Disclaimer: I do not own CSI, and unfortunately, no one I know owns it either.
Title: Last Chance, chapter 11
Author: hazeleyes57
Rating: PG
A/N: Many thanks to those of you who have reviewed or emailed or both. Totally appreciated.
Last Chance Chapter 11
"It means that I'm pregnant."
The words seemed unnaturally loud as they echoed and bounced around the office.
Sara searched Grissom's face to see if there was any glimmer of a sign that her Gil was listening. Judging by his visible shock and deathly silence, she thought not. Sara had taken a little while to take in the news herself that he had only just heard, so she gave him time to absorb it.
She too had been a little shocked when she found out for certain that she was pregnant. The day before Grissom had been discharged from hospital Sara had realised that she was a few days late but put the information to the back of her mind, more worried about Grissom than herself at the time. She had almost convinced herself that it was just delayed shock from the accident that was throwing things 'off'.
That had been a week ago. Two days ago she had gone out and bought a home pregnancy test kit. She knew that she could easily have run the test at work, but she hadn't wanted to take a chance on being caught.
At home she would have the opportunity to panic in peace.
Although Sara had been fairly certain what the test would show, she had still been surprised when it had turned out positive. She ran through the gamut of emotions from elation that the test was positive, through fear - the 'crap what have I done' moment, to profound sadness that Gil wasn't there to share in her discovery.
As Sara waited, part of her was praying that this might be the trigger that restored Grissom's lost memories of their new relationship. She absently fiddled with her necklace until she became aware of what she was doing. As each second passed her hope faded. She wondered what was going through his mind.
Grissom was stunned. There was no other word for it. His first night back at work - which technically had not yet even started - and he was completely lost for words.
He remembered to breathe after the longest moment. He felt crushing disappointment that Sara had taken this route. Artificial insemination. Christ, what a mess.
Sara had said that they had discussed it and that he had been 'very helpful'. Obviously not helpful enough, or she wouldn't be standing here now, telling him that she was pregnant.
Grissom's gaze involuntarily moved to Sara's waist. She folded her arms at almost the same moment and her expression became defensive. He looked unseeingly down at his desk in an effort to pull himself together.
He had been silent too long, but he didn't know what to say. He had never been the kind of person to automatically say 'congratulations' when given this sort of news by anyone, let alone it coming from Sara.
He managed to bite back the impulse to shout 'are you insane?' When he had control over himself again he managed to sound almost normal.
"Is it what you want?"
Sara wanted to run over to the desk and shake him until he rattled. She wanted to scream 'yes, you idiot, we did this deliberately'.
But she just nodded, not yet trusting herself to speak.
Grissom had several questions, but he thought that most were of a personal nature and he had no right to ask them. He looked up at Sara's face and thought how beautiful and fragile that she looked. He was bemused by the wave of protectiveness that swept through him. Then he felt angry at feeling that way. What Sara did in her private life was her business, it was nothing to do with him. Nothing at all.
So why did he feel so irritated?
"Are you okay? I mean, do you feel well enough to work?"
Unfortunately Grissom could not entirely keep his irritation out of his voice, so it sounded to Sara as if he were cross that she might not be able to do her job. It made her response a little terse.
"Yes. I feel perfectly all right. I have no symptoms yet, and if it weren't for the test I wouldn't have known. It's still early days."
Grissom nodded, not knowing what else to say.
Sara continued in a monotone.
"In light of the fact that one in six pregnancies are lost even before the women find out that they're pregnant, I would appreciate it if this was just kept between the two of us for now."
Grissom could understand that.
"If that's what you want. Have you seen a doctor yet?"
Sara half smiled reminiscently and Grissom wondered at it.
"Yeah, you told me what questions to ask. But I haven't seen the doctor since the test was positive. She doesn't book people in until after eight weeks, in case the baby is lost. They don't call it miscarriage so much these days. Spontaneous abortion is the term now."
Sara's tone was very matter of fact, but Grissom could hear the emotion beyond it.
Fear.
It dispelled the last of his illogical anger. He didn't smile, but his features softened.
"I'm sure you'll be okay. Try not to worry."
"Second nature to me now."
Sara had spoken without thinking, but with the truth. She had been so worried about Grissom that it now coloured many aspects of her life.
"That's natural, but you should also try to relax."
Sara's gaze flew to Grissom's. It wasn't the first time that he had told her to relax and she supposed that she would have to get used to these moments of familiarity where she would remember and he would not. She felt unexpectedly emotional.
Grissom had seen the hope flare in Sara's eyes and knew that he had touched another nerve. He felt the familiar frustration that said that his answers were just out of reach and if he could just ask the right questions, something would 'click' and he would be whole again.
The words 'whole again' gave him that bloom of resonance that he had previously felt with 'chalk dust'.
Grissom had opened his mouth to speak to Sara - this was too good an opportunity to miss - when he was interrupted by a brisk knock on his office door. As the door opened immediately with the knock, he never had the chance to tell whoever it was to 'go away'.
Catherine stuck her head around the door and looked a little startled to see Sara standing in Grissom's office. Her eyes moved from her to Grissom, taking in the atmosphere and their postures in a split second.
"Oh, sorry Gil. The rest of us are waiting in the break room. Didn't realise you were busy."
Catherine didn't let it stop her from entering the office.
Sara looked at the older woman with barely concealed irritation. Grissom had been about to say something and now the moment was lost.
Grissom looked at Sara in frustrated annoyance. He couldn't ask his questions with the other woman present. Sara probably looked as peeved as he did.
Sara smoothed out her expression as she turned and started to leave the office.
" We weren't busy." She said to Catherine, then looked back to Grissom and added,
"If there is anything else, I'll be in the break room."
Sara nodded to Catherine on her way out.
Catherine watched her go, then looked back to Grissom.
"Did I interrupt something...?"
"No."
Catherine raised her eyebrows in surprise at Grissom's abrupt tone. She watched him write something in the back of a notebook and then fixed him with a stare as he got to his feet.
"Y'know, Gill, you're as bad a liar as she is."
Grissom entered the DNA lab. and glanced around casually to see if anyone else was working in the room. To his mild annoyance Greg was working at the bench, but the young man was concentrating hard on a sample application and barely spared Grissom a glance.
With perfect timing the printer in front of Grissom coughed up two report sheets. He removed the reports and cleared the analyser for use, deleting his worklist. He didn't look at the reports until he was back in the privacy of his office.
Grissom frowned as he looked at the two printouts. One was the 'unknown' DNA from the toothbrush in his bathroom, the other was a fresh sample of his own DNA for comparison purposes. He had listed his sample as 'second unknown' rather than use the stock elimination samples that the lab had on file to exclude the criminalists from evidence collected at a crime scene. He didn't want any official named records of the work to be logged on to the departmental mainframe.
