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Chapter Four: Admitting The Truth
It was four in the morning and Catherine was still awake pouring over Sara's file for what felt like the thousandth time. Since Greg had given her the file four days ago, she had read it at least ten times. She had remembered every detail in the file by now. Everything from her less than pleasant childhood to her almost DUI. Yet she still continued to reread the file, repeatedly torturing herself with the doctor reports from Sara's childhood. That's all she could do.
After Sara had been missing for two days, the FBI had been called in. Grissom, Nick, Warrick, Greg and Catherine, had all fought to stay on the case, but Ecklie had said that they were all too close to the case. He gave the case to the feds, but not before Catherine could get copies of everything in the case file. By the fifth day Grissom had demanded that she take a few days off to rest. Even he could see that she hadn't been sleeping. She really had been trying to sleep, but every time she would go to sleep, she would always wake up in a cold sweat after having a nightmare about Sara. It was the same nightmare every time. Sara would be beaten and bloodied, lying in an alley waiting for them to come save her. Everyone had just figured that she felt guilty for messing up on the case, but they didn't know what she knew.
Sara had been missing for ten hours when she had finally sat down and started thinking about what was happening. It was then that she had discovered why Sara's disappearance was bothering her so much more than Nick's had. She had feelings for Sara. Not the kind of feelings someone has for a friend, rather the kind that leads to sleepless nights thinking about the other person in compromising situations. She wasn't about to tell the guys that, so she took the few days off.
Rather than going home and resting, she had gone out to investigate Sara's case on her own. The feds had given up on ever finding Sara when they had searched her apartment and found a letter of resignation, so Catherine had taken the investigating into her own hands. She had even gone so far as to interrogate each of the suspects in all of Sara's active cases. All that got her was a migraine and a good yelling at from her mother when she came home late, again.
Instead of fighting with her mother, Catherine had gone up to her room, making some excuse about needing sleep. Unfortunately, Lindsey was at the beach for a couple of weeks with one of her friends. The younger Willows usually served as an escape from work for her mother. Sighing, Catherine laid down on her bed with her feet hanging off the bed. For a couple of hours she stared up at the ceiling willing the answer to Sara's whereabouts to appear there.
By six the next morning, Catherine had showered and dressed, and was grabbing her coat and purse when there was a knock at her door. Within seconds the door was open and she was standing face to face with Warrick. Looking at his rumpled clothes, she guessed he had just gotten off work. Well that and the fact that he was there instead of at home with his wife.
"Hey, Rick. What are you, uh, doing here?"
"Hey, Cath. You wanna go grab some breakfast?"
"I can't. I promised Linds we'd go shopping today, you know because I've been caught up in Sara's case." Warrick just shook his head and looked up at Catherine sadly.
"Lindsey's at the beach for two weeks. You told me that a month ago, remember? Come on, Cath. Please. We haven't talked much since I got married and since Sara went missing you've been distancing yourself from everyone. I miss you, Cath." Though she tried not to, Catherine looked into Warrick's pleading eyes and couldn't refuse him of anything at that moment.
"Alright, let me get my purse and coat and I'll be right back out." For the first time in six days Warrick smiled; just a small smile but a smile non-the-less.
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The whole ride to the diner was made in silence. Not a single word was said between the two until they had been seated and were ordering their drinks. Once the waitress walked off Warrick turned to Catherine. For a moment he took the time to examine her physical appearance. Her eyes were bloodshot and dark bags hung under her eyes. He didn't have to be a CSI to know that she still wasn't sleeping.
"When was the last time you got any sleep?" Warrick asked, his voice laced with concern.
"I've taken a few power naps here and there. Just enough to keep me alive," she said knowing there was no use in lying to Warrick. He would be able to see past any lie she told.
"Have you gone to a department shrink, yet? If you won't talk to us and let us help you, maybe a shrink could.," he suggested.
"Why, so they can tell me something I already know? That if I don't start getting some sleep I'm going to crash. That I have unresolved issues concerning Sara that I need to get out. Thanks but no thanks. I already know why I'm not sleeping, I don't need a shrink to tell me that."
"Well, will you talk to me?" Once again Catherine heard the pleading in his voice and sighed defeated.
"You can't tell anyone about this conversation, Rick. No one can know about what I'm about to tell you, because I'm not even sure that I know what's going on inside my head." Warrick nodded, silently promising to keep her secret. With another sigh, Catherine took a calming breath before she began. "I think I-I might have feelings for Sara."
"We all care about-" He was interrupted by Catherine shaking he head.
"No. I mean I might be attracted to Sara." Realization dawned on Warrick and he stared at her in shock. "I don't think I'm feeling this just because she's missing. I think I've always been attracted to her. I, uh, think that might be why I kept her at a distance. And, yeah, that's a lot of thinks, but yeah, I'm attracted to Sara," she said hurriedly. Warrick just continued to stare at her. "Rick, say something!"
"Cath, I don't know what to say. I love both of you. Both of you are my friends, and I want you both to be happy. If you think that the two of you can be happy together, then I hope things go well for you. God knows you both deserve to be happy. I don't want this to end up being because Sara was kidnapped. I don't want to see either one of my friends hurt and I don't want to have to chose one over the other."
Catherine looked down at her hands and nodded. She didn't want to have to put Warrick in the position of having to chose one of them over the other. Then again, Warrick also said that if she thought they could be happy together then to go for it. Did she really believe that they could be happy together? Not to mention she didn't even know if Sara even liked her. What if they never found her at all, or if they did and she was dead? Now that she had come to the truth would she be able to deal with that? It wasn't until she heard Warrick let out a long exhale that she allowed herself to be pulled from her thoughts.
"Cath, there's something else we need to talk about," he said pausing long enough to make sure that he had Catherine's attention. "The feds are going back to their home office. They're still going to be working on the case, but they don't think she'll be back."
Catherine simply nodded in response. She had known as soon as they had found the letter of resignation that it would only be a matter of time before they left. They didn't expect her to come back so why would they stay? They would go on and forget about her. She would just be another missing person, another name on their list of people who were never coming back. She was coming back though, they would find her and she would tell Sara how she felt about her. She would do everything in her power to protect Sara whether Sara wanted that protection or not.
