Intellectual Itch

Disclaimer: Mine no! CBS, Anthony Zuiker et al Yes! Pity :o(
Dedication: To Aby as always and you certainly know why girl! To Vividlyblue for Being my inspiration and all the encouragement she gives me. And to Erin for all the long distance hand holding and reassuring :o)
Feedback: Yes please but please be kind, I'm nervous! :o) E-mail: KesNaya@aol.com
Archive: anywhere you like but drop me a line to let me know okay!
Author's Note: This one just popped into my head half finished so thought I'd try it out! The <<<<< signify flashback territory.


Chapter 1

They were getting nowhere and they knew it. They'd been working on this particular case for four weeks now. It was either the same woman who had struck in three other states or a very good copycat.

"Shit! This is so annoying!" Warrick exclaimed then shook his head bowing an apology to the other occupants of the room.

Gil Grissom looked up at the younger man, the expression on his face showing his displeasure at his colleague's outburst. "This is not a time for emotions, Warrick," he told the young African American.

Warrick had been waiting on that. Grissom refused to let his emotions influence or direct a case and he expected the same from the rest of his team. But damn sometimes it was difficult. Like tonight, they had DNA evidence, fingerprints and epithelias, even a used condom for God's sake, everything they needed to identify the perp but like the other states their job was proving impossible because the woman didn't appear in any of their systems.

"What good is all this, Griss, if we can't get the bitch?" he asked trying to lower his voice.

Nick and Sara were feeling just as frustrated and watched to see what pearls of wisdom Grissom would bestow upon them this evening.

"Sooner or later she's going to make a mistake," Grissom told Warrick quite aware that the other two members of their team had stopped to listen, "when she does she'll appear in the system and we'll get her."

Warrick sighed, he knew that but it didn't help. "What good does that do us and her victims right now?"

Nick chuckled and then excused himself seeing his superior's displeasure. He knew that the men she assaulted were victims but none of them seemed to mind too much. Hell, one or two of them had even admitted it was the best sex they'd had in years, although they did say they'd rather have initiated it themselves and would have preferred to have been able to participate more.

Grissom knew exactly what Nick was thinking but rather than reprimand the young man he looked at his watch. It was ten minutes from the end of the shift. If the perp stuck to her usual routine they'd have two cases tomorrow night and they'd need to be fresh. Anyway tonight had been Catherine's night off and she'd surprised him by inviting him for a meal when he finished, they'd been spending more and more time together away from work and Lindsey even seemed to be accepting his presence now. What good was it being the boss if you didn't have a few perks?

"Okay, people," he said standing and walking to the door, "let's call it a night and attack this with renewed energy next shift."

They were all very appreciative of the early night and thanked him as they headed to the parking lot and he went to his office. He'd only taken two steps inside his private sanctuary when heard Sara comment.

"Does he ever go home?" she sounded annoyed, "he's going into his office and you know what that means."

Warrick chuckled, "Hey, Sara, maybe it means he's left his car keys there and he needs them to get home."

"Yeah, Sara," Nick chimed in, "stop jumping to conclusions. That's not what a good criminal investigator does you know?"

Sara grumbled about them ganging up on her and that was the last Grissom heard. He might have known they wouldn't think he'd take advantage of the lull in the evening, and leave early, after all he didn't usually. But hadn't they noticed a difference in him now he had Catherine Willows was waiting for him.

He was climbing into his Tahoe when he realised the other three were still in the parking lot and hadn't left as he had expected.

"See Sara," Warrick murmured, "he's leaving too."

Nick looked up to see his boss at the car next to him and a thought seemed to occur to him, "Hey boss," he said raising his voice enough for the other man to hear him, "I just thought, you'd better watch yourself,"

Grissom looked at the young Texan a frown forming on his face, "And why is that, Nick?" he asked what was this guy up to now?

"Well, our lady of the moment picks on guys between forty-six and fifty-two, intellectual, who work the night shift and live alone," Nick stated glancing at his two colleagues before smiling and adding, "you fit cosily into that criteria, so you better watch out while she's in town."

Shaking his head and sighing, a small smile pulling at the corners of his mouth Grissom called out a good night and shut the car door.