As he had suspected the DNA on the toothbrush was not his. Not unless he had changed sex recently and not noticed. XX for female, XY for male. He unlocked his left-hand desk drawer and pulled out a copy of another DNA elimination sample. This copy he compared to the first 'unknown' sample.
The two were a perfect match.
It was one thing to suspect something, it was quite another to have your suspicions confirmed in a manner that left no room for doubt.
The DNA had come from Sara.
Warrick looked up and grinned as Nick entered the break room. The Texan's big smile was notably absent.
Nick looked at Warrick's expression and held up one hand.
"Just do not say anything. You were right. I do not wish to get into it."
Warrick tried to reign in his grin but failed miserably.
"Aw, c'mon man, where's your sense of humour?"
Nick opened the fridge and pulled out a bottle of cold water. He drank it down in one long chug. When he had finished he lobbed the empty bottle into the recycling bin.
"It would be funny if it were happening to Greggo. Not to me."
Warrick still smiled.
"Ah, but Greg wasn't the one that Grissom overheard commenting that Sara looked very much better since her 'holiday with Grissom'."
Nick stretched his back and grimaced when it hurt. He was hot and filthy. He would enjoy a long soak in the tub when he finished this shift.
" I don't know why he took it so bad. I didn't mean anything by it!"
Warrick shook his head. Nick just didn't get it.
"Of course not. However, it was open to interpretation and you got interpreted by Gris. Unfavourably. Besides, that store needed cleaning and reorganising, you're doing a great job. We're all grateful."
"Yeah! Grateful that you're not the ones doing it."
Warrick smiled disarmingly.
"True."
He had warned Nick to keep a low profile about the 'break' that Grissom had taken prior to his accident. From one or two things that Catherine had said Warrick had realised that the official stance was that Grissom had taken leave 'at the same time' and not 'with Sara'. Personally he thought that it was none of their business what the two of them did or didn't do together, providing that it didn't impact on their work environment. It was obvious to him that Grissom was finding it frustrating not to remember what had happened to him. Since the accident he had been less patient than before.
And something was definitely different about Sara.
Some nights she came into work with a spring in her step and her usual zest for the work. Some nights she came in and was very quiet, just put her head down and got on with 'it'. In the two weeks that Grissom had been back at work Sara had been a little remote, as if she occasionally retreated inside herself. Sometimes he caught her with a smile very reminiscent of the Mona Lisa painting.
Once he had even found her asleep.
They had been working together on a case and were awaiting confirmation from Greg about the DNA present at the crime scene. Warrick had gone to find Sara with the results and found her in the break room with her head on her folded arms on the table used for assignment distribution. He had called her name before he realised that she was not awake, and then felt bad for waking her. Sara had laughed it off as the effects of a busy day off the day before.
Nick grunted as he stretched to release the tension in his shoulders.
"So, what you doing today, War?"
Warrick folded the newspaper that he had been reading and shaded his eyes as he looked up at Nick.
"Well, that depends on a lady."
Nick grinned.
"Don't it always? Who is it this time? That redhead that keeps staring at you from upstairs, what's her name? Laurel? "
"Laura. And no, not interested. Especially having seen Mr. Laura. You know I don't knowingly graze in someone else's field."
Nick shrugged.
"Still leaves you a lot of scope, plenty more fish in the sea."
Warrick looked at his watch and stood up to go. The shift had just ended, and for once it hadn't overrun.
"Maybe, maybe not. The mysterious miss would still have to fit in around her work, my work and Vegas. Not an easy combination."
"Nuthin' to it. Find an insomniac."
Warrick grinned as he made an exaggerated detour around the aromatic Nick.
"Obviously where I'm going wrong. See you."
Nick waved him off, then pulled a face when he caught a whiff of himself.
"Man, that is bad."
Grissom opened his briefcase and checked that it contained his diary and the DNA report. He then locked the case, picked it up, had a brief look around his office out of habit, and then headed for the door.
Grissom had a lot to think about despite his bone weariness at another long night. He still had not shrugged off all the physical effects of the accident even if the bruises had faded to pale yellow smudges.
Hovering in the back of his mind all night had been the information that it was Sara's DNA on the mystery toothbrush.
While visiting colleagues might eat with you, or use the bathroom, they didn't normally avail themselves of a toothbrush.
Which implied that Sara hadn't been in the townhouse just as a colleague.
More or less on automatic pilot, Grissom made his way up the corridor on his way out of the building. The day shift was taking over but he hardly noticed except for the extra bodies in the locker room.
Just as he reached his Denali his cell phone rang.
"Grissom."
Catherine's voice sounded harassed.
"Gil, sorry, I meant to tell you this at work but I forgot until just now. I don't know if it's at all relevant, but I think you were seeing someone within the last three months. I only just remembered. I came around to your place because I unexpectedly had some free time and you were very cagey. You were in such a hurry to go out that you left in your slippers. I told you 'good luck' with whoever it was and warned you not to let Sara find out about this one, this time."
" 'This time'?"
"Yeah, she didn't take the Lady Heather incident very well."
Grissom bit back the urge to tell Catherine that 'the incident' was no one's business but his, and allowed himself to think about what Catherine had said about him seeing someone. He thought it unlikely.
"Okay, thanks."
Grissom heard Lindsay's voice in the background but couldn't make out what she was saying.
"Gotta go, Gil. See you tonight."
Catherine cut off the connection.
Grissom got in the Denali and drove out of the car lot.
He felt nothing new after Catherine's information. There was no reference to someone new in his life in his diary, and while he wasn't an assiduous diarist, he figured that he would have at least made a note about it. He did think that it would be very out of character for him to be 'seeing' a woman while Sara was leaving DNA at his place.
Unless the 'other' woman had been Sara.
It was a tremendous leap without much in the way of facts to back it up and it shocked Grissom so thoroughly that he was surprised to find himself parked in his space at his townhouse with no clear memory of how he had got there.
Once inside the house Grissom had a quick shower and then checked for messages on his ansaphone. He prepared an omelette for breakfast and put on some coffee. He wasn't as weary as he was earlier and knew that he couldn't sleep with so much on his mind. Everything seemed more jumbled than he was used to and he felt that if he could just restore the order, everything - that he could remember - would become much clearer.
After he had finished eating he took a second mug of coffee with him back to the dining table, where he opened up his laptop.
Although the Doctor in the hospital had talked to him about the amnesia, Grissom decided even before he had left the hospital that he would do some further research on the Internet the first chance that he could get. He started to type.
