----- ----- -----

Chapter 4: Revelations Shared

----- ----- -----

"Catherine?"

Glancing up from her work, she saw Grissom standing in the nearby doorway to the layout room looking completely helpless. She raised an eyebrow rather than directly answer him.

"Will you please talk to Aidia? She won't tell me what's wrong and she's barricaded herself in the women's bathroom."

Catherine looked down and went back to sorting through her evidence. "Did you ever think that maybe there's a reason why she won't tell you what's wrong?" she asked, shaking her head.

"I don't know. That's kinda why I wanted to talk to her. She burst out at Warrick in front of everyone about some conversation they've had regarding Fayre and it's obviously affecting the rest of the team."

"So why don't you talk to her about it?"

"Because she ran away from me, Catherine! I'm worried about her. I'm worried about everyone for that matter. There's obviously something going on and it's pulling everyone away from their work, especially Sara. Come on, Catherine, you're supposed to be my friend."

"Don't you dare pull the guilt card out on me, Grissom," she warned. "I am your friend… So what?"

"So help me out here."

Catherine sighed. "Let me get this straight. You want me to once again bail you out of a potentially embarrassing situation so you can sit back, say it's been taken care of, and save yourself the trouble of showing someone that you actually do care about them, whether romantically or otherwise… Is that about it?"

Getting nothing but a clueless look in response, she shrugged and walked to the door.

"Hey, why not? At least this time it's not Sara."

With that, she pushed past him and made her way down the hall, wondering if he tried to be an emotionally challenged asshole or if it was just a God-given gift.

Coming to the ladies room, she opened the door to see Aidia leaning over the sink, having just splashed her face with water.

"Hey."

Aidia turned, apparently not having heard anyone else come in.

"Hey," she said, turning back to the sink to dry her face with a paper towel.

"You all right?"

"I cannot believe I just did that!"

Assuming that she meant screaming at Warrick, Catherine shrugged. "Hey, it's alright. I know better than anyone that sometimes people just need to be verbally slapped."

'Although physically slapped is always a bad choice either,' she added silently, her mind wandering back to her conversation with Grissom moments before.

"Well, that he deserved, but I could've at least waited till after assignments. I didn't mean to embarrass him, especially in front of Fayre. She really likes Warrick." After a moment, she seemed to realize what she'd just said and her head snapped up, her eyes wide with alarm and her hand flying to her mouth.

Catherine laughed. "Secret's safe with me. For future reference, though, if it's something private, I wouldn't share with Warrick or Greg, otherwise it won't stay secret for long."

"Thanks, but it's a little late for that. It'll probably be all over the lab by now if news travels as fast as you say." Aidia groaned. "Fayre's gonna kill me!"

Catherine's brow furrowed. "Mind if I ask why?"

"Warrick came in to help when Fayre had her panic attack-"

"Wait! Fayre had a panic attack?"

"Yeah, and when Sara came in, I pulled him out to give Fayre some privacy. He started asking what was wrong, why she freaked out. I hesitated because I figured Fayre would tell everyone when she was ready, but he looked really worried, so I made him swear not to tell anyone…"

"Look," Catherine interrupted. "If he swore he wouldn't tell, then he didn't tell. If there's one thing I know about Warrick, it's that you can always trust him to keep his word."

"Then how the hell did Grissom know what happened?" Aidia snapped.

"Maybe you should ask Warrick."

----- ----- -----

Though he'd entered with a feeling of nervous anticipation, Nick came out of Grissom's office an hour later with the sense of a burden lifted. Though he hadn't told Grissom why, he'd finally gotten it across that molestation cases bothered him. After some badgering, he'd also gotten through that the past leaves scars that can be reopened on a case, not just with him but with others as well.

Thinking that maybe things would be more pleasant around the lab, Nick walked into the layout lab to see Aidia working diligently on her case. He leaned in the doorframe, watching her sift through everything she and Catherine had brought back from the alley behind the strip club, trying to pick out what was evidence and what was garbage.

