Rating: PG
Pairing: Sara/Warrick, Sara/Grissom
Spoilers: Everything up to the end of season three to be safe.
Feedback: Makes my day
Disclaimer: If it was in the show, it's not mine.
Archive: At my site Checkmate , Fanfiction.net; anywhere else, please ask.
Summary: Grissom left two years ago… what effect does his return have on Warrick and Sara?
Notes: Triptych - anything in three parts or leaves, specifically a writing tablet in three parts, two of which fold over on the middle part or a picture or altarpiece in three compartments.

Grissom stands at the counter and pours himself a cup of coffee, but instead of drinking it straight away, he raises the mug to his nose, sniffs it carefully to confirm his first suspicions. When he's proven right, a slow smile spreads across his features. "Blue Hawaiian, forty bucks a pound, the finest that money can buy," he says aloud, a voice in his head that's not his own supplying him with the words, and the first sip he takes is just as good as he remembers.

It's good to know that some things never change.

The first sip, while good, is a little on the hot side, so he blows across the surface of the mug, thinking as he does so about his next move, about where he should go. He's not sure who's on tonight, if any of his old team are still here, and he'd rather not wander around the halls all night. If some things never change around this place, like Greg Sanders and coffee for example, he knows that the gossip routes are just as well established.

His thoughts are interrupted by a familiar voice, though it's not a voice as much as it's a growl of frustration, and even though it's not the most positive sound in the world, it is, quite literally, music to his ears. It means that the first person he's going to see is the person he's missed most of all, that she's not going to find out about his return second hand. He's going to get to see that look on her face and he didn't know until just now how much he wanted that.

Just like he didn't know until just now how much he's missed her.

She stands at the door to the break room with some lab tech he doesn't know, who's giving her a folder, explaining some kind of test results to her. From what he can overhear, it doesn’t look like she's gleaned the results she was looking for, and the impatient sigh she gives as she looks heavenward certainly bears that out. "I need coffee," she mumbles, and the lab tech leaves her to it, chuckling as he goes, probably glad that he's escaped with his life.

"Still terrorising the lab staff I see," he observes; he can't help it. There's a smile on his face as he talks, and it stays there as Sara spins around to face him, her face falling in stunned surprise when she sees him standing there. Her hand flies to her chest in almost Victorian shock, and he realises as he fights back his grin that this is the first time he's ever seen her speechless.

"Grissom," she says. "You're here."

Once upon a long ago, he might have chided her for stating the obvious. Today though, he just nods. "Sara," he says, looking her up and down, the blue jeans and work boots, the simple red top. Her hair falls down to her shoulders, loose and straight, and under his gaze, she reaches up, tucking a lock of it back behind one ear. "You look well," he says simply, an understatement if ever there was one he thinks.

She swallows hard, nods her head as she looks down at the ground for a second. He's sure he sees her lips twist in a bitter smile, but when she looks up again, it's gone, and he's not sure if he just imagined it, if his guilty conscience is playing tricks on him. "I didn't know you were coming back…" she says, and he shrugs.

"I didn't tell anyone," he says, and knows instantly that it was the wrong thing to say.

"Sounds familiar," she says, and this time, he knows he's not imagining the bitterness.

An awkward silence ensues, and he's the one who breaks it, seizing on familiar territory. "So, I see you're still working on night shift. What about everyone else?"

She squares her shoulders, leans back against the counter. "We're all still here," she tells him. "Greg's working out really well as a CSI…though he's got a nasty habit of chewing out the DNA guys if he thinks they're not working quickly enough." She chuckles slightly at that, and Grissom permits himself a smile, hoping that that's something he'll get to see. "Catherine's supervisor…Warrick and I are still on graveyard…Nick transferred to days last year."

Grissom lifts an eyebrow in mild surprise, because in his day, no-one ever volunteered to go to Day Shift. "Is Ecklie still here?" he asks, because that's the only thing that makes sense to him, and he's shocked when Sara nods.

"Nick's not too happy about working with him," she allows. "But he does get to actually see his wife and daughter, so he doesn't complain too much."

There's a smile on her face and in her tone, but Grissom knows her well enough to hear the steel underneath, knows that there's a thinly veiled barb there. Still, it's all he can do to echo, "Wife? Daughter?"

Sara nods. "It'll be two years in November," she tells him. "And Sophie's a month old."

"Good for him," Grissom murmurs, and Sara smiles, that small gap-toothed smile that has haunted him for the last two years, and he basks in the image, so much better in person than in memory.

"Yeah," she says softly, and when he looks at her, he's sure that her thoughts are a million miles away.

"I missed you." The words falling from his lips surprise him, but they stun her, and she literally takes a step back. So he takes one forward, but he's careful not to encroach on her personal space. "I know I did a lot of things wrong," he tells her, intent on making her listen to him, making her understand what he did and why he did it, hoping that she'll hear him out. "But I'd like to make it up to you… explain, maybe take you out for dinner… "

He stops when she holds up a hand, waits for her to speak, but the words seem to be a long time coming.

When they do, he wishes that he hadn't stopped.

"I'm engaged," she tells him, and he knows that his jaw drops, but he can't help it, because of all the things that he thought she would say to him, that wasn't one of them.

His gaze goes automatically to her left hand, to the ring finger there, and when he finds his voice again, he points out the obvious. "You're not wearing a ring," he says, his voice fading again when she reaches up, under the neck of her shirt. A gold chain glints in the light of the room as she pulls it out, holds it out to him, letting him see the ring threaded onto it. The row of three small diamonds glint as they catch the light, and his mouth goes dry.

"I don't wear it at work," she tells him, her own voice sounding hoarse, and it makes sense to him, too much sense. "We're getting married in two months… just after Christmas."

He just about manages to nod. "Congratulations," he says, the words almost sticking in his throat. "When do I get to meet the lucky man?"

When she stands up soldier straight, lifting her chin almost defiantly, he knows that he's not going to like the answer. "It's Warrick," she says simply, and for the briefest of instants, he thinks that his ears are playing tricks on him, that he's literally not hearing her properly. Because she and Warrick have always been friends, true, but there's been a distinctly frosty undertone between them as well, and he'd always had the sense that they were, on occasions, a powder keg waiting for a match to be lit.

"Warrick," he repeats dully, hoping that saying the name will help him to believe it. It doesn't. She doesn't say anything, lets the silence linger, until it's so awkward, even for him, that he has no choice but to continue. "Well… congratulations… " Even he can hear the insincerity in his voice, and he knows she didn't miss it either, knows it by the way she bristles.

"We've been together for over a year," she tells him, her tone almost defiant, and he knows a challenge when he hears one, rises to meet it.

"Do you love him?" he asks bluntly, and her jaw drops in what looks very like a combination of shock and anger, but the longer she looks at him, the more it leans towards anger.

"How dare you?" She doesn't shout though, which, in an encounter of surprises is just one more for the list. He quickly realises that she's gone beyond shouting, is too angry for that, so her anger is displayed in that still fury that somehow is more effective. "How dare you come back here after two years of nothing… "

Anything else she might say is interrupted by the ringing of a cell phone, and she bites her words off with considerable effort, wrenching the phone from her belt, flipping it open with such force that Grissom worries she's going to break the hinges. From her tone though, he'd never know that she was angry, all calm professionalism when she says, "Sidle." He turns away from her, listening to her side of the conversation, gleaning what information he can from it, only turning back to her when he hears her hang up. "Greg," she said, putting away the phone. "We're working a missing person's case… they've just found a body." It's on the tip of Grissom's tongue to ask for more details, but he stops himself, remembering just in time that, like a lot of things, that's not his place anymore. "He and Warrick are on their way… I need to meet them there."

She takes a step towards the door, but he can't let her go like this, can't leave things like this. "Maybe we can talk later?" he says, and she stops, turning slowly, staring him down with something that's now a combination of anger and pity.

But all she says is, "I'll see you around Grissom."

>*<*>*<

Sara knows that Warrick and Greg are on their way to the crime scene. She knows that they're expecting her to meet them there; she knows that they probably have a good idea of how long it's going to take her to get there, and are expecting her accordingly.

She knows all this, but still when Sara gets to her car, she doesn't turn the key straight away, doesn't go off on her way. She knows she could, but right now, she couldn't if she wanted to, and she's not so sure that she wants to.

For the first time in a very long time, maybe ever, she's not so sure that she wants to see her fiancé, not now, not when she's feeling like this. Not when she's not even sure how she's feeling.

Shocked is a pretty good word she thinks, because how else could she be feeling when Grissom walks back into the lab, into her life, as if he'd never been away? A distinctly bitter voice in the back of her mind reminds her that he left without a word, so it shouldn't be that surprising that he'd return the same way.

That same bitter voice reminds her that Grissom left almost two years ago. He's undoubtedly not the same man that he was back then; she knows for damn sure she's not the same woman. She's grown, she's changed.

