Chapter 9

Queen of Hearts, King of Clubs

Sara and Finn both froze, hands still above their heads as they found themselves staring down the barrel of a gun.

Sara could feel a hundred and one different memories and emotions rushing through her body in the space of a few seconds of silent hesitation that suspended the three women in that one moment.

They finally came to rest on fear and regret.

Regret for all of the things she had not done, had not said and now never would. Regret for not accepting that they had both made mistakes. For not knowing from this job how fleeting and cruel life could be and wondering why she had not simply thrown herself into his arms and kissed him and told him that she loved him and always would.

"I'm sorry." She whispered again, eyes white and wild, skin taut and pale, hands shaking violently on the cold metallic gun, now slick with sweat, "This has nothing to do with you. I never wanted this. But there are some things we must do whether we want to or not and if you've come for me-"

"We didn't come for you Carla." Finn said quietly, predictably being the first to find her voice, "We came here for your daughter, Ella?"

The use of her name, and, more so, her daughter's caused the other woman to pause.

"We didn't come here for you, or for your husband, we came here for her."

"Well you came too late didn't you?" she choked, "He already killed her." She snarled,

She turned back to her husband, swinging the gun wildly to face him again.

"You…" she hissed, advancing on him, "You swore to me that you wouldn't touch her. You swore that if I put up with it, you would never go anywhere near her, you would never make her go through the Hell you put me through. You lied to me Paul…"

"I lied to you a lot sweetheart." He sneered, eyes darting between her and then gun as he attempted to take control of the situation, "And I'd sworn to stop hurting you and look how that worked out so why don't you just do us all a favour and give me that?"

He snatched angrily and unwisely for the gun still clutched in her hand but she was too quick for him, the years of abuse giving her faster reflexes than he had counted on as she withdrew it, stepping away from him again as she cocked it and pointed it between his eyes, hissing,

"No, no you don't get to do that anymore Paul. I am the one with the gun; I am the one with the control." She screamed, looking as though she had never had less in her life.

"So put it down…" Sara murmured softly,

"I already told you," she screeched, pitching away from her husband and back towards the two CSIs once more, "That this has nothing to do with you."

"It has nothing to do with you either." She shot back in a low voice, "And it has nothing to do with him. It has to do with your daughter. She is dead because of this. Dead. That is who and what this has to do with."

"And what can you know about any of this?" she spat feral eyes leering at her as she sneered, "You with your badge and your science and your morals. What can you possibly know about this?"

"Plenty…" she murmured darkly,

She could feel herself shaking as well as a cold sweat crawled over her skin and her spine, sending involuntary tremors up its length. Though not from fear or adrenaline or anticipation; but for empathy.

She could place herself in the shoes of the little girl in the bedroom with a little too much ease.

It could have been her.

That was how her life could have ended and it damned near had. That night…

She had never told anyone the specifics of how that night had played out, not even Grissom. Up until now, she had never been able to bring herself to fully recount and relive it all, only seeing it and explaining it in vague, sketchy flashes, never with any substance. Because it always made her feel like she did now.

Sick.

Her stomach was twisting and convulsing as though someone had slipped a pit of vipers down her throat and into it. Her limbs were shaking violently, as was her body, its fragile frame being wracked by powerful tremors. She could feel the cold swear she had suddenly become drenched in sticking to her feverish skin, clinging to her and causing her to feel as though she was suffocating in the thin clothes she wore, the light material adhering to her without permission.

That was how this was making her feel now as she felt her eyes close and her hand clutch the back of a chair for support as she swayed on this spot in response to the sudden torrent of half-forgotten, dreamlike images that flooded her conscience, assaulting her senses.

Tears clung to the corners of her large brown eyes as she cowered against the wall, pressing herself into it and forcing herself to be quiet as she trembled, her desire to cry and scream in pain numbed by her terror that she would wake him.

He had finished with her and tossed her aside as he did every night. She had been able to smell the drink that had hung heavy on his breath and had clung to his pores like a suffocating perfume, gagging and blinding her as she had silently done as she had been told. He had collapsed onto the bed, passed out from the alcohol and left her paralysed in the corner, too scared to move.

The door to the bedroom opened and every muscle in her body tensed in response. The faint golden glow from the hall light beyond illuminated to tears in her thin cotton nightgown as well as accentuating the gashes on her slim wrists and the bruises on her pale white skin.

It also caused the cruel silver blade of the knife to glint darkly in her mother's hands.

Her voice was already ruined, rough and raw from the screams and cries she had uttered and he had ignored when he had first dragged her into the bedroom. He had stolen her voice and now she could only watch in silence, huddled in her quiet corner, always there but never noticed as she watched her mother cross the room with wide, haunted eyes.

She soon covered them as they were haunted once more, taunted with images that she should not have had to see, the cold, cruel knife adding more pain and sorrow behind her eyes than should have been there for her age.

She could still see the walls hungrily reaching out to catch the crimson mist as it flew from both body and blade. The thick, white carpet below eagerly drank the scarlet waters that flowed from above, inescapably dyeing it as the red fountain trickled from the plum sheets, standing out in sharp relief against the once white fabric.