A couple of hours later, his coffee cold and untouched, Grissom had a better understanding of his condition.
But no answers that would magically restore his memory. He was, however, more optimistic that he would recover his memory. In most cases amnesia was a temporary condition and usually brief, varying from a few seconds to a few hours. Duration could be longer depending on the severity of the causal trauma, and could last as long as a few weeks or even months.
According to one of the articles he had found, his older memories should return first and the more recent memories last, until all of his memory was recovered.
Grissom frowned as he read through the different types of amnesia. To his less practised mind, he would have thought his symptoms matched 'emotional' amnesia rather than retrograde. He refused to use the term 'hysterical' amnesia. It wouldn't be the first time a rushed doctor had not quite hit the nail on the head.
Grissom smiled ironically. Not the best analogy that he could have used.
He sighed heavily. The only thing that he could do now was wait.
Having satisfied his curiosity and drawn a line under the subject for the moment, Grissom turned his thoughts back to Sara. As usual it had required little effort.
What on Earth had possessed her?
Sara was - in his opinion - throwing away a good career with this latest stunt. Couldn't she see how hard it was for Catherine being a single parent? Her daughter was at school now, but that just created a different set of demands on her time.
He had nothing against single parenthood per se, it happened for one reason or another; from divorce or a death in the family right down to the other end of the scale with simple carelessness. But to go and do it deliberately...?
Imagine trying to look after a baby and sleep during the day in order to be up all night at work.
Grissom shook his head as he got up from the table and took his mug to the sink to rinse it. Memory loss or not, he was sure that he must have made some effort to talk Sara out of this plan of hers.
And had obviously failed miserably.
He went to his bedroom and put on the bedside light, then closed the blinds and drapes to leave the room darkened sufficiently for sleep once the light was off.
Grissom had emptied his pockets on to the side table earlier before his shower. Now, as he sat down on the edge of his bed, he looked at his keys and thought of Sara coming to his house while he was in hospital.
He suddenly thought of the Christmas photos. Had he left the drawer unlocked?
He checked the drawer and relaxed. It was locked and Sara wouldn't have known where to look for the key. He removed his bathrobe, got into bed and pulled the covers up to his waist. He turned off the light.
Grissom shut his eyes and tried to relax. Turned over. Turned back.
Dammit!
He opened his eyes and reached over to turn on the light. He snatched up the keys and opened the drawer.
There, see? The pictures were still there, they -
Grissom's thought broke off as he noticed the computer disk partially covered by the prints.
He picked it up and looked at it in puzzlement. He did not recall putting the disk in the drawer. It wasn't labelled, which was unlike him.
He turned it over thoughtfully in his hand. A clue to the past perhaps?
Now he would never sleep until he had checked this out. He got out of bed and grabbed his robe, belting it as he reached the dining table and his laptop.
Grissom tapped his fingers impatiently as he waited for the computer to boot up.
As soon as it was ready he loaded the disk and opened it up.
Or tried to. The file was password protected.
Crap.
How the hell was he supposed to access a file with no memory of a password?
Without any real expectation of useful help he clicked on the password prompt key.
It came up with the word 'lazy'.
Lazy.
The first word that popped into his head was 'idle'.
Idle. Sidle. Sara.
Grissom typed in 'Sidle'.
No, that wasn't it.
'Sara' would be too easy. Anyone would try that first.
He tried 'idle' and that too was rejected.
He liked crossword puzzles. Perhaps an anagram.
Grissom typed in 'idles' and grinned when the file opened up.
He read the opening title of the first article and the smile fell off his face.
What the f...?!
Sara brought her bare feet up on to the sofa and tucked them under the edge of her bathrobe. She was tired but edgy and couldn't settle enough to try to sleep. She had just tried the warm bath, and now she was going down the milk and cookie route.
She was also trying to be good, so there was only one cookie.
The fact that it was bigger again by half than her palm was no ones business but hers.
Sara smiled as she broke off a piece of the chocolate chip and put it in her mouth.
Medicinal chocolate. Her favourite kind.
She chewed slowly as she smoothed out a piece of notepaper. The paper was not frayed or torn, but it had obviously been read and re-read several times and now folded easily along its crease lines. It was the note that Grissom had left during their first attempt at AI.
'Hemingway had someone like you in mind when asked the definition of 'guts'. He replied,
Grace under pressure.
G.'
Sara folded the note carefully and slipped it into the back of the book that she was trying half-heartedly to read.
She sighed heavily and picked up her glass of milk. The 'pressure' bit she had down pat, it was the 'grace' bit that was proving troublesome. She just wanted to walk straight into Grissom's office and tell him everything. It was so frustrating to go to work each night and be so close to Grissom but so far away.
Sara disliked not having a definite plan to follow; she hated things up in the air. She was a 'doing' person, not a patient one. She wanted to be actively working on restoring Grissom's memory, not just hanging around on the off chance that it would come back.
She really wished that she had someone to talk to. The only person that she had ever opened up to had been Grissom and most of that had been in the last month. Now that she had finally got the taste for conversation she missed it more acutely.
Her mood swings were irritating her. One minute she was up and optimistic, the next she was down and weepy, then angry about the moods and her reactions to them. If this was what it was like at less than six weeks, heaven help her later on in the pregnancy.
She put the now empty milk glass on the phone table beside the armrest, then pulled the throw off the back of the sofa and spread it over her.
Sara's eyelids drooped and she put the book on the floor beside her sofa. Thank goodness - she was beginning to bore herself to sleep. She really ought to go to her bed, she'd just have a few minutes here before...
Sara slept at last.
Grissom scowled as he skipped through the information on the screen in front of him. It was a very thorough 'how to' guide for artificial insemination.
This must be what he meant in his diary about Sara asking for his help. Or he had collected the information himself in an effort to convince Sara not to go ahead with her plan.
Grissom removed the disk, shut down the laptop and leaned back in his chair. He rubbed his face with both hands and realised that he had another headache starting. He went to the bathroom and looked for some painkillers to try to offset the full headache. He swallowed a couple of the tablets with some water and returned to his bedroom.
He felt the same frustration he had earlier. He thought that he had all the information he needed, but he couldn't seem to organise it in his head, he couldn't concentrate. Something was hovering on the edge of his perception but it wouldn't come into full view.
Grissom returned the disk to the drawer with the photos and locked it again. He threw his robe on to the end of his bed, got back into bed and turned off the light.
He promised himself that if he were still awake in half an hour, he'd resort to a quick DIY session to help him sleep.
As Grissom settled into the cool pillow and closed his eyes, he had a bizarre thought.
He fancied a doughnut.
