A/N: Thank you again everyone for reading! I love reviews, they help me to know whether or not I'm doing my job properly. I can't think you enough. Your enthusiasm for this story spurs my own.

Chapter 17:

Sara sat in the breakroom, laptop open and the Hayashi casefile next to it, and couldn't focus on her job. There were things that she had firsthand experience with that many other people didn't, one of those was how to live with someone with mental illness. Someone who's actions could be, at times, confusing, scary, and deeply worrisome. Her mother had been crazy. At the time, she had no idea. Her childhood had been normal. Her normal. The days in her house stretched into some pretty long nights.

She remembered having to take over the running of their bed and breakfast. Only a kid, she was running the place. Her father, too busy with drugs and ignoring reality, and her mother with her illness. When her mom was on her medication it was like she wasn't even there. She couldn't do anything for herself; she couldn't think clearly, it was like she was stuck. There was no will in her to move, to think, or to do anything. And when her mom refused to take her medication, her delusions and hallucinations ruled over her, but at least she could function. It didn't matter that she talked to herself or thought people were after her, she acted more like a mother during those times than she ever did when she was on pills.

For years she was terrified and desperately afraid of following in her parents' footsteps that she wouldn't let herself get close with anyone. She never wanted to put a husband or family through any of that. Play Russian Roulette with a kid and hope they didn't develop a mental illness. It was hereditary. She never wanted her family to be afraid of her. God, how horrible would that have been? So, she stayed clear of it all.

And that's what she did. She rationalized. Her defense mechanism always ruled over her life. Deep down, though, she would feel the pain, but outwardly she never let it show, until a case hit a nerve. Abusive husband. Psychotic child prodigy using her intelligence to get her brother off for murder.

As she stared off at the far wall, she remembered the last time she saw either of her parents before everything changed.

Walking home from the library, her books pressed hard into her chest, the world moved around her as she was lost in thought from the night before. The yelling, her dad's harsh words, filled her head. He'd gotten so upset with her mom that he smacked her. Right across the face. Right in front of her.

Then said, "She had it coming! She's not making any sense!" Before storming off, slamming doors as he left.

Her mom hadn't been making any sense. When she wasn't still sitting at the kitchen table, chain-smoking cigarettes, she was speaking nonsense. The nonsense terrified her more than the silence. As the argument between her parents grew stronger, louder, her mom's words got stranger, repetitive, and made her feel scared. Not necessarily scared for herself but scared for her mother.

Her mom had been pacing the living room, hands gesturing all over, as she rattled off, "That's not what they want. No, no, no, no, that's not what they want. I went out, I went out and—It's like blue skies and red blood. Red is the color of roses and blue the color of violets. I like flowers, but don't trust them. Can't trust anything with thorns. They prick. The pricking, pricking, pricks—They're inside the television, I hear them. Spying. They're on the radio, I see them. Listening. Happiness, happiness is on the doormat—"

That was when her dad had snapped and smacked her, yelling at her to shut up before leaving.

The books she had gotten from the library were all on mental illness. There was something wrong with the way her mom thought. Her dad wouldn't take her to get help, and her mom didn't trust doctors. There was no one else. She had no grandparents, no relatives, and no one else she could trust or turn to for help. It was up to her. It was always up to her. She had to get up and feed herself, make sure the bills were paid, the bed and breakfast was running smoothly, rooms were clean, and food stocked. She couldn't remember a time just being a kid. She had no friends.

All she had were her books, and music. And crazy parents. But she loved them, despite it all. She really loved them. She didn't know how not to.

Getting home, she went through the kitchen door like always, bypassing the front, and walked inside. She dropped the books to the table, she called out to no one, "I'm back! If anyone cares," she muttered the last part under her breath.

Upon seeing the calendar on the wall, next to the refrigerator, she saw it was a week until her birthday. She could not wait. The legal age to be emancipated from your parents in San Francisco was fourteen. She'd been taking college courses along with finishing high school a few years early while working at the bed and breakfast full time.

It'd been a real balancing act, but she'd been up to the challenge. She was set to graduate high school next month, then in the spring, she'd be a part time college student. And, hopefully, fully independent. She wanted to move out, live closer to the university, but still work. Someone had to take care of the place. If she left the business in the hands of her parents, they'd be homeless in a month. Two tops.

