Chapter 14
[Spoilers: Playing with Fire & In the Box]
Sara sat down on the large bed and pulled the top spread onto her lap as she watched Grissom pulled the blinds halfway to block out any sun shining on the bed.
"I want you to get some sleep Sara." He said on a sigh as he round the bed and turned on the bedside lamp.
"I'm not tired." She protested, pulling at the spread.
Grissom turned to her slowly and looked at her hands clutching the cover to her body. He moved down the side of the bed and stood in front of her. "Maybe, maybe not, but you must have caught a cold or something last night." He grasped the corners of the spread and gently wrapped it around her shoulders.
"Why didn't you come back?"
She shrugged and shifted back to lay down on the middle of the bed.
Reaching for her feet, he removed her shoes for her when she struggled to kick them off. "I want you to try and sleep while I call down for something to help fight this cold." He stopped talking and stared at her for a moment.
So many thoughts swirled around his head as he approached her. -Does she really only want me?- He asked himself as he sat on the edge of the bed and watched Sara drift off to sleep.
~*^**^*~
"Staff meeting, break room, 5 minutes." came the unmistakeable voice of a certain blonde CSI.
"Huh?" Warrick and Nick shared confused glances as they left the layout room. "I think all this power is going to her head."
They chose their seats by the door so that they could make a quick escape if need be, and exactly 5 minutes later the rest of the group came through the door, looking as confused as them.
"So Cath, what is this about?" Nick enquired.
"My plan is ready, granted it's not very original and I doubt they'll fall for it, but it's the only thing I could think of that didn't end in a lawsuit."
"Enlighten us." Warrick said, his usual cheery demeanour ever present.
"Okay, here goes." Catherine started, "I ask Gil to get something for me from the locker room, because I can't reach, my locker is at the back of the room and doesn't have a clear view of the door so he shouldn't notice when Sara comes in."
"How exactly are we getting Sara there?" Brass asked, once a cop always a cop, he always had to know the details.
"That's Greg's job." she stated, seeing Greg's jaw hit the floor.
"Hey I agreed to help not give Sara cause to hate me for the rest of my life." he complained.
"Anyway," Catherine carried on, "Greg, you tell Sara that you lost or left something in the locker room and you need help finding it, okay, you got that. I don't need any screw ups or this won't work."
Greg's face rose from the floor at this, but still stayed in a frown as did Nick's, who didn't appreciate the way that Catherine was making Greg look incapable of doing the simplest thing, he didn't like people giving him a hard time.
"Yes, I got it, but I still don't see why Nick or Warrick can't do it."
"I need them for something else." she explained, "so at this point me and Gil are at my locker, Greg and Sara are at his, everything is perfectly normal, but then coincidentally Greg and I are both paged at the exact same time, that's where you come in." she said glancing at Warrick and Nick, who were still sitting cautiously by the door.
"You know they'll figure it out straight away don't you?" Nick said.
"Yeah, but there's nothing they can do about it, as Greg and I will lock the door when we leave, so they have no choice but to talk to each other."
"I like it," Brass smirked. "Very devious. What do you want me to do?"
"You're on guard duty. Knowing those two the first they'll do is try and get out, and they'll have their cell phones so they'll be calling people to help them. I need you to stop anyone going in or out, is that okay?"
"Sure, getting paid to stand around sounds like fun."
"So what happens if they do call us, do we act like we don't know or pretend we're trying to help?" Warrick asked.
"Whatever comes to mind at the time. Okay, so everyone knows their jobs, we just need to hope it works when they get back, oh and Greg," she added a little quieter as they were leaving the room, "please try not to screw this up."
Greg didn't reply, but Nick could see that he was upset and decided to take this up with Catherine. He followed her to Grissom's office, somewhere she would not be happy to leave when Grissom got back.
"Catherine, what was that about?" he called from the door.
"What was what about?" she asked, sounding honestly confused.
"All those digs you made at Greg, making him sound like a screw up." Nick said trying his best to defend his spiky haired friend.
"Well, you know what he's like, he's always messing around." Catherine answered as though she thought that justified it.
"That doesn't mean he's incapable. Just give him a break, nobody's perfect, not even you."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Two words Catherine, explosion... lab, not necessarily in that order." Nick regretted saying this, he didn't want to cause trouble, but he just couldn't help it.
"Hey, that was an ...."
"Accident." Nick finished her sentence, "My point exactly. Greg's coping pretty well considering that wasn't that long ago, maybe you could just give him a break and maybe an apology."
Catherine sat down at the desk and for the first time realised that Nick was right and felt ashamed.
"Hey Nick." she called just as he was leaving. "Thanks. You're right, I'll go and see him as soon as I can. If you ever catch me acting like that again, you'll tell me right?"
