Chapter Four – With Friends Like These
Sara managed to find herself a hotel but she soon realised that in the long term, it would not be the right place to bring up a baby. She was still thinking about her living situation when she arrived at work, trying to keep one eye out for Grissom.
"He's not here."
Catherine had arrived at her side, her face hard.
"I heard what happened."
Sara had forgotten just how quickly the lab grapevine worked and felt herself tense for a fight with Catherine. She was one of Grissom's oldest friends.
"I'm sorry to hear that it's over. He was happy with you."
Sara let out the breath she was holding as Catherine's face softened slightly as she graced Sara with a small smile.
"Do you need anything?"
Sara shook her head and mutely watched Catherine walk past her and leave her in a state of shock. She was expecting to have to defend her actions to Catherine, to have to explain right down to the last detail just why things happened the way they did. The sympathy that the older woman extended was rather shocking. And the rest of her day was the same. If Grissom was at work, Sara never saw him. Nick, Warrick, Catherine and Greg acted as buffers, making sure that there was no need for either of them to see each other. She knew that it would not last forever but it was nice while the found was still fresh. She was in the locker room when Brass found her, his face grim.
"Greg told me you are staying in a hotel?"
Sara nodded and opened her mouth to comment but Brass beat her to it.
"You can't raise a child in a hotel. You will come and stay with me."
"I can't do that Brass. I don't want to disturb your life with a child."
"I want you to stay with me. I have more then enough room and I will be at work most of the time anyway. I've organised with Catherine for some of Lindsey's old baby stuff to be delivered to my place and we can organise the rest later. Here's a key. Now get your ass over at the hotel, cancel your booking and I'll meet you at home."
Brass turned his back on her and left the room before she could have any sort of argument with him. She wanted to accept the offer, she really did but how could she expect Brass to take in her as well as a baby? Because she had no other option, that's why. With a sigh, Sara gathered her belongings and attached the key to her key chain and made her way to the truck, hoping that tomorrow would look a little brighter.
Life settled into a rather bizarre routine, one that Sara found herself extremely comfortable in. She had taken up Brass's offer to move in and he came with her to pick up Amelia a few days later, watching the baby as Sara signed the papers that made Amelia legally her daughter. She still had to go to work but the hours had been cut right back to just three days a week, the rest of the time was spent learning about how exactly to look after the supposed bundle of joy she had inherited. She spent many sleepless nights trying to figure out why Amelia was crying, trying to decipher whether it was her hungry, wet or unhappy cry and found herself, with great amounts of guilt, wondering if keeping Amelia had indeed been the right choice. The doubt was always wiped from her mind when Amelia began to recognise her voice and face and became excited a smile bursting over her face. Brass seemed to have gotten himself a huge fan as well, Amelia loved nothing more then playing with him, pulling at his badge and giggling as he blew raspberries on her fat belly when he changed her diaper. Amelia was growing so quickly that Sara was wondering where the time had gone. All too soon it had been two months since she had made her decision and Sara still found herself wanting to tell Grissom all about the new things that Amelia had done that day, remembering with a jolt that she could not do that anymore. She had done all her crying in the early days, lying beside Amelia and matching her howls of unhappiness with her own, her face permanently raw from crying so much. Now she just felt the dull ache of hurt where his love used to be. She missed him desperately even though she saw him so often at work. She wanted to hug him, kiss him and hold him in her arms, to smell him and make love to him again. Instead she settled for diving herself into solving Jaime's case, which had come to a halt thanks to a series of mass murders that had taken place over the last couple of months, pushing Jaime's case back slightly. But Sara was determined to have it first on the list as soon as the other killings had been sorted. They needed to know what those fibres were and where they had come from.
"Did you buy some more diapers?"
Brass had reappeared from where he had been giving Amelia a bath; the baby in question nestled happily in a towel against his chest.
"Yeah I put them in the basket."
Brass nodded and headed back into the bathroom and Sara turned her attention back to Jaime's file in front of her, trying to take in any new information she had missed the last few times. All they had to go on were those fibres and not much else. Sara could not quite believe that nobody had seen or heard anything, not when you saw the mess she was in or the room, so she believed that someone had made a point of threatening everyone in that tiny neighbourhood.
"Here we go. I'll make us some dinner."
Brass handed Amelia to Sara and proceeded to the kitchen. Amelia immediately began tugging at Sara's hair, her favourite hobby, until Sara abandoned her task and gave her full attention to the little girl.
"Come on sweetie, let's get you ready for bed."