She's fallen in love with another man.

She's not in love with Gil Grissom any more, she tells herself firmly. She's over him, he means nothing to her anymore. He shouldn't have the power to turn her legs to jelly, to make her hands shake and her stomach churn. He shouldn't be able to do that.

Yet she finds herself sitting in her car when she should be going to a crime scene, with her legs and hands shaking, her stomach churning.

With considerable effort, she pulls herself together, turning the key in the ignition and starting her drive, though how she gets to the crime scene is one of those mysteries of life that she knows she'll never be able to explain to anyone. She sees Warrick and Greg straight away, standing at the edge of the crime scene tape, and inside, she can see David Philips kneeling beside a body. That's good for another deep breath in, because their missing person was a young woman of twenty-four years of age, a mother of one, and from what Greg told her on the phone, it was a horrible death. There are days, she sighs, pulling herself out of the car, when she really does hate her job.

The two men turn to her when she calls out in greeting, and Greg looks pointedly at his watch. "What, did you get lost on the way?" he quips, and she tries to smile, which is harder than it might appear, especially when Warrick is looking at her, a vague suspicion of worry in his eyes. This is why she didn't want to see him right now, because he knows her, and he knows when she's feeling bad and trying to hide it.

"Not quite," she says, avoiding prolonged exposure to Warrick's gaze, smiling instead at Greg. "As a matter of fact, I was talking to someone."

"Ah, gossip, thy name is woman," Greg says, shaking his head in mock sorrow, and she wants to remind him about all the times that she caught him gossiping, or flirting, or basically doing anything other than working back in his DNA-mad-scientist days.

She wants to tease him about that, but Warrick's question stops her. "Who?"

She smiles, because what else can she do, and bites the bullet. "Grissom," she says simply, and their reactions couldn't be more different.

Greg's jaw drops open in surprise, his lips immediately thereafter turning up in a huge smile. In the space of a couple of seconds, he looks to have grown a couple of metres, and he's practically bouncing up and down with excitement.

Warrick's face goes slack, and she sees worry burn through his eyes like fire through kindling. It only lasts for a second though, then he pastes a smile on to his face, and while it might fool Greg, she knows what a real Warrick Brown smile looks like, and this one isn't even close.

"You're kidding me!" Characteristically, Greg's the one who first puts his thoughts into words, and Sara shakes her head in response. "Man, that's cool! He just showed up, no call, no nothing? What's he been doing with himself?"

Sara's eyes widen, her shoulders rise and fall in a shrug. "I don't know," she says. "I was only talking to him for a minute, then you called me… " It's a lie, and she's pretty sure that Warrick knows it, but Greg can't know that, and she knows Warrick won't call her on it. Not here, not now, not like this.

Any further discussion is precluded when David calls up "Guys… I'm ready," and she silently blesses the man for his timing. Greg pinwheels around instantly, ever eager to start work on the case, but Warrick doesn't move. He's still looking at Sara, and she looks down at the ground because she can't look at him.

So she only hears him saying, "Greg, why don't you go on down, start with the photos? I'll fill Sara in on what we know so far."

Greg's only too eager to comply and doesn't need to be told twice, and Sara hears him move away. But she still doesn't look up, not until she feels Warrick's presence beside her, close enough to touch her. He doesn't touch her, but she really wishes that he would. She chances a glance up at him, sees him looking down at her with that vaguely concerned look on his face, and her eyes slide off him, and she turns, looking down at Greg asking David questions as he snaps pictures.

She keeps her back to him, waits for him to tell her about what they know, the way he told Greg he would, but she's not surprised when that's not what he does. He doesn't speak, and she's on the verge of begging him to say something, say anything, when she feels his palm on the back of her neck, the warmth of his skin such a contrast to the coolness of the night. His fingers find the top of her spine, knead that spot gently, and she knows what the touch means. She knows that it's a wordless question, an enquiry if she's all right, as well as a promise that he's not going to push her, not going to put any pressure on her. He doesn't need an answer, just wants her to know that he's there for her. She closes her eyes for a moment, leaning into his touch just a little, just enough to let him know that she understands, that she's grateful, and one hand goes to her chest, tracing absently the shape of the ring she wears around her neck, the ring he gave her.

The combined weight and warmth of gold and skin ground her, centre her, and she takes a deep breath, knowing what she has to do. "Let's go," she says, stepping towards Greg.

Warrick follows her, and she can feel his eyes on her back the whole way.

>*<*>*<

Warrick's glad when Greg volunteers to drive back to the lab, because he's not sure that he'd be the safest person to have behind the wheel in his present state of mind. He's also not going to deny the fact that he hopes that if Greg is driving, he'll be less inclined to tease Warrick, but he realises all too quickly that he should have known better.

"I'm just saying," Greg says merrily, never taking his eyes off the road. "I've never seen you do that for any of the other CSIs you've worked with."

Warrick rolls his eyes, staring out the passenger window. His arm is propped up on the passenger door, his chin resting on his fist, and were it not for Greg yammering away, he'd be lost in thought. "She had a headache," he reminds Greg. "What, you wanted her in the lab, making herself worse?" Playing on Greg's friendly, and not so friendly, feelings for Sara probably wouldn't be the worst idea in the world he tells himself, and he knows he's right when Greg backtracks hurriedly.

"No, of course not." He sounds indignant that Warrick would think such a thing, but he bounces back quickly. "I'm just wondering if you'd do the same for me or Catherine or Nick… "

"Greg." Warrick's voice is firm, and Greg's head turns sharply to look at him, and Warrick realises, not without guilt, that he may have been a little more abrupt than necessary. "Sorry." Rubbing his hand over his chin, he sucks in a deep breath, thinking before he speaks. "She was sick," he finally settles on, though he knows it's a lie. "She needed to go." The words "away from me," linger in his mind, though he doesn't speak them out loud.

When he looks over at Greg, the younger man is looking over at him too, his head flying crazily between the road ahead of him and Warrick beside him. "She didn't look that bad to me," he objects, and Warrick forces himself to chuckle, as if there's nothing wrong, as if his relationship might not be falling apart around him.

"It's Sara," he reminds Greg, and his friend's face clears, accepting the validity of the argument. To ram the point home, Warrick continues with, "You think she's going to lose face in front of anyone?"

"Including you?" Greg's voice has swung all the way back from concern to teasing, but this one Warrick can handle easily.

"Especially me," he counters, making Greg laugh. Mercifully, it also seems to close the conversation in the younger CSI's mind, leaving Warrick to his thoughts.

What he'd told Greg had been a mixture of truth and lies. Yes, Sara had complained of a headache, and she'd displayed all the classic symptoms - furrowed brow, distracted silences, rubbing the bridge of her nose, her forehead, every so often. The three of them had worked the crime scene, and it had been obvious to him that she wasn't at her best, and he'd cornered her quietly about it when they were almost finished, asking her if she was ok, telling her that it looked like she had a headache. She'd seized on the excuse quickly, a flash of gratitude in her eyes, and when he'd suggested that shift was almost over and she could go home early, she'd leapt at that suggestion too.

But he knows that she didn't really have a headache.

Or if she did, he's pretty sure he knows the cause.

He knew something was wrong with her the instant she stepped out of the car, began her walk towards him, because he hadn't seen her look that upset, that confused in a long time, certainly not in the last year and a half or so. He'd had an odd feeling about what might have been wrong with her, and hearing Grissom's name had only confirmed his suspicions.

He feels the beginnings of a headache starting low in the base of his skull as he pictures the look on her face tonight, remembers how she looked in those first weeks and months after Grissom's departure. He's not so sure that she can go through that again, and if he'd been asked a few hours ago, he would have said, without thinking, that she wouldn't have to. He would have said that Sara's feelings for Grissom were a thing of the past, that she was in love with him, that they were going to get married and live happily ever after.

Now he finds himself wondering if Sara's feelings for Grissom were only muted by his absence, if her feelings for him are simply those of rebound guy.

Though if he's honest with himself, that's always been his deepest fear.

He deals with this fear the best way he knows how, by working. For all the things that Sara has learned from him, that's something that he's learned from her. So he tells Greg that he'll deal with logging in the evidence, leaving Greg free to roam the labs, chase the techs for whatever needs chasing. Greg's eager to accept, muttering something about the shoe being on the other foot nowadays, and Warrick watches him go with a smile before going back to the monotonous business of logging evidence.

By the time that's done, it's time to go home, and he goes to the locker room, grabs his jacket and walks into the open air. It looks like it's going to be a beautiful morning, and any other day, he'd be pleased to be heading home, hoping to spend some quality time with his girl.

Today though, he's stopped in his tracks when he walks into a familiar face that he hasn't seen in too long. "Grissom," he says, nodding in greeting, crossing his arms over his chest. "Heard you were back."

