The Choice, chapter 4

Notes: Sorry the last chapter was so sucky, hope this one is better...

Nick's breath came in quick pants. He controlled his exertion by breathing through his nose, slowly slightly. His tennis shoes pounded into the asphalt biking trail, and occasionally small switches and tree branches grabbed out at his arms. His track pants served a dual purpose: one, he wanted the sweat to pour from his body, cleansing his system; and two, he wasn't sure he was secure enough to let Sara see him in his running shorts, or as he referred to it, his gay man's apparel.

Hugging the curve of the track, he zigzagged his way through the wooded area, over a small bridge and pond. Speeding, he felt his heart clenching with the pressure and strain of exercise. He loved this, loved running. It was simple, uncomplicated. Going to the gym, pumping up his muscles was entirely for show. The real workout was the five miles per day, meant to keep him lean, limber and ready for anything.

Just because he wasn't an athlete anymore didn't mean he shouldn't have the athlete's body. He was more toned than most of the cops he knew, a fact in which he took pride. He spent plenty of time on the Dallas Police Force chasing down scum like the Reno Rapist. He spent plenty of time getting to know dark alleyways, and forested areas like this one. He'd seen plenty of crime in his short life.

Running away from the park, his feet met more solid resistance as asphalt turned into concrete. He fairly leapt up the apartment staircase, and slowly jogged in place out on the balcony to get his heart rate down. It wasn't even six a.m, Sara was probably still asleep. Sara...

She was mesmerizing. Nick couldn't help but think of the night of her panic attack and softly groan. Seeing her so open and vulnerable was a change from the usual tough-as-nails façade he saw every day in the lab. He knew she'd been hurt, like him. It made it easier, feeling for her, knowing they had that connection.

Sara had been his best friend for so long, he wasn't sure when he started to think of her as anything but. He wasn't sure he would have even realized the fact if it weren't for this case. She'd been on his mind constantly since he stepped off the plane, and he was pretty sure it wasn't just the fact that they were undercover together.

He loved seeing the small lopsided grin every time she came home to find he'd already made dinner. It was a habit that he'd already established, and enjoyed the rewards much more than he ever thought he would when he started. It was the way his breath caught in his throat whenever she wandered around in her sleepwear—either her cotton shift or her sports bra and boy shorts. Did she know how delectable her body was? How sleek and smooth her curves seemed to him? Even her little bit of tummy made him smile, reminded him she was not perfect and he didn't want her to be.

He loved the fact that she curled up next to him when watching TV at night, laid her head on his shoulder, allowed him to put a protective arm around her.

'Get a grip, Stokes,' he told himself. It had been less than a week and suddenly he was imagining that this was what it would be like to come home to her every night. Nick reminded himself that Sara was his friend, and his colleague, nothing more and nothing less.

His heartbeat gradually slowed, and he let himself back into the apartment silently, and closed the door behind him. Sara was sitting on the couch, drinking coffee and watching the morning news.

"You could have gotten me up, I would have gone running with you," she smiled, glancing at Nick over the rim of her cup. She hoped the awkwardness from the night before wouldn't linger. Nick smiled at her, and winked, and she felt much relieved. He didn't say anything as he drifted off into the den and then disappeared into her room to take a shower. He was privately amused; he didn't bother to explain that running something or someone out of your system was a lot more efficient if they weren't there.

When he was dressed, he emerged and found Sara curled on the couch, dead to the world. He covered her with the throw on the back of the sofa and sat in the armchair across from her, watching her sleep.

Sara was a strange, strange person, by all accounts. She worked herself to death every month, hardly slept, and bristled when anyone tried to get her to take better care of herself. She loved evidence, she loved the lab, and she loved Gil Grissom. Nick didn't know a lot about the relationship that Sara had had with their mentor, but he saw the affectionate gazes between them, Sara's fierce protection of Grissom, and Grissom's less-than-fatherly regard for Sara. He knew they had had some kind of falling-out before Grissom's leave of absence, and Sara had thrown herself into her work again, more than usual.

Would she ever see Nick as anything more than her friend? Would she ever see the way Nick gazed at her, would she ever see Nick's regard? He supposed not, and he didn't have to wonder why. He was less experienced, and less mature than Grissom, to be sure. But he was also more gentle, more thoughtful, and a hell of a lot more respectful. What exactly did she see in him?

Nick saw a man who with a few more years tacked on, could be her father, his father, for that matter. He saw a chubby, bowlegged, difficult man who refused to let anyone in, and refused to admit the power he held over his young students, Sara in particular. Catherine had once told him that Sara worshipped the ground Grissom walked on, and Nick had agreed. Now he wasn't so sure. Of all the people that had walked in and out of his life, Sara had been by far the hardest to read. And the most rewarding.

