A Shoulder to Lean On

Rating: PG

Spoilers: A Night at the Movies and everything up to that.

Feedback: Makes my day

Disclaimer: If it was in the show, it's not mine.

Archive: At my site Checkmate (http://helsinkibaby.ahkay.net) , Fanfiction.net; anywhere else, please ask.

Summary:  Warrick is worried about Sara

 

It was the end of yet another long shift, and one that Warrick was not displeased to see the back of. At least, he reminded himself, he and Sara had been able to put this case to bed, all loose ends tied up into neat little bows, ready to be sent to the DA. The only thing they’d had to do was tell the victim exactly what happened, which is what they’d done, and now they were on their way out into the early morning sunshine, with Warrick at least thinking about the dozen and a half things that he had to do today, a nice long sleep being at the top of his list.

 

He couldn’t vouch for what Sara was thinking though, especially since she’d been somewhat less than communicative with him, with everyone, for the last few days. Most people were chalking it up to just Sara being Sara, but Warrick was a little more worried about it than that, because he knew Sara, the real Sara, not the reputation that she had around the crime lab, and he knew, like he knew his own name, that there was something wrong. He also knew, that because this was Sara, that she wouldn’t tell him about it, at least not until she was good and ready.

 

Which didn’t mean that he wasn’t going to try to talk her into a good mood, or at least make the dark clouds that were surrounding her dissipate a little. “So, any big plans for the day?” he wondered as they walked across the parking lot.

 

“Huh?” Sara turned to him with a vaguely distracted frown, reaching up and pushing her hair back behind her ear. Glancing down at her, Warrick felt a frown crossing his own face, noting how pale she was, the dark shadows under her eyes.

 

Swallowing his concern, Warrick rephrased the question. “You got any plans for the day?”

 

Her lips quirked up in a pale, and fleeting, imitation of a smile. “None to speak of,” she murmured quietly, a far-away look on her face that he was growing rather accustomed to, and didn’t like.

 

“Well then,” he said, shrugging, trying to keep his voice normal, pretty sure that he was failing completely. “How about breakfast?”

 

She bit her lip, and he could see her swallowing hard, and she looked around her as if to find an exit sign somewhere. She evidently did, because she looked stricken suddenly, and her face actually grew paler, something that Warrick didn’t think was possible. “Just hang a minute, ok? I need to-”

 

Warrick followed her gaze, kept his face level with difficulty when an ambulance parked, saw Hank Peddigrew crouched inside, checking instruments and equipment. “I’ll meet you at the car,” he said simply, nodding, and she flashed him a quick grin of appreciation before making her way across to the ambulance.

 

Once she was gone, Warrick gave full vent to his feelings, letting a frown cross his face and settle there as he looked at Sara and Hank, taking in every nuance of the conversation. For the life of him, he couldn’t imagine what Sara would want to talk to Hank about, because after last month, after she’d found out about how he’d cheated on her the entire time that they were together, Sara had been very definite about they two of them being through, about how she never wanted to see Hank again. Of course, that much had been said to Catherine under the influence of alcohol, but the same had been said to him the next day under the rather more soothing balm of coffee and Advil. From the look in her eyes, he’d known that she’d meant it, and she’d never as much as mentioned Hank since then. Why she was seeking him out today was a mystery to Warrick, so after making his way slowly towards the car, he leaned against the driver’s door, keeping his gaze on Hank and Sara, observing the interplay between them. Hank had emerged from the ambulance, was standing beside Sara, and from Warrick’s standpoint, and much to his surprise, it was Sara who was making all the overtures, doing all the talking, while Hank looked disinterested, kept trying to turn away from her, but Sara wasn’t taking that, kept coming around in front of him. It looked very much like she was trying to reason with him, but he kept on shaking his head, and eventually, he threw his hands up in the air, turned on his heel, and walked away.

 

From the way she’d been gesturing, Warrick expected Sara to follow Hank, or at the very least, come towards him, spewing invective. What he didn’t expect was for Sara to stay exactly where she was, wrapping her arms around herself in an unmistakably protective manner. He didn’t expect for her to tilt her head back towards the sky, for her shoulders to rise and fall with deep breaths, didn’t expect her to look like a woman who was on the verge of falling apart right there in the parking lot of Desert Palms hospital.

 

He’d known Sara for over two years by now, he’d never seen her like this, and he knew, because he knew Sara, that she’d be mortified by him, by anyone, seeing her in that state.

 

He just didn’t care, because she was his friend, and she was hurting, and he wanted to help.

 

He was beside her before he was even aware that he was moving, certainly before she was aware that he was moving if the little jump she gave when he said her name was any indication. He gave her a smile of apology, harder to do than he’d have thought, because her face was whiter than chalk, her eyes a livid shade of red that told of the tears she was trying to keep back. “You ok?” he asked gently, keeping more than arm’s length away from her, letting her have her space.

 

She chuckled, a harsh, mirthless sound that had his throat tightening, and shook her head, something that had his throat tightening more. “You know,” she said slowly, her voice hoarse, low. “I don’t think I am.”

 

He frowned more at the un-Saralike admission, glancing in the direction Hank had vanished. “Did he say something? Do something?” Implicit in his words were a promise that, were she to answer in the affirmative, he would go after Hank and teach him a little lesson in manners and how to treat a lady, but Warrick’s mind was diverted from such violent thoughts by another one of those mirthless chuckles, this one sounding rather more like a truncated sob.

 

“You could say that.” It was a non-answer if ever he’d heard one, and he tilted his head, looked at her curiously.

 

“Would you say that?” She didn’t reply, just looked down at the ground, and Warrick, for no reason that he could articulate, felt himself growing very cold, took a step closer to her. “Sara? What is it?”

 

Her deep breath was audible and he could almost see her make the decision to talk to him about whatever it was that was bothering her. Slowly, she lifted her head, and he waited impatiently, each second passing like a lifetime. Once her eyes met his, it seemed to take a long time for her to speak, and when she did, the three simple words hung in the air for aeons before he could process them.

 

“Warrick, I’m pregnant.”

 

Once he processed them, he nodded slowly, the entire scene making sense. “And Hank’s not too pleased about that.”

 

Her lips twisted a grimace as she looked towards the ambulance. “He’s saying that it might not be his.”

 

“Wha-?” Warrick could only get the first syllable of the word out, such was his shock, and he knew that his jaw was wide open, his whole body going slack with shock. He had a very good idea of what he must look like, but when Sara looked at him, she actually snickered, a sound of real amusement, and a genuine smile lit up her face. “You’re kidding me, right?” Because much as he and the rest of the CSI lab might have wondered about what Sara and Hank’s relationship was all about, what with her denials that Hank was her boyfriend, Warrick knew that she hadn’t been seeing anyone else, knew damn well that Sara Sidle was not the kind of woman to cheat on her boyfriend.

 

She nodded. “Evidently, he judges everyone on his own standards.” Sighing, she reached up, pushed her hair back from her face. “I sure can pick ‘em, huh?”

 

Warrick had no idea what to say to that, but he did have a couple dozen questions that he wanted to ask her, all of which were second to his concern that Hank might come back and see them there. Quite apart from how Sara might react to seeing him, Warrick was far more aware of the fact that he was very likely to give in to his violent impulses of seconds earlier. So when he spoke, he started with a caveat that morphed into a question. “Look,” he said slowly, holding up his hands as if to forestall any violent impulses on her part that his words might foster. “I’m not trying to get into your business, and you don’t have to tell me anything, not if you don’t want to… but you want to go somewhere? Talk about this?”

 

This time, her nod was accompanied by an audible intake of breath, and when she spoke, her voice was thick with tears, the same tears that were forming in her eyes. “I’d like that,” she whispered, so quietly that he could barely hear her. “I could really use a friend right now.”

 

Nodding, his own voice uncomfortably thick, Warrick extended an arm towards the car, and she fell into step beside him. “You’ve got one.”

 

>*<*>*<

 

When he first made the offer of breakfast, he’d envisioned them going to their usual place, the place where most of the CSI graveyard shift went to unwind and enjoy good food at a reasonable price. Sara’s revelation put paid to that though, because this was the kind of conversation that simply couldn’t be had in public, and knowing their luck, no matter where they went in Vegas,  even if it was a big city, they were bound to bump into someone they knew. Thus, when Sara suggested that they go to her place, Warrick agreed straight away, only realising as he followed her through the streets of Vegas that in all the years he’d known Sara, he’d never been to her place, had never even seen the outside of it. Parking down the street from the building, he met her at the front door, walked up the stairs side by side with her, and when she let him in the front door, his CSI’s instincts kicked in straight away, his eyes roaming over the apartment, taking everything in at a glance. The place, he gleaned straight away, was pure Sara, her personality stamped on every corner, the sparse, yet comfortable furniture, the shelves overflowing with books, some of which were spilling over on to the coffee table and the desk to his right. The desk itself was cluttered, papers and books and yet more papers, which was something of a surprise to him, because he’d always pictured Sara for the neat freak type. However, as he was learning rapidly, there was a lot more to Sara than he thought.

 

“Make yourself at home,” she told him, over her shoulder, heading into the kitchen, throwing her keys on the counter. “Can I get you anything? Coffee, tea, juice…”

 

He nodded as he followed her, leaning against the counter. “Juice would be good,” he said, his eyes taking in the neatness of the kitchen –when was the last time it was used, he wondered- not missing the bowl of fresh fruit beside the refrigerator, or the vegetables he could see inside it, a sight that had him re-evaluating the answer to his seconds-earlier question. Evidently Sara did cook; she was just really good about cleaning up after herself.

 

“Orange ok?” There was a little smile on her face as she turned to ask him the question, and he was faintly embarrassed, sure that she knew what he was doing, the direction his thoughts were going in. There was no way that he would admit it, and he knew she wasn’t going to call him on it, so he just smiled at her, nodding.

 

“Perfect,” he said, and she grinned, a real Sara-smile, the first that he’d seen all day, or maybe longer. “You’ve got a nice place,” he told her, and she shot him another look over her shoulder, this one frankly sceptical.

 

“Not really,” she replied, in a tone that left no room for argument. “It was only supposed to be a stop-gap while I found a better place… I’ve been here two and a half years.” She shrugged, not sounding too upset about it, despite her words. “I figured it was fine, that I was never here that much, always working…” Her voice trailed off then, and she stared hard at the two tall glasses that she was filling with orange juice, as if she was being very careful about not over-filling them. But when she had to clear her throat before she spoke again, he knew that wasn’t it. “I guess I’m going to have to look for a new place soon.”

 

There was nothing he could say to that, so he simply waited for her to turn, accepted the glass she held to him with a quiet, “Thanks,” and following her lead, moved to the couch. She sat down at one end, he on the other, an ocean of space between them, and he waited for Sara to speak, not wanting to rush her.

 

Her glass of juice was half-empty and his hand was freezing from holding his before she finally sighed. “I guess you’re wondering how this happened,” she said, looking at her white-knuckled hands rather than at him, her face drawn.

 

The first words that came into his head were a smart comment, and in a split second, he considered whether he should give voice to it, deciding that he really should. “Grams did give me the birds and bees talk,” he said, and her head snapped up, her lips curling up into a wide grin, a laugh bubbling up from somewhere deep inside.

 

“Funny,” she said, rolling her eyes, and he shrugged off-handedly, reaching over to the coffee table and putting his glass on it. When he straightened up, he leaned his right side against the back of the couch, resting his arm on the cushion and propping his head up on his hand.

 

“I meant what I said Sara,” he told her seriously, all levity forgotten. “I’m not looking to get into your business… but if you want to talk, I’m here.”

 

She smiled, nodding as she too leaned towards the coffee table, placed her glass on it, and when she sat back on the couch, she mimicked his posture exactly, something that he noticed, but knew better than to comment on. “I never expected this,” she told him frankly, and a slight tinge of pink made it way across her cheeks. “We were careful.” Warrick shifted, because frankly, that was as much information as he was comfortable knowing, and from the look on her face, from the way that she moved on swiftly, it was as much as she was comfortable with sharing as well. “And then, when I found out about Elaine, we broke up, I didn’t even think about it.” She rolled her eyes. “I thought it was a stomach bug at first… and then I took a mouthful of Greg’s coffee in the lab one night and promptly threw up.” His eyes grew wide at that, and she snickered, nodding. “I’ve never been so grateful to be alone in the break room,” she confirmed. “That same night, I was signing off on something, I can’t even remember what, and I noticed the date…” Her voice trailed off, and he took pity on her.

 

“And two and two made four.”

