A/N :Once again, I only own the characters new and unfamiliar to you.
Anything in italics is a flashback.
For my own use, I have estimated Adam's age at 25. His sister's at 30. Just works better.
"Its taken me a while but now I finally know.
Everything that matters most is at home."
-Home by Paul Brandt
You're related to who? ... How is that even remotely possible?
It was a gorgeous late spring afternoon. The sky was clear and electric blue. The sun high and bright, raining down warmth. A sight breeze tousled the tree tops surrounding Bleeker Park in downtown Brooklyn. The playground equipment covered in foul mouthed graffiti. Beer bottles and trash littering the patches of long dead grass. The basketball court was missing half the chain link fence and all of the nets. The swings had been twisted around the poles or over the top railing. Yet for two children, from a home where love an affection came in short supply and you were more liable to see the leather of a belt across your back side or a back hand across your face or days without proper meals and no clean clothes, this park was like heaven. An escape. An escape to be themselves. To just be kids.
"'You're getting way too heavy for this, Adam." Eleven year old Samantha Ross complained, ponytail flying in the wind, cheeks flushed with exertion as she ran as fast as she could,hands gripping the metal of the bar so tight her knuckles turned white.
"Shut up," he growled. "and just go faster."
"You're bigger than me almost. You should be the one pushing me." she said.
"I'll push tomorrow." he promised, flat out on his back, eyes riveted on the sky above him, brown curls tousled in the breeze.
No matter how often the did this, the never got tired of it or felt the least bit dizzy. It had become something special between the seven year old boy in his faded holey jeans and torn Transformers t-shirt and his sister, every inch the tomboy in baggy overalls and an ancient Yankees t-shirt she'd found last week in the lost and found at school. This was something they did together. Their own private thing. And although they'd never admit it,they'd miss it and each other when the novelty passed. They would also never admit that they were each other's best and dearest friend. They didn't really bother with the other kids. Mom always refused to let them have people over in case daddy was in one of his moods. Just like after he got in one of those moods, they got locked in the basement for hours on end, nursing bleeding welts on their backsides and rubbing each other's bruised faces. Next day, no matter how hot, they always had to wear long clothes to school so no one would know what bad kids they were and embarrass momma and daddy. It was no matter. The other kids didn't really bother with them. They picked on Adam because of how intelligent he was and how quick he was to answer questions in class or to offer to stay and help the teacher after hours. And they were scared of Sam, because even though she was little for her age, she'd beat up anyone, boy or girl, that picked on her brother. She also got in the way when Daddy picked on him too. And for that her beatings were always ten times worse than Adam's.
Sam, or Sammie,as Adam affectionately called her, stopped running and hopped up on the carousel and lied down beside her younger brother. They held hands tightly and looked up at the sky and listened to the birds in the trees and the sounds of the carson the road several hundred feet behind them.
"If momma and daddy find out we skipped this afternoon, we're in big trouble." Adam said fearfully.
Sammie shrugged. "It was my idea, peanut. Don't be sweatin' it. Besides, daddy's working overtime and momma could care less where we are as long as we stay out of jail."
But Adam would sweat it. He'd sweat it for the rest of the afternoon. The thought of facing the wrath of his father enough to send chills down his spine and make himself nearly wet his pants. Sometimes that happened when daddy got to yelling loud enough to wake the dead and started throwing things around the house. And Sammie would take him upstairs and clean him up and dry his tears of shame and lie on his bed with him and rock him and stroke his hair and promise one day they'd get out of there.Together.
"What do you want to be when you grow up, peanut?" Sammie asked curiously.
"I don't know," he replied. "I guess..." he thought long and hard, forehead wrinkled with the effort, eyes squinted. "I wanna be a rock star." he announced confidently.
"What kind of rock star? Like Elvis?"
"Nah. More like the guy from Aerosmith. Do ya think I could be a rock star one day?"
"I think you're way to smart to be just a rock star. You should be a doctor or a scientist or something and be a world famous rock star on the side. Make lots and lots of money and live in a really big, fancy house and have all kinds of cars and people asking for your autograph."
"That would be so cool," Adam sighed dreamily.
"And if you're a doctor or a scientist, too, than you can help people at the same time."
He just nodded and lay there in silence as they carousel began to slow down. "What do you want to be when you grow up?" he asked in return, looking over at his sister.
