A/N's: Sorry, forgot something else. Out of character-ness occurs. Oops.

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I can kiss him any time I want, Sara realized, and the thought made her laugh. I can love him now, hold his hand. The realization made her feel giddy, and laughter again burbled from her.

Grissom flicked his gaze away from the television to her face, wondering what was so funny about an unsolved triple murder. She wasn't giving any indication, and was now staring intently at the screen with a secretive smile on her face, so he shrugged to himself, pulling her a little closer, and placed a kiss on the top of her head.

I had sex with Grissom. The thought had crossed her mind when he kissed her, and as it rolled through her awareness again, Sara dissolved into giggles. It was completely absurd, it couldn't be real. My god, I had sex with Grissom.

He really didn't understand now. Why was she laughing at the line, "Luminol was used to determine the spray radius of the blood"? He could understand laughing at the narrator. . . there was definitely something strange about a Canadian in a television as the narrator of Secrets of Forensic Science, but it wasn't that funny. Sara had laughed herself away from him and off the bed, and was lying flat on her back on the rug giggling like a twelve-year-old. Grissom turned away from the forensics documentary to watch her. She was holding her sides, tears streaming down her face as she chortled. "You okay, Sara?" he asked.

The sound of his voice did nothing to ease the giggles, in fact it made them worse. It was a strange laughing cycle: the instant she was under control, she would see him and the thought would cross her mind again, and she was gone.

"I'm fine," she gasped, breathing hard as she regained control of herself. "I'm fine."

"Want to tell me what was so funny?"

There was no way she could look into those crystal blue eyes of his and tell him what had cracked her up, so Sara lay there for a minute collecting her thoughts. Finally, she got up.

He watched her every move with complete attention, tracking her as she walked to the small refrigerator and removed a bottle of water, drinking half of it before replacing it and closing the door of the fridge. He watched her walk towards him with a predatory smile on her face, watched her lean down, lost track of who he was and what he was doing when she kissed him, long and hard, slow and sweet.

"You taste like laughter," Grissom said as they seperated.

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Georgia, two weeks later. Sara watched Grissom pacing through the lecture hall. It hadn't opened yet, and he was getting more and more nervous the closer it came to show time. "You have all the handouts?" he asked, back turned to her.

"Ready to go," she said from her post at the door. It was her job to hand out the packets to the college students who walked in. And make comments at Gris during his presentation. He nodded and continued pacing. "Calm down, Gris. You'll be fine."

"I. . ."

"You'll be fine," she emphasized. "You always have been. You haven't messed up on any of these lectures."

"Easy for you to say," he grumbled. "You're observing. And biased."

"Of course it's easy for me to say. You've honestly been excellent. And I'm not just saying that because. . .you know."

Grissom stopped pacing and came to stand in front of her. She reached up, caressed his cheek. "Stop worrying," Sara chided, and brushed her lips against his. "Now get up there; I can hear impatient science nerds outside."

She opened the door as he reached the podium, handing papers entitled, 'Careers in Forensics' to the people entering. Some chuckled at what Sara had added underneath the title, 'How Forensics changed my life. . .and others!' Grissom had berated her good-naturedly when he saw what she had written, claiming, "it's not scientific enough." Her response: "You didn't have any fun in college, did you?"

Grissom took a deep breath at the podium as people sat down. As Sara closed the door, he began. "Forensics is like magic, only more scientific, and more socially redeeming. You get to pull rabbits out of hats, and explain why. You play card tricks that wow a suspect into confession. And, my personal favorite, you get a beautiful assistant." He gave the crowd his charming half-smile, and laughter coursed through the room. Sara, leaning against the door frame, winked at him.

His smile faded. "You don't always get a beautiful assistant, but I got lucky. The woman who handed you those packets you all are holding is Sara- "

"Sexual harassment, Grissom!" she shouted, teasing, the students turned to look at her, some chuckling, some not. "Completely inappropriate, thank you very much. I thought you were a scientist!"

He gave her an eyebrow, and continued as if he had not been interrupted. "As I was saying, that's Sara, the consummate CSI: science nerd, determined, incredible attention to detail. . ." Grissom winked at her as his tone shifted from complementary to bantering. ". . . obsessive, emotionally involved, maxing out on overtime, workaholic, wondering why she can't live at the lab full-time. . ."

"Thanks a lot, Gris," she called.

"In short, perfect for the job. Except for the emotionally involved part."

"Hey, emotionally involved is better that emotionally stunted!"

"Sara, get up here," he commanded. When she arrived, he stage-whispered, "You're ruining the flow of this lecture."

"You left the mike on," she whispered back, and the students roared.