Taking Peter Benchley's "Beast" with her, having just finished his novel "Jaws", she pushed the kitchen door open. She couldn't wait to start reading it at the front desk while waiting for customers—

The book dropped to the floor next to the dead body. There was a pool of blood. Her mother, next to him, crying with the bloody knife still in her hand. Shock was the best description for what she'd been in, staring down at the lifeless body of her father.

"I saw them. I saw them. In his eyes. In his eyes, they went on for miles." Her words were lost in a jumbled mess of illogical nonsense. Then she said, "I did it for you." Blinking back against the tears, she heard her mom say again, "I did it for you."

Interrupting her thoughts, Trace tech David Hodges walked in and gave her a smile. She hadn't seen him in a few days. "How's your mom, Hodges?"

"She's doing better, thank you for asking," he said before getting him a bag of chips from the vending machine. "She's in Canada."

She wrinkled her head in confusion as she asked, "I thought she had a medical emergency?"

"She did. I think her doctor recommended bed rest because she went to spend time with her brother. But she did say that there was no doctor who could fix the pain she had. It was all very confusing."

She shook her head. Hodges's mother had to take a vacation because she needed a break from him. He was her pain. "Have you considered moving out?"

Hodges regarded her for a moment before asking, "Why?" Either he was in denial, or… "Have you seen Grissom?"

"Last I saw him, he was in the conference room. David—"

Hodges didn't give her time to say anything else before leaving the room.

That was just awkward. Returning her attention back to her work, she continued to stare at the laptop, not really seeing the words as she realized that she didn't really know the man she was so distracted by. Grissom was her supervisor and friend, new lover, but still, she didn't know who he really was. Like him, she used to always hide when they got too close. Her advances had always come after rough cases, and when she just directly asked him out. Once she was shot down, she rationalized it was he was just not ready.

There were times when she would talk freely about something that had happened in her life, where the energy of life took her over and she was there with him, happy and telling him stories. But he never knew about her past with her family, or what she loved to do when she wasn't working or what made her laugh out loud instead of just smiling and nodding along with him.

Once that all started to change once she finally broke down and told him about her family, he still held so much back. She still remembered that first date. How self-assured yet tentative he'd been.

Grissom got them a table at the vegan restaurant she frequented that wasn't too far from her apartment. His hand left hers to pick up the menu. The cold air replaced his warmth; she wanted his hand back on hers.

"Why is this called the Buddha Bowl?" She found the item on the menu and read it over as he said, "Buddhist cuisine is derived from Asia, mostly East and Southeast Asia, as well as China, Japan, Vietnam, and Korea. They have one member act as chef and follow strict culinary parameters that pay respect to their ethics and rules. I'm wondering how Mexican crema and tortilla strips pay that respect, especially seeing how both are processed foods."

"It's just what it's called. It has nothing to do with Buddha or the Buddhist religion."

He stared at her for a very long time before saying, "Then why use the title? It's implying it's a bowl of food that the Buddha, or a Buddhist, would eat. It's not." The server appeared at the table and Grissom turned to her and pointed to the menu item, saying, "This should be called the vegan taco bowl. There's nothing Buddhist about it. There's no rice, the vegetables aren't stir-fried or cooked in vegetable broth, there's no curry—"

The server stared at him, then at her, and then said, "I'll…bring that up to management. What would you like to drink?"

After they ordered drinks, she told the server, "We're going to need a few more minutes before we can order." The moment the server walked away she couldn't hold it in any longer. She started laughing. Grissom didn't look remotely amused. "You're serious, aren't you?"

"Yeah," he said in all seriousness, which made her laugh even harder. "As I said, Buddha is not a name, but a title. It means "a person who is awake" and what they are awake to is the true nature of reality. Buddhism teaches that we all live in a fog of illusions created by mistaken perceptions and "impurities", like hate, greed, and ignorance. A buddha is one who is freed from this fog. It is said that when a buddha dies they are not reborn but pass into the peace of Nirvana, which is not a heaven–per se, but a transformed state of existence. If a Buddhist walked in here, saw this on the menu, the processed ingredients…" He raised a brow, saying, "he, or she, probably wouldn't even care."

"But you do."

"I just think it needs a new name," he said, before his eyes darted around the place, checking for exits, watching who came inside, who left, and the cars out in the parking lot.

"Do you ever not watch the world around you?"