She'd opened up to him in a way that he never dreamed of upon first meeting her, seeing her prickly countenance. He saw the way she flirted with him, the way he flirted back, but it didn't mean anything. It was an act, just like everything else in those first few months. But then the forced comments and tedious flirting turned in to something more genuine. The easy manner and tone developed from their proximity, and Sara didn't fake it anymore.

Sara had a true friend for perhaps the first time in her life, and Nick had never been more glad that it was he than when Ecklie pulled him in to give him the assignment of a lifetime. Run undercover to catch one of the worst serial criminals in the history of Nevada. Run undercover with his best friend, his confidante, and they would be unstoppable. The trust between them was unwavering, almost bordering on precognition: anticipating one another's moves before they even made them. They complimented each other they way most law enforcement teams could only hope for. She was the fric to his frac, the scientist to his humanist, the stem to his petal. She at the very least was a foil to his charms, and she didn't take anything he said seriously. He wondered if she ever would.

"So grocery shopping, lunch, and then what?"

"I don't know, I was thinking we could either go to a movie or go back to the apartment and take a nap. We're running surveillance tonight, so it may be our last opportunity to sleep for about the next eighteen hours," Nick answered, consulting his watch.

"Let's go see a movie," Sara's eyes lit up, and Nick rolled his eyes at her seeming boundless energy. Nick pulled into a parking space at Marty's Market, and turned off the ignition.

Sara began to get out of the car, when Nick stopped her with a gentle hand on her arm. He handed her the small box that held her "hearing aid," and watched as she carefully inserted it into her ear, after making sure that it was turned off. She shut the door of the car, and allowed Nick to take her arm companionably on the way up to the front of the store. Nick grabbed one of the small red baskets at the front counter, not relinquishing her arm.

"What's on the list?" Sara asked, squeezing more tightly around his forearm, but not letting go.

"Milk, bread, lunch meat. Eggs, coffee, bagels. All pretty innocuous," Nick winked at her, and she found herself amused by his quick wit. They began in the produce section, gathering fresh fruits and vegetables, only what they'd need for the week, and Sara found herself going back to Nick each time, and taking his arm after each foray. He stood with her patiently as she picked out a cereal, and didn't say a word when she decided to inspect the organic food aisle.

As they rounded the corner to frozen foods, they almost ran straight into an oversized shopping cart. A small set of seats were molded on to the handle of the cart, and two small pixies were staring up at them with tiny little faces and squirming bodies.

"Danielle," Sara greeted her with a big smile.

"Detective Sark," Danielle's face was obscured by her hair, and she smacked a tiny hand that reached out for a jar of honey on the nearby endcap.

"Danielle, this is my husband Sam," Sara introduced. "Babe, this is Danielle, she works in Vice with me."

"Nice to meet you, Danielle," Nick's easy smile put the woman at ease, and Sara saw her smile for the first time.

"And who are these guys?" Sara kneeled to look into the faces of the mischievous lads who seemed to be giving their mother so much grief.

"Michael and Monroe," Danielle's hands trembled as she smoothed down their dark hair. "Please excuse me," her voice wavered and she pushed past the young couple on her way down the main aisle of the store.

"Strange," Nick commented out of the side of his mouth, and Sara agreed by nodding, and worrying her bottom lip with her teeth. As they finished their shopping, Sara couldn't help but think about Danielle and the look in her eyes when Sara had asked about her children.

Nick paid for the groceries and took the bags, and Sara followed him, lost in thought. His hand on the small of her back was the only contact between them, but it was enough as he gently guided them out to the car.

"Where to?"

"Cassie...Officer Matanopolous told me about a great cop hangout over on the East Side. We should probably go check it out, just to see. She said it was a barbecue joint called Lucky's," Sara's smiled was forced.

Nick nodded, but several minutes later, he pulled into the small Jewish deli near the apartment. Sara looked over at him with a look somewhere between grateful and a complete absence of surprise.

"We don't have to be on the clock twenty-four hours a day, undercover or not," he said, getting out of the car. He came around to her side of the car to open her door for her, and she let him, almost as if they had planned it. Perfectly synchronized. He took her hand to lead her into the restaurant, and didn't let go until they were given plates to raid the salad bar. Steaming bowls of soup were waiting when they arrived at their table.

"Soup in the summer?"

"Must be a house specialty," Nick sat down across from her and immediately handed her the pepper. "At least it's tortilla."

They ate, and traded stories about high school. Sara couldn't explain why she was pleasantly relieved to find that Nick hadn't been a playboy, and Nick enjoyed hearing her regale him with stories of her life as a teenage science geek. They enjoyed their lunch and the good company, and Sara found that at the end of their meal together, she didn't want to break the connection with anything as trivial as a movie.