 

She nodded. “Went to a drugstore on the way home, did the test… when I saw that blue line, I threw up again.” Her lips twisted into a grimace as she spoke, and she leaned over to the table, taking up her glass and taking a sip, holding the liquid in her mouth for longer than usual, as if she was trying to get the memory of the taste out, replace it with something nicer. “Took a couple of days to get my head around it, and then I told Hank.” Suddenly, she chuckled, but it was decidedly less than humorously. “Of course, the date happened to be April 1st. He thought I was kidding him.”

 

Warrick rolled his eyes, feeling a surge of anger course through his veins, imagining beating Hank to a bloody pulp. “He would,” he muttered darkly, and if Sara heard him, she didn’t say anything.

 

“When I managed to convince him I wasn’t, he told me…” And here, Sara’s bravado faltered, and she looked down and to her left, at her fingers picking idly at the pattern of the couch fabric. “He told me that our relationship was hardly exclusive… that there were weeks where we hardly saw one another… that he couldn’t be sure it was his.”


As she spoke, her voice grew lower and lower, and by the end, Warrick could barely hear her. He was seized by another urge, this time decidedly non-violent, the urge to reach out and touch her hand, her shoulder, her knee, anything to show her that he was there for her, to provide her with some sort of comfort. But this was Sara that he was dealing with, and he was sure she wouldn’t welcome it, was even more afraid that it would cause her to shatter and crack, so he did nothing, just waited for her to speak again.

 

When she did, her words made him even angrier at Hank. “I thought it might be the shock talking,” she explained. “That once he had time to think about it, he’d been more reasonable…” Her voice trailed off, and she didn’t have to say anything else, because it was more than obvious that that hadn’t happened. “As you saw…”

 

“He’s a jerk Sara,” Warrick said quietly, just about keeping his temper in check, and a sad smile crossed her lips.

 

“Yeah,” she whispered. “But he’s the one who gets to walk away.”

 

Frowning, he shifted in his seat slightly, because from the way she’d been talking about this, and from that comment in particular, there was only one conclusion that he could draw. “You’ve made up your mind?” he asked, wondering briefly if that was a question too far, only found out that it wasn’t when she shrugged.

 

“There was never a choice to make,” she told him honestly, her eyes meeting his, and she didn’t look away. “I don’t believe in abortion Warrick, I never have.” Another shrug. “I mean, if people make that choice, that’s fine, but… it’s not for me. I could never take a life.” He remembered her saying that to him once upon a long ago, in a tone that was far more strident, more angry, than the one she was using here, and he nodded, because once he heard her say the words, he couldn’t imagine her doing anything else, honestly, had barely even contemplated the notion in the first place.

 

“And you’re ok with doing this on your own?” he asked, the words out before he could stop them, and he instantly regretted them when she bit her lip, looking stricken.

 

“No,” she said, with something that might have been a laugh, or might have been midway to a sob. “But I don’t have a choice about that either.”

 

He shook his head, not sure of what to say that wouldn’t sound corny, or patronising, and settled for going for honesty. “You’re not alone you know,” he told her. “We’re all going to be here for you… whatever you need.”

 

She smiled, nodded her head, and to his surprise, she reached out with one hand, touching his knee lightly, briefly. “Thank you,” she whispered. 

 

>*<*>*<

 

Warrick would be lying if he said he felt well rested when he arrived at the crime lab later on that same day. He wasn’t normally a man who had trouble sleeping, but when he’d arrived home that day, laid down on his bed and closed his eyes, his dreams had been filled with images of Sara, her eyes filled with tears, her face drawn with pain. He’d seen her arguing with Hank, his imagination easily filling in the words he hadn’t been able to hear, and his dreams had taken him into the future, allowing him to see Sara, a baby in her arms, but no smile on her face, instead tears rolling down her cheeks.

 

He’d tossed and turned and slept fitfully, worrying about her, and when the alarm went off, it had been a relief.

 

He’d showered and dressed as quickly as possible, grabbing breakfast on the run, a slice of toast, eating it in his car on the way to the lab. Once there, he didn’t, as was his custom when awaiting a new case, go straight to the break room where Grissom usually gave out assignments, or to Grissom’s office, to get his pick of the cases. Instead, he wandered the halls, looking for Sara, eventually finding her in one of the layout rooms, packing up the evidence of the case they’d finished the previous day. “Hey,” he greeted her, coming in and leaning his hands on the table, relieved when she looked over her shoulder at him, tossing him that easy smile of hers, the same kind of smile that she used to give him all the time.

 

“Hey,” she said, going back to piling files in the evidence box. “You’re here early.”

 

He wasn’t going to let her away with that. “So are you.”

 

She glanced over her shoulder at him again, her smile faltering momentarily. “I couldn’t sleep,” she shrugged, a thin line of tension appearing between her eyes, and he pursed his lips, moving closer towards her.

 

“There’s a lot of that going around,” he observed, and this time when she looked up, she held his gaze.

 

“You don’t need to worry about me Warrick,” she said, keeping her voice low, her eyes every so often darting towards the door, as if she was afraid that someone would walk in on them, or worse, be lurking outside, ready to overhear. Though, Warrick noted, this was the CSI lab, and stranger things had definitely happened.

 

“I know I don’t need to,” he countered straight away, having learned from long experience that the only way to win an argument with Sara was to cut her off before she got a good head of steam going. “And yet I find myself doing it anyway.” The last was said with a wry smile, a teasing lilt to his voice, something that had her looking down at the ground, then looking up at him through her eyelashes, a blush coating her cheeks, a blush that only intensified when he continued with, “How are you?”

 

She nodded. “I’m fine Warrick. Really.” He must have looked sceptical, because the last word was tacked on after a slight pause, and the usually taciturn Sara Sidle, the woman who would rather have teeth pulled than talk about her personal life, continued doing just that, even if she didn’t look at him as she spoke, even if she went back to packing up those boxes with more concentration than the task really deserved. “I actually think it helped… talking to someone about it…” She chuckled during another pause where her hands stilled, but her head stayed lowered. “Thank you, by the way.”

 

Somewhere in the conversation, he’d ended up standing right beside her, his feet moving him of their own free will, and now his hand discovered a will of its own too, reaching up and closing over her shoulder, touching down for a second, dropping almost at once. “Any time.” She glanced up at him quickly, her cheeks scarlet, and he nodded seriously. “I mean that, you know.”

 

“I know.” Her work done, she closed the lid of the box, looked around for a pen to write the case number on it. Noticing one nearer to him, he grabbed it and held it out to her, her fingers touching his briefly as she took it from him. “Thank you,” she said, scribbling down the letters, and Warrick noted, not for the first time, but knowing better than to say anything, that whoever might be looking for the box in future might have difficulty reading the writing. “But we’ve put this one to bed, now all we need to do is get it to the vault.” She sounded triumphant, flinging the marker onto the table and moving to lift the box, stopping only at the sound of Warrick’s rather alarmed voice.

 

“Let me get that,” he said, leaning across to take it from her as he spoke, and she looked at him with surprise stamped all over her face.

 

“I can lift a box Warrick,” she told him, but he was already lifting it, testing the weight, realising that indeed, it was as heavy as he’d thought it was, and that there was no way in the world that he was going to let her lift it.

 

“In your-” he began, biting the comment off before he complete it, but from the grin on her face, she knew exactly what he was going to say, and she was hugely amused by it.

 

“In my condition?” she asked, keeping her voice low, but this time, she didn’t look towards the door, didn’t take her eyes, dancing with amusement, off his. “Is that what you were really going to say, in my condition?”

 

He sighed, shaking his head. “Sara…”

 

“It’s fine, it’s fine,” she chuckled, holding her hands up. “It’s actually kind of sweet…”

 

He rolled his eyes. “Man, you’re killing me here,” he mock-grumbled, and was rewarded by another peal of giggles, one that she quickly cut off, narrowing her eyes at him, even though they were dancing, even though she was smiling.

 

“That’s nothing,” she told him, “Compared to what I’ll do if you say something like that in front of the others.”

 

She was dead serious, and he tilted his head, looking curiously at her. “You do know this isn’t the kind of thing you can hide for long, right?” he asked, keeping his voice deliberately light, and she nodded.

 

“I just need a little while to get used to the idea before I tell anyone,” she told him. “That’s all. You wouldn’t-”

 

“Sara.” He cut her off before she could even finish the question and her expression was instantly contrite.

 

“Sorry.”

 

“Your secret is safe with me,” he promised, before turning, heading for the door. “Come on, let’s get this to the vault then find out what we’re doing today.”

 

As it happened, they didn’t have to look far to find their assignment, rather, it found them as they were coming out of the evidence vault. “Hey, I was looking for you two,” Nick said, waving a piece of paper in his hand. “Gris wants us working together.”

 

“Us three? Together?” Sara’s surprise was stamped in every syllable, and Warrick couldn’t blame her. Usually, Grissom split them up, two of them working with either him or Catherine, the odd time giving one of them a solo case, or letting two of them work together. Warrick couldn’t remember ever working with both Sara and Nick on the one case.

 

“Kinda a surprise, huh?” Nick’s teeth flashed white in his face as he fell into step beside them. “DB at a warehouse just outside of town… I got the directions here.”

 

“I’ll drive,” Warrick said instantly, out of long habit, and the annoyed look that Nick flashed him made him grin. “You can navigate. Sara can sleep in the back.” It was a joke, but when he looked over at Sara, any semblance of mirth vanished. She had paled considerably, and wasn’t looking as if travelling anywhere was in the cards anytime soon.

 

“I’ll pass, thanks,” she said, holding up one hand, something that was supposed to be a smile on her face. “I’ve driven with you before. Besides, there’s something I’ve got to take care of here…” She glanced over at Nick, who was frowning slightly at her. “You got those directions?”

 

He nodded, handing her a slip of paper. “Copied two sets, just in case,” he told her. “You ok Sara?”

 

She nodded, smiling brightly at him. “Just have a call to make, that’s all,” she said, and Warrick had to give it to her; the girl was smooth. Only for he knew what was the matter with her, only for her face was so pale, he would have bought it completely. “I’ll meet you guys out there.”

 

With that, she was gone, turning on her heel and walking quickly away from them, and Warrick didn’t take his eyes off her until she was out of sight. Once that was done, he shook himself slightly, glanced over at Nick, then took a step in the opposite direction. “You ready?”

 

Nick nodded, but his expression was slightly preoccupied. “Hey man,” he said as they walked. “Mind if I ask you something?”

 

Warrick shrugged. “Shoot.”

 

“You noticed anything off with Sara lately?”

 

His face schooled into a blank mask, Warrick made a show of searching his memory banks, finally ending up looking at Nick, shrugging his shoulders. “Off? What do you mean?”

 

“I dunno…” They’d reached the locker room by now, were grabbing badges and jackets. “She seems quieter… even for her. Ever since she broke up with Hank…”

 

The name evoked a snort of disgust from Warrick’s lips, he couldn’t help it. Nick looked surprised at his vehemence, so Warrick did some fast thinking, rolling his eyes. “Jerk,” he decreed, because that much was evident, even without his new knowledge. “She’s better off without him.”

 

“No argument here,” Nick agreed. “And I thought she was ok with that you know? But lately, it’s like there’s something else going on with her, and I’m not sure what it is.”

 

Warrick shrugged again. “Look, if there’s something wrong with Sara, I’m sure we’ll find out what it is sooner or later.”

 

He thought that was an innocuous enough statement, but whatever way he’d said it had Nick’s head turning sharply to him, had his friend’s eyes boring lasers into his. “You know something,” Nick said, and it was a statement, not a question. “You do.”

 

For a long moment, Warrick didn’t speak, because he didn’t want to lie to Nick, but there was no way that he wanted to betray Sara’s confidence either. Eventually, he settled for running a hand over his forehead, through his hair. “We need to get to that crime scene,” he said simply, and Nick didn’t look happy at the non-answer, but he didn’t call him on it either.

 

Instead, the journey to the crime scene passed as these things normally did; the two of them chatting about sports and time off and Grissom and Catherine’s case, a dead body at a movie theatre, something that led to more than a little hilarity because neither of them could really picture Grissom inside a movie theatre. They must have delayed at the lab more than either realised, because by the time that they made it to the warehouse, following Nick’s directions to the letter, Sara was right behind them, and they walked up to O’Riley as a trio, Nick taking care of the greeting, Warrick of asking who called it in, while Sara was silent, something that Warrick tried very hard not to notice and failed utterly.

 

“Passing motorists heard gunshots,” replied O’Riley. “First officer did a drive up. Found the scene, called in the word. I hope you brought extra supplies.”

 

“Why’s that?”

 

They were the first words Sara had spoken since back at the lab, which the part of Warrick’s brain that wasn’t involved with working the scene registered. “You’re going to be here a while,” O’Riley told them as he opened up the warehouse door, exposing something that none of them had ever expected to see.

