Thanks for all the reviews, I really appreciate them!
Anyway, I was feeling crazy tonight and decided to post 2 chapters. Hope you like them and enjoy! The *~*~*~*~ thing means flashback.
Disclaimers ect are on the first chapter.
Chapter 6- An Explanation
She read the name on the computer screen; she recognized it and it shocked her. Without even realizing it, Sara dropped her coffee mug on the floor all the while focused on that name on the screen. Suddenly it felt like she was under water, her vision becomes blurry and she could hear her colleagues talking to her, but they sounded so far away and she couldn't seem to respond to them. She felt strong hands on her upper arms steadying her and she vaguely recognized them as Grissom's.
"Sara? Sara honey are you ok?" Catherine asked as they managed to sit her down in one of the office chairs. Warrick and Nick are attempting to clean up the mug she had dropped without getting in the way. If Grissom was concerned earlier, he was scared now, it took a lot to shake Sara Sidle, but this one name put her in a state he had never seen before.
As suddenly as it happened, it disappeared, Sara finally looked around at the people staring at her, with clear eyes, and it felt like she was above water. She had really only been out of it for a few seconds, but to her friends it seemed like an eternity.
"I'm ok. Sorry, didn't mean to scare you guys."
"Well you did." Nick said plainly as he walked over to the printer to pickup the guys driver license photo, all they had for now. "Don't do that again."
"Sorry." Sara said sheepishly. She really was, mostly because she couldn't believe she lost control like that. It had just rattled her so bad she had a physical reaction to it. She had never expected to see that name again; it was so long ago, so long.
"You going to tell us how you know…. Jason Reading?" Warrick asks as he looks at the printout Nick hands him and passes it around. He wanted to get answers so they could catch this guy before he found their friend. Finally the photo Nick printed has made its was around the room to Sara who is still sitting. She shakily takes it from Catherine, which does not go unnoticed by the other people in the room and stares at it like it was covered in disease.
Taking a deep breath and steeling herself from the memories Sara started slowly, "It was one of my last cases in San Francisco, what, almost 3 years ago now? I worked this murder, a young woman she was literally beaten to death. We had almost no evidence to go on, but we had a suspect, her ex- boyfriend. I was shadowing a rookie, Lauryn, she was good, but a little too ambitious, wanted to be a CSI so bad, she would do anything to get there. Anything. We worked it together with the supervision of the shift head. We were actually making progress, starting to build some circumstantial evidence; we had already proven that his alibi was bull. The suspect was James Reading, Jason's brother. James was so smug about everything, he thought that there was no way we could catch him. God he angered me so badly, he flaunted in front of us constantly that we couldn't prove he did anything. James and Jason lived together in a small house in the city. Jason was a paranoid schizophrenic, off his meds, and he didn't like the police, he thought they were after him; James didn't bother mentioning that to us. We were tossing the place, looking for evidence, when the first incident happened."
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"Nothing in James' room, you get anything from the bathroom?" Sara asks as she meets Lauryn at the top of the stairs, they were on the second floor with James and Jason watching them at a distance, the police where at the bottom of the stairs. The girls had assured them they would be fine.
"Nothing. Go for the brothers room?" She asks already on the way to the closed door.
"Yep, it's covered in the warrant." Sara smirks at James, letting him know she would find something to nail him, if not here, then somewhere. He had been very talkative while they were searching up to this point, asking about their work and the schools they went to, he seemed very impressed that Sara had attended Harvard and had a physics degree. He had asked her why forensics, and she told him that someone had turned her onto it at a seminar.
The women walked into the cluttered room and began to thoroughly go through every square inch, looking for what the ME had told them was probably the murder weapon, a baseball bat, in addition to any other trace evidence. This room was in stark contrast to the others, which were neat and tidy, it was a mess, old pizza boxes littered the floor, dirty clothes strewn everywhere. So engrossed in what they were doing, neither woman noticed that Jason Reading was becoming increasingly agitated at their presence in his room and had come to stand in the doorway.
Sara walked into the bathroom that was attached to the room and began searching, finding a small smudge of blood on the underside of the pedestal sink. Taking a sample, she suddenly heard a loud thud coming from the bedroom.
"Lauryn?" Getting up and getting no response, Sara asks again and walks into the bedroom "Lauryn, you ok?"
