Huge thanks as always to Marlou for beta-ing for me hugs . Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to review, I appreciate every one.

Mary Philips smiled warmly when Brass, Grissom and Nick approached her desk, but the smile soon faded away when she saw the police badge that Brass flashed at her.

"Um…can I help you officer?"

"Detective actually," Brass corrected her with an agitated smile as he pulled a photo of Lurie out of his pocket. "We're investigating a kidnapping of a CSI and it involves this man."

Passing the photo over to her, he noticed her ashen face pale even further. "Oh…"

"Ma'am," Grissom spoke from behind Brass, stepping forward so he could see the woman clearly. "Have you sold a house to this man recently?"

"But he seemed so sincere," she whispered, her shock quickly melting as she looked up again, her eyes flittering between Brass and Grissom. "I sold him a house about a month ago. I only remember him because he made a fuss over the pot-bellied stove."

"Excuse me?" Brass asked.

"Oh, sorry…the stove was black and he specifically wanted it to be red." Her eyes dropped to the picture again and shook her head. "Are you sure he's the man you want? He said he wanted to buy a house as a surprise for his wife."

"Did he mention her name?" Grissom asked quickly. "Please, this could be important."

"Yes he did," she smiled. "He said she would love the butterfly garden out the back of the house. I think he said her name was Sara, I'm almost sure of it."

Nick let out the breath he had been holding and pulled out his cell phone. "Grissom I'm gonna call Warrick, he'll want to know."

Grissom just nodded, but kept his eyes firmly fixed on the middle-aged woman before him. "We're going to need the address."

"Of course," she nodded, standing up quickly and handing the photo back to Brass as she spoke.

Grissom closed his eyes in sudden relief, it had been almost 24 hours since Sara had been abducted, and all he wanted to do was find her and hold her close to him forever.

"We're gonna find her Gil," Brass told him in a knowing whisper.

Grissom glanced at him and nodded solemnly. Ever since the Debbie Marlin case he'd been tormented with her image. The scene always replayed over and over in his mind but the only difference was that instead of Debbie lying there in a pool of blood, it was Sara. Grissom shook his head as he tried to rid himself of the disturbing possibility. He needed to find her and tell her that he'd been wrong before, that he was ready now to take the risk.

Turning abruptly, he left the real estate's office knowing that the old Gil Grissom no longer held him hostage. The lab explosion should have been the one incident that had opened his eyes, but instead it had only served to strengthen the walls around him. Brass watched him leave, worry ever present in his eyes.

"Here we are," Mary said triumphantly as she thrust a paper with the address out towards him. "He seemed to be very much in love with his wife."

"I'm sure he did," Brass sighed as he shook his head solemnly. "Thank you for your help."

"Of course," Mary nodded.

Warrick snatched his cell phone from his pocket and flipped it open. "Yeah."

"We think we know where she is," Nick blurted.

"Nick that's good news," Warrick breathed. "That's great."

"You still at Sara's place?"

"Yeah, Cath's going through the bedroom now. So far there's no evidence that suggests that Sara was being stalked." Warrick looked up when Catherine came out of the bedroom and shook her head.

"Catherine's in Sara's bedroom?" Nick asked, his voice tinged with worry.

"Yeah, look Nick, they've had their differences but you know she wouldn't hurt her on purpose."

"Do I?" Nick huffed.

"Nick?"

"Look bro, I gotta go, Grissom's here. I'll call you as soon as we know anything." The call ended so abruptly that Warrick looked into the receiver as if the rest of the conversation would magically filter through.

"Have they found her?" Catherine asked worriedly as she stepped closer to Warrick.

"That was Nick, he says they've got a lead." Turning away from her, he picked up his kit and walked towards the door.

"Is that all you're gonna tell me?" Catherine asked as she followed him.

"You don't like Sara much do you Cath?"

"What?" she gasped, his question throwing her off balance. "Of course I like her." She regarded his disbelieving gaze for a long moment, then sighed heavily before closing her eyes in defeat. " It's just that she gets to me sometimes that's all. I guess we both get on each other's nerves."

"You could change that if you wanted to," Warrick told her quietly. "She's a good person."

