Part Eleven - Dinner
(Lady Heather's Box)
The lab was so quiet as she packed up the evidence that Sara could almost hear her heart beating, could practically hear the sharp taste of disappointment, bitter like bile, rising up her throat. This wasn't what the job was supposed to be like; she was supposed to work out what had happened, track down the clues, arrest the criminals. That was her job, she was good at it. She should have been able to do more on this one.
Not that she expected things to work out every time; after all, every CSI had stories of the one that got away, Grissom even had a cork board full of them in his office. But this case, this was different.
Because it was personal, close to home.
Not that she'd known Eddie, on the contrary, she'd never even met him. She'd heard plenty about him though, from the caustic comments that Catherine tossed around when talking about him, from the disapproving looks that Warrick and Nick got on their faces when his name came up, and most of all from the look of utter disgust that came to Grissom's. A man renowned for his taciturn expression, that, more than anything else, had told Sara loud and clear that Eddie was a nasty piece of work.
But he was still Catherine's husband. Lindsey's father. The subject of her case.
For all those reasons, Sara had wanted to find out what happened to him.
But try as she might, there had been nothing that she could do.
All she could do now was this, box up the evidence, writing labels with a heavy heart, but the pen skidded across the paper slightly when she heard a voice behind her. "So, you're calling it?"
She looked up slowly and turned, giving herself time to prepare her response. Catherine hadn't been exactly helpful to her during the course of the investigation, and Sara wasn't going to forget dragging her off Candeece in a hurry. Nor would she forget the harsh words that they'd exchanged, though she still stood by hers. Catherine had been out of line, she should have been at home with her daughter, and she certainly shouldn't have said the things she'd said to Sara.
Even if it did look like they were true.
Sara was more than a little afraid that they were going to have the same conversation again, but Catherine didn't seem as annoyed this time. In fact, she didn't appear annoyed at all. Instead, she appeared drained, as if someone had sucked the life right out of her, and she looked older than Sara had ever seen her. Which is why the response she gave was the most honest one she could think of. "I got two liars and no murder weapon ... and no choice. I'm going to nail the singer on child endangerment and fleeing the scene, and the dealer goes up on possession for sale." It wasn't the best outcome. Hell, it sucked as an outcome, but it was the best that she could do.
Catherine barely reacted at all, just that same lifeless manner again. Somewhere in her, Sara knew that she understood, that in time, she'd accept that. But not today. Today she sighed, and said, "What a great bedtime story for my little girl."
Sara wouldn't have thought it possible, but the quiet recrimination, even if it hadn't been meant as such, stung more than the angry words of earlier. Sara had known that those weren't true, but this? This had the ring of truth to it. It was one of those strange paradoxes, she reflected. Even though she'd done all she could, she still felt like she should have done more. Even though it was an unsolvable case, she still felt that she should have solved it.
She didn't know if there were words to reach Catherine, but she felt she had to try. The only ones that came to mind were, as second earlier, the truth, forcing the words past a swell of emotion in her throat, prickling behind her eyes. "Cath, I did my best."
Catherine didn't say anything, just looked at her for what seemed like a long time. Then her eyes slid off Sara's face, moved over the evidence slowly, taking everything in. Once that was done, she looked back at Sara, but she didn't say a word as she turned and left the room.
Sara knew what a slap in the face felt like, even without the contact.
She didn't know how long she stared at the open door, wishing that things could have been different, but eventually she turned back to the evidence of her failure, and slowly, methodically, just as she'd been taught, she catalogued each piece, writing it down none too neatly in a shaking hand. She placed each item into the box as if it was the finest crystal, and when it was all boxed away safely, she hefted the box in her arms, bringing it to the evidence room, placing it neatly on a shelf, name and case number front and centre, just as she'd been taught.
She didn't look back as she walked out of the room. Instead she glanced at her watch, realised that she only had a couple of hours before she was due back on shift. There was no time to go home, get some sleep, not that she thought she'd be able to sleep anyway. Even if she did, there was the risk of dreams, Catherine's face, Lindsey sitting wrapped in a blanket, soaking wet and scared to death, gunshots on an audio track. Sara shuddered at the bare memory. Definitely, no sleep in the near future.
She was pressing the buttons on her cell phone before she even realised that she'd made a decision, pressing herself back against the wall, tapping her foot while she counted the rings. She was about to hang up when she heard his voice. "Hey," she said. "It's me."
