August 20th, Horatio found it hard to believe that summer was almost over. It had been a largely unpleasant and lengthy one with more rain than sun though the golden skies Miami was famed for had finally returned. He was hoping for the return of something else too, specifically a detective who he missed stealing his parking space.
The beautiful half-Italian, Greek sitting opposite Horatio smiled across the white coffee table at him and remarked calmly, "Horatio I don't think I've ever seen you so troubled about a woman before."
Horatio tipped his trademark glasses down to glance across the table at Yelina with a wry look. "I'm not troubled," he retorted serenely.
Yelina smiled as she leaned back in her white painted chair and crossed one leg over the other. They were on a break together outside Yelina's favourite cafe enjoying the summer Miami sun. The purpose of the break was to discuss Detective Moon's progress over the past few weeks.
After Ridley's theory had proved right about an uninvited party guest at the murder mystery party, Horatio had ensured his superiors didn't question her stability or taking more leave, though he had stuck firmly to his order of her taking a week off and when she was ready to return he had insured she had his recommendations but equally made it clear that she only got handled 'normal cases'.
Her theory had led to the successful arrest and conviction of one Mark Holly, a jilted ex-boyfriend of Sadie Pearlman's who also despised hostess Lydia Bell for being an elitist bitch who had incidentally been making his social life hell it turned out. He had ridden his motorbike in the early evening, dumping it close to the house and walked the rest of the journey on foot, risky given the weather and the darkness, and then, high on drugs, he had gone from his initial plan to simply 'screw up the party' and murdered Sadie when he had found her unconscious and entirely too vulnerable. Shannon had then paid a fatal price when she had caught him by the pool dumping the bear claws; he had panicked and choked her without even thinking about it. He had hidden when the cops had arrived, panicked again, knocked them out, slashed everyone's tyres and then fled the scene, escaping on his bike. It didn't explain the power cut or the moved furniture but the CSIs were happy to accept the storm as the reason behind the lights going out and one of the guests playing a prank as a reason for the furniture.
"We're getting side tracked," Horatio chided gently as he pushed his glasses up once more and glanced out at the dark glistening ocean that was just visible across the road.
"I already told you Ridley's doing great; you want her on this new case don't you?" Yelina pried. "That's what you're asking me about her."
Horatio took a moment to think over his answer. This latest case, another bout of weird, dangerous and disturbing, it had prompted him to look into Ridley's past cases carefully and then her psych reports all over again as he wondered if she should, could and would handle it, if it really was her expertise. He didn't want to stereotype her the way New York had and yet, she did seem to excel with odd cases better than anyone else he knew. She did her research, she knew the myths and lore that criminals turned into a troubling reality and she had a certain sixth sense about her, when she speculated it always seemed to be right on the mark, not that Horatio could approve of theory over evidence. Oh sure, they went with theories a lot in Miami but still, evidence was concrete, theories were risky.
"I don't know," he admitted as he turned back to Yelina. "She was fragile and that's my fault," he continued softly. "I don't want to have her pushed over the edge again but equally I don't want to smother her talents and wrap her in wool, it's too late for that anyway. I had a good team with her Yelina before the Suburban Legends killer got her, now I'm not so sure."
"Why?" Yelina queried calmly before she took a sip from her cappuccino.
"Well human nature for one," Horatio admitted grimly, "my team were more than friends at one point, it was foolish but I didn't stop it, and now they're not."
Yelina shook her head disapprovingly. "That's your problem Horatio," she scolded him, "you see things too much in black and white sometimes, you think colleagues should just be colleagues, it's nice on paper but it doesn't work and no one understands this life we live better than someone else living it with us. It's not unique to our profession either; no matter where you work you will find work colleagues that also hang out as friends."
"But when you run the risk of turning that friendship into something more there are consequences," Horatio replied bitterly. It was a risk he had thought about numerous times but had never taken, there was the professional relationship to consider but also the murkiness of familial ties that he felt he would dishonouring and risking. Yelina was his late brother's ex-wife after all and yet Horatio had constantly wondered if Ray really would disapprove? And what if it could work out between them? Was he not risking loneliness and unhappiness if he didn't try?
