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The remaining Graveyard Criminalists were in the LVPD Crime Lab locker room getting ready to go home. Shift was finally was over for the day. Catherine and Sara had left already because Sara overheated her Tahoe for the 4th time that month. She had a heavy foot and blew out her brake pads and needed to get them replaced. Catherine offered to give her a ride home; she didn't mind since it was on her way.
Nick, Warrick and Gil were in the locker room, hoping the downpour would stop when Nick opened his locker. A pink folded piece of paper fluttered to the ground landing right at his feet. He squatted down and picked it up. He sat down on the bench that ran the whole middle of the room and smelled the paper, it smelt like, perfume. Nick unfolded the piece of paper and read what it said to himself smiling. Warrick slammed his locker shut and sat down beside Nick noticing the pink paper.
"What do you have there?" he asked.
"A love letter I guess," Nick stated re-reading the paper for the 4th time.
"Well read it out loud," Grissom said joining his younger co-workers on the bench.
Roses are red,
Violates are blue,
Sugar is sweet,
And you’re cute too,
Love you Nicky-poo,
Your secret admirer.
"Sounds like someone has a crush on you," Grissom replied and patted the younger man on the back.
"I'm going to find out who it is," Nick stated as he slammed his locker shut.
“Good luck with that, I would laugh if it was Sanders,” Warrick replied and all three men laughed.
The following evening Grissom came to work early as usual, and walked into his uniquely decorated office. On his desk that was cluttered with on going cases and evidence was a vase filled with 12 ruby red roses. He set his brief case down on the chair and picked up the card, reading it out loud.
Hey bug man hope you enjoy these red roses.
Love your secret admirer
Grissom re-read the card could smell something sweet, like perfume or lotion. He smelt the roses then the card and detected it as the source. Catherine appeared at the door and gave her boss a quizzed look.
"Gil, what are you doing? And where did you get these beautiful red roses? Did you know they are my favourite flower? You didn't happen to get these for me did you?" she questioned.
"Ah, no, sorry, I got them from a mystery person read the card they left me," Grissom replied and handed the card to Catherine, who had a frown on her face.
She read it over and couldn’t help but giggle. She forced herself to smile and handed it back to Grissom. Catherine spun on her heel and headed back towards the door.
"Hey! What did you think of the card?" Grissom called after.
Catherine turned around and strutted back towards his desk, "Well I would have to say they have nice smelling shampoo and you know, come to think of it, it smells familiar," Catherine replied grabbing one of the roses and walked out of the room.
"Where did you smell it before?" Gil asked hoping to get to the bottom of this as quickly as possible. He had more important things like a double homicide to worry about than a silly secret admirer.
"You can figure that out bug man," she called as she walked down the hallway laughing and Grissom just rolled his eyes.
Nick was sitting in the break room reading a magazine patiently waiting for his assignment when Sara walked in. She leaned over his shoulder looking at the magazine he was reading, seeing it was one from Greg’s “secret stash” when Nick spun around and spotted Sara with a smirk on her face.
"Trying to find a girlfriend Nick?" Sara snickered.
"There are plenty of attrative and intellegent girls in Vegas than in this Sports Illustrated Magazine.” Nick replied and could see Sara grabbing herself a cup of Java.
“Sure Nick, the only place you’ll be able to find women who would be willing to take their clothes off for the camera would be in the Dance Clubs.”
“Your just jealous,” Nick stated and saw the scowl Sara was giving him. He knew he was beginning to push her buttons, something no one should do at the beginning of a shift, “Anyway I need you to see this letter someone gave me,”
"Someone must have mixed you up with someone else for you to get it," Sara replied and snatched the letter out of Nick's hands. She unfolded it and read the poem to herself as a smile crept across her face to help stop her from bursting into laughter.
"What are you smiling about?" Nick snapped.
"The poem it's too funny!" Sara said before she started to laugh.
“I knew I should have asked Catherine, she would have been more mature about it,”
“Whatever. See you later, Nicky-poo!” Sara spit out laughing and left the break room.
Nick looked at the poem and read the last word to himself. It was the same as what Sara just said. Then he thought that maybe she was just making fun of him and his stupid secret admirer.