"You bet I will." he laughed, "Don't worry about it Cath, we all get a little bossy sometimes. I guess actually being the boss doesn't help." he said, offering a smile.
"I never realised how hard Grissom's job was until now. No wonder he can never get around to talking to Sara. Once you've done half of this paperwork, an entire year has gone."
"Well, it's a good job we're helping them then, but for all our sakes I hope it works, because I don't want to have to confront them if it doesn't. Anyway, I got to get back to work and so do you," he added glancing at the desk.
"Yeah, see you later." Catherine called as she looked up, but he was already gone. "Huh, now I know why Sara always does that, very dramatic exit." she laughed to herself as she prepared herself for a very long night.
~*^**^*~
Grissom closed the case file and stretched his back as he stood. He had been sitting for about two hours, going over what evidence they had. -Well, nothing physical, but it still seemed stupid being here in the first place- He grumbled to himself.
A knock at the door broke through his thoughts.
Checking that Sara was still sleeping as he past the sliding doors, he pulled one side closed before walking towards the door.
"Hello Jim." Grissom greeted, pulling the door open wider to let the detective passage into the room.
Brass offered his friend a grin and continued walking further into the room. "So, how did the shrink lesson go?"
"First off," Grissom started as he pulled the other sliding door closed. "Keep your voice down, Sara's not well."
"Oh? Why's that?" Brass smirked.
Rolling his eyes, Grissom rang room service for some coffee.
Brass looked around the place and had to smile. What could clearly be seen on the back of the couch was a silk navy blue nighty and on the armchair by the window, was a long beautiful dress that Sara must have worn to the party the night before.
"There's not much here Jim." Grissom broke the detective from his snooping. -What's he looking at?-
"Huh?" Brass asked as he sat down on the couch.
Sighing, Grissom leaned down and flipped the file he had been reading earlier, open for his friend to see. "You bring us here to follow a suspect. We follow the suspect and get nothing." Pausing, he removed his glasses and dropped them to the table. "I think you got the wrong guy."
"Really?" Brass nodded. "How so, cuz, Sheridan and his team are certain this is their guy."
"Because he's got nothing to hide. Both Sara and I haven't seen him acting suspicious, plus," Grissom continued. "He's a nice guy."
"Nice guys can commit kidnap and murder Gil."
-God!- "Fine, it's a gut feeling that this isn't the right suspect. He's never seen alone, yes, but we haven't heard any couples being reported missing since we got here."
Brass shrugged. "Maybe we've got him where we want him and he's waiting for the right couple."
Grissom huffed out an angry breath. "Maybe we've got him and me and Sara are the couple he's after. Stop it Jim. I'm tired and I'm sick of doing the FBI's dirty work."
"Ok. How about I get Sheridan to place some of his people in the room down the hall." Brass suggested. "To give you two some time off."
Thinking about this for a few minutes, Grissom stood in the middle of the living area with one hand in his pocket and the other scratching at his beard in thought. "You mean, another couple?"
Brass nodded.
"Why don't we let them continue where we left off and we can go home?" Grissom asked, hopeful that this would be over soon.
"We could, but how would you explain your sudden leaving? You're here for your two weeks honeymoon, not just a holiday Gil. What about the suspect and his questions? And that other couple-"
"Sean and Allison." Grissom supplied when Brass tried to remember their names.
"Right. You just going to up and leave and maybe the suspect gets them."
Grissom's head snapped up. "You blackmailing us?" He asked gravely.
Brass grinned. "No. Just think about it. If the suspect is here and you don't think Jenkins is him, what's stopping the real murderer from grabbing another couple, say Sean and Allison?"
"That's not fair Jim." Grissom sighed and rubbed his tired face.
"I know and I'm sorry, but I do know that if you and Sara leave now, this operation is a disaster."
"We haven't made any progress." Grissom argued. "We have nothing."
"Perhaps, perhaps not. Sheridan thinks you are doing a great job. You got a profile put together quicker in a week than his team could in months since this began." Brass stopped and leaned forward to pull out some photos of the couples that were staying in the hotel.
"There are only three couples on their honeymoon and that includes me and Sara." Grissom explained as he moved to sit down on the couch and pull on his glasses.
"So, this is Allison and Sean, right?" Brass pointed to one photo. He recognised them from a few days ago.
"Yeah." Grissom fished out the second photo and sighed. "They are the Gardners. We haven't met them, but Allison and Sean have. They were talking about them being very in love and barely seen leaving their room."
Brass chuckled. "Ah, love birds." He nodded and sat back to take another look around the place. "I'll get some people watching their room, get someone in the next room to keep an eye on them and the other couple too. You take the night and morning off and we'll do the rest."
"Thanks Jim."
