FIC: One Good Man--part 9/?
Aug. 19th, 2004 07:05 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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nickngregAuthor: geekwriter
Title: One Good Man – part nine
Rating: R
Category: romance, angst, drama
Summary: Wherein Greg is disgusted with Nick's pantry and Nick is disgusted by videotapes.
"This," Greg said firmly, "has got to be the most disturbing thing I have ever seen."
"What?" Nick asked, looking up from the newspaper he was flipping through.
"This!" Greg cried, stepping back so that Nick could see his own pantry.
Nick looked at it. It just looked like a fully stocked pantry to him. "What's wrong with it?"
Greg gaped at him. "What's wrong with it is that you've got enough food to feed an army and yet no food that anybody would ever want to eat." Greg sighed as he looked back into the small closet. "Energy bars? Protein powder?" He snatched a box off the shelf. "Whole wheat pasta?"
"I can make you an omelet or something," Nick said, starting to get up.
Greg waved him down. "I suppose Wheaties will have to do. Where's your sugar?"
"Right there."
Greg looked up and down the pantry shelves. "Where?"
"There, next to the teabags."
Greg slowly picked up the box of small blue packets. He looked down at it for a moment, then looked up at Nick with horrified eyes. "Artificial sweetener?" he hissed. He shook his head. "You're a sick, sick man, Nick Stokes."
Nick smiled at him. "You're still a little kid when it comes to your eating habits, aren't you?"
Greg set the box of fake sugar back on the pantry shelf. "I'm not going to dignify that with a response."
"One of these days your metabolism is going to slow down and you'll be sorry you never learned to eat right."
Greg looked at him for a long moment. "It's weird," he said, "it looked like you were speaking, but the voice coming out of your mouth was my grandmother's."
Nick laughed. "She must be a smart woman."
"Well, I had to get it from somewhere." He swung Nick's pantry door closed. "I'll just grab a cheeseburger on the way to class."
"Or you could study for your quiz some more and not eat at all," Nick said with a grin.
Greg came over to the kitchen table and pushed Nick's chair back, straddled his lap. "Well, if I did that I might end up passing out in the lab due to exhaustion." He tipped his head down and pressed his mouth to Nick's. "You did put me through quite a workout this morning," he whispered.
Nick slid his hands over Greg's thighs and gripped his hips. He leaned up and caught Greg's mouth with his own, teased his lips apart and slid his tongue into Greg's warm mouth. His tongue touched Greg's, slid over it as Greg's tongue stretched into his own mouth, moaned into the kiss as Greg braced his hands on the back of Nick's chair and began to slowly rock his hips.
Greg broke the kiss, tipped his head so that his forehead pressed against Nick's. "You're going to make me late for class."
Nick grinned. "Me? I'm pretty sure you started it."
Greg sighed. "And, sadly, I'm going to have to be the one to stop it." He stood up and ran one hand through Nick's hair. "I'll see you later, all right?"
Nick captured Greg's hand in his own and pulled it down to kiss the palm quickly. "Later," he said.
He sat there for a few minutes after Greg left, flipping through the sports page. He was just about to clear the table when his phone began to ring.
Nick snatched up the ringing cell phone. "Stokes," he said, balancing the phone between his shoulder and his ear as he picked up his breakfast dishes and carried them to the sink.
"I…Nick?" Grissom sounded confused.
"Yeah, I'm here," Nick said. "Can you hear me? Hold on, the signal's stronger on the other side of my place."
"No, I can hear you," Grissom said. "The signal's fine, I just…I was looking for Greg."
Nick took the phone in his hand, then switched it to the other ear as he stood up straight. His heart was slamming against his ribcage. "Why would I know where he is? Why don't you call him?"
"I just did, and you answered," Grissom said.
Nick pulled the phone away from his ear and stared at it for a quick second. It looked similar to his phone, but it wasn't the same. "Oh," he said, his mind flying forward, racing for an answer. "We, uh, we must have mixed them up at work or something. Maybe you should call my cell, see if you can get a hold of him that way." He forced himself to laugh and prayed that it didn't sound fake.
"Oh," Grissom seemed satisfied enough with his answer. "Good idea. See you tonight, Nick."
"Yeah," he said before he snapped Greg's phone shut. "Fuck," he whispered, taking a deep breath and setting the phone on the counter. He braced his hands on the counter and leaned forward, closing his eyes, trying to catch his breath.
It hadn't been that bad. He'd come up with a lie pretty quick, and Grissom had believed him, hadn't he? Sure, he had a kind of creepy uncanny thing going on sometimes, but it's not like he had any reason to think Nick would lie to him. He and Greg could have easily switched phones by accident.
He jumped as his own cell phone began to ring. He followed the sound to its source and pulled the phone out of his jacket pocket. He dropped it onto the couch as it rang again.
Answer it. Just answer it and laugh and say that you must have stolen Greg's phone because you thought it was yours. No, he won't believe that. He'll know Greg was here and he'll want to know why and you can't lie for shit—not when asked a direct question, anyway. Just answer it and say that Greg stopped by for pizza and videogames. No, because you would have told him that before if it was true. But he thinks Greg has your phone, and Greg always answers his phone—unless he's in class. Maybe Grissom will just think that Greg turned the phone off before he went into class…
Nick took another deep breath as the phone stopped ringing. Finally, he picked it up and looked at the missed call log. Grissom had been calling from his home number, not the lab. That was good, right? That meant that it wasn't a work emergency it was just a…personal call?
He wanted to laugh. Add the fact that Grissom called Greg from home to the list of things Nick never would have suspected. And for what? To chat? To talk about…science? Chess? Those were the only things Nick knew they had in common, and he couldn't see Grissom picking up the phone just to have a friendly chat with Greg about chess moves or the latest advances in biochemistry.
He wanted to cry, too, because he couldn't remember feeling that scared in a very long time. And for what? Answering a cell phone that wasn't his? It was hardly a crime. Even if Grissom did know the truth, which he didn't—couldn't—it wasn't like it was something Nick would get fired for.