Grissom walked into the break room and sat down at the table with Nick. Nick kept looking at the letter he found in his locker not even noticing his bosses’ presence.
"Any luck with finding out who your secret admirer is?" Grissom asked eyeing the magazine.
"Maybe, do you have Sara’s last report?" Nick asked deciding to go with his gut about his admirer being Sara and solve the mystery forensically.
"Yes, why?"
"I have a hunch on who my secret admirer is,"
"Come with me," Gil said and both me left the break room.
The two investigators entered Grissom's office and Nick noticed the red roses on his desk. He checked the card while Grissom was searching for Sara's report, on his cluttered desk.
“You got one too huh Griss?" Nick said and compared the handwriting and they didn't match, “Well at least we know it's two different people, hopefully women, but your card smells like Catherine's shampoo,” Nick confessed.
The only reason he knew that was because he had to borrow some of hers one night after processing a decomp. Everyone, including Grissom joked about his hair smelling like strawberries.
Grissom looked up when Nick said that remembering Catherine had said the aroma smelt familiar. He snatched the card out of Nick’s hand and read the first part it stated, bug man, just like Catherine said when she left his office earlier. He handed Nick Sara's latest report and then took out Catherine's as well.
"Was it something I said?" Nick replied seeing his bosses’ wheels in his head turning.
“I have a hunch on mine as well” Grissom stated and Nick smiled.
They walked down the maze of hallways bringing their letters and samples to Ronnie the labs handwriting analysis. They walked into the lab and saw he was searching for forged signatures on legal documents.
“Ronnie, I need you to compare this letter to this report" Nick said holding up his letter and Sara's report
"Alright,” Ronnie said looking up from his magnify glass. He took the two documents and placed them under the comparative microscope looking at each one carefully to come to a conclusion.
“Well the s in sugar matches the s in suspect and the v in violet matches the v in victim meaning that Ms. Sidle wrote both documents," Ronnie concluded and handed Nick back his letter and Sara’s report.
"Thanks," Nick said.
"Can you compare mine as well?" Gil asked.
"Sure no problem Mr. Grissom,” Ronnie said taking the card and report from Grissom’s hands and placing those two documents under the microscope.
“The a in admirer matches the a in apartment and the r in red and roses matches the r in revolver which concludes Ms.Willows wrote both of these documents,"
"Thanks Ronnie"
"No problem just doing my job" he replied and got back to work on the legal documents.
Nick and Grissom headed back to the break room with their new found evidence and hoping to get an explanation from both Sara and Catherine about the stupid charade they conjured up. When they passed the windows in the break room Gil could see the to girls in their laughing about something.
The men walked in and the girls stopped talking looking up at their co-workers with smiles plastered across their faces as if they were painted on.
"What have you two been up too?" Catherine asked as Sara tried not to laugh.
"Nothing," they answered in unison.
"Then why do you have mine and Catherine's latest reports in your hands as well as your love letter from your secret admirers?" Sara questioned.
Grissom and Nick hid the papers behind their backs shaking their heads; "No reason" Nick replied and smiled hoping that would convince them and get them to stop asking questions.
"You didn't by any chance go see Ronnie and ask him to compare the writing samples?" Catherine asked eagerly getting out of her chair and inching closer towards Grissom as he stepped back, "Did you?" she pressed.
"Ronnie? No I-I was just reviewing your reports with Nick and excellent job…both of you…as usual" Grissom lied beginning to feel his cheeks redden.
“Grissom, we handed those reports in a week ago, how could you possibly be reviewing them now?” Sara said and Grissom gave her a nervous smile.
“You know me, always forgetful, leaving stuff to the last moment,” Grissom confessed and Catherine stopped moving as Grissom bumped into the counter; cornered like a rat. He did tend to leave stuff to the last minuet or forget about it altogether.
"What about you?” Catherine said whipping her head towards Nick who looked like he was about to jump out of his skin, “Did you go see Ronnie?” she finished and gave Sara a slight nod for her to take over.
“Because you know we could always go over there and ask him our selves," Sara added as Nick jumped at the sound of her voice.
