A/N sorry this took a bit longer, I've been a busy girl, what can I say? Thanks to everyone who reviewed, keep it up darlings, hope you like it! (and I haven't been feeling well, so let's blame any mistakes I made on that, shall we?)- Solomynne
The inside of a nightclub is very similar to that of an overcrowded elevator:
It's hot, it's stuffy, and there's a lot of unwelcome touching. These are three of the main factors why Sara Sidle avoided them at all costs, and as she and Grissom entered the doors of Les Enfants, all the many other reasons came flooding back to her as well. The throbbing beat of the music was so loud Sara could feel it vibrating in her chest.
"How are these people not deaf?" Grissom yelled at her. "Don't they know that listening to music this loudly has been proven to cause hearing damage?"
"What?" Sara yelled back, cupping a hand to her ear. Grissom waved a "never-mind" hand at her, and the two of them began scanning the crowd for their co-workers. The place was completely dark, save the occasional colored laser slicing through the crowd; sub-par lighting for finding your own nose, never mind other people. Squinting in the darkness, Sara reached for Grissom's hand and began to pull him through the sea of people, her eyes trained on the back of a familiar looking blonde head.
They wove their way through the thick throng of dancing people, brushing past a pair of guys gyrating to some obscure electropop song. Sara smiled to herself, wishing she could see Grissom's face as the two men began to grind. Then again, knowing Grissom, he probably looked completely impassive, save perhaps a hint of mild curiosity. "Joslyn!" called Sara. The girl didn't turn, no surprise since the music seemed to have gotten louder, if that was even possible.
Sara and Grissom emerged, sweaty, from the other side of the crowd. Panting, Sara let go of Grissom as she approached the blonde girl who was now leaning up against the bar, reaching out to put a hand on her shoulder. The girl, who turned out to not be Joslyn, spun around and met Sara's eyes with blatant interest on her face. She was wearing tight leather pants and a revealing red halter that strained against her breasts as she gave Sara a once-over with a pair of small, dark eyes. Sara, wondering how she could possibly have thought this was Joslyn, took a step back in surprise. "Oh, I'm sorry, I thought you were someone else."
"You're sure I'm not who you're looking for?" asked the woman, biting a lip as she reached out to run a hand down Sara's free arm. Grissom watched the interaction with growing interest. Momentarily speechless, Sara's mouth hung open as she searched for an answer that wouldn't end with a bitch slap, but was saved from having to respond by a warm hand on her arm. She looked to see Joslyn smiling up at her, and relief washed through her body. Putting an arm around Joslyn she looked back at the woman, who raised her eyebrows and backed off, but not without running her tongue across her lips suggestively.
Sara, feeling both shocked and slightly aroused, allowed herself to be led by Joslyn towards the back room where Brass and Warrick were talking to the club owner.
"What was that all about, 'darling'?" laughed Joslyn, as Sara took her arm from around her shoulder.
"I thought she was you!"
"Oh come now, you know my leather pants are at the cleaners," scoffed Joslyn, her eyes crinkling with laughter.
"Ha ha," answered Sara sarcastically. Brass looked up as they walked into the back room with Grissom in tow. He gestured to the two seats that surrounded the small wooden table he was seated at with Warrick and the club owner. The room smelled of cigarettes and stale beer, and was lit by an eerie red light bulb, casting their faces into shadow. The music was still loud even with the doors closed, but it was possible to have a conversation now.
"Girls," he started, "this is Damien Price, club owner. Mr. Price," he said, turning to the owner, "this is Sara Sidle and her partner Joslyn Grace. And this is Gil Grissom, night shift supervisor for CSI."
"So many of you?" asked the aging man, raising a thick eyebrow. He was short, only a little taller than Joslyn, and he had his dark hair slicked back in a John-Travolta-style swoop. The jeans he was wearing were so tight they left nothing to the imagination, and his black silk shirt was unbuttoned halfway down, revealing several gold chains hanging from his neck. He peered at them from squinty blue eyes; a gold tooth peeking out from his small mouth every time he spoke. Overall, the cheese factor on this guy was probably an 8.5 on a 1-10 scale.