He sat down on the couch and rubbed his face in his hands. Not that he wanted Grissom to know, but he knew the man wouldn't fire him for it. Grissom didn't care about their personal lives as long as it didn't affect their work—and even when it did he stood by his people. He rewarded their loyalty to him with unshakeable loyalty of his own. After all, he hadn't given up on Catherine when she couldn't break her cocaine habit, hadn't given up on Warrick when his gambling got so bad it cost another CSI her life.
He didn't give up on me when most everyone else thought I was a murderer.
He smiled as he remembered Kristy. It had been long enough that the pain was more of a sweet sadness. Funny, beautiful Kristy, who had tossed her head back and laughed when he finally confessed to her that he'd only gotten blowjobs from women before. He remembered the way she leaned across the couch and kissed him, laughed softly as he remembered her offering to get her strap-on in order to make him feel more comfortable. He'd laughed, then, too, and told her no, if he was going to be with a woman he wanted to do it right.
Grissom had been confused and maybe a little disappointed, but he hadn't turned his back on Nick. And maybe he'd be confused and disappointed if he knew the real truth—the whole truth—but Nick had gotten to the point where Grissom's disappointment didn't crush him the way it had in the beginning.
But that was a moot point. Grissom wasn't going to be disappointed in him because Grissom wouldn't ever know.
Greg thought the whole phone mix-up thing was funny when Nick caught him out in the parking lot.
"Stopped my heart," Nick said. "I thought I was going to pass out for a second."
Greg laughed and took his phone from Nick's hand. "You're strung a little too tight, I think," he said, and Nick could tell that Greg wanted to kiss him.
He wanted to kiss Greg, too, but the parking lot outside the lab was hardly the place for it, so they satisfied themselves with meaningful looks before they headed inside.
It wasn't a very eventful night. He continued processing the evidence from the black lab crime scene from two nights earlier, and when the cops brought in the results of their latest warrant, Nick stared at the box full of videotapes and knew, whatever it was, he didn't want to see what was on those tapes. Not if he ever wanted to be able to look at a black lab again without getting nauseous.
"Hey," he said, knocking on the open door to the DNA lab. "You busy?"
Greg shrugged. "No more than usual." There wasn't any music playing for once, but that didn't stop him from dancing as he adjusted the comparison microscope. "You?"
"PD just brought in more evidence from the doggie case," Nick said. "Videotapes. Lots of them."
Greg stopped dancing and looked at him. "They're not…home movies, are they?"
"I have a bad feeling they are," he said. "And I've always liked dogs, but not like that."
Greg laughed. "So pawn it off on Archie. He's having a slow night, and he is the A/V guy."
Nick thought about it for a moment. "I don't know if I can…"
"Oh, come on, just ask if he wants assisting credit on the case and after he agrees, which he will, then you break the news that he gets to do the shit work. That's what you always do to me."
Nick smirked. "Yeah, sorry about that."
"No, no, looking at each tear in about fifty thousand matchbooks is my idea of a good time. Really. And this way, you'll be delegating responsibility, proving that you're cut out for a supervisory position."
"You're just sweet talking me so I won't be cranky later," Nick whispered.
"Maybe. But what's the purpose of having a position of authority if you can't make the people under you do the dirty work? When's the last time you saw Grissom trudging through the sewer system for eight hours? Come to think of it, when's the last time you trudged through the sewer system for eight hours?"
"Point taken." Nick laughed as Greg boogied across the lab. "You're in a good mood," he said.
Greg grinned at him. "You have no idea how good."
"Any particular reason?" Nick asked softly. "Besides the fact that this time Archie has to do the dirty work instead of you?"
"Yes," Greg said, tapping his hands rhythmically on the counter top to a beat only he could hear. "But it's a secret."
He couldn't help but laugh again. "What kind of secret?"
"Can't tell you," Greg said, breezing past him with a microscope slide in each hand.
"Can't or won't?" Nick asked with a grin as he watched Greg fit each slide onto the comparison microscope.
Greg scrunched his face up as he pretended to think for a moment. "Technically? Won't. It's not like I'm physically unable to tell you, but if I did tell you it wouldn't be a secret anymore."
"I thought you told me all your secrets," Nick said in a low voice as he shot Greg what he knew was one of his most seductive looks.
Greg returned Nick's look with one of his own. "Not all of them," he whispered. "A boy's got to have some surprises left in him."
Nick licked his lips and took a deep breath. "You have no idea what I'm gonna do to you after I get you home."
Greg tried to suppress a smile but couldn't. "Oh, I think I have a pretty good idea of what's going to…" He sat up straight. "Wait, I can't."
Nick gaped at him.
"It's not that I don't want to," Greg's voice resumed its seductive tone, "because I do. I mean, I really, really do."
"Me, too."
"I have, um, an appointment. At eight o'clock."
"Come by after?" Nick asked, vaguely aware that the question made him sound slightly desperate.
"Yeah." Greg nodded. "Yeah, definitely."
When Nick got home he changed his sheets. He considered just leaving the covers on the floor since that's where they'd end up, anyway, but after a few minutes of indecision he made the bed, arranged the pillows, smoothed down the dark blue comforter. He set condoms and lube on his bedside table, then decided that it was kind of tacky and put them in the top drawer, instead.
He straightened up the living room, then decided that it looked too clean and he messed it up a little bit, moving things around on the coffee table so that they weren't perfectly aligned at right angles, toeing off his shoes by the couch and letting them lay in what he hoped looked like a casual heap.
When he looked at the clock it was only seven-thirty. He sighed and sat down on the couch. He turned on the TV and watched but didn't really hear the morning news. He stretched out on the couch and flipped through the channels, finally settling on something about the frilled lizards of Australia. He tried to keep his eyes open, but they closed against his will. He slept.