Jason had smashed Lauryns head against a corner of the heavy pine dresser; she was bleeding profusely, but still conscious. When Sara walked into the room, Jason was standing over her, it looked to her like he was ready to attack. Sara briefly glanced at James, the only other person there, and he had a look on his face that disturbed her more than anything, he looked pleased and was making no effort to control his brother or calm him. Taking in the scene in front of her, Sara screams for the cops downstairs and pulls her gun, pointing it at Jason.
"Freeze." Sara screams at him, and it seemed to her then that the other officers should have been there already, but really it had only been seconds since she called for them.
Jason turns on Sara and the look of unrestrained fury tells her that she is in trouble. She instructs him again to freeze, but it is too late. Jason is already charging her and in a millisecond he has rammed into her at full force, slamming her back against the doorframe to the bathroom. The force he put into it stuns Sara, Jason is not much bigger than she is. For an instant her world goes blurry but she doesn't pass out, the wind has been knocked out of her, she can't seem to catch a breath. This is more terrifying than anything, at this second she is unable to protect herself, her gun having come out of her hand the instant she hit the door. Jason is looming over her, like an animal that has wounded its prey.
Next thing she knows Jason is pulled off her and the cops are arresting him.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"We were both treated, but Lauryn was kept overnight to observe her concussion. I had a fractured rib, nothing more." Sara stops and looks at the faces around her, they are all wearing different masks of concern. Grissom actually looks terrified and angry.
"You said that was the first incident. What about the second?" Warrick asks confused.
Sara just looks at him, "That's the next part." She said lightly.
"Suddenly Catherine pops in with a question, she just didn't want to ask it. "Sara, why didn't you just shoot him? You would have been justified."
Sara's eyes darken noticeably and she puts her head down "I had never, ever fired my gun in the line, yes I was trained to, but I froze, I…I couldn't do it. I regret that even now, the first of many mistakes I made on this case."
"Jason was arrested and convicted of two counts of assault, but because of his mental illness he was remanded to the mental health facility and treated for four weeks, at which point he was released. By then we had a pretty solid case against James, we had a witness who could confirm he was at the ex-girlfriends apartment the night she died. Lauryn had made this her mission now, she was going to get him, so she wanted to confront him about the witness, get him to just confess and make the DAs job that much easier I guess. She was going to go alone, I really don't know why after what had happened a month prior. I found out and told her I was going with her, there was no way she was going by herself. Second worst mistake of my life, I should have forced her to stay, or waited for someone to go with us."
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
They arrived at the house for a second time in 5 weeks, it was dark, the sun had just set over the bay and Sara was nervous about this whole idea. So as Lauryn got out of the car, Sara radioed dispatch that she needed backup ASAP at her location, and quickly relayed the address. She got out of the car and met up with Lauryn on the porch, by then James had already opened the door and was looking at them.
"May we come in?" Lauryn asked.
"Of course, anything for my favorite police officers." He said with what appeared to Sara to be a very menacing expression. She was now beyond nervous about being here she was scared.
"Mr. Reading, we have proof, a witness, that you were at your ex- girlfriends apartment the night she died, care to explain that?" Lauryn asks him, as she closes the gap between herself and the suspect, anger in her voice evident.
"I have no idea what you are talking about." James is starting to get nervous and is looking around desperately for something. Sara meanwhile has stepped closer to her partner and the suspect and happens to notice Jason Reading staring at her from the top of the stairs.
"Lauryn…." Sara says, trying to get her attention and tell her they should wait for back up. Lauren ignores her, she is so occupied by the man in front of her, and Sara is focused on the more dangerous man who is now advancing toward her down the steps. They don't notice the gun that James suddenly pulls from out of nowhere and is pointing directly at Lauryn. To this day, Sara cannot remember where it came from and Lauryn claims she can't either.
"Oh god." Lauryn breathes as James hold the gun in his hands, Sara is distracted from watching Jason when she hears Lauryn make a surprised noise, looking over she sees James with the gun pointed directly at her, Sara quickly pulls her own gun, and orders him to freeze. Unfortunately James doesn't head her warning and shoots at Lauryn, luckily Lauryn's training kicks in and she is able to move in time and the shot catches her in the shoulder.
Without thinking this time, Sara shoots him square in the chest and he goes down in a spray of blood. Sara hears the almost animal howl of Jason as he witnesses his brother shot. Quickly she spins on him gun up and ready, but he has moved past her, going to his brother instead, placing his hands over the dying mans wound. James is bleeding profusely from the wound and Sara can now hear the sirens of the backup she called for earlier, arriving minutes to late.
