Wow...does anyone else feel like this book is flyin by? Hmm, maybe that's because it kinda is...wow. This thing has only been on the site for about a week or so...whoa. –shrugs—normally it take that long for me to write a chapter. But hey, can't blame me if this book flows easier than anything else I'm writing... (or not writing).
Timeline: In case some people haven't figured it out, this is set mid season six and on.
Spoilers: Grave Danger
Anyways, I'll let ya'll get on with the book and stop boring you with the Author's note... (Though I secretly wonder if anyone reads these things...) Eh, probably not. Are you all ready for an (accidentally) long chapter (long for this book anyway)? Hope so...
Chapter 10
(Two days later)
Bite. Bite. Bite.
Scrape. Scrape. Scrape.
Scratch. Scratch. Scratch.
Another loud scream...it wasn't his own...it was a woman's.
But who's...?
The cool barrel of the gun was dragged along his jaw line, tracing the frame of his face. And it was thrust to his chin once again...
And just like the last time...Nick wasn't holding the gun.
He was being held down by someone. Someone who shouldn't have been able to hold him down. The fingers were cold...thin...feminine...and dead.
The nails dug into his arm.
"Help me Nicky..." The voice begged.
"Help you? I can't even help my fuckin self!"
"Help me..."
The voice was familiar...
"Kristy?"
"You've saved me before Nicky...why didn't you save me the last time...? It's your fault..." The hands released him.
"Kristy!"
There was no answer.
A new pair of forceful hands grabbed him. They weren't Kristy's this time. But they were women's hands.
"No! No! No! Let me go! Get the ants off of me!"
"Stop it Nicky! We're helping you! We know what's best!" Warrick's voice called out and soon a cold blast of ice shot through the top of the Plexiglas coffin.
It was chilling him...suffocating him.
"No! No! You're suffocating me! It isn't helping! None of you are helping! You're making it worse!" Nick exclaimed frantically, his voice cracking.
"Yes it is Nick! It's helping! We're helping you!" Sara called from above the coffin. She stood next to it and began throwing dirt over it.
"No! You're burying me!"
"It's only what's best Nicky..." Grissom explained and pressed his hands against the lid.
The coffin started crushing around him...it was closing in on him much faster this time.
Nick's hands were suddenly set free...the person had let go...but their hands were not yet off of him...and he was no longer in his coffin.
He was lying in his old bedroom...when he was a kid.
The hands continued to touch him.
They went over his arms, chest and stomach...they fell down to the waist of his pajama bottoms. "No! This isn't right! You shouldn't be here!" His voice was immature...he hadn't even hit puberty for Christ's sake and this was already happening to him!
"Stay still Nicky...or it'll only be worse." The voice taunted.
A hot tear slipped down his cheek as he felt his pajama bottoms come off. "No! Please don't...please leave me alone."
She wasn't supposed to be here...
This shouldn't have been happening to him.
"Stop!" He screamed as loud as he could.
Suddenly he was back in the box.
Nigel was pressing on the lid.
"Stop it Nick! I'm helping you! You don't know what you need!" Nigel assured him. "You're my best friend Nick! And I know what's best!"
Bite. Bite. Bite.
The ants continued biting his skin.
The people around him continued blasting the icy air in...smothering him.
"Get him! Grissom! Catherine! Warrick! Someone get him away from here! He's making it worse!" Nick tried desperately to convince the people around him.
He started choking on the cold air filling his lungs. He began to beat on the box's lid, trying desperately to get himself free.
"Stop fighting it Poncho...you can't fight it anymore!" His dad yelled at him.
"You never could! It was never enough Poncho!" Grissom yelled, smiling wickedly.
"No, you couldn't Nick...you couldn't ever fight it...you couldn't even fight me. I was so much weaker than you and it still wasn't enough!" Walter Gordon replied menacingly and Nick tried to get away from him.
Same as before...he couldn't get away.
Nick frantically beat the box, he twisted and turned and flailed his arms and legs, desperate to get away.
"Stop Nicky! Nick!" A different, yet familiar woman's voice demanded. "Hey! Stop it!" She ordered, and tried to pull him away.
He was out of the box...he was standing above the box, watching it all happen. Suddenly he was in Nigel's place. He was pressing the lid down, crushing his other self.
"What the Hell is wrong with you?" Riley demanded, and Nick recognized these words...