"Plenty of times; when I'm inside, alone." His eyes returned to hers as he worked out something to say.

Then the server reappeared at the table, took their orders, and once the silence stretched on, she thought Grissom had completely moved on from her earlier confession. She had never told another living soul about her parents. Not even Hank, and they dated for a while before breaking up.

He surprised her when he said, "I lost my dad when I was nine. He'd been outside, working in the yard. It'd been hot. He came in to get out of the heat, laid down on the couch and um…" He shook his head. "No one told me why. I had to find out for myself. Finding that out, understanding what had happened, brought me a sense of closure. I guess that's why I do this job. I want to find out the truth of what happened in order to give other people that same sense of closure."

She realized that her reasons were the same as his, in a way. Her father had been murdered. Though she knew the culprit, bringing justice, real justice, to those who couldn't get it felt like something she could do. "The dead demand justice, only, they can't speak for themselves. That's why I do it."

His smile was so deep, and genuine, that she couldn't help but get lost in it.

"Anything else I should know about you?"

He let out a breath as he said, "Plenty, but uh, I think the biggest thing to know right now is that my mother's deaf, and she's going to want to know all about you once I tell her that I'm dating someone."

"Your mom's deaf?"

He gave a nod. "A few years ago, so was I. It's hereditary. I thought I'd been found out during that murder trial. The one with the so-called movie star. His defense attorney knew about it thanks to Philip Gerald. She dropped her voice when she asked me a question…I didn't hear what she said."

That was why he asked her to repeat the question a few times. "Wait, you can read lips?"

"I can."

"You seem to be hearing okay now."

"I had surgery to correct it."

She remembered that a few years ago he'd been gone for two months. "Ah, so that's why the two-month sabbatical. You came back with more than a beard, but improved hearing. You look hot, by the way."

He reached up and rubbed it, asking, "You think?"

"Absolutely, just don't go all mountain man on me."

"I don't plan on it, unless I move to the mountains."

She almost laughed at how serious he was. She didn't think he was joking. "You're okay with me calling you hot?"

"Why shouldn't I be?" he asked, confused.

"Well, it's just that you never liked it before when I said things that explicitly acknowledge my interest in you. I know you said that this is a date, but a part of me can't help but think that it won't last more than tonight. You'll wake up tomorrow regretting you even tried."

He was awfully quiet, and she quickly went to apologize for being such an idiot, she shouldn't have said that, when he reached out and took her hand in his again. His fingers lightly caressed over her skin, making it tingle. His eyes were on hers, searching them, as if searching out the answer to the entire universe.

Apprehensive, and a little shy, he said, "Like an unsure step into the dark, I will stumble blindly—tripping, falling, undoubtedly forever…For she is blinding in her beauty, fortified by spirit, admirable in mind…this woman who has stolen my heart." Then with a soft, cheeky smile, said, "Grissom."

She could barely breathe as she felt the love she'd always had for him surge up into her chest. The words that came out of her mouth were not expected, "Don't go saying things like that and then back out and break my heart."

There was so much pain in his eyes as he shook his head and told her, "I have absolutely no intention of breaking your heart. Can you…promise me the same?"

She had to push all the swirling grips of emotions that threatened to break. Giving a nod, she told him, "I can."

As a promise of what was to come, he lifted her hand to his mouth and kissed her knuckles, and then her palm. He held her hand to his face as he continued to look at her. Again, contemplating the universe.

She'd hold him to it then. And if there ever came a time when he even thought about leaving, she'd reminded him of all the reasons for him to stay.

Once he took her back home, she thought he was going to come inside. He had a look that maybe he wanted to as well, but hesitated as he stood just inside her doorway.

Teasing him slightly, she said, "Been a while, huh?"

He almost blushed. It was adorable. "It's not that. I, uh, I just want us to get to know who we are first, outside of work."

"We know who we are."

"Do we? Just tonight we learned about our families for the first time in eight years. There's still so much—"

"People have sex with one another knowing far less."

Giving her that soft smirk of his, he said, "I'm not people," with all the whimsical humor that she'd learned to love about him. He then cupped the side of her face before leaning in for a kiss. She wanted that kiss to last the rest of their lives together. It felt like home. Once it ended, she didn't want him to leave. There was a deep longing in his eyes once he opened them, and he hesitated once again before telling her, "Have a good night, Sara. And, uh, I'll talk to Ecklie."