"It's a big case," explained Jim, taking out his notebook. "Now, can you tell me anything about Trinity Wescott?"
"Who?" asked Price.
"Trinity Wescott, she's Sullivan Wescott's daughter. We're working a case that she's involved in, we need any information you might have on her."
"Sorry buddy," answered Price, scratching his head, " I don't know who either of those people are."
"Sullivan Wescott is the Nevada State Senator," Sara responded, "Trinity is his daughter."
"Ah, I was never much for politics," he answered, waving a ring-cluttered hand.
"Here," said Brass, handing him a photo of Trinity, "maybe this will refresh your memory."
Price regarded the photo, knitting his eyebrows in the dim lighting. "Yeah I recognize her. I don't know any Trinity, but that looks like Gina Matthews. She was a regular, used to come in for a drink and a dance with her girlfriend a couple times a week."
"She could have been using an alias," said Sara to Grissom over the music, "trying to keep from being recognized." He nodded in agreement. Sara spoke to Price, "Did she ever have any problems? Get into any fights with anyone, something like that?"
Damien Price shook his head, "Naw, Gina was a good kid, she was no troublemaker. She was just here to have a good time."
Warrick nudged Brass with an elbow; "You think your pal Pierce was just leading us on a goose chase? Maybe there's nothing for us here."
Damien narrowed his eyes, "Pierce? Charlie Pierce? What's that jerk-off been saying now?"
"You know him?" asked Joslyn.
"Yeah, he and I used to co-own this club together. Bastard was a real good friend of mine."
"So what happened?" asked Warrick.
"He started using. Got really heavy into drugs, and debt. Eventually, I had to tell him to get lost. No way in Hell I was going to let him drag me and Les Enfants down with him. Anyway he got really bitter about the whole thing. Kept showing up here, hassling the customers, ranting and raving. I think the last time I saw that guy he was begging for change in front of Circus-Circus. Damn shame."
"You have no clue as to why Mr. Pierce would tell us that Les Enfants had something to do with Trinity, er – Gina's death?" asked Sara.
"No," shrugged Pierce, "the guy's crazy. He was always talking about Big Brother watching us all, that kind of thing. You know now that you mention it; I remember Gina was one of the people he flipped out on. Telling her to watch her back, that people were out to get her.
"And how did she respond to that?" asked Grissom, intrigued.
Damien shrugged, "Just like anyone else would, she got freaked out. He practically had her cornered, yelling this and that about her 'being watched'. He kept repeating that part, that she was being watched. He also kept saying 'he knows what you're doing', whatever that means. It really got to her though. She started to cry, and that's when her girl Gloria got her out of there."
"Do you know much about her? Gloria?" asked Sara.
Damien gave another shrug, "Just stuff I've picked up from her being here so often. She's a nurse or something right?" Sara nodded. "Yeah her and Gina, or Trinity I guess, were really in it."
"In it?" asked Joslyn, confused.
"Yeah you know, 'in it'. Like in love. Those two were head over heels; you get to know after so many years of people watching. Awful about what happened."
"Alright, thank you Mr. Price, we'll be in touch," said Brass, standing.
"Yeah sure, anytime," answered Price, rising with them. "And hey, anytime any of you want to come for a dance, you can consider the cover charge waived."
They each shook his hand, Joslyn promising to take him up on the offer as they filed out of the room, making their way through the mass of dancers on the dance floor. Their spirits, and hope for the case, rising with every beat of the music.
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Back at the lab, Greg walked into the layout room where Sara and Joslyn were going over case details. So far the only thing they'd been able to come up with was more questions. Why didn't the Senator tell them about the Catholic camp he and Trinity were supposed to be at? And why had he lied to them about the fact that Trinity was in a relationship? Obviously he wanted to keep her sexuality under wraps, but to lie to the police seemed a little extreme. Greg regarded the two women poring over the case files. They were bent with their heads together, hunched over several manila folders with the light from the layout table glowing on their faces.
They looked up as he walked into the room, their faces breaking into tired smiles. "Hello ladies, find anything interesting?"
"Well," started Sara, rubbing a bruised eye, "we know the Senator wasn't being honest with us about…well, anything. I'm thinking we should get him back here and tell him we know that Trinity was gay. If he knows we're aware of the fact, he may be more willing to give up some helpful information."