It was nearly eleven when he awoke with a start. Someone was knocking on his front door, an incessant trill of quick knocks and raps.
"Coming," he said, pushing himself up off the couch. He was groggy and he yawned as he headed towards the door. "Greg, stop it, I'm coming." He yanked the door open and Greg dropped both his hands. "Trying to give me a heart attack?" he asked.
"No, trying to wake you up," Greg said, stepping inside and closing the door behind him with his foot. "Hey, sleepy head," he said, reaching up to smooth Nick's hair down. He shrugged his backpack off his shoulders and let it drop by the front door.
"Hey, you," Nick smiled a sleepy smile and wrapped his arms around Greg's waist, pulling him close.
Greg sighed into the kiss, then nuzzled his face into the crook where Nick's jaw met his neck. "God, you smell good," he whispered.
Nick smiled. He'd just been thinking the same thing about Greg, who smelled like a combination of cinnamon, soap, and warm skin. There was something else beneath that, too, a scent he couldn't define as anything other than Greg, and it was that part that made him groan as he breathed in, that made his cock begin to swell.
"Sorry I'm late," Greg said as he ran his hands up Nick's back.
Nick shrugged. "You're not late. It's not like we ever decided on a time when you'd get here."
"I ran home to change and pick a few things up, to check on the fish."
"How's your gobi?"
"He was stirring up sand like a pro when I left him." He lifted his head and kissed Nick again quickly. "I need to make coffee."
"I thought you hated my coffee," Nick said. He yawned, then tipped his head to the side to stretch out his neck.
"I do." Greg pulled away and unzipped his backpack, then pulled out a bag of Blue Hawaiian.
"You're never gonna sleep if you drink that stuff," Nick said as Greg walked past him towards the kitchen.
"You'd be surprised," Greg called over his shoulder. "A cup of this stuff is like warm milk to me—puts me right out. It takes at least three cups to get me going."
"All that caffeine's bad for your heart."
Greg stuck his head out of Nick's kitchen. "Decaf is the devil, Nick. The sooner you realize that the happier you'll be."
Nick grinned, then leaned down to pick up Greg's backpack from where it had fallen onto its side. As he lifted it up to set it against the wall, a small plastic baggie fell out of it and hit the floor.
Nick squatted down and picked up the baggie. He held it between his thumb and forefinger and stared at the pale brown crystals inside. He hefted it in his hand. Half a pound at least, and that wasn't cheap.
I make good money, you know.
"Jesus," he whispered. He swallowed hard, looked over towards his kitchen door and could hear Greg humming something while he banged around making coffee.
There had to be another explanation. Greg wouldn't, he couldn't…
I started doing it when we had sex.
Was that what he had planned? His secret? His surprise? He wanted to get spun before they had sex? Nick remembered what he'd read, remembered the fact that the initial rush felt as good as ten orgasms. But there was a lot in the baggie—too much for just a few lines before sex. Too much for anyone to have at one time. Unless he's cooking it. The thought came unbidden. He tried to push it away. Greg wouldn't, not after everything that had happened. He'd promised.
"So," Greg's voice startled him, "I was thinking that maybe next week sometime we could head out to Grapevine Canyon, do some hiking…Nick?"
Nick stood up from where he'd been squatting on the floor. He looked at Greg for just a moment, couldn't bear to look at him any longer.
"I…" Greg took a step back. He laughed and Nick realized that he was beginning to be able to differentiate Greg's real laughs from the laughs he forced to cover his nerves. "I mean, it's not like we'd be taking a vacation together or anything," he said. "Just, you know, a day of hiking, breathing in the fresh air. But if you think it's too soon for us to do stuff like that—"
"Jesus, Greg," Nick said. "How could you?"
Greg looked around for a moment. "What? I…I just thought we could…" His voice trailed off as he spotted the baggie in Nick's hand.
"You promised me," Nick whispered.
Greg took a deep breath and didn't say anything. Nick noticed that his hands had started to shake.
"Is it the stress of work plus trying to get CSI certification? I know it's hard, I know how tired you can get, but this…it's not worth it."
He laughed again. "You think…? Fuck you, Nick."
"Look, if you haven't starting using again, if your appointment this morning was just to get this…we can work through it. We can."
"I use it all the time," Greg's voice was hollow. "Every day."
Nick sighed. "Even at work?"
"Especially at work. Can't get through a shift without it."
"God, Greg. Why didn't you just tell me? I can help."
Greg let out a choked laugh. "You can help?" he asked. He laughed again, and the sound of it chilled Nick to the bone. "You can help me with this. My addiction."
"Just let me try. I care about you, Greg. I…I love you."
"Oh," Greg snapped, "I can see that. You're such a fucking hero, Nick. So noble, taking in wounded strays and nursing them back to health."
"It's not about that. It's about you and me, and how we need to be honest with each other. I'll help you through this, Greg. I will."
Greg gripped his hair in his hands and turned and screamed, actually screamed, his voice full of more frustration and rage than Nick thought possible. Nick started towards him but stopped as Greg began to kick at the closet door. He screamed and slammed his fist into it over and over again.
Nick was frozen, watching Greg punch and kick at the door. His breath hitched in his chest. "Greg, what are you on?" he asked in a tense whisper.
"You wanna know what I'm on?" Greg asked, his voice breaking on the last word. "You wanna know what I'm fucking on?" He raked his fingers through his hair, stalked towards Nick. "You wanna know what's got me so fucked up, Nick?" he demanded.
"Look, man, I just wanna help you," Nick said, holding his hands out in a gesture of peace.
Greg laughed, a sick choking laugh that made Nick cringe. "Of course you do. Of course you do. You've gotta save me, right Nick? You've gotta be the hero swooping in to save the day."
"I told you it's not like that. I care about you and I—"
"The hell you do." Greg's voice was harsh. "This?" He snatched the baggie out of Nick's hand. "This is my drug of choice, Nick. Bravo. You've really got the makings of a crack investigator."
