Author: Joyce
Title: The Consequences of Flirting
Disclaimer: Nope, still not mine.
Note: There is one more chapter to go after this one. I can't believe this turned out to be a 16 chapter long story. I never saw that one coming! Thank you all for the kind words and for being my inspiration. Enjoy this one!
Silence, fools and confessions
Several months later…
Warrick woke up with a frown, sensing that she was gone already. She did that often, getting up early to go to work while he took the time to enjoy his spare time. He loved his quality hours with her and had no intention to let work interrupt them. Not Sara however, she would come to him and laugh with him, sleep with him but when that damn phone rang...She was gone and he was left without her. He was starting to feel like work was always going to be more important.
When he entered the lab a couple of hours later he found her in the trace lab, her eyebrows furrowed, completely focused on the piece of evidence lying in front of her.
"Hey," he greeted her softly and she looked up with a warm smile.
"Hey yourself," was her reply while she motioned for him to get closer. "Take a look in that microscope," she ordered. "What do you see?"
He glanced at her evidence briefly before he looked back at her. "Work," he told her while leaving the lab. "I'll always see work."
She watched him leave with short, almost angry, steps, confusion written all over her features. Getting up to follow him she was interrupted by Greg entering the lab.
"Brass just brought in our suspect," the young CSI told her with great enthusiasm. "You coming with me?"
She hesitated, looking in the direction Warrick had stormed off too. "Yeah," she eventually told him, seeing the young victim in her mind and needing to solve this case. "I'm coming."
Back in the break room Warrick entered with force, startling Nicky who had been enjoying his coffee break in silence.
"Damn it," he heard the tall man mutter before he sat down, a defeated look on his face.
"What's wrong, bro?" Nick asked him and the question made his friend look up, obviously surprised by the presence of another person in the room.
"I didn't see you there," he answered with a small smile, before he frowned. "Why is the radio not on?"
Nick answered with a smile of his own. "I'm learning to deal with silence again," was his simple reply, not elaborating any further on the subject and in that moment Warrick knew that his friend was going to be ok.
"So," Nick drawled, "Want to tell me what's going on?"
His friend just shook his head, standing up.
"Nothing," he said. "I love Sara and apparently...she loves her work."
He was gone before Nick had a chance to say something and he shook his head. "That man can be such a fool sometimes..." he mumbled.
Sara didn't see Warrick the rest of the night, once she was out her interrogation she had learned that he had a robbery uptown. He hadn't been back to the lab all night, only checking in with Grissom on his cell once in a while. Slamming the door of her locker she was determined to find him now.
"Boy troubles?" she heard behind her, seeing Catherine there with a genuine look of concern on her face.
"Yeah," she grumbled, "But it's nothing a little ass kicking won't cure."
"Go easy on him," Cath advised her before Sara left the room. "He loves you, you know?"
"I know," the taller woman replied. "But he can't seem to understand that I love him too."
Getting angrier by the minute Sara drove off in a hurry, heading for his crime scene. When she got there the place was taped up with the familiar yellow tape she knew so well and there was an officer guarding the building. She showed him her ID, asking him where Brown was and he send her to the top floor where she found him taking shoe prints. She studied him for a minute, seeing the look of concentration on his face and she smiled in spite of herself. She loved him, it was as easy as that. He had taken her out of her shell and she felt vibrant whenever she was near him. Her frown returned when she remembered the conversation they had earlier that night, when she remembered the look on his face during that conversation. For a CSI that smart she couldn't figure out why he was acting like a total idiot. Her anger returned in full force and she stepped forward.
"You can be so stupid!" she spit out and he looked up, startled by her presence and the fury he spotted on her face.
"Excuse me?" he asked her, getting up to face her but she was already standing right in front of him, sending him daggers with her eyes.
"You doubt me!" she shouted at him, "You never ask me what I feel and you assume way to much. You're a moron!" she finished, crossing her arms and waiting for his reply.
He just blinked, shaking his head in an effort to clear it and then she saw anger flaring up in his eyes.
"I'm the moron here?" he hissed back. "So tell me, Sara, who is the one leaving me in the middle of the night because Grissom called about a DB lying in the dessert? Who is the one canceling dinner because you have one last piece of evidence to process? Or one last suspect to talk to. It's always work with you."
She shook her head, turning around and heading for the elevator. "You will never get it," she told him while pressing on the button of the elevator.
"And you'll always be in love with your work," he retorted, his back to her and a tired slump in her shoulders.
"Yes, I love my work," she replied, while getting in the elevator. " But I'll always be in love with you."
When he turned around the doors where already closed and she was gone, leaving him to rub his head in a tired manner while slowly a smile spread on his face.
Five minutes later Warrick Brown hurried past the officer standing outside of the building. "I'll be back tomorrow," he promised the man before he jumped in his car and drove off, getting to her place in record time, just in time to see her in front of her door, searching for her keys.
"Why didn't you just tell me?" she heard him say behind her and she turned around to see him right in front of her, a smile on his face that she couldn't place.
"Tell you what?" she asked him, finding her keys and opening the door.
"You've never told me you loved me," came his reply and he stepped into her house. The place that had become a second home to him. "You've told me I was special," he continued, "that you cared about me but love? Never."
"I did tell you," she countered, standing in front of him and taking his hand in her own. "I told you by coming to you whenever I felt like giving up, I told you by allowing you to enter my life like you did. I may have never said the words...but if you had paid attention you would have known."
"I'm not a mind reader, Sara," he told her. "I know you're not used to sharing your emotions but every once in a while...I just want to know what is going on inside that head of yours."
"Fine," she agreed. "I'll share more if you promise me to stop behaving like an utter fool."
"I'll try," he told her with a grin on his face before he kissed her, cupping her face between his hands. "Why are we such a weird couple?" he asked her between kisses and she shrugged.
"Who cares?" she whispered. "I like us," she paused, thinking about what she had just said, and shook her head. "No," she continued, "I love us, I love you. Don't ever doubt that again."
He just shook his head, tracing the outer lines of her face with his hands. "I won't," he promised her, holding her fiercely. "I love you too."
"Yeah," she commented dryly. "You see, I never doubted that."
His laugh filled the house and Sara wrapped her arms around his waist, thankful to have found such a fool.
Tbc...
