"Ines, are you ready to go, now?" Catherine asked.
"Sí. I want to see my daughter," Ines said hoarsely.
"Okay. Let's go find her."
Ines pushed herself in her wheelchair and Catherine walked alongside. Marquita was either in the surgery or recovery ward. Who knew how long it would take for the doctors to sew up a wound like hers?
"I can't believe someone shot my sister; stabbed my daughter," Ines grumbled. "Who does things like that? Not even in my village in Mexico do you hear of such terrible things…"
"Where are you from in Mexico?"
"A little place outside Acapulco, called Sierra Cuervo. My husband and I ran away to Las Vegas when we were sixteen and Diego was born two years later. I haven't been back since. Pancha was the only one who came up to see us. She actually met her husband Carlos here during one of her visits. She came so often, she moved here too," Ines bit her lip and tried not to cry again. "Ay, I have spilled so many tears," she sniffed.
"It's okay," Catherine assured her.
"No more tears, mamí. no más se rasga, no más se rasga, no más se rasga…" Ines chanted as she pushed her wheelchair a little more forcefully.
"Tell me, Catherine Willows," Ines said, as the pair got into the elevator. "What happened?"
"What? At Stop-n-Go?"
"Sí. Deseo saber."
"We don't know yet."
"I thought you were a police?"
"No. I'm a CSI. Police catch criminals, but we tell the police who they are."
Ines was silent. "The criminal. Anyone who stabs a seventeen year old girl is a criminal."
"Anyone who does anything to seventeen year old girls is a criminal."
"Oigo eso. Amen," Ines exclaimed. "About my daughter's hand, Catherine Willows…"
"It was clean, Ms. Dali," Catherine assured her. "What we call at CSI, 'through and through'. The knife went it, knife went out, left Marquita with a nasty incision."
"Will she be okay?"
"Well, judging by the fact that it was right through the palm, the hand and fingers may be useless for a long time, due nerve-damage."
"It won't be amp…amp-you…ay, ¿cuál es la palabra? Para amputar," Ines blurted, frustrated with an unfamiliar English word. Then she stuck out her arm made the motion of sawing at her wrist.
But Catherine understood. "Amputated? No, I don't think so. Unless nerve damage is so severe it can never be recovered, but I doubt it will be so extreme."
"Gracias a Dios. I don't know what I'll do if it happens." Ines breathed easier. "My poor baby."
The two woman located Marquita's room without any trouble. They found Marquita fast asleep and a doctor and a nurse checking her over. Ines knocked on the doorframe and the doctor and the nurse looked up.
"Can I help you?" the doctor asked, a tall, stately man with black hair and glasses too big for his comely face.
Catherine looked down at Ines and cleared her throat. Ines nodded and began to speak, carefully.
"I am Marquita Dali's mother," Ines announced.
"Ah…Mrs. Dali," the doctor approached Ines. "I am Eli Gold, I am the on-call surgeon in emergency tonight, I performed the operation on your daughter's hand." He held out his own hand for Ines to shake, which she did.
"Hello," she said. "And this is Catherine Willows."
"Of the Criminalistics Team for the LVPD," she added.
"Oh…you must be the famous Catherine," Dr. Gold smiled.
"Famous?"
"When we were sewing up Marquita's hand, she kept asking for Catherine. We kept asking her who 'Catherine' was," Dr. Gold chuckled, "she answered, un ángel, un ángel bonita! So you must tell me, Ms Willows—are you a beautiful angel?"
Catherine blushed with flattery and began to explain what might have caused Marquita to call her that, "Well, Dr. Gold…I was called in to investigate the robbery that I'm sure you know about."
"Yes, we get as much gruesome details as you do, as a heads up, if you will."
"Anyway, Marquita was hidden in a closet and my supervisor and I found her. She was terrified, covered in blood. She showed me the wound in her hand and I helped her out until the paramedics came. She fainted when I told her about her aunt. She fainted right in my arms," Catherine added softly.
"Well, we woke her up. It's common during a sutures procedure that the patient is kept awake, much like a customary caesarian section, using an epidural, when only the body is numbed as opposed to putting the patient to sleep," Dr. Gold said, mainly to Ines. He then knelt so he could be eye-level with Ines. "The procedure went as well as planned, Ms. Dali."
"Oh, thank goodness," Ines sighed, hand over her heart.
"Your daughter is perfectly fine but we don't think she'll regain full usage of her left hand."
Ines couldn't do anything but nod, neither smiling nor frowning.
"We reattached as many nerves as we could, but it's tricky work. We don't know if the entire hand can wholly respond to pain. The middle and ring fingers are the ones we're most concerned about, but we'll see."
"But she's okay?"
"She's okay."
"May I see her?"
