Disclaimer: If they were mine, the show would be moved to HBO.

The following evening, the two women met in the hall outside the morgue where they were headed to review Doc Robbins' autopsy. Catherine grabbed Sara's forearm and stopped her brisk pace.

"Hey, Sara?"

"What is it, Catherine?" The brunette looked up into hesitant blue eyes.

"Look, I just wanted to apologize for my behavior last night."

"Don't worry about it." Sara tried to brush her off.

"No, I was really out of line and not professional. You were just trying to get me in a better mood and I jumped on you."

Sara smiled stiffly, "I'm used to it."

The redhead withdrew her hand from Sara's arm as if she'd been burnt and looked to the tiled floor with flushed cheeks, "Yeah, about that. I honestly don't know why I'm always attacking you, but I know it hurts your feelings-"

"Cath-" Sara argued.

Catherine shook her head "No, let me finish."

Sara nodded.

"I know it hurts your feelings, and you have to believe me when I say that I always feel really guilty after I snap at you or insult you. It just…slips out. But I want you to know that I am seriously going to work harder to not be so harsh anymore."

Sara hesitated, "Okay…"

"When we're being nice to each other, we actually get along really well…so I'm going to try to not let my temper get ahead of me so much."

The dark-haired woman smiled at the image of a well-mannered Catherine, "Good luck with that." She started to turn back towards the morgue but stopped, "And I'll try not to be so…sensitive, try be more sensitive to you, that is. I know that half the time you're just lashing out because you're tired or frustrated and that it really doesn't have anything to do with me."

"More than half the time."

Sara nodded, "Just don't get too nice. Truthfully, I like you just the way you are." Grinning, she walked in to hear what the Doc had to say about Bill Cassidy.

Slightly stunned, but flattered and more than a little curious as to the flush creeping up her neck, Catherine followed a moment later.

"Hey, Doc." Catherine greeted as she came through the door, "What've you got for us?"

"Evening, Catherine. Sara and I were just getting to that. It looks like your vic died from blunt force trauma." The man gestured at Bill Cassidy's now shaved crown.

"Aha. A whack on the head." Catherine peered at the wound in the man's skull.

Robbins shook his head, "No, the cracking of the skull is consistent with a fall, or possibly something falling on him."

"Would it have been bloody?" The redhead wanted to know.

"For sure. His hair was matted in blood as well as dirt, but there should have been more."

"We didn't find any blood at the scene. Is it possible he sustained the injury and then walked to his front porch."

"Very unlikely. Whatever he hit or hit him jarred his spine. He was most likely killed instantly, if he wasn't, he was certainly paralyzed."

"So…" Catherine's blue eyes looked into Sara's brown ones.

As the brunette read her mind, she nodded, "Somebody moved him."

"Maybe the same somebody who helped him fall."

Sara looked to the Doc, "What about the rocks in the wound?"

"Sent them up to trace early this morning."

"Awesome. Thanks, Doc."

"Oh, by the way. You might want to know that this guy's lungs were shot. No traces of tobacco in the esophageal track, though, and nicotine levels were normal."

"So he wasn't a smoker."

"No, but his lungs were clogged. I made a slide- it's the same stuff that was all over his body before I cleaned him up. Sparkling dust. It's almost like he was a miner or something."

"A miner way out in the Nevada desert…" Catherine said, thinking.

Sara picked up a her line of thought, "A miner…or a prospector."

Catherine smiled, "Everybody in this damn state is looking to strike it rich. Money says the sparkles were precious metals."

Sara smiled back, "No bet."

"Silver." Sara read the trace report. "The dust held trace amounts of silver- nothing to write home about, as well as pyrite and limestone. Well, the whole state is made out of silver and limestone; he could have been killed anywhere."

"Not true." Hodges handed her another sheet of paper, "I ran the purple-red rock fragments you lifted and the ones the ME got out of the skull- they match each other by the way. It's a conglomerate igneous rock called Jasperoid. The only places true Jasperoid is found are in the deep strata of central Nevada and Iran."

"How deep?"

"One hundred-fifty to three hundred meters below the surface."

"Well, that fits with our miner/ prospector theory."

"So does this." Catherine walked into the lab waving a rolled up chart in her hand.

"What do you have?" Sara asked, curious. Sara nodded her thanks to the lab tech and the two women walked out into the hall.

"The layout of Bill Cassidy's property. He has eleven marked open mine shafts and a license to dig for practically any valuable mineral, rock, or metal. The guy was leeching everything from the soil that he could."

"Well, Hodges said that the rock fragments are a mineral that's only found in Nevada and Iran and only deeper than a hundred and fifty meters."

"There were no visible tire treads at the scene. Whoever moved the body carried it or dragged it."

"Probably from one of Bill Cassidy's mines." Sara agreed.

Catherine smiled, "Up for some gold digging?"

The tall woman returned the expression, "I'll get the gear."

"I'll go get some lunch for the drive. Meet you in the parking lot in twenty?"

"Get some extra bottles of water- you never know, right?"

Catherine nodded. As she headed out the door, she ran into Nick.

"Heya, Cath. Watcha workin' on?"

"Hey, Nicky. Sara and I were just about to head out in search of a primary crime scene somewhere in a mine."

Nick laughed, "Watch out for bats."

"Bats?" Catherine grimaced.

"Griss and I pulled a case once…"

"Oh, right, the phony prospector." The redhead shivered, "I don't like bats."

Nick patted her on the shoulder, "Take care, Catherine. I'll see you around."

"Sure thing, Nick." Smiling, she went out to pick up sandwiches across the street.