open, and she got out of that naturally self-protective position that had broken his heart when he had seen her do it in the car the previous night. She leapt up and knelt on the bed.

"Gil!" she exclaimed.

"This is the neighbour's dog," Gil said before she accused him of going out to get a dog. "She's on loan. Her name is Lexie."

He unclipped Lexie's lead from her collar and gestured for Lexie to jump onto the bed, which she did, approaching Sara's outstretched hands. Sara's eyes flickered from the dog to Gil to the dog. He grinned. Just the reaction he had been hoping for, frankly. Sara was speechless.

"I…" She frowned at him and shook her head. "How do you even know this dog?"

Gil gave her a moment before he answered. She had turned her attention back to Lexie and was smoothing her hands around the dog's velvety ears and scratching Lexie's warm chest, as Lexie panted happily and nuzzled her.

"We crossed paths in the elevator a few times in our first week here, and I was in the park one day and Lexie's owner Paula recognised me and came over to introduce herself. We talked. I was going to introduce you but then I had to go away and I figured we'd get around to it."

"Have I met this Paula?" Sara asked. "I knew there were dogs in the building, I just haven't seen any."

"Ah, I'm not sure. She's seen you, because when she introduced herself she asked about my wife, the tall brunette. She only lives down the hall. She's about my age, grey hair, five-four? She's a retired special needs teacher, lives alone with Lexie, but she still takes Lexie to the school every morning for the kids. I've often seen her going out for a walk in the afternoons, sometimes just as I'm coming back from my own walk. So, Lexie's a therapy dog. As you can see, incredibly passive."

"Oh, I love her," Sara whispered as she wrapped her arms around Lexie and rested her face against the dog's golden fur. "I always liked that name too," she mumbled. "Lexie, Lexie Grissom."

"You can't adopt her, darlin'," Gil said, happy to tease her but touched by the sentiment.

So, he realised finally. She had thought about a child. Of course, she had. He had too.

Sara chuckled and playfully pouted at him, but her eyes gave her away and they shared a deep look. Sara turned her face down into the dog and hid there for a while, and that was fine, that was why Gil had sent Paula a text message that morning, asking if he could please borrow her dog.

Slowly, Gil climbed onto the bed with them. He laughed when Lexie licked his hand as he scratched under her chin. He and Sara had only ever had one dog, and maybe that was all they would ever have – those two years with Hank – but Gil did know the good it had done, for him as well as for Sara, during what became a difficult time in their lives. Gil rested his free hand on Sara's thigh as she sat back on her heels and wept into the dog. Whatever was going on in her head, she just needed to let it out. He couldn't tell whether she was homesick for the boat or devastated to be leaving San Diego, or a bit of both, topped off with the memories of her parents, her childhood, and the realisation that it had all been a very long time ago, even if it sometimes felt like yesterday.

"She's beautiful," Sara eventually declared. She wiped her face and sniffled when she looked up and into Gil's understanding eyes. "You've been getting to pat a dog all this time and you never told me?"

Gil blushed and shrugged.

"I thought it might upset you a bit, the dog," he said. "Since we can't get a dog because of the boat and I'm the reason for the boat. But um, I've enjoyed, having someone to talk to as well."

"You made a friend," Sara said with a loving smile.

He nodded. He supposed that he had.

"I love that," she assured him. "I'm not mad, Gil. Paula sounds nice. I've seen neighbours on my way in and out I guess…but I don't know if I've ever even smiled at her. What on earth did you tell her, to make her bring you her dog and leave it here? For how long?"

"Just an hour. She's going to pick her up once she's ready to go to school," he said as they both continued to pat Lexie, who lay down on the bed and rolled onto her side. Sara sat cross-legged and rubbed up and down the dog's chest and belly. "On the day we met properly," Gil continued as he watched them interact. "Paula said something like, 'Oh, and is that your lovely wife I've seen in the halls as well?' I said yes, my wife was in law enforcement and I'm retired. It turns out her father was a police officer in the '60s and '70s, and he developed what we'd now call post-traumatic stress, though it wasn't properly identified or treated then, but he had a dog, and that's what got her into therapy dogs once she then became a teacher for these kids. I've told her about our life in Vegas, what we used to do, and about Hank too. So, I sent her a message this morning saying you'd had a rough night at work and could Lexie make a house call?" He hesitated. "Do you like her?"

Gil didn't always say the right thing, but this was the dumbest question he had ever asked.

Sara just laughed, and that was confirmation enough.

Her phone vibrated across the top of the bedside table and she sighed.

"Isn't it still breakfast time?" Gil asked, annoyed by the interruptions they didn't need.

Sara reached back for her phone and stared at it. She turned it around and held it across to Gil. It was a text message from Sophie.

We got her.

Gil raised his eyebrows and told Sara silently that he was impressed, as Sara put the phone back down without replying. She returned her attention to the dog. Gil was sure it felt strange for Sara, to be a part of a case and yet to not be a part of it, to be informed as a leader but to not really be the one with any authority to lead.