She had yelled them at him after he had been in the bar fight.
He was sitting here, trying to kill his other self, and she was trying to make him stop...using the same force and desperation she had used that night.
"Nick no!" She finally pulled him away and he fell back against the hard ground.
He was back in the box.
"No! Not again!"
He was getting damn sick and tired of this.
"Just stop! Everyone stop! Everyone get the fuck away from me!"
"Stop fighting it Nicky...you're killing yourself by fighting..."
Riley's voice was back...
And she was the one holding the gun...
"Riley! What are you doing!"
"Making the pain go away...it won't hurt any more Nicky..." She replied.
"No! I'm not ready to die!"
"I'm sorry." She answer, regret evident in her voice.
"No!"
She pulled the trigger.
Nick bolted up in bed...just like he did at the end of every dream. Nick was afraid that one of these days it wouldn't end with the gun going off...and he'd have to experience death.
The dream had been taken to a new level of fucked up.
What the hell was the babysitter doing there...Kristy too...and Nigel...
Then Riley had held the gun to his head...
Nick let the sobs escape from his body as he wiped away the sweat covering his body...he looked around the room. He had come back to his house last night...he was too tired to deal with the hotels...
And Nick realized what had brought on the new occurrence of the dream.
He was in the 'Gates of Hell'...at least that's what he was calling it lately.
This was where it all happened.
It was the first house he had lived in since the babysitter...
It was the house he had gone home to after he had slept with Kristy, and then again when Catherine had proved he didn't kill her...
It was the house Nigel Crane stalked him in...
It was the house he returned home to after he had been taken in the night by Walter Gordon...
And it was the house his world fell apart in almost a week before...the holes in his walls, both literally and figuratively, being evidence of that.
Nick wiped away the tears he didn't know he was crying and untangled himself from the sheets. He walked into the bathroom and splashed cold water on his face. He turned on the shower, took off his clothes, and jumped in...the same routine he had been following every morning he awoke for the past week.
He sighed and pressed his hands against the tiled wall of his shower, trying to release the tension from his body. It was going to be a long day...he could already tell that.
Nick sighed as Vega stepped forward and handed him the case file. "Hey Sam...did they break him yet?" Nick asked in reference to the main suspect in their murder investigations. Two bodies were found at an abandoned warehouse, beaten beyond identification. Doc Robbins estimated time of death only a few hours before they had found them, COD was strangulation, then mutilation, followed by a video recording, that never revealed the killer, delivered to the victim's family for degradation. The third body was identified as the two boys', James and Andrew, younger sister, Angela Colbert. She had sought out revenge on the man that had killed her brothers, and landed herself in a mess of trouble.
"Yep. He just confessed to all three murders." Vega answered as they walked down the hall towards lock up.
"Tell me he told you why." Nick begged. He had let Greg go in for the interview while Nick finished up the necessary paperwork for the case.
Vega nodded. "They saw something they shouldn't have..." Nick looked at the other man expectantly. When he didn't continue Nick raised his brows.
"Is that it?"
Vega chuckled and shook his head. "C'mon Stokes, it took me two hours to drag that outta him. I had to have my fun with you. You weren't getting the information that easily." Nick rolled his eyes as they continued down the hall. "Saw him bribing their father for more money on a pay off. The kids' father was in serious debt and our Mr. Johnson caught him snatching money from the company vault. Decided to keep the information to himself in exchange for a nice little slice of the pie."
Nick shook his head. "People don't get that the pay off never ends...one payment doesn't ever settle it."
"The father was going to put an end to the embezzlement by turning himself into the police. And that pissed off Mr. Johnson."
"No more Mr. Colbert, no more Mr. Jacksons for Mr. Johnson."
Vega nodded. "Boys ran across the plans to kill the father, then they went to warn him, but Johnson caught them first. So Johnson held the boys death over the father's head and told him he'd pin the murders on the dad if he didn't keep up with the pay off..."
"And then the girl turned up dead."
"She tried to help her father."
Nick shook his head. "I don't get people, man..." Nick sighed in frustration and broke away from his walk with the detective to go towards the locker room. He had buried himself in the case to keep his mind off of Riley, but hadn't had enough energy to restrain himself from getting attached to the victims...
Three innocent children just trying to help their father...the world, especially Sin City, could be sick and unfair. Lives were ended so soon...most barely had enough time to begin. Nick sighed again and grabbed his stuff from his locker and exited the room, passing Grissom's office on the way.
