Chapter 89

Knock, Knock

"Gil…did you hear that?

"Hmm?"

"I think someone is at your door."

"Ssh…"

"No, someone is at your door. Listen…"

There was a faint knocking sound at the door and Gil had to pause to hear it, the frantic creaking of the bed had drowned it out. She was right, there was definitely someone knocking.

Gil winced, the last thing he wanted to do right now was get out of bed, especially when it had taken all week just to get there with Sara. It had only been five hours since she'd arrived and after talking over several cups of coffee and watching an hour long documentary on the discovery channel, everything had been a blur of kisses, and discarded clothing.

"Ignore it," he murmured near her ear, nuzzling her neck

"It sounds urgent," Sara gave a tiny moan as he began to move against her again, and her expression told him she was caught between curiosity of who was at the front door, and enjoyment with being pinned down on the bed.

"If it's urgent, they'd have called," Gil covered her mouth in short kisses, finding it hard himself now to ignore the insistent knocking at the door. It was getting louder, more desperate.

"Your phone is ringing…" Sara glanced to the floor where she could see Gil's cellular phone jutting out of the pocket of his discarded pants.

"Ignore," he repeated.

"Might be work."

"All the more reason to ignore," Gil gently tugged on her bottom lip with his teeth. The phone was persistently shrill, and along with the knocking at the door it was becoming harder to concentrate on what he was doing. He began to rock harder, hoping the creaking of the bed would further drown out everything.

Sara let out a loud moan of approval, rocking with him. "Oh…OH!"

"Ssh. Whoever's at the door will hear," he let go of one of her wrists and pushed his hand over her mouth.

Her eyes were laughing at him and she lazily stroked his back as he continued with his lovemaking, trying to be oblivious to everything around them.

The cell phone stopped ringing, but now in the living room he could hear the house phone ringing just as loud and persistent.

"COME TO THE DOOR!"

Gil immediately stopped what he was doing, he heard the frantic voice of Greg Sanders coming from the phones built in answering machine in the next room. "Greg…" he whispered.

Sara immediately pushed Gil off, "he's supposed to be with Andrew…"

Gil withdrew from Sara at once and grabbed his robe, pulling it on hastily and tying it as he headed for the living room, to the hallway and the front door. He wasn't prepared for what he found.

Greg was standing looking completely distraught. High on his cheek there was a swollen welt. His lip was split and bleeding and he was holding a bloody tissue to his nose.

"Greg…what the—?" Gil asked in complete bewilderment.

"I lost Andrew."

"You…what?" Gil stepped aside and let Greg step in.

"I lost Andrew," Greg repeated sounding caught between angry and frantically upset. He passed by Gil with a sigh.

"What happened?" Gil asked, he saw Sara stepping out of his bedroom wearing one of his button down shirts which fell barely to below the top of her thighs. Gil found himself hoping that Sara was wearing underwear, and also hoped that Greg would be too distraught to notice that it was obvious by the appearance of himself and Sara they'd been caught in the middle of making love.

Sara looked a Greg, her mouth dropping, "Where's Andrew?"

"I lost him," Greg sighed, he dropped into a seat at the kitchen counter, "we were a strip club and he just…he kept knocking back the drinks like they were water…and the more he was drinking, the more miserable and hostile he starting to get…" Greg sighed.

"But you had the money…" Gil pointed out, "You could have cut him off at any time."

Sara suddenly had a guilty look on her face, "I gave him money…before he left…"

Gil turned and looked at her, "you gave him money again?"

"What was I supposed to do, send him out without any cash?" Sara remarked, suddenly quite cold. Her eyes were blazing. "What does it matter if I gave him money again…it's none of your business…"

Gil sighed, he didn't want to get into this argument with her again. "Then what happened, Greg?" he pulled a first aid kit out from a kitchen cupboard and opened the case.

"So he's knocking back these drinks and there was this waitress he hit on…and the waitress's boyfriend happened to be the guy behind the bar," Greg watched what he was doing, and flinched when Gil took a medicinal wipe from the box and reached out to wipe the blood from Greg's chin.

"I know it stings," Gil said.