"Goodnight, Grissom," she reluctantly said.

"I think it's about time you called me Gil, at least, when we're not at work."

She felt like teasing him again, and said, "What about Gilbert?"

He smiled, saying, "Only my mother calls me Gilbert. Normally when I'm in trouble."

"Get in trouble with me, and you'll be hearing it often."

God, the way he was trying not to laugh made her want to kiss him again. So, she did. It took him longer to leave than expected, but he finally managed to stop kissing her long enough to do it. The next day she learned that she still had her job. Gil told her over breakfast that he made for her, before kissing her again.

That had been the most he'd talked about his life, his past, since. It took a serial killer reemerging in his life for him to tell her the rest. Though, she knew he probably couldn't, he could have still said something even if vague of details. Even before she knew any of those things, she still clung to him; she tried to gasp and take whatever he offered and used it to keep herself going, to keep them going, and grounded and focused.

She could never tell him that; she never wanted him to feel like she was valuing him too much that he felt pressured or burdened with her insecurities. She never wanted him to feel responsible for her when she dove off the deep end only to realize that he'd made a mistake. She didn't want to bring him down with her.

And then he went off and told her that he saw something that wasn't there. She knew he wasn't like her mother. Gil wasn't crazy, he told her he wasn't and she knew he wasn't. However, there was a small amount of uncertainty that crept up that it wasn't completely true. She could rationalize it, reason it away, like always. Or, not.

So, she had to ask herself who was Gil, really? He was a man with a desperate need to understand human nature. A man who never questioned why he didn't turn his head away from the horrors of what the mind could make a human do to another. He could manipulate. He could read people, get into their heads, and know what secrets they held even when they couldn't admit it to themselves. He, once upon a time, had used that ability to either catch or kill people who happened to be serial killers. In her mind, a savior of potential victims by doing his job. He brought both closure and justice.

Her rationalization as to why, for her, she could be okay with knowing that the man she loved had killed someone. She thought she never could, but then…She also felt so much anger with wife abusers that she was certain if she ended up in a relationship with one that she'd could kill him. Or a psychopath in Las Vegas who took her boyfriend's son.

Her mother, though crazy, had killed her abusive husband during one of her delusions. Would she have done it if she hadn't been crazy? She hadn't talked to her mother since she was fourteen years old, and it was in court. After Nick's abduction, after his rescue, Gil told her that they should visit her mother. Maybe it would give her closure, he had said. Help her let it go and move on. They had planned on taking a few days to go up to San Francisco. That was before Hannibal Lecter interrupted their lives.

Night Shift Supervisor Harlyn Reno walked into the room, gave her a 'what's up' gesture and then went to the vending machine. She watched as she got a can of soda before leaving the room without a word. Not much of a talker, Harlyn mostly kept to herself, which oftentimes she appreciated.

Letting out a breath, she eyed the laptop, the casefile, and tried not to rationalize Gil's words. Saying things like he's just unique. He's Grissom, his mind is just…different. He's a genius empath, of course he's going to see things that aren't real.

She wasn't afraid. She was worried. There was a difference.

Pushing that feeling aside, she got down to business. Joy and Daniel Hayashi. There was a reason, a connection to Hannibal Lecter that she had to find. Why them? Of all the friends, acquaintances that Grissom had in Las Vegas, Lecter chose the Hayashi's. They hosted parties for the so-called elite and rich. They had a huge house with guest rooms, not just one. They were decent people. A software tech and a doctor—

Checking the records, she saw that Joy Hayashi worked at Desert Palm hospital. The same hospital where Hannibal Lecter had shown up, and where Heather Kessler was taken to. Why Desert Palm and not any other hospital?

She brought up a map and checked the location between the hospital and the hotel. Because of the proximity, it was the closest hospital. Grissom had said, and from the security footage, Lecter had on a doctor's lab coat and had parked in an employee parking spot. That was why he'd been undetected.

Another question they still hadn't answered was the use of Xylazine. Turning to the laptop, she started researching Dr. Joy Hayashi. It took some time to find a connection, but she finally found it. Joy had been involved in a lawsuit several years ago involving malpractice at a pop-up surgical care clinic for the homeless.