"Uh Nick..." Grissom called as Nick walked passed the door. Nick back tracked a few steps and peered into the office.
"You need me Boss?"
Grissom nodded and waved Nick in. "Yeah...sit down Nicky."
Uh oh...
"I want to talk to you."
This can't be good... "Um...okay." Nick answered tentatively. Grissom sighed and sat back in his chair, chewing on the end of pen, before setting it down and looking Nick in the eye.
"The accident on Tropicana...what is your relationship with the girl?"
"Was...what was my relationship." Nick corrected and Grissom examined him for a moment before nodding. Nick sighed and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "We were dating..." He raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Is this your way of telling me that something happened to her?" Nick asked worry starting to grow in the pit of his stomach. Grissom shook his head and Nick nodded slowly. "So what are you trying to say?"
"I uh...how long were the two of you dating?"
Nick stifled a protest and tried to keep his face neutral. "About three months...why?"
"I just uh...I wanted you to know that I had to bring her down here to ask her some questions...I didn't want to surprise you."
Empathy...not a usual trait from our fearless leader...
But then again, Nick wasn't giving him much credit. Just as much as the box had changed Nick, it changed everyone else as well. Sara had seemed to rediscover the art of smiling when she was around Nick...even when it wasn't needed. Catherine had decided to be more of a mother towards her own daughter...and the boys and Warrick had become even more protective of Nick then he had before.
Apparently Grissom had learned the beautiful art of feeling something...well, it was a semi-beautiful art. At the moment Nick was beginning to think Grissom was right all along. Stay away and you can't get hurt.
"No offense Griss...but why all the sudden do you care if I were to be...surprised by something like this? What's with the new found empathy?"
Grissom looked up from the spot on his desk he was focusing on. Grissom looked back down, away from Nick's eyes, and sighed deeply. He closed his eyes and turned them towards Nick before slowly opening them once again. "I've always cared Nick...I just...was confused by it."
Nick furred his brow. What was the older CSI trying to say...? "So now you're un-confused by it?"
"No...I'm more confused by it now than I ever was before...I just...I'm more knowledgeable on the subject."
"Of empathy."
"Of feeling." Grissom corrected. Nick searched the blue eyes for some sort of clue as to what he was saying. Suddenly he realized.
He's still confused, he's more confused, knows that girlfriends can be a sensitive subject, he's trying to comfort me about my relationship disaster with Riley. But...why all of the sudden?
Grissom seemed to be reading Nick's mind. "I um...I suspect that you and this girl were close..." Grissom smirked slightly, almost knowingly.
Shit...even Griss knew how I felt about her before I did...question is, did Riley know...
Nick nodded, just one quick motion of lowering and raising his head slightly. Grissom's smirk tuned into a sad smile and he nodded. "I...well, lately I...I know how that feels...being close to someone I mean."
"You have a girlfriend?" Nick's jaw hit the floor, and he picked it up quickly, ashamed at his reaction. Nick shook his head and Grissom blushed and ducked his head, still smiling at the revelation. "I'm sorry...I just...who...?"
Suddenly the office door opened, and Sara peeked her head in. "Grissom, Vartann and I are heading out to the victim's house. Are you joining us?"
Grissom blushed slightly and ducked his head, pretending to look for something in his drawer. "Uh...no. Y-you can handle this one yourself. Um...just page me with any new information."
Sara nodded and walked out. Nick turned away from the door, a knowing grin on his face. "You have a girlfriend named Sara...?"
Grissom kept his head in his desk drawer. He slowly sat back up, the grin still on Nick's face. "The point is Nick, it was pointed out to me that I could more...understand when it comes to you all." Grissom changed the subject slightly, and tried to suppress the grin rising to his face.
"That's why you didn't freak when I took off at the scene."
"For the past few months I had been suspecting that a woman had an effect on the new you...I figured that was her." Nick nodded and Grissom paused. "That doesn't mean I wasn't angry. I need to know you're not going to drop everything and come running if she gets upset here by some of the questions."
No! Hell no! I got in big trouble last time I tried that!
"Um, no. I tried that already, protecting something that isn't yours...she wasn't too happy."
Grissom smirked. "Sara use to be like that." Nick nodded. That wasn't exactly a secret around the lab. And then Grissom shocked the hell out of Nick again. "Do you need to talk about it?"