They went back to the apartment, and Sara led Nick into the bedroom, and closed the door behind him. Lying down on the bed, she didn't have to beckon him to join her, and they both lay on their sides, facing one another, talking and softly laughing, until both fell into sleep.

"Okay, let's go over this again," Nick shined his small flashlight onto the lists they were reviewing. Max had the officers broken up by shift, and then rank. She cleared the sergeants first, then the officers. It looks like there are 7 Captains, 14 sergeants...then the chief, Nick read, distracting himself. "Captain Merritt, of Vice was attacked April 25, is out of a leave of absence. That leaves, Captain Yessen of Robbery/Homicide, Captain Barclay of Patrol and Auto Theft, Captain O'Reilly of Financial Crimes, Captain Caldwell of IA, Captain Peoria of Gang/Narcotics, and Captain Dennis of Special Victims. Yessen, Merritt and Caldwell are cleared through IA."

"Who cleared Yessen?" Sara asked sharply.

"Caldwell gave me background information on his misuse of force complaints, all were unsubstantiated, and he has provided alibi information that has been confirmed through IA."

"Okay, so that leaves Barclay, O'Reilly, Peoria and Dennis. Max cleared Dennis and Peoria on the date of Isabel Shepard's attack, looks like Dennis was at his kid's baseball game, and Peoria was at the City Council Meeting, which would also eliminate the chief of Police, if he hadn't been cleared already. We eliminate O'Reilly based on gender, which leaves Barclay the only Captain unaccounted for."

"Good," Nick grunted, flipping through pages. "Okay, fourteen sergeants, Hodges and Grievely in Traffic, neither cleared by IA, and Grievely was cleared by Max. Davis and Johnson in Robbery/Homicide, both cleared by IA," Nick stopped speaking, and Sara immediately picked up.

"And cleared by Max," she noted. "Steel in Vice is cleared on gender, which leaves Singleton, who has not been cleared by IA or by Max." She flashed her own light over to Nick's page briefly, and he began speaking again.

"Okay, so Maddox and Pierson in Financial Crimes were both at seminars in Boulder during Shepard's and Merritt's attacks, so they've been cleared by IA and by Max. Lark and Campbell in IA have both been cleared by IA, but not by Max…hmm, interesting," Nick mumbled and began flipping through the pages.

"Who interviewed them?"
"Caldwell, he signed off on the reports, it looks like he's reviewed all of this." Nick flipped back to his list, "Okay, moving on, it looks like Hernandez and Alvarez in Gangs/Narcotics have been cleared by IA, but also not with Max."

"Well, Max said she didn't have time to get to everyone. She hasn't eliminated most of the officers. I guess we can just be grateful for the ones she could clear."

Nick nodded, "Last officers are Zhou and Franklin with Special Victims, Franklin is cleared by gender, and Zhou was in Boston at the time of the McReynolds attack at his daughter's graduation."

"So officer by officer, that leaves Captain Barclay, and Sergeants Hodges, and Singleton. Plus Officers Hancock, Chin, Chappel, Samson, Lindsey, Kukyendahl, LaLiberte, Marquez, Behr and Yates."

Sara groaned, "and that doesn't even count all the Admin: budget, dispatch, records, payroll, polygraph..."

"Actually, look at the addendum to the file," Nick flipped her pages back for her, showing her the list of Officers not in the field. "Only Pemberly in Records and Dixon and Payroll weren't cleared by IA. Max probably never even considered the officers not in the field. All of the victims were attacked during or immediately after their shift."

Sara brightened, but before she could say anything, her phone rang.

"Sark...Uh huh...you're kidding. No. Yeah, okay, we'll do it. Thanks."

"What?" Nick asked, when she flipped her phone closed.

"You're not going to believe this, but Mrs. Nancy Klinkerman, who's lovely home we are now parked in front of, called up to the police station to report suspicious activity. She seems to think that we're casing the place."

Nick let out a loud laugh, which filled the car with warmth.

"I told Caldwell we would take a drive around the block, park on the opposite side of Mr. Hancock's residence, and then be more discreet."

Nick fired up the ignition, and put the car into gear.

"He told me if Mrs. Klinkerman calls back, he was going to tell her we were on a stake-out," Sara giggled, leaning back in her seat. Her black ballcap sat snugly down over her ears; her hair tucked through the hole in the back made her look young enough to be in college. "I can't believe he actually has a sense of humor."

"I don't like him," Nick's brow furrowed. He circled the block and came to park on the opposite side of the street. Sara filed her papers away and set the folders on the dash and eased back down into her seat.

"It's a Saturday night, surely this guy is going to go out," she sighed, puffing out her cheeks and letting her lower lip jut out as she exhaled.

Nick also put his clipboard on the dashboard and fished around in the console until he found a half-empty bag of trail mix. "Score."