"N-no way Sa-sara,” Nick stuttered and Sara began walking towards him. Nick began walking backwards until he bumped into the counter as well, “Plus I gave up on finding out who my secret admirers is"
“I’m sure you did, that’s why your carrying around your love letter that you got in your locker huh?” Sara spat and Nick looked at her confused. He never told her he had found it in his locker.
“How did you know that I found it stuffed in my locker?” Nick asked and Sara was about to hit herself for being so stupid.
Come on Sara you can think of something, you’re a Criminalist for Christ sake!
Sara thought to herself and then replied, “I just guessed, I mean if I were a woman who was shy and love sick over someone I would stick a letter in their locker instead of confronting the person” Sara said and smiled as she turned to Catherine, “You would do the same thing wouldn’t you Cath?”
“Of course, it’s way less painful if the guy turns you down,” Catherine replied and glared at Grissom who was sweating bullets and she noticed he was almost as red as a tomato, "Grissom you're blushing! You’re lying! You got Ronnie to analyze the report again the love note I g-“ Catherine stopped and coughed, “I mean some crazy woman gave you!" Catherine snapped with rage diverting the attention away from Sara and back to Grissom.
Sara looked back at Nick and noticed that he was looking at the floor avoiding the rage in her eyes, he always did that when he was lying, “Your lying too Nick! What were the results?" Sara raised her voice, placed her hand on hip and tapped her foot, waiting patently for the answer.
Both men were afraid to say anything incase the two ticking bombs standing in front of them would explode with anger and do something they might end up regretting.
"The-” Grissom began to say but was too afraid to look Catherine in the eye.
“Spit it out Grissom I don’t have all day!” Catherine yelled and glanced at Sara. The comotion in the break room began to catch the attention of the near by lab technicans as they stopped what they were doing and watched the scene unfold.
“The, the results of both of the tests were that, that Sara wrote Nick’s and you wrote mine" Grissom stated staring long and hard at the crumb on the floor in front of Catherine’s tapping foot. He finally had enough courage to look up and finished, “What sick game have you two been conjuring up then?” he then saw Catherine's stare. One he never wanted to see, it was like looking at the incredable Hulk.
The girls glanced innocently at each other and shrugged, "We haven't been up to anything except working, so Ronnie must be wrong" Catherine said in a serious tone, almost threatening.
“I don’t think he’s wrong, I think your both lying” Nick said and Sara slapped him across the face for accusing her of such a horrible thing.
“Come on Sara, let’s go we have some real cases to solve” Catherine said grabbing her hand and pulled Sara towards the door.
“Damn that girl can slap,” Nick muttered as he massaged his reddened cheek. Grissom watched as both ladies left down the hallway and out of sight and earshot of the break room.
“I have another way that we can prove they wrote these,” Grissom said.
“What would that be, beat it out of them?” Nick asked and smiled as Grissom smirked as well.
“Fingerprints. They might be able to lie to our faces but what never lies?”
“The evidence…of course! Let’s go”
They both walked into the print lab seeing Mandy, their fingerprint analysis looking cross-eyed staring at all the prints on the computer screen, 8 hours a night.
“Mandy you look tired, why don’t you go take a break and we’ll take over your post for a little bit,” Nick said and Mandy looked up at him giving a smug smile.
“Thank-you guys, I’ll be back in 20 minuets,” Mandy said and got up out of her chair walking out of the print lab.
“Take your time,” Gil called but Mandy was already gone.
Grissom took out 2 fingerprint brushes and one jar of black fingerprint powder. Both men dipped their brushes in the fine powder and lightly brushed them across their notes in a circular motion revealing a print on each love letter. They lifted the prints onto the sticky paper and scanned them into the computer. Grissom pushed a few keys on the keyboard to commence the search through the AFIS database. He leaned back in his chair as both men waited patiently for the computer to spit out a suspect. Five grueling minuets later the machine beeped saying it had found a match. Nick leaned forward and hit some keys allowing the descriptions of Catherine and Sara pop onto the screen giving the guys the evidence they needed.
“Griss! We got them! It’s their prints,” Nick said and Grissom smiled as he got out his pager typing a message to Catherine as Nick did the same to Sara.