Nick almost reacted to hold his jaw in place as to not repeat the events from earlier. "Um...no. I uh...no."
Grissom nodded and looked back at his desk and the folder in front of him. "Okay..."
"When are you bringing her in?"
"Sometime Monday night. She's getting released from the hospital tomorrow and I figured I'd give her a day to recuperate...the doctor says she's doing good. She has full mobility back but she still isn't allowed to drive, at least according to her doctor, Brass said she refused and escort here so..."
Nick let a sad smile form on his face. "That's Riley."
Grissom furred his brow and slight panic came over his features. "Riley...? I'm talking about Bryn Turner."
Nick smiled. "She goes by the first half of her middle name, Riley."
Grissom leafed through the papers in the file and nodded slowly, then furred his brow. "Interesting..."
"What?"
"Her initials spell out BRAT."
Nick chuckled and stuck his tongue in his cheek. "Yeah." Was all he allowed himself to say.
"Okay...well if you don't have anything you want to talk about then you can go home for the day."
Nick nodded and stood, grabbed his bag, and headed towards the door. Suddenly he turned back to his boss. "Hey Griss..." Grissom looked up. "She um...she doesn't know that I work on this shift or that you're my boss..."
Grissom nodded, getting the hint. "I won't mention it. Same goes for you..." He raised his brow, as if that was the international signal for 'keep your mouth shut about me and Sara'.
Nick nodded. "I will. Thanks Grissom..." Nick cracked a smile. "Have a fun weekend...but not too much fun." And scurried out of the room before anything more could be said.
Riley sat in the passenger seat of Deven's car, trying not to fall asleep. She had been up all night again. She and Kiersten had decided to stay up till four in the morning watching chick flicks, and had spotted a giant spider in Riley's bedroom. They were too scared of the spider to fall asleep and risk having it bite them (an unlikely event) while they were sleeping, so they decided to stay up all night.
She then got a call that the man working the accident case wanted to talk with her about what happened. She was too tired to comprehend the fact that she was going to Nick's place of work, but Deven wasn't...that was why he had offered to take her there.
She finally gave in and decided to rest her eyes when the car came to a stop. Deven reached over and brushed a stray hair, which had escaped from her pony tail, from her face. His hand lingered on her cheek and he gently shook her shoulder to wake her. She opened her eyes and tried to rub the tiredness from them with no such luck. She sighed and looked up to see the large building in front of her.
"Come on Ry..." Deven said softly. She climbed out of the car slowly, almost painfully, and walked beside Deven into the building. She didn't notice as the Denali, eerily similar to Nick's, pulled into the parking lot as she and Deven made their way into the building.
Deven's hand dropped to the small of her back and he steered her towards what appeared to be the receptionist's desk. "Riley Turner, here for questioning." She replied and the tiny red headed woman checked the list.
"Here." She handed them two identification tags and they walked back towards where the woman had directed.
Deven's hand steered her towards the Detective they had been introduced to the other day. "Ms. Turner?" He asked and Riley nodded. "Captain Brass, why don't you come with me. Sir, you can wait in that office right there. I'll be back shortly." Brass informed them and Deven reluctantly left Riley's side.
"Are you gonna be okay?" He asked before the detective led her away. She smiled.
"They're asking me questions Deven, like what you and Kit were doing all last night." She rolled her eyes and Deven chuckled.
"Don't push it Kid..." He warned teasingly and Riley rolled her eyes before Brass led her into the interview room.
"Do you need a cup of water, coffee, anything?" Brass asked and Riley's ears perked up.
"Actually, coffee would be amazing." She drawled and Brass smiled.
Looks like we might have a nice Southern Belle for Nicky to drag him out of the slump he's been in the past few days.
Unknown to Brass...she was the cause of the slump, that and Nick's ignorance. "Alright, I'll fetch our ex-lab rat. He's got the best coffee around." Riley smirked as Brass paged the young man. "You wanna play a joke and no doubt get a boost to your ego?" Brass asked in an attempt to relax the girl, she smirked a little and nodded.
A few minutes later he appeared. "I got your 911 Brass, what's up?" The eager man asked.
"I need a cup of coffee." He said smirking and Greg's face fell to the floor.
"You paged me for a cup of coffee...?" Greg asked slowly. Riley pursed her lips to keep from smiling, and she failed miserably. The detective was right, this was funny.