"Hey!" Hank sounded surprised to hear from her, but not in a bad way she thought, and she smiled despite herself. "How's it going?"
The answer that sprang immediately to mind was "Fairly crappy" but Sara bit it back. If she'd learned one thing about working in the Las Vegas Crime Lab, it was that walls had ears, and what you thought was private wasn't always. "Not so bad," she said simply, hoping that he'd read between the lines of that. "Listen, I've got a couple of hours off, I was wondering if you were free for dinner?"
There was a moment's pause, just long enough for Sara's heart to drop and her appetite to vanish. "Baby, I'd love to, you know that," came the reply. "But I just finished my break … "
She shook her head, even though he couldn't see her. "Don't worry about it," she told him quickly. "It's fine." And funnily enough though, it was, and it surprised her to realise it.
"If I'd known you were going to call … " Hank was still trying to pour oil on troubled waters, and the fact that he cared enough to do it made her smile.
"Hank, it's fine, really." Something that might have been a spark of normality flared in her brain, because reaching out to someone had never been her style, and she told him, "You can make it up to me later."
She heard his laugh and it very nearly made everything all right. "Now that's a date I'm going to keep." Then there was another voice in the background, and a series of muffled words that Sara couldn't make out, and when he spoke to her again, he sounded distracted. "Look, I'm going to have to go…"
"I understand." And she did, because how many times had she said those exact words to him. "I'll talk to you later."
"Bye." And then he was gone, leaving her standing there, alone. Sucking in a deep breath, she straightened her shoulders, resolving to make the best of things. So what if she'd just failed with a case she had a personal interest in, for the second time in a row, some mocking little voice at the back of her mind reminded her mercilessly. So what if her boyfriend had to work and couldn't spend a little quality time with her? She could handle it; she'd handled worse than that.
"Like the fact that you don't care that your boyfriend can't make the time to be with you?" A little voice that she didn't want to hear spoke up mockingly in the back of her head, and in an effort to outrun the thoughts that she didn't want to think about, Sara pushed herself away from the wall, turning in the direction of the locker room, starting in surprise when she walked right into someone. It was completely her fault, because she was looking down at the floor as she'd turned, hadn't been paying attention, and she was halfway through a stumbled apology before she looked up, her words dying on her lips when she saw the amusement in Cyrus's dark brown eyes.
"There a fire someplace I don't know about?" he wondered, and she chuckled despite herself, more in embarrassment than amusement.
"We've got to stop meeting like this," she told him, holding up her hands, and shaking her head towards heaven, because it wasn't the first time that she'd walked into him like this. He nodded in understanding, and she tilted her head, looking at him curiously as a thought occurred to her. "We don't usually see you around here at this hour Detective," she observed.
It was his turn to look towards heaven then, and he did so with a roll of his eyes. "I drew a case with the supervisor of Day Shift," he told her, the last two words delivered in a tone that left her in no doubt as to his lack of fondness for that particular bunch of people. She snickered in sympathy, because she could well imagine what he'd been putting up with, didn't even need him to continue on with, "Tell me, is it possible for Conrad Ecklie to be a bigger jackass than he actually is?" He looked around him carefully before he said that, said it a low voice, just in case the walls did indeed have ears as she'd thought earlier, and she answered him in kind.
"He continues to find new and innovative ways," she replied, and Cyrus actually groaned.
"You sure know how to cheer a guy up. This case is looking better by the minute."
He was kidding, but her answering chuckle was mirthless, and she could feel the bitterness rising like bile in her throat. "I know that feeling," she said, regretting her words the second they'd passed her lips, because he wasn't going to be interested in her problems. If he was working a case with Ecklie, he had more than enough of his own. She shook her head slightly, wrapping her arms around her waist protectively, looking down at the floor, wondering what he must be thinking of her.
It seemed a long time before he spoke. "Sam Vega told me that you two were on the case involving Catherine's husband." His voice was kinder than she'd ever heard it, pitched low so that there was no possibility of anyone overhearing them, and she found herself swallowing hard for no reason that she could articulate. There was another pause, then, "He told me it wasn't going so well."