"I wanna be a police woman,"she answered quickly. "I want to help people and put people in jail that deserve it. Bad people that do awful things to good people."
"Like us?" Adam asked seriously. "Help people like me and you and put guys like daddy in jail?"
"Exactly."
"Ya think that'll ever happen? Ya think me and you we'll ever be what we want to be?"
"We can be whatever we want," she assured him.
"Ya think we'll ever get out of Brooklyn?"
"Sure. I'm gonna live on Park Avenue in a big old penthouse!" she enthused.
"Police men don't live on Park Avenue," Adam scoffed. "Just reach people do."
"Well, then when your a rich and famous rock star scientist, you can buy me a penthouse, peanut. How does that sound? Deal?"
"Deal." Adam agreed. And they shook on it.
"You know what I'm thinking right now?" she asked.
"What's that,Sammie?"
"I'm thinkin' its your turn to push."
Adam just couldn't contain himself any longer. For the last hour he'd been checking the clock over the door of the trace lab. Unable to concentrate on the samples before him or the loud rock music blaring in his ears via his I-pod. He couldn't remember the last time he'd been this excited about anything. Especially when it came to work. That time not long ago when Mac let him take all the credit for cracking the Second Life game and letting him work alongside of him had been a rush. But nothing compared to this. When his sister had called last week to say she'd been given the job as the new CSI at the lab, he'd jumped around his living room like the Giants receivers in the end zone after scoring a touch down. The last real time he'd been able to spend with his sister was last year following the incident in the warehouse and he'd gone down to Arizona to rest and recuperate and she'd taken three weeks off to play nurse maid. He didn't care that he'd be sleeping on the couch for God knows how long. All that mattered is that she was here. Where she belonged. With him. When she'd gone her separate ways to pursue schooling, the heart ache had been unreal. She went to Dartmouth in New Hampshire while he stayed behind in Arizona to finish high school. And when it came time for him to head to Columbia in New York, she'd returned to Phoenix to begin her career. He'd stayed in New York when Mac hired him after graduation. And while he and Sam e-mailed and called and talked via web cam, it just wasn't the same as face to face contact.
When the clock above the door reached twenty to three, he shed the lab coat and the latex gloves and re-catologued and locked up his samples for later and quietly and calmy left the room. So quietly and calmly that Lindsay, working on the other side, didnt' even notice him leave until he was already out in the hall. What the hell is he up to? she thought, and shurgged out of her lab coat and snapped off her gloves and decided to follow him at a discreet distance.
"Where's Adam going?" Stella asked as she stood by her office door, watching the back of the young lab tech get further and further away. She'd seen him pass by the glass walls like a man on a mission. And when he didn't respond to her calling his name, she went after him as well. Now she and Lindsay both stood in the hallway, watching and waiting to see what in God's name he was up to.
"I don't know." Lindsay replied. "But he's been acting really strange these past couple of weeks. And when I called his house yesterday, some girl answered. And it wasn't Kendall. And when I asked him about it, he dodged the question completely. Strange. But then, he's a little strange, don't ya think?"
"I think you need to be a little nicer to him." Stella replied forcefully. She couldn't forget Adam putting his ass on the line with get her HIV testing done as soon as possible. "He's a stand up guy," she told Lindsay. "and he's an asset to this lab. I couldn't imagine him not being here."
Adam went down to the elevators and stopped. Standing before them with his hands shoved in his pockets and rocking on his heels and biting his bottom lip. Any second now, he thought, as he watched the numbers above on of the elevators get closer and closer to 35. Any second now and I don't have to keep my mouth shut anymore. 'Cause its killing me.
There was a loud BING! and the doors slid open and a familiar face stepped out, followed by Danny and Flack. They didn't matter. A huge, bright smile spread across Adam's boyish face, mirroring the one gracing the beautiful face before him, and before Danny could get half of the name Adam out, he and Flack were stopped dead in the tracks of the new CSI being embraced by Adam Ross. Practically lifted off her feet. And she was hugging him back.
"Flack..." Danny looked mortified. "Ya don't think someone like her could be with someone like him, do ya?"
"There's someone for everyone Messer." Flack reasoned, thinking I sure as hell hope she's not with him.
"I know...but Adam? And her? Adam and her? Together? What the fuck is up with that?"