 

It was your standard warehouse, high ceiling, corrugated iron walls, completely empty, so that their voices would echo off the walls. There were two things that seemed out of place though. One was the body lying face down on the floor, a pool of blood around it. The second was the sunlight streaming in through the bullet holes on the wall, shafts of sunlight coming from every direction, landing in seemingly a thousand different places. O’Riley looked from CSI to CSI, while they looked into the centre of the room in stunned silence, and it was Nick who spoke first.

 

“Looks like a war zone.”

 

He could have taken the words right out of Warrick’s mouth, but the words had the effect of breaking their paralysis, making them move carefully towards the body, whether to avoid the pools of light, as if they were the vampires that Day Shift sometimes not so playfully called them, or to avoid disturbing evidence, Warrick couldn’t tell. “We got an ID on the body?” he asked.

 

“No cash, no ID,” O’Riley replied. “Just a driver’s permit.”

 

If there were any words that Warrick hadn’t wanted to hear out of the burly detective’s lips, those were they. “Driver’s permit,” he echoed dully, leaning forward, looking at the body and ascertaining that yes, the kid really did look that young, if not younger.

 

“Driver’s permit? What is he, sixteen?” Sara asked.

 

“Fifteen and a half,” O’Riley told them, and Warrick just about kept back a wince. “Timmy McCallum. Coroner’s on his way.”

 

Warrick glanced up at him. “Tell them to watch their step. There’s casings and blood everywhere.” O’Riley nodded, making his way outside to wait on the coroner, and Warrick stood, glancing from Sara to Nick and back. “Divide and conquer. Inside or outside?”

 

He was looking more at Sara, who once again seemed to have paled significantly, and from the way that her gaze shifted more and more to the body, Warrick had a good idea as to her preference and the reason why. So he wasn’t really surprised when she promptly replied, “Outside perimeter,” turning and following O’Riley’s footsteps without giving them a chance to argue with her. She did, however, give Warrick a grateful look as he turned, or, he thought to himself, that could have been just his imagination.

 

“I’m Dennis Rodman,” Nick said, turning and following Sara out, and Warrick nodded, looking at the body, and speaking his own preference, even if there was no-one there to hear him.

 

“I’ll take everything below the knees.”

 

The next few hours passed mostly in silence, with Warrick painstakingly marking each fallen casing, pouring the contents of the many beer bottles littered around the body into containers, marking each one neatly, then bagging the bottles, marking them too. As he did that, Nick was up and down ladders, marking every bullet hole with rods, a back-breaking job that he loved and that Warrick hated with a passion. They traded comments back and forth every now and again, loose theories and notions of what could have happened, but nothing serious, following Grissom’s maxim of evidence first, theories last.

 

Through it all, Sara stayed outside, only coming in when both he and Nick were just about finished. In her hand, there was a long pole, which Warrick couldn’t connect to the case, and nor could she from her question. “Hey guys? What do you make of this piece of bamboo? I found it on the roof.”

 

Nick’s answer was immediate, and had he been a shade slower, Warrick would have made the same comment. “Bag it.”

 

“That’s funny,” Sara said, in that Sara-tone that indicated it was anything but. “Very funny.” Warrick had been moving towards her, intent on getting a closer look at her, seeing if she was all right, even if the comment, and the tone in which it was uttered, spoke volumes on that particular score, but he paused when he saw something on the floor, something shiny and small, like a piece of glass. He was moving in for a closer look when Sara noticed something herself. “Did you get the hole in the ceiling?”

 

“You find anything else up there?” Nick asked, and that did get Warrick’s attention, because the thought of Sara climbing up on that roof, walking around up there – and come to think of it, how the hell did she get up there in the first place? - in any circumstances, let alone in her condition - and he knew he was going to catch hell if she ever heard him thinking that, but he didn’t really care - frankly gave him hives.

 

“No,” Sara answered, and Warrick bit his tongue, instead focussing on his discovery.

 

“Got some shards of glass,” he told them. “Clear in colour. Mixed with some small pieces of black plastic.” Standing then, he looked around at Nick, just coming down his ladder. “You almost finished with that? What’s your count?”

 

“Yeah,” Nick told him. “109 rods.”

 

Warrick knew it was going to be a big number; not that big though. “109 bullets?” he echoed, and Nick gave him a knowing look, followed immediately by a question.

 

“How in the world do trajectories occur fifteen to twenty feet off the ground? Horizontally?”

 

Sara was as baffled as he. “What in the hell went on here?” she wondered.

 

All Warrick could do was shrug his shoulders, looking at the carnage around them. “I don’t know,” he murmured. “But it’s gonna be hell finding out.”

 

No-one disagreed with him.

 

>*<*>*<

 

Warrick and Sara headed back to the lab first, leaving Nick at the crime scene, collecting up all the bullets to give to Bobby Dawson. He’d complained at first about being left to do such a menial job, but as Warrick pointed out to him with an evil grin, what went up had to come down; namely the 109 rods that Nick had put around the walls. Having come with Nick, Warrick therefore caught a ride back with Sara, and much of the initial part of their journey was spent speculating about what might have happened in the warehouse, throwing ideas and theories around, in gleeful abandon of Grissom’s “evidence first” maxim. It was only when they were almost back at the lab that Sara glanced at him out of the corner of her eye, her expression suddenly serious. “Thanks for letting me take the perimeter,” she said, and he shrugged, not having thought much of it at the time, save the obvious.

 

“Not like there was a stampede for it,” he observed, truthfully as it happened; the perimeter was always the least sought-after job on a crime scene.

 

“True,” Sara murmured, biting her lip, then looking over at him sharply as if something had just occurred to her. “You don’t think Nick found it weird, me looking for the outside?” Warrick looked at her, debating whether to tell her of his conversation with Nick, perhaps hesitating a moment too long, because she looked at him sharply again, the car swerving slightly before she righted it. “Warrick?” she asked, more than a little alarm in her voice, and he sighed.

 

“We were talking on our way to the scene,” he told her. “He’s noticed that you haven’t been yourself lately, asked me was it just him.”

 

“What did you tell him?” Her voice was sharp, and he held up a hand, as if to ward off any accusations she might direct his way.

 

“I didn’t tell him anything Sara… you know better.” In spite of his words, his tone was gentle, and that must have registered with her, because her expression was one of instant contrition.

 

“I know… I’m sorry…”

 

Warrick waved a hand to indicate that she shouldn’t worry about it. “I told you I wouldn’t tell anyone, and I won’t. But I think he knew that I knew more than I was telling him…”

 

He was unsure of how she was going to take that, and he was spared some reaction when she pulled into the CSI parking lot, pulled into a parking space there. Staring straight ahead for a long moment, she rested her hands on the steering wheel, arms locked dead straight, and Warrick could see her shoulders rise and fall with several deep breaths. Finally, she turned to look at him, a forced smile on her face. “It’s ok,” she said, and he wasn’t so sure who she was trying to convince. “I expected this… it’s ok.”

 

The previous day, he hadn’t wanted to touch her, was afraid that it might cause her to break. Today, he was beyond such concerns, wanting only to comfort her, and he reached out almost without thinking, his hand landing on her shoulder, squeezing gently. When she smiled in response, it was a ghost of a smile, but it was a genuine one, and he dropped his hand quickly, not wanting to push his luck. “You know I’m here for you,” he said. “If you want to talk… or whatever…”

 

Her smile broadened, to be something much more approximating what he was used to from her. She didn’t speak, just nodded, and he nodded back, and in unspoken agreement, they got out of the car and began taking out the evidence.

 

Despite the serious atmosphere between them in the car, once they hit the open air, it was back to normal, carrying in their field kits, shucking their jackets in the locker room. “So,” Warrick said conversationally, after a look around to make sure that they were alone. “I take it you don’t want the autopsy?”

 

He regretted his teasing remark when he saw the effect it had on Sara; her face paling, having to swallow hard as she looked up at him. Nonetheless, she gave him a rueful smile, even though it looked rather forced, as if she was swallowing lemons. “No,” she agreed, nodding her head nervously. “It’s… em… it’s all yours.” Warrick couldn’t even smile, so worried was he by her reaction, and she reached up to rub her forehead, bringing her hand down to wave him away. “Go,” she said. “I’m fine.”

 

“You sure?” He knew she was telling the truth when he found himself on the receiving end of the patented Sara Sidle glare. “OK, OK, I’m going…” He made it to the door before he turned again, looked at her sitting hunched over on the bench, elbows on her knees, running her hands through her hair, pushing the strands back almost fiercely, holding it there. “You’ll page me if you need me?” he asked softly, and she looked up at him, nodding tiredly.

 

“Go,” was all she said, and he went, because he was having the uncomfortable urge to lift her into his arms and carry her home to put her to bed, and he was fairly sure that if he looked at her a second longer, that that was exactly what he would do.

 

Instead, he made his way to Doc Robbins’s autopsy room, where they were both surprised by what they found on the victim’s body; bruise marks the like of which Warrick had rarely seen, save on torture victims. Cause of death was as expected, a single gunshot wound to the chest; what was less so was the angle of the wound, a downward angle of twenty five degrees in a room with a roof angle of forty five meant that the shooter was ten to fifteen feet tall. Aside from the bruises and the gunshot wound, there were other abrasions, what Doc Robbins termed ‘Boys will be Boys stuff’ but Warrick couldn’t shake the feeling that there was more to it than that.

 

He finished up with Doc Robbins, did everything that he was supposed to do, and he was fairly sure that no-one would have seen anything in his demeanour that indicated he was anything other than wholly absorbed in his work. He knew better though, knew that while much of his thinking was devoted to the case, there was a small part of it that was thinking about Sara, worrying if she was all right, worrying about what would happen when people found out about her, wondering how she would handle being a single mother, what might happen if Hank changed his mind. He tried to stop thinking about her, to push her out of his mind completely, but nothing worked, and he decided that he might as well seek her out, see if actually seeing her would put his mind at ease. After stopping at the photo lab, he even had himself an excuse to do just that.

 

Thus it was that he found himself wandering the halls of CSI, finally finding her in a room with the door sealed off with crime scene tape. She couldn’t have announced her desire for privacy more if she had the door alarmed, and Warrick made his voice light when he announced his presence. Not that it was a hard job; after all, she was trying to fingerprint the bamboo rod that she’d found on the roof of the warehouse, and the perfect opening line came without thinking.

 

“This where the limbo party is?” She looked up at him and smiled, a sight that eased Warrick’s worries considerably. She looked relaxed, or at least as relaxed as Sara ever got when she was working. “Can I come in?”

 

He barely waited for her “Yeah,” already ducking under the crime scene tape when it came, and as he walked over to the bench, she continued, “Sorry, I don't want everyone in here.”

 

He wasn’t sure if that was because of the work that she was doing, and how she didn’t want to explain how this related to their case, or because of personal reasons, but she was looking so like her normal self that he didn’t think twice about not asking her. Instead, he showed her the photographs in his hand.  “Well, I've got your one-to-ones.  The tire treads, there's nothing specific here.”

 

Sara was as pleased over that as he was. “Bummer.”

 

There was a bright side though, one that he showed her. “But the shoe prints that you took, they look interesting.  It looks like five suspects walked in, and four ran out.” He’d marked them on the photographs, and she grasped the implication immediately.

 

“Four guilty people out there somewhere.”

 

“No doubt.” He nodded slowly, then, unable to ignore the proverbial elephant in the room, he tilted his head towards the bamboo stick. “How's it coming with your big bamboo here?”

 

He regretted the question when shadows seemed to fall across her face. “Well,” she said, sounding disgusted. “I have black lung from all the powder, and not a single print, nothing, nada.”

 

Warrick considered a moment, then something obvious occurred to him, something so obvious, he was sure she would have done it, but asked her anyway. “You test for GSR?” She looked at him blankly, and he realised with a shock that she hadn’t tested for it, something that surprised him to no end. “The place was riddled with bullets,” he added. “It wouldn’t hurt.”

 

If she was annoyed that she’d missed something so obvious, she didn’t show it, just smiled. “Wouldn’t hurt,” she echoed, and without further ado, they got down to the business of testing the pole.

 

As they worked, they talked and he told her about the autopsy, what Robbins had told him, leaving out as many of the gory details as possible, though her stomach seemed to have recovered in the last couple of hours if the grin she gave him was anything to go by. “Think Nick’s done collecting those bullets yet?” she asked him with a wicked grin, and Warrick chuckled, recalling Nick’s face as they’d left.

 

“I think the bullets were the easy bit,” he told her. “Getting the rods out of the walls would have taken longer.”

 

Sara nodded, holding a swab up to the light, as if that would help her see if there was any GSR evident. “I wonder how the bullets got up so high,” she murmured. “You saw the height of the roof.”

 

“Yeah…” Warrick dragged the word out, glancing over at her, then purposely looking down at the wood as he asked his next question. “Sara, how did you get up on that roof?”