What could easily be termed the biggest understatement of the millennium drew a bitter laugh from her, and she looked up at him quickly, unable to keep her instinctive reply from coming out. "If you call two liars pointing the finger at one another, evidence that can be interpreted either way and no murder weapon not going well, then yeah, it's not going well." The sharpness of her reply stunned even her, and he blinked, literally taking a step back. Chastened, she closed her eyes for a second, opening them to see him frowning at her. "Cyrus, I'm sorry. I just … " Words failed her, so she closed her eyes again, shaking her head.
"It's rough when it's someone you know." The gentle words penetrated her darkness, and when she opened her eyes again, she saw sympathy in his face. While at any other time that might have raised her hackles, today it was just what she needed.
"Yeah," she sighed, tilting her head back so that it rested against the wall. "That's it exactly." They stood there in silence for a moment, and when she looked back at him, she found that he hadn't moved at all, that he was just looking at her with serious eyes. His whole being radiated concern, and she found herself oddly touched. She hadn't expected that level of concern from him. "There are times when I really hate this job," she muttered, more to herself than him, and he didn't hesitate in his reply.
"No there aren't."
The words were uttered with an air of utter certainty, and her lips quirked up in a brief smile despite herself. "Well … not many anyway," she allowed. Taking a deep breath, she straightened up, rolling her shoulders in an effort to relieve the tension that had settled in them. "I should let you get back … "
The last thing she wanted to do was to delay him, but he didn't look to eager to rush back to the sunny disposition of Conrad Ecklie. "Are you sure you're gonna be ok?" he asked, looking down at her doubtfully.
She smiled, trying to reassure him, but she wasn't so sure that it worked. "I'm fine Cyrus," she told him. He still didn't look like he believed her, so she added on, "Really." The extra word didn't do anything to emphasise her point, in actual fact, it did the opposite. She wouldn't have believed her either.
"OK." He nodded, looking for a second as if he was going to take off, even turning slightly away from her. Then he turned back to her, as if something had just occurred to him. "Look, you want to go get dinner or something?" She blinked, taken aback by his offer, and he added, "Change of scene, different point of view … it might help."
She stared at him for a long moment, not sure of what to say. On one hand, she was hungry, and she certainly needed a change of scene. That was what had prompted her to call Hank, in the hopes that he'd take her mind off the disaster that had been her latest case. But he was busy, had to work, and there was no way she wanted to go home alone right then, where the walls of her apartment would whisper her failure.
On the other hand though, there was a level of intimacy with Hank that wasn't there with Cyrus. No matter how well she got along with the detective, no matter how nice he was, he wasn't her boyfriend, she wouldn't be able to open up to him like she would with Hank.
She opened her mouth, all ready to decline the invitation.
"That sounds nice," came out instead.
***
To say that Cyrus was surprised that he'd ended up having dinner with Sara was something of an understatement, not that he was going to complain about it. He hadn't thought that he'd bump into her in the CSI lab, having genuinely been there to talk to Ecklie about something relating to their case. This had been the first time that he'd ever worked with the day shift supervisor, having heard many stories about how hard he was to work with. He hadn't been looking forward to it, but he'd been willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. He knew that stories tended to get exaggerated, that Ecklie probably wasn't as bad as people made out.
After five minutes walking the crime scene with him, Cyrus had known that he'd been right. Ecklie wasn't as bad as people made out.
He was worse.
How a man possessing no people skills whatsoever made it to the level he had was a mystery to Cyrus, but one he had absolutely no interest in solving. All he wanted to do was solve the case and hopefully never have to work with Ecklie again, while thanking his lucky stars that he'd avoided it this long.
Seeing Sara in the halls had been an unexpected surprise, all the more so when she literally walked into him. He'd made a joke about it, and while her lips had fashioned a smile, it hadn't come anywhere close to reaching her eyes, and he'd found himself worried about her. She didn't seem like her usual self, her skin pale, her eyes looking a trifle red, and he'd recalled what Sam had told him earlier, about the case with Eddie Willows not going well.
He hadn't intended to ask her for dinner, had meant to just let her go, sure that she'd want to handle it herself. That's what his head had told him anyway, but his heart had over-ruled it, and he'd held his breath as the words hung in the air between them, sure that she was going to say no.
He wasn't sure who was more surprised when she'd agreed.
Either way, they'd picked out a diner that they both knew, taking separate cars there. She'd arrived first and was already reading the menu when he slid into the booth across from her, reaching out for the other menu as he greeted her, scanning it with a practised eye. They exchanged small talk until the waitress came to take their order, and he was surprised when she ordered the vegetarian lasagne. He opted for the non-vegetarian option of the same thing, turning to her in surprise as the waitress left. "I didn't know you were vegetarian," he said, and she nodded, shrugging her shoulders.
