A/N: Okay guys! We're almost through the thick of it. Our happily ever after should be here in the next few chapters. Get excited!
Nick and Greg processed the hotel room.
"What was she doing here anyway?"
"I don't really even think we should talk about it."
"But, I rode up in the elevator with her. She didn't mention anything."
"Greg, I'm serious. I really don't want to talk about it. Alright? Lets just try to do our job."
That's when Nick found a necklace behind the bed. He held it up.
"That's Sara's. I recognize it." Greg's face was ghostly white now. "I don't understand."
"Go process the bathroom." Nick said to Greg, not wanting to harp on hypotheticals that he knew were circulating Greg's mind.
Shortly after, Greg emerged with the shower drain cover in a clear evidence baggie. "Well this doesn't look good. Hair in the drain is not a match to our Vic, and length and color is consistent with Sara's."
Nick took in Greg's appearance, sensing his worry for Sara. "You want to check the bed or should I?" Nick was trying to sound tough, indifferent. But this was eating away at him.
"I will." Greg resigned and pulled the comforter off the bed. "It's been stripped."
"Someone took the evidence."
"Why am I so relived right now?" Greg spoke absently.
"Because you just got out of having to process sheets for seminal and vaginal fluid that very well could have been contributed by Sara."
Greg felt nauseous at hearing those words from Nick but stayed silent.
"So that's the consensus now? That I cheated on my husband?" She knew she couldn't hide the divorce for much longer. It was getting dangerous to, but she couldn't bring herself to admit it. Not to the team. Not yet.
"Betraying Grissom is like betraying God to Hodges. And in his eyes, you did."
The feeling of despair washed over her. The dull ache in her heart caused the sadness to multiply. When would it end? she wondered. This pain felt just as real to her as the dislocated shoulder she'd had after the night in the desert. Just as real as the three fractures in her arm, her broken wrist, the broken rib. She cringed at the thought of her broken rib. It was aching now for some reason and she couldn't understand why. She hadn't felt it hurt in years.
"I have a real problem with you lying to me Sara."
"I didn't lie."
"Then what were you doing with Tyler two weeks ago?" Nick stared intently at Sara, Judgingly so. It broke Sara down to see the disapproval in Nicks eyes. She had to come clean. She could feel the tears welling in her eyes, a lump forming in her throat.
"You lied to me. You lied to him. And I know it's not my place to comment on your personal life—"
"You mean my cheating on my husband?" She chocked on the words, the accusations in their eyes.
Both D.B. and Nick diverted their gazes. She waited until D.B. looked back up at her to continue, "Truth is, he's not my husband anymore."
Nick looked up now, eyes almost watery, hurt for her, shocked, "Why what happened?" His voice calmed and small.
"Ask him. I'm sure he had my best interest in mind." Her voice was laced with bitterness but it betrayed her at the end of the sentence. Tears welling in her eyes. "So... yeah. Yeah. I've been struggling a little bit.
"Why didn't you tell me?" Nick's voice stayed soft and concerned.
"He's so revered around here, there's no way I don't come out looking like the bad guy."
"So you're suggesting Sara sleep-showered and doesn't remember it." Finn questioned hodges as they and Greg stood in layout.
"I'm suggesting that you have to consider any other sleep acts that could have happened. Showering, walking... even murder is certainly a possibility. Incidentally, don't you think that one of us should call Grissom?"
Greg shot a dirty look Hodges' way, "No. One of us should not call Grissom."
Hodges retreated back to his lab and contemplated. Had Grissom already been called? It was protocol to notify the family of an individual being held. And Sara was now being held. She was processed, wearing an orange jumpsuit, after allegedly assaulting Basderick in the garage of his workplace. Hodges didn't care what Greg had to say, he decided. He quickly picked up his work phone and dialed Grissom's number.
"Grissom."
"Hey Grissom, It's Hodges."
"How'd you get this number?"
"Not important. Look there's something you need to know. Sara's been arrested."
"Is she alright?" Hodges heard the irritation leave Grissom's voice and get replaced with concern and worry.
"Physically yes, she's fine. But she's in a lot of trouble."
"What is she charged with?"
"Right now assault. But she's suspected of stabbing her—"
"What?"
"I shouldn't be the one to tell you this but, stabbing her boyfriend. He died."
Grissom suddenly felt like he was going to vomit. His head spinning. He did his best to regain his composure, "Hodges. Should you be talking about an on going investigation with outside parties?"
The question struck him as odd, "It's protocol to inform a spouse when—"
"Hodges." He cut him off, the irritation returned to his voice, and a hint of sadness too, Hodges noted, "You shouldn't have called me. I'm not her husband anymore."
"Oh."
"Goodbye, Hodges."
Grissom hung up the phone. He felt an intense migraine coming on. His head heavy and hot, vision blurring. He quickly dialed a familiar number.
"I didn't expect to be hearing from you so soon." Dave spoke on the other end.