A colleague of hers, Dr. Mel Schmidt, had illegally used Xylazine for the surgeries, causing death. She was the key witness for the state, having been the one to discover what Schmidt had been doing. She testified against Schmidt who turned out to be killing the homeless patients on purpose. An "Angel of Death". Lecter had spiked the wine with the same drug that Schmidt had used to kill the homeless.

Closing her laptop, she gathered everything up and finally left the breakroom. She needed to go to Desert Palm hospital. She wondered since Hannibal Lecter had been there, posing as a doctor, if anything was missing.

"He hasn't moved in an hour."

It took Harlyn an unreasonably long time to realize that Hodges was actually talking to her. She'd stopped at the lab to grab the results from her case, enroute to the morgue, and had decided to grab a soda out of the vending machine. She'd been walking to the lobby when Hodges spoke those words loud enough for her to hear.

She had stopped, looked all around the hallway, and realized that the Trace tech was actually speaking to her. Or, talking to himself very loudly. Easing up beside Hodges, she peered into the conference room. Grissom was sitting on the table as he ran his eyes over the evidence photos. She had seen him like that many times over the years, though never as so still.

When Hodges said nothing else, she asked, "What're you talking about?"

"I've been watching him," Hodges said without taking his eyes off Grissom. "When he came out of his office, it was like he was in a daze. He went into the conference room, sat down on top of the table, and hasn't moved in an hour. I don't think he's blinked once."

"Why were you watching—"

"I wanted to fully understand him, the past Grissom, when he was Will Graham. I read an article—"

"Maybe you shouldn't have read those articles, David." The only articles Hodges could have read were the ones written by Freddie Lounds twenty years ago.

Hodges kept talking as he said, "People don't understand guys like us, Grissom and I. How our minds work. Genius is hard to comprehend. I should talk to him. You know, make—"

"I'll talk to him."

They both turned around to see Ecklie standing in the hallway. Harlyn glanced back at Grissom as she said, "I don't know, he looks pretty busy. You might not want—"

"He's not busy. He's staring at a wall."

"He's thinking," she countered. "To Grissom, that's being busy. He's taking in the evidence, forming connections—"

"I'm his boss, your boss, I can speak to whomever whenever I want," Ecklie cut her off as he stared down at her. "Don't you have an autopsy to get to?"

She'd thrown taller and bigger men to the ground when she was military police, but this was no longer the Navy. She had a job to preserve. Smiling slightly, she moved aside and said, "If I'm needed, I'll be at the morgue," before walking away.

Then she rounded the corner and ducked into the A/V lab. Phelps glanced up at her from where Archie usually sat during nights and said, "Reno, you know the rules. No loitering unless—"

Harlyn handed him her can of soda without a word as she kept her eyes on the two men out in the hallway. Ecklie told Hodges something before opening the door to the conference room, leaving it open. From her vantage point, she could see exactly what was going on inside.

Hodges glanced up and down the hall, spotting her watching, then hurried over and ducked into the A/V room.

Phelps looked back at Hodges and said, "Got something for me, Hodges?"

Hodges sighed and pulled a bag of potato chips out of his lab coat. As he handed it over to the Swing Shift A/V tech, he muttered under his breath, "Blackmailer."

"I'd rather be a blackmailer than a brown noser," Phelps shot back. After a moment, he asked, "Are you two spying on someone?"

"Of course we are," Harlyn said. "I heard rumors that Grissom has a temper, especially when it comes to the AD. In all my years of working here, I've never seen him get angry."

Phelps stood from the worktable so that he had a better view, saying, "When I was on Days, he went off on Conrad in the breakroom. He broke a coffee pot. Slapped it right out of his hands."

She felt a nudge next to her arm. Phelps was offering her some chips. Taking one, she heard Hodges protest.

"Those are mine. Can I—"

"They were yours," Phelps said as he cut Hodges off. "Now, they're mine, and I get to decide who to share them with."

"Don't be an ass, Phelps, let him have one," Harlyn said as she went back to watching the conference room. Of all the people that could get away with defying Conrad Ecklie, Gil Grissom was at the top of the list. This should be good.

Lecter was in the evidence, he just had to find him. Hidden inside all the places and things left behind, he would find out his end game. He knew where he'd been, and that was the best starting place.

Tracking the Domaine Armand Rousseau wine purchase back to Argentina, it was safe to assume that was where to start. Argentina had to have been where Hannibal had fled with Clarice in the summer of 2001. It was also where Barney Matthews, Lecter's old orderly had been killed. Listening to the recordings from the mental institution, there was no reason for Hannibal to hunt Barney down to kill him. They respected one another. So, the only logical reason was because Barney had seen something that he wasn't supposed to see: where Hannibal was living.