"You killed him." He shouts at Sara, who is stunned herself by what just happened. "You killed him you bitch. I will never forget that."
*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Quietly Sara amends the story with "I guess my one shot was a good one, I nicked an artery, he bled out in minutes, if that. His brother, I thought, was housed in an institution in San Francisco with no one to take care of him, that was the only choice." She is obviously rattled by the story, even though it had been years before. She keeps her head down, looking in her lap.
"Jesus." Is the only response she gets, which comes from Nick.
Catherine has been watching Grissom reaction to Sara's story and is fascinated with his un-Grissom like behavior. Grissom is now kneeling in front of Sara with his hands on hers in her lap. Catherine, in her many, many years of working with Grissom cannot remember him being this gentle, this tender and caring with anyone, victim, suspect, or colleague, and she is honestly surprised Sara is letting him. Nick and Warrick don't seem to notice, but they are talking quietly to each other. Catherine looks back to Sara and Grissom as he carefully touches her cheek with the tips of his fingers, almost reassuring her, she doesn't even flinch. Looking at his face, Catherine is unable to describe the emotion he is showing, mostly because it's a foreign one to Grissom's features, but she can tell that he has some serious feelings toward Sara.
"Well for whatever reason, he is no longer properly cared for, so it's now our jobs to find him before someone else is murdered." Grissom says without removing his eyes from Sara. "Lets get to it. Nick, you almost done gathering that information?"
"Yep boss. Its all in the conference room."
"Ok, first things though, we get Brass to issue an APB, maybe we will get lucky, and in the morning, we have a news conference to warn women and have people call in if they see this guy. It's the best we can do for now."
Grissom suddenly remembers Sara's behavior at the note and asks about it. "What did you recognize in the note Sara?" He asks her softly.
"Oh… James persisted in calling me Harvard Girl from then on, almost mockingly. It drove me nuts, but I didn't let on." She says as she lifts her head to the group, she looks exhausted, under her eyes is rimmed in dark from lack of sleep and emotional toll of being responsible for two deaths, even though no one blames her.
"Ok everyone, this is going to be a long night already, but we need to try and find any connection between theses women. Except you Sara, I want you to go home, you can barely keep your head up."
"Oh no." She says as the others quickly leave, no one wants to get in the middle of this fight. "Grissom I am not leaving, these women are dead because of something I did, I am not leaving during this investigation."
"Sara, I realize that, but you are no good to me or those women if you are exhausted, and don't lie to me, I know you are." Grissom tells her sternly.
"I am tired Grissom, but so is everybody, don't single me out..." Suddenly Sara realizes how tired she really is when she can't seem to complete her thought "Alright" She says quietly "But how about if I just take a nap on the couch in the break room? Is that ok with you?"
Grissom debates that for an instant before responding in the affirmative. He would prefer her here anyway, so he can keep an eye on her, no telling what Sara would do if left to her own devices. Plus he was feeling very protective of her and while he trusted Brass' men, he preferred it if either himself, Nick or Warrick watched her, having her stay here solved both problems. He wanted someone looking over her that HE trusted that HE knew.
Slowly Sara stands up, with Grissom grasping an arm for support. Without saying a word to each other, Grissom escorts Sara to the silence of the break room, gets her to lay down on the couch and covers her with a blanket that is already there
Leaning down he whispers in her ear "I wont let him near you."
"I know." She responds while giving him her best smile, she knows he means it.
For an instant they just stare at each other, unable to break eye contact when Grissom cups the side of her face in his hand and kisses her forehead. "Sleep." He commands quietly and leaves without saying another word shutting off the lights on the way out, trying not to think about the line he just crossed. The line he said he would never cross with her, but the events of the last few days have showed him something, that you shouldn't take for granted what you have, in his case, that was Sara. She could have easily been one of the victims.
The beauty of the night shift is that there is only so many people on duty and before he makes it to the conference room lets David and Greg know to avoid the break room for a while. He figured that she had at least three hours before the day shift arrived and he would be forced to give a press conference with Brass.
Walking in, three pairs of eyes look up at him with the same question. "We compromised. She is sleeping in the break room." They all nod and quickly get to the task at hand; reading the files again along with personal information, trying to find anyplace that both victims may have met Jason Reading, and any clue as to where he may be now, they were racing against the clock.
tbc………
***********
"You have that Sara look." Warrick
"You mean that Grissom look?" Sara
Anyway, I was feeling crazy tonight and decided to post 2 chapters. Hope you like them and enjoy! The *~*~*~*~ thing means flashback.