"For about the last two years now," she told him. "I could always kinda take or leave it before ... my parents are ex-hippies, so meat was never a big thing for us anyway … "
Tilting his head, several about her words struck him, not least of which was that her parents had been hippies once upon a time. Because he'd got to know Sara Sidle pretty well by this pint, and he'd heard enough stories about her personality to know that the laissez-faire attitude that one would normally associate with hippies was something that one would never associate with her. He declined to ask her about that though, instead choosing to follow up on the timeline question. "So what pushed you over the edge?"
She chuckled dryly, shifting in her seat. Her arms were crossed, resting on the table, and she looked away from him for a moment. "I'm not sure I should tell you before we eat," she replied, and he looked at her strangely.
"We've investigated eviscerated cheerleaders together," he reminded her. "I think I'm beyond the point where I can be grossed out by anything."
She smirked, then shrugged again. "Grissom and I spent an entire night sitting in a parking lot, looking at a dead pig, wrapped in a blanket, and observed the development of larvae, the effect they had on the skin of the pig … "
Her voice trailed off, probably as a result of him shaking his head in confusion. "Why in the world would you-"
Seeing the question coming, she interrupted him by holding up a finger. "See, the skin of the pig most closely resembles the skin of a human being. So, since we can't sit out all night beside a corpse, a dead pig is the next best thing. We had to document the arrival of the bugs, chart their growth … "
There was a devilish smile hovering around her lips giving him the distinct feeling that she was embellishing it for his benefit, but loathe as he was for his constitution to appear less than robust to her, he couldn't take any more of that. "OK," he said, reaching for the water jug and pouring himself a glass, offering one to her. "You know when I said I was beyond being grossed out?" He paused a beat, allowing her to nod. "I lied," he said flatly, pouring her a glass of water, enjoying the smile that lit up her face, the laugh that bubbled freely out of her. After the scene in the hall, he would have bet a year's salary that getting her to laugh would have been a hard job, but it hadn't worked out that way.
"You and me both," she acknowledged. "And that's why I stopped eating meat."
Cyrus nodded. "The things you do in the name of science."
Another chuckle, and he decided that he could definitely get used to that sound, that smile. "Grissom does have some strange experiments," she allowed. "But they usually end up working." She took a sip of water, her eyes dancing with mirth. "I'd much rather him than Ecklie."
Cyrus didn't bother to suppress to the urge to roll his eyes. "Wasn't the dead pig story enough for you? Are you trying to turn me off my food?"
"I would say it can't be that bad," Sara allowed. "Except that it's probably worse." Her expression flickered then, her eyes growing dark for a moment, sliding away from him, and he knew instantly where her thoughts were going.
"Looks like there's a lot of that going around," he said slowly, and she sighed, reaching out and grabbing her fork, playing with it absently.
"Yeah," she said flatly, still not looking at him.
"How's Catherine doing?" It seemed to be a safer topic of conversation, enquiring after the other CSI; less personal than the line of questioning about her vegetarianism and her parents, nothing to do with the case itself. And it was a legitimate question too; he'd worked cases with Catherine, had found her easy to get along with, not to mention a top of the line CSI. It couldn't hurt to ask after her.
Except that Sara sighed, and when she met his eyes, he could see the thinly veiled pain there. "As well as can be expected, isn't that what they say?" Her voice was bitter enough to cause him to wince, never mind her, and she must have realised that because she tried to smile. "She's devastated … and the fact that we can't nail anyone for it doesn't help."
"No." Cyrus's voice was quiet. "It wouldn't." He was quiet for a moment before he thought of something else. "How's her daughter?"
Something that could have been admiration, or amazement, flitted across Sara's face. "You should have seen her in the interview room," she said, with a gentle shake of her head. "This kid has just been pulled out of a sinking car, she's seen her father for all intents and purposes die in front of her, and she's able to give the details of what she saw … and the only thing she cares about is that Catherine not get mad at Eddie." She shook her head, and this time, Cyrus knew it was with amazement. "She's pretty tough."
Cyrus shrugged. "Like mother like daughter, isn't that what they say?"