"...and lastly, Warrick and Greg, you have a decomp. in an apartment block. Neighbour has been complaining for 'ages' about the smell to the landlord and he finally found out why they hadn't seen the guy in 3B for weeks. Doesn't look like suspicious circ's, but keep an open mind."
Grissom handed out the last of the assignment slips to Warrick and pretended for the moment that he couldn't feel the laser hot glare that he was getting from Sara's end of the briefing table.
"Any questions? No? Okay."
Everyone got up from the table and scattered to their tasks except Sara. Greg risked a quick glance at her on his way out of them room and didn't envy Grissom right at this moment.
Boy was Sara pissed.
She stood up and opened her mouth as soon as the others had left.
Grissom held up one hand.
" Not here."
Sara's mouth closed with a snap and she followed Grissom back to his office.
Grissom did not take refuge behind his desk but turned to face Sara head on.
"Okay. You're angry that I put you on the jewellery robbery instead of the decomp."
"Yes! You know that I - "
Grissom interrupted firmly, knowing exactly what she was going to say.
"Sara, I was not asking for your input, I was handing out assignments. I did as I saw fit and will continue to do so. Greg hasn't had a decomp. yet and this will be good experience for him. Catherine is on the murdered traffic cop with Nick because as she often likes to point out, she has seniority."
Grissom's voice softened slightly, but he was still the Supervisor.
"I put you on the robbery because you have sharp instincts for a lie and I had the impression from Brass that this isn't a straightforward job. The fact that it will be easier on your stomach was also a consideration, but it was a secondary one."
Sara visibly calmed, but she still had some fight left.
"Then you're not sidelining me because of my condition?"
"No. Just being aware of it. But my decision wouldn't have been any different if you weren't pregnant."
"Oh." Sara looked at him as he leaned back on his desk.
"So what will you be doing?"
The twinkle in Grissom's eyes reminded her of Gil.
"Thought I'd come with you."
Sara's first and instant naughty thought was that it wouldn't be the first time. She clamped her lips together to prevent the words slipping out, but she couldn't hide the smirk.
She forgave him.
"Cool."
The encounter set the tone on the next few weeks at work. For both of them it was a poignant journey into the past to a happier time before the 'this' that Grissom did not know what to do about. Although deeply affected by Gil's continued absence, Sara took some comfort from the return of the slightly flirty solicitous Grissom.
Some nights it was the sweetest torture.
If any of the rest of the graveyard shift noticed they did not comment overtly. All of them had Nick's storeroom experience fresh in their minds.
As the nights passed and the work progressed in its usual fashion, Grissom became more restive about his amnesia. He still had the nagging feeling that he was missing some big clue that would tie everything up in a neat bow and this was reinforced by his certainty that Sara was hiding something from him.
So when Grissom found himself on a night off, he decided to sit down and tackle the problem as if it were a difficult case.
He took a block of writing paper to the dining room table and spent several minutes assembling his thoughts. He started to write.
It didn't take long and shortly Grissom put down his pen and took a sip of his cooling coffee. As he read through the list he tried to detach the 'evidence' from any personal connection to either himself or Sara, so that he could see it just as a 'case' for conclusion.
Female DNA present in house.
From diary: One year left for female to conceive. Request / offer of 'help'. 'S' at three and four day intervals.
Possibility of holiday 'together?
Female pregnant.
Grissom frowned as he read through the list. Although he was thorough and methodical and went by the book - most of the time - his experience had often shown him that his first instinctive 'gut' response often turned out to be right. He was a great believer in the principal behind Occam's razor; namely, that the simplest explanation is often the right one.
Having said that, Paige Ryecroft had given him a healthy respect for the Chaos Theory as well.
Either way he would try to stick to facts and what he could prove.
But as he listened to his gut now he wondered if this time he could be wrong, because if he didn't know better, he'd swear that...
No.
Grissom's stomach dipped and flipped in a way that no roller coaster had ever managed to create.
She couldn't have.
HE wouldn't have.
Surely not...?
Grissom ran a shaking hand over his beard in a nervous smoothing gesture.
After several seconds of frozen speculation, he went to his briefcase and took out his diary and day planner.
He looked at the 'S' flagged dates. He checked them all against his work calendar and they had at least one thing in common.
Not one of them was on a day that he or Sara was scheduled to appear in court.
'Sara has asked for my help...I can't believe that I've agreed.'
The sentence he had written in his diary suddenly took on a whole new meaning.
Dear God.
Had he supplied Sara with what she had needed for AI?
If that were so, then he was the father of Sara's baby.
What the hell had he done?
Catherine jumped in surprise as the door to the ladies washroom swung open just as she was reaching for the handle.
She was even more surprised when someone who closely resembled Grissom came storming - that was the only word for it - in.
It couldn't actually be Grissom, of course, because he would not storm into the ladies looking dishevelled and impossibly sexy in a pair of faded blue jeans and a midnight blue T.
Especially not on his day off.
"Gil? What -?"
"Where is she?"
Even as bit out his question Grissom noted that all but one of the stall doors was open.
He crossed the floor rapidly and banged on the one closed stall door.
"I know you're in there, come on out Sara!"
Grissom looked briefly back at Catherine.
"Leave."
It did not occur to Catherine to disobey. She was half way to the door of the room before she had even rationalised her decision. She had known Gil Grissom a long time and she had never seen him quite like this. Not even when he had hauled Eddie off her out in the corridor had he been this steamed.
The last thing Catherine saw as the door closed was Grissom checking that the other stalls were empty.
Sara flushed the toilet and arranged her clothing. Her heart was in her mouth at the tone in Grissom's voice.
"Sara!"
There was another bang on the cubicle door and Sara took in a deep breath to help her relax.
It didn't work.
She opened the door anyway and stepped out into the glare from a pair of wonderfully blue eyes.
"What can I do for you Grissom?"
Grissom felt an entirely unwarranted anger at her apparent calmness as she crossed the room to wash her hands. He wanted to rattle her as he had been rattled himself.
"Just to be clear, I don't give a crap what the doctor said about my memory. I want a straight answer from you; yes or no - none of the run-around that you've been giving me lately."
Sara nodded warily as she dried her hands.
"Okay."
There was a long silence.
When Grissom finally did speak his voice seemed to echo off the walls.
"You asked for my help. I apparently agreed." Grissom paused, suddenly assailed by doubt that he had made another wrong conclusion.
"Am I the baby's father?"
As if in slow motion he watched the surprise appear briefly in Sara's face, along with her quickly quashed burst of hope. He saw one of her hands unconsciously fiddle with the gold necklace tucked into her shirt.
Time snapped back to the right speed as Sara simply said,
"Yes."