Flack just shrugged, waited for the new girl and Adam finished getting reacquainted.
"I see you guys met my sister." Adam exclaimed, turning to them with his arm around the girl's shoulders.
"Your what?" Danny asked, surprised.
"My older sister, actually." Adam chirped, smiling proudly at her.
"Get out of town!" Danny laughed. Still in disbelief. "Your sister? I didn't even know you had a sister, Adam."
The lab tech just gave a little laugh. "Surprise!" he exclaimed.
"Let me get this straight," Danny was having a hard time wrapping his head around it all. "This is your sister."
Adam nodded.
"Your older sister." Flack needed clarification as well.
Adam nodded again.
"That you've never mentioned. Ever. And now your secret sister is now our new CSI." Danny said.
"Absolutely." Adam nodded. "Mac asked me not to say anything to anyone 'cause he didn't want anyone thinkin' he hired her 'cause we're related or anything. She got hired 'cause she's crazy smart. You guys know she was a cop in Phoenix? And that she has a masters in forensics and a b.a. in criminal profiling? Talk about an Einstein, huh?"
I am so royally screwed with my grade twelve, Flack thought. No girl with a brain pan the size of New York would be with a guy like him. Grade twelve diploma, a lowly second grade homicide detective. No way in hell.
"Adam, how do ya expect me to know all that when I didn't even know you had a sister or that you were originally from Brooklyn." Danny complained.
Adam shrugged. "Maybe you should have asked more about me instead of talking so much about yourself." he said gently.
"You're a goddamn comedian." Danny grumbled. "How is this possible? How can someone like her, be related to someone like you. Not even a resemblance or nothin'. Is this April first? Is this April Fools day? What the hell? Are we being Punk'd or something."
"Ha-ha," Adam said dryly. "This is my sister." he assured the two men. "Samantha Ross. Detective Samantha Ross actually. And Sammie, this is Detective Danny Messer..."
Danny offered a hand, still burdened down by the trays of coffees. "Still think we're being Punk'd," he said as she shook his hand.
"Danny's a CSI, too." Adam informed his sister. "He was the one in the warehouse with me that day. And this is Detective Don Flack. He's homicide. He's the..."
"One that got you out of the warehouse that day," Sam finished as she shook the handsome detective's hand. He actually far surpassed handsome. He was simply down right gorgeous. And those blue eyes. "Adam told me all about that day," she said, taking her hand back, feeling her face flush and knees go a little week. I so don't need something like this, or someone like him in my life, she thought. "Thanks for getting him out of there. It meant a lot to know someone cared about him that much. Nice to finally put a face to the name. He talked about you all the time."
Adam blushed slightly.
"When he kept calling you detective, I kept thinking of the guy on CSI or on CSI:Miami." she said. "You know, the old crotchety type."
"He ain't old," Danny said. "But the crotetchy part fits."
She ignored the comment. "Wasn't expecting someone like... I don't know... someone like you."
"I don't know whether to be flattered or offended." Flack said light heartedly.He noticed that like Adam, she rambled when she got a little nervous about something. And that the tips of her ears went red and her eyes darkened. She was insanely beautiful. He honestly had never meant any one like her in all his life.
"Flattered. For sure." she assured him. "It's jsut that... you know what? Never mind. Just thank you for helping my brother."
"No problem." Flack said. "And Adam was a real hero that day. Saved two cops singlehandedly."
"You never told me that." Sam scolded her brother.
Adam blushed furiously. "It was no big deal."
"Maybe you can tell me about it later." Sam said. Speaking to Flack.
"For sure." he said with a charming, boyish smile that showed off dimples in his cheeks.
Danny looked at his best friend, then at the new girl, then back at his best friend. Saw the way the two of them looked at each other. Obviously some kind of spark there. "Now taht we've all gotten to know each other," he said, anxious to get a shot at the new girl himself. "Maybe we should get ya to Mac's office."
"Good idea." she agreed, falling in step between Adam and Flack as they led the way.
Sonofabitch, Danny sighed and followed reluctantly behind. He made a mental note to tear Flack a new one later.
Special thanks to:
Aphina, Madison Bellows, Bluehaven 4220, EddiesGirl, LaLa 036 and Shane varson for reading and reviewing! Enjoy! Pass the word!