"Sidle."
"Sara, I need you to go to Desert Palm and process the second swarm victim. She survived the attack, looks like it may be linked to my DB in the casino parking lot.
"I'll head there now."
"Thank you dear."
She'd catch herself smiling each time he'd pepper in an affectionate "dear" in any workplace event. she wondered, sometimes, if he caught himself doing it. If it had just become so comfortable, second nature, for him to call her that.
"Greg!" Sara spotted him walking down the hall, still sporting his suit. "How'd it go?"
"Fantastic." He glowed as Sara approached. "Buried the guy under evidence. The prosecutor was so impressed, she took me out for dinner after."
Sara flashed her gap tooth grin his way. "Female prosecutor?"
He nodded with delight. "She was fishing, I was just happy to see a case from the crime scene to the court room."
"Well done, Greggo. Let's grab a drink after next shift to celebrate." She looked at her watch briefly, "I've got to get back to the garage."
Greg took in her appearance. Her hair up in a ponytail, sporting department navy coveralls, dirt on her face. "What are you working on?"
"I'm recreating the kick patterns of our assault victims."
"Nothing like a 1am workout." He laughed as they parted. Sara made her way back to the garage. Dipping the toe of her shoe in dirt and kicking the dummy on the ground. She was working up a sweat.
"Whoa! Pick on someone your own size!" Sara turned around to see Grissom had entered the garage. His eyes looked her up and down.
"You volunteering?" She pursed her lips, voice layered thickly in sexual suggestion. She watched as his eyes flickered briefly with consideration.
"No." He finally responded with an arched brow.
"You sure?"
"Maybe later." He smiled and leaned a little closer to the dummy to get a look at the shoe impressions. "There's another robbery that sounds like it was committed by the same assailants. I just sent Greg out to respond."
"These guys don't take a break. The girl, Jessica, she's lucky to be alive. Beatten to a pulp."
Grissom simply nodded in agreement, "And that dummy is lucky not to be. Remind me never to get on your bad side." His lips hinted a smirk. He glanced at his phone as it sounded off. "I've got to go."
"Bye." She smiled and began kicking the dummy again.
A little later on Grissom walked back into the garage to find Sara still processing the foot impressions. "Is your phone off?" He approached her both quickly and tentatively.
"Oh, I must have left it on silent while I was processing the girl at the hospital…" Her voice trailed off, taking in his appearance, the worry etched over his features. "What is it?"
"He took a small step closer to her, "It's Greg… he's alive, but he's been badly injured. He just became the third victim of the swarm's crime spree." He watched the horror cross Sara's face.
"Where is he?" She quickly unzipped her coveralls and stepped out of them. She moved past him.
"He's still at the scene. The medics are there now. Sophia too."
Sara ran out of the garage without another word, got in her car and sped to the scene. She raced straight to Greg when she arrived.
"Why isn't there a medic on Greg?"
"He's been stabilized. Sara, he's going to be okay." Sophia responded as Sara rushed to his side and knelt down next to him. She touched his head gently and took in his appearance. Every inch of exposed skin was black and blue and swollen. She swallowed back the pain of seeing him like this.
"Sara." He spoke in a small belabored voice.
"I didn't think you could see me."
"I can't." He managed through ragged breathing, "I know that Sidle scent."
"I am going to take that as a compliment." She retorted with slight jest but seeing him laying there in that state was too hard to bare. She looked up to fight back tears stinging the back of her eyes.
Her hand continued to stroke his hair. It'd been the most intimate touch he'd ever received from her. The version of himself that once had a crush on her would have soared. Some time ago, he'd dropped that crush. As he got to know her better, and as they became such great friends over the years, the infatuation simmered and he was able to move past it. Especially once he realized she didn't view him that way in the slightest.
He got lost in her touch. Focusing on the feeling of her fingers stroking his scalp rather than the pulsating pain over every other square inch of his body.
"I scratched one of them. And you should check my vest. I think the same guy sp-sp-spit on me." He worked hard to get his words one, "One of the cars crashed into the Denali. I guarantee there's transfer. You should process the scene."
She continued to stroke his hair softly. "I came here for you Greg." She picked up his hand gently and held it cradled in hers.
"We'll load him up in the next 10." A paramedic spoke to Sara as he passed by with the original victim on a stretcher. His skin a similar color to Greg's now as they both moaned softly in pain.
Sara turned her attention back to Greg and thought about what she'd want in that moment. A distraction.
"I have something I need to confess to you."
"You're in love with me?" She saw the smile yearning to escape his lips.
She laughed genuinely, "I knew you before us working together in Vegas. Well—kind of."
"What?"
"I was in my graduate program at Stanford when you were in undergrad. I saw your band play at the Rusty Nickel."
"No."
"Yeah." She laughed again. "Wearing a lab coat behind the keys, frosted tips, mad scientist vibes. I remembered a few weeks after you started."