The two women were enjoying a bite to eat at the near by deli when both of their pagers beeped simultaneously. They put their sandwiches down on their plates and unclipped their pagers reading the messages from Grissom and Nick.
Catherine’s read:
Meet me outside the Las Vegas Police Department ASAP! Grissom.
Sara’s read:
Meet me outside the LVPD NOW! Nick
“Uh oh I think we’ve been caught…better go see what our punishment is this time” Catherine snickered and Sara laughed as she left money out on the table that covered both meals.
Both women walked out of the deli and hopped into Catherine’s Tahoe as she flooring it down the road towards the Las Vegas Police Department. They got out slamming the doors behind them seeing Nick and Gil waiting outside of the Police station with frowns on their faces and disappointment in their eyes.
“Gil, what’s with the frown? Did one of your cockroaches die?” Catherine said as she walked up beside him as he backed off.
“Catherine Willows, you are under arrest for the writing and manipulation of a letter written by an assumed Secret Admirer; you have the right to remain silent anything you say or do will be used against you in a court of law,” Grissom recited as he cuffed her hands behind her back, thinking he had gone insane.
“Grissom, are you feeling alright? You’re arresting me on a charge that doesn’t even exist!” Catherine yelled as she was being shoved inside the police department, “GRISSOM!” she screamed and began to fight but knew it was no use.
Nick and Sara with cuffs on as well not far behind, “You two are going into separate interrogation rooms were we are going to beat this out of you with all we’ve got” he replied pushing Sara into a separate room slamming the door behind him.
“Nick! What the hell is this? I think you’ve gone a little over the edge! Nick answer me!” Sara yelled as Nick chained one hand to the arm of the chair.
“Sara I’m not getting up out of this chair until you tell me why exactly you lied to me?” Nick said sitting down in his chair. He pounded his fist on the table causing Sara to jump.
“Nick…I think you need to take a few deep breaths and calm down” Sara said.
“I am calm!” Nick screamed. Sara was now scared, she had never heard Nick act like this before.
In the interrogation room next to them Grissom wasn’t getting very far with Catherine either.
“Cath, please tell me why you wrote the letter?” Grissom asked for the 3rd time in a row as Catherine sat there staring blankly at the wall, not saying a single word.
“I didn’t write the letter,” Catherine finally said and that was when Grissom had lost it.
“You didn’t write it huh? Then how do you explain your fingerprints on the letter!” Grissom said raising his voice making Catherine tense. It was the first time in years she had heard him raise his voice at her.
“They could have gotten there when I touched the stupid card to read what the saying was in your office! Did you ever think of that?” Catherine retorted extremely upset now.
“Your prints are the only foreign ones on there besides my own,”
“The person who wrote it could have worn gloves”
“But the letter was done in your hand writing meaning all evidence points to one person…you”
“Someone could have forged my writing. I swear to god I didn’t write you a letter” Catherine stated folding her arms across her chest not saying another word.
Back with Nick and Sara they weren’t making much progress.
“Sara, I’m not letting you out of this room until you confess to writing the letter” Nick said
“Well then I guess we’ll be here awhile” Sara retorted and flashed a gap-toothed smile at Nick.
"You know to move things along we could always give you girls a lie detector test. Prove once and for all if you're lying or not," Nick suggested and saw the worry flood Sara’s eyes.
Come on Sara don’t fall for these tricks. He’s just trying to get under your skin Sara thought smiling, "Don't you think you guys are getting a little carried away with this, I mean your taking these love letters way too seriously" Sara stuttered, “Plus a lie detector test is not admissible in court,”
“So you think this is going to go to court?” Nick asked.
“Why not, this is police brutality and your keeping me sequestered in an interrogation room on circumstantial evidence and you have not even given me the option of appointing a lawyer, oh and actually arresting Catherine and I on a bogus crime! So yeah I believe I can take you to court!”
“Fingerprints are not circumstantial evidence Sara, you know that. If you’re scared just say it, but if you have nothing to hide then a lie detector test should be painless"
Sara sat there staring at the brick wall deciding to keep her mouth shut because she was afraid if she opened it then she would end up confessing to the whole thing. She wasn’t quite sure if Nick was telling the truth about the evidence he had on her or if he was bluffing, to get her to leak information. Mostly, what scared her was she had no idea what Catherine was doing in the other room.
