Okay, now for the Las Vegas side of the story...a bit of humor, or at least I think so.

Chapter Four- A Hard Day's Night

"Come on, Grissom." Sara whined from inside the locker room, buttoning up the front of her dress. "I don't really have to wear this do I?"

"Yes…get out here." He ordered, knocking from the outside.

"It's a dress…an ugly one at that!"

"Well, you wanted to go undercover before, and now I'm letting you." She angrily whipped the door open nearly hitting him with it on the way out. She was outfitted in a blue diner uniform dress, just like their past four victims.

"Why this time? You want a reason to laugh at me?"

"No, it's smaller than the supermarket and I can sit and drink coffee without looking suspicious. Oh, I almost forgot…your skates." He picked up a pair of white roller skates off the floor by their laces and handed them to her.

"Very funny. It's going to be your fault if I fall and get sued for spilling hot coffee on someone. I haven't worn skates since I was like thirteen."

"And remember you aren't Sara, your name is Lydia." He gave her a name plate pin to wear on her uniform. "I don't know how long this will take, so if anyone asks why you've been there so long, you are a single mother working doubles to keep your daughter in private school."

"Shouldn't you be asking Catherine to do this?"

"She's not this guy's type. She's a redhead and too old to fit the profile."

"Don't tell her that." She could just imagine the other woman's reaction if she had heard that last comment first hand.It was actually a good thing that they worked completely different shifts.

She had been waiting tables for hours. She was tired, her feet ached from the awful white roller skates, and though it's normal for the first time waiting tables, she still hated the fact she was clumsy enough to nearly dump a whole omelet in some young businessman's lap while he was discussing productivity with a co-worker on his cell phone at the time. She had dealt with deaf old couples who could hardly hear her asking for their orders. Parties of ten or more had showed up without reserving an appropriate size table. And she had heard too many complaints about toast being too burnt or eggs not being cooked as they requested. Everything that had happened just made her remember how unpleasant living humans could be to work around and that she'd rather say in the morgue with Doc Robbins.

Grissom had already drank a whole pot of coffee to himself, and hours ago had resulted to his handy dandy genius level crossword puzzles. Though compared to what he had witnessed Sara begrudgingly doing "in the name of forensics", he had the easy job.

He had an ear piece, as did she, that would transmit anything said to one another or anyone talking close enough to Sara to pick up on the bugged microphone hidden down the front of her dress. He was trying to seem inconspicuous to other people in the dinner, though his early breakfast hour was moving on toward lunch. They did however ask the owner of the diner first before setting up an undercover operation in their restaurant and they were glad to help.Since it slipped after the first victim was found that she had worked there, as did al the others, it had taken a toll on their normal number of customers.

There had been a few diners that had complemented Sara on how well she was doing even though she was rather new at it, or left a generous tip to help her out, but no one had been especially friendly, like in a possible suspect kind of way. That was until a late thirties man dressed in a business suit came in and sat at one of her tables and ordered, as he said, his usual blueberry pancake and a side of sausage.

"Um…Lydia…" He read from her name pin. "…Have you ever taken dance lessons?"

"No..actually I haven't taken any dance classes. Why do you ask, sir?" Sara repeated awkwardly louder so Grissom could easily hear it though the piece in his ear.

"Sara, keep your eye on him."Sara heard Gil say throughhis microphone. "All the victims had something in common…" She nodded to him from across the room but didn't say anything because of the man at the table. "…they all moved to Las Vegas to be dancers…showgirls…"

"You just seem so light on your feet, graceful. So many girls here are so clumsy…running in to people, spilling things."

"Well sir, if you were here earlier…then you might think differently." She nervously smiled back, not knowing of he was a man who was just normally odd or she was smiling in the face of a possible serial killer.

She waited until he finished up his meal and had left the restaurant to bag up his coffee cup and the silverware he used to bring it back to the lab and, hopefully with the license plane number she had quickly scribbled down as he left, get a match to wrap up the case.

There was a loud clanging of bells against a glass window pane as Grissom opened the heavy wooden door for Sara trailing close behind. As they emerged into the darkened room, Grissom's nose was greeted with the smell of cigarette smoke, and his ears with the loud cheering of the men crowded around the football game playing on ESPN at the one end of the bar. Sara had been there so many times she didn't notice it any more.

Sara lead the way past the men in red and blue jerseys and hopped up on her usual stool at the farthest end of the bar, resting her elbows up on the water stained wood and waited for Gil the follow suit.

"I don't think I need to ask if you come here often." He coughed, getting up on the stool beside her.

"A few drinks and you won't notice it."

"Should you be here? What about your counseling?" He asked in a worried tone.

"Relax...I haven't been here in months?"

Just then the bartender came up to the two. "Hey Sara!" He grabbed a coaster and a green bottle and sets it in front of her. "The usual, right? It's been so long."