 

He looked at her when she answered, saw her shoulders rise and fall in a shrug, and she was concentrating hard on the bamboo too, something that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up, all the more so when she actually spoke. Her voice was casual, too casual he knew at once. “There was a ladder going up the side of the building,” she told him, her voice airy, but his jaw dropped anyway.

 

“In your-” He realised instantly that his voice was just a little too loud, perfectly audible from the hallway, and she did too, narrowing her eyes and throwing a pointed gaze at the door. Dropping his voice, he set his jaw, all but hissing, “In your condition?” at her, and a smile spread across her face, followed by a loud laugh.

 

“I knew you were going to say that,” she said, not pausing as she rubbed another swab on a section of bamboo. “I saw your face at the crime scene; you looked like you were going to explode.”

 

“Do you have any idea how dangerous it was for you to climb up there?” he demanded. “You should have let me or Nick do it…”

 

“Warrick.” Her voice was strong, even if quiet. “I’m pregnant. Not incompetent.” She held his gaze, long enough so that he would get the message, and he sighed, nodding once to let her know that he agreed with her. “Besides which,” she continued, “Of the three of us, I’m the lightest… which also makes me the safest choice to go up there. Doesn’t it?”

 

It was a logical argument, one that he had no answer to. “Sara…” he breathed, and she shook her head, forestalling further argument.

 

“Look, Warrick, you’ve got to trust me… I’m not going to take any risks, put myself in any danger. If I need help, I’ll ask for it… but you can’t keep on like this for the next few months… you’ll drive us both crazy.”

 

He chuckled wryly, because he knew that much was certainly true. “Yeah,” he said, almost under his breath, and when he met her gaze, he saw a curious glint in her brown eyes. “What?”

 

She shook her head again, looked off above and to the right of his head. “I guess… I’m just wondering why you care so much… why this means so much to you.”

 

Put so baldly, he had no real answer to give her, didn’t know the answer himself, just knew that it did. So he can up with the best answer he could, the one that came off the top of his head. “I just want to look out for you, that’s all,” he told her. “I think you need that.”

 

“I need a friend,” she countered. “Not a mother hen.” He grinned, so did she. “You think you can be that?”

 

He nodded. “I can be that.”

 

Then, just like when they got out of the car, they dropped the subject, because they’d reached the end of their respective sections of the pole, having finally met in the middle, and neither of them had found GSR. Sighing, Warrick made what he was sure was going to be an unpopular suggestion. “Maybe this has nothing to do with the case.  Maybe it was just a piece of debris left at the scene.”

 

“No.” Sara rejected the notion straight away, not even having to think about it, with the same vehemence she usually displayed when opposing having to do an experiment involving meat of any kind. “No no no no no,” she continued. “I’m not quitting. No, I am in too deep.”

 

With that, she picked up the bamboo and headed for the door, leaving him mystified, and with no choice but to follow her, seeing her walking down the hallway very carefully, the pole almost long enough to hit off the walls. “Where are you going?” he called, and she half-turned to answer him, only slightly slowing.

 

“Trace,” she called back. “Maybe Hodges can find something.” Knowing that she must really be desperate if she was voluntarily calling on Hodges for help, Warrick chose not to comment on it, distracted by how she nearly poked some poor unsuspecting tech’s stomach out as she tried to turn a corner with the pole. “Coming through,” Sara called, a little late for the tech who dodged just in time, with a stifled exclamation of “Whoa!” Sara didn’t even apologise, barely gave him a look, just saying, “Careful people, easy…”

 

All Warrick could do was look at her and smile, surprised once again at the lengths that Sara would go to when she was chasing a hunch. She was completely indomitable, indefatigable, any other in- you cared to mention, and while he was amused at the doggedness with which she was pursuing this particular piece of evidence, there was a larger part of him that was happy to see her so passionate about something, especially after her apathy of the last few days, the tears and the hurt that he’d been witness to in her living room the previous day. Even if this turned out to be a wild goose chase, it was her wild goose chase, something she’d been able to sink her teeth into, something to make her forget her worries for a while, and that, Warrick knew, was priceless.

 

His thoughts were interrupted when the tech that Sara had nearly eviscerated came up to him. “Hey Brown, PD called. Mrs McCallum’s there.”

 

“The mother,” Warrick sighed, the mention bringing him crashing back to reality; interviews with grieving relatives were never his favourite things to do. “Tell them I’m on my way.”

 

>*<*>*<

 

He didn’t go straight to PD, checking in with Nick first, gleaning from him that Greg had identified some of the DNA from the crime scene; that one of the samples collected belonged to a brother of Timmy McCallum. So he was interested when sitting beside his mother was Kevin McCallum, older brother of Timmy, who admitted not to being at the warehouse, but to dropping Timmy off, having bought beer for him earlier that night. From the appalled look on Mrs McCallum’s face, Warrick believed that she knew nothing about her sons’ arrangement, but her words stayed with him for an entirely different reason.

 

“Mr. Brown, I don't know what to say.  I'm a single mother ... I work nights, and you can't keep your eyes on your kids all the time.  At a certain age, you just have to trust them.”

 

It was a familiar enough line; he’d heard it, or variations thereof, innumerable times in his work as a CSI, or even outside that. About how hard it was for a single mother to balance caring for her kids and providing for her kids, of how there weren’t enough hours in the day, of what a struggle it was. Catherine had given him chapter and verse on that often enough, but he knew that it was slightly different for Catherine. At least until recently, Eddie had been around, and while he’d been a faithless husband, he’d worshipped Lindsey, had done his share in helping to raise her. Catherine had a sister too, and friends who were willing to help out with Lindsey if work got in the way, as it so often did.

 

But Warrick wasn’t thinking of Catherine, or even Mrs McCallum.

 

As for so much of that day, he was thinking of Sara, and he was thinking of how much harder it was going to be for her. She didn’t have a family to help her out, didn’t even have that many friends, and he was reasonably sure that those she did have came from work, none of whom would be exactly able, even if they were willing, to step in with childcare duties. And there was a world of difference too, he knew, between being a single mom of a grade schooler and a newborn infant. Especially for someone like Sara, whose work was her life, her life her work, with little or nothing outside that.

 

Keeping his mind on the case was difficult, but he managed to do it, just enough to sympathise with Mrs McCallum. “I understand.  We are going to need to keep Kevin here to ask him some more questions about that night.  Do you object?”

 

When Mrs McCallum stuttered out, “No,” Warrick nodded, standing up and leaving the room, going back to the lab, looking around for Sara, to see if she’d found out anything. He couldn’t find her anywhere, until he walked into Jackie, who, for some reason that escaped him, was wearing Greg’s swami hat. “Hey Jackie,” he said. “Love the-”

 

He stopped talking when she levelled him with a glare that Sara would have been proud of. “Mention it, and you’ll go to the bottom of my list every time you leave evidence in.”

 

From the tone of her voice, she wasn’t lying, and he held up both hands, leaving well enough alone. “You seen Sara?”

 

Jackie’s face went from irritation to concern in the blink of an eye. “Everything ok with her?”

 

“Why wouldn’t it be?” Warrick was all innocence, and he only hoped that he could pull it off.

 

Jackie shrugged. “I dunno… she just seems off lately. As if something’s bugging her.”  She shook her head. “I met her in the hall wearing this thing; she didn’t even blink.” Reaching up, she adjusted the hat, with an expression on her face that screamed loud and clear she’d like to do a hell of a lot more than that. “That’s just not normal.”

 

More innocence from Warrick, and he hoped that Jackie wasn’t as perceptive as Nick. “I haven’t noticed anything.” A pause, then, “She say where she was going?”

 

“Trace lab.” Jackie replied, snickering suddenly. “That’ll really help her mood.”

 

Warrick grinned, already moving past her. “Thanks.” He made his way down the hall to Trace, where he could hear Hodges’s voice from the hall. “What do you think I am, a miracle worker?” he asked, and Warrick rolled his eyes, knowing that the answer to that was definitely in the negative. If Hodges were a miracle worker, he could make people actually like him.

 

“Well, that’s obvious Hodges.” Warrick blinked when he heard Sara’s voice, because she sounded more like her old self than she had all day, and he knew he’d been right, that working, keeping her mind off things, had done her some good. “If you were a miracle worker, you wouldn’t be rude.”

 

Warrick bit back a grin. “That’s my girl,” he thought.

 

Anyone else would have stopped after that smackdown, but not Hodges. “I wasn't being rude, I was being curt.  Rude would be, ‘When I know, you'll know’.” He took a beat then, and Warrick could only imagine the look that Sara was giving Hodges. “Friends?”

 

“No,” Sara replied, her tone matching the look that Warrick imagined perfectly, and that was when he decided that he’d better go inside, lest someone see him standing around and wonder what he was doing, or why. Especially since he couldn’t answer either question himself.

 

“Hodges, how's it coming with that glass?’ he said. Hodges tapped the microscope near to Sara, and as invited, Warrick leaned down, checking out the glass. What he saw there surprised him. “Looks like there's some kind of coating on it.”

 

Hodges sounded like the supreme know-it-all he was when he replied, “More specifically, crystallized calcium fluoride.”

 

Warrick stepped back, allowing Sara to look into the scope, and she had a question of her own for Hodges. “You ran it through the I.R.?”

 

“Please,” Hodges scoffed. “I.R. says "fluorspar".  I say "high-end optics".”

 

“Camera lens,” Sara decided instantly, taking the words right out of Warrick’s mouth, leaving Warrick to ponder the next question.

 

“You think someone has this murder on tape?”

 

Sara shrugged, then, glancing at Hodges, tilted her head in the direction of the door. It was an unmistakeable suggestion, and Warrick nodded silently. They didn’t speak again until they were in the hallway. “Murder on tape?” Sara asked, and Warrick lifted one eyebrow, letting out a long breath.

 

“Could be… it’s another thing to ask Kevin when we talk to him again.”

 

“He’s still here?”

 

Warrick nodded. “Mother said it was ok for us to keep him… he’s cooling his heels in the interrogation room. See if that does anything to make him talk. Meanwhile, I get to check their car… see if the tyre treads match first.”

 

Sara nodded. “You want a hand with that?” Warrick gave her a look, because the first thought that came to his mind was that maybe crawling around and underneath a car wouldn’t be the best thing for her to do. His face must have shown what he was thinking, because she narrowed her eyes. Her lips turned up in a smile though, so he took heart at that. He knew what a really angry Sara looked like, and this wasn’t it. “Don’t even think about saying it.”

 

Warrick chuckled. “I wouldn’t.”

 

“But you’d think it.” It was nowhere near a question and he shrugged.

 

“Can’t arrest me for my thoughts.” By this time, they were at the break room, and he stopped walking, tilting his head, then checking his watch. “We’re about due to go off shift you know.”

 

She stopped too, crossed her arms over her chest, lifting an eyebrow. “You’re driving me crazy,” she informed him flatly.

 

“It’s a short trip.” He didn’t even think about his response, and he had to dodge a sharp slap to his upper arm. “Hey!” he protested laughingly, taking a step back, just in case. “So, if you’re done assaulting me, you want to grab something to eat?”

 

Sara considered it for a moment, but only a moment. “The usual place?” she suggested, and he nodded. “You’re on.”

 

>*<*>*<

 

The usual place was an open all hours coffee shop five minutes walk from the lab, a place that served good food cheap, a place that offered the choice of takeout or eat in. Usually, their preferred choice was takeout, food carried back to the lab and eaten in the layout room while they reviewed files, or sometimes, in the lab, over Grissom’s strong protests. Today, takeout would have been Sara’s choice, and as they walked, she gave Warrick what she evidently considered to be a very good reason for it, that she had to start cataloguing the bullet trajectories. Warrick however, wasn’t going to let her away with that. “You have to input data into a computer,” he reminded her flatly. “And if you don’t watch yourself, you’ll end up maxing out on overtime.”

 

Sara tilted her head, considering his point. “Again,” she muttered, and he bit his tongue, because he’d been thinking it, even if he hadn’t said it.

 

“The bullets will wait Sara,” he said gently, knowing that he was walking a fine line, knowing that he was an inch away from toppling over. “You need to take better care of yourself.”

 

She narrowed her eyes. “Because of…” Her voice trailed off and she looked around furtively, as if she was afraid that someone was around who could overhear them.

 

“Because you’ve not been doing it for months,” Warrick countered, and when Sara looked down, he knew that she was taking his point on board. “Look, let’s compromise.” She looked up at that, a hint of a smile in her eyes. “You and me, sit down here, have something to eat, kick back a little. After that, you decide you want to go back to the lab, I won’t stop you.”

 

She was silent for a moment, running the proposition through her head, as if looking for hidden catches. “You mean that?”