Disclaimers ect are on the first chapter.
Chapter 6- An Explanation
She read the name on the computer screen; she recognized it and it shocked her. Without even realizing it, Sara dropped her coffee mug on the floor all the while focused on that name on the screen. Suddenly it felt like she was under water, her vision becomes blurry and she could hear her colleagues talking to her, but they sounded so far away and she couldn't seem to respond to them. She felt strong hands on her upper arms steadying her and she vaguely recognized them as Grissom's.
"Sara? Sara honey are you ok?" Catherine asked as they managed to sit her down in one of the office chairs. Warrick and Nick are attempting to clean up the mug she had dropped without getting in the way. If Grissom was concerned earlier, he was scared now, it took a lot to shake Sara Sidle, but this one name put her in a state he had never seen before.
As suddenly as it happened, it disappeared, Sara finally looked around at the people staring at her, with clear eyes, and it felt like she was above water. She had really only been out of it for a few seconds, but to her friends it seemed like an eternity.
"I'm ok. Sorry, didn't mean to scare you guys."
"Well you did." Nick said plainly as he walked over to the printer to pickup the guys driver license photo, all they had for now. "Don't do that again."
"Sorry." Sara said sheepishly. She really was, mostly because she couldn't believe she lost control like that. It had just rattled her so bad she had a physical reaction to it. She had never expected to see that name again; it was so long ago, so long.
"You going to tell us how you know…. Jason Reading?" Warrick asks as he looks at the printout Nick hands him and passes it around. He wanted to get answers so they could catch this guy before he found their friend. Finally the photo Nick printed has made its was around the room to Sara who is still sitting. She shakily takes it from Catherine, which does not go unnoticed by the other people in the room and stares at it like it was covered in disease.
Taking a deep breath and steeling herself from the memories Sara started slowly, "It was one of my last cases in San Francisco, what, almost 3 years ago now? I worked this murder, a young woman she was literally beaten to death. We had almost no evidence to go on, but we had a suspect, her ex- boyfriend. I was shadowing a rookie, Lauryn, she was good, but a little too ambitious, wanted to be a CSI so bad, she would do anything to get there. Anything. We worked it together with the supervision of the shift head. We were actually making progress, starting to build some circumstantial evidence; we had already proven that his alibi was bull. The suspect was James Reading, Jason's brother. James was so smug about everything, he thought that there was no way we could catch him. God he angered me so badly, he flaunted in front of us constantly that we couldn't prove he did anything. James and Jason lived together in a small house in the city. Jason was a paranoid schizophrenic, off his meds, and he didn't like the police, he thought they were after him; James didn't bother mentioning that to us. We were tossing the place, looking for evidence, when the first incident happened."
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"Nothing in James' room, you get anything from the bathroom?" Sara asks as she meets Lauryn at the top of the stairs, they were on the second floor with James and Jason watching them at a distance, the police where at the bottom of the stairs. The girls had assured them they would be fine.
"Nothing. Go for the brothers room?" She asks already on the way to the closed door.
"Yep, it's covered in the warrant." Sara smirks at James, letting him know she would find something to nail him, if not here, then somewhere. He had been very talkative while they were searching up to this point, asking about their work and the schools they went to, he seemed very impressed that Sara had attended Harvard and had a physics degree. He had asked her why forensics, and she told him that someone had turned her onto it at a seminar.
The women walked into the cluttered room and began to thoroughly go through every square inch, looking for what the ME had told them was probably the murder weapon, a baseball bat, in addition to any other trace evidence. This room was in stark contrast to the others, which were neat and tidy, it was a mess, old pizza boxes littered the floor, dirty clothes strewn everywhere. So engrossed in what they were doing, neither woman noticed that Jason Reading was becoming increasingly agitated at their presence in his room and had come to stand in the doorway.
Sara walked into the bathroom that was attached to the room and began searching, finding a small smudge of blood on the underside of the pedestal sink. Taking a sample, she suddenly heard a loud thud coming from the bedroom.
"Lauryn?" Getting up and getting no response, Sara asks again and walks into the bedroom "Lauryn, you ok?"
