Thank you for all the wonderful reviews. I hope you'll review on this one as well.

Jess, thank you as always for being my beta… You're the best, even when you threaten me with ducks… That's not nice by the way…

I hope you all enjoy this even if it is a bit short. I'll make up for that in the next chapter.

Chapter Sixteen

Working

The night turned to morning without the team noticing. All of them were busy working the different angles of the case. Nick and Warrick had checked out every aspect of Mr. Rowan's past and found nothing. Sofia and Kimberly had interviewed all the people who had seen and talked to the victim on the day of her disappearance, and were still busy trying to create a timeline of the whereabouts of Siobhan Rowan the day she died. Catherine and Sara had read through twelve years of letters from Oscar Charles Dunne to Veronica Christiansen, and Siobhan's diary, but found nothing more than they already knew. The diary had no information other than the normal teenage dreaming and drama, so the Dunne theory still fitted. After all, his MO had been to stalk Veronica without her knowing before making his move.

"This guy is completely insane!" Catherine exclaimed, and threw the letter she was holding onto the table.

"I know." Sara chuckled a little.

"Right." Catherine realized who she was talking to. "Sorry about that…"

"No, it's ok." Sara looked up and met Catherine's eyes. "It was a long time ago. And I didn't know about these." She gestured to the letters. "I didn't know that it was this bad."

"You couldn't have known, Sara." Catherine said soothingly.

"I could have if I'd been around for her." Sara answered, the guilt evident in her voice.

Catherine got up from her chair and went over to stand in front of the brunette. She leaned forward and gave a surprised Sara a warm hug.

"We all do what we have to do to survive, Sara." She whispered. "The past is the past. We just have to make do with the present and work hard to make the future better than the past."

"Yeah?" Sara whispered back. "And how do you do that?"

"I'm not sure." Catherine smiled. "But I do know one thing, you never stop trying." She stood back up and straightened her clothes. "We'd better get back to work."

"Yeah," Sara looked up at her. "Thanks."

"I'm gonna go check up on the boys," Catherine said with a smile. "See if they've found anything."

"I'll just finish these." Sara gestured to the few letters that she hadn't read yet and reached out for one of them.

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"Nick!" Catherine spotted Nick in a lab across from the conference room.

"Catherine," Nick looked up from the papers he was reading. "Got anything new?"

"Unfortunately, no." She answered, sitting down in a chair beside him. "I was hoping for good news from you guys." She looked around. "Where's Warrick?"

"He went to get coffee. Sofia and Kimberly have gone out to grab something to eat, but they're close to getting the timeline together." He gestured to the papers in front of him. "The Rowans are squeaky clean. We haven't gone through the information on the Governor yet, but if he's anything like his Chief of Staff, we won't have much luck there either."

"Have we gotten anything on the hair from the vic's clothes yet?" Catherine inquired.

"I just talked to Wendy and she said that it would be a couple of hours before the results are ready."

"Ok." Catherine pushed back her chair and got up. "You go get something to eat too, Nick. I hadn't realized it had gotten so late." She looked down at her watch, which read 11 am. Looking back up, she caught a glimpse of Sara still reading in the conference room.

"How long since she's eaten, you think?" She asked Nick, while tilting her head towards Sara.

"Don't know." Nick answered. "How long since she clocked in?"

"Why don't you take her with you and make sure she gets something to eat?" Catherine suggested.

"Sure." Nick gathered the papers in front of him and placed them in a folder. "This is the information on Mr. and Mrs. Rowan." He explained and gave her the folder. "I'll just grab Sara and my jacket and we'll be back in an hour or so."

"I'll just go and tell Warrick to take an early lunch as well." Catherine went out the door while saying: "We'll meet back in the conference room again at one o'clock. That should be enough time for you to get the report on the hair, and for Rick to read the autopsy."

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"Sara?" Nick poked his head into the room to get her attention.

"Mmmm?" Sara answered, without looking up from the letter she was reading.

"Let's go get some lunch."

"I'm not quite done here. I'll just grab an apple later."

"Come on, Catherine practically ordered us to go get something to eat now, and an apple won't do it. Besides we have a meeting at one, and we all need to be ready for that."

"But…" Sara gestured to the letters.

"We all know what's in those letters. And they'll still be here when we get back."

Sara sighed, but got up anyway.

"You're not gonna give up until I go, are you?" She asked trying to sound defeated, though the truth was that she needed a break - those letters were making her skin crawl.

"Nope." Nick smiled, holding the door open for her. "So where do you want to go?"

"I don't care, as long as they serve vegetarian dishes."

"I knew that."

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Catherine met up with Warrick in the break room.

"Hey Cath." He greeted her.

"Hey Rick."

"Any news?"

"No, not much." She sat down opposite him. "I just sent Nick and Sara to grab a bite, you should do the same."

"Ok." He looked at her. "Hey, are you ok?"

"Yeah," She sighed. "Just got a lot going on right now."

"Biggest case of the year and Lindsey's birthday coming up," He smiled. "That would make anyone stressed."

"If only that was all of it." Catherine muttered under her breath. Out loud she said, "You better go, maybe you can catch Tina and have lunch with her."

"Actually, Tina has plans with her mother today." Warrick replied, getting up and throwing his empty cup in the garbage. "So you're in luck – I'm free to have lunch with you." He joked.

"I'll just get something from the vending machine. I still have a couple of calls to make." Catherine answered, brushing him off.

"If we leave to eat – you leave to eat." He put his arm around her and dragged her with him. "So where do you want to go?"

"Rick, I really have to make those calls." Catherine tried to protest.

"You can make your calls in the car on the way to the restaurant. Go get your purse and I'll meet you by the car." He said and pushed her gently towards the locker room. "Besides, it's been ages since we had lunch. We have some catching up to do."