.
TBC
Title: Last Chance, chapter 11
Author: hazeleyes57
Rating: PG
A/N: Many thanks to those of you who have reviewed or emailed or both. Totally appreciated.
Last Chance Chapter 11
"It means that I'm pregnant."
The words seemed unnaturally loud as they echoed and bounced around the office.
Sara searched Grissom's face to see if there was any glimmer of a sign that her Gil was listening. Judging by his visible shock and deathly silence, she thought not. Sara had taken a little while to take in the news herself that he had only just heard, so she gave him time to absorb it.
She too had been a little shocked when she found out for certain that she was pregnant. The day before Grissom had been discharged from hospital Sara had realised that she was a few days late but put the information to the back of her mind, more worried about Grissom than herself at the time. She had almost convinced herself that it was just delayed shock from the accident that was throwing things 'off'.
That had been a week ago. Two days ago she had gone out and bought a home pregnancy test kit. She knew that she could easily have run the test at work, but she hadn't wanted to take a chance on being caught.
At home she would have the opportunity to panic in peace.
Although Sara had been fairly certain what the test would show, she had still been surprised when it had turned out positive. She ran through the gamut of emotions from elation that the test was positive, through fear - the 'crap what have I done' moment, to profound sadness that Gil wasn't there to share in her discovery.
As Sara waited, part of her was praying that this might be the trigger that restored Grissom's lost memories of their new relationship. She absently fiddled with her necklace until she became aware of what she was doing. As each second passed her hope faded. She wondered what was going through his mind.
Grissom was stunned. There was no other word for it. His first night back at work - which technically had not yet even started - and he was completely lost for words.
He remembered to breathe after the longest moment. He felt crushing disappointment that Sara had taken this route. Artificial insemination. Christ, what a mess.
Sara had said that they had discussed it and that he had been 'very helpful'. Obviously not helpful enough, or she wouldn't be standing here now, telling him that she was pregnant.
Grissom's gaze involuntarily moved to Sara's waist. She folded her arms at almost the same moment and her expression became defensive. He looked unseeingly down at his desk in an effort to pull himself together.
He had been silent too long, but he didn't know what to say. He had never been the kind of person to automatically say 'congratulations' when given this sort of news by anyone, let alone it coming from Sara.
He managed to bite back the impulse to shout 'are you insane?' When he had control over himself again he managed to sound almost normal.
"Is it what you want?"
Sara wanted to run over to the desk and shake him until he rattled. She wanted to scream 'yes, you idiot, we did this deliberately'.
But she just nodded, not yet trusting herself to speak.
Grissom had several questions, but he thought that most were of a personal nature and he had no right to ask them. He looked up at Sara's face and thought how beautiful and fragile that she looked. He was bemused by the wave of protectiveness that swept through him. Then he felt angry at feeling that way. What Sara did in her private life was her business, it was nothing to do with him. Nothing at all.
So why did he feel so irritated?
"Are you okay? I mean, do you feel well enough to work?"
Unfortunately Grissom could not entirely keep his irritation out of his voice, so it sounded to Sara as if he were cross that she might not be able to do her job. It made her response a little terse.
"Yes. I feel perfectly all right. I have no symptoms yet, and if it weren't for the test I wouldn't have known. It's still early days."
Grissom nodded, not knowing what else to say.
Sara continued in a monotone.
"In light of the fact that one in six pregnancies are lost even before the women find out that they're pregnant, I would appreciate it if this was just kept between the two of us for now."
Grissom could understand that.
"If that's what you want. Have you seen a doctor yet?"
Sara half smiled reminiscently and Grissom wondered at it.
"Yeah, you told me what questions to ask. But I haven't seen the doctor since the test was positive. She doesn't book people in until after eight weeks, in case the baby is lost. They don't call it miscarriage so much these days. Spontaneous abortion is the term now."
Sara's tone was very matter of fact, but Grissom could hear the emotion beyond it.
Fear.
It dispelled the last of his illogical anger. He didn't smile, but his features softened.
"I'm sure you'll be okay. Try not to worry."
"Second nature to me now."
Sara had spoken without thinking, but with the truth. She had been so worried about Grissom that it now coloured many aspects of her life.
"That's natural, but you should also try to relax."
Sara's gaze flew to Grissom's. It wasn't the first time that he had told her to relax and she supposed that she would have to get used to these moments of familiarity where she would remember and he would not. She felt unexpectedly emotional.
Grissom had seen the hope flare in Sara's eyes and knew that he had touched another nerve. He felt the familiar frustration that said that his answers were just out of reach and if he could just ask the right questions, something would 'click' and he would be whole again.
The words 'whole again' gave him that bloom of resonance that he had previously felt with 'chalk dust'.
Grissom had opened his mouth to speak to Sara - this was too good an opportunity to miss - when he was interrupted by a brisk knock on his office door. As the door opened immediately with the knock, he never had the chance to tell whoever it was to 'go away'.
Catherine stuck her head around the door and looked a little startled to see Sara standing in Grissom's office. Her eyes moved from her to Grissom, taking in the atmosphere and their postures in a split second.
"Oh, sorry Gil. The rest of us are waiting in the break room. Didn't realise you were busy."
Catherine didn't let it stop her from entering the office.
Sara looked at the older woman with barely concealed irritation. Grissom had been about to say something and now the moment was lost.
Grissom looked at Sara in frustrated annoyance. He couldn't ask his questions with the other woman present. Sara probably looked as peeved as he did.
Sara smoothed out her expression as she turned and started to leave the office.
" We weren't busy." She said to Catherine, then looked back to Grissom and added,
"If there is anything else, I'll be in the break room."
Sara nodded to Catherine on her way out.
Catherine watched her go, then looked back to Grissom.
"Did I interrupt something...?"
"No."
Catherine raised her eyebrows in surprise at Grissom's abrupt tone. She watched him write something in the back of a notebook and then fixed him with a stare as he got to his feet.
"Y'know, Gill, you're as bad a liar as she is."
Grissom entered the DNA lab. and glanced around casually to see if anyone else was working in the room. To his mild annoyance Greg was working at the bench, but the young man was concentrating hard on a sample application and barely spared Grissom a glance.
With perfect timing the printer in front of Grissom coughed up two report sheets. He removed the reports and cleared the analyser for use, deleting his worklist. He didn't look at the reports until he was back in the privacy of his office.
Grissom frowned as he looked at the two printouts. One was the 'unknown' DNA from the toothbrush in his bathroom, the other was a fresh sample of his own DNA for comparison purposes. He had listed his sample as 'second unknown' rather than use the stock elimination samples that the lab had on file to exclude the criminalists from evidence collected at a crime scene. He didn't want any official named records of the work to be logged on to the departmental mainframe.
