Threads of Time By Gabby Castillo

Author's note: I'm kinda stuck on "Stuck" right now. I sat down to right a chapter, but this is what came out instead. I guess we can consider it my next WiP, I'm almost done with "Stuck" anyway! So, please, enjoy this, it really has some potential!

Disclaimer: CSI does not belong to me. My therapist says I have to learn to deal with it… lol!

……….

"I love you, Griss."

"I love you too."

Grissom stole one last kiss from Sara as she walked out the door, heading to a seminar in Denver that she wouldn't come back from…

……….

Two years today. Two long years today.

Grissom sat up in large bed, and stared around the room, hoping for any sign that today everything would be different. He looked for signs that Sara had returned, maybe never even left. A suitcase, her brush, the Copy of Forensic Monthly that she had taken with her. The outfit she had worn that day. But all of it was still missing.

And he was still missing her.

Just like all the other days in the past two years, Grissom laid his head back onto his pillow, and counted the reasons not to get up, like counting sheep to go back to bed. Except for each of his "sheep" had a gun, and a bullet in the barrel, and a trigger that refused to be pulled. Grissom closed his eyes. Two years may have gone by, but he refused to believe that she was dead. Sara would have put up a fight, found a way to stay alive.

Grissom pulled himself out of bed, and headed for the bathroom. Two years was a long time, and every second it got longer and longer.

……….

Two years and one week earlier…

"It's a seminar on trace evidence and lab analysis. I've been asked to be a speaker."

Grissom leaned over Sara and read the pamphlet she held in her hands. He skimmed over it's surface and frowned.

"Four days long? That's… torture."

Sara set the pamphlet down and turned around, raising a skeptical eyebrow, "Torture?"

"Yeah, you know… four days without you in my arms. Torture."

Sara smiled and softly pressed her lips to his. After a few seconds she smiled, and broke the kiss, "Look at the bright side…it's only four days. That's not forever."

"Yeah, but I'll miss you," whispered Grissom.

"Oh, yeah?" Sara took his hand, and slowly led him down the hallway, towards the bedroom, as she whispered seductively, "Then I think you should show me just how much you'll miss me."

……….

Grissom wrapped his arms tighter around her, and kissed her check. Sara sighed happily and snuggled closer to him.

"What are you thinking?" she asked quietly.

Grissom ran a hand through Sara's hair, and sighed, "You."

Sara laughed, "Me?"

"You are what occupies my thoughts, my dreams, my very soul and every part of me."

"Who says that?"

"Gil Grissom."

Sara turned around in his arms and planted a kiss on his lips, softly caressing his cheek as she pulled away.

"This may sound kind of selfish… but I wish you weren't going to Denver," he said.

Sara frowned, "Why?"

"You ever get the feeling that something bad is going to happen, but you can't quite figure out what?" Grissom paused to kiss her forehead, then continued, "I don't know… if you think about it… this… us… just happened fairly recently. I'm so scared that if you go now, I'll wake up from this beautiful dream, and things will go back to the way they were before…"

"Lonely," mumbled Sara.

"Miserable."

Sara laid her head on his chest and listened to his heart beat against her ear. She closed her eyes as she focused on the rhythm coming through, the feel of the slight thump against her skin. She kissed his bare chest, then looked into his eyes.

"We are as real as you're heart beat. We're both alive, and will probably both be around for a very long time. I love you, Grissom, with every fiber in my being… and I can assure you, as much as it feels like it sometimes… this is not a dream."

"I love you so much, Sara."

"Hold me, Griss… and don't let me go"

"Never, Sara. Never."

……….

Present…

Grissom leaned against the warm spray of water coming from the showerhead. He wiped the last remaining soap from his hair, and stayed still to let the hard spray brush against his skin.

Sometimes Grissom looked back on that conversation and wondered if it hadn't been a dream. If his mind hadn't come up with it after Sara turned in her resignation and left the lab. But he knew for sure that Sara left for Denver… it was the coming back that had never happened.

'I let you go…' he thought.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he told himself there was nothing he could have done. Las Vegas and Denver were two very big cities that were very far apart, and even if he could have gotten to Denver as he received the call, he was almost positive things wouldn't have looked much better…

……….

Two years ago…

"How'd it go?"

"Wonderful! It was amazing!" the excitement was thick in Sara's voice.

"Yeah? Tell me all about it?" Said Grissom as he signed his name to another file.

Over the phone, Sara sighed, "I miss you."

"Well, I was talking about the seminar, but I miss you too."

Laughing, Sara replied, "Oh, you know… lots of questions, but I had all the answers. I think I had the complete attention of all the males in the room…"

"College students. I gave a lecture once, and there was this college girl sitting in the front row, couldn't take her eyes off me. I swear, she fell for me then and there."

Sara huffed over the line as Grissom laughed, "I'm sure she did Grissom."

There was a muffled knock in the background, and Grissom chuckled, "Room service?"

"Hold on one sec," the phone went quiet as Sara held it against her shoulder and answered the door.

Grissom could hear Sara give a polite hello, but the next noise scared the living hell out of him.

The phone dropping to the floor, and Sara's scream.

"Sara? Sara!"

He could hear a male, and a loud thump, "Shut up, bitch! I'll kill you, I swear!"

Grissom heard the distinct sound of a slap, followed by another loud thump.

"Grissom!"

"Sara, oh God!"

Grissom could hear the phone being picked up off the ground, then heard a stranger laugh, "Gil Grissom? I've heard so much about you. Too bad you won't hear much about me… you'll never see her again. And be sure of it, you are going to go through the rest of you're life in hell, not knowing if she's dead or alive. So, consider her dead, Gil, and remember… hell hath no fury like a student scorned."

"Gri…" Sara called, but the line went dead.

And slowly, as Grissom jumped up and started his frantic search, Grissom started to die inside too.

……….

Present…

The phone rang from the living room, and Grissom walked slowly from the bedroom to answer it. He picked it up, and answered.

"Grissom."

"Gil Grissom? My name is Kyra Green, I'm with the Denver Police Department. You're name was in a file, a missing persons investigation…"

"Sara Sidle?" he could barely say it.

"Yes sir. Your listed as lead investigator from the Vegas end. I was told by my supervisor to get a hold of you right away sir. A young women was found off Interstate 76, in a small town called Hudson, about 31 miles from here, matches the missing women's description. You should get here a.s.a.p, sir. I think we have her."