"Anyway," he persisted, "about three of you in this room are going to be just like her one day. And for the rest of you, don't look so down. There are careers in this field for everyone. Forensic artistry and reconstruction for the artists; anthropology for those who are interested in bones; materials and chemical analysis for the chemists and physicists- commonly known as Trace; we have places for those interested in DNA, fingerprints, guns and other weapons. You're a psychology major, we have a department in forensics for you. And if you're all these things and not squeamish, you can be a CSI."

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Sara backed her way into the bathroom, holding her inky hands up so she wouldn't get ink on the door. She thanked whoever designed the bathroom for having a swinging door; it was so much easier than trying to turn a knob with her palms.

The row of sinks were gorgeous, sparkling clean. . .very fancy hotel. She didn't want to mess one up by washing off the fingerprint ink in the pristine porcelain, and seriously considered finding a janitor's work sink to clean her hands. But Grissom was waiting outside, so Sara sighed, looked into the mirror and apologized as she pushed soap onto her hands.

She scrubbed each finger individually, wincing as the vanilla-scented soap made black streaks in the sink. The ink was coming off like magic; she had no idea what ink Grissom had used, but it was definitely washable.

A toilet flushed, a man stepped out of a stall behind her, and Sara wondered for a second if she was in the wrong room. Scanning the room quickly, she noticed the tampon machine and realized the man was in the wrong room. She almost told him, but something about the man's demeanor kept her quiet.

He was medium height and build, with dark hair and penetrating green eyes. His eyes were the only noticeable thing about him, she would have passed him on the street without a second thought. He looked like a regular guy, nothing special, the guy everyone would trust. . .

With a flash she realized who he was. Grissom, Georgia wasn't far enough away, Sara thought, her heart sinking.

"Hi," he said calmly.

She swallowed hard. "Hi."

"What're you doing?" he asked innocently.

"Washing the blood-I mean, ink-off my hands," she said quickly, chastising herself for her slip.

He chuckled softly, leaning against the stall. "I saw the lecture. Your performance was intense, Miss Sidle."

She stared into the mirror. "Took you long enough to find me, didn't it?"

"It wasn't a matter of when. I found you."

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Grissom checked his watch again, impatient. What could possibly be taking her so long? She'd been in the bathroom for ten minutes, and it wasn't like Sara to waste ten minutes washing ink off her fingers-at most, it took her five minutes. He watched as another woman entered, waited another minute and watched the same woman come back out. It happened a dozen times before he stopped a redhead and asked, "Did you see a tall brunette in there?" and described Sara's clothes. The redhead shook her head, and, at his request, returned to the bathroom and looked for her. The woman came out and apologized, saying, "Your friend's not in there."

He thanked her and dialed Sara's cell phone, which he discovered quickly she'd left with him in her jacket. His heart racing, Grissom did the one thing he could think of.

He called Catherine.

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"Grissom, what's wrong?" Catherine asked.

"Shit, he has her, I don't know how, I was with her all the time." The panic in his tone was amplified by the cell phone.

"What?"

"Sara, he has her, she's gone."

"Are you serious?"

"Yes. Let me talk to Ari or Kate. Shit, I don't know what to do." Grissom hardly ever swore, he had to be extremely upset to act like he was.

"Calm down, you're no good like this. It'll be fine, I'm getting Ari and Kate right now." She put the phone down on the table. "ARI! KATE!"

The two ran in, accompanied by Warrick and Nick. "What's going on?" Ari asked.

"Grissom's on the phone, he has to talk to you about the case."

"Why, what's wrong?" Warrick asked.

"Sara. . .she's gone."

"Grissom? Hi, this is Kate. I know." Kate had picked up the phone as soon as Catherine said Sara's name. "Okay, you have to calm down, I can't understand you. Was she ever alone? No? You're positive. What about-? Okay. Listen, he gets them alone. He's never gone after them when someone's in the room. It makes sense that he probably grabbed her there. Go cordon it off and. . ." She listened for a second, then, "I'll tell them," and hung up.

"Hey," Catherine protested.

"He hung up," Kate said defensively.

"What'd he say?"

"The only time Grissom left her alone was to go to the bathroom, that's probably when he took her. He's going to stay in Georgia until she's found."

"We should go out there," Nick said, and Warrick agreed.

"No," Catherine said. "I'm in charge right now, and we have to stay."

The boys protested.

"Look," Ari said, "she's right. One obsessed and upset friend is all Sara needs out there. We don't need to be in the way. Be glad it's Gil who's there."

"Why? He's the least biased of all of us."

"Because he knows her best. If she can leave anything behind, he'll know what it means. They've been staying together for the last two weeks, they've had a lot of time on their hands and they've probably worked something out just in case."

"He didn't sound like they had," Catherine pointed out.

"He didn't know where she'd been taken from," Kate said. "He knows now, he'll run every square inch of that bathroom looking for what she left behind."