Grissom nods too, his hands down at his side, apparently relaxed, but to Warrick's eyes, there's a line of tension across his shoulders. "Warrick," he says, his tone neutral. "I hear congratulations are in order."

They’ve been engaged for four months by now, but such good wishes still make Warrick smile, no matter who they're from. "Yeah," he grins.

"I was actually looking for Sara," Grissom continues, still in that same neutral voice, but there's something in his eyes that Warrick doesn't like, something that makes his hackles rise, wipes the grin from his face. "She around?"

"She's gone home already," Warrick tells him, and that's all he intends on telling him. However, he was always told as a kid that he lacked discipline, and he knows that he hasn't improved with age. That much is proven when he hears his own voice asking, "You going to tell me what you said to her?"

Grissom blinks owlishly. "I didn't say anything to her," he says, but Warrick doesn't believe that for a second.

"Don’t give me that," he says, barely keeping a rein on his impatience. "We're at home before shift, she's fine. We work on the case, she's fine. We meet at the crime scene, she tells me she's talked to you, and she's a wreck." He's walking a fine line there, he knows, because nobody who saw Sara at that crime scene, not Greg, not David, would characterise Sara as a wreck. Warrick however, knows better, because he knows Sara better. "What did you say to her?" he demands again, and Grissom gives him a dead-eyed stare.

"I didn't say anything to her Warrick," he replies. "But there's unfinished business between Sara and me… there are things we need to discuss."

Warrick hears the words, purses his lips in disgust. "Like?" he demands.

Grissom shakes his head, avoids the question. "There's a lot about me and Sara that you don't know Warrick," he begins, but Warrick cuts him off angrily.

"Like the fact you two slept together the night before you left town?" He flings the accusation at Grissom, and takes great satisfaction in seeing the neutral expression vanish from Grissom's face. The older man's mouth opens slightly; if this were anyone other than Grissom, their jaw would be touching the ground.

"She told you?" he asks, and Warrick blows air out between his lips.

"She's my wife Grissom," he grinds out. "We don't keep secrets from one another." He's surprised when Grissom talks over the second part of his sentence, is so angry that he's sure he's misheard what Grissom just said. "What?" he asks, because he has to be sure.

"I said, she's not your wife." In contrast to Warrick, Grissom is completely calm. "Not for another two months."

A long silence ensues, and Warrick finds himself counting to ten in the hopes that it'll stop him from punching Grissom's lights out. He wishes that it was because the older man was wrong, but he knows that the opposite is true. Grissom's right; Sara's not his wife, not officially, not at all. But the fact of the matter is, to Warrick, they've been married ever since she smiled and said yes, let him slip that ring on her finger. Ever since then, maybe since even before then, he's considered Sara his wife, and to have Grissom of all people pointing out that she's not is a bitter pill to swallow.

"So," he finally says. "It's like that is it?"

He meets Grissom's gaze, holds it. "I love her Warrick," he finally says, and somewhere far in the distance, Warrick's sure he can hear his heart breaking. "I made a mistake leaving. I don't intend on making the same mistake twice."

"That's not your decision to make," Warrick tells him slowly, but once again, Grissom has the answer to that.

"No," he says. "But it's not yours either."

With that, he turns and walks away, leaving Warrick looking after him.

>*<*>*<

Sara stands in front of the mirror in her bedroom - their bedroom, she reminds herself, immediately thereafter asking herself when did she ever need that reminder before? She and Warrick were all but living together by the time they made it to their two month anniversary; she was calling this place home long before they made it official during the summer. She'd never lived with a guy before, had never even come close, but with Warrick, it had been easy, natural. It hadn't been strange living with him and working with him, being around him all the time, it had been nice, and she remembers so clearly lying in bed with him that first day, thinking then that she could do this for the rest of her life.

He'd proposed a week later, and she hadn't hesitated.

So now she stands in their bedroom, in front of the mirror and she looks at herself. Not for vanity, because she's far from a vain person, but because she's wearing her wedding dress, and she wants to see if she still looks like a happy bride in it, because she's not so sure that she feels like one any more. Or maybe, a little voice in her head tells her, she wanted to try on the dress again in the hopes that it would banish any doubts that might be creeping in, any residual feelings that might have been stirred up by Grissom's arrival. Because if she stands in their bedroom, in this dress, she should remember Warrick and all that he means to her, all that they've been through to get here.

It should happen, she knows, but she still feels confused, torn.

Which is something she's never felt when standing here like this.

Usually, she finds herself blushing in embarrassment, because she, Sara Sidle, is not supposed to get all smiley and girly over a wedding, not even her own. She never thought of herself as the kind to get married, had never in her life, even as a little girl, imagined her wedding, much less the kind of dress she would have. So she'd done the sensible thing when she went looking for a dress; had enlisted Catherine to help her, and help her she had, bringing her to every dress shop in Vegas in search of the perfect dress. She'd found one too, not the flouncy, voluminous nightmare that she'd feared, but something simple, not white but cream, a long A-line skirt, no sleeves, with a neckline that skimmed her collarbone at the front, dipping to just below her shoulder blades at the back. She'd loved it the moment she'd tried it on, had known it was the perfect dress when Catherine got misty-eyed when she saw her in it. She'd bought it on sight, taking it home all wrapped up, and swearing bloody death on Warrick if he even thought of sneaking a peek. As far as she knows, he's been good so far, certainly if the amount of hints he's dropping about wanting to see her in it are anything to go by.

She loves this dress, and though she'd never admit it, every time she wears it, she imagines walking down the aisle, seeing Warrick waiting for her at the other end, and she can't stop smiling.

But she's not smiling now.

She left shift early, a first for her, pleading a headache as the reason, only partially a lie she tells herself. She tried to work, she did her best, but she couldn't concentrate, not when all she could feel was Warrick's eyes on her back in the present and Grissom's hands on her body in the past.

She hasn't thought about that night in a long time, and she thought that she was over it, that she'd forgotten all about it, all about him. But when she'd seen him in the break room, she'd instantly been transported two years and more back in time, back to the days when she was madly in love with Gil Grissom, and he didn't have the faintest interest in her. She'd longed for him from afar, she'd waited for him, once she'd even asked him out for dinner only to have her invitation rebuffed. And she'd told herself that nothing was ever going to happen, had thought she was resigned to that.

Then she'd stopped by his office on her way home one night, to fill him in on the latest details of her case and to say goodnight. He'd been finishing off some paperwork, had been quiet, even for him, but she'd put it down to Grissom being Grissom, and she'd shrugged inwardly, turning to leave. She'd turned back just as quickly when he called her name, and her breath had caught in her throat when she'd seen the way that he was looking at her. She'd prayed for him to look at her like that.

She'd barely breathed as he stood, coming around to the other side of the desk, but he stopped there, fingers tapping lightly on the wooden surface as he looked at her, then looked down. She'd frowned, wondering what was going through that mind of his, but she'd stopped wondering when he asked her if she'd like to get something to eat. She'd hesitated, because to say it was coming out of left field was to understate the matter somewhat, but then she'd smiled, and she'd said yes.

They'd gone to a small restaurant that Grissom knew, and since it was early in the morning for the rest of the world, the place had been all but deserted. They'd sat and talked for what seemed like hours, no awkward silences, no in-depth discussions about where they were going or what they were doing. They were just Sara and Grissom, enjoying one another's company.

When he'd walked her to her car, it had seemed natural to linger there a moment, to turn to him with a smile and say she'd see him later.

It had even seemed natural when he'd taken her by the elbow, stopping her from opening the door.

And when he'd leaned forward and kissed her, it had just felt right.

She'd said two words to him, only two words, when they separated. "My place?" He'd nodded, had followed her there, and once there, no words had been exchanged. Lips on lips, on skin, hands roaming freely had said all that needed to be said, and when she'd drifted off to sleep in his arms, she'd dreamed of all that lay in store for them.

Waking up alone had been a surprise.

Walking into the lab and finding that Grissom had left, resigned, without telling anyone had been one hell of a shock.

They'd all been stunned by Grissom's action, and she remembers Warrick talking about something Grissom had once told him; that when he left CSI, there would be no cake in the break room. He'd said at the time that he'd never expected Grissom to be so literal, and everyone in the vicinity had agreed.

She remembers that because it's one of the few things that she does remember clearly about that time. The rest - cases, conversations, everything - is one big blur, as if she was sleepwalking through her life. Work was everything to her, because it reminded her of him, and she kept hoping that one day she'd lift her head from the microscope, would look around, and he'd be there. After a while, she'd noticed that people seemed to be taking an extra interest in her welfare, were hovering around her a lot more, and it had confused her, because they'd never done that before. It was only after the Christmas party, the one that Warrick had all but had to lift her up and carry her to, that she realised why.

