If Nick had felt insecure about his relationship with Sara before, he felt it even more keenly now. He knew that she still had feelings for Grissom and he was worried that those feelings just might outweigh the newfound feelings that she had for him. She had said that feelings were a good place to start their relationship, but they hadn't been dating very long and he had worried if Grissom decided to act like a man and try and win Sara back that she just might go; she had pined for him for three years and she had a lot more invested in the bug man than she had in him. Still, he had feelings for her that he just couldn't contain anymore and he wasn't going to just lie down and let Grissom win her back without putting his cards out on the table and letting Sara decide. The confusion he'd seen on her face though had affected his ability to concentrate and he finally growled in frustration and sat back in his chair; the carpet fiber he was trying to compare to one they'd taken off of their vic would have to wait for a few minutes until he could find a way to clear his head.
It just wasn't fair. He was in love with Sara; not that she knew that, he thought he'd have a little time to work up his courage to get to those three little words after they'd been dating for a little while. He hadn't wanted to scare her off before they'd even had a chance to see if this thing between them might work by telling her that he loved her. But here was Grissom; by all accounts until a few short weeks ago, her dream man, telling her that he loved her and was willing to give up his career for her. The man lived and breathed this lab; if he was willing to give it all up for Sara then perhaps Nick had underestimated him; maybe he really was the man for Sara.
What the hell was he thinking? He was the man for Sara and he needed to show her that. Of course with Grissom making it clear that he wanted her back, he wasn't sure how to go about doing that without coming off as a jerk. He couldn't just walk up to her and say 'hey, baby, you're mine'; Sara was a modern woman and she wouldn't take too kindly to someone telling her that she belonged to them. That was a conclusion that she would have to come to on her own. Still he wanted to be with her and now that word had started to make its way around the lab that they were together he reasoned that it would be pretty damn awkward for her to suddenly decide that she wanted to dump him so that she could go back to Grissom.
Nick let out a frustrated sigh; who was he kidding? It wouldn't really be awkward for Sara it would be awkward for him. Everyone knew that she'd had feelings for Grissom and some surmised that they'd had some sort of romantic tryst before she'd even come to Vegas, the fact that the man with the reputation as the ladies man had somehow convinced her to date him was a far more shocking revelation in the halls of CSI; even if that same reputation was far more over inflated than the actual reality of his love life.
The truth was no matter how much he wanted to be with her or how embarrassing it would be for him if she chose to leave him and go back to Grissom he wanted her to be happy. If Grissom made her happy then he would find some way to deal with his feelings for her. He didn't want to be with her if she had doubts, but he wasn't going to just go down without a fight either.
They had talked about having breakfast after shift and then maybe if the double they were working hadn't turned into a triple by then they might get to spend a little quality time together before getting some sleep. Ever since they'd spent that night together at Red Rock he couldn't seem to get enough of her. Sara had turned out to be an ardent lover and he had grossly underestimated her prowess in the bedroom. That coupled with a friendship cultivated over several years had brought a level of feeling to the whole sexual experience that Nick had never known before. He had convinced himself that Sara was the one for him, but now with Grissom making a play for her again, he wasn't sure that Sara felt the same way; or could feel the same way.
Nick ran his hand over his eyes before gearing himself up to try and concentrate on the damn carpet fiber. They had nothing to compare it to at the moment but they needed to get some sort of identification to place on it so that if they did find another they would be able to tie the two together. He leaned back in and peered into the high-powered microscope.
"Any identification yet, Nicky?" Grissom knew that he needed to keep things professional as he walked into the lab that Nick was using to analyze a few pieces of trace evidence they had collected at the crime scene. He had seen the expression on Nick's face earlier when he'd been talking to Sara and he really wasn't sure what this romantic triangle was going to do the sort of fatherly relationship he had with Nick.
Nick felt nerves in the pit of his stomach and then glanced up. "Still working on it. It's not trilobal so I'm certain that it's not synthetic. I may need to have Hodges do some further analysis. Though Nick had a specialization in trace analysis, there were new things coming across their path everyday and Hodges had a freakish ability to identify things that perplexed just about everyone else.
"Sometimes knowing what it isn't is as important as knowing what it is." Grissom seemed please, although underneath the surface he was nervous too. He wasn't sure he should say anything about the earlier conversation that Nick had overheard, but then again, he had wanted to give him the same courtesy that had been extended in the hospital parking lot. But they were in the lab and there was the chance that someone could walk in, so he decided that perhaps he would bring it up later.
Nick looked at Grissom for a long moment and considered briefly that the man owed him an explanation, but then this was Grissom and oftentimes things he did defied explanation to those who didn't know him. In short, the chances that Grissom would actually bring up the subject of the conversation that he'd interrupted would be slightly less than the chances that a live dinosaur would be found wandering the jungles of the Amazon. He decided that he was going to have to initiate the conversation. "Grissom."
The tone in Nick's voice and the expression on his face caused Grissom to furrow his brow. "Yes, Nicky." He certainly hoped that whatever Nick was going to say was related to the investigation, but he had a sinking feeling that this was not going to be the case.
Nick dove in. "I know you want Sara back...I'm pissed as hell that you do." He tried to keep his voice calm so that he wouldn't attract any undue attention from anyone who might be walking by outside in the hallway. "The thing that I don't get is why now? Why after she's told you that things are over and she's with me and we're happy do you think you can walk in and tell her that you want her back?" The hurt was evident in Nick's tone.
Grissom let out a sigh and pursed his lips; he did not want to have this conversation here, but it looked like this was exactly where it was going to be. "I love her." By the emotion in his voice it was clear that he meant it; he really had no other explanation, but did he really need one?
"And you think that I don't?" Nick looked at him incredulously. "I would have stepped aside for you when we talked at the hospital if you had stepped up to the plate and acted like a man when you had the chance, but I'm not going to do that now." Not after he'd tasted what it was like to have Sara in his life as much more than his friend; he did not want to lose her to Grissom.
"I wouldn't expect you to." Grissom could tell that there was something special between Nick and Sara; Sara herself had said as much to him the last time they'd stood together in her apartment before he'd given her back the key. In the back of his mind, Grissom wondered if that same key was now in Nick's possession.
"Well then what the hell are you doing?" In Nick's world, a man didn't try and steal another man's woman. For himself, if he had known that Grissom and Sara had been dating, he would have never kissed her. That was just part of the code of honor he operated by.
"I want her to have all of the evidence." Grissom's words implied that Sara's decision to leave him was due in part because she didn't have all of the facts before; that her leaving him had been a mistake and he was only trying to give her the information that she had lacked so that she could correct the course of her decision.
Nick looked at him intently and shook his head. "Did you consider that maybe she already had enough evidence to make her decision?" He had no doubt that there was part of Sara that still loved Grissom and probably always would, but he also knew that Grissom had hurt her deeply by not realizing that a relationship with a woman; even a highly logical and intelligent woman like Sara, was unpredictable and just because you told her that you loved her once did not relieve you of repeating it at every opportunity, nor did it relieve you from finding ways to show her that you loved her that meant something to her. He just didn't think that even now that Grissom really got it.
For the first time since he'd decided to try and win Sara back, Grissom realized that he was in far over his head and he had no assurance that things would turn out favorably for him.