The next night the team were waiting in the break room for Grissom's arrival. It wasn't unusual for the man to be late giving out the assignments, he often got distracted by some experiment or other he was running and generally had to be summoned to the meeting that started every shift. But when Catherine checked his office there was no sign he'd been in at all, that just wasn't Grissom.

If something had happened that meant he wouldn't be able to do his shift he would have called the office or Catherine to apprise them of the situation. Further more, he had said nothing when he had left her just before lunchtime that day after spending time with her and Lindsey.

She saw the case sheets lying in the middle of Grissom's desk and picking them up returned to the break room. "Okay, Warrick you've got a robbery. Hotel room on Freemont St." Then she turned to Nick and Sara, "DB in the desert, see O'Riley he'll be waiting in the car park for you, oh and he has the location."

"What about you, Cath?" Warrick asked sensing the older woman's concern.

"I'm going to see if I can find out what's going on with Grissom." She answered directly. What was the use of acting otherwise?

She could hear Nick moaning about not getting to work on his own again. He seemed to think it was monumentally unfair that everyone else in the team got to work DBs solo occasionally but not him. Catherine ignored the comments; until Grissom was satisfied Nick was ready she wasn't going to put the cart before the horse.

Catherine tried calling Grissom's home but there was no reply. She had similar results with his cell phone and pager. This wasn't right, she was starting to get really worried. She recalled what Gil had told her about Nick's joking last night and a knot gathered in the pit of her stomach. He couldn't be right could he? Without another thought she was out in her Tahoe and heading to Gil's townhouse.

Arriving there in record time, Catherine dug into her purse for the key Gil had given her. She spent quite a lot of time at his house nowadays and he'd thought it prudent to get a key made for her. It also meant that if he'd needed to be out of town for any length of time she could watch his place for him.

She put the key in the lock and opened the front door. Nothing looked out of place and there was no sign of anything untoward. She called out from the doorway, "Gil, are you here?" She heard a muffled answer from what she thought might be the bedroom.

Walking quickly she headed in that direction. She opened the door and stopped in her tracks. There tied to his bead with a cloth over his eyes was Gil Grissom, the latest victim of their female rapist.

"Gil, what happened?" she asked storming over to the bed removing the blindfold and untying him. Unlike all the other victims Grissom had some very nasty scratches on his face, chest and abdomen.

"What do you think happened?" he snapped back then looked rueful. "Sorry, Cath, but it's embarrassing."

'Well, that's an understatement,' Catherine thought to herself. What she said was, "I'd better do the assault kit and then phone for an officer."

Grissom's face took on a distinctly red hue. "I'm never going to live this one down am I?" he mumbled. There was no answer to that one, there didn't need to be.

"While I'm doing the kits why don't you tell me what happened," Catherine suggested, "then it will be clear in your mind when the officers arrive."

'Yeah,' thought Grissom, 'and you can have a good laugh at my expense."
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Grissom had arrived home from his day with Catherine and Lindsey feeling very tired. The time they had spent together had eased some of the tension he was feeling from this case but not all of it. He went to the unit and took out a bottle of whisky. 'Funny,' he pondered checking the amount, 'I thought there was more left in it than that.'

Thinking nothing more of it he poured what was left in the bottle into a glass and headed for his bedroom. As he readied himself for bed he took judicious sips of the beverage and finished it just as he slipped under the covers. Within fifteen minutes he was sound asleep.

Someone touching his face awoke him with a start. There shouldn't be anyone in his home right now. He opened his eyes but he couldn't see anything. Trying to raise his hand to his face he suddenly realised that both of his hand were tied to the bed head. His feet were similarly tied to the baseboard. 'Brilliant,' he thought, 'that means there's a blindfold over my eyes and I have a visitor.'

"Who's there?" he asked not really expecting an answer. Unfortunately it also told him something else, his damned hearing had gone out on him while he slept, he couldn't hear a thing. He knew it wouldn't be Catherine, while she might like to have the upper hand, she wouldn't spring something like this on him totally out of the blue.

He felt the bed move as someone climbed onto it. Then he jumped as he felt warm flesh brush against his ankle. He must have been drugged he thought. The other men had thought so to, it was the only way to explain how the woman managed to undress her victims without any struggle. He inhaled the woman's scent, strong and musky. Definitely not Catherine. She didn't wear perfume much, but when she did it was light and sexy just like her.