She remembers fighting with Warrick on the way there, unable to comprehend why he was so stubborn all of a sudden, reasoning with herself that she could steal away from him after a few minutes, lose herself in the crowd and go home. She'd reckoned without Greg dragging her on to the dance floor, teaching her how to Macarena, and she can still see him there beside her, shouting out the names of the movements, smiling, laughing, having a great time.

Realising near the end of the song - and she's pretty sure that someone played it more than once; otherwise it was the hyper-extended remix version - that she was too laughing, smiling, having a great time, was a hell of a shock.

Meeting Warrick's gaze across the room, seeing a smile on his face and relief in his eyes, was an even bigger one.

It had struck her then, with force, that she couldn't remember the last time she'd laughed. That had frightened her, because not even in the first days of her time in Vegas, pre-Hank, pre getting a life, had that happened to her. And when she'd gone home, she'd taken a good look at herself in the mirror, had seen the dark circles under her eyes, the pallor of her cheeks, the way her clothes hung from her body.

She looked like the walking dead, and she knew right then and there that she couldn't go on like that any more.

Luckily for her, Warrick seemed to have come to the same conclusion, and after the success of the Christmas party, he began to seek her out more and more, bringing her to dinner, going to the movies with her, showing her the sights of Vegas, which he was scandalised to learn she'd never seen after so many years there.

Then one day, they'd gone to breakfast after the shift, not for the first time. He'd driven her home, she doesn't remember why, but she does remember him leaning down to kiss her cheek. It hadn't struck her as unusual, because she'd become used to him doing that. Warrick was a tactile person, and in the few months since Christmas, she'd become comfortable with hugs from him, with kisses on the cheek.

But that day, he'd turned to leave, and it had seemed natural to reach out, touch his elbow. And when he'd looked at her, his concern written all over his face, it had seemed natural to kiss him.

It had seemed right.

She'd led him into her apartment, and she hadn't thought of Grissom once, though in later days, she would begin to develop a preference for Warrick's place rather than hers. It was larger, roomier, felt more like a home, courtesy of Grams, and most importantly, she never thought of Grissom there.

Not that she thought of Grissom much, and as time went on, as she and Warrick became more and more serious, Grissom and the night they'd spent together had faded into memory.

Until today, when she walked into the break room, and, just like she'd hoped for, prayed for on so many occasions, she'd seen him there.

She'd thought she'd be happy the day he came back. Sometimes, she'd thought that she'd be angry. She never expected to feel numb, never expected Warrick's ring to burn against her chest, reminding her that Grissom was the past, that Warrick was her present, her future, her everything.

She never expected Grissom to look at her like that, like he had on that last night, and she certainly never expected a few sentences to turn her life upside down.

She jumps when she hears the front door opening, hears Warrick calling her name. "I'm in the bedroom," she calls back, hurriedly reaching for the zipper at the back of the dress. "But you can't come in."

She hears him chuckle. "Ain't nothing I haven't seen before," he replies, but she knows him well enough to hear something simmering underneath the surface of his voice, and she knows just what it is.

"I'm trying on the dress," she says, and that's the end of that.

"Say no more," is his reply, his voice just down the hall, and she hears him turn and walk away.

Changing quickly, she runs her hands over her hair to smooth it down, before reaching up to the clasp of her necklace, sliding the ring free of the chain with practised ease and putting it on her finger. The chain then goes back around her neck, kept safe for the start of the shift, and she goes to find Warrick.

He's in the kitchen, standing at the counter, staring at the kettle as if the sheer intensity of his gaze will make the water boil faster. A quip about a watched kettle never boiling passes through her mind, but when he turns his head slightly, when his green gaze meets hers, all words freeze in her throat. The only thing she can manage is a whispered, "Hey," but it's enough to make his shoulders relax, enough to have him walking towards her.

"Hey," he replies, stopping just short of her, and the space between them is like a physical ache in her stomach. It's in no way assuaged when he reaches out with one hand, laying it on her shoulder, so gently that she almost thinks he's afraid of breaking her. His question is just as gentle, like the touch on her neck from the crime scene. "You ok?" It's enough to let her know that he's there if she needs to talk, but also enough to tell her that he's not going to push her. He's letting her call the shots on this one.

She doesn't know what he expects, but it's clearly not for her to close the distance between them, sliding her arms around his waist, pressing her head into his shoulder so that her lips are millimetres away from his neck. She can feel the surprise course through his body, but his arms close around her back, his chin resting against her head. He doesn't say anything, nor does she, and they cling to one another in the silence for a long time.

Eventually, with a sigh heaved from the tips of her toes, she pulls away from him, bringing her arms from his back up to his chest, resting her hands flat there. She can feel the heat of his skin through his shirt, feel the beating of his heart, strong and steady. When she meets his gaze, it's easier than she would have thought possible to give him a small smile and mean it, to whisper the words, "I'm sorry."

He returns the smile, moving his own hands up to rub her shoulders. "I know," he breathes, and at any other time, she'd bristle at that comment, but now, she just sighs, especially as his right hand travels down to catch hold of her left, fingering her engagement ring. "It's not your fault." His tone is quite tart when he says those words, leaving her in no doubt as to whose feet he's laying the blame at, and she looks down, at his fingers on her hand, not able to take her eyes off them.

"Isn't it?" she asks, but he's not going to let her away with that, bringing his other hand to her chin, tilting it up so that she can look at him.

"No," he says firmly, and she thinks for an instant that he's going to kiss her, but he doesn't. "He's the one who thinks he can just waltz back in here after two years and everything's going to be the same."

She can definitely hear anger and indignation seeping into his voice, and she steps into his body, resting her head on his shoulder again. "You know I love you, right?" she asks, and his palm is warm against her back when he answers.

"Yeah," he whispers. "I know that." There's another pause during which she doesn't straighten up, and she can practically feel the question bubbling up in Warrick. "What did he say to you?"

"Not much." She's still talking into his shoulder, because it's easier, and because he's letting her. "Didn't say where he was. Why he was back. What he's doing. He asked me to have dinner with him and I told him about us… that's when Greg called." She's leaving out some of the details, but they're not important she tells herself, and she waits for his reaction.

When it comes, it makes her pull out of his embrace sharply. "Maybe you should go." Her eyes are wide as she stares at him, while his are sober and serious. "Sara, I know what went down between the two of you. And I saw what you were like when he left." He shrugs, and she's got a funny feeling that he can't believe he's saying this either. "Maybe you need to hear why… for closure."

She shakes her head, feeling as if there's some piece of the puzzle that she's not aware of. "I don't want closure," she counters, but he interrupts her with a few quiet words.

"Sometimes, it's not what we want," he tells her. "It's what we need."

>*<*>*<

Warrick sees her ponder his words, letting them run through her mind, and for an insane moment, he wishes that he could take them back. That he could tell her to stay as far away from Grissom as humanly possible, that they could run away together and never have to mention the man's name again.

But he knows they can't do that. Whether he likes it or not, and the answer is most definitely not, Gil Grissom has been in the background of their relationship from the get-go, and with his sudden reappearance, they can't avoid him any longer.

No matter what that means for the two of them.

"Maybe you're right," she says finally, putting her head back down on his shoulder, her arms once more sliding around his waist. Closing his eyes, Warrick presses a kiss to the top of her head, resting his cheek against his hair, thinking about all the times in the last few months that they've stood here like this. He's never quite been able to believe it, that the two of them, with all their history, have ended up together and happy, would never have thought that Sara would end up being The One.

He knows she's harboured the same thoughts about him.

His breath catches when she turns her head slightly, pressing a kiss to the side of his neck as she tightens her grip on his waist. This is the kind of gesture that usually leads somewhere with the two of them, and when she kisses his neck again, moving up towards his jaw, he's pretty sure that that's what she has in mind. He wants to step away, to tell her that he's not sure that this is the way to deal with their problems, but when she lifts her head, when he sees the look in her eyes, the words escape him.

And when she kisses his lips, winding her arms around his neck and pressing her body flush against him, all thought swiftly follows.

He's dimly aware of the two of them moving towards the bedroom, of the familiar sensations of her hands on his skin, her skin under his hands, the taste and the sound and the feel of her in his arms. It's familiar, and it's good, and it's everything that's right about their relationship, but at the same time, he knows there's something there that he's never felt before. The first time he and Sara made love, it was tentative, almost as if both were afraid that the other was going to change their mind. Other times, it's been slow and languid, fast and passionate, and there's an urban legend going around the lab involving them, a supply closet and a red-faced Greg Sanders, but it's never felt like this.

The only word that comes to mind is elegiac - it feels like goodbye.

And later, much later, when they're getting ready to face into another shift and he hears her cell phone ring, hears her say Grissom's name when she answers it, sees the look in her eyes, he's very afraid that that's what it is.

>*<*>*<

When he leaves Warrick, Grissom knows just where he's going next, and he follows the familiar path to his old office, not in the least bit surprised to find her there, drowning under mountains of paperwork. He stands in the doorway, observing her for a long moment, waiting for her to look up, and when she doesn't, he finally speaks. "There are some parts of my old job I don't miss," he says, and her head whips up, a huge smile spreading across her face.