"Just talk to me, G."
Greg shook his head. "I'm done talking to you. You don't listen. Why should you? People lie, right? Right?"
"Greg, I'm not the enemy here. We can get you help."
Greg's hands were trembling. "What? Rehab? Twelve step meetings?"
"Anything, anything that will help."
"Yeah, well, that's not going to work because there's no rehab to help me get over falling in love with you!" On the last word he threw the baggie at Nick's head, and he had to duck to keep it from hitting him.
Nick stood up slowly, watching as if in a dream as Greg snatched up the baggie, grabbed his backpack and fled the condo.
He was shaking. His entire body was shaking. He closed his eyes and put his hands over his face as if that would steady him.
He concentrated on breathing. OK. That had gone horribly wrong. He'd approached it the wrong way. He should have thought it out before confronting Greg, should have figured out the best way to talk to him. He shouldn't have let his disapproval show. He should have tried to remain neutral.
He sank to the ground and pulled his knees up to his chest. He'd believed Greg so completely when he said he was clean, had believed his every word. And Greg had lied, yes, but Nick still loved him. His heart actually ached, a sharp stab of pain that radiated through his chest, down to his knees, down to his fingertips.
On the carpet against the wall were several translucent brown crystals that had fallen out of the baggie when it hit the wall. Nick took a deep breath. The first step in helping Greg would be to find out exactly what it was he was using. Then, after he knew, he'd find a way to get through to him.
He got a clean sheet of computer paper and laid it on the ground. He transferred the crystals onto the middle of the paper using a tweezers. He folded the paper in half, folded it in thirds, then folded it in half again. He sealed the open end of the bindle with scotch tape and set it on the kitchen table. On the counter, the coffeepot with Greg's Blue Hawaiian had finished brewing.
He drank the entire pot while he sat at the kitchen table and thought. It wasn't like he was going to get any sleep, anyway.
As soon as he got in to work he tried to head towards trace, but Archie cut him off at the pass.
"I, uh, I watched all 32 hours of those videotapes," Archie said to Nick, looking decidedly green around the gills. "It definitely wasn't a surprise to the husband, since he was involved in the, uh, the action, too."
Nick cringed. "What is wrong with people?"
"After watching those tapes?" Archie asked. "My answer is a lot. Do you wanna see my notes?"
"Yeah," Nick said. "Yeah, I'll meet you in the A/V lab in just a sec. I have to drop something off at trace."
Archie nodded and headed back towards his lab.
"Oh, Archie," Nick said.
Archie looked back at him. "Yeah?"
"I know that was a crap job to give you, but you did a good job."
Archie managed a shaky smile. "All in a day's work," he said.
When Nick walked into trace, Hodges was flipping through a copy of "People" and muttering something under his breath.
"Hey," Nick said. "How's it going?"
Hodges looked up at him for a moment, then looked back at his magazine and flipped a page. "What are you here to accuse me of now?"
"Nothing, man," Nick said softly. "I just, uh, do you know what 'off the record' means?"
Hodges looked up at him with bored eyes. "What?"
"I need you to do something for me, but we can't tell anybody about it."
Hodges looked back down at his magazine. "Let me guess, your supplier ran out of steroids and you need me to synthesize you some, quick."
"What? No. Look, I need you to analyze something for me."
Hodges looked back up, mildly interested. "What sort of something?"
"If I knew that, I wouldn't need you." He pulled the bindle out of his pocket and placed it on the counter. "Can you figure out what this is for me?"
"Of course," Hodges said. "But what about your little buddy?" He cast his eyes towards Greg's lab. "I thought you CSIs always went to him for this sort of thing."
Nick nodded. "I'd rather have you on this one," he said softly. "So, can you do it?"
"Do I get overtime?"
"No."
Hodges sighed and picked up the bindle. "I guess I can do it. It's a slow night. But you owe me."
Nick nodded. "I know. Thank you."
Nick listened to Archie explain the notes he'd taken of the doggie porn home videos, but Archie's words didn't really stick in his head.
He sought out Jaqui and listened to her explain that the prints on the knife used to slit the dogs throat weren't the husband's or the wife's, but there was a partial match to a radical animal rights activist whose prints had made it into AFIS after he planted a bomb in the regional headquarters of a fast food chain.
He debated back and forth with Catherine for a while, trying to figure out why, if the murder had been the result of an enraged animal rights activist, the wife had bought it in a spectacularly gruesome way while the husband had emerged without a scratch on him. And how had the activist even known about Mr. and Mrs. Parson's unusual sexual proclivities? And why would he kill the dog? Wouldn't he have wanted to save it?
Finally, he headed back to trace. He held his breath as he passed Greg's lab, but it was empty and he let the breath go.
When he walked into trace, Hodges was leafing through the same copy of "People" he'd been looking at hours before.
"Did you do it yet?" Nick asked.
"Do what?" Hodges asked, not looking up at him.
"You know, that favor I asked you earlier."
"Oh." Hodges looked over at the printout on the edge of the counter. "The results are right there."
Nick picked the sheet up and looked at it for a moment. "This is just a graph."
Hodges sighed. "Well, I don't expect you to know how to read it." He snatched the paper from Nick's hand. "C twelve, H twenty-two, O eleven."
"C twelve…what is that?"
"Sucrose," Hodges said. "Unrefined, in this case. Remarkably pure. I didn't find any trace chemical elements in it at all."
"Wait," Nick said. "Sucrose? That…that's sugar."
"Raw sugar," Hodges said. "It's supposedly superior to refined white sugar in taste and quality. You should ask Sanders about it."
Nick sucked in a sharp breath. "What does Greg have to do with this?"
"He keeps a stash in the break room," Hodges said. "Puts it in his coffee. So, about that favor you owe me…"
Nick didn't take the time to listen, he just turned and hurried out of trace towards the DNA lab. He had to find Greg.