~*^*TBC*^*~
[Spoilers: Playing with Fire & In the Box]
Sara sat down on the large bed and pulled the top spread onto her lap as she watched Grissom pulled the blinds halfway to block out any sun shining on the bed.
"I want you to get some sleep Sara." He said on a sigh as he round the bed and turned on the bedside lamp.
"I'm not tired." She protested, pulling at the spread.
Grissom turned to her slowly and looked at her hands clutching the cover to her body. He moved down the side of the bed and stood in front of her. "Maybe, maybe not, but you must have caught a cold or something last night." He grasped the corners of the spread and gently wrapped it around her shoulders.
"Why didn't you come back?"
She shrugged and shifted back to lay down on the middle of the bed.
Reaching for her feet, he removed her shoes for her when she struggled to kick them off. "I want you to try and sleep while I call down for something to help fight this cold." He stopped talking and stared at her for a moment.
So many thoughts swirled around his head as he approached her. -Does she really only want me?- He asked himself as he sat on the edge of the bed and watched Sara drift off to sleep.
~*^**^*~
"Staff meeting, break room, 5 minutes." came the unmistakeable voice of a certain blonde CSI.
"Huh?" Warrick and Nick shared confused glances as they left the layout room. "I think all this power is going to her head."
They chose their seats by the door so that they could make a quick escape if need be, and exactly 5 minutes later the rest of the group came through the door, looking as confused as them.
"So Cath, what is this about?" Nick enquired.
"My plan is ready, granted it's not very original and I doubt they'll fall for it, but it's the only thing I could think of that didn't end in a lawsuit."
"Enlighten us." Warrick said, his usual cheery demeanour ever present.
"Okay, here goes." Catherine started, "I ask Gil to get something for me from the locker room, because I can't reach, my locker is at the back of the room and doesn't have a clear view of the door so he shouldn't notice when Sara comes in."
"How exactly are we getting Sara there?" Brass asked, once a cop always a cop, he always had to know the details.
"That's Greg's job." she stated, seeing Greg's jaw hit the floor.
"Hey I agreed to help not give Sara cause to hate me for the rest of my life." he complained.
"Anyway," Catherine carried on, "Greg, you tell Sara that you lost or left something in the locker room and you need help finding it, okay, you got that. I don't need any screw ups or this won't work."
Greg's face rose from the floor at this, but still stayed in a frown as did Nick's, who didn't appreciate the way that Catherine was making Greg look incapable of doing the simplest thing, he didn't like people giving him a hard time.
"Yes, I got it, but I still don't see why Nick or Warrick can't do it."
"I need them for something else." she explained, "so at this point me and Gil are at my locker, Greg and Sara are at his, everything is perfectly normal, but then coincidentally Greg and I are both paged at the exact same time, that's where you come in." she said glancing at Warrick and Nick, who were still sitting cautiously by the door.
"You know they'll figure it out straight away don't you?" Nick said.
"Yeah, but there's nothing they can do about it, as Greg and I will lock the door when we leave, so they have no choice but to talk to each other."
"I like it," Brass smirked. "Very devious. What do you want me to do?"
"You're on guard duty. Knowing those two the first they'll do is try and get out, and they'll have their cell phones so they'll be calling people to help them. I need you to stop anyone going in or out, is that okay?"
"Sure, getting paid to stand around sounds like fun."
"So what happens if they do call us, do we act like we don't know or pretend we're trying to help?" Warrick asked.
"Whatever comes to mind at the time. Okay, so everyone knows their jobs, we just need to hope it works when they get back, oh and Greg," she added a little quieter as they were leaving the room, "please try not to screw this up."
Greg didn't reply, but Nick could see that he was upset and decided to take this up with Catherine. He followed her to Grissom's office, somewhere she would not be happy to leave when Grissom got back.
"Catherine, what was that about?" he called from the door.
"What was what about?" she asked, sounding honestly confused.
"All those digs you made at Greg, making him sound like a screw up." Nick said trying his best to defend his spiky haired friend.
"Well, you know what he's like, he's always messing around." Catherine answered as though she thought that justified it.
"That doesn't mean he's incapable. Just give him a break, nobody's perfect, not even you."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Two words Catherine, explosion... lab, not necessarily in that order." Nick regretted saying this, he didn't want to cause trouble, but he just couldn't help it.
"Hey, that was an ...."
"Accident." Nick finished her sentence, "My point exactly. Greg's coping pretty well considering that wasn't that long ago, maybe you could just give him a break and maybe an apology."
Catherine sat down at the desk and for the first time realised that Nick was right and felt ashamed.
"Hey Nick." she called just as he was leaving. "Thanks. You're right, I'll go and see him as soon as I can. If you ever catch me acting like that again, you'll tell me right?"