As he had suspected the DNA on the toothbrush was not his. Not unless he had changed sex recently and not noticed. XX for female, XY for male. He unlocked his left-hand desk drawer and pulled out a copy of another DNA elimination sample. This copy he compared to the first 'unknown' sample.
The two were a perfect match.
It was one thing to suspect something, it was quite another to have your suspicions confirmed in a manner that left no room for doubt.
The DNA had come from Sara.
Warrick looked up and grinned as Nick entered the break room. The Texan's big smile was notably absent.
Nick looked at Warrick's expression and held up one hand.
"Just do not say anything. You were right. I do not wish to get into it."
Warrick tried to reign in his grin but failed miserably.
"Aw, c'mon man, where's your sense of humour?"
Nick opened the fridge and pulled out a bottle of cold water. He drank it down in one long chug. When he had finished he lobbed the empty bottle into the recycling bin.
"It would be funny if it were happening to Greggo. Not to me."
Warrick still smiled.
"Ah, but Greg wasn't the one that Grissom overheard commenting that Sara looked very much better since her 'holiday with Grissom'."
Nick stretched his back and grimaced when it hurt. He was hot and filthy. He would enjoy a long soak in the tub when he finished this shift.
" I don't know why he took it so bad. I didn't mean anything by it!"
Warrick shook his head. Nick just didn't get it.
"Of course not. However, it was open to interpretation and you got interpreted by Gris. Unfavourably. Besides, that store needed cleaning and reorganising, you're doing a great job. We're all grateful."
"Yeah! Grateful that you're not the ones doing it."
Warrick smiled disarmingly.
"True."
He had warned Nick to keep a low profile about the 'break' that Grissom had taken prior to his accident. From one or two things that Catherine had said Warrick had realised that the official stance was that Grissom had taken leave 'at the same time' and not 'with Sara'. Personally he thought that it was none of their business what the two of them did or didn't do together, providing that it didn't impact on their work environment. It was obvious to him that Grissom was finding it frustrating not to remember what had happened to him. Since the accident he had been less patient than before.
And something was definitely different about Sara.
Some nights she came into work with a spring in her step and her usual zest for the work. Some nights she came in and was very quiet, just put her head down and got on with 'it'. In the two weeks that Grissom had been back at work Sara had been a little remote, as if she occasionally retreated inside herself. Sometimes he caught her with a smile very reminiscent of the Mona Lisa painting.
Once he had even found her asleep.
They had been working together on a case and were awaiting confirmation from Greg about the DNA present at the crime scene. Warrick had gone to find Sara with the results and found her in the break room with her head on her folded arms on the table used for assignment distribution. He had called her name before he realised that she was not awake, and then felt bad for waking her. Sara had laughed it off as the effects of a busy day off the day before.
Nick grunted as he stretched to release the tension in his shoulders.
"So, what you doing today, War?"
Warrick folded the newspaper that he had been reading and shaded his eyes as he looked up at Nick.
"Well, that depends on a lady."
Nick grinned.
"Don't it always? Who is it this time? That redhead that keeps staring at you from upstairs, what's her name? Laurel? "
"Laura. And no, not interested. Especially having seen Mr. Laura. You know I don't knowingly graze in someone else's field."
Nick shrugged.
"Still leaves you a lot of scope, plenty more fish in the sea."
Warrick looked at his watch and stood up to go. The shift had just ended, and for once it hadn't overrun.
"Maybe, maybe not. The mysterious miss would still have to fit in around her work, my work and Vegas. Not an easy combination."
"Nuthin' to it. Find an insomniac."
Warrick grinned as he made an exaggerated detour around the aromatic Nick.
"Obviously where I'm going wrong. See you."
Nick waved him off, then pulled a face when he caught a whiff of himself.
"Man, that is bad."
Grissom opened his briefcase and checked that it contained his diary and the DNA report. He then locked the case, picked it up, had a brief look around his office out of habit, and then headed for the door.
Grissom had a lot to think about despite his bone weariness at another long night. He still had not shrugged off all the physical effects of the accident even if the bruises had faded to pale yellow smudges.
Hovering in the back of his mind all night had been the information that it was Sara's DNA on the mystery toothbrush.
While visiting colleagues might eat with you, or use the bathroom, they didn't normally avail themselves of a toothbrush.
Which implied that Sara hadn't been in the townhouse just as a colleague.
More or less on automatic pilot, Grissom made his way up the corridor on his way out of the building. The day shift was taking over but he hardly noticed except for the extra bodies in the locker room.
Just as he reached his Denali his cell phone rang.
"Grissom."
Catherine's voice sounded harassed.
"Gil, sorry, I meant to tell you this at work but I forgot until just now. I don't know if it's at all relevant, but I think you were seeing someone within the last three months. I only just remembered. I came around to your place because I unexpectedly had some free time and you were very cagey. You were in such a hurry to go out that you left in your slippers. I told you 'good luck' with whoever it was and warned you not to let Sara find out about this one, this time."
" 'This time'?"
"Yeah, she didn't take the Lady Heather incident very well."
Grissom bit back the urge to tell Catherine that 'the incident' was no one's business but his, and allowed himself to think about what Catherine had said about him seeing someone. He thought it unlikely.
"Okay, thanks."
Grissom heard Lindsay's voice in the background but couldn't make out what she was saying.
"Gotta go, Gil. See you tonight."
Catherine cut off the connection.
Grissom got in the Denali and drove out of the car lot.
He felt nothing new after Catherine's information. There was no reference to someone new in his life in his diary, and while he wasn't an assiduous diarist, he figured that he would have at least made a note about it. He did think that it would be very out of character for him to be 'seeing' a woman while Sara was leaving DNA at his place.
Unless the 'other' woman had been Sara.
It was a tremendous leap without much in the way of facts to back it up and it shocked Grissom so thoroughly that he was surprised to find himself parked in his space at his townhouse with no clear memory of how he had got there.
Once inside the house Grissom had a quick shower and then checked for messages on his ansaphone. He prepared an omelette for breakfast and put on some coffee. He wasn't as weary as he was earlier and knew that he couldn't sleep with so much on his mind. Everything seemed more jumbled than he was used to and he felt that if he could just restore the order, everything - that he could remember - would become much clearer.
After he had finished eating he took a second mug of coffee with him back to the dining table, where he opened up his laptop.
Although the Doctor in the hospital had talked to him about the amnesia, Grissom decided even before he had left the hospital that he would do some further research on the Internet the first chance that he could get. He started to type.
