In the Night
Romance: Sara/Grissom
Spoilers: everything through the end of Season 4
Chapter 1Gil Grissom gently wrapped his hand around Sara's and gave a squeeze. For less than a moment, he wasn't sure what to do, and then he realized that there had never been any question.
He'd received the call almost half an hour ago, telling him that Sara had been pulled over for an illegal right turn and had been checked for DUI due to the smell of alcohol on her breath. While she had blown slightly over the limit, departmental courtesy had earned her a call to her supervisor rather than a night in jail followed by a trip to court. As her supervisor, it was his job to do something about the situation.
And that was why it had taken half an hour for him to make it to the Station half way across the city of Las Vegas.
His first instinct had been panic; had she been okay. The last thing that anyone wanted to hear was the introduction of a Police Chief followed by the question of whether or not someone worked for him. Gil had seen too many of those calls made, although he'd not been forced to make them himself. He knew what he must have looked like. He had been with more than one officer when a door was knocked on in the middle of the night and a groggy parent answered to find a uniformed officer there. It was never good news; usually the crying started before the officer spoke a word.
Now Gil knew why. Panic. Ironically, it occurred to him that he never had admitted that he was her supervisor, at least not directly. At least, not on the phone. He had been more together after a mind-clearing drive around the outskirts of the city, which had been the fastest route to her given the traffic that crowded city streets even at night in the busy city.
Even after four years, Gil had no clue what to do with a leadership position. He wasn't good with people; never had been. He didn't know if he should go in and bawl her out, or yank her out to his Tahoe before he started yelling. He knew that the yelling had to happen at some point. Sara was to damned good to risk her career over a couple of drinks. No, he hadn't recommended her for promotion, but it had been that Nick was more qualified than she – not that she hadn't been qualified in her own right. There was a fine distinction. It wasn't always easy to make the supervisor's decisions; it wasn't easy to make one when the Officer had called.
And then he had seen her. Gil hadn't seen Sara looking so small and lost since more than a year before, when she'd been blown into a glass wall by an explosion. Then, he'd been worried for her health; she'd looked like she'd been in shock, aside from having a nasty cut on her hand. Then, he'd had the paramedics take her away. This time he didn't have that escape. She was all his, and he just hoped that he didn't screw up too badly.
Sitting down beside her, Gil had realized that there had never been a choice after all. He had taken her hand in his, and he knew that he would have to be a friend first, and a supervisor in the morning. She had the same look of fear and shock that she'd carried after the explosion, only it was overlaid with guilt as well.
"C'mon," he said gently. "I'll take you home."
She hadn't argued. That alone had worried him. Sara Sidle would argue with the devil about the heat in hell given ample opportunity. She didn't argue now though, nor offer explanations. She simply let him hold her hand, picked up her purse, and stood up to follow him. He kept his hand on hers as they passed through the corridors of the Police Station; he told himself it was to be sure she remained upright. Then he wondered why he even bothered lying to himself.
Once he had her in the Tahoe, seatbelt firmly secured and himself sitting beside her, he decided that the talk would have to wait. She hadn't said a word since he'd arrived, either in thanks or in self-defense. She wasn't ready to have any type of conversation. The Sara he knew was rarely, if ever, silent.
He took the same circular path back around the city that he'd used to get to the Station, and for the same reason. Half-way through the drive – perhaps fifteen minutes after he'd picked her up – she spoke for the first time.
"Pull over," she said urgently.
He snapped his head over to look at her, but gleaned little information from her profile beyond a stressed look.
"Why?"
"Because if you don't I'm going to puke all over your car," she ground out. It was then that he realized the careful posture, the trained breathing in through her nose and out through her teeth that they often used to steady themselves after a particularly gory experience.
He pulled over, turned off the vehicle, and set the parking brake.
No sooner had he stopped the vehicle than she was struggling with the door. He reached across her with his left arm to shove the door open and release her seatbelt for her, and then he kept that arm around her so that she didn't fall from the vehicle. He used his right hand to pull her hair back from her face while she emptied her stomach onto the hard-packed Nevada earth.
It took more than a few minutes for the vomiting to subside, and even when it did he kept his arm around her for support. He did release her hair though, and thankful for the bucket seats he reached between them to reach for the kit he always carried with him. He tugged it towards him, and then reached for the gym bag next to it. This was a secondary "kit" of sorts that he'd learned to carry with him as well. It contained a change of clothes, to include socks and shoes, a few energy bars, and the box he sought. He grabbed it, popped the blue lid with the touch of a button, and pulled out an unscented baby-wipe. Perhaps it wasn't standard police issue, but it was damned handy for cleaning up after a messy crime scene.