"But," interjected Joslyn, "if he was the one who killed her, which is looking more and more likely with every passing second, then he's not going to give us anything no matter what we know."
"True," sighed Sara. She looked up at Greg and noticed his eyes were brimming with excitement. She sat up in interest, "You have something, don't you?"
He plopped into the seat across from them, nodding.
"Well?" urged Joslyn.
"First of all I think Jos is right, Wescott's not going to give us anything. The risk of jeopardizing the election for himself is too great, whether he did it or not. Now, what we need is a whole new lead to run on. Something so great that it could change the entire outcome of the case, something so outrageous--"
"--Spit it out Greg, we're tired," interrupted Sara.
Scowling at her for ruining his presentation, he paused for suspense before saying slowly, "Charlie Pierce is Marjorie Hudson's son."
The two girls stared at him in disbelief; neither of them could speak for a moment. Eventually, Joslyn was able to sputter a "…what?"
"How do you know?" asked Sara.
"Well," began Greg, smiling smugly as he put his feet up on the table, "while you two were out dancing at some club on the strip, I was here doing all the real work."
"What are you talking about?" said Sara in exasperation as she shoved Greg's feet off of their case files.
"The necklace that you found at the scene, and the footprint Grissom got a mold of were just sitting, forgotten, in the evidence locker. So, I took it upon myself to analyze them and I think it's safe to say I've got the case breaker right here in my hand." He waved the evidence bag containing the silver necklace they'd found in front of their faces.
"First of all, we hadn't forgotten about them," Joslyn retorted, taking her eyes off the plastic baggie to glare at him, "we were just preoccupied following leads, and, you know, actually working the case."
"Unlike some people who sit around the break room drinking coffee all day," added Sara.
Greg feigned being offended before retaliating, "You guys are just jealous."
"Jealous of what!" yelled Sara, "you still haven't told us anything!"
"Oh, right," he sat up straight. Sara rolled her eyes as he continued, "So I compared the blood on the necklace to Trinity Wescott, and it was a match, surprise surprise. But there was an additional donor in the sample, probably from a cut sustained while ripping the necklace off in a struggle. I ran the DNA through the system, and although I didn't get an exact match, I did find someone who had 11 alleles in common with the necklace-ripper."
"Who?" asked Joslyn.
"Charlie Pierce." The girls looked at each other, and back to him. " Eleven alleles in common is more than enough to suggest a relative. The thing is, whoever it was wasn't in the system, so I started digging. Apparently Charlie Pierce, born Charles Peter Pierce Jr. was born to parents Charles Pierce Sr. and Marjorie Hudson-Pierce, who changed her name back to Hudson after her husband's death in 1998. She filed a missing persons report on her son back in 2000. They never found him."
"Until now," finished Joslyn.
Sara smiled radiantly, "It looks like Marjorie forgot to tell us something."
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"What do you mean you can't find her?" asked a very burnt out Sara Sidle.
She was slumped in a chair in Brass' office between Joslyn and Grissom. They'd been waiting for word on Marjorie Hudson for the past five hours, to no avail.
"I mean exactly that, I can't find her. She's nowhere to be found Sara," defended Brass as Sara let out a frustrated growl. "She's not at home, and from what my guys are telling me it looks like she hasn't been there in days. The chef at St. Mary's says she hasn't turned up for work the past two days in a row, I think it's safe to say she's skipped town."
"Not surprising," said Grissom, "she had to know we'd figure out her relation to Charlie eventually. And she probably also knew once we figured that out it would only be a matter of time before we started looking at her for this murder."
"I'm still not sure about that," said Joslyn quietly. "I mean I know that her blood was on Trinity's necklace, but that doesn't mean she killed her. At least not on her own."
"Why, what are you thinking?" asked Sara, her head in her hand.
"Well, I'm guessing the silk fibers we found in the oil drum are from Marjorie too. But they were at the bottom of the barrel. And the necklace, something Trinity most likely wore all the time, could have been ripped off not in a struggle, but as a means of slowing down the identification process. It just seems to me like all the evidence connects her to disposing of the body, but not the actual murder itself."