"Wait," Catherine looked up into his eyes incredulously, "I never said she wasn't a good person!"

"You didn't have to," he told her gruffly.

"Look Warrick, I know you cared about her, but…"

"She's not dead!" Warrick growled, anger sparking in his eyes only to die away into sorrow. "Oh Jeez…she can't die."

"I'm sorry Warrick," Catherine soothed, her own eyes filling with tears as she spoke. "I promise when we get her back that I'll try harder okay?"

"If we get her back," he whispered hoarsely.

Catherine dropped her kit to the floor and turned to face him, her hands clasping his face so she could look into his eyes. "We'll get her back. Gil won't let anything happen to her, I know he wouldn't."

"He's already let something happen to her," he whispered sadly as he pulled out of her grasp. "We'd better lock up and get back to the lab."

Catherine nodded silently and retrieved her discarded kit to follow him towards the door. Taking one last look around the apartment, she decided at that moment, that as soon as Sara was home she'd come over and bring a plethora of plants and pictures. Sara's home needed life, and Sara needed to start living.

Stepping out into the hall, she turned to watch Warrick take his own keys from his pocket and lock Sara's door. She looked up at him in amazement, she'd assumed he'd used a lock picker to gain access since she arrived a few minutes after him. "You have her keys?"

"Yeah, and she has mine."

"Something you wanna share?" she asked with a smile as she tried to lighten his mood slightly.

"I also have Nick's key, and Sara has his too. We're good friends Cath, nothing more. Maybe if you got to know her instead of always picking fault you'd be her friend too!" Turning away from her he walked slowly down towards the outside door, leaving her to look upon his retreating form in shock. Shaking her head to rid herself of Sara's image, she started to walk quickly to catch up with him.

Lurie lifted Sara's limp form onto the bed and tried to ignore the tears that obscured his vision. Turning quickly, he rushed into the bathroom and picked up some fresh white bath towels and ran them under some cold water until they were dripping wet. He couldn't rid his mind of bloody images, first from Debbie and now Sara.

Turning back, he wrung the towel lightly to wring out some of the water before going back into the bedroom where his sleeping love still lay unmoving.

Blood from her wounds had now seeped onto the white satin beneath her body and he found himself picking up one of her arms to move it away from the red claret only to have more droplets cover the material.

Placing the wet towel around her wrist, he started to wipe away the blood that covered her arm. Tears fell from his eyes as he repeated his task, his cleansing only lasting for a few seconds before she bled again.

Standing up from the bed he returned to the bathroom, this time going to the small medicine cabinet that hung on the wall above the bath tub next to the sink. Yanking open the door he spotted some new bandages that were still in their paper wrappings and pulled them out, then returned to the bedroom.

Sara's body still lay unmoving and for a moment he was frozen in awe with her beauty. She resembled an angel as she lay motionless, her skin paling against the red of her blood. So much blood…the smell, the colour, the texture, all things assaulted his mind in one painful barrage and he almost dropped the bandages to the floor.

Sara needed the doctor in him right now, and he loved her enough to help her come to terms with this new life he had built for the both of them. Taking a slow step towards the bed, he sat down softly and lifted one of her arms to his lap.

Her blood seeped onto his pants and through to his skin, but he ignored the sticky warmth it provided. Instead he pulled the wrapper off of the bandage and threw it to the floor, then started to wrap it tightly around her wounds in a desperate bid to stop the bleeding, but still the redness began to creep through the bandage.

Standing quickly, Lurie walked around to the other side of the bed and began to repeat the process with the other arm which was also swimming in red, but the tighter he wrapped the stark white bandage, the more blood seeped through.

"You bitch," he growled angrily as he threw Sara's arm from his lap in frustration. "All you had to do was love me!"

Still she did not move and his anger faded away within seconds. He took a slow step away from her to try and process the situation. He knew she needed to go to the hospital, but he still wanted to keep her for himself and was unwilling to take the chance of someone else taking her from him. He watched silently as blood started to creep further up the white bandages but instead of helping her, he backed away and turned to exit the room.

