Just Another Statistic

Disclaimers and Thank-Yous:

Thank you so much for those that have reviewed both here and on my personal email! I really love hearing back from you guys! My Dad actually heard me being so happy when I realized that I got a bunch of hits and stuf and tried to get me to let him read. snort yeah right. Like I'm gonna let my Dad read this... Or any of my other work for that matter. Anywho, I just want to thank Kagura, sassysarasidle, and smacky30 again. You guys are great!

Again: CSI and none of its characters belong to me. The only character in this story that sort of belongs to me is Russell. But he's based off of a real person. Not a rapist but a jerk all the same.

Chapter Two, Part One: Letting it sink in

Sara leaned miserably over the toilet as tears slipped down her cheeks and into the basin. She was allowing it all to sink in. She had tried to block it out but now it was time to face the music. As she remembered more a fresh wave of nausea swept over her and she whimpered. This all had to be a dream. That was what she had told herself every moment since the morning she woke up. Now it was nearly midnight and she had to accept what had happened. She had to or else it would just get harder and harder. She had to let it out.

As another sob escaped her lips, she heard the front door close and she rested her cheek against the cold toilet. She reached her hand above her head to unlock the door. She knew he would come. When the doorknob began to turn Sara used the same hand to flush the toilet without even moving her head. She watched the contents of her stomach and her salty tears slip down the drain and felt Grissom kneel down behind her. She let the tears continue to flow as she felt his hands on her shoulders and heard his ragged breath in her ear.

"I'm so sorry," Grissom's voice brushed against Sara's ear. "I am so sorry, Sara. I'm sorry I wasn't there for you. I'm sorry it took so long for me to get to you. I'm so sorry." His voice cracked and Sara turned her head upward a little as she felt a hot tear land on her exposed neck.

Sara saw the pain in his face and knew he meant what he said. Her eyes filled again with tears and she sagged backwards against his chest. The tears were flowing freely down her cheeks now and she felt dampness on her head where Grissom's tears were soaking her hair. They slid down to the floor, Grissom cradling her against his chest. They both fell asleep within minutes and both dreamed about the same thing: each other.

Sara and Grissom sat on the bleachers around the hockey rink taking notes. "This game is crazy," Sara said. "I don't like any sports but this tops the rest on my list of crazy."

Grissom smiled a rare smile. "I like baseball," he said.

Sara snorted. "Of course. All those statistics, you're sure to love it."

"It's a beautiful sport," Grissom urged.

"Since when are you interested in beauty?"

Grissom looked down at his notes. "Since I met you," he said before standing. "Come on. We'll sweep the rink from the goal-post to the middle line." He started walking and didn't notice Sara's mouth hanging open.

Sara sat on the side of the curb outside the crime lab with her hand cradled against her chest and paramedics swarming around her. Grissom noticed her and knelt in front of her. "Are you okay?"

Sara looked up, startled. "Yeah. I'm fine."

Grissom grabbed her hand and bit his lip. "Honey, this doesn't look good." He yelled over his shoulder at one of the paramedics, "Can I get a doctor over here? She needs stitches."

It only occurred to them later what he had said. Such a simple word and yet it was so meaningful.

"I read something about that in the Entomology text book that Grissom gave me for Christmas last year," Sara said offhandedly to Nick and Hodges.

"Funny," Nick smiled. "I didn't get anything from Grissom for Christmas, did you, Hodges?"

Hodges shook his head with a smirk. "Nope. Me neither."

Sara glared at the two smiling men. "Shut up."

Sara looked through the glass at Grissom sitting like a broken man at the table. Her mind was swirling with disbelief. What had he meant? Surely he hadn't meant her when he spoke about choosing his job over a woman he loved…had he?

Grissom looked helplessly through the glass wall at Sara and that crazy man with the plaster pressed to Sara's throat. He wanted to get in there but where was that stupid janitor? "Let her go!" he yelled through the glass but one look into the man's eyes told him that he was going to rape Sara. "Open the door!" he shouted again as he pounded on the glass. The janitor had appeared at his shoulder and he hastily slipped the key into the lock and turned it. A security guard quickly detained the man and Sara was free. Grissom wanted to pull her into his arms then and there but she looked so scared and fragile…

"Do you want to sleep with me?"

"You know gray hair is very attractive on a man…"

"Some people just aren't meant to be together."

"I don't know what to do about this."

"I do. But by the time you figure it out it really might be too late."

Sara opened a bleary eye and groaned. She stuffed her face back into her pillow and willed time to jump back a couple hours so that she could dream again. She wanted to remember Grissom's hints and her advances. She wanted to picture his bare chest glistening with sweat and see his intense blue eyes looking into hers. That's when she heard the music. She smiled as she recognized the CD that Grissom had gotten her years ago. It was his favorite, he had said, and it soon became hers. There was also a faint smell… Was that coffee?

Sara blinked in surprise. Why could she smell coffee? Why… Suddenly a wave of memory flooded her and she had to dash to the bathroom to empty what little was left in her stomach. When she had rinsed her mouth out she stripped and turned the shower water on hot. She took as long a shower as the supply of hot water would allow her and, more from routine than anything, she rubbed her lotion on her body before getting dressed in sweats and a large T-shirt that she had gotten from Nick a few months back. Then, she took a deep breath and made her way into the kitchen.

