Chapter 11 – Flowers

Again, Sara had debated going to work that night. She had taken a cold shower and tried to keep the crying to a minimum, and in the end decided work would keep her mind off her date. She shuddered at the word. She was now wondering how she had gotten into going on a date. When she nearly passed out it should have told her she wasn't ready. Sara shook it off and went to work.

They started in the break room like always, but Nick noticed right away that she didn't look good. He took her aside after they had gotten their assignments.

"Are you ok?" he said softly so the others wouldn't hear.

"Yeah," she tried to sound happy, "I'm ok. Why?"

"You don't look ok…what's wrong?"

There was no getting anything past him. Sara looked at her feet.

"What's wrong?" he asked again, trying to get her to look up.

"I…I went on a date tonight. It was a really bad idea." Sara tried to dismiss the touchy subject but nick persisted.

"W-with who?" he seemed to be as touchy on the subject as Sara. Odd.

"A guy I met on Saturday. He…he saved Charlotte's life and he asked me…on a …a date," again she shuddered at the word. "I nearly passed out." She gave a little nervous smile. She looked at Nick.

"Are you sure you are ready for dating?" he asked. He looked very concerned. Maybe it was because she had completely broken down the last time she kissed someone.

Sara shrugged. "I'm not sure….but I've decided to give it a try. I mean…I really like Jeff." She smiled but Nick didn't smile back.

"Sara?" Catherine popped her head back into the break room.

"Yeah, ok I'm coming," she said and turned back to Nick. "I'll be ok. But thanks for asking." She gave him a smile and followed Catherine out of the break room.

"What was that about?" Catherine asked in the hall.

"Nothing," She said hoping Catherine wouldn't probe further. Of coarse she did.

"It didn't look like nothing."

Sara chose her words carefully. "It's just something….I had to tell Nick. Kind of personal." She gave Catherine a smile and hoped that that would settle it. Catherine looked like that didn't satisfy her but she just gave Sara a suspicious look and kept walking. Sara let out a small breath, glad the subject was dropped.

They walked into the DNA lab. Greg had paged Catherine.

"I have DNA from your rape victim." he waved a sheet of paper in front of them.

Catherine's mouth dropped. Normally Greg would have made some smart remark but he knew how much this case meant so he wasted no time.

"The DNA matches George Shempsky. But I ran it through CODIS and I found out he has been doing this awhile. He has 4 restraining orders against him in three states."

"Hmm," Catherine said, thinking. "Do you want to lay it out?" she asked Sara. They had been working this case almost a week and had gathered quite a bit of evidence. Sara thought a moment to mentally gather the information and started laying out what she think happened.

"He meets his girl and follows her home." They had found that the latest victim, Jillian Haynes, was living in Vegas and had rented the hotel room to try and get away from Shempsky. "Stalks her for only a few days then comes in for his attack. Drugs her then rapes her. Punches her to knock her out then brings her back and rapes her again." They had found evidence of repeated rape of all the victims. There were 4 women who had been attacked by the same guy in different states and they had contacted them all. "This is repeated until he thinks he is finished. He cleans up after knocking her out again, letting her come to on her own, leaving cut marks on her stomach. But Jillian Haynes got a different treatment. She was cleaned up too, but she was killed by strangulation."

"He's escalating," Greg said from his chair. Both women nodded in agreement. Catherine shuddered beside Sara. She was thinking, "What if that had happened to me."

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The next few days brought no new leads in the case. It was starting to wind down but Catherine was determined to catch this guy. It was personal now.

Sara wanted to catch him too but those few days after her date with Jeff she just tried to keep her mind away from it. She felt guilty, sad, happy, and tense all at the same time. She couldn't decide what to do, but three days after her date she was called down to reception.

Jeff had come in and asked o talk to Sara. She went down and stopped short when she saw him. She tried to back away without him seeing her but he did so she walked up to him.

"Sara," he said with a big smile.

Sara tried to smile back but she was sure it looked forced. He held out his arms to her and she looked down at them. He was holding a small bouquet of lilies.

"Oh, Jeff," she breathed. Again she was feeling a mix of emotions rush over her.

"I wanted to see you." was his simple explanation.

She looked up at him. "And I wanted to apologize."

"What did you do?" Sara asked confused.

"Well you left in such a hurry the other night….i thought I did something wrong."

"No…Jeff it wasn't your fault….it was me. I shouldn't have left like that. I'm sorry."

Jeff's smile stretched a smile wide. "Then we are ok?"

Sara nodded and did her forced smile again.

"So…do you want to go on another date?" He smiled. "God I love that smile," Sara thought. She couldn't resist. He was pulling her in.

She took the lilies from him and gave him a real smile. "Ok."