Yet Ridley and Tim had tried, and Calleigh and Eric had tried, Horatio knew that even if they thought he didn't, and now...now it was all complicated and messy. Alright, they were dealing with it well, Calleigh and Eric were still admirable friends and there was definitely a spark very much present and Horatio didn't think they had given up like Tim and Ridley but what about if he brought Ridley back to the fold? What then? She still socialised with Calleigh but he didn't think she was there when Calleigh, Tim and Eric went to a bar after work or a cafe, it was probably as simple as circumstance, she worked different shifts and when she wasn't working she was in therapy or at home but Horatio had to consider the possibility of unpleasantness between her and Tim.
"They're all professionals," Yelina reminded him. "Look, Ridley's fantastic on homicide cases and if you want her to stay with us she will excel but there is a hunger for her eyes to go back to you, even Frank's noticed it. She's being trying very hard, she practises her shooting, she trains at the gym and she's been very good at keeping up with her therapy and the psychiatrist's advice and it has been working. It's been four weeks since you ordered her off the team, give her another chance."
"I didn't order her off the team," the redhead replied defensively, "just off the abnormal."
"And now you've got abnormal in a big way and you need her on the team to solve it," Yelina reminded him as she finished her cappuccino at last. "A celebrity's daughter from Vegas, that's big."
"Our victim is the same as any other," Horatio downplayed Yelina's awe.
"She wasn't a nobody," Yelina chided.
"No victim is a nobody," Horatio replied calmly. Although Yelina was right; the daughter of a wealthy, well known singer, a minor celebrity in Nevada and a major celebrity in the city of sin, a girl who one would have thought could have been afforded better protection.
"Well you've had three days with this," Yelina reminded him as she leaned down and reached for her white handbag at last, "and what progress have you made?"
"Some," he replied neutrally as he tugged out his wallet before Yelina could reach for her purse, opened it and threw several notes down.
"Enough that you could keep going without Ridley?" Yelina prompted. "If you can do without her on the case then go ahead, don't stress about it, give her another month if you think that's what she needs, I can't lie and say she won't be hurt about it but that's the nature of the job. Frank and I will keep her busy though, don't worry about that."
Horatio sighed as he put his wallet away again. "It's not just about her feelings," he muttered, "although you are right, she won't forgive me if I keep her from a case like this-"
"Which with anyone else you could deal with," Yelina interrupted as her piercing brown eyes cut into him, "but not her, why is that? If this were Calleigh, Eric or Speedle, you'd let them get angry about it and accept their misplaced hate but not Ridley." The suspicion was there again, no matter how many times Horatio tried to abate it, it wouldn't quite go away with Yelina. The redhead knew it never would unless he explained his complicated history with Ridley to Yelina but he wasn't prepared to do that, it would be unfair to Ridley.
"I've let her down enough times," was all Horatio would confess. "That's not the point though, the point is I could keep her from the case and it might cost us, something that only Ridley could figure out might be missed. Without Calleigh we could miss a weapon, without Speed we could miss important trace evidence and without Eric we could miss the hidden evidence."
Yelina nodded though the suspicion remained simmering in her beautiful, Italian eyes. Everything about Yelina was exotic and charming to Horatio, she had a certain natural beauty that no one else in the city did, Yelina's soft, golden skin wasn't seasonal, it came from the swarthy natives of Greece and Italy as did her long, natural chocolate brown curls and that confident, glowing appeal that many Italian women seemed to be blessed with. Yelina wore her beauty with ease, so used to it she didn't even seem to realise the effect it had on men.
"Well Horatio, it's your choice," she reminded him softly, "you are the Lieutenant after all but you did persuade Ridley to transfer down here, if you didn't think she was ready perhaps you should have waited before encouraging her to quit New York."