Brass drove like a mad man along the winding road that led to the house that stood alone in the clearing a mile or so ahead of them. Behind him, Grissom and Nick followed, only to be accompanied by three more police cars, their sirens blazing. Dust from the road billowed around the vehicles, puffing up into the air like a whirlwind as they made their way towards their target.

"Is that the house?" Nick asked quickly as his voice road into near hysteria. "I see it, Gris I see it."

Grissom nodded silently, his attention kept firmly on Brass' car in front of them. His heart beat thundered in his ears and his stomach churned in nervousness. His silent vigil for Sara kept him focussed and unable to function on anything else, he just hoped that this was the right place and she was here.

Nick fought his own raging battle. They were speeding towards the nearing house yet still they seemed to be taking forever to get there. He wanted so much to be able to comfort her and keep her safe from everything that could have possibly hurt her but he also knew that Grissom was the only man who could help her to heal.

Taking a deep breath, Nick sat up straighter in his seat and turned his head towards his mentor. "She's there, I can feel it."

Grissom knew what Nick's words had meant, and he wanted so much to believe him, but he couldn't speak for fear of breaking. His emotions were riding high at the moment and he knew that if he tried to convey in words what he was feeling then he wouldn't make it through the next minute, let alone a lifetime. Instead he nodded silently and continued to follow Brass as they came up the driveway that led to the house.

Brass sped faster, his own instincts spurring him forward as well as the affection he held for the young woman who had somehow captured something inside him. If anything had happened to her he vowed that he would make Lurie's life a living hell for as long as he possibly could.

Something about Sara Sidle had lured him closer to her over the last year, something that made him look inside himself. He knew she had so much she was struggling with right now and the fact that she confided in him from time to time only made him grow fonder of her. Over the last nightmarish hours since she had disappeared he'd done something that he hadn't done in a very long time; he prayed to whoever was listening to keep her safe.

The house seemed to come upon him suddenly from nowhere and he almost instantly felt the invigorating energy charge through his body. Turning the car along the bends of the driveway he finally reached the front of the house and screeched to a halt. Grissom followed a second later and the police cars only seconds after that.

With lightning speed, Brass was out of his car and approaching the front door before Grissom could even step out of his Denali. Drawing his gun, he took a step closer and raised his weapon steadily as the front door swung open.

"Get down on the ground, hands behind your back…NOW," he yelled when Lurie stepped out in a daze.

Lurie held his hands into the air and sank to his knees as he broke into tears. "I didn't mean to hurt her," he sobbed. "Believe me, I wanted to love her."

His words filled Grissom with aching dread as he numbly moved forward. "Where is she?"

Brass motioned to the six other officers that also had their weapons drawn. "Cuff him, and read him his rights. Brooks, Sharpe, you're with me."

"We need to get in there," Nick hissed angrily when Brass blocked his entrance.

"There could be others inside," Brass told him firmly, his own worry pouring through his words as he spoke. "Are you armed?"

Nick nodded silently and pulled out his gun and watched numbly when Grissom did the same. Both followed blindly as Brass and the other two officers entered the house ahead of them.

"LVPD," he yelled. "I'm armed."

His voice was met with silence but he still moved cautiously forward. Turning back to Brooks he motioned for him and his partner to clear the downstairs and nodded silently for Nick and Grissom to follow him up the staircase.

They moved up slowly, one step at a time until; they reached the top. Brass felt his stomach roll with nausea when he saw a trail of bloody footprints coming from one of the bedrooms. He heard the curses behind him and knew that both Nick and Grissom had seen the red stains too. Reaching the door, he nudged it open slowly with his gun and took a slow step inside while indicating his two companions to stay behind him.

The first thing to hit him was the coppery smell that drifted through the air, a smell he knew all too well. Closing his eyes tightly he tried to gather the courage to take another step inside, unwilling even now to believe that anything bad could have happened to the woman they all loved.

Opening his eyes again he saw her and froze. The breath seemed to wheeze from within him and he felt his legs turn to jelly, unable to move in any direction. Nothing had prepared him for this, not even the countless crime scenes he had seen. This was different; this was Sara.

