Disclaimer: I don't own Grissom, worse luck, Catherine or any of the gang. I just play in their sandbox. Dedication: Thanks to AbyKitten for being patient and betaing and vividlyblue1 for giving me back my muse!
Chapter 4
Brass sat down in his office, 'Damn but this has been a long shift,' he thought, 'and it's going to get even longer.' Like the CSIs on the Graveshift he had no intention of going home until they had Gil Grissom back where he belonged.
The phone on his desk rang and stifling a yawn he answered it, "Brass."
"Jim, it's Gil, put me on the speaker." God it was good to hear the other man's voice.
"Gil, where are you, are you okay?" he asked. He took out his cell phone and desperately paged the other members of the team just as Grissom knew he would; they'd want to hear this.
"I'm fine, a little dehydrated but..." his voice broke off abruptly and there was the sound of flesh hitting flesh. "Ah..." Grissom spluttered, then there was the sound of someone spitting. Catherine, Warrick, Nick and Sara arrived just in time to hear him say, "I never did like the taste of my own blood."
"Gil, are you all right?" Catherine asked anxiety clear in her voice.
"Fine," he replied, "but I've to stick to the Script." His words sounded slightly distorted, she thought his mouth might be swollen.
'Must have given him a fat lip.' Brass thought to himself, he hoped that would be Grissom's only injury.
There was a rustling sound that Catherine recognised from another case, clearly Grissom's script had been written down for him.
"You're to re-open and re-evaluate the McCardle case from last year," Grissom's voice intoned, "an innocent man has been sentenced and is sitting on death row. You're to find the real killer, he's one of the original four suspects."
"McCardle case?" Nick asked, "Never heard of it."
"We'll need to check the files," Sara stated.
Grissom's voice came over the speaker again, "You've got forty-eight hours."
"We're gonna need more time than that," Warrick answered for all of them, he hated working against the clock, rushing things led to mistakes no matter how careful you were.
"You're being given an incentive," Grissom sounded puzzled at this. Then they heard an ominous click and Grissom's nervous voice escalating with panic. "No! You don't have to do that! Please!" The sound of gunfire echoed in the suddenly silent room.
Brass recovered first, "Grissom, Gil, are you okay?!"
"He shot me," Grissom's voice sounded high and tight with shock and pain, "the bastard shot me!"
Tears welled up in Catherine's eyes; she could see the shocked expressions the others were wearing. Warrick looked stunned, Nick looked sick, Sara was trying to stay in control and Brass was furious. Trying to keep her voice steady Catherine asked, " Is it bad?" It sounded such an inane question to her ears but they had to know.
"Clean shot," Grissom answered he sounded in pain but under control, they could almost imagine his work mask falling into place. It was the only way he could deal with it for now, "through and through..." Suddenly he screamed.
"Gil?" Catherine shouted. What were they doing to him now? Wasn't shooting him bad enough?
"I guess alcohol cleanses all germs," he answered cryptically but she could hear the tears roughening his voice. "You have forty-eight hours or more bullets will fly," he told them in a shaky voice and then the line went dead.
They all stood looking at one another, too stunned to move into action. Catherine shook her head to clear it then began to give her orders. "The McCardle case, Sara check the files see who the original CSI was that handled it." She turned to Warrick, "Go see Greg, I left some evidence with him from the scene, see if he's managed to come up with anything yet." Taking Nick by the arm she left the room saying, "you and I are going to check shoe treads and tyre tracks."
Brass sat back watching them all leave, there was little if anything he could do right now. He had to wait on the lab boys and the team giving him something he could run with. \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
Grissom was all on his own again. After dressing the wound the man had left, locking the door behind him once more. He lay on his back on the mattress and tried to think of anything but the pain in his leg. He thought he vaguely remembered the McCardle case; it had been one of Ecklie's. It was just typical that it fell to his team again to clear up on of the day shifts mistakes.
If he remembered rightly, the crime had been a murder. A young deaf couple had been attacked in their own home and the wife killed. With his own hearing being so erratic he tended to remember cases involving people in a plight similar to his own. That would mean the man holding him prisoner was the widower, 'No, Gil,' he thought, 'don't get a head of yourself.' So he might be the widower, but why was he so sure that the man they had caught was not the killer? What could have happened to make him act this way?
Grissom had tried to engage the man in conversation before he'd left. He'd tried to make him believe that they would have looked into the case without the need to kidnap someone. Did he want to end up in jail because that was where this was all heading? He knew his team would never give up on him, it just wasn't in their natures.
*I won't do any jail time. * The man had answered confidently.
*What make you so sure? * Grissom asked, * you've abducted me, held me prisoner and shot me, do you honestly think they'll just let you walk away? *
The man just smiled, he was so sure of himself. *By the time this thing gets to court I'll be dead, * he assured the older man. *I've got liver cancer and it's in its final stages. *
Grissom sighed, he was right. The courts took so long nowadays to get anything done that the man would be in his grave probably before the investigation was even over.
*But why abduct me? Why didn't you just come to us? * He asked trying to find some way out of this situation and now.
*Oh I went to the police, told them I had new evidence, but they said it wasn't admissible. It was only my word against someone else's. * The man sounded really bitter, * apparently I'm not the only one turning a deaf ear to things. *
That sounded typical to Grissom. Why hadn't they just told him to contact them directly, others had? Maybe they could have done something about this before anything bad had to happen.
He moved his leg trying to get more comfortable and a wave of pain and nausea hit him. With relief he let the darkness over come him and he fell into unconsciousness.