And, in order for Barney to know that it was Hannibal, it had to have been before Hannibal had facial reconstructive surgery. That tracked with the order of the kills. Barney Matthews was first in Argentina. Then a former colleague and his personal psychiatrist in Italy. Followed by the surgeon in Havana—

No, that was wrong. He checked the dates again in the file without having to pick it up nor take his eyes off the board. In his mind, he flipped through the file and reexamined the dates. Sidney Bloom was killed first, in Maryland, though his body was found after the surgeon Raymond Kubrick was killed in Havana. That left Crawford last.

Why kill Bloom at all? Unless Starling knew the FBI psychiatrist—

It hit him like a punch to the chest as all the air was pushed out of his lungs. Clarice wouldn't have known Bloom. She wasn't the reason why Hannibal had targeted Bloom. The FBI psychiatrist had information about one particular person: Will Graham. Better yet, Gil Grissom.

He'd gone to two people to get a new life, Lloyd Bowman and Jimmy Price. But, he had also gone to see one other person before he left for good, and that was Sidney Bloom. The man who never wanted to be left alone in a room with him was finally put in that position.

Bloom rested back in the chair, trying to keep a level head as he said, "I don't think that's a very good idea, Will. For starters, you're in a very fragile place right now—"

"Don't psychoanalyze me."

"I'm not trying to do anything except help—"

"Don't do that either," he said, cutting him off. Bloom had offered him a seat but he preferred to stand. "I didn't come here for your help. I came here to ask you a favor."

"What favor?"

Before he told him, he saw the subject of the file on Bloom's desk.

Bloom followed his eyes and said, "Lecter escaped a month ago. They have your profile already, but, given the circumstances—"

"We both know that the profile is useless. Lecter changes his profile, daily. Jack's trying to use you—"

"I never let him use me. Not the way—" Bloom stopped himself from saying anymore. "Why did you let him—"

He shook his head as he stepped away from the psychiatrist. Fingering the cigarette between his fingers, he stood staring out the window that overlooked the FBI Academy. "I didn't let him. Once I looked…"

Bloom finished for him, saying, "You imagined all the others."

"I knew he wasn't going to stop. I would have been seeing the dead families of Dolarhyde's victims for the rest of my life. They would have haunted my dreams. Jack knew it. He knew, once I looked, that I would have to do something." Once the silence settled between them, he had to ask, "Why don't you want to be left alone in a room with me?"

Bloom hesitated before saying, "This has been hard on you for a long time, Will. You're not—"

"Take the damn kiddie gloves off, and tell me–"

"You already know the answer to your own question. Stop asking me the obvious. Ask yourself why it matters."

He spotted a group of young recruits jogging down along the path, heading towards the woods. Raising the cigarette, he took a puff before saying, "You think I'm like him. It matters to me because…I can still feel him, inside. I can still hear his thoughts."

"You are alike. Damn it, Will. You shut me down, turn to stone, and then the next thing I know…you're in my head. Who does that sound like to you, Will? I wouldn't mind it so much if I knew that I could trust you, but I don't. The thing is, I'm not afraid of who you are, Will. I'm afraid of what you can become when you stop seeing yourself, and all you can see is what they want you to see."

He glanced briefly over at Bloom before dropping his eyes. He couldn't look at him. He was afraid of what he might see reflected back. "That's why I have to do this. I have no other option."

"Running away isn't a victory. It's a retreat. A loss, in more ways than one. One of these days, it will catch up to you. By then, you might not have anyone to help you. You might have to face it alone. Are you up for that? At least here, with people who know—"

"I'm already alone. I can't remember a time when I haven't been."

And he meant those words. It didn't matter if he was surrounded by people, married, or had a kid. He was always alone. No one else could go where he could. No one else wanted to even try.

And to be alone was the only option he had in order to save the life of the one other person he loved, and that was his son.

Without looking at Bloom, he told him, "Tell Jack to never call me. Tell him to never write to me. And to promise that no matter what happens, he'll never tell Kevin where I am."

"That's the favor?"

"That's the favor."

