Author's Note: 1) I think I finally settled on an ending I like. 2) I have a friend who acts like Nick does in this chapter when he's drunk. 3) I love White Russians. 4) I know stupid cops like the one in this chapter. 5) Stop reading the author's note and read the chapter. 6) Review.

Sara was determined to get to Catherine's, but not so determined that she missed Warrick's car pulled over on the side of the road. Warrick was being pressed up against the car and hand cuffed. She pulled over behind them and stepped out of the car.

"Excuse me," she called over to the two of them. "What's the problem over here?"

"Ma'am," the officer answered. "I'm gonna have to ask you to just keep driving."

"I can't do that," Sara said. "You see, that's my colleague you have there. He's on the clock so I'm sure our supervisor would like to know why you're detaining him."

The officer looked at Warrick, then at Sara, and quickly uncuffed him. "Oh," he said. "He really is a CSI?" Sara showed her badge as proof. "But neither of you are dressed like you're on duty."

Sara pulled her jacket tighter around her, glad the only thing he could see of her costume was the cutoff shorts. "Yeah, well, it's a company party."

"He said it was a crime scene," the officer said.

"Trust me," Sara answered. "If you don't let him go, it will be."

Warrick tore away from him as soon as the cuffs were off his wrist. He rubbed them, annoyed. "Damn, man, I told you to just give me a ticket."

"Thought the car was stolen," said the officer. "And he might have been a dealer. I found rum in his trunk."

"You found rum in his trunk and you arrested him?" Sara was outraged. "What are you, crazy? Get out of here."

"Yes, ma'am," said the officer and he took off in the car.

Warrick looked over at her and couldn't help but shake his head in confused laughter. "I have no idea what that was."

"I do," Sara said, no laughter in her tone at all. "He was an asshole."

"We did lie about being on the clock, though," Warrick pointed out with a small smile.

Sara shrugged. "A minor little fib. Slap on the wrist."

"What are you doing here?" Warrick asked. "What about Greg's party?"

"I had a bad feeling about Catherine," Sara replied.

"Yeah," said Warrick. "Something's not right."

"Meet you there?" Sara said.

"Definitely."

And they each jumped into their cars.

Lindsey opened the door and then looked up at her mother who was waiting in the hall for her.

"Oh. Um. Hi, mom. What are you doing here? Shouldn't you be sleeping?"

Catherine smiled sweetly at her daughter. "Oh, sweetheart," she said. "I wouldn't miss you coming home for the world."

"But… you generally do," Lindsey said.

"I know, baby," Catherine said. "And I'm sorry for the way I treat you. You don't deserve me as a mother."

Lindsey was confused. "Don't talk like that, Mom," she said. "You're a great mother." Catherine reached out to her daughter and cupped her cheek in her hand. Lindsey was unnerved by the tear which streamed down her mother's cheek. "Mom? What's going on? Are you OK?"

Catherine's smile held something beautifully tragic as she beheld her daughter. "Oh honey," she said. "Trust me when I tell you this is the smartest thing I've done all my life. You won't tell anyone, will you? You won't tell anyone what Mama's gonna do?"

"Mom…" said Lindsey, slowly. "You're scaring me. Where's Grandma?"

"She's not here," Catherine whispered. "We're all alone. Just you and me."

"Why are you crying?" Lindsey asked nervously.

Catherine pulled her daughter into a warm embrace, the blade of the knife resting on the young girl's back. "Lissy, no matter what, you have to promise me that you'll remember that Mommy always loved you."

"I know that, Mom… Did you say Lissy? You've never called me that before." It occurred to Lindsey that her mother had said 'loved' in the past tense. She broke away from her mother's arms and saw the knife in her hands. Her terror mounted. "OK, Mom, what's wrong with you? What's that for?"

"This?" Catherine inquired innocently, gesturing at the knife. "It's my salvation, baby."

"Your salvation?" Lindsey's heart was racing as she backed up against the door. "What's that mean, Mom? Mommy?"

Catherine held a finger to her lips. "Sh… Baby, it's all OK, don't cry. No one will ever know. Not your father, not Lizbeth…"

"Liz who? What— Mom!" Lindsey screamed the name now, hoping her volume would get through to her mother when her words didn't. "Mom, what are you doing! Stop it, I'm your daughter!"

"I know, baby," said Catherine, sounding truly sorry as she raised the knife. "That's exactly why I have to do this."

Lindsey made a mad dash for the stairs and scrambled up them. Catherine followed her calmly.