He wiped her face, making sure he got the majority of the mess off her, before grabbing a second wipe to run over her neck beneath her hair where a cold sweat had collected. He left that wipe in place, hoping it was cool enough to do some good, and fumbled for the gym bag again. After more than a little digging, he found the bottle of water that he'd been seeking, and after making sure that she was now leaning against her seat rather than out the door, he released her long enough to open it and hand it to her.
"Rinse," he told her simply. "I have some sports drink for when you feel up to drinking. You'll need the electrolytes."
She didn't bother to nod, but simply followed his directions compliantly, taking a sip, swishing it around, and leaning over to spit it onto the ground outside the Tahoe.
"Better?" he asked as she handed the bottle back to him.
She nodded, but she didn't speak. Her eyes were closed and her breathing steady once more.
"Are you ready to start moving again?" he asked.
Again, she nodded, but didn't move. He reached over her again, having to lean against her heavily to reach the handle of the door, and pulled it closed. He locked the door out of habit rather than safety. Then he reached for her seat belt and tugged it loosely around her, snapping it into place but leaving about an inch of give between the material and her lap. He'd been sick before – although he doubted any of his CSI's would believe him that human – and he knew that pressure against her abdomen was the last thing she needed.
This time when he turned the ignition, he also flipped on the vents to full, making sure that the fan sent a generous portion of cool air in Sara's direction. He couldn't believe he'd forgotten how easily an intoxicated person could become ill; Heaven knew he'd been the designated pickup driver on enough occasions that it should have been habit. But it had been a lot of years since college, and a man couldn't remember everything.
The rest of the drive seemed to be going uneventfully, right up until he took his exit off the highway.
"Where are we going?" she asked groggily. Apparently, Sara wasn't asleep after all.
"Townhouse," was his brief reply. He could have given reasons: it was closer; he was more familiar with the route; it was late. He didn't bother to quantify his decisions with an explanation of any kind. It was too hard to explain it to himself.
"Why?"
Tenacious; but then, that had always been one of his favorite things about her. "Because it's almost sunlight, and I'm tired. And because I don't want you sleeping alone. How many DBs have we processed because of asphyxia due to inebriation? I'll run you home before shift this evening."
"So, you're not afraid I'll pin a sexual harassment suit on you for dragging me to your home against my will?"
She didn't sound particularly amused, nor challenging. She asked it as a simple question, unemotional, much as she would at a crime scene.
"Not particularly," he admitted. Their relationship had been going through some bumps, but he thought the foundation was still solid. He certainly hoped it was, because he was going to have enough of a battle in the moments to come without having to treat her as a suspect. It was irrelevant that in a way – for the moment – she was.
She was silent again until they pulled into the driveway before the townhouse. It was as neat and tidy as his few home-bound hours could make it, but he could see that to an observant eye the weeds were getting a little out of hand and the flowers could use a little more water. He made a mental note to try to remember that, but was fairly certain it would get lost in the multitude of priorities that he held before gardening. Truthfully, he'd always been more interested in the insect life attracted by the greenery than the plants themselves. He parked the SUV, then walked around to open Sara's door and help her out. She wasn't wobbly, but then he wouldn't expect her to be. Given the rate at which alcohol degraded in the bloodstream, she was probably at half the legal limit by now. If only she had waited to drive home until now, the entire situation wouldn't be taking place.
He didn't touch her as he escorted her to his front door, but he did stay close when she walked up the few steps towards the door. He unlocked it, and wondered at her capitulation as she walked quietly into the main room. There, she just stood with her arms wrapped around herself as though holding herself together. He assumed that in a way she was. In addition, things were about to get worse.
"Would you like the couch or bed?" he asked. When her head snapped up at that, he clarified. "I don't mind either, so the choice is yours. The couch sleeps okay, but it'll take me a few minutes to get sheets and blankets together. The bed is ready, but the sheets there haven't been washed this week, and I don't have a spare set in that size."
He waited, then. Then next move was hers.
"Couch," she finally said, and he nodded his understanding. He gestured her towards the black leather furniture before leaving the room to grab the set of sheets he used when his mother came to visit. He usually took the couch then, so that his mom could have some privacy when he came and went during odd hours of the day or night. It wasn't as though the noise of his moving around would bother her, but she was extremely sensitive to light, and he respected that.