She moved herself and Amelia onto the sofa, settling the baby between her legs, her small head resting on her stomach. She pulled out a book that Amelia loved with bright pictures of ducks, cows and sheep. Within the first few pages Amelia was asleep, her head now tilted to rest on Sara's thigh. Sara manoeuvred her carefully into her arms and took her to the room where her crib laid waiting for her.
"She's a good little sleeper now isn't she?"
Brass had slipped into the room silently, coming to stand next to Sara, his large hand brushing Amelia's cheek gently.
"Thank god. I don't know how many more sleepless nights I could have dealt with. She's getting too big for these clothes as well. I need to go shopping again."
"Babies grow like weeds. Let's get some dinner before she wakes up."
Sara followed Brass out of the room and into the dining room, where a plate of steaming vegetables and chicken waited for her.
"This looks good. Thanks Jim."
Brass smiled at her as he dug into his food and a comfortable silence fell, one that had been a regular occurrence since she had moved in. She knew that Brass had many questions for her regarding her relationship with Grissom but he was sensible enough not to ask about it. But this time Sara wanted him too. She wanted to know exactly how Grissom was.
"So have you spoken to Grissom recently?"
Brass swallowed the mouthful of vegetables before answering, a small smile on his face.
"You know what? Grissom asked me the exact same question about you."
Sara's heart pounded hard in her chest at the idea that Grissom wanted to know about her, that he was worried about how she was.
"And what did you say?"
"That you missed him."
"And what did he say?"
"He missed you as well."
The little bit of hope that she was clutching too, the one that refused to leave when the rest did, hummed happily. Maybe, just maybe, things could be sorted.
"He's stupid you know."
Sara clicked back to the conversation with Brass.
"Sorry?"
"Grissom, he's stupid. He can't help it, he's a male. We're all like that really."
"Why didn't he call me?"
"Why didn't you call him? You are both too proud, too stubborn to admit either of you were wrong. That's part of the problem."
"When did you become so wise when it came to relationships?"
"When I lost too many good woman to my stupidity. You have a good thing with Grissom and it would be stupid to let anything make you lose it."
Sara nodded and stabbed at the rest of her food with her fork, suddenly losing the will to eat. All she wanted to do right now was see Grissom.
"Brass, do you think you could look after Amelia for a little while?"
Brass nodded, a knowing smile coming to his face.
"He's still at the lab. If you go now, you should catch him."
Sara threw on her coat and gave Brass a quick kiss on the cheek before dashing out the door, hoping that she wasn't too late to fix her stupid mistake.
Grissom was just finishing some paper work on the last of the murder cases when Sara came bursting into his room, her hair out of place and her face flushed. He fought his desperate desire to hug her, to tell her that he was wrong and that he was reaction was because he was so shocked at what she had done. He wanted nothing more then to hold her again.
"Are you busy?"
"No."
"Brass told me that you asked after me today."
"Yeah I did."
Sara stayed where she was at the office door, her hand still on the door knob and he could see her fighting some internal battle, as if she was trying to remember why she had come in the first place.
"I'm sorry."
The words were out of his mouth all of their own accord and he realised that he meant them. He would crawl on broken glass just to get her to forgive him, just to see that sweet smile that meant everything was fine again. Sara looked at him long and hard before releasing the door and pushing it closed with her foot and allowing her cost to slip off her shoulders, draping it over the chair across from him.
"I want both of you in my life you know. I can't do this without you. I love you too much."
"I was surprised Sara, but there is no real excuse for not sorting this out sooner."
"So are we ok again?"
Grissom ignored her question, standing and pulling her into his arms, where she should always be, pressed against his chest. He breathed in the smell of her hair and laid a small kiss on her temple.
"I love you Sara."
"I love you too."
Eventually they disentangled themselves from the hug and Sara took a seat across from him.
"We need to talk about Amelia."
Grissom nodded and started making tea for them both before settling down for a long chat.
"I spoke too soon."
Sara frowned.
"What do you mean?"
"I had plenty of time to think and I do want children one day. And I want them with you. And Brass told me how you are legally Amelia's mother now and I want you to know that I want to give the whole family thing a go."
"Really?"
"I was wrong to ever make you choose Sara. I know that you could never leave Amelia where she was. It was stupid and foolish of me, not mention unbelievably selfish."
Sara abandoned her seat across from Grissom and instead settled herself on his lap, her lips finding his.
"I want that as well, more then anything else in the world. I really do."
"Good. Oh and I have other news for you"
"And that would be?"
"I want you back on the Jaime Cullen case."
Sara grinned down at him, her face flushed.
"You are the best boyfriend in the world. I feel a little bad though."
"Why?"
Brass in completely in love with Amelia and he's helped me so much and now we're just going to up and leave him."
"I'm sure he'll cope. Maybe he could baby-sit?"