"Of course," Dr. Gold stepped aside and let Ines and her wheelchair pass.
The doctor and the CSI watched as the thin, brunette nurse backed away from Marquita's bed and Ines parked her wheelchair beside it. She leaned over and kissed her sleeping daughter gently on the face.
"Thank you, Catherine Willows," Ines said without turning around, "for saving the life of my daughter."
"You're very welcome," came Catherine's reply, softer than she would of liked, but her throat had closed up.
Dr. Gold stepped out of the room and Catherine followed him.
"So, Miss Angel," Dr. Gold said. "Will you be getting back to Heaven anytime soon or do you have any time to maybe grab a cup of coffee?"
Catherine blinked the confusion out of her eyes like snowflakes stuck in her lashes. "Excuse me?"
"Am I being too brash?" Worry furrowed Dr. Gold's brow.
"No. No, not at all," Catherine replied, a bit flabbergasted.
"Well, what I mean to say…that is, for you still want to," Dr. Gold pulled off his glasses and tucked them in the jacket of his white coat, nestling them between his pens, "if you'd like to get a drink? The coffee in the cafeteria is pretty decent."
Catherine noticed how very green Dr. Gold's eyes were without the glare of his lenses in the way. Then she looked down at her watch. Grissom would have buzzed her on her cellphone if anything was up, and they couldn't leave without each other, but how long were they to linger? Seeing no harm in it, Catherine agreed to have at least one cup of coffee with the good doctor.
"I must say, Ms. Willows," Dr. Gold said as they sat in the cafeteria across from one another at a small table, "that I'm impressed."
Catherine knitted her brow. "Pray tell with what, Dr. Gold?"
"It's Eli, please. And I don't know. With you, I suppose. Your air, your aura."
"Why?"
Dr. Gold smiled a bit and shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe it's the way you carry yourself. With determination, with purpose. A doctor's swagger, as I like to call it."
"I'm not a doctor. I'm a scientist," Catherine said between sips of coffee. It perked her up a little bit and it was surprisingly good, as hospital provisions go.
"Who says it's not nearly the same thing?"
"Gray's Anatomy."
Dr. Gold paused and then chuckled. "I deserve that. I'm sorry if I'm coming on too strong, Catherine. If I may call you Catherine?"
"Of course." Anything but "angel", please. Though she was honored that Marquita had bestowed such a designation on her, even in a state of pain and delirium, Catherine was never much for pet names.
"Again, I'm sorry. You're a very striking woman."
"Thank you…Eli."
"How long have you been a CSI? I'm fascinated by the forensic field."
"I'm sure we can blame the Discovery Channel for that," Catherine gave a wry smile.
"Oh, no. On the contrary, I don't watch much television. My ex-wife watched all these terrible cop- and hospital-dramas and so many reality shows that it basically ruined the experience for me. I don't even own a television anymore."
"You're divorced?" Catherine asked.
"Yes. Well, not totally. I'm married to my work, as some would say."
"I know the feeling. Any kids?"
"Two," Dr. Gold held up two fingers. "Rachel is nine; Benjamin is six."
"I have a daughter," Catherine said non-chalantly. "Lindsey. She's almost eleven."
"Are you divorced as well?"
"Thankfully," was Catherine's dry response.
"You know, in the Jewish tradition, marriage is what they call a mitzvah, the highest form of blessing," Dr. Gold sighed. "But so is divorce in some cases, eh?"
"Oigo eso," Catherine answered, borrowing a phrase from Ines, whom she now wondered about.
Dr. Gold chuckled again after a beat of silence. "Strange, isn't it, how we get off topic so? What were we talking about?"
Just then, Catherine's cellphone vibrated on her hip, making her jump a little. "Hold that thought, Eli." She flipped open the cell. "Willows."
"Wrap up whatever you're doing. We have to go. Now."
"Grissom? Where did you disappear to? Are you still in the—"
"Meet me in the lobby in five minutes."
"Sure, okay," Catherine said, but Grissom had already hung up on her. She closed her cell and hooked it back onto her jeans. Then she turned to Dr. Gold. "Eli, I'm so sorry but that was my supervisor. I really have to go."
She and Dr. Gold stood at exactly the same time, Dr. Gold perhaps eagerly so.
"I, um…Catherine," he blurted. "I need to know…would you…would you care to go to dinner with me?"
Catherine was knocked for six. "Why?"
Dr. Gold frowned. "Why not?"
She was hoping he'd say that. She sized him up with her eyes and gave a short nod. "Deal. When Marquita Dali regains consciousness, have someone give us at CSI a call and I'll be back. We'll take it from there."
As Catherine walked out of the cafeteria, she could hear Eli Gold call out after her, "Save a place in Heaven for me, angel."