"Dave, I—"
"What is it, Grissom?" Grissom could hear the irritation in Dave's voice. He was short and monotone and obviously angry about how things ended with Sara. But he had to push through this awkwardness.
"I think Sara's in trouble. And it would be inappropriate, and likely unwanted for me to intervene."
"What kind of trouble?"
"I believe she's been arrested."
"Thanks, Gil. I'll get to the bottom of this."
"Wait, Dave—"
"Yeah."
"Will you let me know that she's alright?"
Dave softened a bit, hearing Grissom's desperation on the other end, "Yeah. I will."
The team stood around a layout table. Having the awkward, painful job of investigating Sara. At this point, however, they were all on the same page—Sara was being framed by Basderick.
"There was a DHS record in our files on Sara." D.B. spoke as he held up a file and watched as everyone in the team furrowed their brows. Everyone except Gregg, whose expression now was a mix of sickly green and ghostly white. "Anyone know anything about this?" Silence. He turned to Greg, "Greg?"
"I thought I got rid of that. That has nothing to do with this. We should not be looking at that." Greg started talking a million miles a minute.
"What is it?" Nick spoke up.
"It's a record of her time as a ward of the state."
"Prison?" Morgan was shocked.
"No." Greg chimed in. "D.B. this isn't relevant."
"What the hell is it?" Nick looked at Greg intensely now and realizing that it had to come out, Greg responded:
"When we were trying to find Natalie Davis, DHS was sending records of foster children that were in Dell's care. Sara's name was on the request form and some administrator there saw the name, not realizing it was as a CSI requesting the file and thought it was instead a request to release her records. So they sent them here."
"Sara was in foster care?" Nick looked confused.
Greg nodded, "It's really not right for us to be talking about this."
"Unfortunately Greg, we do need to talk about it. I read the files, and I'll spare Sara from going through the details with you all, but we need to talk about what happened to her father because it just became relevant."
"How is that relevant?" Greg challenged.
"7 Stab wounds, first one to the heart." D.B. responded directly to Greg and watched as realization washed over him.
"What does that mean?" Nick felt very out of the loop as he watched Greg and D.B. interact. Clearly Greg knew what was going on.
"Now I don't think she did this. But for some reason all physical evidence is pointing to her. Including this. Everyone here knows about her Mother?"
Nods. Nick had only found out about Sara's mother's situation a few years ago after working a hoarding case together. But he didn't know much more than her diagnosis.
"Tyler was stabbed seven times. The same amount of times Laura Sidle stabbed Richard."
"Richard?" Nick squinted.
"Her father." Greg answered for D.B. "How would Basderick know about that?" D.B. shrugged in response.
"I don't know. But I think he got his hands on this report, and replicated her Father's murder."
"That's sickening." Morgan spoke almost under her breath.
Suddenly everything fell together for Nick and he felt sick to his stomach. Nick realized just how bad of a day Sara was truly having: On her birthday, a man she was using to get over her divorce from Grissom was killed in a mimicked version to that of her father's death. On top of all of this, Sara had to rush to the hospital where her schizophrenic mother was being monitored after an episode. Nick could think of zero other ways in which this day could possibly get worse for her.
Eventually the truth came out and the sting operation deemed successful. Nick and the officers rushed into Basderick's house and arrested him after he fired blank bullets at sara.
Tears now fell from Sara's eyes as she quickly wiped at them. Nick turned to her and hugged her tightly. "It's over." He held her there like that for a long while. Just moments earlier he'd heard Basderick admit that he made Tyler's murder look like the murder of Sara's father. Nick couldn't imagine what Sara was going through right now, reliving that night, feeling the pain of her divorce, being accused of murder herself. He couldn't let go of her.
She made her way to the hospital knowing that her mother was being discharged soon.
"There are so many things I wish I'd done differently. And most of them I can't change now. But mostly, what I would like to try and change, is the way things are between us. Maybe we could visit once in a while? I just want you to be okay."
"I'm fine. I'm great." She reassured her mother.
"So you didn't kill that man?"
"No mom."
"Thank goodness." There was a long pause, "I'm sorry to hear about you and Gil. I liked him."
Sara nodded sadly as she pushed her mother out in a wheelchair, "Me too."
Back at the lab, after D.B. reinstated her, Sara stood in the break room and got herself a cup of coffee. She turned around to see Nick and Greg entering the room, closing the door behind them.
"Little late for an intervention. Don't you think?"
"I just thought—"
"We." Greg Corrected.
"We, just thought it might be a good idea to talk."
"...Or listen, whatever you prefer."
Sara smiled at her colleagues, her friends, her family. "Have a seat." She motioned to the table and the three sat together. She took a tentative sip of her hot coffee and finally spoke, "I didn't mean to shut you guys out. I didn't tell you about Grissom and me mainly because I didn't really believe it myself. You know we made that dinner reservation together before we split up and as I sat there alone in the resturant, I honestly expected him to show up."