Within a minute, her phone rang. It was on silent, but the vibrations were persistent.

Sara picked it up again, looked at the screen, and handed it across to Gil. She offered him a small smile, and then folded herself over Lexie and wrapped her arms around the dog. They curled up on the bed together, and Lexie put her head on Sara's arm and looked back at her new human friend. Lexie was used to children laying all over her every day, hugging her and patting her, or simply needing to touch her. A lot of the students at Paula's school were non-verbal, and Lexie made each day a little easier. That was all Gil could have asked for, as he looked down at Sara's phone. He sighed. It was still ringing, and he scooted off the bed and went toward the window to answer it.

"Hi Nick," he said.

"Hi Sara," Nick said, laughing. "You sound a little croaky. Late night, huh?"

"Very funny," Gil said with a chuckle. "What's up?"

"Is she there?"

"Yes," he said. "But she's indisposed right now, why don't you tell me."

"Right-o," Nick said. "Not sure if she knows yet but we've made an arrest, Chloe Rollins' killer and the person behind all these cases with the brick dust. Suspect passed out on the side of the road, ambulance picked her up and took her to hospital, and the hospital called the cops because of the knife wound and she wasn't talking. We've matched her prints, her injury's consistent with the witness statement and she matches the artist's impression to a tee. Lochie's also got a visual of her at the site the bricks were stolen from. We're waiting on DNA, but it's a slam dunk, and that's before the line-up. Since we've managed to wrap this up while you guys are still here, I wanted to know if Sara wants in on the interrogation. Aaron and Lochie are gonna be there. Can you tell her? The hospital still has to discharge this girl into custody but the psych who saw her says she's fine to be released and interviewed. We don't need the confession but it'd be nice to try to understand why. It's happening in an hour at the PD."

Gil paused and looked back at Sara. She had propped herself back up on her elbow and had been watching him as he listened to Nick. Her other arm lay in a relaxed way around Lexie's middle.

He remembered what Sara had said when he got back from Portland, about saying no.

Sara knew they had a suspect in custody, she had seen it was Nick calling, and she had given Gil her phone, so that he could take the call. Because maybe she knew she couldn't say to Nick what she wanted Gil to say for her. Or to her.

If Sara really wanted to be a part of anything that happened next she would already be up and getting dressed and halfway out the door. She could still be like that, but she also wasn't that person all the time, and now he saw that spirit more when they talked about research and travel.

Sara didn't want to sit in an interview room and listen to the reason this person had stabbed a girl once for every year she had lived, a terrible coincidence the media were enjoying far too much.

Sara didn't need to hear the reasons why or to get any special closure on this case, because she already knew the sort of frame of mind it took to commit those bizarre break-ins and that murder, and she was still scared that somewhere deep down she was like her parents. Her reaction to her own shouting in the car was evidence enough of that. Gil had only heard Sara's exhausted voice raised in desperation, but Sara had heard someone else, someone angry and more terrifying.

Now, after a long sleep and his apology and their talk, Sara was at peace. She offered him a brief but lovely smile and then turned her face away as she listened. Gil knew what he had to do.

"You there, Nick?" Gil asked.

"Yeah, still here."

"We're going to say no," Gil said. He resisted the urge to apologise because there was no need. "Sara's still coming in this morning to do the lab work, but I think the others can handle the rest." He hesitated. He stared directly at Sara and asked into the phone, "Is that okay?"

Sara glanced back at him and nodded with a small, satisfied smile, and he relaxed.

"Yeah, that's fine," Nick said. "Is she all good? She seemed a bit off last night."

"She's fine," Gil assured him. "We're just hanging out with the neighbour's dog."

"Oh man, I miss the best stuff," Nick said with a groan, as Gil chuckled.

"Sometimes you will," Gil said. He had missed out on a lot of good stuff doing his job, too.

"All right," Nick conceded. "I'll see her at the lab later today, and you're coming to Sara's farewell drinks and dinner on Friday night, right? I got a few CSIs here who wanna meet you too."

"I'll be there," Gil said. He hung up the phone after Nick said goodbye and then lay down on the bed on his stomach. He handed the phone back to Sara, who put it aside, and then he scratched Lexie's belly as she rolled over to give him more room.

"Thank you," Sara said. "I am fine. There just seems to me, to be a big difference between doing a job because you kind of have to, and doing a job because you love it and it's a part of you. I haven't put myself into that first category since I was in college. I still love the job and want to keep the safety net, but I think I loved it more back then, than I do now. It's a much smaller part of me."

"That's how I feel too," Gil said. "Nothing wrong with that."

"So if Nick called you up tomorrow and said, 'Hey we've got a corpse that's covered in flies and maggots, we need you', what would you say?"

"Well, firstly I'd say call another entomologist, because I'm not the only one in the country."

"Gil," Sara said, teasing him for evading the question.