"I heard you were back in town," she says, standing up and going to him, pulling him into a hug. He returns the gesture, not the least bit surprised at it, while at the same time wishing that Sara had given him that kind of reception. His comparisons are cut short when she steps back from him, looking at him for a second before hitting him, hard, on the shoulder.

"Ow!" he says, the reaction partly borne of surprise, but mostly born out of the fact that Catherine's got one hell of a punch. "What was that for?"

"What was that for, he asks me," Catherine scoffs. "Walking out of here without so much as a 'see you 'round'?" Another punch. "Recommending me for this job, making sure I'd get it, and making sure that I didn't have a clue what I was doing?" Two more punches in the middle of that speech, and Grissom's got a clue now, is trying to move away from her. She seems to have punched herself out though, and she's standing in front of him, hands on her hips. "So?" she demands.

He blinks. "What?"

Catherine rolls her eyes. "Where have you been? What brings you back? And why now?" She throws her hands up, shaking her head. "God Gil, I have so many questions for you… not least of which is, do you want this job back, because I've got to tell you, after the day I've had… "

He holds up a hand. "I don't want my job back," he assures her. "I'm going to teach," he adds. "UNLV, criminology and forensic science."

Catherine's eyes widen, and she looks impressed. "Professor Grissom," she teases, and he shrugs. They regard one another in silence, Catherine looking him up and down before asking, "Look, let's get out of here. You want to come to my place? I'll cook breakfast."

A smart comment comes to mind, but he bites it back, saying instead, "That sounds great."

On their way out to the parking lot, he asks about Lindsey, Catherine filling him in on how she's getting on at school, the classes and activities she's taking. He follows her home, as if he could have forgotten the way, and while she said that she would cook, he ends up helping her, the two of them working together as well as they ever had, and it's almost as if they were never been away from one another.

Catherine waits until after they've eaten to ask the hard questions, and they're sitting on the couch in her living room, cups of coffee in hand when she wrinkles her nose the way she always does when she wants to ask a tricky question. "So," she says, pausing for a second, and that's when he knows what's coming next. "Was it your hearing?"

He nods, but it's not as hard to talk about as it could have been. "The first operation from 2003 worked for a while," he tells her. "But not permanently. My hearing started degrading again… that's why I knew I had to leave."

It's the truth, but Catherine's looking at him curiously, head slightly tilted, eyes narrowed. "But you can hear now, right? I mean, you're not… "

"No," he acknowledges. "It just goes to show Catherine… you should never underestimate the advances of medical science. New procedures, new therapies… I had another operation a couple of months ago, and it looks as if this one will stick."

Catherine smiles brightly. "I'm so happy for you," she tells him, and he hears the sincerity loud and clear in her voice.

"So I came back," he continues simply, answering one of her questions from earlier in the evening.

"I’m glad." Catherine takes a sip of her coffee, then chuckles as if something has just occurred to her. "Lots of changes around here."

"True. Nick got married?"

Catherine nods. "Diana… she's great. And their daughter, Sophie… she is the sweetest thing. And you've heard about Warrick and Sara."

Grissom nods, taking a careful sip of his coffee. "Sara told me," he says simply. "I can't say it didn't surprise me."

Catherine snorts. "You and them both," she says, and off his surprised look adds, "We all saw it coming long before they did." Grissom lifts an eyebrow in silent question, and she shrugs, continuing. "They were spending a lot of time together," she says. "And it was crystal clear that they were crazy about one another… I don't know why they waited so long."

"I never knew they were that close." Grissom knows he's fishing for information, but he can't help it. Catherine, fortunately, doesn’t seem to notice.

She does sigh however, choosing her words carefully before she speaks. "A lot changed after you left Grissom," she says. "We were shocked - all of us were shocked. But Sara… she took it hard. And I don't think any of us knew how hard for a long time… of course, when we finally noticed, she didn't make it easy for us to help her… Warrick was the only one who could get through to her."

"Hard?" Grissom asks, not sure what she means, a stab of guilt running through him all the same.

"Working all the time… even harder than usual. Not sleeping, not eating… barely talking," Catherine explains, and he suddenly finds his cup of coffee very interesting, because he can't look at Catherine, not when she's got that look on her face. It's a look that's somewhere between sympathy and remembered pain, and it tells Grissom all he needs to know about what it was like for Sara after he left. "Look Gil, it's not my place to pry, and I don't need to know what happened between the two of you but you should know-"

"We slept together."

He didn't mean to tell her that, was hardly aware that he'd spoken aloud until she stopped talking. When he looks up at her, he sees her staring at him with a perfectly frozen expression, as if she's not sure that she believes what she's just heard, her coffee cup halfway to her lips. Then she blinks, lowers the cup carefully and places it on the table, adjusting her position so that she's sitting upright on the edge of the couch. Only then does she turn to look at him again, turns slowly and deliberately, the same way she speaks when she says, "Excuse me?"

It's a neutral tone of voice; too neutral he knows at once. He's gone too far to turn back now though, so he repeats himself. "We slept together." He remembers it clearly, every moment, from when he was finalising his paperwork, making sure his desk was clear for whoever would take over his job, looking up to find her there, right up to lying propped up on one elbow, looking at her sleeping, wishing with all his heart that things could be different. He certainly hadn't planned on being here, hadn't planned on asking her out to dinner, but then he'd been looking at her, and in a moment of weakness, knowing that this could be the last time that he'd ever see her, he'd asked her to have dinner with him. Why he'd let it progress so much further, he'd never be able to say, but he does know that those memories have sustained him through many a long and lonely day. He regrets leaving her, regrets hurting her, but he doesn't regret that night.

Even if he knows he probably should.

Now confident that she heard him right, Catherine asks, "You and Sara?" He nods. "You slept together?" Another nod. "When?"

"The night before I left."

She blinks, then her eyes grow wide as she processes that information, her jaw dropping. "Tell me," she says slowly, ominously, "That you told her you were leaving. That you told her why." Grissom says nothing, and Catherine's tone grows more strident. "Tell me that she didn't wake up the next morning and find you gone." Grissom's silence speaks far more eloquently on the matter than words, and Catherine emits a sound that can only indicate disgust. "I can't believe you."

"Catherine-" he begins, but she cuts him off, standing, pacing the room like a caged animal.

"Just give me a minute," she commands, in a tone that's not to be trifled with. After a couple of lengths of the coffee table, she looks down at him, pure disdain etched on her face. "You know Grissom," she says coldly, and the use of his surname leaves him in no doubt as to the depths of her displeasure. "Eddie wouldn't even have done that." It's the worst insult that she could have paid him, and they both know it.

"You just left?" she asks, as if she's hoping that he's going to change his story, tell her that it's not true. But when he doesn't, when he nods, she stares at him helplessly. "But why? You had to know she was in love with you, everyone knew that… "

"I did."

His quiet acceptance stuns her. "Then why… "

"Because I love her too."

The tense doesn't go unnoticed by her; he hadn't expected to. But she still tries to deny it, treat it like just a slip of the tongue. "You mean loved," she challenges, and her tone is dangerous.

Dangerous, but he won't lie to her. "No."

If he thought his initial bombshell shocked her, that was nothing compared to his. Not only does her jaw drop, her hands rise and fall, landing on her thighs with a slapping sound, and he's pretty sure that that's what she'd like to do to him. "You can't be serious."

But he is, and he says it again, just to make it clear. "I love her Catherine."

"No," she says, with a vehement shake of the head. "No, no, no, no, no… you can't do this Gil. You can't!"

"Catherine-"

"Gil!" Her eyes are wide, panicked even, and she's not going to let him away with this. "You can't do this to that girl… you have no idea what it was like when you left, you have no clue what it did to her… you can't just waltz back into her life and pull the rug out from under her like this."

He sighs, meets her gaze. "Is she happy Catherine?" he asks, and she regards him with frank and open amazement.

"Happy? Gil, I've never seen Sara happier," she tells him. "The way they are together, the way they look at one another… Warrick worships her." She shakes her head, a wide smile forming on her face as she looks over his shoulder, focussing on something that only she can see. "I was with her when she bought her wedding dress… we must've gone to a dozen stores, tried on about fifty dresses… then she came out and she was radiant… you could have powered the Strip for a month, just from her smile." Grissom's staring at Catherine, and doesn't miss the slight tinge of tears in her eyes, but it doesn't change how he feels. "You can't do this," she says again.

"I want to tell her the truth," he argues stubbornly. "She deserves that."

"She deserves happiness," Catherine counters. "It took her a long time to get over you, but now she has. The past is the past… leave it there."

He holds her gaze for a long moment. "It's not the past Catherine," he says. "Not for me."

