Here's hoping this works this time around.

I'm so stoked that everyone likes my story. Even the Snickers and anyone who thought stalker stories are too contrived, I'm one of them(that's where this story came form) I really don't like the idea that Sara would just go soft and hide at Grissom's while he confessed his undying love...wait I did that...but it's not tacky...right?

Tessa works too hard and I love that she keeps telling what she thinks after fixing my mistakes. You're beautiful.


"I just finished talking with a Doctor Montgomery. He doesn't a record for a male with OCD involving numbers in that style. He did give us a lecture though." Nick said into the phone as Catherine moved through the building to meet up with Warrick. "He says in some cases the patients don't take or like their prescriptions, like Prozac, Paxil, or Zoloft. So instead they self medicate with heroine, morphine and methadone. It works the same only like any addictive drug; money trouble. Oh and Doctor Montgomery says Sara must have done something to the stalkers routine to piss him off."

"She went on a date. Remember the first note came then. Is that really enough?"

"I guess so. You know Sara, you could set your watch by her. She'd be an OCD's ideal mate." Catherine nodded her head and turned the corner to the morgue.

"Okay, where are you on your field trip?" she asked Nick as she ran into Warrick, she held up a finger to signal for him to wait. She eyed the report in his hand.

"One more doc to go. I'm crossing my fingers that this doc has the file on our guy."

"Okay. See you later."

"Later." She snapped her cell shut and gave Warrick a tired look. "I thought Greg had the hand?"

"He had to run with something else for his own case, felt bad that he couldn't help." He held out the report. "The hand was severed peri-mortem. Rick's still alive but not for long according to Doc Robbins."

"Shit!" she swore loudly.

Warrick silently agreed with the sentiment and followed her to the break room.

"What did Nick have to say?" he asked.

Catherine relayed the information Nick told her and how so far they were moving backwards instead of forward. "Sara must be beside herself." She said after a few moments of silence.

"She's tough, besides Griss is with her." Warrick assured her shrugging, he gestured to the coffee machine. Catherine nodded and gave him a doubtful look.

"Have you learned nothing? Grissom to Sara's emotions is like water to oil. She might just as well be talking to a bust of Grissom." He thought about that and decided she was right, "And." Catherine continued. "Imagine the guilt of knowing something you did caused an innocent man to have his hands hacked off."

"But she couldn't have known that was gonna happen. And they weren't hacked off, it was a clean cut with an axe."

"Whatever. Anyway, no not the first time but the second?" a humourless smile reached her lips, "I pity Grissom right now, having to deal with Sara when she probably wants to kill him."

Warrick chuckled.

"Yeah, picture Grissom huddled in the corner while Sara goes at him with a butcher knife."

Catherine tried not to choke on her coffee.

"Naw, I don't think Sara has the balls to go off on Grissom."

"No, huh?" Warrick asked, his blue eyes gleaming. "I hear she almost took a suspects head off."

Catherine raised her eyebrows in disbelief.

"When was that?"

"Shelton case a few years ago. Right when she became a vegetarian."

"Oh, wasn't that when Grissom did that Linear Regression with his bugs to prove that the vic had been dead for five days?"

"Yeah, only the bugs said three days. They watched a pig rot to show it was really five days." He corrected.

Catherine bobbed her head remembering the past.

"Those were better days for them. I wonder what happened."

Warrick wondered that too.

"Yeah, Griss' used to be fun. Now he's kind of dead. Emotionless, like something died inside him."

Catherine figured if she had to take a guess as to when Grissom had changed it would be around the time of the Debbie Marlin case. Her thoughts were interrupted by the present Grissom rushing towards them with a slight bit of terror mixed with anger on his face.

"Is she here?" he asked, his voice tinged with fear.

"What?" Catherine asked. The sight of an askew Grissom was sending her common sense through a loop.

"Sara, is she here? After the note she left. I thought she might come here. I searched the streets on the way here but nothing…" he explained.

"She's not here." Catherine answered.

"Did you check Rick's place?" Warrick asked.

Grissom shook his head.

Catherine wasted no time and dialled Brass.

"Jim, Sara took off. Send someone over to Rick's place."

"Will do. Have you checked her place?" Brass asked.

"No, but we will."

"Do it."

Catherine turned to Grissom.

"Check Sara's house."

"Why would she go there?" Warrick asked looking for an answer from the other two.

"Because." Grissom started. "That's where her stalker wants her to be."

TBC…

Up next... Sara waits...

As for the title, yes it's Bare Feet. I think I should have made it longer and gone with Bare Feet and Socks. It'll be explained in chapter 17.