"You bet I will." he laughed, "Don't worry about it Cath, we all get a little bossy sometimes. I guess actually being the boss doesn't help." he said, offering a smile.
"I never realised how hard Grissom's job was until now. No wonder he can never get around to talking to Sara. Once you've done half of this paperwork, an entire year has gone."
"Well, it's a good job we're helping them then, but for all our sakes I hope it works, because I don't want to have to confront them if it doesn't. Anyway, I got to get back to work and so do you," he added glancing at the desk.
"Yeah, see you later." Catherine called as she looked up, but he was already gone. "Huh, now I know why Sara always does that, very dramatic exit." she laughed to herself as she prepared herself for a very long night.
~*^**^*~
Grissom closed the case file and stretched his back as he stood. He had been sitting for about two hours, going over what evidence they had. -Well, nothing physical, but it still seemed stupid being here in the first place- He grumbled to himself.
A knock at the door broke through his thoughts.
Checking that Sara was still sleeping as he past the sliding doors, he pulled one side closed before walking towards the door.
"Hello Jim." Grissom greeted, pulling the door open wider to let the detective passage into the room.
Brass offered his friend a grin and continued walking further into the room. "So, how did the shrink lesson go?"
"First off," Grissom started as he pulled the other sliding door closed. "Keep your voice down, Sara's not well."
"Oh? Why's that?" Brass smirked.
Rolling his eyes, Grissom rang room service for some coffee.
Brass looked around the place and had to smile. What could clearly be seen on the back of the couch was a silk navy blue nighty and on the armchair by the window, was a long beautiful dress that Sara must have worn to the party the night before.
"There's not much here Jim." Grissom broke the detective from his snooping. -What's he looking at?-
"Huh?" Brass asked as he sat down on the couch.
Sighing, Grissom leaned down and flipped the file he had been reading earlier, open for his friend to see. "You bring us here to follow a suspect. We follow the suspect and get nothing." Pausing, he removed his glasses and dropped them to the table. "I think you got the wrong guy."
"Really?" Brass nodded. "How so, cuz, Sheridan and his team are certain this is their guy."
"Because he's got nothing to hide. Both Sara and I haven't seen him acting suspicious, plus," Grissom continued. "He's a nice guy."
"Nice guys can commit kidnap and murder Gil."
-God!- "Fine, it's a gut feeling that this isn't the right suspect. He's never seen alone, yes, but we haven't heard any couples being reported missing since we got here."
Brass shrugged. "Maybe we've got him where we want him and he's waiting for the right couple."
Grissom huffed out an angry breath. "Maybe we've got him and me and Sara are the couple he's after. Stop it Jim. I'm tired and I'm sick of doing the FBI's dirty work."
"Ok. How about I get Sheridan to place some of his people in the room down the hall." Brass suggested. "To give you two some time off."
Thinking about this for a few minutes, Grissom stood in the middle of the living area with one hand in his pocket and the other scratching at his beard in thought. "You mean, another couple?"
Brass nodded.
"Why don't we let them continue where we left off and we can go home?" Grissom asked, hopeful that this would be over soon.
"We could, but how would you explain your sudden leaving? You're here for your two weeks honeymoon, not just a holiday Gil. What about the suspect and his questions? And that other couple-"
"Sean and Allison." Grissom supplied when Brass tried to remember their names.
"Right. You just going to up and leave and maybe the suspect gets them."
Grissom's head snapped up. "You blackmailing us?" He asked gravely.
Brass grinned. "No. Just think about it. If the suspect is here and you don't think Jenkins is him, what's stopping the real murderer from grabbing another couple, say Sean and Allison?"
"That's not fair Jim." Grissom sighed and rubbed his tired face.
"I know and I'm sorry, but I do know that if you and Sara leave now, this operation is a disaster."
"We haven't made any progress." Grissom argued. "We have nothing."
"Perhaps, perhaps not. Sheridan thinks you are doing a great job. You got a profile put together quicker in a week than his team could in months since this began." Brass stopped and leaned forward to pull out some photos of the couples that were staying in the hotel.
"There are only three couples on their honeymoon and that includes me and Sara." Grissom explained as he moved to sit down on the couch and pull on his glasses.
"So, this is Allison and Sean, right?" Brass pointed to one photo. He recognised them from a few days ago.
"Yeah." Grissom fished out the second photo and sighed. "They are the Gardners. We haven't met them, but Allison and Sean have. They were talking about them being very in love and barely seen leaving their room."
Brass chuckled. "Ah, love birds." He nodded and sat back to take another look around the place. "I'll get some people watching their room, get someone in the next room to keep an eye on them and the other couple too. You take the night and morning off and we'll do the rest."
"Thanks Jim."
~*^*TBC*^*~