She felt the floor pitch violently beneath her, like a ship tossed about in rough seas and Finn's concerned hands at her waist as she opened her eyes and found the concerned blue of the other woman's staring back at her.

"That's why I'm doing this. That's why I have to do this." She replied shakily, sounding as though she was trying to convince herself as much as she was trying to convince them. "For my daughter. To protect my daughter." She whispered, "Tonight was the last night he was going to touch her…"

"Carla." Sara began gently, "Carla I'm so sorry but she's gone, your daughter's de-"

She found herself cut off as Finn gently pulled the sleeve at her elbow, quietly attracting her attention. She turned and the other woman nodded wordlessly to something on the floor in front of them.

Following the other woman's gaze, she saw too what had attracted it.

Muffled by the dark wood but clearly visible to those who knew what they were looking for, was the hallmark of a small footprint in blood. Running from the horrors of the other room.

Looking back at the other two people in the room with them, she saw that both of their feet were clean. The prints did not belong to them, which could only mean…

"You have another daughter…" Sara breathed, her breath catching in her throat.

Carla nodded and Finn murmured, gently,

"Where is she?" Carla just shook her head, tears springing from helpless eyes as the gun trembled more violently than ever and she mouthed wordlessly.

"Come on Carla. Let us help her; she shouldn't be here to see this." Finn encouraged gently.

"She doesn't know…" Sara murmured hollowly, understanding how this would work, "Does she?" she spat, turning to Paul who was still on his knees in the middle of the room.

He leered at each of them in turn, baring his teeth but did not speak.

"Where is she?" Sara snarled, moving closer to him, feeling Finn's warning fingers close desperately around her wrist and impatiently pulling herself free, "Tell me where she is or I swear to God I will walk out of this house right now and she can do whatever the Hell she wants with you." She spat, bending low towards him, "If you want any chance of getting out of this with your pathetic little life intact then you tell me where she is."

"I don't know." He said tonelessly,

"Liar!" Carla screamed, launching herself at him, the sickening crunch of metal on bone filling the room as blood leaked from above his eyebrow and he slammed her to the ground, only to be stopped when she pointed the gun, warningly over his heart once more.

Undercover of the chaos that was erupting in the heart of the room, Finn began to quietly follow the little bloody footprints to a small, dark wooden cupboard in the corner of the room, the little door slightly ajar.

She gently wrapped her hand around one of the little silver handles and eased the door open, sighing with relief as she found the little girl trembling in its heart, clearly petrified but otherwise unharmed.

"It's OK, you're OK now sweetie." She murmured, softly, drawing the little girl out. "Sara." She called, drawing their attention to her.

"Oh thank God." Carla breathed, forgetting her husband for a moment as she saw her daughter. "Rosie, Rosie sweetheart come here." She held her arms out but the little girl, who could not have been any more than four or five, resisted her mother's call and clung, silently, to Finn's legs instead, staring at her, her young, brown eyes willed with fear and confused accusation.

"Go." Finn murmured to her, gently guiding her to the door, knowing that she would not stray far and that Brass would soon be upon them.

The little girl ran for the door and Finn made to follow but Carla stopped her as she pointed the gun at her and hissed, a hard edge to her voice now,

"Not you. Don't you move. You stay there or I swear…"

Finn stopped dead and raised her hands soothingly, her eyes flicking towards Sara for a moment but otherwise she betrayed nothing of her own emotions.

"And you…" she breathed, turning back to her husband and pointing the gun to his heart once more, "You will not hurt her again. You will not hurt me again. You have to pay for what you've done."

"Carla, stop." Sara murmured, gently placing her hand on top of the gun.

"Stop? Stop?" she screamed, "Do you have any idea what he has done to me? To my children. To his children?"

"Do you have any idea what this will do to them?" Sara asked, her voice low and urgent.

"It will protect her…From him." She hissed

"That's not all she'll lose. She'll lose you too." Sara told her

"I don't care. If that's what it takes…So be it."

"No not so be it." Sara snapped, firmly, "You said you were in control Carla, so take control, take control of your life, of your daughter's life. Give me the gun. Give it to me and I promise I'll make sure that he gets put away, that he will never hurt you or Rosie again."

"No. I can't. What if he isn't sentenced? What if they take her away from me?"

"They won't. I promise they won't." she breathed, "I'll help you Carla, I'll make sure they don't take her away from you, but if you pull that trigger there's no going back. They will take her away from you. They will take her away and you won't see her again unless it's on her terms and she will hate you for what you did."

"No. No, I protected her; I'm doing this for her. She'll understand; when she's older she'll understand."

"She won't. She can't. She won't be able to understand why you did this and not what you should have done, what I'm asking you to do. She doesn't want you to do this Carla." She said, gently wrapping her fingers around the body of the gun.

The other woman jerked it away from her, her eyes filling with hatred and mistrust; she had been betrayed too many times.

