Disclaimer: dittos...

The rest of Sara's hospital stay went like clockwork. Sara's pre-op sedative had the right effect; Gil enjoyed the giddiness it produced in her, not a care in the world. That was short lived; however, as they swooped in and whisked her away from him. Recent events made it incredibly difficult to let her out of his sight, but it had to be. Waiting in the hospital room for hours was pure torture. He had books and crosswords, but wasn't able to concentrate. Finally, staring down his phone, he made the call he had been putting off.

"Hello, Marion Davies, social services."

"Gil Grissom. I had a message you wished to speak with me."

Ms. Davies dropped what she was doing to concentrate on the call, "Yes, thank you for the call. How is Sara?"

"Right now she's in surgery."

"I was referring to her emotional state."

"Considering that she just survived an encounter with a serial killer, and on the heels of that, a confrontational exposure of her most painful emotional scars, she's actually doing about as well as can be expected." Gil didn't waste any time establishing his opinion of what transpired.

"I understand your frustration with the way that was handled, but you must understand, I was put in a situation where I had to do a job, if I didn't do it, there were potential ramifications, legal and otherwise."

"Surely there are better ways to handle this."

"There are, that's why I'm pursuing this complaint against Dr. Lurie. Typically a physician gets a report as troubling as Ms. Sidle's, they go to the patient. They get a history of the fractures, a feel of the current situation, they put in a consult to social services, we follow up. The consult usually steers us a bit, like, 'history of old abuse, need confirmation,' or 'physical abuse suspected, please investigate.' They prepare the patient for our visit, inform them we're coming, and so on."

"I take it this was not handled like you described."

"Not even close. Lurie came to my office with the consult in person, highly unusual. Doctors are way too busy to walk down a consult to social services. At the time, I didn't know quite what to make of it. He claimed he was trying to expedite the consult so that he could transfer the patient off his service because you had been difficult to deal with. He portrayed you as controlling, you're the boss, you're in control, you have medical power of attorney, and you were giving him grief over his handling of her case."

"You do know that doesn't describe me, my relationship with Sara, or the conversation I had with him in the least. Except that I do have her medical power of attorney, but she has mine as well."

"Well, that's become clear in the interim. At the time, I agreed to see her without her being prepared in advance only because I was trying to cooperate with the expedited nature of the process. Having said that, the doctor was coming along to introduce me, and I still fully expected to be introduced to the patient in a non-threatening manner."

"When did you realize something was amiss?"

"Oh, my," she replied, laughing somewhat, "when I set foot in the room! It was clear he had been looking for a confrontation with you, but instead was getting plenty of confrontation from the patient and visitors."

"With all that, why then didn't you just stop it?"

"I tried to focus on the patient. I had checked the radiology reports myself; so I knew that something truly happened to her. That much was fact, and that was my obligation. I tried to tune out the distractions, especially since at that point I had no idea what was going on! I mean nobody was acting normally, not Lurie, and certainly not the visitors. I didn't know anybody until that day, so how would I know who was the bad guy or who was the good guy; I was in up to my eyeballs, so I just focused on the job at hand. The only person acting at all predictably was Ms. Sidle; she was acting like a woman who had been traumatized. So, when the room cleared out, it was get the story from her, get some corroboration, make sure she is truly safe, and then look at the rest of this once that's done. That's where I am now."

Grissom was starting to understand the social worker's perspective. "You know, there's some history between Lurie and me, but I can't divulge the details of an old investigation."

"I guessed as much. I'm new to this hospital, but I have since learned that Dr. Vincent Lurie is a very prominent surgeon; he is clinically brilliant and he is a masterful teacher, a very rare and valued combination in a teaching hospital. However, I'm also learning his personal reputation is not quite so stellar. I'm not privy to his file, but I know this isn't his first rodeo with the ethics committee. Just like in your business, infractions do tend to add up."

"This is true. I would love to cooperate in any way I can, what do you need from me?"

"I know you're reluctant to risk discussing your past interaction with Lurie, but rest assured, I really don't think I need any of that. Dr. Braily mentioned that you spoke with Dr. Lurie privately outside of the room. Can you tell me what you discussed? It seems obvious he misrepresented that to me, and that's quite critical."

"Sure, I remember every word of that conversation." His stomach tightened up recalling his encounter with Lurie. He continued, "So, what do you see coming out of this?"

"My job is to document the behavior as factually as I can. It's their job to determine guilt and punishment, and that will all occur behind closed doors. I can tell you this, I would be shocked if he doesn't get his privileges at the hospital suspended, at least temporarily. That will then set off a state licensing board investigation. Harassment should be harassment, period, but they get really riled when harassment of a patient by a doctor is believed to have occurred. Depending on the severity of his past transgressions, it's possible he could ultimately lose his Nevada medical license over this."

"I'm always intrigued when justice is served in an unexpected form."

"Unfortunately, I need to bring up one more thing, but I, um, honestly, this is a bit touchy."

Gil had been impressed by her forthright delivery of information, and he was bracing himself for whatever came next. "Please, go ahead."

"As I said, I don't know what the outcome of this will be, but I suspect, at least in the short term, Lurie is going to be forced to have some time on his hands."

Gil sighed, rubbing his temple, getting the drift of where she was going.

"When I went back to get accounts of Lurie's behavior towards Ms. Sidle and you; well, I got some disturbing observations. He was seen staring at Sara in a trance like state virtually every time he saw her. I'm not one to make unfounded accusations; I'm relating this to you in confidence. There were other things too; a lot of his actions had the feel of a stalker. I'm only telling you this as a caution; I really don't want to upset anyone needlessly, but I couldn't help but be concerned. I thought you could best relay this to her in a way that would help her to be careful, but not to scare her."

"I understand, and thank you, we'll be very careful." Gil felt a headache coming on at the mere suggestion that another lunatic could come after Sara in the future.

"Will you call me when things settle down? I'm late for a meeting right now, but I would like to make an appointment at your convenience to go over your story, and that will give me a chance to check up on Ms. Sidle."

"Yes, I'll be sure and do that, and thank you."

After terminating the call, Grissom wondered if the rumor mill had provided Ms. Davies with the story behind Debbie Marlin, her relationship with Lurie, the murder, the subsequent investigation, and Sara's uncanny resemblance to her. Her insight made it appear she understood all that, without actually going there. No wonder Sara and Catherine ended up being impressed with her.

Now, that the call was done, Gil was back to trying to figure out how he would endure the next hour or so waiting for Sara to come back from surgery.

TBC….