 

Her scepticism was palpable, and Warrick grinned, raising his fingers in a time-honoured salute. “Scout’s honour,” he said, and she burst out laughing.

 

“You’re telling me you were a boy scout?”

 

“No,” he replied, opening the door of the coffee shop for her, letting her go through ahead of him. “But it’s the thought that counts.”

 

She rolled her eyes, but didn’t otherwise say anything, and they sat down at a booth at the window, ordered their usual choices, though Sara opted to forgo her usual cup of coffee, instead settling for orange juice. Warrick noticed, but didn’t say anything, instead turning the conversation to the case and to the many things that might have happened, and what they could do to further the case. By the time their plates were clean, they had several questions for Kevin McCallum, as well as a couple of suggestions for O’Riley. Warrick was feeling pretty ok, the meal having done him the world of good, and he was all ready to go another couple of hours in the lab, despite his earlier words that they were ready to go off shift. Sara though, he couldn’t help but notice, looked ready to fall asleep.

 

“You ok over there?” he asked, more in amusement than worry, and she might have been about to reply, were it not for the fact that a huge yawn cut off any words she might have been preparing.

 

“Sorry.” A slight tinge of pink spread across her cheeks, her lips curling up in a sheepish smile. “I guess it’s the food… made me sleepy.”

 

His own lips twitched, and he bit the inside of his cheek to keep a full-blown grin from appearing. “Yeah,” he said. “The food. That’s what it is.”

 

A trademark Sidle-glare was sent in his direction. “Mockery isn’t nice Warrick.”

 

“But it’s so much fun.”

 

She threw her balled up napkin at him, but she laughed, and he laughed too, before fixing her with a serious look. “So,” he said, and she must have heard something in his voice, because her smile faded slightly. “You still feel like going and cataloguing those bullet trajectories?”

 

Her answer didn’t need words, because she actually groaned at the thought. “I think I might head home for a couple hours,” she said, and while he might have responded with something along the “I told you so” lines, he didn’t even think about doing so. Well, not much anyway.

 

Instead, he asked her another question, and he didn’t really care if she gave him hell for it. “You gonna be ok getting home?”

 

She gave him a tired smile, nodding. “I’ll be fine. All of a sudden, all I want is my bed.” She wrinkled her nose, something he couldn’t ever remember seeing Sara do before, something that struck him as adorable. “Which is odd. I don’t get tired.”

 

“Maybe someone else does.” The second the words were out there, he wanted to take them back, but much to his surprise, she just smiled, the type of smile that he never would have associated with Sara Sidle. Moreover, her right hand moved to her abdomen, rubbing there absently.

 

“Maybe so.” They were silent for a moment, her lost in thought, him looking at her. The moment was broken when her eyes met his, and he saw a flicker of doubt there. “Am I doing the right thing Warrick?” she asked, and he didn’t hesitate in his answer.

 

“You’re going to be fine Sara. I have no doubts.”

 

Earlier in the day, he might have. But sitting there, with her, he had none. And when he saw her smile, he was even more sure.

 

>*<*>*<

 

After he and Sara walked back to the lab, and he made sure that she was in her car and safely on her way home – just short of making her promise to call him when she got home so that he’d know she got there ok – he decided to take his own advice. Heading home, he sacked out the second his head hit the pillow, and it seemed like no time at all until his alarm was blaring and it was time to go back to the lab.

 

His first stop was the garage, where he checked the tyre treads from the crime scene against the mini-van. On visual observation alone, he knew that they were onto something, but he covered all his bases anyway, hunkering down and putting the clear plastic sheets over the tired treads, proving beyond doubt what he already knew. “Venus and Serena,” he murmured. “Perfect match.”

 

That much done, he got down to the serious business of searching the car, and it didn’t take him long to hit pay dirt. There, clear as day, was a torn beer carton that bore the price tag of Jenko’s Liquor Store, and upon checking the door, he noticed several dark spots. A spray of phenothaline later, those dark spots were bright pink, and he was reaching for his cell phone to call O’Riley, tell him that they were ready to talk to Kevin McCallum.

 

He was on his way down the hall when he saw Sara coming in the other direction, and he slowed down, giving her a smile. “Hey.” Then he looked at his watch. “You just get in?”

 

Sara nodded, looking abashed. “I overslept,” she said, making it sound like a four-letter word, and her cheeks darkened when he laughed. “Don’t tell anyone?”

 

“My lips are sealed,” he promised. It was on the tip of his tongue to ask how she was, to point out that she must have been tired if she was sleeping late, but he resisted temptation, instead asking, “So, you’re on bullet trajectories?”

 

Sara nodded. “You want to help?”

 

He snickered. “Picture that,” and Sara shrugged, as if to say that you couldn’t blame a girl for trying. “I gotta go over to PD, talk to Kevin McCallum. Blood in the van, and part of a beer carton from Jenko Liquor.”

 

From the look on Sara’s face, Warrick wasn’t sure whether she was surprised or impressed, and her tone didn’t do anything to help. “He was there,” she said, and he nodded.

 

“Looks like. So O’Riley’s starting him off, and we’ll see what we can get.” He checked his watch. “I should be back in an hour, hour and a half? I’ll meet you then.”

 

“Great.” Sara was already walking past him, but after a couple of steps she turned, grinning at him. “I’ll save you some bullets.”

 

“Music to my ears,” he quipped, walking backwards down the hallway, not turning until she’d turned the corner.

 

Warrick went straight to PD, and to his surprise, found Nick there already, standing on the other side of the two-way mirror, watching O’Riley interrogate Kevin McCallum.

 

“Just talked to Bobby Dawson,” Nick said. “All the bullets came from the same gun. 

Nine-millimetre semi-automatic.  How's this going?”

 

“I found a twelve pack container in the McCallum minivan,” Warrick replied. “Sales slip said ‘Jenko Liquors’.”

 

Nick nodded. “I'll check the surveillance, see if we can get some footage of this guy.” As they watched Kevin McCallum shifted in his seat, uncomfortable under the weight of O’Riley’s stare, and when his left arm moved, Warrick noticed something odd on his shirt. For a split-second, he thought his eyes were playing tricks on him, that he was seeing what he wanted to see, but then Nick spoke, proving that he’d seen the same thing. “What is that on his elbow?”

 

There was only one person who could answer that, and without further ado, they went into the interrogation room, nodding to O’Riley, Nick asking the detective with a raised eyebrow if they could step in. O’Riley moved his chair back slightly, stretched out one arm to show his approval, and Warrick inclined his head towards Nick, indicating that he should take the lead.

 

“What’s that on your arm?” he demanded, in a voice that didn’t allow for argument, but Kevin tried to stonewall anyway.

 

“It's just a scab,” he replied. “Got it skateboarding.”

 

Warrick didn’t believe that for a second, but this was Nick’s thing, so he let him take the lead. “Can we see it?”

 

Kevin sighed, but didn’t look disposed to move, so Warrick put on his most serious countenance, counting that his frown would intimidate the kid. “Peel it back,” he ordered.

 

Kevin might have been trying to be brave, but with Warrick, Nick and O’Riley all staring daggers at him, he knew when he was beaten. Slowly, he removed the bandage, exposing his cut to their eyes, and Warrick kept his face neutral with difficulty. He didn’t pretend to be an expert on abrasions and injuries, had no formal medical training, but he knew a gunshot wound when he saw one.

 

“Skateboarding?” he asked. “Why don't you stand up and take off your shirt?”

 

His bravado vanishing by the second, Kevin tried one last feint. “Don't you guys need a warrant for that?”

 

That was a question that O’Riley chose to deal with, the burly detective managing to insert more threat into a few simple words than Warrick or Nick would ever have been able to accomplish. “We get a warrant, and we're going to strip you down to nothing, then ask you to bend over.” He left a slight pause, just long enough to let those words sink in. “Choose.”

 

Kevin let out a long breath, but then he stood up, taking off his shirt, exposing his chest to their gaze. Warrick wasn’t the least bit surprised to see that his body was covered in cuts and bruises, almost the same as those that they’d found on Timmy. “Geez, man, what happened to you?” he asked. “Turn around.” There were more marks on Kevin’s back. “Those are the same markings your brother had.  You want to tell us what went down here?”

 

He’d thought that they were getting somewhere, but Kevin’s next words put paid to that notion. “I can't talk about it.  I'm sorry.”

 

Warrick couldn’t help but note that he really did sound it, and maybe Nick heard that too, because he played good cop, saying, “Hey, listen, if you’re the victim here, you can tell us. OK?”

 

Seeing perhaps a slight flicker in Kevin’s face, Warrick pressed on with, “Kevin, who did this to you man?”

 

Kevin looked at him for a long moment and didn’t say anything. Then he sat back down again, silent.

 

>*<*>*<

 

After seeing the marks on Kevin McCallum’s body, they stayed with him for a long time, trying to get him to talk, but to no avail. When it was evident that they were getting nowhere, Warrick excused himself, going out to his car and getting his camera, taking pictures of the marks on Kevin’s body. “Probably won’t do any good,” he told Nick and O’Riley when they left Kevin in the room, giving him yet more time to think about what he could do. “But you never know.”

 

Nick nodded. “I’ll start tracking down that surveillance footage. You want in?”

 

Warrick was about to nod, but then he remembered that there was someplace else he had to be, and he looked at his watch, finding to his dismay that he was already way late to meet up with Sara. “Sara’s working on the shooting reconstruction; I told her I’d help her out.”

 

Nick held up his hands. “Far be it from me to stop you man,” he said, but with a smile on his face that Warrick wasn’t entirely crazy about.

 

“What?”

 

Nick was all innocence. “What?”

 

“You got something to say, come out and say it.”

 

Nick shrugged. “Just that you and Sara seem to be spending a lot of time together. That’s all,” he said. “You got something you want to tell us?”

 

Warrick blew air out between his lips. “Man, you’re trippin’,” he said, even as Sara’s words from the previous shift ran through his mind, the query she’d voiced that he hadn’t been able to answer.

 

“I’m just wondering why you care so much… why this means so much to you.”

 

Nick’s voice came in on the tail end of Sara’s, his tone pure scepticism. “Am I?”

 

Warrick rolled his eyes, waved a hand in disgusted dismissal before turning on his heel and making his way back to the lab and Sara. He tried to put Nick’s insinuation out of his mind, because he knew it was ridiculous. He was just looking out for Sara, that was all. She needed a friend, was going through one of the hardest things she was probably ever going to have to go through. If Nick knew what he knew, he’d be doing the same thing. That was all there was to it.

 

Warrick told himself that, several times, but for some reason, it didn’t make it ring any more true.

 

Such thoughts stayed in his mind as he made his way back to the lab, but he forced them out once he stepped through the doors, making his way to the AV lab where he knew Sara would be waiting for him. He didn’t waste any time apologising when he saw her bent over the computer typing, a frown on her face. “I’m sorry I’m late. What bullet are you on?” From the time he’d been gone, not to mention from the tension across her shoulders, he figured she was pretty near to the end, and her next words bore that out.

 

“109, finally.” He just about kept back a wince, keeping his face neutral. “Height, distance, angle.” She tapped each key ferociously, and he found himself wondering if he should move backwards lest she stab him. “This has been a very laborious shift,” she concluded dryly, turning to him and looking into his eyes. He wanted to ask her if she was all right, but there was something in her countenance that made him think she’d lynch him if he tried, and besides, in the back of his eyes, he was sure he could see a spark of humour there. “Are you in the mood for a light show?” she asked, and he grinned, knowing that she’d read his mood and thoughts perfectly.

 

“Yeah,” he said, turning his attention to the screen. “Hook it up.”

 

With the press of a key, the screen came to life, showing the crime scene and the bullets moving across it. Streaks of red light converged in one direction, making a distinct image, one that looked familiar to Warrick. “The trajectory is all pointing in one uniform area.  Looks like some kind of a pole.”

 

The second the last word left his lips, an image invaded his mind; Sara, walking down the hall and nearly skewering some poor lab tech with a limbo pole. He knew exactly what she was going to say, and he wasn’t surprised when she said it, in a very “I told you so” tone of voice. “Or a bamboo stick.”

 

What with the absence of GSR, Warrick had been sure that the pole was indeed a piece of debris that had just happened to be on the roof of the warehouse. He’d more or less forgotten about it in the investigating of Kevin McCallum’s story and the mysterious glass. Now it looked like the bamboo stick did indeed have some kind of bearing on the case, though Warrick couldn’t imagine what or how. It was an extra piece to a puzzle that already had too many, and he couldn’t help but laugh. “The whole case has been like this,” he observed. “It's like you can't wrap your head around it, you know?”

 

Sara began running through the evidence they’d collected so far. “A bamboo cane with black swirls descending downward, no GSR, 109 rods, 109 bullets, all fired from the same gun.”

