Title: Round Table Discussion V
Author: Esynnaj
Author Email: vebesahchalarc@sbcglobal.net
Rating: FRM
Pairing: Warrick/Gil
Status of Story: Complete
Summary: Complications, complications and a few more complications.
Story Notes: This will be completed in a story called Black Gold and Crimson Steel. It's too long and involved to be a Round Table Discussion.

The gathering of the CSI clan for breakfast at their favorite restaurant was becoming an involved affair. With seven adults and four children, two of them infants in a baby carrier, they had been forced to move from their favorite sitting places to a corner area where two tables could be pushed together and they still had breathing room. Catherine's daughter and Warrick's son were at the new breakfast buffet getting food while their elders busily arranging themselves and the smiling, wriggling, kicking twins at the tables during lively conversations before getting their own. After they had acquired nourishment and sat down, Tina began handing out her very individualistic and very highly sought after, since all was now convinced of their safety, homemade tea bags to the ones to which each belonged.

Because it was the first time Lolita was receiving one, she regarded it with caution, turning it over and over in her hands and sniffing it before announcing, "It smells weird. Nice but still very weird. What the hell is it?"

"A balancing agent," Tina told her serenely. "It assists in the alignment of those worrisome personality traits which upbringing, environment, cultural references and all other incidental matters, including destiny and stress have placed upon us. It also improves what's good about us. It helps to make of us a better person."

"Oh? Are you saying I'm not good enough as I am? Are you saying there's something wrong with the way I already am?"

"I am not. I'm simply saying all of us can do with a little improvement."

"Yeah, right," Lolita said with a bitter smile. "What you really mean I can use more improvement than most."

"I'm saying nothing of the sort. That's your insecurities speaking for you. Don't make them known. Never allow them to show their presence. They have no business being in us, so deny them the right."

"Hah. This hasn't got a thing to do with my insecurities. You're trying to poison me or something."

Glancing at her as he dipped his bag in a cup of water, Warrick advised, "Lola, you're not just showing your insecurities, you're showing your ass. Stop complaining and just drink the stuff. It's good."

As Lolita bridled, spearing Warrick with an indignant glare, Tina tapped his hand with her spoon and told him to, "Hush, Warrick." Then to Lolita, she said, "My gift of the tea is not meant to be an insult. It's a measure of kindness I extend only to members of my family of which you are now one."

Hearing that, Lolita brightened considerably and asked with a pretty little bounce, "Really? You think of me as part of the family?"

Sara muttered in a hiss to her life partner from the far side of Tina, her head down so Lolita couldn't hear. "Say no. You say yes and we'll never get rid of her. I still think she's got her eye on Warrick."

Tina ignored her to tell Lolita, "Of course you're part of the family. You brought Juny to us. He is now ours. You are his mother. That automatically makes you one of ours as well."

Lolita smiled glowingly at her son who was sitting next to his father. "You hear that, Junebug? We're part of the family."

"Yeah, Mama, I already know that," Juny said around the food he was shoveling into his mouth. "Dad's been saying that for months, haven't you, Dad?"

Warrick grinned and gently tugged his son's diamond encrusted right ear. "Yeah, man, that's what I've been saying. Glad you took note."

"Always, Dad, always. Got to make the old man feel good about helping to teach me how to be a healthy and happy adult, right?"

"Yep, that's what I'm doing all right. But, you can stop with the old man garbage. That'll get your head knocked off," Warrick warned as he tousled Juny's hair. "Still though, you're right. You talk very intelligently to be only nine years old."

"Can't help that, Dad. Mama's been treating me like I was twenty since I was two. She said that was cause she wanted it so I could take care of myself when things ever happened to turn out that she wouldn't be around. Besides, teaching me how to be a right kinda man is what Unca Gil told me that you're all doing."

Warrick sent Gil a grin over the table while he covertly and covetously rubbed his foot along Gil's ankle under the table. "Is that what you've been saying, Uncle Gil? Did you say that we're all teaching June how to be a right kind of man?"

"I did and please stop doing what you're doing, Ricky. It's not a proper family activity and you're making it difficult for me to concentrate on my food, which is very delicious. So stop."

