A/N: Thanks to tarheelventeran! for helping me! chapters 1-5 used 2 be chapter one when this story was originally published but she broke them up for me! And she's helped me a whole lot on this story and still continues to! I appreciate her and her help! So please go and read her stories and give her shout outs as well! Enjoy the new and improved Wall of Lies!
It had been just two weeks since she returned from her leave of absence, but in her sadness, it might as well have been an eternity.
Christi and Rick had not spoken for nearly six weeks now. Calleigh had spoken to her about going down to IAB and discussing her custody with Chris.
She swallowed and bit her lip as she came closer to the door. It had been exactly a month and half since she last talked to him or even had contact with him. Still, even after all the time Christi had spent avoiding Rick, she felt the adrenaline surge and her palms sweat.
Come on damn it! You're a Caine for Christ's sake! Do it! Do it you big chicken!
Her eyes tightened as she bowed her head and tapped on the door.
"Yeah?"
There was no turning back now. She breathed deeply as she stepped just into the office. "Rick, can I come in?"
Dispassionately he glanced up from the brown folder. "Yeah sure, come on in."
Christi's breakup with him didn't seem to be killing him. Still, she breathed deeply and crept into the room. "Rick, I'm so sorry about how things panned out with you and me. But I had just lost my son, and my world felt like it was crashing down. My family just turned their backs on me." In her weakness, she leaned on a red easy chair. "I just felt so…miserable and I wasn't thinking straight and…I don't know, Rick. I just felt like…I don't know. But I was a total idiot, moron, bitch, self-centered.…Don't be afraid to jump in and stop me."
His head still down, the IAB agent glanced up at her with his eyes.
"Well?"
"That's okay. I'm the head of IAB. I'm used to being lied to."
WHAT?
"You heard me!"
Slapping the folder closed, Rick stood up and paced toward her, making sure he was a good distance.
"You gonna take my word for why you lost Chris, Christi? You know Horatio hates my guts!"
"Wait a minute. Rick—"
"You know damned well what Horatio thinks of me and what I think of him. Maybe all those things wouldn't have happened if you stood up for your son. And for me, for that matter!"
Christi put her hand up. "Rick?"
He turned and walked back to his desk. "Go back, find out what really happened, and then we'll come back and talk. Till then you just go on and cry all over somebody else."
Christi muttered some choice Gaelic words as she walked out.
She climbed up to the roof of the lab to go and sit there and think for a while and that's how Eric found her a few hours later with tears rolling down her cheeks. "What's the matter Shorty?" he asks sitting next to her making her jump.
"Everyone was right."
"About?"
"That if I had fought harder I would have been able to keep Chris and Rick but I got all wishy-washy. Maybe it was right for me to lose them both. Maybe this is a sign that I shouldn't be a mother or a girlfriend, fiancée or wife. Maybe I'm destined to be alone for the rest of my life."
"Christi, you know that's not true! Speed and Horatio have tricks up their sleeves to get whatever they want and you know that. Now what happened with Rick?"
"I basically apologized and he said that he was used to being lied to. He said that the reason why is because of his hatred for my dad and visa versa. I know that if I had stood up for my son and Rick I wouldn't be where I am right now. Then he told me go and told me to find out what really happed then we'll go back and talk. He said till then to just got and cry all over someone else and I can't help it! I feel like shit."
"Hey, Christi, he's just being an ass right now. It's a guy thing. We don't show our emotions. Much."
She nodded and leaned against his strong shoulder, wrapping her arms around her abdomen.
"Shit!"
"What is it?" Eric wanted to know.
Clutching her throat, Christi groaned and leaping up and running over to the ledge that's over the grass and retched.
Eric followed her and held her hair back. He knew what was happening.
"Hey. There a chance that you could be pregnant again?"
As the spasms ceased, Christi leaned against the wall and didn't look up.
"I am. I was gonna tell him today and if he would have just forgiven me. Now I can't. I can't tell him. I don't want Rick and I being together if he doesn't want us to be together. I don't want him stepping up and feeling like he has to be in my life and the baby's if he doesn't want to be. I don't want that because then both of us will be miserable, and he'll be even more of an ass than he's already being."
"I see."
With one finger she wiped the Florida sweat from her eyebrow, hugging her legs, her back turned to him. "What do you see?"
Silence. He was trying to digest the news. Finally, Eric tightened his lips and looked away. "Christi, did you forget?"
She sat against the wall and leaned her head onto her hand. "Did I forget what, Eric?"
"What you're gonna give up to raise that baby on your own? I mean, you had Tim there to help you with Chris."
She raised her head finally. "Yeah, I know."
"You have to try and work things out with Stetler. I mean Rick. Don't just cry about not wanting to be together. He needs to know! You need to tell him!"
"What if he doesn't want to listen?" Christi hugged her chest. "He might tell me to…."
"To what?"
"Have an abortion."
The CSI sniffed. "Come on. He can be an ass sometimes like you said. But I don't think either of you wants to kill that baby just because you can't get along. That's a human being, for God's sake!"
Leaning her back against the wall now, she hugged her knees and looked at him with teary eyes. "Well, what do you suggest?"
Eric sat down against the same wall next to her. "Christi?"
"Yeah?"
He drew a breath. This wouldn't be easy for him. All the things he'd have to give up.
"The baby should have a last name."
Slowly she looked at him. "What are you saying?"
He held his sweaty hand out and took hers. "I guess what I'm saying is….Christi, will you marry me?"