"Are you ready to head home?"

Erin looked up from the file that was open on her desk and gave her partner a small nod. "Yes. I really tried to focus today, to get through the backlog of things that piled up from yesterday, but I found that I couldn't concentrate, yet again."

"Did Karen talk to you?"

She nodded, giving him a small smile as she stood and pulled her purse out of her desk and went over to his side. "She did. And it was really good to talk to her, too. Of course, the gossip is already spreading like wildfire around the building, and I'm just surprised that I haven't been called into Sheppard's office."

Dave gave her a guilty look, and she narrowed her eyes as they stepped onto the elevator. "I may have already spoken with him yesterday, after Blake took you home, since I had to inform him of what was happening. I didn't want it to get to his ears from a different source." She nodded a little, stepping closer to him as more people got on. "And I already organized a DNA test for us. I think that might be the only thing that will prove to Spencer that you're telling the truth."

"Thank you." Erin rested her head on his arm, letting a still quiet fall between them as they continued to ride down.

Somehow, they made it home, though she wasn't entirely certain how, since she had zoned out, allowing Dave to lead her. It was only when they pulled into the garage that she noticed they had been followed home, and she frowned a little as she watched the vehicle that pulled into the drive behind them. A hopeful gasp left her throat when she saw Spencer climb out, and she reached out for Dave's arm, squeezing it tightly. "I see him. Why don't you head inside while I see what he wants."

Erin nodded as she went in, hanging her purse on her hook before stepping out of her shoes and padding into the kitchen. She wanted to make some tea for them all, so she started the kettle boiling as she rifled through her stash, trying to find the perfect flavor. While she was doing that, she heard the front door open and close, and she tried not to smile hopefully as they came through the doorway.

Spencer just gave her a cold look before continuing his conversation with Dave, and her lips started to wobble. "Do either of you want some tea?" she asked, hating how quavery her voice sounded.

"Like I would accept anything from you," he replied, and she nodded as she tried not to break down in front of them. Turning to the stove, she turned off the burner, listening to them head farther into the house. Once she was certain they were occupied, she slipped her shoes back on and went into the garage, getting into her car and starting it, pulling out and starting to drive aimlessly. A few tears started to course down her cheeks, as she tasted them on her lips, and a dirty thirst began to gnaw at her throat, turning her aimless drive into one that would lead her to a place where she did not want to be.

Still, as she parked in a spot near the door of her favorite liquor store, Erin knew that this had always been her trajectory. She drank to bury her secrets and lies, got better, revealed said secrets, and now that they were turning against her, she would fall back into the lying arms of alcohol. Taking a deep breath, she slipped out of her car and headed into the store. Her feet knew the exact path to take to lead her to the whiskey aisle, and then she was standing in front of the myriad bottles and trying to remember which would get her drunk the fastest with the least amount of damage.

Erin had just reached out to pick up a bottle of Glen Morangie when her phone began to ring. Frowning, she pulled her hand away from the forbidden bottle to pull the device from her purse and looked at the display. It was her David, and she sent him to voicemail before reaching out for the bottle once more. This time, no one interrupted her, and her hand closed around the neck of the bottle, and Erin brought it to the front, hurriedly checking out before going back to her car. She knew that she couldn't go home, to either home, so she made the snap decision to head to one of their favorite parks, knowing that she would be safe there, if she spent the night nursing her hangover.

Parking beneath a tree, she got out and climbed into the back seat with her bottle of whiskey and stretched out as she stared at the bottle. Erin was torn between opening the bottle and drinking it all down in one go or retaining her sobriety, which was nearly at thirty days once more. Her phone rang again, and Erin sighed as set the bottle on the seat next to her in order to take the device from her purse and turn it off. She didn't want to be found, or bothered, if she made the plunge into drunkenness once more.

Penelope's face stared up at her from the screen, and a stab of guilt made her heart throb as her finger hovered over the decline button. Erin hesitated long enough for the call to be sent to voicemail naturally, but within moments, the younger woman was calling her once more. A part of her knew that Penelope was already triangulating her current position, and she let out a heavy sigh as she finally answered the phone. "Yes?" she whispered.

"Where are you, sweetling?"

"I'm safe," Erin replied as she began to unwrap the bottle. "That's all you need to know."

A soft sound of concern came over the line, and she answered it with a broken sound of her own. "You have a bottle of something, don't you?"

Erin looked down at her hand and breathed out her affirmative. "Spencer came over, and he wouldn't even look at me, though he was quite eager to talk to David. Maybe this time, if I drink this entire bottle, everything will work out for them. They won't have a liar attached to them like a millstone."

"Oh, Erin, sweetling, no. Please, tell me where you are. I will talk to you all night, if I have to."

Knowing that Penelope would just track her down through her phone if she didn't reveal her location, Erin rattled off where the park was before hanging up the phone, needing to have some space between her and Penelope before she would have to talk out her feelings with the woman. It was a necessary thing, she knew, but there was still a part of her that just wanted to hide away from the world at large until everything was right once more.

Letting out a long breath, Erin dropped the phone onto her lap as she stared at the bottle, feeling the pull of taking that first drink grow stronger and stronger as she waited for Penelope to arrive. And a very large part of her started to hope that the woman would arrive before she lost her will and cracked open the bottle to take that first sip.