"Last time we were here, you couldn't run. Do you remember that?" Catherine called. She reached the upstairs landing and looked around. "Come out, sweetheart. Mommy promises it won't last long. It's for the best, I promise."

Her daughter was hiding from her, but Catherine could wait. So long as Daniel didn't find her first.

Lindsey hid among the dresses in her grandmother's closet, scared out of her mind and twice as baffled. She hugged her knees as she muttered a silent prayer that her mother wouldn't find her there. The tears leaked freely from her eyes and she made no move to stop them. She read somewhere that crying made one feel better. She wondered if her mother cried, then maybe she would feel better too.

Slowly and with trembling hands, the young girl pulled out her cell phone. Her mother had always told her that she should never hesitate to call her if she was in trouble. But who would she call now?

Her body shaking all over and her breathing coming in short, erratic bursts, she pecked out the three digit number with a clammy forefinger.

"911, what is your emergency?"

"I— I'm at my house. My mom— My mom is trying to kill me." Even as she said the words, they tasted foreign on her tongue, like they were not her own.

"OK, sweetheart, calm down." The 911 operator was soothing and sweet, and probably a mother herself, Lindsey imagined. "Where do you live."

Quickly, Lindsey recited her address. When she was four years old, her mother made damn sure that she knew it by heart. She'd learnt her phone number before she even spoke her first word.

"OK, we're sending someone over right now," said the operator. "Where are you? Where is your mother? Do you live with your father?"

So many questions and none of them Lindsey felt was important. There was only one she wanted answered and that was why. "Um… I'm hiding in the upstairs closet, in my grandma's room… My mom, she's outside, she's— she's not herself. Please. She has a knife. Hurry."

"Sweetheart, listen to me," the operator said sternly. "You have to get out of the house."

"I— I can't," Lindsey sobbed, despair overcoming her. "I'm upstairs… I should have… But she was standing by the front door, I had nowhere else to go…"

"I know it's hard," the operator said. "Stay with me on the line and find a window."

"A window?" Lindsey whispered, hope rising up in her.

"Yes," said the operator. "How old are you, sweetheart?"

"Fourteen," Lindsey replied.

"Fourteen…" The operator sounded mildly surprised. "Alright, what's your name?"

"Lindsey. Willows."

"OK Lindsey, do you ever sneak out of the house?"

Lindsey thought about the question. Her mother was never home, and her grandmother was always asleep. She never needed so. "N-no."

"Well you're a good girl," the operator said. "But I have to admit that makes this harder. Are you looking for a window?"

Lindsey shook her head as she bit her lip, then remembered she couldn't be seen by the nice woman. "No, I— I can't leave the closet."

"Lindsey, you have to get out of the closet."

"Is there police on the way?" Lindsey asked, breathless.

"Yes," the operator replied. "But until they get there—"

"Then I'll be fine," Lindsey interrupted resolutely. "My mother… she wouldn't really hurt me."

"Lindsey? Are you OK?"

"I'll be fine," Lindsey repeated, as much for herself as the operator. "Thank you."

And with that she hung up.

She rocked back and forth, her eyes wet. Her breathing had calmed down, and she took deep breaths. Lindsey had seen a lot in her fourteen years, and she had learned to deal with it accordingly. She even admired her stalwart mother, who in spite of everything never wavered, not even a little bit. She regretted her mother's absence, sure, but over all Catherine Willows was a good mother to her, and she didn't forget that for a moment. She had tried to explain that to her. She knew how hard Catherine worked to be with her. But Catherine never seemed to understand. Lindsey was afraid that she had finally lost it. Maybe seeing death every day had made her tired of the living. Maybe Catherine preferred her daughter's company if Lindsey wasn't breathing.

The thought made Lindsey choke on a sob. In the few times she saw her mother a week, if she even saw her weekly, Catherine was always stressed, she was always hurried, she was always in a mad rush to be somewhere. When she wasn't sleeping, she was arguing with Lindsey's grandmother, and when she wasn't doing that, she was hastily trying to sort through and pay bills. On occasion, she'd pour over a particularly irksome case for hours, photos of corpses and crime scenes sprawled out right there on the kitchen table. Catherine Willows seemed to have a love affair with death, and now it seemed she had really taken her work home with her.