Horatio kept his emotions carefully hidden though Yelina had hit a sore mark with her comment. Why did she always have to be right? 'Well it's part of the reason why you go to her for advice,' he thought to himself dryly. 'I had Ridley come here to spare her from New York, I was protecting her from those cops who abandoned her,' he realised, 'but I never thought about what would come after, I knew it would be hard work for her but I didn't think about how hard. New home, new job, and all those memories to deal with, it might have been better in New York, she probably knew how to distract herself there, she probably learned after Detective Silver's demise but here she wouldn't know where to go to occupy her thoughts, where to hang out and when and who with. It was silly of me to expect her to just slip into her new life so soon and it's unfair of me to penalise her for struggling with it.'
"Okay," he decided aloud, "she can join the case, providing my team agree to report any signs of trouble with her, no matter how small. First sign and she's back to you and Frank, I won't make her go off again unless it's really necessary," he allowed, "since it does her more harm than good anyway." He wouldn't forget how on her second day of forced leave she had greeted him sullenly with a few choice curse words and after an hour or so had lost her temper altogether and purposely chucked her badge at him. It had hit him squarely on the nose and stung at the time though he had not reacted to it, save to pick it up, rub it clean with his sleeve and press it back into her hand tightly, assuring her that he did not give out Miami-Dade badges lightly.
At exactly 15:03 Horatio went to Ridley's house and informed her of his desire for her to rejoin the case. It was a lengthy hour as he went over the case in loose detail with her, made assurances of his belief in her abilities to handle the case, accepted her suspicion and scorn in response and her tart retort that he wasn't going to pick her up and throw her down again like a yo-yo.
At 18:20 Ridley stepped into the crime lab with Horatio to go over the photos of the crime scene. Horatio was not just waiting for her reactions to the crime scene but her reactions to the team as well.
They entered the lab as Tim was mid-sentence with someone on his mobile. "I'll pick you up at eight, yeah-" He paused and looked over at them awkwardly, his brown eyes settling on Ridley with a degree of surprise before a voice down the phone drew his attention back to the call. "What? Sorry, eight, look I've got to go, work, see you later Serena." He hung up the phone and immediately turned his attention to the blue dress laid out before him, freshly printed and tested; now he was comparing the blood spatters on it to the blood spatters in the photographs beside it.
'Serena,' Ridley thought numbly as she purposely looked from him to Eric who was just opposite trying a little too hard to busy himself with the results from scrapings of stone found at the crime scene, which he had now identified as quartz.
"Speed, could you show Detective Moon the photos of the crime scene please?" Horatio ordered calmly as he tugged off his shades and headed towards Eric.
Speed visibly flinched before glancing up with a calm expression and nodding. "Sure," he murmured before walking off from the bloody dress to a lit up table at the back of the lab where all the photos were placed out.
Ridley followed after him, taking care to keep a gap between him and herself when she stood round to face the photographs. She studied them silently for a moment, they depicted a girl, around sixteen or seventeen with long, dyed blonde hair lying propped up against the metal stand of a billboard. She was clad in a blue dress with a white apron and a frilled, white petticoat that came short above her knees, the apron and dress were spattered with blood. The girl's legs were parted to show the fact that she had no underwear on, and on her legs were stripped black and white socks that went to her knees and on her feet were thick heeled, blue, glittering shoes. She also wore a black hair band with a gigantic, blue bow on it, in her lap was a decapitated white rabbit and in her left hand she was clutching an empty, porcelain cup. Worst of all, her eyes had been gouged out, and there were slashes down her arms and legs and a pool of blood beneath her suggesting damage in an intimate area, she also looked wet and was stained with something faded and brown as well as the blood.
There was also a photograph showing a note made crudely from font cut out from newspapers and magazines, there was a passage in black with quotation marks, 'for it might end, you know,' said Alice to herself, `in my going out altogether, like a candle. I wonder what I should be like then?' following by words in bold, red, all capitals- IMPERFECT ALICE WAS FOUND. THE ART HAS IMPROVED. PERFECT ALICE ENJOYED TEA.'