"What happened, Sara?" Nick asked with concerned eyes, "I never saw this coming."
"Neither did we, really. I'd like to say it happened all of a sudden, but the truth is, is that it's been coming for a long time. Neither of us wanted to be the one to admit it. Grissom just took the step to do something about it, I realize now." She paused momentarily before continuing, "You know, I was only supposed to be here for a month or two until you found a replacement. But then, I guess I got comfortable, and started to enjoy the work again and I didn't want to leave."
Nick and Greg nodded knowingly.
She continued, "Grissom doesn't want to be in Vegas, and the long-distance just wasn't working I guess. Our paths diverged somewhere along the way and we couldn't figure out how to bring them back together."
"I think we all like the idea of you two being together. And maybe that's because that was our way of hanging on to him a little bit. But—if its over, its over." Nick said comfortingly.
"Hey you can't sit around waiting forever." Greg spoke regarding her and Tyler, that she shouldn't feel bad about what did or did not happen there.
"Thank you for not giving up on me." She responded sadly.
"Silver lining: No kids involved. I'm sure that makes divorce that much less messy."
Sara couldn't breath after Greg's statement. Little did he know the conversations she and Grissom had had once upon a time. The shared vision they'd have of creating a life together and raising that child in Northern France or in San Fransisco. She could still picture the face of the child she'd conjured up in her mind: It was always a boy to her, a little boy with ice blue eyes and thick brown hair, a dimpled chin and an insatiable curiosity.
A single moment of silence longer and she may have cried right then and there at the thought, but the three of them quickly looked up to see a man opening the break room door. Greg and Nick watched as Sara stood quickly.
"Dave?" She rushed over to him and hugged him tightly. He rocked her back and forth slightly, "What are you doing here?"
"I got the first flight out I could."
Greg and Nick exchanged curious looks as they watched the scene play out.
"Are you okay?"
"Yes, yes. I'm fine now... How'd you know about this."
"What are you talking about, I'm here for your birthday." He said with a classic Dave grin.
"Dave..." She pressed.
"The lab community is pretty tight knit." Was all Dave would say, and while Sara wasn't satisfied with that answer, she didn't feel much like prying.
"Dave, these are my colleagues Nick and Greg. Guys, this is Dave Crow—my—" She paused. She'd always introduced him as her former supervisor but it just didn't feel right anymore. And now that Greg and Nick knew a bit about her past, her next words wouldn't need as much explaining, "My father in a way."
"Nice to meet you sir." Nick and Greg both moved to shake Dave's hand. Greg, of course had known about Dave. He'd learned about him more when he'd visited Sara in San Fransisco all those yeas ago after she'd left Vegas. And he'd known about him from the DHS reports he'd accidentally read when Sara had gone missing at the slight of Davis' hand.
Dave quickly wrote a text and returned his phone to his pocket. The text read:
"She's safe and exonerated. It's all over. -DC"
His phone buzzed in his pocket, but he knew what the message would likely be "Thank you. -G"
Grissom laid in bed that night, feeling emotions he had no name for. He tried to open his large book of Shakespearian Sonnets in an attempt to compartmentalize what he was feeling, but it became unbearable to read any of them. Each and every sonnet read made him think of her. Forced her image into his mind, her soft brown hair, deep chocolate orbs, that sidle-famous grin. He could almost smell that lavender scent in his olfactory.
She was safe. She was fine. Grissom kept repeating in his head. He and Sara had only spoken once since that phone call they'd had deciding to get divorced. One that was filled with silence and cold, monotoned, staccato verbiage, where the goal was to divi up their assets.
This proved to be a fairly easy task, neither wanting anything from the other, and the only shared asset in their names—the Vegas house—was easily given to her with no problem. He sighed thinking about what a divorce would have been like if they'd had a child together two years ago like they'd planed. But as he thought about it, he realized that a divorce would never have come about had they gone through with creating a life. Because if they'd taken that step, they'd be in the same city. Grissom quickly realized that this relationship had been over since the moment the seized talking about children. The obstacle they faced then was the same one as today, it just took two years for either of them to admit it.
Still, he couldn't help but to replay all of his favorite moments of them together in his mind, regardless of how sad it made him. He missed her with every beat of his heart, but he knew this was for the best. She'd be happy one day with someone else. That thought was rather conflicting for Grissom. Because one part of him wanted nothing more than for her to move passed this and find happiness with someone else. The other part of him knew for a solid fact, that he could never do the same. Sara was the only person he could ever love, and he'd let her go—he'd let her free.
For the first time since all of this mess began, he let himself cry. He curled up in his bed all alone and let the hot tears streak down his face. As he did he realized the last time he'd cried was when Sara sent him that video from the Sea Shepard... when he'd sought the comfort of his friend Heather, and laid in her guest bed and cried himself to sleep.