She absorbs that, and after a long silence, she runs a hand through her hair. "You're an ass," she says flatly. "For leaving like you did… for doing what you did to her in the first place… for even thinking about doing this." She shakes her head. "You're going to do what you want to do, I know that. But know this Gil… if you hurt her… if I hear of her crying the slightest glimmer of a tear over you… I'll never forgive you."

Catherine's words settle in his heart, in his soul, ring in his ears, but he doesn't back down, and she changes the subject then, moving on to other, safer, matters. But the words linger in his head, circling around, but they're not enough to stop him picking up the phone later on, calling Sara's number, asking her if they can meet after the shift.

And they're not enough to stop him smiling when she says yes.

>*<*>*<

Sara's not sure that she can ever remember a longer shift than this one, and it's not made any easier by the fact that Warrick seems to be studiously avoiding any semblance of personal contact with her. Oh, he talks to her, but only when it's to do with the case, even then only when he absolutely has to. He hadn't acted that way around her, ever, not even when they were first going out together, when they were so nervous about people finding out before they knew where they were going - even though they would shortly find out that people had seen it coming long before they had.

Warrick acting so strangely would be bad enough, but it's worse when it's accompanied by Catherine's serious eyed stare. Sara would bet every last cent of her paycheque that Grissom's talked to Catherine, has told her everything, so she does to Catherine what Warrick's doing to her, and skilfully avoids her as much as possible. She finds it harder to avoid Greg though, and she can't miss how his natural enthusiasm seems to have lowered several notches, as if he too knows that something is amiss.

Even the longest shifts come to an end though, but there's still one more hurdle to clear when she meets Warrick in the locker room. It's mercifully deserted, so despite how strange, how strained, things have been between them today, she feels safe stepping towards him, close enough that she can rest one hand on his hip, the other on his chest, close enough that he can rest his hands on her shoulders. She looks up at him, meets his eyes, and for no reason that she can name, she goes cold all over. It's the exact opposite of what usually happens when she looks into his eyes, and she doesn't know what that means. She wants to tell him that Grissom means nothing to her, that it's him that she loves, but the words stick in her throat, and the only thing she can do is whisper his name.

He sighs heavily, his hands kneading her shoulders gently. "I know," he says, keeping his voice low. He leans forward, brushing a kiss across her forehead, then he moves one hand, closing it around her hand resting on his chest. "I'll see you at home," he says, and then he lets her go, lets her grab her jacket and walk out into the parking lot to meet Grissom.

He's standing there, leaning against his car, arms crossed over his chest, and he smiles when he sees her coming. She doesn't know where it comes from, but her heart quickens at the sight of him, and she does her best to ignore it, labelling it a relic of the past, a ghost of former feelings. It's not real she tells herself, repeats it several times.

They exchange pleasantries, but she's as reserved with him as Warrick was with her earlier on, and she wonders as she follows Grissom's car through the streets of Las Vegas if Warrick's reasoning was the same as hers - keep the language simple, keep the emotions in check, because otherwise it's just too damn hard.

When she pulls into the parking lot though, looks around her, she's hard pressed to keep her emotions in check as she realises where she is. It's the same place that Grissom picked two years ago, the same place where they talked, ended up kissing by her car, ended up doing a hell of a lot more than that in her apartment.

She's pretty sure she knows why he chose this place, but while it does bring back memories, they're not the warm and fuzzy feelings that might have been expected. Instead, a flash of almost irritation courses through her veins, and when she joins him in the walk to the front door, she doesn't look at him, keeps her eyes fixed straight ahead of her.

When they sit down, they chat as they look at the menus, with Grissom asking her about the case, her telling him. It's almost like old times, but the twist of her stomach signals the difference, because it's not the good twist that used to be there, it's something slightly different, and it only gets worse when they place their order. Hers is small, because she's not sure that she could eat anything at the moment, and Grissom's eyes narrow slightly as she tries to smile.

Any moisture in her mouth seems to have evaporated, so she takes a sip of water, hoping that her hand doesn't shake. It doesn't, and when she puts down the glass, not looking at him, she hears his intake of breath, knows that they're about to get down to the real business of the meeting.

"I know it must be a shock for you," Grissom says, and she looks up at him sharply, the flash of almost irritation that she'd felt walking into this place coalescing into the real thing at what might just be the most massive understatement she's ever heard. "Me coming back like this," he continues, and a bitter laugh escapes her.

"Coming back, leaving… what's the difference?" Her words shock even her, and his eyes flare with surprise. Shaking her head, she looks down, rubbing the bridge of her nose, knowing that she really should feel worse about snapping at him.

But all Grissom says is a mild, "I guess I deserve that."

She could agree with him, but she bites her tongue. That's not going to get them anywhere. "Why did you come back?" she asks him.

"I can't tell you why I came back." When she hears those words, she wants to get up, wants to walk away and never look back, but he stops her when he continues instantly with, "Not until I tell you why I left."

Those words make her raise her head ever so slowly, meeting his gaze. "Why?" It's one word, but it's all she can manage after so many days and nights of wondering, of analysing, of blaming herself. Even as she asks the question though, she realises the truth in what Warrick had said in the kitchen the previous day; that even though she hadn't agonised over Grissom's leaving in many a long day, she still needed to know why. She still needed the closure.

She doesn't expect his next words. "I was sick." She can feel her jaw drop, and a thousand questions come to mind, but he halts her by raising her hand. "Nothing serious… it wasn't life threatening. It's called otosclerosis… it's a hereditary disease… and it causes the sufferer to go deaf."

The words lie in the space between them, and in her mind's eye, she sees a courtroom, sees Grissom on the stand asking Marjorie Wescott to repeat her question, not once, but twice. At the time, she'd thought it was just Grissom grandstanding, a brilliant ploy to make his point. Suddenly though, she knows better. "You were losing your hearing?" she asks, just to make sure, and he nods.

"My mother has the condition," he says, and the words are out before she can stop them.

"That's how you learned to sign," she says, a smile coming to her face, a mystery solved, and he smiles too.

"Yes." He pauses, looks down for a moment. "I had an operation, which I thought would work… but it didn't. I was getting worse… so I had to leave."

"Why?" She narrows her eyes, running the scenario through her head, and she must be missing something because she can't see why he had to leave.

"A crime scene investigator depends on all five senses Sara," he says, the mentor to the student once again. "I was losing one of mine… there was nothing I could have done."

"Why didn't you tell us?" she demands, then, more to the point, "Why didn't you tell me?"

"I didn't want anyone to know."

She blinks, raises her glass of water to her lips, but doesn't drink, just moistens them a little. "So you just left." Her voice is flat, devoid of emotion. "Without a word."

"I didn't have a choice."

He might believe that, he sounds like he does, but the words are like a red rag to a bull, and she works hard to keep her temper in check. "You had a choice when you took me out to dinner that night," she reminds him through a clenched jaw. "You asked me, remember?"

"I remember everything." There's weight in the three simple words, enough to knock the breath out of her, enough to leave a bruise, and she can't look at him. "I'm not proud of what I did Sara," he says, with such obvious sincerity that she has to swallow hard. "But I don't regret it." There's a long pause, during which he reaches out, lays his hand over hers, and she drags her gaze up to his. "I could never regret it."

There doesn't seem to be enough air in the room, so she sucks in a deep breath. "Grissom… " she whispers, but he silences her with a shake of the head.

"I had another operation," he tells her. "Which did work. My hearing's not one hundred percent, but it's not far off it. I'm not back in Vegas for the lab… I'm going to be teaching at UNLV. I came back for you."

The only thing she can say is his name, so she says it. "Grissom… " but once again, he stops her, stuns her into silence.

"I love you Sara," he says, and she's sure her heart stops, because how many times has she dreamed of him saying those words to her, how many times had she prayed for it? For one glorious night, she'd let herself believe that her dream was about to come true, but that was a long time ago. "I always have. And I don't want to be without you any more."

Sara looks at him, looks in his eyes, those eyes that haunted her dreams for so many months. His hand is on hers, he's saying all the right things, and for all the two of them know, they're the only two people in the room.

It's what she dreamed of.

Except that while Grissom's hand is on hers, her other hand is resting against her chest, able to feel the ring that's hiding beneath her jumper, and she's remembering a pair of green eyes that looked at her worriedly before she came here, remembering another man's touch that banished all her troubles away.

She's looking at Grissom, and he's what she dreamed of.

But he's not what she wants any more.

"Do you remember when the lab exploded?" she asks him slowly, softly, and he nods. "I asked you to dinner. You turned me down." She doesn't mention the time that he asked her out, though she knows they're both thinking about it. "You said, 'I don't know what to do about this'." He nods, and she tilts her head curiously. "Do you remember what I said?"

He hesitates, but she knows from the expression on his face that it's not because he doesn't remember, just the opposite in fact. "You said that you did. And that by the time I figured it out, it could be too late."

