Disclaimer/Author's Note – See Chapter One.
Chapter Nine – Search & Rescue
As their SUV hurried through the desert landscape, the little boy's face haunted Sara. Swollen from the beating he'd sustained, his sorrowful eyes stared up at her as though begging her to make things right in the world. Relying on her to bring back his big sister.
Grissom's gentleness with the child had almost done her in. In a soft voice, he guided Mikey through his story, managing to extract all the important information from him while trying not to cause additional trauma.
"Can you tell me what happened, Mikey?"
The child's voice, even an hour later, as she remembered it, brought tears to her eyes.
"Daddy was mad at me because I wouldn't stop crying."
It was a pathetic excuse (as any excuse would be) for hitting a child, much less for beating one into unconsciousness. But Mikey believed it. He felt culpable in his own abuse. As they left the hospital room, he was crying in his mothers arms, apologizing for acting like a baby. Not for the first time, Sara wished she could forgo the responsibilities of her job in law enforcement and beat the bastard to a pulp.
She also wished she could just have an hour in which to unburden herself of all the misery she was feeling. She just wanted to lock herself in a room and sob all the pain away. And that made her feel incredibly selfish. After all this child had gone through, all his sister was still going through, she was thinking about her own pain, her own problems.
Sitting in the car next to Grissom in silence, she was still thinking about those problems, becoming angrier every second she spent focused on them. She was working herself into a fury – angry with herself, angry with Jill and, as irrational as it was, she was even angry with Grissom. Why had he allowed himself to get mixed up in her life now, when she could cause him the most damage? And still he stayed, trying to convince her that it wasn't her fault, knowing full well that every moment he spent with her meant another nail in the coffin of his career.
It had crossed her mind that morning at her apartment when she sent him home alone and it crossed her mind again now – how much better off he would be without her. But she couldn't think about that now, much less come to a decision. A child was still in danger and she had a job to do.
Mikey's information was enough to secure a warrant for the address Sara had found. His father had told them he was taking them to their 'Aunt Jess's' house. Now Brass, two patrol cars and Grissom and Sara's Tahoe were on their way there too.
The property was a ramshackle assortment of buildings, resembling what might have been a working farm at one point in history. At the last possible moment, they announced their presence with sirens and one patrol car blocked the driveway, while Sara and Grissom hung back, in case there was any trouble.
They watched in silence as Brass's car trundled up the rest of the way to the front of the property. Hopping out of the driver's seat, he was immediately flanked by two uniformed officers as he approached the front door and rapped sharply.
"Michael Harper! Las Vegas PD!"
They heard a bang as the back door flew open, and someone they could only assume was Mike Harper made a run for it.
Grissom could feel Sara tense beside him. Sensing she was about to take off after their suspect, he grabbed her arm, keeping her at his side.
"Let the cops do their job, Sara," he said in a quiet but firm voice.
Two of the uniforms had already cut off Harper's escape route. He changed direction clumsily, only to find another policeman in his path. Even from a distance, Sara could tell he'd been drinking. The chase lasted barely a minute, with Harper staggering more and more, unable to evade his pursuers. He was firmly in the grasp of two cops when Brass reached him.
"Where is she?"
Harper was the picture of innocence as he shrugged.
"I don't know what you're talking about."
Wrenching herself from Grissom's grasp, Sara launched herself forwards, hurrying towards their suspect.
"Where's Jane? What have you done with her?"
As he followed Sara, Grissom spotted a woman, Jess he assumed, standing just inside the front door, her arms folded, impassively watching the scene. Nodding to two of the police officers nearest the house, he called out instructions to search the house for the girl but to touch nothing.
Sara reached Harper several steps before Grissom did, and he could tell from her posture that she was doing her best to control herself, and for that he was grateful. The last thing he needed her to do right now was to attack a suspect.
"What have you done with her, you son of a bitch?"
Harper regarded her disdainfully. "Go to hell, lady," he spat.
"You'll be in hell if we don't find that little girl alive and well."
Harper turned his attention to Grissom as he arrived at Sara's side. "You want to keep her under control, pal?"
Grissom looked at him like the dirt he was. "You don't tell us where your daughter is, and she'll be the least of your problems, pal."
Three quarters of an hour later, Harper still wasn't forthcoming with the whereabouts of his daughter. He and the lady of the house had been taken into custody, while the police commenced their search. The initial search of the house was followed up by a more detailed one by Grissom and Sara, while the four police officers that had accompanied them searched the exterior of the property and the many out-buildings.
Sara barely spoke, though Grissom noted a steely glaze that had fallen over her eyes, which told him she was both upset and angered by proceedings. He felt his own professional veneer slipping every time her glanced round to check on her, desperately wanting to forget they were at a crime scene so that he could just gather her up in his arms and take the pain away.
It didn't take too long before she was frustrated beyond reason.