"It's not for me." Brass replied.
"You paged me for a cup of coffee for someone else...?"
"Yep. One cup of Blue Hawaiian...for her." Brass gestured to the pretty red head sitting at the table. She gave a soft smile and Greg lit up.
"One order of Blue Hawaiian comin up." He replied and rushed from the room. Riley chuckled and shook her head.
"And that little character was Greggo. Our faithful little ex-lab rat." Brass explained. Riley nodded slowly and pulled off her denim jacket, folding it in her lap. "Well, Gil should be in shortly...until then," He shrugged and sat down across from her. "So...where did you grow up in Texas?" He asked and Riley raised her brow. "The accent. I am a detective, remember?" He teased and she chuckled.
"Fort Worth."
Brass opened his mouth to reply and inform her that they had a CSI from Texas on their team, when Grissom opened the door and stepped into the room. "Ah, and this, Ms. Turner, is Gil Grissom." Brass gestured to the slightly younger man as he sat down next to Jim. "I'll leave you to it then."
Just as Brass exited, Greg walked in and set the mug of coffee next to the girl, a huge grin plastered on his face. "The best coffee around, for the prettiest girl ever to walk through the doors." Greg stood back slightly and smiled at her.
Riley blushed. "Thanks." She drawled.
"Hey, are you from Texas?" Greg asked and she nodded. "That's cool, I have a friend named-"
"Greg, don't you have some paperwork to finish?" Grissom interrupted before Greg could spill the beans. Greg sulked for a second, before waving good bye to Riley and disappearing. He ran into Brass in the hallway and Brass smirked at the look on his face.
"I take it Grissom interrupted your little 'conversation' with the red head?" Brass asked and Greg rolled his eyes.
"Eh, I'll catch her before she leaves." Greg replied optimistically.
Brass chuckled and moved down the hallway. He saw Nick a few feet away with his head down, and Brass smiled. "Hey Nicky, how was your weekend?" Brass noted that the Texan was wearing a black T-shirt, dark wash jeans, and a pair of black boots. It seemed like he was dressing darker these days. Almost always in all black.
Nick shrugged. "It was okay...just did some work around the house. How 'bout you?" He asked politely, not putting much effort into the question. Truth be told, he was tired, miserable, and didn't really care much about anything lately.
"It was okay." Brass replied and continued his walk down the hall. Nick sighed and let his head fall back to it's original position of looking at his feet as he walked. He sighed and brought his head up to watch where he was walking when a flash of red hair caught his eye. He looked over and saw Riley sitting in the interview room, with her head down, staring at her hands folded on the table, talking to Grissom.
Nick stood there for a moment, then looked towards the door beside it...the room for the two way mirror. He bit his lip and gave into temptation...just for a minute...he just had to hear her voice...then he would leave. He closed the door behind them and walked over to the mirror. He felt a pang of ache flash through his heart as he saw a small smile form on her lips for second as she shook her head.
"No...no it was um, it was a gift from a friend...I got a thing for the Dukes of Hazard. I only had the car for a few days before I wrecked it again and sent it back to the shop." Riley admitted, smiling slightly. Grissom chuckled.
"It certainly is a unique car..." Grissom shook his head and looked at his notes. He slid on his glasses as he did so. "Where were you coming from when the accident occurred Ms. Turner?" He studied his notes for a few seconds longer, then looked up at her.
She had tensed for a moment, then ran her hand through her red hair. Nick tensed behind the mirror and scratched and the back of his neck. "From...from a f-friends house." She replied, trying to make it sound casual.
"Where does your friend live?" Grissom asked and she bit her lip.
"On Americana Blvd." She said softly and Grissom looked up at her quickly...Nick lived on Americana...that probably wasn't a coincidence. Grissom nodded and dropped his head to his notes again. Nick sighed from inside the other room and hung his head as he rocked on his heels.
"Did you see the car that hit you?" Grissom asked and she shook her head and closed her eyes.
"No. I was stopped at the light and I saw a car from about a mile down the road and I figured he was going to just pull up to the stop light...so I uh, I bent down to change the channels on my radio and when I looked up the car was coming at me full force..."
"Do you remember what time that was?"
"10:23 a.m."