"Cath didn't look so tough when she saw me boxing up the case," Sara murmured. "I don't know if we're going to get past this." The last was uttered so quietly that Cyrus thought she might have been talking to herself rather than to him, but he couldn't let it go, because he knew it wasn't true.
"I investigated a case once, where I knew the victim … it wasn't a homicide, it was a home invasion … and rape. Victim was the sister of one of my high school buddies; I'd known her since I was fourteen. I remember going to her parents' house to talk to her, seeing her parents, Jack … and the bruises on her face … " Even after all this time, it still hurt to think about it. "I promised her we'd find the guy who did it … but we never did."
Sara's face registered sympathy. "That sucks," she said.
"Yeah. I was the one who told them we were closing the investigation … she cried … Jack stormed out of the room … and her mother told me that she would have expected better from Jessie Lockwood's boy." He shrugged his shoulders. "Allie told me later that she didn't blame me, that she knew I'd done my best … but every time I can't make a case, I hear that voice."
Sara nodded, then her eyes narrowed and she tilted her head. "You mean you're telling me that it doesn't get better?" she asked, deadpan, and he was taken aback, because that hadn't been his intent at all, and he was about to launch into an explanation when her face suddenly broke out in a grin, and he realised what she was doing.
"Just call it payback for not making me feel better about Ecklie," he retorted, but she'd already moved on to another topic.
"Hang on … Jessie Lockwood's boy? Investigation involving a high school friend? That means you worked where you grew up?" Cyrus nodded, and Sara looked amazed. "Wow," she said. "The second I could, I was gone … what's that like?"
Cyrus shrugged, because he'd never really thought about it in those terms before. He'd grown up in a close family, in a friendly neighbourhood, and he'd never really ever wanted to leave. "It was great," he said honestly. "My dad's a fire-fighter, my mom didn't work, but she was active in the community … I think they knew everyone in the neighbourhood." He shrugged. "It's not so bad you know, when you know everyone, and everyone knows you … of course, you've also got-"
"The down side of everyone knowing you." Sara beat him to the punch. "Tomales Bay isn't exactly a beehive of activity outside the tourist season," she told him. "You're from Reno, right?"
He nodded, because he'd told her as much at Christmas. "Yeah. Born and raised and never left until I came here."
"What made you leave?" Sara looked at him curiously, then literally sat back as if she'd been stung. "I'm sorry … you don't have to tell me … "
"It's fine." Cyrus waved a hand dismissively. "It's probably your age old story … boy meets girl, they fall madly in love … boy is on the verge of proposing when girl says that she's in love with someone else."
He paused to let that sink in, and Sara winced. "Ouch."
"Yeah." A sip of water and he was ready to continue. "It's not like I ran away to recover from my broken heart or anything like that," he told her. "But I could see my whole life with her, the house, the kids, the whole nine yards. And once that was gone, I began to wonder if there was more to life than Reno." He shrugged again. "Decided to try something new. So I put in for a transfer, and ended up here. Of course, my sister was already living here with her husband, so it wasn't like I was upping sticks entirely … "
"Which is what I did," Sara told him. "I moved to Boston when I was eighteen and I've never lived at home since."
"You get home much?"
"Not really." Her shoulders rose and fell, and she tapped her fork against the rim of her glass absently. "My parents and I don't see eye to eye all that much … I tried to keep in touch more when I was in San Francisco … but now I'm further away … "
"Not that much further away," Cyrus objected, and he knew he'd gone too far when her face slammed shut, rendering the subject closed.
"It's just easier this way," was all she said, and he decided to let the subject drop.
"So you were in San Francisco … what brought you to Vegas?"
The effect of the question was instantaneous, a bright grin appearing on her face. "Grissom," she said simply. "We'd met at a seminar a few years back, kept in semi-regular contact. They were short of manpower, he asked me to come down here on a temporary basis." She chuckled. "Two and a half years later, here I am."
"Some temporary basis." Something about the way that she looked when she mentioned Grissom's name had him curious; something in her smile, in the way her eyes lit up. It reminded him of the way that his sisters had looked when they first told him about the guys that they had ended up marrying, and what he couldn't figure out was how she could look like that about Grissom yet be dating someone else.
Then the look passed, and he thought that maybe he just imagined it.
Then the waitress came with their orders, and they ate in fits of silence and small talk.
It was a small place and a plate of lasagne, but Cyrus couldn't remember when he'd last had a better time.