Title: One Good Man – part nine
Rating: R
Category: romance, angst, drama
Summary: Wherein Greg is disgusted with Nick's pantry and Nick is disgusted by videotapes.
"This," Greg said firmly, "has got to be the most disturbing thing I have ever seen."
"What?" Nick asked, looking up from the newspaper he was flipping through.
"This!" Greg cried, stepping back so that Nick could see his own pantry.
Nick looked at it. It just looked like a fully stocked pantry to him. "What's wrong with it?"
Greg gaped at him. "What's wrong with it is that you've got enough food to feed an army and yet no food that anybody would ever want to eat." Greg sighed as he looked back into the small closet. "Energy bars? Protein powder?" He snatched a box off the shelf. "Whole wheat pasta?"
"I can make you an omelet or something," Nick said, starting to get up.
Greg waved him down. "I suppose Wheaties will have to do. Where's your sugar?"
"Right there."
Greg looked up and down the pantry shelves. "Where?"
"There, next to the teabags."
Greg slowly picked up the box of small blue packets. He looked down at it for a moment, then looked up at Nick with horrified eyes. "Artificial sweetener?" he hissed. He shook his head. "You're a sick, sick man, Nick Stokes."
Nick smiled at him. "You're still a little kid when it comes to your eating habits, aren't you?"
Greg set the box of fake sugar back on the pantry shelf. "I'm not going to dignify that with a response."
"One of these days your metabolism is going to slow down and you'll be sorry you never learned to eat right."
Greg looked at him for a long moment. "It's weird," he said, "it looked like you were speaking, but the voice coming out of your mouth was my grandmother's."
Nick laughed. "She must be a smart woman."
"Well, I had to get it from somewhere." He swung Nick's pantry door closed. "I'll just grab a cheeseburger on the way to class."
"Or you could study for your quiz some more and not eat at all," Nick said with a grin.
Greg came over to the kitchen table and pushed Nick's chair back, straddled his lap. "Well, if I did that I might end up passing out in the lab due to exhaustion." He tipped his head down and pressed his mouth to Nick's. "You did put me through quite a workout this morning," he whispered.
Nick slid his hands over Greg's thighs and gripped his hips. He leaned up and caught Greg's mouth with his own, teased his lips apart and slid his tongue into Greg's warm mouth. His tongue touched Greg's, slid over it as Greg's tongue stretched into his own mouth, moaned into the kiss as Greg braced his hands on the back of Nick's chair and began to slowly rock his hips.
Greg broke the kiss, tipped his head so that his forehead pressed against Nick's. "You're going to make me late for class."
Nick grinned. "Me? I'm pretty sure you started it."
Greg sighed. "And, sadly, I'm going to have to be the one to stop it." He stood up and ran one hand through Nick's hair. "I'll see you later, all right?"
Nick captured Greg's hand in his own and pulled it down to kiss the palm quickly. "Later," he said.
He sat there for a few minutes after Greg left, flipping through the sports page. He was just about to clear the table when his phone began to ring.
Nick snatched up the ringing cell phone. "Stokes," he said, balancing the phone between his shoulder and his ear as he picked up his breakfast dishes and carried them to the sink.
"I…Nick?" Grissom sounded confused.
"Yeah, I'm here," Nick said. "Can you hear me? Hold on, the signal's stronger on the other side of my place."
"No, I can hear you," Grissom said. "The signal's fine, I just…I was looking for Greg."
Nick took the phone in his hand, then switched it to the other ear as he stood up straight. His heart was slamming against his ribcage. "Why would I know where he is? Why don't you call him?"
"I just did, and you answered," Grissom said.
Nick pulled the phone away from his ear and stared at it for a quick second. It looked similar to his phone, but it wasn't the same. "Oh," he said, his mind flying forward, racing for an answer. "We, uh, we must have mixed them up at work or something. Maybe you should call my cell, see if you can get a hold of him that way." He forced himself to laugh and prayed that it didn't sound fake.
"Oh," Grissom seemed satisfied enough with his answer. "Good idea. See you tonight, Nick."
"Yeah," he said before he snapped Greg's phone shut. "Fuck," he whispered, taking a deep breath and setting the phone on the counter. He braced his hands on the counter and leaned forward, closing his eyes, trying to catch his breath.
It hadn't been that bad. He'd come up with a lie pretty quick, and Grissom had believed him, hadn't he? Sure, he had a kind of creepy uncanny thing going on sometimes, but it's not like he had any reason to think Nick would lie to him. He and Greg could have easily switched phones by accident.
He jumped as his own cell phone began to ring. He followed the sound to its source and pulled the phone out of his jacket pocket. He dropped it onto the couch as it rang again.
Answer it. Just answer it and laugh and say that you must have stolen Greg's phone because you thought it was yours. No, he won't believe that. He'll know Greg was here and he'll want to know why and you can't lie for shit—not when asked a direct question, anyway. Just answer it and say that Greg stopped by for pizza and videogames. No, because you would have told him that before if it was true. But he thinks Greg has your phone, and Greg always answers his phone—unless he's in class. Maybe Grissom will just think that Greg turned the phone off before he went into class…
Nick took another deep breath as the phone stopped ringing. Finally, he picked it up and looked at the missed call log. Grissom had been calling from his home number, not the lab. That was good, right? That meant that it wasn't a work emergency it was just a…personal call?
He wanted to laugh. Add the fact that Grissom called Greg from home to the list of things Nick never would have suspected. And for what? To chat? To talk about…science? Chess? Those were the only things Nick knew they had in common, and he couldn't see Grissom picking up the phone just to have a friendly chat with Greg about chess moves or the latest advances in biochemistry.
He wanted to cry, too, because he couldn't remember feeling that scared in a very long time. And for what? Answering a cell phone that wasn't his? It was hardly a crime. Even if Grissom did know the truth, which he didn't—couldn't—it wasn't like it was something Nick would get fired for.
