"You look happy." Grissom glanced up briefly as he closed his one folder and opened another.

"I *am* happy."

Her response made him stop writing. He looked up. "Finish your unfinished business?"

Catherine simply smiled, her eyes on the case file she was studying.

"So I guess I can cross off the 'personal life' goal on your evaluation."

She looked up at him, the smile still on her face. "Things have improved...slightly."

"Slightly? That's an understatement considering you haven't stopped smiling since you came in tonight. So who's the lucky guy?" Seeing the amused look on her face, he added, "You don't have to say if you don't want to."

"Chris Beszich."

"Chris Beszich? Isn't that Mike Trent's club manager?"

Catherine nodded, looking down again at her case file, not wanting to face what she was sure was coming next.

"Catherine, what are you doing?"

"Paperwork."

"Catherine, I'm serious."

"I know what I'm doing. He was never a suspect."

"But he was still involved with the case!"

"We didn't actually have a date until after the case was closed."

"This is..." He shook his head angrily. "I can cover for you once, but I can't cover for you forever."

"Then don't! I don't need your covering, Grissom."

"Really? Do you realize you wouldn't be sitting here if I had written about Sam's check in your evaluation?"

"I didn't ask you to do that."

"No, but I thought you'd appreciate it."

"And I did. I do. I appreciate you looking out for me but I don't need you to look out for me this time because I didn't do anything wrong! I didn't break protocol, I didn't make a mistake. Chris and I didn't get involved until the case was closed."

"They're not going to care when it began, Catherine. All they're gonna care about is the fact that it happened at all! Don't you get it? The explosion and then Sam's case being thrown out...their trust in you is wearing thing."

"Their trust in me or your trust in me?"

"If I didn't trust you, I wouldn't have covered for you."

"Right, but if you trusted me, you wouldn't be questioning me right now."

"Can you blame me for doing so?"

"No, you have every right to not trust me anymore. But let me get this right, you're asking me to stop seeing Chris Beszich?"

"I'm asking you to think about what you're doing."

"I know what I'm doing."

"Do you? Cuz it doesn't seem like you do! Catherine, you keep risking your job like this and..." He trailed off and sighed. "Of course, now that you've got Sam's money..."

"Oh, that's nice." She nodded and stood up in frustration. "You know, I asked you if we were fine and you said we were gonna be but I guess that's not true, is it?" She pushed her chair in angrily and headed for the door.

"We're not done here."

"I think we are." With that, she stormed out.