"I hope that was yours from before," Sara winced.

Nick winked at her, and went back to the bag. He fished out the raisins in silence. He offered her one, but she declined with a shake of her head.

"Today was a good day," she finally said, quietly. "I mean, I had a good time."

"We should hang out more. I mean, when we get back home."

"We should," Sara agreed, absently. "I would kill to sleep in my own bed again."

"We're in complete agreement. I never want to sleep on a couch again," Nick professed.

"Nick, you don't have to, I..."

"I know you said you'd switch off with me, Sara, but that just doesn't feel right. I just wasn't raised that way."

"I was going to say you don't have to, that I would share," the words came tumbling out of Sara's mouth before she could stop them. She hadn't really planned on saying that, and yet, out it came. She flushed bright red, and noticed, to her very great embarrassment, that Nick was blushing also. He dug around in the bag for chocolate chips, and studied them intently before eating each one.

"So," he began finally, desperate to change the subject, hoping to break some of the stifling sexual tension inside the small car. "I know what you were like in high school, and college. But what was middle school like?" Nick's tone has almost reached casually conversational.

"Why do you want to know?" Sara laughed nervously.

"Just wondering." Nick popped several small pieces of chocolate into his mouth and looked over at her curiously.

Sara ducked her head down as she spoke. "I was the belle of the ball. An outrageous flirt," her laugh was caught between amused and bitter.

"What changed?" Nick asked, somewhat distracted as he began rooting around for peanuts.

"A rape," Sara answered simply, still staring at her lap. Nick looked up sharply, the muscles in his neck and face tightening.

"Yours or someone else's?"

"Mine," Sara answered, her voice small.

"How old?"

"Fourteen."

"Jesus Fucking Christ!" Nick's fist slammed against the steering wheel. Sara jumped in surprise. "Did you know him?" he demanded.

Sara nodded silently.

"Who?"

"Next door neighbor."

"Did you report it?"

Sara shook her head no. "I...I'm not the same person I was then."

Nick shook with a fury that Sara had never seen before, the hate rolled off of him in waves, making him speechless.

"Please don't hate me, Nick, but I just couldn't. I couldn't..."

Nick's voice was soft when he spoke again. "Sara, I could never hate you, no matter what. You had to do what was right for you."

"Then why do I feel so guilty?" Her voice wavered, and she begged herself not to cry. "Why do I feel like I've aided him in so many other attacks and rapes, because I didn't report the first one?"

Nick didn't have an answer for that, but he pulled her close, his arm tightening around her shoulder. Sara didn't cry, but instead, watched the residence across the street, and sat up ramrod-straight when she saw a woman emerge from the house and step out on to the porch.

"Max," she whispered softly, watching as Max eased down the steps on the side of the porch and got into her car. She backed out of the drive and proceeded down the street and away from their car. "Damn it!"

"Do you want to follow her, or stay here?" Nick asked, business-like.

"Follow her, I'm sure Hancock isn't the one," Sara bounced up on her seat, eager, and Nick put the car into gear, and proceeded to tail Officer Maxwell around the corner. Sara felt more than a little stupid when Max went straight home, and went inside. Ten minutes later, all the lights were off. They mosied back over to Hancock's place, where they found his car still sitting in the driveway, and all the lights were out there, too.

They watched the place for another hour in near-silence, still on edge from their discovery. What would Max and Hancock be in cahoots about? Particularly since she hadn't cleared his name for the time of Isabel Shepard's attack? Sara mulled the matter over and over in her mind until her head throbbed.

Sara was already in bed when Nick came out of the bathroom, fresh from his shower. His towel was slung low on his hips, and she could smell the clean scent of Zest soap radiating off of him.

"Nick?" her voice was tenuous and he could hear the yearning behind that single word. "Please. You don't have to sleep on the couch."

He came to the side of the bed where Sara lay and eased his weight onto the mattress on one hip. Not saying anything, he reached out for her face, and very gently moved his thumb across cheekbones, then the soft hollow of her cheeks, past her lips and down to her chin. Sara kicked off the comforter that had been pulled up to her waist, exposing her boy shorts and alabaster thighs to Nick's gaze. He closed his eyes at the sight, and tried to regain his strength.

"Nick?"

"I can't," Nick opened his eyes to see Sara staring at him, her eyes wide and her mouth a soft "o" of surprise. Nick looked down to see his towel poking up precariously. He nearly leapt off of the bed, startling Sara even more. It was four huge steps to the door, and then he closed it firmly behind him. He made it to the den and closed the door once he was inside, and leaned against it, his breathing ragged. Letting his towel fall, he began to jerk himself furiously, not waiting, not able to do anything but indulge himself. Oh, God...

TO BE CONTINUED, shortly.