"This is ridiculous!" she stated, getting up off her haunches, having been crouched down for the better part of five minutes looking for loose floor boards in the living room. "She's not in here."
Grissom kept his voice cool and calm to counteract hers. "We have to keep looking."
Breathing out in frustration, she made her way to the door. "You keep looking here, then. I'm going to go search the property."
The cops were already covering the barn and the larger out-buildings near the house, so Sara made her way to the buildings further away. What she guessed was an old tool shed, along with a tiny outside toilet were both empty.
The third building she entered could only have been the slaughter house, judging from the multitude of now rusting hooks that hung from the rafters. Fighting off the urge to shiver, she looked around for any place suitable to hide a small child. Unfortunately, there were many such places.
"Jane!" she called out, her voice echoing around the place in a haunting manner. "My name's Sara. You don't need to be scared. I'm here to bring you back to your Mom."
Avoiding a dangerous piece of rusting metal, Sara slid open a cupboard door. Nothing was inside but the carcass of a dead rat. Placing her sleeve across her nose and mouth, she slid the door closed again.
"Jane! If you can hear me, tell me where you are." No reply, except the echo of her own voice.
Making her way to the far side of the building, she pried open another door, so stiff she doubted it had been opened in decades. There was nothing at the other side of it except more piles of rusting metal.
She was about to give up hope and move on to the next building when she heard it. The tiniest of noises. She became perfectly still as she listened with all her might. And then it came again.
"Help me."
The voice was so quiet, so muffled; Sara could barely make it out. But she was in no doubt of what she had heard.
"Jane. My name's Sara. Where are you honey?"
Silence for a moment, an excruciatingly long moment, until… "I don't know. It's dark."
The child sounded terrified. Hunkering closer to where she's though the voice was coming from, Sara tried to keep her own voice strong and reassuring. "It's okay, sweetheart. We're going to get you out of there and get you home, okay?"
Moving quickly, she ran to the door of the building to alert the rest of the search party.
"I've found her!"
Dashing back to the corner where she heard the voice, she started talking again. "We're going to get you out of there, Jane. Just keep talking to me. I'll follow the sound of your voice, okay."
"Okay," came the tiny reply. "How's my little brother? Did you find him?"
Sara had begun moving debris out of the way, searching for a door or something that would lead to Jane. "Yes. We found him. He's safe. He's with your Mom. Which is exactly where you're going to be very soon. Keep talking to me."
Brass and a handful of cops piled into the building, followed quickly by Grissom. By that time, Sara had already figured out Jane's hiding place.
"See the drag marks," she pointed out to them. "He dragged this piece of machinery over some kind of trapdoor, I'll bet. Piled a lot of detritus on top of it. I need help moving it all."
It took them only a few moments to clear the area of debris and uncover the hidden trapdoor beneath. Rushing forward, Sara opened the door with a gloved hand to reveal the wide, scared eyes of the little girl.
"It's okay, honey," she whispered, scooping her up into her arms. "You're safe now."
By the time they had driven back to Vegas and reunited Jane with her Mother and brother, Sara was emotionally drained. There was intense satisfaction in having found the little girl and arrested her abusive father, but the needlessness of the whole situation still stuck in her throat. Children should not have to go through experiences like these.
Grissom found her getting some air outside the hospital entrance.
"Do you want to go to PD for the interrogation?" he asked her, noting how tired and strung out she looked.
Slowly, she shook her head. "I, uh… I think I'll just head back to the lab and start logging the evidence we collected out at the house. Okay?"
Thinking it was probably for the best, Grissom agreed. "Okay."
"See you later," she said, not looking up, walking off towards the SUV before he could utter another word.
"Summations are first thing tomorrow morning," the District Attorney, Marcus Rutherford, grumbled. "You've cut this very fine."
Catherine shot him a look that would curdle milk. "You didn't exactly give us a lot of time on this. Now, would you like to waste even more time, or do you want to hear our findings?"
Appropriately discomfited, Rutherford sat back in his chair, ready to listen. Satisfied, Catherine nodded to Sofia, giving her the floor.
Sofia got straight to the point. "Catherine and I have gone through every piece of evidence, all of the case notes and interviewed the lab technicians involved in processing the evidence in this case. There is no evidence of any cover-up or anything else improper taking place."
Rutherford raised an eyebrow. "There's still the question of Supervisor Grissom being involved in the handling of evidence. The defense…"
"The defense are doing a tap-dance routine to distract the jury," Catherine cut him off. "Grissom and Sara Sidle were not involved in a personal relationship at the time of this investigation. There was no reason for Grissom to remove himself from the case. The defense can cry about it all they want. There is no evidence of any wrong doing by any member of this lab."
The DA sighed and looked to Ecklie. "I'm not sure it'll make much difference anymore, Catherine," Ecklie admitted. "Your internal investigation may have cleared Grissom, but it may be too late to sway the jury."
