Sara Sidle walked into Grissom’s office, “Ready and fit for work.” She informed the silvering haired man.

“Medically and psychologically?” Her supervisor queried.

“Clean bill of health.” She replied.

Grissom studied her for a moment, “It’s only been four days, you can have more time…”

She interrupted, “I’m going crazy not working and I need to find out how I’ll cope out there.”

“Okay, but I’ll keep you teamed up with…”

”Anyone but Nick,” she interrupted, she noticed the surprise and then dismay on Grissom’s face, “he’s been great and things are getting interesting between us,” she gave a big grin, “but he’ll try to be soooooooooo protective, I’ll not be allowed to do anything.” She gave a small shrug.

“Okay, Warrick will be your partner for the next few days then we’ll reappraise the situation.” He told her.

Nodding her thanks she left, passing Catherine on her way in.

“Everything okay?” the blonde woman asked as the door closed behind her.

“Fine, I’ve teamed Sara with Warrick for a few days…”

“Nick, being a little too protective?” Catherine asked a twinkle in her blue eyes, “They seem to be getting on all right outside of here.”

“Mm hmm,” He agreed, “almost as good as us.” He answered grinning and coming round his desk to give her a passionate kiss.

“Careful,” she began pushing him back a little, “the door isn’t locked.”

He gave her a quick kiss and headed back to his seat, “I’ll be good here, but wait till the end of shift.” Catherine gave a small throaty laugh.

Sitting down and taking on his professional mode he asked, “What can I do for you?”

“Remember you and Brass weren’t too happy with the way this all ended?” He nodded, “Well you got me thinking. Mrs. Holmes put on a very good show for Sara and us and I think that’s all it was, a show. She was so upset she contacted her husband’s solicitor right after she got out of hospital.”

“That’s interesting. I figured out what had been annoying me, I was just going to call Jim when Sara came in.” he sighed, “It was the carving, it had been done post-mortem on everyone else.”

She studied him, eyes wide, “Why did he start carving her letter before killing her?”

“Maybe he didn’t.”

“Me, thinks the lady doth protest too much.” Catherine quoted.

“The game’s afoot!” Grissom exclaimed.

Brass joined the two CSIs in Grissom’s office.

“The more I look into this Holmes character, the less likely it seems he’s our man.” The detective said as he sat down on the couch.

“Well it can’t be Mrs. Holmes. Sara told us it was definitely a man that was in the back of Frances Wicker’s car and Doc. Robbins stated the depth of the wounds and the angle is indicative of a right handed man.” Catherine informed them, “Not only that, Mrs. Holmes could not have carved that partial E on herself.”

Grissom sat thinking these points over, “Unless we take Nick’s idea.” He said softly looking at Catherine and then Brass, “Two people?”

“You think Mrs. Holmes and a male friend?” Catherine queried.

“Possibly.” Her supervisor agreed.

“I think I’ll check out who had the money in the Holmes family and see if there were any ties on it.” Brass stated rising.

A few days later the detective collected Catherine and returned to Grissom who was in his office catching up on paperwork. The other members of the graveshift were out on cases.

“Mr. Frederick Holmes was a very wealthy man. His business was a hobby more than work. He married Ann Chalmers when they were both teenagers and to all appearances the two of them have been happily married for twenty years. As they married so young Holmes’ father insisted on there being a pre nuptial agreement, Mrs. Holmes would receive a paltry twenty thousand dollars if she divorced her husband. However should she outlive him she would receive all the Holmes’ family money.” Brass informed his attentive audience.

“The plot thickens.” Grissom whispered, Catherine grinned and Brass looked at him puzzled, it had been sometime since he had seen Gil Grissom so relaxed.

“It seems that Mr. Holmes had a wandering eye, although friends state he never had any intention of divorcing his wife. She was, to all intents and purposes, an excellent hostess and very good in bed.” The detective went on.

Catherine stared at him, “You give us a motive and then take it away. Good of you.” She almost snarled at him.

“I think our sleuth has something else,” Grissom told her, “look at the smirk on his face.”

Seeing he was about to be attacked by an irate female CSI, Brass held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. “Two years ago Mrs. Holmes decided what was good for the goose was good for the gander, only she has been seeing the one man for that period of time.” He told them raising his eyebrow quizzically to see if they were following his line of thought.

“So if Frederick Holmes found out he might well divorce her, it wouldn’t do for him to be made a fool of.” Catherine stated.

“She probably thought she had earned more than twenty thousand dollars having put up with his philandering all these years.” Grissom added, “Well done my dear Holmes, oops bad pun.”

“I got the motive; all you have to do is prove Frederick Holmes didn’t do the killings and that his wife and her lover did.”