She saw his body begin to relax a little, even smiling through the pain.
"And you never told the guys?"
"Nope."
"You do love me." He joked. She breathed out softly through a smile.
Eventually the paramedics came back for Greg and loaded him into the ambulance for transport to the hospital. Sara climbed in with him, never leaving his side. When they arrived at the hospital he was whisked away by doctors immediately, leaving Sara in the waiting area. She took the opportunity to give Grissom a call and update him on Greg's condition.
"How is he?"
"He's in a lot of pain, but he's okay. The doctors are with him now."
"Good." She could hear his sigh of relief on the other end. "While you're there—"
"Collect evidence from the male assailant/victim, Dimitris James? Yeah, I'm walking there now." She finished his sentence for him as she made her way to the receptionist area to locate his room.
"Thank you, Dear."
"Dear?" Grissom's head snapped upward at the sound of Catherine's voice in his doorway.
"Doc Robbins. He's my work wife." Grissom offered, playing into a quirkiness he had to dig a bit for to find.
Catherine made a bit of a face and then walked into the room, "I just heard about Greg."
"Sara's with him now. He's okay."
"Thank god." Catherine shook her head and sat down across from Grissom. "What a year." She was referencing the streak of misfortune the greater team had taken lately. Catherine's ordeal was barely a few months gone, leaving Sam dead, Catherine roofied, Lindsay kidnapped. Now Greg.
Grissom nodded in return. He pinched the bridge of his nose.
"Migraine?" Catherine questioned at his grimace.
"Yeah. I've been getting them more frequently lately." Catherine was surprised at the additional information Grissom offered. "We've got to get this swarm off the streets."
"Sometimes we go fast by going slow." He smiled at his own words leaving her lips. She leaned in a bit toward him, really taking in his appearance. "What's different about you?" She noticed now that he'd slimmed down a bit, he was clean shaven much more often then she'd ever known him to be, and he looked... rested? Even with the migraine.
"No man stands in the same river twice."
"Okay, Heraclitus." She acknowledged his quote and pushed on, "You look good. You've been taking care of yourself."
He just nodded in turn. Unsure how to navigate the conversation.
"It suits you."
Grissom made his way to the hospital a little while later. He took in the former lab tech's appearance for the first time. Bandage wrapped, blood dried around his ears, his arms, shoe print shaped bruises. His eyes were swollen under a deep purple hue of skin.
"Greg?" He finally spoke, unsure if he was awake.
"Grissom." Came Greg's response through a tight and unmoving jaw.
"Just another day at the office, huh?"
"At least I can see now." Only one eye opened a small slit, "The guy they beat up, how is he?"
"He's going to be fine."
"What about the other guy? The guy I hit?"
"His name is Demetris James. He's in surgery."
"Is he going to be okay?"
"I don't know?" Grissom answered honestly, "Has someone called your parents? We should let them know." He watched as Greg winced at the idea and groaned. "What's the matter?"
"My parents… they still think I'm in the lab."
"Why do they think that?"
"When I was in high school, I never played any sports. No football, no basketball, definitely no hockey."
"I would have never guessed." Came Grissom's lighthearted response.
"It wasn't by choice. My mom wanted four kids. She ended up with just me. She always made sure I stayed close. If I got a nose bleed, she'd rush me to the ER."
"Well, now would be the time to come clean." He offered.
"My mom is going to freak."
"You tell her that you risked your life to save someone else's and I think she'll be very proud of you." His eyes squinting in sympathy. "I'll have Sara make the call, okay?"
Greg winced in pain and anticipation. He knew Grissom was right, he just didn't want to face it. He nodded with the smallest of movements.
"You did the right thing, Greg." Grissom added, "You saved an innocent man's life." He watched his CSI's labored breathing, "Get some rest, Okay?"
Grissom walked out of Greg's room and ran into Sara at the end of the hall.
"Hey. You see Greg?"
"I just left him." Grissom nodded.
"Doctor found these…" She held up a small glass jar with two circular items inside, "in Demetris James."
"Contact lenses?" Grissom questioned as he looked at the evidence.
"Special kind. They're called Halloween lenses. They're wearing costumes."
"Great, so this is a game to them."
She nodded sadly, "Can you take that back to the lab for me. I want to stay with Greg a little longer."
"Okay." He spoke softly, they stood in closer proximity to each other then they would have otherwise let themselves if they'd been in the lab. "Can you call his parents?"
"They don't know he's in the field."
Grissom's brows lifted at the realization of how much Greg and Sara knew about each other "They will now." He placed the evidence jar in his pocket, "Can I bring you anything?"
"No, I'm fine." She smiled, "Let's just get these guys off the street. I'll come back to the lab soon."