That was when he remembered the liquor bottle. He shook his head angry at his own inattention. 'Stupid, Gil,' he thought. But then he hadn't really believed Nicky was being prophetic when he'd told him to watch out. Things like this happened to other people in Vegas not to the criminalists themselves.

He gasped in surprise as lips connected with his nipple. The other victims had spoken about how gentle and erotic this woman had made their experience, that is of course if it was the same woman, but what were the chances of it being someone else when so much of the m.o. was so accurate. Then he thought of the usual outcome, the victim found tied and blindfolded in his own bed by one of his concerned co-workers when he didn't show up for work as usual.

Grissom groaned. He didn't know what was worse, what was happening now or one of his team finding him like this.

Fingers began slowly tracing a line up the inside of his leg, stroking his calf and pausing to circle behind his knee. He hadn't realised how sensitive he was there before but he wasn't letting this female know anything by responding. The hands continued their upward movement barely making contact with his limbs but almost causing him to shiver at the fiery touch they left behind them. They made their way to his groin but instead of lingering they skipped over without touching.

She broke away from him leaning her head into his chest and he thought could feel a subtle vibration across his pectorals and he guessed she might be speaking to him but he had no idea what she was saying.

She moved her hands and mouth to his chest, feather like caresses brushing over his body as her lips locked onto his nipple and she lathed and suckled it. He bit down on his lip to prevent a moan of pleasure escaping his mouth. He was only human after all and she was certainly well educated in seduction. The hands moved slow and delicately always dancing just in reach of his flesh.

He gasped as they circled over his lower abdomen a fire beginning to burn in his body, spiralling every closer to his groin. This woman knew exactly what she was doing and what she wanted. It wouldn't take long for her to accomplish her ends.

Kissing and nipping his inner thigh while her fingers slowly circled down his stomach and onto his groin, growing ever closer to his shaft, Grissom could feel himself begin to grow aroused as his loins filled with heat and his breath became short and rasping.

Still he refused to move, refused to give her what some of the others had. She had sought some validation in what she was doing as if to ensure in her own mind that what she was doing was more consensual than it actually was.

Finally he felt a condom placed over his penis and then the woman raised herself up before plunging down on him. She was as ready for this as he was. He struggled to stay silent not wanting to co-operate with her. This was rape no matter what way you looked at it, and he refused to give her any pleasure she couldn't take from him involuntarily. Some of the other men may have been willing to play along with her once things got started but Gil Grissom wasn't like that. He and Catherine had begun to build a relationship and he would do nothing to jeopardise that, to comply with what this woman was doing would be cheating and he wouldn't do that to Catherine, especially after the life she'd had with Eddie, he owed her better than that.

Moving slowly at first the woman got herself into a rhythm and began to pump herself up and down on him. There was very little he could do to stop what was happening so he had to just let his body do what it would and hopefully get this over and done with. Again he felt vibrations this time on his face, he definitely thought she was talking to him. The others had spoken of her words. Telling them things like she had always wanted to scratch an intellectual itch and that it would be good for them too.

Suddenly he felt nails raked across his cheek, missing his left eye only because the blindfold was in place. The woman moved more furiously biting down on his nipple before raking her fingers across his chest and abdomen. Was this just because he refused to participate or was it something to do with his lack of response? He didn't know, and quite frankly, he didn't care he just wanted her to finish what she was doing and go.

Almost instantaneously they both reached their peak. Grissom bit his bottom lip, thinking he tasted blood; he refused to give her the satisfaction of thinking there was even a chance he had complied with her or enjoyed himself.

The cold air engulfed his body as she moved away from him, ripping the condom from his penis as she did so and eliciting a cry.

He didn't know if she was still there or not. He could hear nothing then suddenly his hearing returned just in time for him to hear the snick of the front door as it closed. Now he had to sit and wait to see who would come to his rescue.

He prayed to God it was Catherine; he could never live with the embarrassment of it being one of the younger CSIs.
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Catherine, having finished processing the crime scene, sat quietly on the edge of the bed as Grissom dressed himself. "But why did she scratch you?" she asked him, "she didn't mark any of her other victims."

Grissom accepted her confusion but wasn't prepared to voice his own theory. He hadn't been forthcoming about his hearing loss to any of his people and he wasn't prepared to do so now either. "Maybe I wasn't as satisfying as her other victims." He tried to make it sound like a joke but Catherine wasn't buying it.