Catherine shook her head. "That's ridiculous. Jill is as guilt as sin."
"That as maybe," Rutherford replied. "But the defense has pushed the reasonable doubt argument very hard the whole way through this trial. All it takes is one or two doubting Thomases in the jury, and we're in trouble."
"Everything logged?" Grissom asked as he entered the layout room several hours later to find Sara immersed in paper work; boxes and envelops of evidence laid out in front of her.
"This is the last piece," she replied, not looking up. "I'll leave the report on your desk when I'm done."
He suddenly felt incredibly frustrated. Sara had always given him her full attention in the past, whether in the professional realm or, more recently, in the realm of the personal. Now she was actively not looking at him.
"Sara."
The impatience in her voice did not mask the other emotion that was present. Distance.
"I said I'm nearly done, Grissom."
Still no eye contact. Grissom sighed out in frustration and rubbed a hand idly over his beard. Surely she wasn't mad at him? Had he done anything to piss her off in the past 48 hours? Racking his brains for the slightest clue, he concluded that he had not. He'd been nothing but supportive of her. Maybe a little too supportive, the paranoid sector of his brain suggested. Maybe you're suffocating her…
He stood by the door watching her, suddenly realizing what he'd been like when he'd shut her out all of those years. Cold and distance, finding eye contact difficult. All because he had been afraid of hurting her. And, most especially, because he had been afraid of getting hurt.
Things had been going so well between them, and as much as he wanted to avoid putting too much pressure on her, he'd be damned if he let her repeat his mistakes by keeping him at arms length.
While he'd been lost in thought, Sara had risen to her feet and begun to gather the evidence into her arms.
"Let me help you with that."
"It's okay. I can manage."
Stepping forward, he picked up a large box from the table. "Sara, let me help, okay?"
"Okay," she said reluctantly. "Thanks."
They didn't speak on their way to the evidence vault, the silence laying heavy between them. Once everything was inside and the door safely locked, Grissom decided to try again.
"Shift's over. Would you like to grab some breakfast?"
She shook her head, granting him a small, regretful smile. "Not today. I just… I'm just going to head home." She looked at him, her eyes meeting his for a split second before darting away again. "I'll see you tonight."
As she started towards the locker room, Grissom felt anger start to build within him. Why was she pushing him away?
"What's wrong?" he asked, his tone halting her steps.
Barely looking back over her shoulder, she feigned confusion. "What do you mean?"
Not wanting to have a scene with her in the middle of the corridor, he nodded his head in the opposite direction. "Let's go to my office." Without waiting for her to acquiesce, he stalked off in that direction, not stopping or turning around until he reached his desk. He was relieved to see that she'd followed him.
"What are you doing?" he asked her, his eyes searching her face for a clue to what she was thinking.
"What the county pays me for, Grissom. My job."
She did flippant better than anyone he knew and right now it was pissing him off.
"Shut the door."
Ignoring the reproachful look she shot him, he waited until the rest of the lab was excluded from their conversation.
"What's going on with you?" he asked her. "You've been avoiding me."
She looked at him as though he'd lost his mind. "I've been working with you on this case. I'd hardly call that 'avoiding' you."
"Stop it Sara," he replied, losing his battle with himself to keep his voice down. "Stop pretending nothing is wrong. I'm meant to be the asshole of this relationship. I'm the one who avoids you, who runs away, who hides behind the job to avoid intimacy. You think five years of practice hasn't given me sufficient ability to spot that behavior in you? You've barely been able to look me in the eye since I got back from court. We haven't spent any personal time alone together, much less talked about everything that's happened."
She bent her head, her stoic façade cracking. Seeing her upset, he immediately hated himself for being angry and went to her, cradling her cheek in his hand. "Sara, how can I help you if you won't let me in?"
It would be so easy, she thought. Just to give in, to let him take care of her. To act like the helpless woman Jill wanted her to become and just let him wrap his arms around her and sob into his shirt. But she couldn't do it.
"Maybe I don't want you to help," she said, her voice quiet but firm. "Maybe it's something I have to do alone."
And with that, she had left his office before he even knew how to respond.
Sara sat in the locker room, both mentally and physically exhausted. She was grateful that Grissom hadn't followed her – the last thing she needed was another heart-wrenching conversation. And yet, she didn't hurry to leave the building; a small part of her (the weak part, she thought) wanted him to find her.
When Nick came in at the end of his shift, she was gathering her things together.
"Hey," he greeted her cheerfully. "Greg and me are heading out for some breakfast. You up for joining us?"
Grateful for the offer, she sadly shook her head. "Sorry, Nick. It'll have to be another time. I have somewhere I need to be."
Half an hour later, Sara slipped into the back of the courtroom, just as Helen Spencer stood to give her closing statement.
TBC.