He gently touched her shoulder, running his fingers down her arm to her hand and gave it a small squeeze before walking off in opposite directions. It would be another two week's before Greg was able to go back to work. In that time Sara remained a diligent friend. Spending time with him after shift, bringing over dinner and movies. She even met his parents on a couple of these occasions as they dropped by to check up on him.
Eventually he did come back to work. But he wasn't really the same. He was quieter, more serious. The dancing, exuberant goofball he had been left but a ghostly trace.
Sara sat on a stool next to the vic's body, collecting organic elements from her skin. This woman had been hoisted up on a cross in a church. She heard the morg door swing open and didn't even lift her head.
"Were there any shrubs at the crime scene?" She asked, knowing it was Grissom who entered the room, hearing the click of latex snapping into place as he put on his gloves.
He looked up for a moment to visualize the perimeter of the church. "Two bushes at the entrance of the church. A row of four on the wall of the community center. Three others adjacent to the statue of St. Jude."
She slowly looked up as he spoke, a bit flabbergasted, "Did you anticipate my question in order to impress me with your powers of observation?"
"Memory is a gift." He shrugged.
"Hmmm…" She turned back to the body and continued to collect the organic material, "From whom?" The two had never really talked in depth about their religious beliefs before, she realized.
"Who do you think?" He spoke easily as he arched his brow, leaning in behind her to get a look at what she was collecting.
"Well, I would't necessarily call myself an atheist, but I am definitely not sold on the notion of a higher power. However," She continued, "I used to love the stories of the saints."
Grissom stopped listening, his eyes became fixate on the victim's neck and the post-mortem bruising pattern he observed. He lifted his glasses to get a better look.
"This job certainly challenges your faith." He offered.
"Yes it does, but I have science."
"I believe we need a little of both."
"Sometimes, I think we made up God just to have someone to blame for our mistakes." She revealed and was surprised to see Grissom straighten himself out and walk out the door without a word. "It's just a theory!" She called after him, but he was gone, leaving her alone with the body once more, a little confused.
A short while later Grissom returned.
"Something I said?" She looked at him now, curious about his departure from the room.
"No, dear." He offered, focusing on the neck bruising pattern once more.
"I didn't offend you, did I?" She moved slightly closer to him, "Did I say something offensive to you as a Catholic?"
"I'm not really a Catholic anymore, you know? I suppose I practice a kind of secular Catholicism that involves ritualizing certain aspects of everyday life and viewing them with a spiritual intensity that they might not otherwise poses." He shrugged a little and added, "But I don't want to put too fine a point on it."
She listened intently and nodded, smiling at his musings. Her attention was then drawn to the necklace he was pulling out of a box.
"And the Rosary beans are a part of that?" She was trying to engage on the topic with him.
"This belonged to my grandmother." He then held the beds up to the victim's neck to show Sara why he'd left the room originally. "Take a look at this pattern."
Sara leaned in close to him, just behind him. Her chest resting on his back as her resting on his shoulder. Her hair touched his cheek as she tilted to get a better view. She pulled back to grab the camera and snap a photo as Grissom held the beads close to the vic's neck.
He loved to work with her like this. When they were sure no one was around. Just the two of them, navigating a puzzle together. He didn't have to worry about what he said to her or how he said it. He loved how close she could get to him, how her scent would infiltrate and tingle his nose. How her soft skin felt against his. He turned his head toward her, coming just an inch from her face. She smiled at him and stood up to create a small amount of distance.
"Who would strangle someone with a Rosary beads?"
"Probably the same person who would crucify someone in a church."
"I wonder if all this symbolism is genuine or if it was used to lead us toward a certain father."
"Hmmm." He thought for a moment. "Well, there were definite signs of a man in her life. Seamen on her sheets, men's toiletries. I would venture that it won't be Father Frank's when we get the results."
She nodded, "Did Robbin's perform an SAE kit?"
"Sexual activity. Some tearing, but he said it could be from rough sex."
"So she had sex within the last 48 hours."
Same he thought.
He watched as she continued to examine the body for trace. Scraping under the vic's fingernails. Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength. While loving someone deeply gives your courage. Grissom related to this Lao Tau quote in this moment, realizing he felt both strength and courage in who he was with her and for her. Every passing day he felt like he was more and more comfortable in their intimacy.
He thought back to other romantic moments in his history. Eventually he'd lose interest, or they couldn't play second fiddle to his job any more. The longest relationship was Julia Holden at 3 months. But in that time, he'd canceled four dates and left two early.
With Sara, she would just join him. She understood the passion for the job better than anyone. And more than that, she liked doing science experiments with him. Their days off together were often spent conduct science experiments and inquests in a variety of fields. Just to see what happens. She pointed out insects to him on their hikes. And then there was this moment he was in with her right now, where she was working. Flexing all of the intellectual muscles she needed for the job with grace and ease. His heart swelled with that feeling again. That thing he now knew as love.
He was so happy.