"And how the Hell do you know what she would want?" she spat,

"Because I know what it's like to be her." Sara murmured, "I know what it's like to be the girl whose mother killed her father and I know that no-one wants that. When I was twelve, my mother took a knife from the kitchen drawer and stabbed my abusive father to death with it over and over again. He never hurt me again but she did. I couldn't understand why she had done it; I can't forget what she did and I can't forgive her. Because of her, I was raised in foster care; I didn't see her again until I was nineteen. The damage she did that night, she could never fix. She's spent her life trying to, but she knows she can't. We both know she can't. Please don't do that to your daughter. Give me the gun."

Sara watched as the other woman's expression and bearing completely transformed during her speech. From aggressive and disparaging to angry and disbelieving, to cold and indifferent, to warm, harsh recognition, to empathy to what she was now, trembling with emotion, hands twitching.

She dropped the gun and threw herself at Sara, her arms closing tightly around her neck as she collapsed and sobbed.

"Thank you…" Sara breathed, kicking the gun away from her, shocked and relived that that had worked.

"I'm going to take her out." She told Finn, helping her unsteadily to her feet.

Finn nodded. "I'll be right behind you. Someone needs to check on the little girl." She said, jerking her head towards the bedroom.

Sara nodded silently as she supported the other woman to the door. As soon as his wife had released he had scampered for the kitchen and the back door.

Finn turned and headed solemnly to the bedroom. She had only just pushed the door open when she felt a deathly whisper trace its way across her neck as a cold metal blade was pressed against her throat and someone wrapped a powerful arm around her waist. She struggled and snarled,

"I helped to save your life you ungrateful bastard."

"No." he hissed, "You let me live so you could destroy me later." He spat in her ear, pressing the knife more insistently against her throat drawing blood as he whispered, "I can't let that happen…"

Sara carefully set Carla down on the wall at the bottom of their driveway and wrapped her coat around her as she continued to shake, clearly still in shock, as the tears poured uncontrollably from her eyes.

"Mummy…" the small voice mumbled at her elbow.

"Rosie!" she cried, delighted, as she took the only thing that could have given her any strength in her arms and held her close to her chest, tenderly stroking the thin blonde wisps of her daughter's fine hair.

"What will happen to me?" she breathed as they heard sirens in the distance.

"I can't tell you that. Not for definite." Sara said quietly, "But I'll put in a good word for you with the DA. I don't think he'll be too harsh. I don't think he can be. There isn't a judge or jury alive out there that would convict you." She told her, struggling to smile.

The other woman slipped a cold hand into hers and murmured, "Thank you…For everything…You were right. She would never have forgiven me. Thank you…"

Sara only nodded, unable to speak, overcome with emotion and her own troubled thoughts to reply.

Brass and his team were upon them a few minutes later and just as he approached Sara and Carla, a thinly veiled scream issued from the house and alerted Sara for the first time to the fact that Finn had not joined them.

"Finn!" she cried, sprinting up the driveway, Brass and several other armed officers at her heels.

She was about to leap through the door without paying any attention to the danger she was putting herself in when she felt a strong arm catch her around the middle and haul her back. Brass hissed in her ear,

"Don't even think about it."

And forced her to wait behind as he and his team surged into the house, with her following behind them.

"Finn!" she exclaimed as she spotted the shadowy figure dart away from her limp form and head for the kitchen, followed by several of Brass' officers.

She knelt down beside her, tentatively feeling for a pulse as the scarlet blood poured from a wound in her chest.

…..

She could feel her hands shaking as she stewed in the cool locker room, pressing her head against the cold metal doors as the paramedic's assurances that Finn was in good hands echoed around in her skull. She was still not quite sure how she had come to be back in the lab…

"Hey…" Russell said from the door, startling her as he hovered in the dark space watching her as she tried several times to shakily hang her jacket on the hook in her locker.

"Hey…" she replied tremulously, "I take it you want to talk?" she asked, voice cracking, knowing that she was not ready but equally knowing that she would have to be.

"No." he murmured, crossing the room in two long strides and pulling her into a hug, "No. Go home. Get some sleep. We'll do this in the morning. You've been through enough for one day."

She could have cried with relief as she sank into him, the tension draining gratefully from her limbs as she forced herself to choke out instead,

"Finn?"

"It's alright. She's going to be fine, they've taken her in to surgery but they're sure she'll be OK. I'm going up to the hospital just now. I'll call you later; she won't be awake tonight at any rate. You can see her in the morning but for now go home, cry, sleep, whatever but promise me you won't leave that house unless it starts burning to the ground."

For once, she agreed without question, too exhausted by the day's events to protest.

…

Sara pushed her way into the darkened house, savoring the cool, refreshing effects of the cold floor on her now bare feet. She allowed herself a moment to drink in the calming atmosphere of the house before quietly padding into the living room.

She froze as she heard footsteps coming down the hall to her right and changed course, moving away from the kitchen and towards the source of the sound.

"Gil?" she asked, cautiously, waiting for a response.

"In a manner of speaking..." the voice replied, evenly. "You look good Sara…"

A/N: Not really sure where I was going with this, but you know me, any old excuse for some angst and a chance to delve into Sara's past. Hope you enjoyed! Thanks for reading! Please review :)