Lindsey wondered if her mother would actually kill her, like she seemed intent on doing. Of course, Catherine hadn't come out and said she was going to kill her, but the implication had definitely been in her words, and the knife only further emphasized them. And what about that name she had said… Lizbeth… It was completely alien to Lindsey, who had never known anyone by that name in her life. She knew plenty of Elizabeths, but none of them went by that nickname. And all of them were friends of hers which her mother had never met. Not that her mother knew any of Lindsey's friends at all.

Lindsey heard footsteps outside and the soft coo of a maternal voice trying to calm a crying child.

"Come on, Lissy, it will all be alright if you just come out."

But her name wasn't Lissy either. At first, Lindsey thought it was an attempted nickname— a gross bastardization of her own name. But it didn't fit. Catherine had never called her that before and it definitely sounded wrong in her ears.

Deep inside of her, a voice seemed to speak to her, telling her to not be afraid. She laughed at the thought, thinking that through her panic she was beginning to hallucinate. But the voice soothed her, the voice told her that she was in good hands, and that mothers did cruel things to their daughters all of the time. The voice was there to take her by the hand and guide her, to protect her, and to lead her through any trial she was about to endure.

Lindsey vaguely wondered if she would go to heaven.

The voice said, yes, she would.

Lindsey wondered if she would survive.

The voice said, no, she wouldn't.

Lindsey shivered.

Lindsey listened.

And when the door to the closet opened, Lindsey held her breath.

And when a cold and twisted smirk contorted Catherine's features, Lindsey screamed.

Despite what he had expected, Grissom was actually enjoying himself at the party. While he was doing his usual thing of hanging out in the corner and nodding politely to people he recognized, he had spotted a scrabble game hiding under the television cabinet and pulled it out. Since, he had challenged Nick to a game who gave him a skeptical look at first, but upon Grissom's goading, and possibly because he was a little drunk, Nick finally agreed, and they even had a twenty dollar bet on the game.

Being drunk may have given Nick the bravado to accept Grissom's challenge, but it definitely didn't give him an edge in remembering how to spell words. And Grissom was winning, until Nick spelt the word "finity" and landed on a double word score, Grissom accused him of making up the word.

"Not true," Nick said, his words only minimally slurred, although Grissom wondered if it could be attributed to his southern drawl. "Finity is totally a word. It's the opposite of infinity. The noun of finite."

"Nick," Grissom said slowly. "Finite has no noun."

"Does so," Nick insisted, folding his arms.

"Does anyone know if Sara has a dictionary?" Grissom called out, but no one heard him through all the chatter. He saw Greg, who was pacing up and down by the door, and beckoned him over.

The young CSI looked troubled as he waved Grissom off and Grissom rose to his feet. "Have another White Russian, Nick," he said absently before walking over to Greg. "What's the matter?"

Greg looked up at him, his whole body tense and smiled. "Oh, it's nothing. Just— Sara."

"Sara," Grissom repeated. "Why? Where'd she go?"

"I don't know," Greg replied with a shrug. "She won't answer her phone."

Grissom tensed all of a sudden. He recalled that Warrick wasn't at the party either and wondered at his absence. "When did you last see her?"

"She left about half an hour ago but wouldn't say where she was going," Greg answered.

"Said she was going to find her sister." Greg and Grissom both jumped at Nick, who now seemed completely sober. "What's going on?"

"Sara doesn't have a sister," Grissom said in bafflement.

"I know," said Greg. "That's when I began to worry."

"Is she not back yet?" Nick asked. "This is her apartment. She wouldn't leave a bunch of people here alone for very long, would she?"

"No," Grissom's voice was flat. "And where's Warrick?"

"I thought maybe he got held up at Catherine's," Nick replied. "Maybe not."

"Has anyone called either of them?" Grissom asked.

"I didn't know they were supposed to be here," Greg replied.

All of a sudden, Brass made his way through the room, looking pale. He took Grissom by the shoulder, who realized something wasn't right immediately.

"Jim," he said. "What's wrong?"

"Dispatch got a 911 call from Catherine's home," Brass replied.

Whatever jovial mood had remained among the three CSIs immediately dissipated at these words.

"What?" Nick's voice was harsh and strained.

"Is Catherine—"

But Brass interrupted Grissom shaking his head. "No," he said. "It's not Catherine. It's Lindsey. She said her mother is trying to kill her."

The silence that surrounded them made them deaf to any noise outside of their own thoughts. All of a sudden, Greg broke it by laughing and they stared at him. He looked at them all as if the conclusion were obvious.

"It's a prank call," he said, as though it was the most logical explanation. "Lindsey's obviously acting out. Looking for attention or something— didn't Catherine say she's been going through that teenage rebellion thing?"