Jason had smashed Lauryns head against a corner of the heavy pine dresser; she was bleeding profusely, but still conscious. When Sara walked into the room, Jason was standing over her, it looked to her like he was ready to attack. Sara briefly glanced at James, the only other person there, and he had a look on his face that disturbed her more than anything, he looked pleased and was making no effort to control his brother or calm him. Taking in the scene in front of her, Sara screams for the cops downstairs and pulls her gun, pointing it at Jason.
"Freeze." Sara screams at him, and it seemed to her then that the other officers should have been there already, but really it had only been seconds since she called for them.
Jason turns on Sara and the look of unrestrained fury tells her that she is in trouble. She instructs him again to freeze, but it is too late. Jason is already charging her and in a millisecond he has rammed into her at full force, slamming her back against the doorframe to the bathroom. The force he put into it stuns Sara, Jason is not much bigger than she is. For an instant her world goes blurry but she doesn't pass out, the wind has been knocked out of her, she can't seem to catch a breath. This is more terrifying than anything, at this second she is unable to protect herself, her gun having come out of her hand the instant she hit the door. Jason is looming over her, like an animal that has wounded its prey.
Next thing she knows Jason is pulled off her and the cops are arresting him.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"We were both treated, but Lauryn was kept overnight to observe her concussion. I had a fractured rib, nothing more." Sara stops and looks at the faces around her, they are all wearing different masks of concern. Grissom actually looks terrified and angry.
"You said that was the first incident. What about the second?" Warrick asks confused.
Sara just looks at him, "That's the next part." She said lightly.
"Suddenly Catherine pops in with a question, she just didn't want to ask it. "Sara, why didn't you just shoot him? You would have been justified."
Sara's eyes darken noticeably and she puts her head down "I had never, ever fired my gun in the line, yes I was trained to, but I froze, I…I couldn't do it. I regret that even now, the first of many mistakes I made on this case."
"Jason was arrested and convicted of two counts of assault, but because of his mental illness he was remanded to the mental health facility and treated for four weeks, at which point he was released. By then we had a pretty solid case against James, we had a witness who could confirm he was at the ex-girlfriends apartment the night she died. Lauryn had made this her mission now, she was going to get him, so she wanted to confront him about the witness, get him to just confess and make the DAs job that much easier I guess. She was going to go alone, I really don't know why after what had happened a month prior. I found out and told her I was going with her, there was no way she was going by herself. Second worst mistake of my life, I should have forced her to stay, or waited for someone to go with us."
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
They arrived at the house for a second time in 5 weeks, it was dark, the sun had just set over the bay and Sara was nervous about this whole idea. So as Lauryn got out of the car, Sara radioed dispatch that she needed backup ASAP at her location, and quickly relayed the address. She got out of the car and met up with Lauryn on the porch, by then James had already opened the door and was looking at them.
"May we come in?" Lauryn asked.
"Of course, anything for my favorite police officers." He said with what appeared to Sara to be a very menacing expression. She was now beyond nervous about being here she was scared.
"Mr. Reading, we have proof, a witness, that you were at your ex- girlfriends apartment the night she died, care to explain that?" Lauryn asks him, as she closes the gap between herself and the suspect, anger in her voice evident.
"I have no idea what you are talking about." James is starting to get nervous and is looking around desperately for something. Sara meanwhile has stepped closer to her partner and the suspect and happens to notice Jason Reading staring at her from the top of the stairs.
"Lauryn…." Sara says, trying to get her attention and tell her they should wait for back up. Lauren ignores her, she is so occupied by the man in front of her, and Sara is focused on the more dangerous man who is now advancing toward her down the steps. They don't notice the gun that James suddenly pulls from out of nowhere and is pointing directly at Lauryn. To this day, Sara cannot remember where it came from and Lauryn claims she can't either.
"Oh god." Lauryn breathes as James hold the gun in his hands, Sara is distracted from watching Jason when she hears Lauryn make a surprised noise, looking over she sees James with the gun pointed directly at her, Sara quickly pulls her own gun, and orders him to freeze. Unfortunately James doesn't head her warning and shoots at Lauryn, luckily Lauryn's training kicks in and she is able to move in time and the shot catches her in the shoulder.
Without thinking this time, Sara shoots him square in the chest and he goes down in a spray of blood. Sara hears the almost animal howl of Jason as he witnesses his brother shot. Quickly she spins on him gun up and ready, but he has moved past her, going to his brother instead, placing his hands over the dying mans wound. James is bleeding profusely from the wound and Sara can now hear the sirens of the backup she called for earlier, arriving minutes to late.