She nods, because that's it, almost word for word. And while, at the time, she'd feared that her words would come true, now she knows that they have, and she always thought that she'd be more upset about it. But she's not, not really.

"It's too late Grissom," she says, and means it. "I love Warrick. We're living together, we're getting married… Grissom, he's my life." She shakes her head and she hopes that Warrick knows that, knows she's going to go home and tell him that. "I was crazy about you, for so long… but I'm not that person any more. I haven't been for a long time."

He opens his mouth, closes it again, blinks as his eyes dart from side to side, as if he's trying to come up with the perfect argument. "Sara-" he tries, but she shakes her head again, not needing to hear what he's going to say. There's no perfect argument that he can make, so she takes her hand away from his, standing up.

"I'm glad you're back," she says, and she means that too. "I'm glad to see you again… and I'd like you to be in our lives. But I'm in love with Warrick. That's not going to change."

She holds his gaze for another long moment, then she turns, walks out of the restaurant and goes home.

>*<*>*<

Warrick watches Sara as she walks out of the locker room, and while he's always known he lacks discipline, he discovers hitherto unknown reserves, because he doesn't give in to his first impulse, to run out to the parking lot, punch Grissom's lights out, and tell her that there's no way she's going anywhere with him. He counts to a hundred before he moves, is thankful that he doesn't meet anyone to draw him into conversation, is able to make his way straight home. Once there, he goes to the kitchen, makes himself a cup of coffee, sits down at the kitchen table, and waits.

He doesn't know how long he's been sitting there before he hears her key turning in the lock. He does know that it's long enough for his muscles to have grown stiff, for the dregs of his coffee to turn cold in the cup, for the residue around the rim to have hardened into a creamy brown scum that's going to be murder to rinse away.

It's also evidently been long enough for Sara to have had dinner. He just doesn't know if dinner was all she had, and the second that thought, that suspicion comes to him, he feels himself growing cold as the liquid at the bottom of his cup.

He hears her coming towards him, but he doesn't look at her, scared at what he might see on her face. He doesn't move until he hears her ragged intake of breath, hears her exhale his name. Only then does he turn his head, and for once, he doesn't put on any masks, any airs. For once, he lets the emotions he's feeling play across his face, and he doesn't miss the flash of pain in her brown eyes as a result.

She sucks in another sharp breath, closing the distance between them, sinking down into the chair perpendicular to his, as if her legs won't hold her up any longer. Her elbows rest on the table, her hands flat in front of her, and he knows that she's mimicking his posture exactly, but that's not what he chooses to focus on.

He's much more interested in the ring finger on her left hand; the one that's bare of any engagement ring.

He's used to that sight at work, even if it does seem wrong to him, because as far as he's concerned, that ring belongs on her finger, not on some chain around her neck. But he knows that it's necessary because of the work they do, and because she's terrified of losing it, and he accepts that.

But they're not at work now, they're off the clock, and he knows that the last thing she always does before she leaves the lab is to take the ring off the chain and slide it back on her finger.

She obviously didn't do that today, and he's not sure he wants to know what that means.

She must know the thoughts that have been going through his head, or maybe she just knows him, because her first words are designed to soothe his worries. "Nothing happened. You know that, right?"

He's just about able to tear his eyes from her ringless finger to her face. "Yeah," he says flatly. "I know that."

Except that his tone tells the opposite tale, and her mouth opens and closes again as she searches for words. "Grissom and I went out for dinner," she finally tells him. "We talked. Then I came home." The words "to you" go unspoken, but he hears them anyway.

"You talked." The words are ground out between clenched teeth, and when she merely widens her eyes in response, he continues with, "Did he tell you that he's in love with you?"

There's the briefest of pauses before she says, "Yes," though he's not surprised at her honesty. After all, they've never kept secrets from one another; isn't that exactly what he'd told Grissom yesterday? He shakes his head, swallows hard against the bile rising up in his throat, and he almost misses her next words over the roaring in his ears. "And I told him he was too late."

He wants to believe that, more than he's ever wanted to believe anything in his life, but he's lived with the ghost of Gil Grissom between them for too long to accept the words at face value. "You really mean that?" he asks. "Or did you just say that because you thought you had to?"

Her jaw drops and he doesn't think he's ever seen her look more stunned; she looks as if he's just slapped her. "You have to ask that?" she exclaims, and from the anger burning in her eyes, he knows just how much he's hurt her with those words. Strangely enough, there's a part of him that's glad to see it, because she can't fake emotion like that, so she must be telling him the truth. The second that thought strikes him, he banishes it, can't believe he's thinking like that, because that's not him. That's not them.

He knows he's acting crazy, but he can't help it, and he knows why.

"You know what it's been like, being with you the last couple of years?" he asks after a long silence, a long silence where they've been staring into one another's eyes. "Falling in love with you, planning to spend the rest of my life with you, all the while thinking that I was your second choice? That if Grissom showed up again and clicked his fingers, you'd go running?"

She's shaking her head. "Warrick, no," she murmurs softly, but he's not letting her words stop him, because this needs to be said.

"I knew Sara… I knew how you felt about him. Even before he left. Then when he did… " His voice trails off as he remembers watching Sara become more withdrawn than he'd ever seen her, the gap-toothed grin seemingly disappearing from existence, how she'd worked even longer hours than before. He'd been sure that she wasn't sleeping, had been damn sure that she wasn't eating properly, as he'd watched her already slender frame dropping pounds that it couldn't afford to lose. "You scared the hell out of us Sara."

A small, sad smile hovers around her lips. "But you saved me."

Against all odds, he chuckles. "I don't know about that." He just remembers pure frustration getting the better of him, culminating in the day that she told him she wasn't going to go to the staff Christmas drinks. At the time, he hadn't been able to remember the last time he'd seen her out anywhere, and he'd simply told her that that was unacceptable, that she was going to go and that she was going to have a good time. She'd protested, but he'd dragged her there anyway, and she'd barely made it in the door before Greg had been dragging her out on the dance floor, insisting that she was a woman who looked like she knew how to Macarena, and that if she didn't, he was the very man to teach her. He can still see the two of them in the middle of the floor, Sara attempting to follow Greg's lead, at first with a forced smile, eventually a genuine one lighting her face.

"The Christmas party?" Her voice brings him back to reality, and he realises that she must be remembering too. "I think it was the first time I'd laughed in months."

"That's when I knew." He doesn't mean to say that, but when she looks at him curiously, he has no choice but to continue. "That I was in love with you," he elaborates, watching surprise land on her face as she makes the connection.

"But… we didn't start dating till the next summer… " she protests, and he nods slowly.

"I know. See, I think I'd had feelings for you for a while, without even realising it. And then there I was, at that party, watching you try to copy Sanders… and that's when it hit me. That I could spend the rest of my life with you, trying to get you to smile like that." He sees her swallow hard, shrugs nonchalantly. "I just knew."

He hadn't done anything about it, not knowing the details of what had happened with her and Grissom, but knowing instinctively that she wasn't ready for anything. He'd resolved to be her friend, to be happy with that, and he'd kept dragging her out of the lab, on any excuse, any pretext.

Pretty soon, he hadn't had to drag.

And then, they went out for breakfast after the shift and he dropped her to her front door, leaning down before he left to drop a kiss on her cheek. He'd done it before, no big deal, but that day when he'd turned, she'd held on to his arm, not letting him go. He'd turned back to her, ready to ask if she was all right, but his words had died under the gentle pressure of her lips against his.

It had been everything that he'd been waiting for, and they'd been together ever since.

"Just like I knew," he continues now, "That nothing ever would have happened between us if Grissom hadn't left. So many times I've thought that you were going to come to your senses, realise that I wasn't who you really wanted… "

She's frowning when she interrupts him. "You knew Grissom was in love with me? Now… not just then?"

He nods. "He told me so… yesterday."

"You knew that," she says slowly, and he's heard that tone a thousand times at the lab, when she's on her way to figuring out some vital part of a case. "You knew that, and you still said I should meet him, hear him out?" He doesn't speak, doesn't nod, just looks at her, and she opens and closes her mouth a couple of times before the word "Why?" finally passes her lips.

It's a good question, but it's one he knows the answer to. "Because… you deserve to be with the person you love. Sara, I don't want you to wake up in ten years and realise that I'm not the one."

Even if losing her would kill him.

She closes her eyes, tilts her head back and blows a steady stream of air between her lips. When she opens her eyes again, when she's looking at him, it seems as if there's a suspicious sheen about her eyes, and a cold hand reaches into his chest, squeezes his heart. "That's not going to happen," she whispers, her voice hoarse, but firm.

Something that feels a lot like hope loosens the cold hand, but doesn't dislodge it entirely. "You can say that for sure?" He's challenging her, but he's always challenged her, ever since the day they first met at that dive of a casino on Blue Diamond Road.