Ridley swallowed hard, she recognised the scene, she had had nightmares about it for two nights before the old terrors had returned. "It's just like in the attic of the Chimera House," she said coldly. "A teacup, a dress with an apron and a small animal's body."
"Yes, weird thing is we never made that body public," Tim commented sardonically, "and that skeleton from that house was also a rabbit." He rubbed his nose briefly with one hand; Ridley recognised it well as a sign of his desire to hurry on with things.
"You don't have to be uncomfortable," she said softly.
He gave her a brief awkward glance; they hadn't talked since he had taken her home from the cinema. He had thought about ringing, texting or visiting her but she had made the call to not date and he had accepted it so he didn't contact her. For a while he had hoped she would make contact with him but she hadn't and that had made him angry, and then upset.
Calleigh had given Tim her usual scorn over the matter, prompting him to retaliate, leading to a heated argument Eric had broken up. For a while things had been tensed amongst the three of them, Eric was Tim's best friend but he was obviously trying to form a relationship beyond friendship with Calleigh so it made it difficult for him to get involved, plus his opinion was that both CSIs were equally wrong and right about the matter of Ridley. He then reminded them both that only he had any idea what Ridley was going through, and that was a glimmer of an idea at best.
"I'm seeing someone," the words came out bluntly before he could help it.
"That's okay," she retorted calmly, not a hint of anger, remorse or guilt in her voice.
That just made Tim angrier, wasn't she bothered by that? "Serena," he continued, more to bait her than give her an explanation, "from the murder mystery party if you were wondering. She came by for her police photograph, said it would make a good profile picture and we got to talking."
"You don't need to explain," Ridley assured with a vague, half-smile. "I'm the one that ended things; you're entitled to move on."
"Things never started," Tim said unkindly before he turned away from her. He had only been seeing Serena for a handful of days and had been contemplating ending things tonight because he knew she was just a rebound but now, now he wanted to keep her seeing her, if Ridley wasn't bothered by it why should he be? "Anyway," he continued on, his professionalism back in place, "the victim is one Estella van le Rael, she came here from Vegas without her parents' permission for a wild weekend with friends. She was last seen on the Saturday night at the Palms Beach Club, friends say she started hanging out with a large group they didn't know, got close to a couple of guys and at some point vanished. She was found around two in the afternoon the next day by a dog walker, Alexx puts her time of death at probably just a couple of hours prior to that."
"What was the cause of death?" Ridley queried coolly, forcing herself to be just as professional.
Tim glanced at her once more, this time out of the corner of his eye, hoping to catch a shred of emotion in her brown-grey gaze but there was nothing. He took a careful step to the left away from her, making a pretence of reaching out to tap one of the photographs, a close up of the teacup. The truth was the smell of her vanilla perfume was beginning to grate on him, he couldn't count the amount of times he had moped about his house thinking of that smell while she in New York.
"The girl was eighty percent tea," Tim commented sardonically, "LSD laced tea in fact, it certainly contributed to her death but Alexx went with blunt force trauma and blood she er..." He faltered, his anger towards Ridley slipping slightly as he tried to think of a way to continue telling her about the case, all too aware as to how close Horatio was standing to them now, waiting for Ridley's reaction. "She was raped and then violated with something sharp."
Ridley paled just a little but there was no tremble in her hands, no widening of her eyes and not even a whimper of protest. "Vulgar," she replied swiftly, "and no traces of the attacker's DNA I'm guessing."
"None," Tim answered flatly, unsure if he should be relieved by Ridley's lack of reaction or not.
The door opened and Calleigh hastened in. "Sorry I'm late guys," she commented chirpily, "there was a gang war downtown, six victims and four different guns to match bullets up to, a bit messy."
"That's alright Calleigh, you're here now," Horatio answered smoothly.
Calleigh's clear blues filled with joy at the sight of Ridley before a smile broke out across her face as she hastened to her friend. "Ridley!" she squealed in delight. "About time you came back here, it's no fun with just men!"