He sat down on the couch and rubbed his face in his hands. Not that he wanted Grissom to know, but he knew the man wouldn't fire him for it. Grissom didn't care about their personal lives as long as it didn't affect their work—and even when it did he stood by his people. He rewarded their loyalty to him with unshakeable loyalty of his own. After all, he hadn't given up on Catherine when she couldn't break her cocaine habit, hadn't given up on Warrick when his gambling got so bad it cost another CSI her life.
He didn't give up on me when most everyone else thought I was a murderer.
He smiled as he remembered Kristy. It had been long enough that the pain was more of a sweet sadness. Funny, beautiful Kristy, who had tossed her head back and laughed when he finally confessed to her that he'd only gotten blowjobs from women before. He remembered the way she leaned across the couch and kissed him, laughed softly as he remembered her offering to get her strap-on in order to make him feel more comfortable. He'd laughed, then, too, and told her no, if he was going to be with a woman he wanted to do it right.
Grissom had been confused and maybe a little disappointed, but he hadn't turned his back on Nick. And maybe he'd be confused and disappointed if he knew the real truth—the whole truth—but Nick had gotten to the point where Grissom's disappointment didn't crush him the way it had in the beginning.
But that was a moot point. Grissom wasn't going to be disappointed in him because Grissom wouldn't ever know.
Greg thought the whole phone mix-up thing was funny when Nick caught him out in the parking lot.
"Stopped my heart," Nick said. "I thought I was going to pass out for a second."
Greg laughed and took his phone from Nick's hand. "You're strung a little too tight, I think," he said, and Nick could tell that Greg wanted to kiss him.
He wanted to kiss Greg, too, but the parking lot outside the lab was hardly the place for it, so they satisfied themselves with meaningful looks before they headed inside.
It wasn't a very eventful night. He continued processing the evidence from the black lab crime scene from two nights earlier, and when the cops brought in the results of their latest warrant, Nick stared at the box full of videotapes and knew, whatever it was, he didn't want to see what was on those tapes. Not if he ever wanted to be able to look at a black lab again without getting nauseous.
"Hey," he said, knocking on the open door to the DNA lab. "You busy?"
Greg shrugged. "No more than usual." There wasn't any music playing for once, but that didn't stop him from dancing as he adjusted the comparison microscope. "You?"
"PD just brought in more evidence from the doggie case," Nick said. "Videotapes. Lots of them."
Greg stopped dancing and looked at him. "They're not…home movies, are they?"
"I have a bad feeling they are," he said. "And I've always liked dogs, but not like that."
Greg laughed. "So pawn it off on Archie. He's having a slow night, and he is the A/V guy."
Nick thought about it for a moment. "I don't know if I can…"
"Oh, come on, just ask if he wants assisting credit on the case and after he agrees, which he will, then you break the news that he gets to do the shit work. That's what you always do to me."
Nick smirked. "Yeah, sorry about that."
"No, no, looking at each tear in about fifty thousand matchbooks is my idea of a good time. Really. And this way, you'll be delegating responsibility, proving that you're cut out for a supervisory position."
"You're just sweet talking me so I won't be cranky later," Nick whispered.
"Maybe. But what's the purpose of having a position of authority if you can't make the people under you do the dirty work? When's the last time you saw Grissom trudging through the sewer system for eight hours? Come to think of it, when's the last time you trudged through the sewer system for eight hours?"
"Point taken." Nick laughed as Greg boogied across the lab. "You're in a good mood," he said.
Greg grinned at him. "You have no idea how good."
"Any particular reason?" Nick asked softly. "Besides the fact that this time Archie has to do the dirty work instead of you?"
"Yes," Greg said, tapping his hands rhythmically on the counter top to a beat only he could hear. "But it's a secret."
He couldn't help but laugh again. "What kind of secret?"
"Can't tell you," Greg said, breezing past him with a microscope slide in each hand.
"Can't or won't?" Nick asked with a grin as he watched Greg fit each slide onto the comparison microscope.
Greg scrunched his face up as he pretended to think for a moment. "Technically? Won't. It's not like I'm physically unable to tell you, but if I did tell you it wouldn't be a secret anymore."
"I thought you told me all your secrets," Nick said in a low voice as he shot Greg what he knew was one of his most seductive looks.
Greg returned Nick's look with one of his own. "Not all of them," he whispered. "A boy's got to have some surprises left in him."
Nick licked his lips and took a deep breath. "You have no idea what I'm gonna do to you after I get you home."
Greg tried to suppress a smile but couldn't. "Oh, I think I have a pretty good idea of what's going to…" He sat up straight. "Wait, I can't."
Nick gaped at him.
"It's not that I don't want to," Greg's voice resumed its seductive tone, "because I do. I mean, I really, really do."
"Me, too."
"I have, um, an appointment. At eight o'clock."
"Come by after?" Nick asked, vaguely aware that the question made him sound slightly desperate.
"Yeah." Greg nodded. "Yeah, definitely."
When Nick got home he changed his sheets. He considered just leaving the covers on the floor since that's where they'd end up, anyway, but after a few minutes of indecision he made the bed, arranged the pillows, smoothed down the dark blue comforter. He set condoms and lube on his bedside table, then decided that it was kind of tacky and put them in the top drawer, instead.
He straightened up the living room, then decided that it looked too clean and he messed it up a little bit, moving things around on the coffee table so that they weren't perfectly aligned at right angles, toeing off his shoes by the couch and letting them lay in what he hoped looked like a casual heap.
When he looked at the clock it was only seven-thirty. He sighed and sat down on the couch. He turned on the TV and watched but didn't really hear the morning news. He stretched out on the couch and flipped through the channels, finally settling on something about the frilled lizards of Australia. He tried to keep his eyes open, but they closed against his will. He slept.
It was nearly eleven when he awoke with a start. Someone was knocking on his front door, an incessant trill of quick knocks and raps.
"Coming," he said, pushing himself up off the couch. He was groggy and he yawned as he headed towards the door. "Greg, stop it, I'm coming." He yanked the door open and Greg dropped both his hands. "Trying to give me a heart attack?" he asked.