Brass shook his head slowly. "I don't know," he said. "She sounded sincere enough to convince a 911 operator."

"Lindsey knows how serious that number is," Grissom said. "Even if she is rebelling, she wouldn't do something that stupid. Besides, didn't Warrick drop Catherine off at home…?"

Nick was already heading for the door. Grissom called after him. "Nick! Where do you think you're going?"

"To Catherine's," he replied. "Where else? That's where Warrick went, and I'll bet you fifty bucks that's where Sara went too, and now this 911 call? Something's going down. I believe we were all seduced by Catherine earlier this morning, weren't we?"

Slowly, Grissom and Greg nodded. Meanwhile, Brass frowned, looking from one to the other in bafflement.

"Uh… I wasn't."

"Your loss," Greg muttered out of the corner of his mouth.

"That's what I'm saying," Nick explained. "Catherine was off earlier, she threw up in the locker room, Sara played it off like it was nothing, and Warrick was freaking out earlier worried about her. That pretty much runs the gamut of emotions, wouldn't you say? And then they both run off? I'm telling you, there's only one place they could all be."

"Catherine's," Grissom nodded. "Alright," he said, striding towards the door. "But I'm driving. You're drunk."

He walked right past Nick, who looked absolutely insulted. "I am not drunk!"

But as Greg walked by and smelled his breath, he shook his head and laughed. "Dude, you're totally drunk."

Nick looked after him, offense scribbled across his features. "Well I had a few drinks, so wha—"

As Brass walked by he interrupted. "I don't even need to breathalyze you to tell that you're over the limit."

Glaring at all three of them, Nick closed the door behind him, only to have it pulled open again. He spun around and nearly fell over.

"Hey guys," Sofia said, looking curious. "You were leaving and—oh my God, Nick, have some gum or something!" Sofia dug in her purse as Nick rolled his eyes and walked away. She pulled out the gum and waved it at them. "Where are you going so fast?"

"It's Catherine," Brass explained. "Something's not right."

Sofia's brow wrinkled in concern. "What's not right?"

"Stay here," Grissom suggested. "Hold down the fort."

Sofia looked skeptically back at the party. "Right… Grissom, this isn't my house. Where's Sara?"

"That's what we're trying to find out," Grissom replied. "Please. Make sure nobody breaks anything. Keep a particular eye on David Phillips. I saw him eying a lamp earlier."

Though reluctant, Sofia nodded and closed the door.

"We can take my car," Greg said. "Oh, wait, I forgot, someone stole my wheel."

"Actually that was Sofia," Brass said as the elevator arrived. "Your wheel is in Sara's bedroom."

Greg stared at him agape as they all filed into the elevator. "That was part of Sara's plot?!"

"Of course it was, Greg," Grissom replied. "You think I would have offered you a ride if it wasn't?"

"I thought you were being a good person," Greg pouted.

"Please," Nick scoffed. "I know what it's like driving with you. You can never settle on a radio station and when you do, it's loud and obnoxious. Very few people can stand being in the same car with you for longer than ten minutes."

"You do," Greg snapped.

"I just happen to be one of them," Nick replied, sounding for all intents and purposes as a martyr. Rightfully, Greg hit him.

As the elevator opened up onto the main lobby, the four men exited and made their way to their three cars, Greg veering towards Grissom's who turned him away. "Oh no," Grissom said. "You're going with Nick."

Greg's jaw dropped. "You're joking."

"He told you, he's the only one who can stand you," Grissom replied matter-of-factly. "Besides, you need to drive for him."

Nick dangled his keys in front of Greg, who took them angrily. "Fine," he muttered.

Nick put a hand over his heart dramatically as he walked backwards towards the car, looking at Grissom. "'Tis a far, far better thing I do than I have ever done."

Greg glared at him. "But I get to choose the music."

"If you can decide on something for longer than thirty seconds," Nick muttered.

"You know," said Greg, climbing into the driver's seat. "We could have all fit in one car and we could save the environment."

"And used the car pool lane," Nick added as a joke.

"Why are we doing this?" Greg asked.

"In case they're not at Catherine's," Nick explained. "And we need to split up."

Greg sighed and nodded as he switched gears from park to drive. "Alright," he agreed. "Well then let's go pollute the ozone."

"And find Catherine, Warrick and Sara."

Greg glanced at him as they drove down the road. "You're surprisingly focused for a drunk."

Nick grinned dopily. "Thank you!"