Brass' audible gasp caused both Grissom and Nick to step up close to him and follow his gaze, then all hell broke lose. Nick was the first to react when he saw her, disregarding every part of his training as he pushed past both Brass and Grissom.

He stepped into the room in a daze, his eyes suddenly glazing over with emotion as he approached her. His voice caught in his throat and a soft whimper escaped as he sank down onto the floor beside the bed. "Sara…" his voice pleaded painfully as he sobbed her name.

Grissom moved slowly into the room, his eyes staring over Sara's ashen face and he couldn't remember when he had felt so much pain rip through him. "Oh God," he managed to gasp before grief welled up in his eyes. His whole body threatened to close him down and the inner pain pierced his soul. His Sara, his beautiful Sara was lying on a bed now reddened with her blood, unmoving, and he wanted to scream, yell, anything to make this vision go away. His eyes clouded over with emotion. Taking a step closer, he reached out a trembling hand to touch her but withdrew it again, knowing that one touch would be his undoing and he needed to be strong.

"She's bleeding…Grissom…oh God…" Nick's voice wailed through the silence as he reached over to one of her bloodied arms and pressed down over the bandage to try and stop the blood from seeping through.

The crackle of Brass' radio intruded into the room and he could hear the anguish in Jim's voice as he numbly gave their location, and that they needed a medical team urgently, his voice shaking through tears as he spoke.

A silent sob escaped Grissom's throat as the image of Sara and the image of Debbie cascaded and overlapped in his mind. He couldn't seem to move from her side and everything he knew he should be doing didn't mean anything right now. His eyes drifted down to her other arm and for the first time seemed to see the deepening red patch on her wrist and blindly reached down towards her, pressing his hand over her wounds.

Nick lifted up on his knees and reached across Sara's body to feel for a pulse. His heart thudded inside his chest as he felt a weak pulse drumming beneath his fingers. "Oh thank God," he gasped, unable to keep the pooling tears from escaping. "Sara…we're here, you can wake up now sugar…" His voice broke and he sniffed back against the next onslaught of emotion and begged silently for her to open her eyes.

Grissom watched the scene before him with a mixture of relief and despair. He wanted to be the one to hold her and bring her back from wherever she was, but he just couldn't move and he cursed himself for not being strong enough for her. His whole body betrayed him and he could feel the anguish burning inside his chest and he could feel his knees threatening to buckle, but he pushed everything to the back of his mind, closing off the pain from his senses. Sara needed his strength not his sorrow, even though he could feel himself slipping further and further down into misery.

Nick raised his eyes from Sara's still form and for the first time seemed to notice that Grissom was in the room. He could see the anguish quite plainly on the older man's face and his eyes seemed uncharacteristically tearful. Blinking back his own tears he stood up and gazed down at the woman on the bed one more time before looking back towards Grissom again, silently begging him to make this right, but even he knew Grissom held no power over space and time.

"The ambulance is on its way Nick, she's going to be okay." Grissom told him quietly, more to convince himself than anyone else. His own voice was already betraying just how lost he was feeling right now. He needed to be doing something to help her, but instead all he could do was freeze.

Grissom's words seemed to open the floodgates to Nick's emotions, causing his crumbling resolve to come crashing down around him. His body trembled painfully as he pulled himself further up towards the bed only to reach for her. Leaning over Sara's limp form he pulled his body closer to her, resting his head on hers as he tried to heal her with his touch.

"Nick…" Grissom started, his own trembling voice cracking as he tried to remain in control of his emotions. He knew that Nick and Sara shared a special bond and that Nick's turmoil was churned up in sorrowful affection that ached through all of them. Grissom felt it too, cutting through into his soul to leave him breathless. The emotional ties that joined him to Sara went far deeper than anyone could ever imagine, and even though he wanted to scream out his pain and reach for her he couldn't even for a second show just how weak he was right now.

"Where the hell is that ambulance," Jim Brass whispered hoarsely. "I told them to get here right away…" Swiping angrily at his eyes he turned and walked out into the hall, unable to hide his own tears any longer.

Brass' words faded into the air and everything in the room seemed to disappear into a mournful haze and all that was left was Sara. Her smile flashed into Grissom's mind, bringing a painful wave along with it only to cause more tears to gather in his eyes.