"No, trying to wake you up," Greg said, stepping inside and closing the door behind him with his foot. "Hey, sleepy head," he said, reaching up to smooth Nick's hair down. He shrugged his backpack off his shoulders and let it drop by the front door.
"Hey, you," Nick smiled a sleepy smile and wrapped his arms around Greg's waist, pulling him close.
Greg sighed into the kiss, then nuzzled his face into the crook where Nick's jaw met his neck. "God, you smell good," he whispered.
Nick smiled. He'd just been thinking the same thing about Greg, who smelled like a combination of cinnamon, soap, and warm skin. There was something else beneath that, too, a scent he couldn't define as anything other than Greg, and it was that part that made him groan as he breathed in, that made his cock begin to swell.
"Sorry I'm late," Greg said as he ran his hands up Nick's back.
Nick shrugged. "You're not late. It's not like we ever decided on a time when you'd get here."
"I ran home to change and pick a few things up, to check on the fish."
"How's your gobi?"
"He was stirring up sand like a pro when I left him." He lifted his head and kissed Nick again quickly. "I need to make coffee."
"I thought you hated my coffee," Nick said. He yawned, then tipped his head to the side to stretch out his neck.
"I do." Greg pulled away and unzipped his backpack, then pulled out a bag of Blue Hawaiian.
"You're never gonna sleep if you drink that stuff," Nick said as Greg walked past him towards the kitchen.
"You'd be surprised," Greg called over his shoulder. "A cup of this stuff is like warm milk to me—puts me right out. It takes at least three cups to get me going."
"All that caffeine's bad for your heart."
Greg stuck his head out of Nick's kitchen. "Decaf is the devil, Nick. The sooner you realize that the happier you'll be."
Nick grinned, then leaned down to pick up Greg's backpack from where it had fallen onto its side. As he lifted it up to set it against the wall, a small plastic baggie fell out of it and hit the floor.
Nick squatted down and picked up the baggie. He held it between his thumb and forefinger and stared at the pale brown crystals inside. He hefted it in his hand. Half a pound at least, and that wasn't cheap.
I make good money, you know.
"Jesus," he whispered. He swallowed hard, looked over towards his kitchen door and could hear Greg humming something while he banged around making coffee.
There had to be another explanation. Greg wouldn't, he couldn't…
I started doing it when we had sex.
Was that what he had planned? His secret? His surprise? He wanted to get spun before they had sex? Nick remembered what he'd read, remembered the fact that the initial rush felt as good as ten orgasms. But there was a lot in the baggie—too much for just a few lines before sex. Too much for anyone to have at one time. Unless he's cooking it. The thought came unbidden. He tried to push it away. Greg wouldn't, not after everything that had happened. He'd promised.
"So," Greg's voice startled him, "I was thinking that maybe next week sometime we could head out to Grapevine Canyon, do some hiking…Nick?"
Nick stood up from where he'd been squatting on the floor. He looked at Greg for just a moment, couldn't bear to look at him any longer.
"I…" Greg took a step back. He laughed and Nick realized that he was beginning to be able to differentiate Greg's real laughs from the laughs he forced to cover his nerves. "I mean, it's not like we'd be taking a vacation together or anything," he said. "Just, you know, a day of hiking, breathing in the fresh air. But if you think it's too soon for us to do stuff like that—"
"Jesus, Greg," Nick said. "How could you?"
Greg looked around for a moment. "What? I…I just thought we could…" His voice trailed off as he spotted the baggie in Nick's hand.
"You promised me," Nick whispered.
Greg took a deep breath and didn't say anything. Nick noticed that his hands had started to shake.
"Is it the stress of work plus trying to get CSI certification? I know it's hard, I know how tired you can get, but this…it's not worth it."
He laughed again. "You think…? Fuck you, Nick."
"Look, if you haven't starting using again, if your appointment this morning was just to get this…we can work through it. We can."
"I use it all the time," Greg's voice was hollow. "Every day."
Nick sighed. "Even at work?"
"Especially at work. Can't get through a shift without it."
"God, Greg. Why didn't you just tell me? I can help."
Greg let out a choked laugh. "You can help?" he asked. He laughed again, and the sound of it chilled Nick to the bone. "You can help me with this. My addiction."
"Just let me try. I care about you, Greg. I…I love you."
"Oh," Greg snapped, "I can see that. You're such a fucking hero, Nick. So noble, taking in wounded strays and nursing them back to health."
"It's not about that. It's about you and me, and how we need to be honest with each other. I'll help you through this, Greg. I will."
Greg gripped his hair in his hands and turned and screamed, actually screamed, his voice full of more frustration and rage than Nick thought possible. Nick started towards him but stopped as Greg began to kick at the closet door. He screamed and slammed his fist into it over and over again.
Nick was frozen, watching Greg punch and kick at the door. His breath hitched in his chest. "Greg, what are you on?" he asked in a tense whisper.
"You wanna know what I'm on?" Greg asked, his voice breaking on the last word. "You wanna know what I'm fucking on?" He raked his fingers through his hair, stalked towards Nick. "You wanna know what's got me so fucked up, Nick?" he demanded.
"Look, man, I just wanna help you," Nick said, holding his hands out in a gesture of peace.
Greg laughed, a sick choking laugh that made Nick cringe. "Of course you do. Of course you do. You've gotta save me, right Nick? You've gotta be the hero swooping in to save the day."
"I told you it's not like that. I care about you and I—"
"The hell you do." Greg's voice was harsh. "This?" He snatched the baggie out of Nick's hand. "This is my drug of choice, Nick. Bravo. You've really got the makings of a crack investigator."
"Just talk to me, G."
Greg shook his head. "I'm done talking to you. You don't listen. Why should you? People lie, right? Right?"
"Greg, I'm not the enemy here. We can get you help."