"See. I told you." She gloated to Gil.

"And who's your friend?" The young man questioned Sara.

"This is Grissom...Gil Grissom, my supervisor. Griss, this is Sam the bartender. We're celebrating." She introduced.

"So this is the infamous Mr. Grissom. What can I get for you?"

"Oh, the same." While Sam got his drink, he asked Sara quietly, "You talk about me?"

"Well, you do know you're on the news every few weeks."

"And she used to talk about you too." Sam smiled to Sara, knowing very well she didn't really want him to know that. "Enjoy." He set Gil's drink down and wandered off toward the other end of the bar.

"There really is a place where everyone knows your name."

"No, it's just Sam. He has a good memory." She picked up her drink. "To what shall we toast?"

"To the Graveyard shift. May we all be together again one day?"

"Oh, I'll definitely drink to that." Though she had always stuck by that since it even happened, her reasons had changed. At first it was about Sophia and Grissom, but now she just missed being around Nick and Warrick. They were like brothers to her,although both she and Greg still hated having to work with her.

Sara clinked her bottle with his and downed nearly half of it. "Whoa slow down."

"What, you afraid you can't keep up with me?"

"I know I can't keep up with you." He watched as a near empty bottle hit the bar. He was worried about her. He always was, when he drove her home from the police station after she got pulled over, when he went to talk to her after Ecklie had suspended her, and when she got herself too investing in a case, fearing she just might do something stupid. He still remembered seeing three empty bottles and one half gone in her hand when he went to check up on her that day.

"Come on, we're supposed to be celebrating." She nudged his shoulders as she swiveled back in forth on her stool. She suddenly stopped. "You never seemed the celebrating type. At Greg's 'I finally passed' party, you were there for ten minutes and then said something about having to feed your bugs or something and never came back." Sara laughed at the thought of Grissom ever having fun at any party whatsoever.

"Speaking of that...are you sure Greg wouldn't have a problem with this?" Grissom asked hesitantly.

"Me having a drink, or a few drinks, with our supervisor after wrapping up one of the most frustrating cases we've seen...why would he care?"

"Sara, I know what's going on with you two. You're inseparable."

"Well at least one of us knows. Would you care to explain it to me?" Grissom looked at her strangely, most likely wondering if she had already had too much from the bar. "We decided to take things more serious,more official,but I don't even know what was happening between us before. It's just all so confusing. I mean, I'm actually happy for once."

With that Grissom called the bartender over and ordered up something a bit stronger. He was going to need it. He didn't want to hear about Greg. He already knew how happy she was, it showed, but for the two of them to talk about her and another man, it hurt. It was like a big slap in the face at all the ways he had pushed her away throughout the years.

A bit later...

Sara raised her glass, but saw Grissom wasn't paying attention. She rolled her eyes and set her glass down on the bar, hitting against the wood to get his attention. Once he looked back in her direction, she raised her glass once again.

"Not another toast." He said annoyed, not sounding quite like himself. "What is…what is there left to toast to?" The pitch in his voice changed as he tried to get the words out. Surely no one had seen this side of Grissom, not even Sara, but she was too much like him at the moment to realize that.

"To being the best damn workaholics in all of Las Vegas!" She hit her glass against his own. Not realizing her own strength, she caused some of her drink to spill over the side of the once full glass.

"Hey, watch your mouth!" Grissom advised.

"That's nothing compared to what I'd like to tell Ecklie." She looked over to Grissom who was sitting beside her not saying a word, only zoned out staring at the framed dollar bill on the wall opposite him. "Grissom?" She asked almost child-like. "Whatcha thinking about?" She was twirling a curl of her hair in her fingers, something she never usually would do.

"What was it that went so wrong between us?"

It was the dreaded question that Sara had always wanted to ask before, but was always so afraid to bring up. She had wanted to put him on the spot, back him in a corner. But now he was the one asking her for them instead.

"Well, you…I think you were afraid to do something about it… 'cause God knows I tried." Gil opened his mouth to speak, but Sara kept talking. "I asked you out to dinner and you said, 'I don't know what to do about this.'" She drunkenly imitated lowering her voice.

"And you just got tired of waiting for me?"

"Yeah."

"Well, I'm sorry."

"You better be." She playfully hit him in the shoulder. "You think we could ever be friends again?"

"We aren't now?"

Grissom downed what little was left in his glass and waved to Sam for another round for both of them. "Sorry, I think you've had enough."

"Well, I sir…" He hiccupped between slurred words. "…don't think so."

"Why don't I call you a cab?"

Grissom sighed, "Fine." He pulled out his wallet and paid for their tab.

Please, I'd love to hear from you, good or bad...I think I can take it.From now on I won't post the next chapter until I get five reviews, though I won't post twice in one day, so it would be be up the next day.