Nick sighed and thought back to what he had been doing about that time...tearing apart his house. After Nick decided that he had tortured himself enough for one day, he quietly slipped out of the room and sighed as he began the short walk towards Brass' office to ask the detective a question. He knocked on the door and opened it when he heard Brass' voice invite him in.
"Hey Brass, what've you heard-" Nick stopped short when he saw Deven sitting across from the Captain's desk. Deven stood up and matched Nick's height. "Deven."
"Nick."
Brass looked between the two men...how did they know each other? Each man radiated jealousy and anger, making the tension in the room so thick, you couldn't cut it with a knife. And just when Brass thought the tension couldn't get any thicker...
"Thank you Ms. Turner. I'll contact you if I have anymore questions."
"Alright Mr. Grissom." Riley answered as they walked into Brass' office. Riley's eyes widened when she saw Nick...and her jaw fell open slightly when she saw Deven was standing next to him. "Nick..."
"Riley." Nick said softly. She folded her hands in front of her stomach and shifted uncomfortably.
No one had said anything for several minutes, and Brass motioned to Grissom with his eyes. He mouthed the words, 'What's going on?'
And Grissom just shrugged and looked back to the three people in front of him.
"Awkward." Riley noted gaining everyone's attention. She blushed as if she hadn't meant to say that out loud.
"Can we talk?" Nick asked her.
"No." Deven objected, and everyone then turned to face him.
"Well good because I didn't want to talk to you." Nick snapped and turned back to Riley. "Riley...please..."
She shifted uncomfortably and pushed her hair from her eyes. "I uh...I don't think this is really the place."
"So then we'll talk somewhere private..."
Riley sighed in defeat and nodded slightly. Nick quickly escorted her from the room, his hand guiding her by the small of her back like Deven had earlier. Seeing this, Deven clenched his teeth and balled his hands into fists.
Nick led Riley down the hall and to the break room. She turned once the door was closed and looked at him tiredly. "What?"
"You look tired." He noted.
"I am. Did you bring me here just to tell me that?" She drawled.
"No...we need to talk. We were supposed to do that at the hospital..." Nick gave an unfriendly smile and she scowled.
"I was tired that night. I'm sorry that was an inconvenience to you but I was just in a car accident, I had a bunch of different sedatives goin through me, and I had just had an exhausting conversation with Deven..."
"So you didn't want to talk to me because you had just dealt with Deven." Nick clarified, his accent growing as thick as hers was.
"No, I didn't want to talk to anyone. I even turned Kiersten away that night. I just wanted to sleep. And if I remember correctly you never made an attempt to see me after that."
"That's because I thought you didn't want to see me."
"Well that didn't stop you before and it isn't stopping you now..."
"I was caught up with work. I had a big case and I didn't even have time to go home..."
Not that I really wanted to anyway...
"Well, we're here now so talk."
"...I wanted to say I'm sorry. I wanted to say that I shouldn't have judged ya'll like that...I'm a crime scene investigator...I should have followed the evidence."
Damn...Griss was right again.
"Yeah. You should have."
"I...when I saw you hug him I was angry...and then I saw you k-" He caught himself before he could finish the word. "...Peck him on the cheek and I flipped."
"I was excited about my new car...he's my friend."
"I know that now."
"You know...it really hurt when you confronted me like you did. You lied to me over the phone and said nothin was wrong, you were sharp with me, and then you started yellin..." Nick swallowed the lump in his throat and looked down. "I don't know what hurt more...the fact that you even thought I would cheat on you...or how you didn't even believe me when I said I didn't. You didn't trust me...and trust is everything in a relationship. You know what hurt the most...out of everything that we fought about..."
Nick shook his head.
She gulped back the lump in her throat and fought against the tears that were threatening to fall. "The fact that I knew what it was like to think that the person you trusted the most did that to you...when I found out Deven did what he did...I hated him. I mean I physically hated him." She sniffled and looked away, shaking her head. "I just wanted him to drop off the face of the Earth and all memory of him to be gone. All memory...even the good times. I didn't want to remember anything about him...he hurt me that much. And then when you...stood there...giving me the same look I gave him..." She wiped at the tears that were falling down her cheeks. Nick gulped and tried to blink back the tears, refusing to cry in front of her. "I felt horrible...especially because I didn't even cheat. I thought you hated me for no reason." She replied through her tears, her accent thick with emotion.
Nick felt like someone had reached into his chest, yanked out his heart and drop kicked it into a lions den...probably the same way she felt. "Ry...I never hated you."