Greg took the wipe from Gil and patted the blood away from his chin and mouth gingerly, "Anyway, so like, the bar tender is yelling 'hey that's my woman', and the next thing I know Andrew is like trying to start fights, I got in between them trying to stop this punch up and I got hit a couple of times, once by Andrew and twice by the bartender. Bouncer came to throw us both out only Andrew got away before the big guy had a chance to grab him. I got grabbed and tossed out onto the street…" Greg sighed.

"You lost my brother…" Sara said as if suddenly it was just hitting her, "terrific…"

"It wasn't my fault," Greg retorted, "I was trying to stop the fight—" he tried to explain although it seemed Sara had no intentions of letting him do so now.

"You were supposed to keep an eye on him!" Sara shot quickly.

Gil took a firm hold of Sara's shoulder, "Hey, calm down. You heard Greg. He tried to stop the fight. Greg wasn't the one who took off. Andrew was – it's not Greg's fault, Sara."

Sara took a deep breath, "did the bartender call the police?" she asked, staring Greg right in the eyes.

"I don't know, everything happened so fast," Greg explained, "One minute I was trying to pick myself up off the floor in the bar, the next I was flat on my face on the street outside…I tried to call your cell phone, Sara, but…it's off, and you weren't at your apartment. I figured you'd be here…"

Sara took off for the bedroom without another word.

"Greg…wait here," Gil said, "clean yourself up," he added, then headed towards the bedroom. Sara was already getting dressed.

"Where are you going?"

"To find Andrew," Sara pulled on her slacks, she shed Gil's shirt, put her bra on and then slipped into her black t-shirt.

"He could be anywhere," Gil pointed out.

"What do you suggest I do?" she snapped.

"I'd suggest calming down for a start," he responded softly.

"And then?" she frowned.

"Wouldn't it better just going to your apartment and waiting? He's got to go there eventually. You're the only person he knows in Vegas, right? He's living you right now, he has no where else to go."

"You go to my apartment," she uttered, she picked up her bag, reached in, took the keys out and tossed them at him, they hit his stomach and fell to the floor with a loud chink. "I'm going out to look for him."

Gil picked up the keys, he kept his eyes on her all the while. "Sara…I'm sorry. I didn't know this was going to happen when I asked Greg to hang out with him…"

"Save it…" Sara clenched her fists, "I don't have time to stand around and talk about this right now…" she reached into the pocket of her slacks, pulled out her cell phone and switched it on. "Call me if he turns up," she added, there was an iciness in her voice that he wasn't used to hearing.

Sara slipped her shoes on and took off without another word, leaving Gil standing holding the keys to her apartment. Feeling somewhat defeated, he got dressed, pocketed the keys to Sara's apartment, and headed back to the living room. Greg had cleared most of the blood off of his face.

"Grissom…I'm sorry," Greg said, "I didn't know this was gonna cause a huge fight between you and Sara…"

"Sara is just mad because of the situation. She'll calm down…this will blow over. In the meantime, if you want to blame someone, blame me for my damn impatience." Gil sighed, he grabbed his jacket from where he'd slung it earlier on the kitchen counter, and he pulled it on quickly. "It's because of my impatience all of this happened, Greg. I might not be directly responsible for Andrew's behavior, but I was the catalyst for the chain of events…" Gil realised. "I'm sorry you got hurt, Greg…" Gil added. He meant it, although he felt he'd never be able to apologise enough to the man.

"You know…the waitress wasn't even that hot," Greg sighed. "Actually…I'm pretty sure it was a man in drag…I guess Andrew was just too drunk to even tell the difference…"

Gil had to smirk slightly despite himself. Trust Greg to play the whole thing off with a joke. "I'm going to Sara's," Gil placed his house keys on the counter, "finish cleaning yourself up, and when you leave lock my door, and put the keys under the fourth rock next to the driveway."

"Will do."

Gil left his house with a growing sense of apprehension.

What's going to happen once we find Andrew?

He knew sooner or later he'd find out.

Okay, so I knwo the chapter is blah and itsucks, and yes, I know that it's been, what, 2 weeks since my last update? Maybe more?

I still went out of my way to write this chapter even though it's my birthday (yeah, I made it to 25 - now what?)and I'm supposed to be giving myself a rest from writing today, lol.

Thanks to everyone who keeps reviewing, and especially thanks to Wishing on the Moon who helped me with this chapter (I was going through a bout of block). Hedi, what would I do without you! lol.

Ash