 

“Camera glass, blood droplets everywhere,” Warrick continued. “DNA that says five people were there, one boy’s dead, one boy’s injured, and he ain’t sayin’ nothin’…” He couldn’t come up with any conceivable way that those elements could be related, and yet they had to be. But from the look on Sara’s face, she couldn’t shine any light on it either, and that perplexed him even more. He and Sara together made a good team, balancing one another out, keeping one another in check, thinking along the same lines, spurring one another along to come to the right conclusion. They’d never come up against a case they couldn’t solve, and the fact that they seemed to be doing now rankled. “Is this the end of the road?” he asked her, just in case he was reading her wrong, but her quiet answer told him he wasn’t.

 

“Forensically?” she asked him, looking at the now blank screen, then back to him. “Yes.” She sounded as depressed about it as he was, certainly as tired and frustrated, and she sighed, turning back towards the blank screen. Pushing the keyboard away from her, she gave herself room to rest her elbows on the table, covering her face with her hands, her shoulders rising and falling in another huge sigh.

 

Warrick frowned, glancing towards the deserted hallway, then back to her, reaching out carefully to rest his hand on her back. He was concerned about how she might react, but she didn’t move, and his frown increased when he felt the tension along her spine. That wasn’t good for anyone, he thought, let alone someone in her… He stopped the thought before it could finish, biting the inside of his cheek as he moved his hand up and down her spine. “You want to take a break?” he asked her quietly. “Go for a walk, clear your head?”

 

He felt the muscle of her back move slightly as she straightened a little, but he didn’t drop his hand. “No,” she replied, moving her hands to push back her hair, tucking it behind her ears. “I’m fine.”

 

“You look like you’re about half an inch away from collapsing,” he told her, not unkindly, and she chuckled, though she stopped when he made his next suggestion. “You want to go get something to eat?”

 

Her face twisted into a grimace, and colour leeched from her face. “No,” she said firmly. “Thank you.”

 

Warrick tilted his head, eyes narrowed in concern. “You feeling ok?”

 

She smiled wanly. “Nauseated,” she told him. “When they say morning sickness, they forget to tell you that it comes and goes all day.” She shot him a wry smile, shook her head at the look he gave her in return. “Don’t even think about saying it.”

 

“Say what?” He tried for innocence, thought he missed it by a mile, a suspicion borne out by her next words.

 

“Anything to do with my condition.” She sounded amused, placing extra emphasis on the last two words, lips twitching. “If you keep on like this, I will have to kill you.”

 

“You just wouldn’t be able to do my autopsy,” he countered, regretting his use of the “A” word when she visibly gulped. “Sorry.”

 

She pressed a fist to the underside of her nose, drawing in a deep breath, letting it out slowly. That must have made her feel better, because she gave him a tremulous smile, though she couldn’t hide the slight shaking of her hand as she held it up to him to indicate that his apology was unnecessary. “It’s fine,” she said. “Except that it looks like this is a kid who’s going to love its sleep and be squeamish at the sight of blood…” Her dry assessment made him grin and she rolled her eyes. “Thanks for the sympathy.”

 

“I’ve got nothing but sympathy for you,” he told her, honestly if not humourlessly, and he stood up, moving his hand from her back to her shoulder, squeezing gently. “Come on, let’s get you to the break room… there’s some ginger ale in the refrigerator, it’ll settle your stomach.”

 

“Sounds good.” A pause as she looked up at the screen. “If I can move from this stool that is.” Snickering, he took a step back from her, noting as she moved that she did seem stiff, though of course, after one hundred and nine bullets, he’d be stiff too. His snickers quickly vanished though when he saw her sway on her feet, one hand going to her forehead, the other grabbing for the table, and his hands shot out without him even thinking about it, steadying her.

 

“You ok?” He didn’t even try to stop the alarm from coming out in his voice, and his worry didn’t abate when she took her time in replying. He could hear her breathing, deep and laboured, and when she looked up at him, her face was chalk white. “OK,” he heard himself saying. “Let’s get you-”

 

“I’m fine.” She interrupted him with no conviction whatsoever, and he simply raised an eyebrow, staring her down.

 

“Look,” he said after a second of thought. “Why don’t you go up into one of the offices upstairs, lie down for a bit?” It was common practice among the night shift CSI’s to do that, especially when they’d worked daylight hours as well. The offices upstairs, manned exclusively by office personnel working solely during the day were all furnished with couches where many a weary nightshift CSI had found solace, if not sanity, after an hour’s lie-down. When she bit her lip, he knew that he was getting somewhere, and he pressed ahead, promising, “I’ll come get you if I hear anything.”

 

She looked down, and he knew the battle was over. “Promise?” she mumbled, and he grinned to himself, wanting to pull her into a hug, but knowing he couldn’t, not with the rest of the lab ready to pass by outside.

 

So he settled for increasing the pressure on her arm momentarily. “I promise.”

 

>*<*>*<

 

The next time he saw Sara was when he responded to Nick’s page about surveillance videotapes, and the three of them were helping O’Riley round up their Junior Tarentinos. He gave her a hard look when he saw her coming towards him with Nick, because he didn’t think she’d been lying down for that long. She nodded at him, flashed him a quick smile, as if seeking to reassure him, but it did anything but. She didn’t look any more rested than she had when he’d walked her up to one of the deserted offices upstairs, and if anything, she looked paler, more drawn than she had a couple of hours previously. He wanted to ask her if she was feeling all right, but he knew better than to do that in front of Nick.

 

Besides, when they found the videotape they were looking for, bringing it to the lab, leaving O’Riley to interrogate the kids, he had a feeling that they were about to break the case, and then she’d be able to go home and get some real rest. He’d be more than willing to do her share of the paperwork if it would put some colour back into her cheeks.

 

When he saw the contents of the video though, he thought that it might take more than a good night’s sleep.

 

Five kids, all of them looking familiar, and not a little wild, were mugging for the camera, boasting about their stunts.

 

Speedway surfing, where cars were driven at high speed, one of the boys standing on the car hood, rolling off onto the hard asphalt. Warrick shook his head at the sight, hard pressed not to wince, hardly able to believe what he was seeing. From the silence to his left, Nick and Sara were feeling the same way.

 

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Sara glancing across at him, but he was transfixed by the next stunt on the tape, what the kids called “The 150 Yard Marker”. That involved four of them strapping on football helmets – and how sick was it, Warrick wondered, that he wanted to praise them for taking that minor precaution? – while the fifth shot golf balls at them.

 

Then came a scenario that was familiar to them.

 

Bamboo Russian Roulette.

 

At the mention of bamboo, Warrick shot a quick glance at Sara, whose eyes were locked onto the screen, and he thought that it could have been his imagination, but she seemed to be holding herself just a little bit straighter, as if she was concentrating hard on the images playing across the view screen.

 

All the pieces of the puzzle fell into place as they watched.

 

The bamboo pole, dropped by one kid down through the hole in the ceiling.

 

The gun, let spiral down it, firing all the way.

 

The four others, running crazily, dodging the bullets.

 

Sounds of gunfire and laughter echoing through the lab.

 

A crazy, dizzying shot as the camera fell to the ground.

 

But it was still recording, and they saw, captured in perfect digital quality, Timmy McCallum, saw the bullet hit him the chest. Saw him fall to the ground, looking right into the lens, saw him fighting for his last breath. Heard the alarm of the other boys before everything went black.

 

Warrick had never heard such quiet in the AV lab, and one look at Sara and Nick told him that they were as sickened by what they’d just seen as he was. Nick, his jaw set, his expression serious, turned slowly to meet his gaze, shaking his head, but his expression changed from disgust to concern when his eyes fell on Sara.

 

Warrick followed his gaze, felt an identical expression coming to his own face. Sara’s head was in her hands, elbows resting on the table, back ramrod straight. Her breathing was loud in the silence of the room, deep and even and too controlled. Though he wasn’t sure why, Warrick felt a shiver go down his spine, felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up one by one, and when he dragged his eyes away from her, meeting Nick’s worried glance, he mouthed a single word.

 

“Go.”

 

Nick nodded quickly, keeping his voice as natural as possible as he rose from the stool. “I’m going to book this in,” he said. “Get it to Archie, get him to grab some stills off it…” All of which could be done there, and they all knew it, but Sara didn’t look up, and Warrick wasn’t about to call him on it. “I’ll catch you guys later,” Nick concluded, beating a hasty retreat, leaving Warrick and Sara alone in the too-quiet room, and Sara still didn’t move.

 

Feeling for the first time a thrill of real fear, Warrick reached out a hand, let it hover over her back, dropping it at the last second before it made contact. For some reason, touching her didn’t seem like an option, so instead, he said her name quietly. “Sara?” When there was no response, he shifted slightly so that he was sitting closer to her, closer, but still not touching her. “Sara, you ok?”

 

When eventually she raised her head, turned her face to him, he couldn’t stop his concern from showing, because she was ashen. The words, “I don’t feel so good,” were formed on bloodless lips, and this time, when his hand reached out, it did make contact, rubbing her shoulder carefully.

 

“You don’t look so good,” he observed, in what he felt could possibly be the understatement of the century. “You want to go home?”

 

Slowly, as if each movement hurt, she shook her head. “Something’s wrong.” Her voice was barely a breath, but it was enough to have him on his feet, slipping a steadying arm around her waist, helping her to stand too.

 

“Let’s get you to the hospital.”

 

>*<*>*<

 

The silence of the AV lab was nothing compared to the silence of the car as Warrick sped towards Desert Palm, alternating between keeping his eyes on the road and on Sara’s white face, lips pressed into a thin line. Her hands were joined on her lap as if in prayer, knuckles as white as her face, and when they were stopped at the lights halfway there, he laid his hand over hers for an instant, was shocked at how cold they were.

 

“It’s gonna be ok,” he found himself saying, saw her swallow hard.

 

“No it’s not.”

 

Warrick could do say nothing to that, could do nothing but continue driving. He didn’t speak again, nor did she, not until they pulled into a parking space at Desert Palm, and it became readily apparent that Sara wasn’t going to be able to walk the short space to the entrance. Warrick had to lift her from the car, carry her inside, all the while muttering what he hoped were calming words into her ear. Her arms went around his neck, gripping tightly, and she gave a soft sob when he stepped from the road to the path, his heart wrenching at the sound.

 

Then they were inside the ER and she was laid on a gurney and taken away from him, and he could do nothing but pace the floor and wait.

 

Of course, he realised in short order that there was something he could do; call Nick and clue him in on where they were. He knew that the other man was going to have some serious questions for him, knew he wasn’t going to get away with this lightly, though it looked that way for a while when Nick answered his phone.

 

“Hey man, where’d you get to?” he asked, and Warrick sighed, leaning back against the wall.

 

“Sara wasn’t feeling so good,” he said simply. “I took her home.”

 

“Home.” Warrick could easily picture Nick’s face when he responded; tense jaw, raised eyebrows, eyes burning with intensity. He was about to ask Nick to lay off, not to push him right now, but Nick beat him to it. “She ok?”

 

It wasn’t quite the question that Warrick was expecting, a nudge instead of a push, and it caught him flat-footed, forcing him into honesty. “I’m not sure.”

 

If Nick’s first question caught him off-guard, the second floored him completely. “How far along is she?”

 

Warrick literally gaped, was barely able to muster a “What?” and on the other end of the phone, Nick chuckled humourlessly.

 

“Man, I’ve got five sisters with nine nieces and nephews. It might have taken me a while, but I recognise the signs.” Warrick closed his eyes, letting his head fall back against the wall, banged it once, then twice. “It’s Hank’s, right? And you found out and she asked you not to say anything.” Nick was quite the CSI Warrick noted; he’d put it all together, and he knew it too, continuing with, “Look, you don’t have to say anything. Just if she needs anything-”

 

“We’re at the hospital.” The words were out before Warrick could stop them, and Nick sounded stunned when he spoke again.

 

“Where?”

 

“There’s something wrong,” Warrick told him quietly.

 

Nick’s voice was soft, dismayed. “Is there anything I can do?”

 

“Cover us with Grissom for the rest of the shift,” was Warrick’s suggestion. “This is my night off… I figure Sara can call in later… or I’ll do it for her…”

 

“You got it man. Let me know how she is, ok?”

 

“Sure.” Hanging up the payphone, Warrick ran a hand over his face and went back to his pacing, looking up at the clock every couple of minutes.

 

He stopped two hours later when a harried looking ER doctor came over to him. “You came in with Sara Sidle?” When Warrick nodded, he continued, “And you’re her partner?”

 

Warrick shook his head, thought too late that that might not have been the best idea. “He’s not around anymore,” he replied, doing his best to look like he had every right to ask his next question. “I’m a friend… How is she?”