Ridley smiled warmly back and welcomed Calleigh's brief hug before they broke and turned to Horatio expectantly. Calleigh shot him a slight accusatory look as she wondered why he hadn't told her that he was bringing Ridley onto the case. She supposed he had known Calleigh wouldn't be able to resist telling Ridley before he could.
Tim glanced at his watch, his shift was almost over and he knew he had to go home, shower and change before meeting Serena but this was Ridley's first day back, well first day back again if he wanted to be picky. Truthfully he would feel bad leaving Ridley, it was like abandoning her to the wolves, he should be here for her, supporting her as he had promised he would.
'I should at least stay as a friend,' Tim thought guiltily, 'but then I'm putting Serena on hold for her and that's exactly what Ridley didn't want me doing. She made the choice.' He frowned and looked at the others calmly as he lowered his hand.
"Anyway, my shift is over," he announced, his frown deepening at Calleigh's glower.
"Have fun tonight man," Eric commented sincerely. "Are you going anywhere exciting?" Eric winced at the look of disapproval that earned him from Calleigh and gave Ridley an apologetic look that she avoided.
"The cinema," Tim answered flatly. He realised his mistake when Calleigh started shooting him daggers but stubbornly refused to look apologetic about it and deliberately did not look Ridley's way. "Have fun," he added dryly before heading for the doors.
Ridley watched him go, feeling a pang of regret as he took the smell, his smell, of chestnuts, leather and the salty Miami air with him. 'I want to go to the cinema with you and be normal,' she thought forlornly, 'but I can't, because it wouldn't be normal and that wouldn't be fair to you.'
10:21 found Ridley, Calleigh and Eric standing in the bar area of the Seahorse Lagoon, they had come at Calleigh's insistence for one drink.
"Real subtle theme here," Ridley commented dryly as she took in the scantily clad waitresses and barmen. The waitresses had palm leaves for bras and bottoms whilst the barmen wore shorts. The bar was themed with sparkling palm trees made of foil, beach balls placed at the back of the chairs, coconuts and seashells dangling from the ceiling and dried starfish and seahorses sitting beneath the glass bar top on a layer of sand and gold glitter.
"Miami, palm trees, beaches," Eric mused with a nod of approval as his warm gaze lingered on some of the waitresses. "I like places that are open about what they're selling," he joked.
"Sun, sand and sex," Calleigh remarked disapprovingly, "that's Miami all over." She sipped thoughtfully at a glass of white wine as she gave Ridley a small smile. "It's good to have you back," she said sincerely.
Ridley nodded appreciatively. "It's good to be back."
"It's been dull without you Ridley," Eric jested with a grin.
Calleigh nodded in agreement before leaning into Ridley slightly. The three were occupying a round, glass table, Calleigh and Ridley sat at the back side by side on the sea blue, leather chairs, which were actually just one long bench against the wall, whilst Eric sat opposite on a sea green, leather stool. "I'm sorry about Speedle," she commented quietly with a sympathetic look. "I wanted to tell you I just...wasn't sure how."
"It's okay," Ridley said as she waved off Calleigh's concern. She grasped her thin stem and was quick to take a deep sip to give herself a moment to consider her next words. The truth was it stung right to core but that was her fault and her problem, she had sent Tim away knowing the pain that would follow. "I...I ended it," she confessed. She flashed a look at Eric who sighed.
"We know," Eric confessed, "Tim told me and..." He paused and glanced at Calleigh.
"And Eric told me," Calleigh confessed with an apologetic look. "Sorry," she added hastily. "I get it Ridley, it's been so hard for you but you and Tim, I mean, don't you want to be with him?"
"I do," Ridley murmured, "but I...I can't." She bowed her head miserably before taking yet another deep sip. "It's too hard after what happened, I'm always having flashbacks and it just makes me sick. Tim waited six months, it wasn't fair to make him keep waiting," Ridley murmured. "Besides, it was complicated enough with everything at work, truthfully I don't think I'm in any state to date anyone no matter what my feelings are and I can't make Tim wait about until I figure that out."