She nods, and for the first time in this conversation, he gets a glimpse of that smile of hers. "I told Grissom once… a long time ago… that by the time he knew what he really wanted, it could be too late." She pauses, takes a deep breath. "And I told him today that it was." She looks into his eyes, brown holding green for a long time. "Grissom's not the man I want to spend the rest of my life with, Warrick. You are."

"You can't tell me that things wouldn't have been different if he'd stayed," he reminds her, and he knows from the set of her jaw that it was the wrong thing to say.

"No, I can't." There's that honesty again, but they both know it's true. "But Grissom didn't stay, he left. And you're the one who was there for me every step of the way… the one who picked me up off the ground… " She breaks off, shaking her head. "I don't know what more I can say to you."

He closes his eyes for a long moment, his emotions in turmoil, and he doesn't open them again until he hears the distinctive sound of metal moving against a chain. She's reaching up behind her neck, unclasping her necklace, and she lets the ring slide down, landing on the table between them. She sets the necklace to one side and stares at the ring, and he remembers all the times he saw that on Grams's finger when he was a kid, remembers the hours walking through Vegas, looking for the perfect ring for Sara before Grams told him that she had the perfect one in her jewellery box. He remembers the day he proposed, how nervous he'd been, how Sara had beamed as she'd said yes, nary an instant of doubt. He remembers lying in bed beside her on countless nights since then, with her wearing that ring and nothing else, wondering how did he get to be so lucky.

The ring lies between them, and neither one of them makes a move to touch it.

"Grissom says he loves me," Sara says finally, and the words make his stomach twist. "But I don't love him Warrick; I haven't for a long time. We're supposed to be getting married in two months… and that's not something I want to change. If you need time to think about it… " Her voice trails off, and she has to clear her throat. "If you have stuff to work through… "

She stops talking again when his fingers touch the ring, when he lifts it up, holds it in the air between them. He remembers what he promised her when he put it on her finger, when she'd raised the issue of working together and being married to one another; she'd been concerned if it would be too much for them, if the higher-ups would even let it happen. He'd told her that there was nothing they couldn’t get through together.

He still feels that way.

"We'll work through it together," he tells her now, and her face, shrouded in doubt at first, clears when his words sink in. He reaches out with his other hand, takes her left hand and slowly, carefully, slides the engagement ring on. It goes on smoothly, as if it was meant to belong there, and he fingers it for a moment before meeting his gaze. "Looks good," he tells her, and she nods.

"Feels good," is her answer as she pulls her hand back just enough so that she can grip his fingers with hers. She stands after a moment, and without letting go of his hand, comes around to stand in front of him. He knows what she wants him to do without being told, so he pushes his chair back, and sure enough, she settles herself in his lap, sliding her arms around his neck, burying her face in his shoulder. His hands go to her back, press her closer to him, and he places a kiss in her hair, closing his eyes. "I love you," he hears her mutter, and he smiles.

"I love you too."

>*<*>*<

A week after his date with Sara, the date when she walked out on him, left him sitting there on his own, Grissom isn't the least bit surprised when Catherine calls him up, asks him over to her place for dinner. He hasn't seen her since the day after he went out with Sara, when they met for breakfast after the shift, and he told her what she already knew, what Sara had said, the choice she had made. Catherine had been sympathetic towards him, even if he knew that she'd been happy for Sara and Warrick too, and the whole meal had been more awkward than any he could remember with Catherine. She hasn't called him since, nor has he sought anyone out, avoiding the crime lab, the people there, as much as possible. He knows though, when Catherine mentions, somewhat tentatively, that there will be a few people from work there, people who want to see him, and asks him does he mind, that he's not going to be able to put off the inevitable any longer.

He's going to see her, see them, and he's not sure how he feels about that.

He knows, of course, what Catherine's plan is, that everyone he's ever known who's still at the Crime Lab is going to be there, and when he sees the sheer volumes of cars outside Catherine's place, that people are literally parked around the block, he knows that he's right. So he's prepared when he knocks on Catherine's door, is grateful when they don't all hide and shout surprise. Catherine is the first person over to him, Nick close behind him, a tall dark-haired woman at his side. Grissom surmises that this is the fabled Diana, another assumption that proves to be right, and when the two of them stand talking to him after Catherine goes to check on the food, it doesn't take him long to realise how in love the two of them are, how happy they are together, and he's genuinely happy for Nick.

He mentions something about how he's heard they have a daughter, and Nick's face lights up in the biggest smile that Grissom's ever seen. "Yeah, Sophie's around here somewhere," Nick says, turning around to locate his daughter, finally managing it. "There she is… with Warrick and Sara."

Grissom follows his pointed finger, his heart skipping a beat at the sight of Sara with a dark haired girl the image of Nick sitting on her knee. The little girl has a set of car keys in her hand, is waving them around, so Sara's very alert, making sure she doesn't get hit accidentally, and from this distance, Grissom can read her lips easily, can see that while she's looking at the baby, she's talking to Warrick.

"I don't think you're gonna get your car keys back anytime soon," she says, glancing up at Warrick, and Grissom's eyes go to the other man's face.

"That's ok," Warrick says, a wide smile on his face. "I'm enjoying the view."

Sara's gaze had gone back to the baby; at Warrick's words, she looks back up to him again. She's grinning up at him, looking at him as if he's the only person in the room, and while Grissom can't read her lips when she's in profile, he doesn't need to.

Just like with Diana and Nick, he knows love when he sees it.

"She does love her godparents," Diana laughs, and Nick laughs too, drawing Grissom's attention to the couple, at what they're saying. He must do a pretty bad job at keeping the surprise off his face, because Nick looks across at him, holding up a hand as if to forestall any objections.

"Man, I know what you're thinking," he says, looking across at the happy trio for a moment. "Sara with a kid? But trust me, no matter what she tells you, she's awesome with them." He raises his glass of juice to his lips, takes a sip. "I wouldn't be surprised if Sophie has a little playmate sooner rather than later… "

Diana rolls her eyes, smacking her husband on the arm. "Sara's gonna kill you if she hears you talking like that," she informs him. "And I'm gonna let her."

"Like I'm the only one who thinks it," Nick counters, and Grissom zones out their talk then, his gaze going back to Warrick and Sara, and it's easy to see why Nick said what he said, why, for that matter, he's not the only one saying it. As he looks at them, Sara jerks her head back quickly, almost having come a cropper thanks to Sophie's waving arm, and she laughs at something that Warrick says, mock-glaring at him before looking back down at the child in her arms. Warrick meanwhile doesn't take his eyes off the two of them, his hand reaching out to touch Sara's hair, stroking it tenderly, a smile on his face that's matched by the one that appears on Sara's.

Grissom's staring at them, lost in thought, and he can almost feel Sara's hair underneath his hand, remembering a time that he looked down at Sara's sleeping form, touched her hair oh-so-gently, just like that, afraid to breathe in case he woke her, because he'd known that he'd never leave her if she was awake. He's carried that memory with him for the last two years, was hoping that they could make more memories together, but he knows now that that's not going to happen. He knows too, that he has no-one to blame but himself, that it's his choices that have led them here. After all, Sara had every right to move on with her life, and as for Warrick… well, who could blame him for falling in love with Sara?

All these thoughts run through Grissom's head as he looks at them, and he's startled when Catherine touches his elbow, smiling brightly at Nick and Diana. "Mind if I steal him guys?" She barely gives them a chance to object, leading him into the kitchen, over to the cooker, and if anyone was looking at them, they'd think that they were just talking about the food.

But they're not. Instead, Catherine looks up at him, an expression of wary sympathy in her eyes. "You see it, don't you? The way they look at one another?"

Grissom nods, because that was actually the first time that he's seen the two of them together since he's been back, and he would never have believed it was possible for things to have changed so much in the two years that he was gone. Because he was damn sure that Sara had never looked at Warrick that way two years ago; he's not sure she ever even looked at him that way.

"They make a good couple," he admits, and it's easier to admit than he might have thought. Sara deserves to be loved, deserves to be happy; he's always known that. He wanted to be the one to do that, he wanted things to work out for them, it's why he came back to Las Vegas. But he had his chance, and he let her go, and now he has to live with that. He's sad for himself, but he's happy for her, for them.

"They really do Grissom," Catherine tells him, patting his shoulder gently. "They really do."

There's no more to be said, except for to serve up the food, and when they're gathered around the table, Catherine exacts some measure of revenge on Grissom for dropping her in the deep end with regard to running the shift, getting him to make a speech, a notion that the rest of the guests looking at him expectantly.

He's always been a man of few words, and two years haven't changed that. So he doesn’t make a speech, instead he proposes a toast, and when he raises his glass, he's looking directly at Warrick and Sara, sitting side by side, hands entwined underneath the table.

Grissom makes a toast to new beginnings, and when they raise their glasses back, he knows they understand.

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