"What about what she said?" she continued, "was that the same as the others reported?"

He shrugged his shoulders as he slipped his pants on, "I don't know."

"What do you mean you don't know, didn't she say anything?" Catherine was getting angry at his reticence. He was hiding something and she knew it.

"Not that I heard." He answered and regretted his phrasing as soon as the words left his mouth. He hoped she wouldn't try and read anything into it.

Before they could talk any further there was a knock at the door. Grissom looked at Catherine as he reached for his shirt.

"I'll get it," She told him and strode angrily from the room.

Finishing dressing Grissom moved into the main room of the house and was surprised to find Jim Brass there. "What are you doing here, Jim?" he asked rather sharply, "this isn't a homicide, just an assault."

Brass shrugged, "Catherine called and explained the situation. I told Jeffries of sex crimes I'd take the preliminary report." He told them, "said I didn't want his boys spreading it all over the precinct and he agreed."

"Does anyone else know it's Grissom?" Catherine asked, she knew her friend would want to keep his name out of the report for as long as possible. He was a private man at the best of times but this was an embarrassing and degrading thing to happen to anyone.

"I don't think so, Jeffries wasn't talking," Brass answered her, "and I certainly didn't enlighten anyone." He smiled; he knew exactly what the other two were thinking.

"Is there anyway we can prevent Warrick, Nick and Sara from learning I'm the sixth victim?" Grissom asked all but pleading. He knew it was unusual but it wouldn't be the first time that they'd got all the pertinent information only for the victim to seek the anonymity of not pressing charges.

"Gil," Catherine turned to him shocked, "you of all people know how important the evidence we get here could be."

Grissom sighed, there were times he could strangle her. She was deliberately being obtuse. "I'm not saying that you can't use the evidence, Catherine, and you know it," he answered trying to keep his temper, "but I can hang off pressing charges until it's absolutely necessary." He looked at her for a moment before adding; "I mean do you honestly expect to get anything different from here than we got at all the other crime scenes?"

She could see his point. The evidence they had gathered so far was very conclusive or would be if they could finger the person responsible. Then remembering the scratches she replied, "Yeah, but you're the only one she hurt, the others spoke of how gentle she was. She left you bloodied remember?"

Jim Brass' head came up at that, "Bloodied?" Then he noticed the lines of scratches on the other man's face.

Grissom sighed loudly; Catherine would have to bring that up wouldn't she. She'd taken plenty of swabs of the scratches so why did she have to go on about them? All she could want would be in evidence anyway.

"Just a few scratches," he snapped angrily, looking over to the police captain, "nothing to write home about."

"Apart from the fact that she's never done it before," Catherine insisted.

"Why did she scratch you?" Brass asked.

This was going to be a long night Grissom decided, if they were going to scrutinise every last little detail before they even got to work. "I don't know?" he replied, "maybe I wasn't as accommodating as her other victims."

Jim Brass could just imagine. There was no way Grissom would have let the woman have as much fun with him as she had had with the others. They had gone with the flow once they realised she wouldn't hurt them, but he'd always figured the entomologist was too up tight for that.

Seeing the small smile tugging at the other man's mouth made Grissom angry. Was this what he was going to face all night? Was he suddenly some kind of joke? "Something funny, Jim?" he asked his ire rising.

Trying to head off any type of confrontation Catherine stepped in between the two men. Like bloody posing peacocks she grumbled to herself. The amount of testosterone suddenly filling this room was enough to choke her.

"Okay, Jim," she said turning to the detective, "I took a few notes of what Gil told me when I arrived," she held out her notebook to him, "will they be enough or do you want to interview him too?"

Brass glanced at the neatly written notes and mulled it over for a few moments. "No, I think this will do for now," he answered then looked at the other man, "but we may need to add a few more details later, you'll stop by my office when it's quiet won't you, Gil?"

Grissom nodded, thankful to be able to put it off for a while.

"Oh, by the way," Jim informed him as he walked toward the front door, "You'd better let Catherine drive you to work tonight." He saw the confusion on both of their faces, "Someone has short work of the tyres on your Tahoe, I've got one of the uniforms checking the scene but you might want to have a closer look yourself and see if there's any evidence."

They sighed in unison. 'That was one vindictive bitch,' thought Grissom not realising that Catherine was thinking something similar.