"Need some help?"

"Hi, Nick," she said without looking up. "What's up?"

"Absolutely nothing. I'm on standby, so I came to see how you were doing."

"Me, or my case?" she challenged.

Nick laughed, and came to the table, pulled on a pair of gloves, and started to help separate potential evidence.

"Your vic was strangled, right?"

"Yeah… How'd you know?"

A guilty smile crossed his face as he added and empty soda bottle to the garbage pile. "I read the report. Do we know what with?"

"Not sure yet," she answered. "We're waiting on the mold from the wound. Coroner hasn't sent it down yet, but I was there for the autopsy and it looked like a cord of some kind. Maybe a belt."

Silence settled as they sorted out items under the halogen bulbs of the lights overhead, both concentrating on their work but feeling oddly distracted. When Aidia caught Nick staring at her, she laughed and asked what exactly he was staring at.

"Nothing… It's just that you're good at your job, and I was trying to imagine you doing anything else. Somehow I just can't picture it."

"Picture what?"

"I don't know. What did you do before you were a CSI?"

She smirked. "I worked my way through college. Three nights a week, I'd travel down to the dark side of underground Boston. I used to hear the other dorm kids talk about it all the time…" she chuckled dryly. "What I didn't hear was that the dark side wasn't all it's cracked up to be."

"I thought you enjoyed it."

She eyed him questioningly.

He shrugged. "First night here, you sort of hinted at it. It sounded like you really loved it."

Aidia scoffed. "I loved the theory behind it. The glitz and the glamour… Everyone staring at you… To be someone they longed for… It didn't take me long to figure out that there is no glamour in that world. They weren't staring at me, they were staring at my tits, and I wasn't longed for, I was lusted after."

Nick looked up to see her now tossing things into piles, her frustration mounting.

"I loved the attention, but I hated what came with it. I was nothing but a piece of meat to them, but policy stated that the customer always gets what he wants…"

Nick stripped off his gloves and came to her side of the table. She was now throwing items down on the table so hard he was afraid they were going to break, her eyes burning with anger as she relived the past that haunted her. He grabbed her wrists gently but held them firm as he stood behind her. After a moment of struggle, she gave in and relaxed, finally turning into him and resting her head on his chest.

Learning in so his lips were right next to her ear, he whispered, "You deserve better than that, Aidia."

She chuckled and closed her eyes. "That's what Fayre used to say. It's funny; Sara never minded so much, but Fayre abhorred it. She always said I could do so much better. I didn't believe her, and when I said so, it set her off."

"What'd she do?"

"Well, first I got an earful. Then she told Sara and me about this seminar on forensic science and practically forced us to go. It was what she was studying, and we were both mildly interested in it, so…" She shrugged. "It's kind of ironic. All three of us ended up in the same job in the same lab all these years later and our boss is the same guy that taught the seminar that got it all started."

"You went to Grissom's seminar?"

"Yeah. We all got hooked. Coincidence?"

"Grissom always says there are no coincidences, but whether that pertains to life or just the evidence, I don't know."

Thy stood in that position for a moment longer, reflecting on the revelations shared, before Aidia looked up.

"Nick?"

"Yeah?"

"Can I have my hands back now?"

"Oh, sorry," he mumbled, blushing slightly as he let go of her wrists and went back to his own side of the table.

The next hour was spent in silence sorting through the remainder of the pile, an occasional glance from one to the other, bringing a smile or two along the way. When they were done and were in the process of putting their gloves in evidence bags, their pagers went off.

"Grissom," Nick said.

"Doc," Aidia mumbled.

As they headed or the door and were about to go their separate ways, Aidia turned. "You know, you never answered my question from before."

"What question was that?"

"You said you were on standby so you came to see how I was doing. I asked 'Me or my case?'"

Nick laughed and started walking toward Grissom's office.

"Nick? … NICK!" Aidia called, stamping her foot and smiling while holding her place by the layout room door.

He turned at the end of the hall with a smile and called out,

"It was you."

----- ----- -----