Chapter Two, Part Two: Breakfast and a Shower...

Grissom stood in Sara's kitchen as he juggled cooking toast, eggs, pancakes, and coffee. He had woken up only an hour or two after falling asleep in the bathroom floor and carried Sara to her bed. Afterwards he had only gotten about two hours of restless sleep on the couch and had started cooking at six in the morning. When Sara walked into the warm kitchen Grissom smiled awkwardly.

"Morning," he said as he flipped a pancake in the skillet and pushed a piece of toast into the toaster.

Sara mumbled something incoherent as she ran a hand through her damp hair. "You're still here?"

Grissom nodded as he poured a cup of coffee. "You don't think I'd leave you, do you?"

Sara didn't respond as she grasped the cup in his hand and cautiously sipped the hot liquid. She was acutely aware of her red face still slightly swollen from crying. She looked around the kitchen in some amusement as she noted the mess of pancake mix and eggshells.

"How long have you been up?" she asked quietly. It was unnerving to think that Grissom had been the only one up in her house. What had he done? Had he looked through her books? Had he looked scrupulously at each of the pictures on the walls? Or had he noticed that there were still moving boxes all over the place?

Grissom shrugged as he turned off the stove and scraped some scrambled eggs onto a plate next to a perfectly cooked pancake. "A few hours. I couldn't sleep so I went to the store to get some breakfast materials. And I stopped by my place to get some clothes." He put the plate in front of her. The smell made her mouth water. "Eat."

Sara greedily picked up the fork that Grissom had handed her and wolfed down the eggs and pancakes. She couldn't remember the last time she had had a hot breakfast. Probably a few years unless she counted McDonald's or something. When she had finished gulping down the last of her coffee and had eaten the last of the eggs she looked up at Grissom.

"Thank you, Grissom," she whispered softly. "You really didn't have to do all this."

"But I wanted to, Sara," he said in an equally low voice. His eyes traveled around the room, looking at anything and everything but her. "I couldn't leave you here alone after…after what happened. I just couldn't do that."

Sara nodded slowly as her fingers played with the fork still on her plate. "I understand. I just wanted to tell you how grateful I am that you did all of this. I mean, the breakfast, the ride home, and the comfort. I don't know what I would have done if you hadn't been here last night."

Grissom's hand grasped hers and his eyes finally rested on her face. Sara's breath caught in her throat as he stared at her, eye to eye, for the first time in as long as she could remember. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity but what was really only about a minute, Sara stood from her chair and took her hands out of Grissom's.

"I'm going to go take another shower," she said in a hoarse voice. Her stomach was rolling again as she placed the dishes in the sink. "I'll be out to clean the kitchen in a little bit."

Grissom only watched her back as she retreated again into the bathroom. He only looked away when the door closed behind her—and he heard the click of the lock. Sighing, he put his head in his hands and started to think.

Sara leaned against her bathroom door and took deep breaths. She couldn't stop herself from locking the door behind her. She didn't want to have to stand alone in a small space if there was no sense of security. She didn't want to have to imagine him barging into the door of the bathroom to finish what he started. Her hand slipped into the medicine cabinet and she pulled out the gun that rested on the shelf. She had left it in here last time she cleaned it and had forgotten to remove it. Now it was a source of comfort as she checked for bullets and set it on the top of the toilet where she could easily reach it from the shower.

With her mind slightly at ease, Sara stripped off her pants and her shirt. She looked reluctantly in the mirrors as she felt the cut above her breast. Her body was bruised all over and Sara flinched as she touched each one in turn. 'Why did this have to happen?' She wondered. 'Why, after I spent all my life trying to protect people from getting hurt, did this have to happen to me? I have gone from protector to victim in just a few nights. I got away with no broken bones, no severe wounds, but I feel broken.' She sighed as she opened a small bottle of pain killers and swallowed one without water. She needed to stop brooding. It was doing her no good and if she dwelt on it too much in these first few days then she would never get over it. She needed to move on.

Sara turned the hot water on and listened to the roar as it hit the bathtub floor. When steam began to rise slowly, almost lazily from behind the drawn curtain, Sara stepped in and gasped as the hot water struck her back. She closed her eyes in something that resembled contentment as she leaned into the spray. It hit her face and her shoulders, relaxing the muscles in her back like only a hot shower could. Sara's fingers trailed a line of soap over her body as she reveled in the hot water and left the world.

Sara rubbed herself down with soap and watched the suds swirl down the drain. Then she grabbed her shampoo and inhaled the sweet scent of coconut. Squeezing it out on her hand she swiftly ran her fingers through her hair and rinsed. Out of habit she grabbed a lemon out of the small bag on the side of the tub and squeezed the juice over her arms, careful not to get it too close to any of her bruises.

Sighing as the water began to cool, Sara turned off the water and reached out of the shower to grab a towel. Her hand felt for the fabric and she tugged. She screamed as hands grabbed her arm and a cold voice resonated through her ears in a sneer.

"Hello, Sara."

TBC

Well, that's it. Thanks again for reading! Just a warning... the next one gets intense:-)

Love you all!

Greggo

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