“Cath? Are you going to even look at me?” Gil asked seeing Catherine was staring into oblivion, probably caught up in her own little world. “Catherine, for the 8th time did you write this letter? I won’t be mad at you if you did, I just want this charade to end” Gil said.
Catherine turned her head back towards Gil and stated, “I want a lawyer,”
Gil was taken back from that, “Is that a confession?” he asked.
“No, if you want to play hard by hauling me into an interrogation room on a bogus charge then I might as well get my lawyer here, you know to make the whole scene even more realistic,” Catherine hissed.
“Catherine, the lawyers would laugh at this for ages if we drag them in here, why don’t we settle this like adults”
“Fine, if you want to act like an adult then un-cuff me,”
"Promise to cooperate?" Gil asked as he got up and went over to his collegue.
"Promise," Catherine whispered.
"Pardon?"
"I said promise! Geeze! Take this metal bracelet off!" Catherine screamed and Gil obeyed.
Meanwhile Nick was staring at Sara as she was staring at the floor avoiding eye contact. She heard Catherine scream over in the adjoining interrogation room and thought she was being torured for information.
“Sara,” Nick whispered after a few minuets of silence. He was hoping to get the attention of his upset co-worker but he saw that she was blocking him out, “Sara, I’m sorry I yelled at you,” Nick apologized and reached out across the table to grab her hand but Sara jerked it away hurting her wrist in the process since she was still chained to the chair, “Sara stop being stubborn!" Nick said raiins his voice, "I didn’t mean to get upset at you it’s just that you were making me upset by lying to me about the letter. I know you wrote it I just need to know why,”
“Do you promise not to reach over the table and strangle the life out of me like Homer Simpson does to Bart when I tell you?” Sara whispered slowly glancing up from the floor to see a smile on the young mans face.
“I promise,” Nick replied and leaned back in the chair waiting to hear her explanation. Sara just hoped that Catherine had caved on Grissom as well and by the sound of that scream she believed she did.
A few minuets later Catherine and Sara walked out of the interrogation rooms smiling at each other as they left the police department. Both Grissom and Nick emerged form the room’s moments later and exchanged surprised looks with each other, never thinking their reason was what they said.
"What is the day today Griss?" Nick asked stunned.
"The 16th of March" Grissom replied staring into oblivion.
“Sara was right it is our anniversary.” Nick stated and looked at Grissom who looked at Nick, “I-I should go get her something…maybe a pretty plant; she loves vegetation.” He replied heading towards the parking lot with Grissom on his heels.
“It’s mine and Cath’s anniversary as well. She said she loved red roses so maybe I’ll go get her a bouquet of those” Grissom suggested and Nick nodded in agreement. “Can you believe it, it really has been 2 years since our wedding and 2 years of Sara and you dating?” said Grissom.
“Yeah, the strangest part is that our anniversaries are on the same day, that’s kind of, creepy”
“Do you think they planned that as well?” Grissom asked and they stopped to think about that. “Nah,” they both said in unison and pushed open the door stepping outside again being greeted by their lovers.
“So Griss, what are we doing for our anniversary tonight?” Catherine asked giving her husband a kiss on the cheek, wrapping her arm around his shoulders.
“Well,” Grissom stated and whisked Catherine off her feet holding her in his arms just like on their wedding night. Catherine wrapped her arm around Gil’s neck and leaned in to give Grissom another kiss, “I know this great home that has a beautiful bedroom,” Grissom whispered and Catherine smiled broadly.
“Sound good to me” she whispered and rested her head on his shoulder.
“What about you Nicky,” Sara said calling her boyfriend by his nickname, which he loved. “What are we doing tonight?” she asked clasping her hand around his as he pulled her in closer to give her a kiss on the top of her head.
“It’s a surprise…” Nick whispered in her ear as she looked up into his eyes and Nick gave her a passionate kiss.
“Did I ever mention to you that I love surprises…” Sara mumbled across his lips as she gave him another kiss as the couples headed towards their Tahoe’s, leaving the Police Station.