Once he had the sheets and a blanket under one arm, he took a deep breath and walked up to his own bedroom to grab his spare work kit. He kept it fully stocked, just in case he happened to be home during a midnight call prior to restocking the one he kept in the Tahoe. He hesitated for only a moment before grabbing the hard plastic handle and lifting the heavy weight of the silver, metal box. Sara wasn't going to like this. He didn't like it much either.
He returned to the main room to find her much in the same position he'd left her in. She was sitting as she had in the Police Station, with her hands between her knees and her head down, staring at nothing and looking like a lost child. He knew that she was waiting for the ball to drop, and he hated to do it to her.
"My mother always told me that I should never drink and drive," he told her almost conversationally. "And we had this rule: if I was ever out and had drank too much, or was with someone who had, I could call her and she'd come get me. No embarrassing questions, no yelling, and no long-term consequences. I wish I could promise you the same, but you aren't the one who called me."
"I know. I'm sorry."
"If you weren't safe to drive, you could have picked up a phone…"
"And said what?" she asked as she put her head in her hands. "I just got finished celebrating with Nick because he was recommended for the promotion he didn't want, but I did? That I didn't want to go home alone to a silent house with no food in it, so it was easier to hit a bar on the way and eat there rather than by myself at a table in the middle of a restaurant where I felt like everyone was looking at me? That I just wanted to forget for a while, so I had a couple of beers, and then a couple more?"
"Any or all of those would have been sufficient," he said as he laid the linens on the counter and placed his kit at her feet.
"I guess my judgment was off," she admitted. "It's been a hell of a year."
"Yes, it has," he agreed as he reached sideways to open the kit to reveal his evidence collection supplies. Moving some of the more common items to the side, he reached for the sterile needle, Vacutainer syringe, and three blood collection tubes with various colored rubber seals."
"What are you doing?" she asked, her voice finally losing its apathy and moving towards suspicion.
"Full tox screen, CBCs, and LFTs," he answered simply. "Right arm or left."
She simply looked at him. For once, she wasn't cooperative.
"Sara, I have two choices. The police department may not have booked you, but the call to me is on record. If I don't provide some action we could both lose our jobs. Standard procedure after a DUI is a tox screen, to be sure there's nothing else in you that might impair reflexes or judgment. The CBC is because I'm worried about you; you're too pale, and lately you've lost weight. I don't know if the reason is emotional or physical, but while I have the needle in place is a good time to find out."
"And the LFTs?" She knew very well what the Liver Function Tests would show.
"This may have been a one-shot event, Sara, and I really hope it was. But saying that I trust you won't prove anything in court. If any of this gets back to the station, they'll want hard evidence. I want it on record if this is just a fluke."
"And if it's not?" she asked.
"Then I need to know," he admitted. "Because you wouldn't be the first person to let this job push them into a bottle, and you're too good for that."
Sara took a deep breath and looked down at him, but he found that he couldn't meet her eyes. By demanding these tests, he was essentially telling her that he didn't trust her, on any counts, and while that was true to a certain extent – he just didn't know her lately – it was a long way from how he felt. He wanted the tests to protect her. He wanted the evidence to exonerate her from any doubts.
"Do what you have to," she muttered, extending her right arm to him.
Gil paused only a moment before applying a tourniquet and checking for a vein. Gratefully, he swabbed a nice, large vein with alcohol and inserted the syringe. By the time he had drawn the three tubes of blood, Sara had reached into his kit herself for a pad of gauze. He released the tourniquet, took the gauze to put pressure on the insertion point, and then removed the needle quickly. He didn't draw blood often, but it was something he was relatively good at. With any luck at all, she wouldn't even bruise. He labeled the tubes, slipped them into a bag, and tucked them into his kit. He would take them by the lab when he went in to work. It wasn't likely that Sara would have to endure an inquiry over this incident, but he'd learned to be cautious. He was protecting her as much as he was trying to confirm her honesty.
Sara had kept pressure on the gauze pad while he finished with his tasks, and had also withdrawn subtly. "I'm sorry," he told her.
"It's better than jail," she said quietly, but she didn't meet his eyes.
Gil closed his kit and returned it to its place, then went back to the cupboard in the hall to grab her a pillow. "Are you sure you don't want the bed?" he asked. "It really wouldn't bother me."
Sara got the oddest expression on her face as her head popped up and her eyes met his for just a moment, but she didn't speak. Instead, she shook her head and took the pillow. Then she turned and began making up her bed for the night, leaving him feeling shut out and – oddly – isolated. It seemed strange to him to feel like a stranger in his own home, so he told her good night, and then went to bed.