"I understand," Calleigh retorted warmly, "really I do. I guess then if it's meant to be it will be but still," she frowned, "he didn't have to move on with someone so quickly and from a frigging crime scene."
"She's not a criminal Calleigh," Eric chided her with a shake of his head.
"It's still inappropriate," Calleigh scorned.
Ridley smiled, appreciating Calleigh's supportive manner even if it was more than a little unfair to Tim and Serena. "It's okay, really," she insisted. "Let's just drink up and enjoy the evening."
"Good idea," Calleigh enthused.
As the night wore on the CSIs and detective stayed for more than the one planned drink and had a merry night dancing, drinking and gossiping. For Ridley it was a welcome relief, she had missed this, just socialising and acting like she hadn't a care in the world.
At a quarter to midnight Eric tugged out his phone as he got a text message. It read from Speed, 'Are you still out? Is Ridley there?' Eric fumbled to reply as he danced jovially with Calleigh. He was so happy to be out with the blonde he didn't even mind Ridley there, Ridley was good fun too when she actually allowed herself to be. He texted back, 'Yes, at the Seahorse Lagoon. Lots of fun without you, more women for me! Rid's still here, I swear I've even heard her laugh twice tonight!'
Eric's cheeks flushed faintly when Ridley slipped off to the toilets and Calleigh suddenly seized him by both hands and tugged him close into a dance. She smiled suggestively back as he twirled her around, his grin widening at her giggling. Over Christmas they had exchanged gifts, for the first year their gifts had actually been personal and exchanged in privacy but then Ridley had hastened back to New York, the magic of Christmas had faded and Tim's moody behaviour had made Eric sympathetic enough to spend some guy time with him.
Though it had gone unspoken, somehow Eric and Calleigh had seemed to agree that their relationship was going to be so slow and careful to the point of not happening because both of them were terrified of risking their professional relationship and their friendship and having it all end in disaster. Was it worth the risk? Looking at Tim and Ridley, Eric wasn't so sure. He frowned a little as he knew Calleigh had even stronger feelings about that, though she had constantly disapproved of Tim and Ridley she had simultaneously gotten it into her head that they were meant to be, some nonsense about Ridley being the only person who could make Tim think about others and Tim being the only guy who found Ridley's weirdness charming. Now that Tim and Ridley weren't, Calleigh had evidently lost faith in the idea of love in the workplace.
Eric paused breathlessly as the wild dancing finally ended and Calleigh broke from him to slip back to the table. His phone went again and he tugged it out. 'I could swing by or would that ruin things?' Eric could hear himself reading the message in Tim's sardonic, angry voice, he knew the moody implication there, even though Tim had left them to go on a date he was still taking it personal that he hadn't been invited to the bar. Eric thought to himself sarcastically, 'yes Speed you would ruin things because you'll only remind Calleigh of your failed relationship with Ridley, then you'll piss them both off simply by being here.' He chided himself for such a negative thought, it wasn't fair, Tim had done absolutely nothing wrong and, as Ridley had reminded them, it had been Ridley who had ended things. So Eric texted back, 'sure come by.'
Twenty minutes later Tim finally appeared looking somewhat suitably dressed in a pale, grey shirt with an open, black jacket and neat jeans. He was clean shaven though his dark hair was unruly in the fluffy, loose curls that Ridley had always adored and teased him over relentlessly. Even though Eric had warned her, Ridley still looked surprised to see him, and couldn't help hating the fact that he looked like he had dressed for a date. She stood up from the table after giving him a polite greeting before excusing herself to the bar.
"Stop glaring at me Calleigh," Tim snapped heatedly as he caught the blonde's disapproving look across the table, "it's not like I brought Serena." He turned away from the blonde, shrugging off Eric's hand and hastening to the bar.
Ridley tensed a little when Tim stepped up beside her, sliding his right arm onto the glass bar top. "We're still friends," he said reassuringly as his eyes flickered from one revealing barmaid to another.