"You didn't do much to disprove that theory at the time. And you didn't even listen when I tried to explain..." Fresh tears began to pour from her unusually sad baby blue eyes.
He looked at her and bit his lip. "I know. But I thought, that when Deven...cheated, on you...I don't know. I thought that maybe you'd cheat on me out of anger." Nick replied, his voice cracking.
She shook her head. "Why would I cheat with the guy that cheated on me?" Nick shrugged. "I wouldn't even take Deven back when I was lonely and almost desperate for human contact...why would I sleep with him after I already had you...? You were all I needed..." The use of the past tense made Nick wince and look away. "If I was going to prove a point at all I wouldn't have even cheated...you know how Southern women get back at men that scorned them..."
A small smirk crept up on Nick's face and he nodded. "I know it well..."
"We go after the truck or the house...eight times outta ten it's the truck. We'll key it, spray paint it, take a baseball bat to the head and tail lights, cut the tires...then if we know the girl you cheated with we go after the house ya'll are livin in and tear it to pieces." Riley replied, not able to keep the smile off her face at the thought.
Nick raised his brow in suspicion as his grin grew, having a good idea what the answer would be to the question he was about to ask. "Did you go after Deven's truck?" She closed her mouth and let her pursed lips and glint of mischief in her eye do the talking for her. Nick let out a chuckle and shook his head. "Hell hath no furry like a Southern woman scorned." He drawled and she chuckled softly.
"Well...at least in mine and Kit's case..."
Nick looked at her, all playfulness gone from his voice, a more serious tone taking its place. "I've missed you Riley...I couldn't even stand to be at my house...I slept at a hotel the past few nights I actually got away from work...and even then I hardly slept."
And each time I did go to sleep, I woke up from a night terror, either about the box, the god damn babysitter, Mrs. Hendler, fuckin Nigel Crane, Kristy...or on fucked up nights like last night when it was a combination of them all. Oh yes, times have been fun without you Darlin...
She nodded. "Me too." She answered softly, snapping him from his thoughts. "I missed you Nick." She admitted and Nick let a small smile creep to his face. "I'm sorry that I was so-"
Nick silenced her by pressing his lips to hers. She was a bit taken back by him, but soon she kissed him back and wrapped her arms around him, bringing him closer to her. Nick pulled away and looked at her for a moment, then blinked a few times to make sure she didn't vanish before his eyes.
She bit her already swollen lip to keep from smiling. "What are you doing?" She asked.
Nick blushed at his need to prove she was real. "I uh...I just wanted to make sure it was really you." He mumbled and she chuckled, pursing her lips to keep from bursting out in laughter.
"It's really me...I'm really here."
Nick nodded and rested his head against hers, kissing her lips softly and smiling. She leaned up to press her lips back into his fiercely as if she had been wandering the desert for days, and Nick's lips were her only source of water. Nick's hands gripped her back tightly, as one slid up the back of her tiny green cotton T-shirt, he caressed the silky skin underneath.
"Ahem..." Someone cleared their throat, dragging Nick's attention away from Riley's lips and skin. Riley and Nick whipped around to face Greg staring at them downheartedly. "Damnit Nick, I saw her first." Greg whined and Riley blushed.
"Uh, yeah...sorry Greggo..." Nick replied, trying not to blow their cover just yet. So far only Grissom and Greg knew for sure that he was seeing someone. "Listen...could you uh...could you keep this quiet?" Nick asked and Greg scowled, but nodded his head.
"Fine." He breathed. "But, Nick, what happened to that 'cat' Warrick was talking about all the time...I mean if you're sucking on anyone's face, no offense," He waved to Riley and she shrugged. "Shouldn't it be the 'cat' that was responsible for those scratches and bite marks?"
Riley pursed her lips to hide a triumphant smile and stepped forward. "I'm guessin that's me..." Nick nodded. "Hi, I'm Riley. I'm the uh, 'vicious cat'." She shook Greg's hand, who at the moment was slapping himself, and Nick chuckled.
"Alright, enough talk about my personal life. Please keep it to yourself Greg?" Nick asked and escorted Riley out of the room.
Tee hee...YAY! Our happy little couple is (probably) a happy little couple again. (I say probably because I might be mean and make something else go wrong...) You'll just have to read (and review) to find out:)
-Chella Belle