 

The doctor looked to be wavering between telling Warrick nothing and telling him everything, eventually tipping in the latter direction. “I’m sorry,” he said, and Warrick’s heart dropped into his shoes. “We did everything we could, but we lost the baby.”

 

“Damn.” Warrick’s throat felt tight, and he had to swallow hard. That surprised him, because he hadn’t known that it meant so much to him. Looking down at the ground, he took a deep breath, cleared his throat. “Sorry… I expected that… but still…” The doctor nodded. “How’s Sara? Can I see her?”

 

The doctor looked over his shoulder, then back at Warrick. “She’s going to be fine,” he said. “Technically, she could go home, but we’d like to keep her in for observation…”

 

Warrick chuckled at both the tone of his voice and the look on his face. “Bet that’s going over like a lead balloon, huh?”

 

“You could say that.” The doctor glanced over his shoulder again, then looked at his watch. “Look, I’m not supposed to do this… but if you want to see her, talk to her, I’ll take you back. You might be able to talk some sense into her.”

 

Again, Warrick chuckled. “You don’t know her very well, do you Doc?”

 

Perhaps wisely, the doctor chose not to comment on that, instead led Warrick back through the ER, pulling aside a curtain at the back of the room. Sara was lying there, the only colour on her face the redness of her eyes, and even from the foot of the bed, Warrick could see tear stains on her cheeks. “Hey,” he said, going over to stand beside her, taking one of her hands in both of his, not even thinking about it. “How you doing?”

 

Her hand was ice in his, and when she looked up at him, she didn’t waste any time in making her request. “Take me home,” she pleaded, and he sighed, casting a glance at the doctor.

 

“They say they want to keep you in for a little while,” he reminded her, and she closed her eyes, tilting her head back. “Maybe you should listen…”

 

He stopped talking when a single tear escaped her closed lids, tracing a silver path down her cheek, and when she opened her eyes, he saw more ready to fall. He’d never seen Sara cry before, and in the split second that it took for that thought to register with him, he knew that he’d do anything to stop it from happening again. “Please Warrick,” she whispered. “Get me out of here.”

 

Sighing, he turned to the doctor. “I’ll take her home,” he said, and when the doctor opened his mouth to object, Warrick spoke right over him. “I’ll stay with her, if she starts feeling worse, we’ll come straight back… right?” That last was aimed squarely at Sara, who nodded obediently, and Warrick nodded at the doctor, who was looking more than a little annoyed. “It’s ok Doc,” he said, Sara’s hand still cold in his. “I’ll take care of her.”

 

>*<*>*<

 

The journey from Desert Palm to Sara’s apartment was just as quiet as the journey from the lab to Desert Palms had been, though the end result was a little different. Wheeled out of the hospital, Sara walked from the car to her apartment, though she moved slowly, stiffly, with Warrick’s arm securely around her waist. She tried to tell him that she was fine, that he didn’t have to support her, but he just glared at her, and she didn’t say anything else after that. The stairs were a different matter though; he had to practically carry her up those, and when they got into her apartment, he pushed the door closed behind them with one foot, then lifted her easily into his arms, carrying her over to the couch and setting her down on it. It was, he thought, a measure of how bad she must be feeling that she didn’t even protest.

 

He left her there, moving into the kitchen and pouring her a glass of water, bringing it to her and putting it on the table in front of her, along with the phial of pills that the doctor had pressed into his hand as he left. “Doc said you can take two of these in another couple of hours,” he told her. “I’ll leave them here…”

 

“You don’t have to stay you know.”

 

Her voice was so quiet that he thought he’d misheard her. “Huh?”

 

“You don’t have to stay.” Her voice was weak, but louder, and she looked up at him as she repeated herself, eyes narrowed as if in challenge. “You must have other places to be.”

 

“Sara…” He sighed, because this was Sara Sidle at her worst, the prickly, surly Sara who didn’t let anyone near her, the one who’d investigated him, been so cold to him when she thought he was gambling again. He hadn’t seen that Sara in a long time, and he knew why she was making a reappearance this time. She was about an inch away from falling apart, and she didn’t want to do it in front of him. Which he completely understood, and absolutely respected. He just wasn’t going to let her get away with it. “I’m here,” he finally told her, squatting beside her, meeting her gaze at eye level. “And I’m staying. So deal with it, ok?” His voice was gentler than his words, and she gave him a watery smile and nod. “You in a lot of pain?” he asked, and she shrugged, even that simple act causing shadows to dart across her eyes.

 

“No.”

 

It was a small, scared, little-girl voice, and he lifted one eyebrow. “You lying to me?”

 

The very edges of her lips turned up briefly. “Little bit.”

 

He grinned, shaking his head. “I figured.” Standing, he reached down for her. “Come on, let’s get you lying down…” He lifted her easily, and once again, she didn’t protest, looping her arms around his neck, letting her head fall against his chest, and he carried her easily into her bedroom, laid her down on the bed. She rolled onto her left side, looking in the direction of the window, the bright sunlight streaming down the room, and his first act was to cross to the window, pull down the blinds. Then he returned to her side, helped her off with her shoes, finally pulling up the blanket at the bottom of the bed, covering her with it. Making a face, she pushed it down so that it fell to knee level, and he held up his hands in mock innocence, a stance that made her smile, albeit briefly.

 

“I’ll be right outside,” he told her, taking a step towards the door, but still facing her. “If you need me, yell, ok?”

 

She nodded, and there were more tears in her eyes when she did, and he took that as his cue to leave, because he knew she wouldn’t want him to see her like that. He got as far as the door before her voice stopped him. “Warrick?” When he looked back at her, she was still lying on her side, but her head was turned towards him. As he looked, she propped herself up, the better to see him, the act causing a flash of pain to sear across her face. She bit her lip, falling back against the pillows, but before she was lying back down again, he was back in front of her, more worried than ever.

 

“You ok?” he asked, squatting down in front of her, and she nodded, her eyes filled with tears. He didn’t call her on the obvious lie, not when he saw her swallow hard.

 

“You’ve been so great,” she whispered. “And I know I shouldn’t ask… I know it’s not…” She closed her eyes, drew in a deep shuddering breath, and he knew what she was going to ask him.

 

Her eyes flew open when he stood, alarm stamping itself all over her features, replaced instantly by relief when she realised what he was doing; unbuttoning his shirt, stripping down to his undershirt, and throwing the shirt over the chair in the corner as he toed off his shoes. “You’d better not be no bedhog,” he groused good-naturedly, walking around to the other side of the bed, and he was rewarded by the tiniest of giggles as he lay down beside her. He was very careful not to touch her, just like he hadn’t wanted to touch her that day not so long ago when they’d sat on her couch and she’d told him all about finding out that she was pregnant. Instead, he lay on his back, staring up at the ceiling, hands joined over his belly, and she lay on her side, her back to him, and he didn’t move, not until he heard a distinctive sniffle, and he knew that she was doing what she hadn’t let herself do since this whole mess began.

 

It took him mere seconds to consider his options, and his mind was made up when he heard a second, quieter sniffle. Because this was Sara, because pulling her into his arms was not an option, he reached out carefully with his left hand, laid it gently on her right hip.

 

For the longest second of his life, she did not move.

 

Then, without turning, her right hand moved up, gripped on to his tightly, held it there, her freezing fingers entwining with his warm ones, squeezing them hard.

 

She did not move, nor did she make any more noise.

 

But minutes later, her breathing was deep and even, her hand still holding his, still resting on her hip.

 

Minutes later, he was asleep too.

 

>*<*>*<

 

He was woken up not too long later by the ringing of the doorbell, pressed with the insistent force of someone who not only has been ringing for a while already, but one who’s not going to be easily put off. Glancing down at Sara, he realised with equal parts amusement and worry that she hadn’t stirred; quite a feat for someone who got by on four hours sleep a night, if that. “Must be some drugs,” he thought to himself, sliding himself off the bed carefully, so as not to wake her. The doorbell rang again as he moved, and he cursed whoever it was silently, pausing only to grab his shirt from the chair and slipping it on, stopping short of buttoning it up. He figured he didn’t have time to worry about that before the next blast of the doorbell would sound, and he figured right too, the noise coming just as he was a step away from the door.

 

He set his jaw as he wrenched it open, ready to give whoever was on the other side an earful, something about not disturbing people when they’re sick, but when he saw who was standing there, all such thoughts went out of his head.

 

Others, far more violent, rushed in to take their place.

 

Standing there, looking as surprised to see Warrick as Warrick was to see him, was none other than Hank Peddigrew, and Warrick felt a rush of anger course through him. “What do you want?” he demanded, keeping his voice low so as not to disturb Sara.

 

“Warrick?” Hank asked, surprise turning to confusion, and Warrick had a sudden vision of what this must look like to Hank; him answering Sara’s door barefoot, shirt undone, looking sleep-interrupted and slumber-rumpled. The direction that Hank’s thoughts were taking was perfectly clear when his eyes narrowed, looked beyond Warrick into the apartment, taking in every inch they could. “Is Sara here?”

 

The question was laced with suspicion, asked as if he had every right to, as if it was all right that he was there after the way he’d treated Sara. It was enough to raise Warrick’s blood temperature several degrees. “She’s sleeping,” he said curtly, and to hell with what Hank thought that meant.

 

Which soon became perfectly clear. “Alone?”

 

At the sharp tone in Hank’s voice, Warrick felt himself using hitherto unknown reserves of willpower to stop himself knocking the other man into the middle of next week. “Yes.” Which wasn’t exactly a lie, he told himself, but Hank didn’t have any right to the truth either. “What do you want?” he asked again.

 

Hank swallowed hard. “To see Sara. I heard… I mean… Is she… is she ok?”

 

Warrick narrowed his eyes, glaring at Hank. “None of your damn business,” he hissed, stepping closer to Hank, almost enjoying the way the other man took a step back, at least, until Hank began speaking, holding up a hand.

 

“Look man, I don’t know what you’ve heard…”

 

“All I need to.” Warrick didn’t want to hear any of his excuses, knew that if he did, Hank would end up picking himself up off the floor. “And enough to know she’s not going to want to see you. So why don’t you just-”

 

“Warrick?”

 

He stopped talking and spun around at the sound of Sara’s voice, but not moving quickly enough to miss the flash of concern and something else on Hank’s face. He figured out quickly that the something else was very like dismay, but by the time he did, he was more concerned with Sara, was moving towards her. She was leaning heavily on the kitchen counter, as if it was the only thing holding her up, and Warrick didn’t doubt for a second that it was. If anything, she was even paler than she had been when he’d brought her home from the hospital, and he didn’t know if it was the exertion of moving or the shock of seeing Hank that had her that way. Either way, he was by her side in an instant, helping her on to one of the stools at the counter, his hand resting protectively on her back, and to hell with his reluctance to touch her of earlier on. Then he’d been afraid that she would break if he laid a hand on her; now he thought that she needed a reminder to that he was there for her. If it served also as a warning to Hank, well then, so much the better.

 

Hank, meanwhile, had taken advantage of Warrick’s preoccupation with Sara to step into the apartment, letting the door close behind him. “Sara…” he began, sounding shocked, his voice trailing off, and while Warrick was all ready to throw him out, closed door or no closed door, Sara’s voice stopped him.

 

“What do you want Hank?” She didn’t sound angry, just weary, and Warrick didn’t miss how she was leaning towards him, stepped just a bit closer to her in response.

 

If the look that Hank gave them was anything to go by, he didn’t miss it either. “Jimmy told me he saw you in the ER earlier,” he replied, looking ill at ease. “Said that you looked in pretty bad shape…”

 

“I had a miscarriage.” Sara’s words were blunt, her voice strong, but Warrick’s hand was still on her back, and he could feel her shaking, knew the effort it was costing her to stay in control. “Is that what you wanted to know?”

 

Hank’s jaw dropped, and he looked down. “I’m sorry,” he began, but that was as far as Sara let him get.

 

“Why? You couldn’t be sure it was yours, isn’t that what you told me? And that you didn’t want to know?”

 

“Looks like I had good reason,” Hank flared, and while Warrick was all ready to jump in, Sara beat him to it.

 

“Don’t.” Her head snapped up, her cheeks red, eyes burning with anger. “Don’t you dare put this on me. Warrick is here because I needed him.” She swallowed hard, took a deep breath. “The baby was yours, Hank. And you know it was.”

 

Hank, looking suitably chastened, dropped his head, a move that Warrick took as tacit confirmation. “I said a lot of things,” Hank finally said quietly. “Things I shouldn’t have said.” Which Warrick thought was possibly the understatement of the century, and he bit his tongue, looking heavenward. “But you’ve got to understand Sara, I was freaked out…”

 

 “And I wasn’t?” Sara sounded incredulous. “I went to you because I thought you deserved to know… and because you were the only other person whose life would change. I thought you’d understand… and you as good as called me a whore.”