Bloom didn't like it, but had agreed to it. Opening his desk drawer, he pulled something out and went to hand it to him. He crossed the room and looked down at the photograph in Bloom's hand. It was a picture that Crawford had taken of both him and Hannibal Lecter while at a ceremonial banquet years ago. Lecter had his arm around his shoulder, like he was a pet.

Lecter didn't kill pets like Dolarhyde had. He fed them.

"Doesn't that belong to Jack?"

"He gave it to me after I told him what you just told me. About thinking you're the same. It was to remind me that you aren't. I want you to take it to remind yourself of that."

He stared down at the photograph for a brief second before he took a step to leave, saying, "I'm not the one who needs the reminder. Promise me you'll tell him what I said."

Bloom put the photograph back into his desk drawer and said, "I promise."

"I want you to be the one to break the news to my son. I don't want Jack to do it."

"He knows Jack."

"He might have questions," he said as he thought of his son. "He will have questions."

Bloom understood. "Okay. I might be able to console him better. Explain in a way Jack can't."

He gave a nod. "Thank you, Sidney," he told him as they shook hands. Then, he left, thinking that he would never see Bloom again.

He was right. But Lecter had because Bloom had the photograph that Lecter had put on Hayashi's refrigerator. He also knew about him, Kevin, all of it. He'd completely forgotten until right then.

His eyes focused on the crime scene photographs. Jack Crawford's crime scene photos, as he thought some more. After killing Crawford, Hannibal went back to Argentina. Why go back? What happened between Bloom's murder and Crawford's? Havana. Surgeries. Lecter and Starling both had reconstructive surgeries done to their faces. They wanted to rest, to let themselves heal. Argentina was a safe place.

A safe place…

"Grissom."

Safe…

"Grissom!"

"Don't talk to me," he warned, cutting Ecklie off as his thoughts started to drift away, slipping through the fingers of his mind as he tried to grasp onto them before they were gone.

"I was expecting you in my office along with Catherine."

He felt the tension of anger building in his chest, spreading outward, reaching his hands, his feet. The Dragon was still sitting next to him, feeling the same.

Eckling kept talking. His thoughts kept slipping further and further away. "Just because you caught Lecter once and used to be FBI doesn't give you the right to ignore—"

Pointing at Ecklie without taking his eyes off the evidence, he warned him again, "Stop talking—"

"I told the Sheriff and Director Pearsall that you're too close to this case. Keeping it a secret that the lead FBI Agent was your son. Now this. For all we know, you let Lecter escape the hospital. Why didn't you call it in the moment you knew he was going to be there?"

The Dragon was behind him now, hot angry breath breathing down his neck.

Ecklie appeared in front of him as he said, "As far as I'm concerned, maybe those news articles were right about you, you and Hannibal aren't too different—"

Gil lunged off the table as he grabbed ahold of Ecklie and shoved him up against the wall, knocking photos to the floor. Leaning in close, he told him, "If I were like Hannibal, I would have killed you already. Then cooked you, ate you, and fed what was left of you to the dog." Ecklie turned a shade of white. His hands were aching as he let him go.

Ecklie, shaking the shock off, asked, "Are you out of your damn mind?"

"I warned you. I was in the middle of something—"

"You're off this case."

"You don't have the authority to—"

"No, but the Director does. I have a meeting with him in fifteen minutes. I'm going to tell him what happened."

"You do that, Conrad. Sheriff Atwater makes the final call. I doubt he'll agree."

"We'll see, won't we," Ecklie said as he went to leave the room.

He and the Dragon both watched as Ecklie walked out the door. Gil noticed across the hallway, watching him, were Harlyn, Phelps and Hodges. All were shocked by what they'd just witnessed.

This wasn't Grissom, they were probably thinking. They would be right.

Before he could think too much about it, his cell phone rang. It was Brass. They found an abandoned box truck.

TBC…

Note: At the very end of the season 4 episode "Homebodies" (which is an episode where Grissom reminds me so much of Will Graham), Grissom arrives at the crime scene and 2 other, unknown, CSI's are already on scene. One's a brunette woman and another a man with blondish hair. In my mind, the woman is my OC Harlyn Reno and the man is one of her CSI's.

Also, fun fact, Billy Petersen was in the TV movie "The Beast" based on the Peter Benchley novel that I referenced in this chapter. Another great Benchley novel, along with "Jaws", is "The Deep", for those who are interested. All are really great reads.