A couple of hours later, his coffee cold and untouched, Grissom had a better understanding of his condition.
But no answers that would magically restore his memory. He was, however, more optimistic that he would recover his memory. In most cases amnesia was a temporary condition and usually brief, varying from a few seconds to a few hours. Duration could be longer depending on the severity of the causal trauma, and could last as long as a few weeks or even months.
According to one of the articles he had found, his older memories should return first and the more recent memories last, until all of his memory was recovered.
Grissom frowned as he read through the different types of amnesia. To his less practised mind, he would have thought his symptoms matched 'emotional' amnesia rather than retrograde. He refused to use the term 'hysterical' amnesia. It wouldn't be the first time a rushed doctor had not quite hit the nail on the head.
Grissom smiled ironically. Not the best analogy that he could have used.
He sighed heavily. The only thing that he could do now was wait.
Having satisfied his curiosity and drawn a line under the subject for the moment, Grissom turned his thoughts back to Sara. As usual it had required little effort.
What on Earth had possessed her?
Sara was - in his opinion - throwing away a good career with this latest stunt. Couldn't she see how hard it was for Catherine being a single parent? Her daughter was at school now, but that just created a different set of demands on her time.
He had nothing against single parenthood per se, it happened for one reason or another; from divorce or a death in the family right down to the other end of the scale with simple carelessness. But to go and do it deliberately...?
Imagine trying to look after a baby and sleep during the day in order to be up all night at work.
Grissom shook his head as he got up from the table and took his mug to the sink to rinse it. Memory loss or not, he was sure that he must have made some effort to talk Sara out of this plan of hers.
And had obviously failed miserably.
He went to his bedroom and put on the bedside light, then closed the blinds and drapes to leave the room darkened sufficiently for sleep once the light was off.
Grissom had emptied his pockets on to the side table earlier before his shower. Now, as he sat down on the edge of his bed, he looked at his keys and thought of Sara coming to his house while he was in hospital.
He suddenly thought of the Christmas photos. Had he left the drawer unlocked?
He checked the drawer and relaxed. It was locked and Sara wouldn't have known where to look for the key. He removed his bathrobe, got into bed and pulled the covers up to his waist. He turned off the light.
Grissom shut his eyes and tried to relax. Turned over. Turned back.
Dammit!
He opened his eyes and reached over to turn on the light. He snatched up the keys and opened the drawer.
There, see? The pictures were still there, they -
Grissom's thought broke off as he noticed the computer disk partially covered by the prints.
He picked it up and looked at it in puzzlement. He did not recall putting the disk in the drawer. It wasn't labelled, which was unlike him.
He turned it over thoughtfully in his hand. A clue to the past perhaps?
Now he would never sleep until he had checked this out. He got out of bed and grabbed his robe, belting it as he reached the dining table and his laptop.
Grissom tapped his fingers impatiently as he waited for the computer to boot up.
As soon as it was ready he loaded the disk and opened it up.
Or tried to. The file was password protected.
Crap.
How the hell was he supposed to access a file with no memory of a password?
Without any real expectation of useful help he clicked on the password prompt key.
It came up with the word 'lazy'.
Lazy.
The first word that popped into his head was 'idle'.
Idle. Sidle. Sara.
Grissom typed in 'Sidle'.
No, that wasn't it.
'Sara' would be too easy. Anyone would try that first.
He tried 'idle' and that too was rejected.
He liked crossword puzzles. Perhaps an anagram.
Grissom typed in 'idles' and grinned when the file opened up.
He read the opening title of the first article and the smile fell off his face.
What the f...?!
Sara brought her bare feet up on to the sofa and tucked them under the edge of her bathrobe. She was tired but edgy and couldn't settle enough to try to sleep. She had just tried the warm bath, and now she was going down the milk and cookie route.
She was also trying to be good, so there was only one cookie.
The fact that it was bigger again by half than her palm was no ones business but hers.
Sara smiled as she broke off a piece of the chocolate chip and put it in her mouth.
Medicinal chocolate. Her favourite kind.
She chewed slowly as she smoothed out a piece of notepaper. The paper was not frayed or torn, but it had obviously been read and re-read several times and now folded easily along its crease lines. It was the note that Grissom had left during their first attempt at AI.
'Hemingway had someone like you in mind when asked the definition of 'guts'. He replied,
Grace under pressure.
G.'
Sara folded the note carefully and slipped it into the back of the book that she was trying half-heartedly to read.
She sighed heavily and picked up her glass of milk. The 'pressure' bit she had down pat, it was the 'grace' bit that was proving troublesome. She just wanted to walk straight into Grissom's office and tell him everything. It was so frustrating to go to work each night and be so close to Grissom but so far away.
Sara disliked not having a definite plan to follow; she hated things up in the air. She was a 'doing' person, not a patient one. She wanted to be actively working on restoring Grissom's memory, not just hanging around on the off chance that it would come back.
She really wished that she had someone to talk to. The only person that she had ever opened up to had been Grissom and most of that had been in the last month. Now that she had finally got the taste for conversation she missed it more acutely.
Her mood swings were irritating her. One minute she was up and optimistic, the next she was down and weepy, then angry about the moods and her reactions to them. If this was what it was like at less than six weeks, heaven help her later on in the pregnancy.
She put the now empty milk glass on the phone table beside the armrest, then pulled the throw off the back of the sofa and spread it over her.
Sara's eyelids drooped and she put the book on the floor beside her sofa. Thank goodness - she was beginning to bore herself to sleep. She really ought to go to her bed, she'd just have a few minutes here before...
Sara slept at last.
Grissom scowled as he skipped through the information on the screen in front of him. It was a very thorough 'how to' guide for artificial insemination.
This must be what he meant in his diary about Sara asking for his help. Or he had collected the information himself in an effort to convince Sara not to go ahead with her plan.
Grissom removed the disk, shut down the laptop and leaned back in his chair. He rubbed his face with both hands and realised that he had another headache starting. He went to the bathroom and looked for some painkillers to try to offset the full headache. He swallowed a couple of the tablets with some water and returned to his bedroom.
He felt the same frustration he had earlier. He thought that he had all the information he needed, but he couldn't seem to organise it in his head, he couldn't concentrate. Something was hovering on the edge of his perception but it wouldn't come into full view.
Grissom returned the disk to the drawer with the photos and locked it again. He threw his robe on to the end of his bed, got back into bed and turned off the light.
He promised himself that if he were still awake in half an hour, he'd resort to a quick DIY session to help him sleep.
As Grissom settled into the cool pillow and closed his eyes, he had a bizarre thought.
He fancied a doughnut.