"But if that wasn't an option, I'd do the job," Gil conceded. "And I'd probably enjoy it, I might even feel like the old me again, because I haven't lost the person I've always been, but then I would leave. I don't need it, and remember I've known that for a lot longer than you. If you've only felt that separation in the last year, or in the last month, then that's okay. It gets easier. When I was your age, I wasn't ready to step back from it the way you're doing now. The work was everything, and my love for it then is one of the main reasons, if not the main reason we weren't together like this sooner, and it's the reason for our life the way it is now. I accept that, and I know you do as well."

"I do," Sara whispered sincerely.

"Maybe there are just other parts of yourself that you love more now." Gil shrugged. "Like there is for me. And I hope you do love yourself, darlin'. You should."

Sara nodded.

"I'm glad I don't have Nick's job," she said suddenly. "I could have done it, but it wouldn't have made me as happy as I thought it might at the time. Not as happy as I am now, that's for sure."

"I'm glad, and I think we're both glad we don't have Nick's job, because we're the ones in bed with the dog while he's at work," Gil quipped. Sara laughed, and they chatted comfortably until there was a knock on the door. "That'll be Paula," Gil said.

Sara was scrambling off the bed just as quickly and eagerly as Gil had seen her move to get to any scene with a dead body in her youth in Vegas.

Some things did not change, he reasoned, they just turned a corner or two over time.

Lexie had leapt off the bed at the sound of the knock and Gil managed to pass Sara when she stopped to self-consciously wipe her face and any sleep from her eyes.

He smiled when he opened the door. He stepped back with the door open as Paula stepped forward and leant down to greet Lexie. Gil attached her lead, not that she was the sort of dog to run.

"Hello, come in," he said to Paula. He gestured to Sara, who was standing eagerly by the kitchen. She had pulled a hoodie on over her bare arms and tucked her curly, messy hair behind her ears. "I don't think the two of you have officially met. Sara, this is Paula. Paula, my lovely wife Sara."

Sara walked forward and shook the older woman's hand with a grin.

"Hello," Sara said. "I'm so sorry it's taken all this time to meet you, and I'm very sorry I'm still in my pyjamas and obviously covered in dog hair, but thank you for the visit. Lexie is beautiful."

"You're very welcome, Sara, it's so nice to finally meet you, we've crossed paths once or twice, and I'm just glad I've been able to help in some way. Gil doesn't stop talking about you."

Sara laughed softly as she turned and looked expectantly at Gil, who felt his cheeks flush.

"Well," he said, a little uncomfortable but mostly proud. He gestured to her. "Why would I?"

Sara replied with a beautiful, loving smile before she looked back to Paula.

"I hear you're only in town a few more days," Paula said. "It's such a shame. Maybe you'd both like to come for a walk with Lex and I on the weekend. Gil's probably told you we sometimes just walk around the park. Nothing funny, I assure you, just nice to have some friendly company."

"Of course," Sara agreed readily. "We'd like that."

"Well, I better run, school's all the way across town, but I hope you have a good day."

Sara reached out to take Paula's hand again before she left.

"Thank you," she said sincerely, as she looked into Paula's eyes. "Just what I needed."

"It wasn't my idea," Paula replied with a knowing smile as her eyes drifted briefly to Gil.

Sara nodded wisely, and Paula patted Sara's hand with the hand that was holding onto Lexie's lead, as the dog stood patiently between them.

"I know it's not always so easy," Paula said. "But Lexie's always here. See you again soon."

Gil waved as Sara showed Paula and Lexie out. She then closed and locked the door and turned around. Gil raised his eyebrows and Sara smirked at him curiously. Her eyes sparkled.

"Were you actually nervous?" she asked. "Gil, I'm tickled that you've made a friend. When's the last time either of us made a friend who we didn't already work with or want to work with?" She walked up to him and laid her arms around his neck as Gil struggled to answer. "She seems nice," Sara continued, as Gil rested his hands on her waist. "In fact, she must be nice because otherwise you wouldn't be friends with her at all, and she just left her dog with us as though she trusts us. So, let's go for a walk on the weekend and maybe you should email each other and stay in touch."

"You think so?" he asked. His hands drifted around her hips and the outside of her thighs.

"It's your choice, but I don't see why not," Sara said. She smiled and stroked the back of his neck. "So, you don't stop talking about me, huh? I'm flattered?"

"You should be," he said with a grin. He extracted an arm from around her to touch her jaw and drew her in for a series of kisses as he spoke. "I told her you're strong. Clever. And stubborn-"

Sara hummed in agreement against his lips as she pressed herself closer against him.

"-and gentle," Gil whispered. "And kind. And funny. Curious. Brave. Beautiful. Mine."

Sara nodded once he finished and Gil immediately deepened the kiss, groaning hungrily into her mouth as he tried to take her back in time to that moment on the couch the previous night.

"Can I be late for work, former supervisor Grissom?" Sara asked, laughing against his lips.

Gil nodded excitedly as they looked into each other's eyes and grinned. Yes, she could.