"Yes," Ridley agreed quietly. "Did you have a good night?"
"Yes," he retorted as he cocked his head to glance her way. "Did you?"
"Yes," she said sincerely with a nod. "I'm glad you dropped by, it's not the same without you," she admitted, "it feels like more of a team with you here."
"I know what you mean," he retorted calmly, "it didn't feel like a team without you Ridley. How've you been anyway? It's been weeks, I wanted to call by but...well I thought I'd leave it up to you, if you wanted me round you'd text."
"I did," she blurted out before she could help it, though she kept her gaze purposely ahead. "I just...I didn't want to keep running hot and cold with you Tim, I need to sort things out with myself first before I can date anyone and I don't know how long that will take and I didn't want you to have to keep waiting and waiting, it's not fair." She could feel a lump growing in her throat and made an effort to swallow it back down.
"I don't agree with it but I get it," Tim murmured as a waitress appeared before them. He was quick to order a pint for himself and another wine for Ridley. "You made your choice and I'll respect it even if it pisses me off but you could still ask me round to your house as a friend Ridley. Shutting me out of your life completely is just fucked."
She nodded rapidly as she blinked back several tears. "I know, I know I just needed time and space, if I had you round I'd be...well...I'd be hugging you hard one moment and then cursing you out the next. I told you Tim, I want to be your girlfriend I just can't, I can't be anyone's at the moment."
"Okay, well I want to be your boyfriend Ridley but you told me not to hang around waiting anymore so I won't and so long as you know that well we can still be good friends and as your good friend I'd like to call by your house once in a while to see how you're doing."
She gave him a small, weak smile and nodded. "Okay, you can do that."
The group continued on in serenity as Calleigh accepted at last that Tim and Ridley's situation was one of Ridley's making and the pair were still getting along. They had several dancing sessions, even twice persuading Tim to join them and then at last called it a night close to two in the morning. Then they headed out across the road to sit on the beach side by side looking out at the calm, black ocean, streaked in white by the light of the full moon. It was beautiful and seemed to go on forever.
"I've missed this," Calleigh said as she dug her hands into the warm sand at her sides and breathed in the fresh evening sea air.
"Me too," Eric agreed happily. "We definitely need to hang out more." His gaze lingered on Calleigh as he said that though his words were for Ridley and Tim too. "It's always good fun with you guys," he added sincerely.
Ridley smiled back from Eric's left side before turning her gaze out to the black eternity before her. She wasn't sure she would ever get used to such a view, having become accustomed to the grey jungles of New York. Calleigh was seated on Eric's right side and discreetly nestled her head against his shoulder briefly before sitting upright prompting him to turn and smile gently at her. Ridley glanced at Tim briefly, only to tense as she caught a flashback of the cold lips of a killer invading her mouth as his hands violated her. She turned away from Tim sharply, looking back to the sea again. Why did it have to be like this?
Tim was filled with a burning desire to wrap his arm over Ridley's shoulders and tug her close to him, wanting to assure her that he would wait for her to sort out her issues but it was a lie, he wouldn't wait, he hadn't waited, she had ordered him away and he had gone. He dipped his head slightly and frowned, wondering like Ridley, why did it have to be like this?
Wow I edited this chapter so many times! It's a little heavy on all the complicated relationships so sorry if anyone's getting bored or sick of that but I really do like writing it! I know I'm awful to Ridley in this fic so far but I just imagine all she's gone through, more than once, and feel that she's because quite scarred and flawed as a result which has made her make some questionable choices, though she feels she's doing it for the better good there's definitely an implication that she's just trying to shield herself because she's scared and in the end she's just depriving herself.
Anyway I've also been toying with the idea of having the Vegas CSIs make a cameo but I don't know, that might take away from the fic but I always loved the flirtatous nature between Horatio and Catherine :-)
As always thanks for all your awesome reviews, honestly I'm so chuffed! Let me know what you think so far!