"...and lastly, Warrick and Greg, you have a decomp. in an apartment block. Neighbour has been complaining for 'ages' about the smell to the landlord and he finally found out why they hadn't seen the guy in 3B for weeks. Doesn't look like suspicious circ's, but keep an open mind."
Grissom handed out the last of the assignment slips to Warrick and pretended for the moment that he couldn't feel the laser hot glare that he was getting from Sara's end of the briefing table.
"Any questions? No? Okay."
Everyone got up from the table and scattered to their tasks except Sara. Greg risked a quick glance at her on his way out of them room and didn't envy Grissom right at this moment.
Boy was Sara pissed.
She stood up and opened her mouth as soon as the others had left.
Grissom held up one hand.
" Not here."
Sara's mouth closed with a snap and she followed Grissom back to his office.
Grissom did not take refuge behind his desk but turned to face Sara head on.
"Okay. You're angry that I put you on the jewellery robbery instead of the decomp."
"Yes! You know that I - "
Grissom interrupted firmly, knowing exactly what she was going to say.
"Sara, I was not asking for your input, I was handing out assignments. I did as I saw fit and will continue to do so. Greg hasn't had a decomp. yet and this will be good experience for him. Catherine is on the murdered traffic cop with Nick because as she often likes to point out, she has seniority."
Grissom's voice softened slightly, but he was still the Supervisor.
"I put you on the robbery because you have sharp instincts for a lie and I had the impression from Brass that this isn't a straightforward job. The fact that it will be easier on your stomach was also a consideration, but it was a secondary one."
Sara visibly calmed, but she still had some fight left.
"Then you're not sidelining me because of my condition?"
"No. Just being aware of it. But my decision wouldn't have been any different if you weren't pregnant."
"Oh." Sara looked at him as he leaned back on his desk.
"So what will you be doing?"
The twinkle in Grissom's eyes reminded her of Gil.
"Thought I'd come with you."
Sara's first and instant naughty thought was that it wouldn't be the first time. She clamped her lips together to prevent the words slipping out, but she couldn't hide the smirk.
She forgave him.
"Cool."
The encounter set the tone on the next few weeks at work. For both of them it was a poignant journey into the past to a happier time before the 'this' that Grissom did not know what to do about. Although deeply affected by Gil's continued absence, Sara took some comfort from the return of the slightly flirty solicitous Grissom.
Some nights it was the sweetest torture.
If any of the rest of the graveyard shift noticed they did not comment overtly. All of them had Nick's storeroom experience fresh in their minds.
As the nights passed and the work progressed in its usual fashion, Grissom became more restive about his amnesia. He still had the nagging feeling that he was missing some big clue that would tie everything up in a neat bow and this was reinforced by his certainty that Sara was hiding something from him.
So when Grissom found himself on a night off, he decided to sit down and tackle the problem as if it were a difficult case.
He took a block of writing paper to the dining room table and spent several minutes assembling his thoughts. He started to write.
It didn't take long and shortly Grissom put down his pen and took a sip of his cooling coffee. As he read through the list he tried to detach the 'evidence' from any personal connection to either himself or Sara, so that he could see it just as a 'case' for conclusion.
Female DNA present in house.
From diary: One year left for female to conceive. Request / offer of 'help'. 'S' at three and four day intervals.
Possibility of holiday 'together?
Female pregnant.
Grissom frowned as he read through the list. Although he was thorough and methodical and went by the book - most of the time - his experience had often shown him that his first instinctive 'gut' response often turned out to be right. He was a great believer in the principal behind Occam's razor; namely, that the simplest explanation is often the right one.
Having said that, Paige Ryecroft had given him a healthy respect for the Chaos Theory as well.
Either way he would try to stick to facts and what he could prove.
But as he listened to his gut now he wondered if this time he could be wrong, because if he didn't know better, he'd swear that...
No.
Grissom's stomach dipped and flipped in a way that no roller coaster had ever managed to create.
She couldn't have.
HE wouldn't have.
Surely not...?
Grissom ran a shaking hand over his beard in a nervous smoothing gesture.
After several seconds of frozen speculation, he went to his briefcase and took out his diary and day planner.
He looked at the 'S' flagged dates. He checked them all against his work calendar and they had at least one thing in common.
Not one of them was on a day that he or Sara was scheduled to appear in court.
'Sara has asked for my help...I can't believe that I've agreed.'
The sentence he had written in his diary suddenly took on a whole new meaning.
Dear God.
Had he supplied Sara with what she had needed for AI?
If that were so, then he was the father of Sara's baby.
What the hell had he done?
Catherine jumped in surprise as the door to the ladies washroom swung open just as she was reaching for the handle.
She was even more surprised when someone who closely resembled Grissom came storming - that was the only word for it - in.
It couldn't actually be Grissom, of course, because he would not storm into the ladies looking dishevelled and impossibly sexy in a pair of faded blue jeans and a midnight blue T.
Especially not on his day off.
"Gil? What -?"
"Where is she?"
Even as bit out his question Grissom noted that all but one of the stall doors was open.
He crossed the floor rapidly and banged on the one closed stall door.
"I know you're in there, come on out Sara!"
Grissom looked briefly back at Catherine.
"Leave."
It did not occur to Catherine to disobey. She was half way to the door of the room before she had even rationalised her decision. She had known Gil Grissom a long time and she had never seen him quite like this. Not even when he had hauled Eddie off her out in the corridor had he been this steamed.
The last thing Catherine saw as the door closed was Grissom checking that the other stalls were empty.
Sara flushed the toilet and arranged her clothing. Her heart was in her mouth at the tone in Grissom's voice.
"Sara!"
There was another bang on the cubicle door and Sara took in a deep breath to help her relax.
It didn't work.
She opened the door anyway and stepped out into the glare from a pair of wonderfully blue eyes.
"What can I do for you Grissom?"
Grissom felt an entirely unwarranted anger at her apparent calmness as she crossed the room to wash her hands. He wanted to rattle her as he had been rattled himself.
"Just to be clear, I don't give a crap what the doctor said about my memory. I want a straight answer from you; yes or no - none of the run-around that you've been giving me lately."
Sara nodded warily as she dried her hands.
"Okay."
There was a long silence.
When Grissom finally did speak his voice seemed to echo off the walls.
"You asked for my help. I apparently agreed." Grissom paused, suddenly assailed by doubt that he had made another wrong conclusion.
"Am I the baby's father?"
As if in slow motion he watched the surprise appear briefly in Sara's face, along with her quickly quashed burst of hope. He saw one of her hands unconsciously fiddle with the gold necklace tucked into her shirt.
Time snapped back to the right speed as Sara simply said,
"Yes."
.
TBC