 

It was stronger language than he’d ever heard from Sara, but if Warrick was shocked, then Hank was more so. “I didn’t mean…”

 

“You never do.” Sara’s tone was contemptuous, dismissive. “But you did… so you don’t get to come here and throw around accusations…” She shook her head, looking away. “Just go Hank… I don’t want you here.”

 

That was all Warrick needed to hear. “You heard her, man,” he said, stepping towards Hank. He half expected Hank to resist, but he just shot Warrick a look, then looked past him to Sara.

 

“If I can do anything-” he said, five words that had Warrick’s hand clenching in a fist. Only Sara’s next words stopped him doing anything he wouldn’t regret.

 

“There is.” Warrick and Hank turned surprised gazes towards her, though Warrick’s transmuted quickly into suspicion. “I don’t know what you told Jimmy, and I don’t care… but I was waiting to tell people…” Her voice broke, and she had to clear her throat audibly before she could continue. “Warrick’s the only one who knows.” She glanced quickly at Warrick, then back to Hank, but he was already nodding.

 

“I’ll take care of it.”

 

“Good.”  Evidently Hank knew goodbye when he heard it, because he nodded once more, turning towards the door, and Warrick watched him go. It was only when the sound of the door closing echoed through the apartment that he turned his attention back to Sara, getting to her just in time for her to collapse against him, her arms going around his waist.

 

He held her tightly for a long moment before pulling back, raising her chin so that he could look at her face. He could feel her shaking, but her eyes were dry, and he sighed. “You should be in bed,” he told her, and she sucked in a deep breath, shaking her head.

 

“I heard you talking…” Her voice was barely a whisper, had Warrick scooping her up in his arms, carrying her back to bed.

 

“Don’t talk,” he told her as he walked, and she obeyed, a sure fire measure of how lethargic she was feeling. Laying her down on the bed, he kneeled down beside her, taking a chance that brushing her hair out of her face wouldn’t be out of line, letting his hand linger there when she didn’t move away. “You want me here, or the couch?” he asked her, perfectly willing to accept either, whichever she was more comfortable with. His answer came quickly, not in words, but in the beseeching brown eyes that stared up at him, the cold hand that closed around his wrist.

 

“Don’t leave me,” she whispered, closing her eyes tightly. “I know it’s stupid…”

 

“Hey…” He gently disentangled her fingers from his wrist, only for as long as it took him to walk around to the other side of the bed, to lie down beside her on it. “It’s not stupid at all,” he told her.

 

She didn’t say anything, but she did move slightly, shuffling closer to him on the bed so that they were lying side by side, both staring up at the ceiling, the right side of her body warm against his left. Closing his eyes, because he, at least, had to get up in a few more hours, he was all ready to get some sleep, was sure she’d want the same. His eyes flew open almost immediately though, at the sensation of her hand closing over his. Turning his head towards her, he saw that her eyes were closed, but that one solitary tear was rolling down her cheek.

 

Moving his hand, he threaded his fingers through hers, squeezed tightly, smiling when her lips turned up in a small smile.

 

Both were asleep within minutes.

 

>*<*>*<

 

At the sound of a soft whimper, his eyes flew open, and he was instantly wide awake. A quick glance at the bedside clock told him that Sara was overdue for her meds, that she must be in some kind of pain by now, the noise that had woken him an indication of that. Even as he realised that, there was another of those little noises, and he realised with a shock that while Sara might have fallen asleep at his side, she hadn’t remained there. Now, she was lying practically on top of him, having turned in her sleep, buried her head in his shoulder, thrown her arm around his waist. It was just as evident that his sleep-soaked mind had not only acknowledged her actions, but welcomed them, because his arms were wrapped around her, holding her securely in place, errant strands of her hair tickling his chin.

 

He was holding Sara Sidle in his arms, and it didn’t feel wrong, or strange, just strangely right. Such thoughts should have alarmed him, but they didn’t, and in any case, they were pushed aside when Sara whimpered again. This one was accompanied by her moving against him, burrowing her head into his chest, her free hand clenching on the white cotton of his undershirt. Frowning, he tightened his grip on her hand, moved the other up her back until it rested on the back of her head, threaded through her hair. “Sara,” he murmured, keeping his voice low, trying to make her awakening as little of a shock as possible. “Sara… come on… time to wake up…”

 

She shifted against him again, fighting sleep. “Warrick?” she mumbled, and he half-expected her to bolt upright, ask him what the hell he was doing there, but she didn’t, just burrowed closer. “What time is it?”

 

“Early,” he told her. “You’ve only been out a few hours.” He neglected to mention Hank, hoping that the brief interlude in a drug-induced sleep would be dismissed as a nightmare. “How you feeling?”

 

She made a move as if to roll off him, but she only succeeded in propping herself up a little before she drew in her breath with an audible hiss. Then she collapsed against him, returning her head to its pillow. “It hurts…” She sounded almost childlike, and he cupped the back of her head, pressed a kiss to her crown, belatedly wondering what the hell he was doing.

 

“I know baby.” The words came automatically, and he wanted to bite off his tongue when he heard the endearment, but Sara didn’t react. “I’ll go get your pills…” He moved as slowly and carefully as he possibly could, but he knew from the sound of her breathing that he caused her pain anyway. In the living room, he found the pills where he’d left them, filled a glass with water, and when he came back, he found her lying on her back, eyes closed, dark circles in a pale face. “Here you go,” he said, holding out two tablets, sitting down beside her on the bed and supporting her into a sitting position when it became clear that she wasn’t going to do it herself. He made sure that the pills were swallowed and that half of the water was drained before reaching over to the bedside table, handing her the phone. “You need to call Grissom,” he told her, and she nodded. He made to move, to give her some privacy, but she stopped him, her hand closing around his wrist, her eyes looking up at him in pleading question. He didn’t need to see anything else, just dropped back down on the bed, making himself comfortable, back against the headboard, legs crossed at the ankle, his arm around her shoulders.

 

She pressed in the numbers to Grissom’s cell phone, and thanks to their proximity, Warrick was able to hear both sides of the conversation, starting with Grissom’s greeting, an austere, not too friendly sounding “Grissom”.

 

“Grissom, it’s Sara,” was Sara’s opening salvo, and Grissom sounded mildly concerned when he replied.

 

“You sound terrible.”

 

A very pale ghost of a smile crossed Sara’s lips. “Yeah… look, I’m not going to be able to come in tonight… probably for the next couple of shifts.”

 

“You’re sick?”

 

Sara nodded, eyes trained on the ceiling. “Stomach flu,” she said, weighing each word carefully. “It’s… it’s pretty ugly around here.” Warrick could see cracks emerging in her composure, wondered if Grissom could hear them too, and he moved his hand from his shoulder to her back, making wide sweeping circles against the material of her blouse.

 

“That’s fine Sara… we’ll see you when you’re better.”

 

“Thanks Grissom. Bye.” With that, Sara hung up the phone, handed it to Warrick who threw it on the bedside table. As he was doing that, she moved to a lying position, scooting down so that her body was pressed against his, his arm still around her.

 

“You ok?” Warrick asked her after she’d been silent for a long moment.

 

“I think the drugs are starting to work,” she replied, tilting her head up towards him. “And Grissom didn’t ask too many questions…”

 

Warrick snickered. “Mark that date on the calendar,” and a flash of humour sparked in her eyes. “You’re gonna take your time coming back to work, right?” he asked, just to make sure, because in the two and a half years he’d been working with Sara, he’d seen her come in dog tired, nearly sick, just over sickness, while still sick… he didn’t want to see that again.

 

She rolled her eyes. “Trust me,” she said. “I’m in no hurry to get back.” A rueful smile, devoid of humour, lit her face. “Guess we should mark that on the calendar too huh?”

 

He sighed. “Sara…”

 

“I never wanted kids Warrick,” she told him, and it was from far enough out of left field that it stopped him talking. “I’m not good with kids… with people. I’d see my friends with theirs, and people I worked with, like Catherine, and they’d look so natural at it… but not me. What kind of mother would I make?” She wasn’t looking at him any more, her gaze levelled on the wall, unblinking, completely dry. “When I found out… I didn’t know what to do. I knew I didn’t want an abortion, but I didn’t know if I wanted a baby either.” She was rambling and he let her, his hand playing idly with the ends of her hair, not interrupting, because she needed this, needed to let it out. “Then the more I thought about it, the more I got used to the idea… it didn’t seem so scary.” He had a sudden memory of her face as they sat in the diner, eating breakfast in the middle of the case, her hand on her abdomen, the kind of smile on her face that he’d never seen there before, and he knew just what she meant. “OK,” she corrected herself with a chuckle. “It still seemed scary… but it was a good scary. You know?”

 

Her eyes met his then, and he knew that a response was expected. “Yeah,” he said quietly. “I know.” In point of fact, he thought that he might be understanding the notion of “good scary” rather too well at the moment, because he’d just realised, once again, where he was.

 

In Sara Sidle’s apartment.

 

In Sara Sidle’s bed, with Sara pressed up against him, telling him her deepest thoughts.

 

It should have felt wrong, but it didn’t.

 

And that, he found, was a very good scary indeed.

 

Maybe she thought the same thing, because her quiet words brought him back to reality. “Is this weird?” He looked down at her, found that she was looking up at him, her eyes narrowed, forehead creased.

 

“What?” he asked, playing for time, because he needed to know more about what she was thinking, how she was feeling, before he committed himself to anything.

 

She lifted an eyebrow in response, a sure sign that she must be feeling better he figured. That was the Sara Sidle of old. “This,” she told him quietly, unclenching her hand from his undershirt, moving it around to indicate the room, them. “Us… this…” Her hand returned to his chest, her eyes following it. “I don’t know why you’re here… why you’ve been here since you found out…” Her voice seemed to choke slightly, her shoulders shaking as she fought back a sob. “I just don’t know how I would have got through this without you.”

 

The words hung in the air between them, and Warrick sighed, his fingers still threading through her hair. “I don’t know either Sara,” he whispered, and she looked up, dark and doubtful eyes meeting his. “I just… it feels like I have to be here.”

 

Her lips moved, forming a brief, shaking smile. “I’m glad,” she whispered.

 

“Yeah.” His free hand reached up, cupping her chin, his thumb rubbing the skin there. Her eyes fluttered closed at his touch, and, after a couple of seconds, his thumb widened its path, brushing across her lips. “Me too,” he breathed, and her eyes opened at his words, and for the first time in days, he didn’t see confusion or pain or anything like that. Instead, he saw something that made him dip his head, made him cover her lips with his. It was the barest touch of skin against skin, but he felt the effects of the contact all the way down to his toes, and from the way she shifted against him, pressing herself closer to him, he thought that she might be feeling the same thing.

 

The kiss was brief, purposely so on his part, and when she leaned back into him, seeking his lips again, he actually moved his head away from her. She frowned, narrowing her eyes in question, and the back of his hand moved across her cheek, brushing back her hair behind her ears. “That was nice…” she whispered, and he chuckled, nodding.

 

“It was,” he agreed, splaying his hands on her back, moving them up and down. He didn’t take his eyes off her, couldn’t, so he was able to see the flicker of doubt – amazed doubt, he thought, but doubt nonetheless – forming there.

 

“Are we really doing this?” she asked, and he sighed, because he knew the answer to that. It just wasn’t one that he was sure he wanted to give, even if he knew that it was the right thing to do.

 

“I’d like to,” he told her, and she grinned. “I’m just not sure we should do this now.”

 

Her smile disappeared, her jaw dropping, and her eyes narrowed in what looked very like a combination of hurt and anger. “What do you-?”

 

“I mean,” he interrupted her, his voice completely calm, “That you’ve just gone through one of the worst things in your life… and maybe, just maybe, you don’t need to make a big decision like this now.” Pausing, he let that settle, and when her gaze dropped downward, he knew that she understood. “I want this Sara,” he continued. “I just want you to be sure about it too.”

 

She nodded, her fingers playing with the white cotton under her palm, and from her demeanour, he knew that she was totally unaware of the effect that she was having on him. “And what if… what if later on… I don’t feel the same?”

 

Once more, his hand went to her chin, tilting her head up so that she could see him, know that he was being sincere. “Then I’ll still be your friend… and I’ll always be there for you… no matter what.”

 

Her smile returned, and tears came to her eyes. Swallowing, she laid her head back down against his shoulder, and he wrapped his arms around her, held her tight. “I’m glad you’re my friend,” she whispered.

 

“Yeah.” He kissed the top of her head, closing his eyes and making himself comfortable, knowing all the while that he could get very, very used to this; knowing that, in time, he would. “Me too.”

 

end