"Yeah," agreed Sara, "I still like the Senator for this one too."
"Well regardless of who you two 'like' for this murder, Marjorie is at the very least guilty of obstruction of justice and of being an accomplice after the fact," reminded Grissom.
He watched Sara nod her tired agreement, noting that her stamina was significantly depleted since her attack. She was having trouble keeping her eyes focused, and her eyelids were half closed.
"Well I'll keep looking, and I'll let you know when I find something," said Brass, bringing Grissom's attention back to the conversation. "There's always a paper trail."
Grissom thanked them and the three of them left Brass' office in a slightly less optimistic mood than when they had entered.
"Well I think it's time we called it a night. Or…day rather," said Grissom, looking out the window at the sun creeping across the horizon.
"Good idea," yawned Joslyn, heading for the locker room as she rubbed her bleary green eyes.
Sara followed her, sitting down on the bench she leaned her head against the cool metal of her locker.
"You okay?" asked Joslyn, putting a hand on Sara's hair.
"Mm just tired," she answered with closed eyes.
"You want me to find Greg, tell him to take you home?"
Sara opened her eyes and slowly sat up straight. "To tell you the truth the last thing I want is to go to sleep in someone else's house and wake up in a strange apartment. I just want to crawl into my own bed and sleep this day away. To Hell with that stupid schedule."
Joslyn sat down beside her, looking at Sara's beaten face in concern. "Sara, should you really be alone? I mean what if that creepy "X" guy comes back?"
Sara sighed, "I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. For now, I'm going home" And with that she grabbed her things and walked out, leaving Joslyn sitting on the bench, staring after her.
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Sara slid into the front seat of her car, relishing in the muffled silence that met her as she slammed the door shut. The air inside the car was still, and warm. She took in a deep breath and laid her head on the steering wheel, cradling her face in her arms. She knew she shouldn't go home alone, and she felt bad for being sharp with Joslyn. After all, Jos was just looking out for her. The truth is she didn't really want to be alone, she just didn't want to be with Greg. She was so tired that she might've fallen asleep right there on the steering wheel, with thoughts of Joslyn and Grissom and Mr. X whirling in her mind, had it not been for the soft knock on the passenger side window.
She looked up to see Grissom peering at her through the glass, and without lifting her head, she hit the unlock button on her keys and let him in. He sat down beside her, closing the door beside him without a word. They sat there in silence for a few beats before he said, "You weren't planning on sneaking off on us were you?"
"I was thinking about it," she mused.
"Sara, do you realize the danger you're putting yourself in?"
"Yes," she answered honestly.
"Then why do you do it?"
"I don't know. Maybe I just don't care," she said softly.
"Why don't you care about your own well-being?"
"When no one else in your life has ever cared about you, it's only natural that you wouldn't either." She couldn't believe that she was saying these things to him. These were things she didn't even allow herself to think, let alone say out loud. It must be the painkillers she thought.
"Sara you know that's not true, we all care about you very much."
"How come you never say it? Why don't you ever tell me that you care about me?"
He had obviously not expected to have this conversation. As he fiddled with his glasses, he managed to answer her. "It would be inappropriate for me, as your superior, to say anything like that. Besides, it was always been implied. I just assumed you knew."
"I do know." She answered.
"Then what's the problem!" he asked. He hated when she set him up like this.
"Because when you assume, you make an ass of u and me, remember?" she asked, smiling.
He laughed in spite of himself. "Look, it's too late, and we're too tired to have this discussion. So why don't you move over and I'll drive us to your place." Seeing her raise her eyebrows he quickly added, "I'm not letting you sleep alone, whether you like it or not."
She definitely approved of the idea, and he knew it. "Fine," she answered calmly, "but I'm driving."
"Sara, how do you expect to drive standard when your arm is in a sling?"
She hadn't thought about that. Tossing the keys at him, he walked around the car as she slid over, resting her head on the window. She was asleep before he'd even pulled out of the driveway, her deep, even breathing the only sound in the car. Grissom watched her as they sat at a red light, the morning sun creeping across the sky, splashing pink and orange across the horizon.
Another day.