"Nick," Grissom whispered, his own voice cracking with emotion as he spoke. "We need to process the scene, we have to…"

"Process…" Nick hissed suddenly, raising his tear filled eyes to glare at his supervisor. "She's lying here bleeding to death and you want me to work? What the hell is wrong with you? This is Sara!"

"I know that," Grissom retorted angrily, his voice cracking through a sob as he fought to keep his emotions in check. "Don't you think I can see her? God Nick…" Stopping abruptly, Grissom turned his head away from the scene before him and squeezed his eyes tightly closed against the fast approaching tears that threatened to possess him, a fist tightly held against his lips to stop the words desperate to break free. He couldn't break down, not here, not in front of them.

A sudden gurgling gasp from Sara's lips brought him to his senses and he whirled around to look down into her face quickly, wondering if the sound was his own imagination, but when he saw the shock registering on Nick's face he realized that he'd heard her. Moving quickly, he knelt down beside her on the bed so that he could look down into her face.

"Sara," he whispered softly, letting go of her arm as he leant in close, holding either side of her face in his hands. "Honey, open your eyes for me."

"Grisss…" she slurred as she tried to force her eyes open.

"I'm here," he whispered hoarsely, his voice catching as he sniffed back the emotion in his eyes.

"Caaame…?" she mumbled softly even as she fought the velvety pull of unconsciousness trying to pull her back down into its depths.

"We did," Nick answered when Grissom was having trouble forming a sentence. Kneeling down on the bed with one knee, Nick reached his free hand down to hers to squeeze it gently. "Do you believe me now?"

Sara's eyes closed again and she slipped back down into darkness, his unanswered question hanging in the air.

The sudden shrill of sirens filled the air and Grissom felt his body shaking with relief. Everything would be fine from now on and he made a silent vow to himself that he would start living. Lifting himself off of the bed, he reached out for her other hand and held it. Between himself and Nick, he knew they would heal her.

The room soon became awash with people that clattered with thudding movements. "Sir step away now, we'll take it from here," a paramedic commanded as he gently pushed Grissom out of the way.

Grissom dropped her hand and watched silently as Nick did the same and moved away to let the other paramedic in to tend to her. "Her name's Sara," Grissom told them urgently. "She was conscious for a few seconds."

"Was she responsive?"

"Yeah, she said my name," Grissom whispered in acknowledgement, unable to tear his eyes from her ashen face. He saw her head fall backwards as the paramedics checked her vital signs and suddenly felt the overwhelming urge to protect her. "Be careful with her."

"She's lost a lot of blood," the paramedic stated, even though his statement was obvious to everyone in the room. Motioning for his partner, both medics carefully lifted her onto the stretcher. Once she was secure, one medic strapped an oxygen mask over her face while the other placed an IV in her arm.

"I'll follow you to the hospital," Grissom told them quickly, following them out of the room before they took her from him again.

Brass watched on helplessly. He needed to do something, anything to ease the pain if only for a little while. "Gil, you still need to process," he said quickly, his voice no louder than a whisper.

Grissom looked back at him and stared silently. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew that Brass was right but he'd already wasted too much precious time. Turning to Nick he barked an order before following the paramedics out of the room. "Call Catherine and Warrick."

Nick nodded silently as he took one last look around the room, the blood spatter causing his stomach to lurch. He needed to get out of this room and the images it still held within it. Shoving his hand in his pocket he pulled out his cell phone. He nodded to Brass who came to stand silently beside him.

"You think Grissom's gonna be okay?" Nick asked worriedly, his voice still shaking.

Brass sighed heavily as he looked around the room. "I can't remember a time when I've ever seen him so…"

"Emotional?" Nick asked softly.

"Yeah. I saw what the Marlin case did to him, but Sara will be fine, she has to be."

Nick swallowed against the lump that was forming in his throat. "I need to go to the hospital, you think you could call Warrick?"

"Go," Brass nodded solemnly. "And you give that girl a big hug from me okay?"

"Count on it," Nick nodded, ignoring the fact that his eyes still bore the telltale signs of his sadness.

TBC