Greg's hands were trembling. "What? Rehab? Twelve step meetings?"
"Anything, anything that will help."
"Yeah, well, that's not going to work because there's no rehab to help me get over falling in love with you!" On the last word he threw the baggie at Nick's head, and he had to duck to keep it from hitting him.
Nick stood up slowly, watching as if in a dream as Greg snatched up the baggie, grabbed his backpack and fled the condo.
He was shaking. His entire body was shaking. He closed his eyes and put his hands over his face as if that would steady him.
He concentrated on breathing. OK. That had gone horribly wrong. He'd approached it the wrong way. He should have thought it out before confronting Greg, should have figured out the best way to talk to him. He shouldn't have let his disapproval show. He should have tried to remain neutral.
He sank to the ground and pulled his knees up to his chest. He'd believed Greg so completely when he said he was clean, had believed his every word. And Greg had lied, yes, but Nick still loved him. His heart actually ached, a sharp stab of pain that radiated through his chest, down to his knees, down to his fingertips.
On the carpet against the wall were several translucent brown crystals that had fallen out of the baggie when it hit the wall. Nick took a deep breath. The first step in helping Greg would be to find out exactly what it was he was using. Then, after he knew, he'd find a way to get through to him.
He got a clean sheet of computer paper and laid it on the ground. He transferred the crystals onto the middle of the paper using a tweezers. He folded the paper in half, folded it in thirds, then folded it in half again. He sealed the open end of the bindle with scotch tape and set it on the kitchen table. On the counter, the coffeepot with Greg's Blue Hawaiian had finished brewing.
He drank the entire pot while he sat at the kitchen table and thought. It wasn't like he was going to get any sleep, anyway.
As soon as he got in to work he tried to head towards trace, but Archie cut him off at the pass.
"I, uh, I watched all 32 hours of those videotapes," Archie said to Nick, looking decidedly green around the gills. "It definitely wasn't a surprise to the husband, since he was involved in the, uh, the action, too."
Nick cringed. "What is wrong with people?"
"After watching those tapes?" Archie asked. "My answer is a lot. Do you wanna see my notes?"
"Yeah," Nick said. "Yeah, I'll meet you in the A/V lab in just a sec. I have to drop something off at trace."
Archie nodded and headed back towards his lab.
"Oh, Archie," Nick said.
Archie looked back at him. "Yeah?"
"I know that was a crap job to give you, but you did a good job."
Archie managed a shaky smile. "All in a day's work," he said.
When Nick walked into trace, Hodges was flipping through a copy of "People" and muttering something under his breath.
"Hey," Nick said. "How's it going?"
Hodges looked up at him for a moment, then looked back at his magazine and flipped a page. "What are you here to accuse me of now?"
"Nothing, man," Nick said softly. "I just, uh, do you know what 'off the record' means?"
Hodges looked up at him with bored eyes. "What?"
"I need you to do something for me, but we can't tell anybody about it."
Hodges looked back down at his magazine. "Let me guess, your supplier ran out of steroids and you need me to synthesize you some, quick."
"What? No. Look, I need you to analyze something for me."
Hodges looked back up, mildly interested. "What sort of something?"
"If I knew that, I wouldn't need you." He pulled the bindle out of his pocket and placed it on the counter. "Can you figure out what this is for me?"
"Of course," Hodges said. "But what about your little buddy?" He cast his eyes towards Greg's lab. "I thought you CSIs always went to him for this sort of thing."
Nick nodded. "I'd rather have you on this one," he said softly. "So, can you do it?"
"Do I get overtime?"
"No."
Hodges sighed and picked up the bindle. "I guess I can do it. It's a slow night. But you owe me."
Nick nodded. "I know. Thank you."
Nick listened to Archie explain the notes he'd taken of the doggie porn home videos, but Archie's words didn't really stick in his head.
He sought out Jaqui and listened to her explain that the prints on the knife used to slit the dogs throat weren't the husband's or the wife's, but there was a partial match to a radical animal rights activist whose prints had made it into AFIS after he planted a bomb in the regional headquarters of a fast food chain.
He debated back and forth with Catherine for a while, trying to figure out why, if the murder had been the result of an enraged animal rights activist, the wife had bought it in a spectacularly gruesome way while the husband had emerged without a scratch on him. And how had the activist even known about Mr. and Mrs. Parson's unusual sexual proclivities? And why would he kill the dog? Wouldn't he have wanted to save it?
Finally, he headed back to trace. He held his breath as he passed Greg's lab, but it was empty and he let the breath go.
When he walked into trace, Hodges was leafing through the same copy of "People" he'd been looking at hours before.
"Did you do it yet?" Nick asked.
"Do what?" Hodges asked, not looking up at him.
"You know, that favor I asked you earlier."
"Oh." Hodges looked over at the printout on the edge of the counter. "The results are right there."
Nick picked the sheet up and looked at it for a moment. "This is just a graph."
Hodges sighed. "Well, I don't expect you to know how to read it." He snatched the paper from Nick's hand. "C twelve, H twenty-two, O eleven."
"C twelve…what is that?"
"Sucrose," Hodges said. "Unrefined, in this case. Remarkably pure. I didn't find any trace chemical elements in it at all."
"Wait," Nick said. "Sucrose? That…that's sugar."
"Raw sugar," Hodges said. "It's supposedly superior to refined white sugar in taste and quality. You should ask Sanders about it."
Nick sucked in a sharp breath. "What does Greg have to do with this?"
"He keeps a stash in the break room," Hodges said. "Puts it in his coffee. So, about that favor you owe me…"
Nick didn't take the time to listen, he just turned and hurried out of trace towards the DNA lab. He had to find Greg.
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no subject
Date: 2004-08-21 02:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-22 12:47 pm (UTC)Uhm.
I was at the zoo today.. so, mind me!
But - I couldn't stop smiling looking at all the "technicolor" fish there since they all made me think of your fic.
Now, isn't that what's called a lasting impression? ;)