"You killed him." He shouts at Sara, who is stunned herself by what just happened. "You killed him you bitch. I will never forget that."
*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Quietly Sara amends the story with "I guess my one shot was a good one, I nicked an artery, he bled out in minutes, if that. His brother, I thought, was housed in an institution in San Francisco with no one to take care of him, that was the only choice." She is obviously rattled by the story, even though it had been years before. She keeps her head down, looking in her lap.
"Jesus." Is the only response she gets, which comes from Nick.
Catherine has been watching Grissom reaction to Sara's story and is fascinated with his un-Grissom like behavior. Grissom is now kneeling in front of Sara with his hands on hers in her lap. Catherine, in her many, many years of working with Grissom cannot remember him being this gentle, this tender and caring with anyone, victim, suspect, or colleague, and she is honestly surprised Sara is letting him. Nick and Warrick don't seem to notice, but they are talking quietly to each other. Catherine looks back to Sara and Grissom as he carefully touches her cheek with the tips of his fingers, almost reassuring her, she doesn't even flinch. Looking at his face, Catherine is unable to describe the emotion he is showing, mostly because it's a foreign one to Grissom's features, but she can tell that he has some serious feelings toward Sara.
"Well for whatever reason, he is no longer properly cared for, so it's now our jobs to find him before someone else is murdered." Grissom says without removing his eyes from Sara. "Lets get to it. Nick, you almost done gathering that information?"
"Yep boss. Its all in the conference room."
"Ok, first things though, we get Brass to issue an APB, maybe we will get lucky, and in the morning, we have a news conference to warn women and have people call in if they see this guy. It's the best we can do for now."
Grissom suddenly remembers Sara's behavior at the note and asks about it. "What did you recognize in the note Sara?" He asks her softly.
"Oh… James persisted in calling me Harvard Girl from then on, almost mockingly. It drove me nuts, but I didn't let on." She says as she lifts her head to the group, she looks exhausted, under her eyes is rimmed in dark from lack of sleep and emotional toll of being responsible for two deaths, even though no one blames her.
"Ok everyone, this is going to be a long night already, but we need to try and find any connection between theses women. Except you Sara, I want you to go home, you can barely keep your head up."
"Oh no." She says as the others quickly leave, no one wants to get in the middle of this fight. "Grissom I am not leaving, these women are dead because of something I did, I am not leaving during this investigation."
"Sara, I realize that, but you are no good to me or those women if you are exhausted, and don't lie to me, I know you are." Grissom tells her sternly.
"I am tired Grissom, but so is everybody, don't single me out..." Suddenly Sara realizes how tired she really is when she can't seem to complete her thought "Alright" She says quietly "But how about if I just take a nap on the couch in the break room? Is that ok with you?"
Grissom debates that for an instant before responding in the affirmative. He would prefer her here anyway, so he can keep an eye on her, no telling what Sara would do if left to her own devices. Plus he was feeling very protective of her and while he trusted Brass' men, he preferred it if either himself, Nick or Warrick watched her, having her stay here solved both problems. He wanted someone looking over her that HE trusted that HE knew.
Slowly Sara stands up, with Grissom grasping an arm for support. Without saying a word to each other, Grissom escorts Sara to the silence of the break room, gets her to lay down on the couch and covers her with a blanket that is already there
Leaning down he whispers in her ear "I wont let him near you."
"I know." She responds while giving him her best smile, she knows he means it.
For an instant they just stare at each other, unable to break eye contact when Grissom cups the side of her face in his hand and kisses her forehead. "Sleep." He commands quietly and leaves without saying another word shutting off the lights on the way out, trying not to think about the line he just crossed. The line he said he would never cross with her, but the events of the last few days have showed him something, that you shouldn't take for granted what you have, in his case, that was Sara. She could have easily been one of the victims.
The beauty of the night shift is that there is only so many people on duty and before he makes it to the conference room lets David and Greg know to avoid the break room for a while. He figured that she had at least three hours before the day shift arrived and he would be forced to give a press conference with Brass.
Walking in, three pairs of eyes look up at him with the same question. "We compromised. She is sleeping in the break room." They all nod and quickly get to the task at hand; reading the files again along with personal information, trying to find anyplace that both victims may have met Jason Reading, and any clue as to where he may be now, they were racing against the clock.
tbc………
***********
"You have that Sara look." Warrick
"You mean that Grissom look?" Sara