Okay - - two notes.

No, dipthalamine isn't a real drug. It's completely part of my imagination. I just thought of bad, nasty side-effects and an appropriate sounding name.

And also, I adore the fact that Nathan has been nicknamed "the mailman." Seriously. That makes me very happy.

Thanks for all your feedback! Evil, nasty mailman chapter here, then a few case chapters.

**

Chapter Nine: Talking it Out

**

The Siesta Inn was a cheap Mexican establishment just off the Strip, full of bright teals and corals, and the pervading smell of tequila. Grissom had, on a whim, taken Catherine with him - - she was less likely to lose her temper with Nathan and more likely to know the right thing to say. Besides, he needed her to act as his anchor. The two of them found Nathan Sanders in the hotel restaurant, lunching on enchiladas and draft beer. When he saw them coming, his smile was vicious, and he patted it down with a napkin and stood.

"Can I offer you a seat? Beer?"

That damned false-charming country club voice was back. Nathan had changed out of the tennis whites and into a neat khaki suit. He looked like a low- rent lawyer getting ready to make a case.

Catherine spoke first. "Can you tell us why you suspect that your son might die?" Her voice was carefully modulated but Grissom could tell that she didn't like having to say the words out loud. That Greg could die - - might likely die - - was a possibility that all of them had considered and none of them had discussed, as if keeping the thoughts in their head might make the probability lessen.

"I talked to the doctors," Nathan said. "They gave me chances as great as two-in-five that Gregory might not even make it through the rest of the day, and another one-fifth chance that he'll linger on for another week before all the lights go out. It would be a shame to waste airfare traveling up here only to travel back for the funeral."

"Why are you doing this?" Grissom asked. "Why come all the way here just to not care what happens to him?"

"I didn't come up here because of Gregory." Nathan's cultured voice was starting to fray the last edges of Grissom's nerves, and the irritating repetition of Greg's full name was bothering him, too, against all odds. He calmed himself as Nathan continued, "I came here to make a good impression on the right people. You, Dr. Grissom. Your colleagues. You're all recognized as some of the foremost investigators in the country. I wanted to meet you."

Grissom's hope that Catherine might act as his anchor was fading fast as her face whitened and she said, "So, when Sara called you to tell you that your ONLY CHILD was in a coma, your first thought was, 'Oh, goody, this will be a great excuse to meet some new people'? What the hell kind of parent are you?"

Nathan stiffened. "There's nothing wrong with wanting to make a good impression."

"Well, you made the worst one you could have." Now it was Grissom restraining Catherine. "Listen to me, you piece of shit, we care about Greg here, and we're not going to let you hurt him."

"I'm a good father," Nathan said quietly. "Gregory was simply a bothersome child. Always clumsy, always around when he wasn't wanted. He was very trying to raise. I'm sure you've noticed that, Dr. Grissom." He turned his gaze to Grissom and again, Grissom hated to see those eyes - - the same as Greg's - - looking at him from Nathan's face. "I'm sure you've had your troubles with Gregory."

("All play and no work make Greg an UNEMPLOYED boy.")

("I tolerate a lot from you, but not right now.")

"Greg is part of my team," he said aloud. "He's the best DNA tech in the country."

"He's difficult to manage."

"He's easy to love," Catherine snapped, and Grissom nodded firmly.

"Greg is very important to us," Grissom continued. "We're doing whatever it takes to find whoever hurt him. We're who he needs right now. Go home, Nathan. Whatever costs Greg is running up for you right now, I'll pay them. I'll do whatever it takes to get you out of Las Vegas. If there's a change with Greg, I'll fax you, but I don't want you within a hundred damn miles of Greg."

"Restraining order, Dr. Grissom?" Nathan smiled. "I'm a lawyer. You can't trick me that easily - - I know perfectly well you don't have the grounds to get one issued."

"I can keep you out of my lab, though." He held up the paper he had brought along, admiring the sheen of the blue-ink signatures. "An order to keep you outside the forensics lab, signed by the supervisors of both shifts, grave and day. See, that's the funny thing - - Conrad Ecklie might hate me, but he doesn't like you, either, and you're far easier to get rid of. It's just like flicking a fly away."

"I'm not accustomed to being kicked out of places."

"Get used to it," Catherine said, smirking. "Or we'll get you kicked out of a lot more."

"This isn't over yet," Nathan said, turning on his heel to leave.

Catherine shook her head in dismay. "I hate it when people take their cues from movies. Do you think he expected us to follow that up with, 'You're right, it's only just begun'? God, it's so cliché it's pathetic."

"He's right. It's not over." Grissom watched Nathan move out of the restaurant, settling his bill with the checker. "He isn't going to leave the city - - we might have been better off pretending that we didn't have a problem with him. If he just came to make a good impression, he would have left eventually. But we gave him a reason to stay."

"Greg?"

"Revenge."

Catherine nodded. "Right." She stared at the rest of the table settings, with the half-eaten platter and glistening bottle of beer. She picked it up and rotated it in her fingers. "Dipthalamine. That's no walk in the park. Do you think she did it?"

"I think she drugged him. I think she set him up. But I don't think she killed him."

"An arranged murder? You'd think she'd want to make herself scarce, get as far from the scene as possible. She could give herself the perfect alibi - - no one would have had reason to suspect her if her DNA hadn't been at the scene. I didn't even know that she and Greg knew each other."

"Maybe it was more than a hit. Greg's not high-profile. Maybe this was something personal."

"So we look into Melissa's personal life. Maybe she knew someone involved in one of our cases - - someone Greg helped to put away. Family bonds can run deep, Gil. This could be worse than we expected."

He thought of the triple swabs from the rape kit. "I've already expected the worst. Call Nick. He knows a few people on dayshift. If Melissa's been working on a few of their cases, she could have some acquaintances there that could help us out."

Catherine pulled out her cell phone. "I'm on it. And I'll work on that gunpowder residue. Bobby says there's no way to tell much about the gun from the residue sample, so I'm going to check the hospital, see if anyone saved the bullet they recovered from Greg."

"Good plan. See if it has traces of white paint on it, like the residue at the scene."

"What are you going to do?"

He opened his kit on the table and fumbled around until he found a pair of scissors. "I'm going to give Greg a haircut."

"You're kidding, right? You just wait until he's under because you don't like his hair?"

"If I find bruising or a cut underneath his hair, it could help us make some sense of Melissa's story. Maybe we could even get some samples from it. And I'll need to have Greg's medical bills transferred over to my account."