Lolita was saying to Tina, "Since you seem to be the wise matriarch of this little group, I'll take your words to heart. Thanks for 'em."

"She's the matriarch?" came from Catherine. She was smiling but with a possessive and brittle edge as she added, "I thought that's what I was."

Nick said grinning "Uh-uh, you're the enforcer, Cath. Tina kinda, real sweet and nice, pushes us in the direction of righteousness. But whenever you think we're not doing what's right, you come down on us with both feet firmly encased in steel toed boots."

"Well, I like that. My feelings are hurt."

"Don't know why they should be, Mom," Lindsey said cheerfully, "Nick speaks the truth. And I've got the marks all up and down my spine from where you've tread on me to prove it."

Catherine grinned at her daughter who was growing up to be as attractive as her mother and said, "Shut-up, kid. Nobody asked you to put your two cents in."

Tina was still smiling as she said, "Nevertheless, Lindsey's correct. Your feelings should not be hurt. Every tribe needs an enforcer to protect it from harm others do to it and harm it might do to itself. You do that very well, Catherine. You've been graced with a natural mother wit. I have sought your advice and guidance, looked to you for the prevention of my own possible misdeeds. Think of your title as our maternal enforcer with pride. You've worked hard to achieve it and deserve it. So enjoy it."

"She does," Nick said. "You must've seen that gleam she gets in her eye whenever she gets a chance to rip into one of us and it's even worse when it's somebody else. I feel sorry for folks Catherine jumps on that she doesn't really care about. Most of 'em never fully recover after she's gotten into their shit. I have seen it. She breathes fire and leaves permanent blisters."

"Nick, please shut-up and eat. Put something in your mouth. Fill it up so your lips can't flap anymore."

"Know what, Cath?" came from Warrick as he leaned forward to look down the table at her. "You'd make one helluva dominatrix. You should get Lady Heather to give ya some lessons."

Smiling back at him wickedly, Catherine said, "How do you know she already hasn't?"

"Oh, you two don't," Sara snapped at them. "This isn't a proper topic of conversation right now. And both of you also need to stop cussing as much as you do when you're around the children."

Catherine grinned and said, "Oh, Sara, lighten up. It's a bit late to be protecting Lindsey or Juny's delicate little ears. Simply from living here and going to Las Vegas schools, they probably know more cuss words than all of us put together."

"You're damn right we do," Juny and Lindsey simultaneously said. Then, after looking at each other, they went off into gales of laughter.

Warrick disapprovingly and lightly cuffed his son upside the head. "Don't do that. It's disrespectful."

"Yes sir," Juny said obediently although he was still giggling.

"We won't let it happen again," Lindsey promised as she muffled her laughter with a hand.

"You're damn right we won't." said Juny, which cracked them both up again.

Rolling her eyes as Catherine joined their laughter and Warrick just grinned, Sara said, "This is so unbelievable. We're supposed to be trying to instruct the children how to use the English language properly, not go along or laugh with them when they abuse it. While it's obvious it might be too late for Lindsey and Juny, you could at least think of the twins."

"But they are thinking of the twins," Lolita said while she was reaching into one of the baby carriers to briefly play with Niki, Warrick and Tina's daughter. "They're teaching them this world isn't such a nice place, but you can still get a little taste of happiness from it."

"They're doing nothing of the sort. I've known Catherine and Warrick longer than you have. They just cuss for the sake of cussing and get a thrill from talking dirty."

Warrick told her, "Sara, do what Catherine said. It's the Christmas season. Lighten up. Be merry. Get that stick out your behind for a change."

Tina went very still, a reflective light in her eyes as a sudden, certain thought occurred to her. Then, she pressed two fingers to her lips as she smiled. "No," she said softly. "I won't say what I was about to say. It would be indelicate and very improper, just as Sara's said."

But Catherine said, "Oh, but now you've got me curious. Can't cha give us a hint?"

"Only a hint which hopefully, young ears won't understand. I just got a very vivid image of, during our time together, when, shall we say, Sara, as Warrick worded it, has gotten that stick out her behind."

"And other objects of a different sort up it, huh?" Catherine salaciously and raucously concluded for her.

Sara instantly leaped to her feet, told them with a slash of her hand, "You are all incorrigible," and stalked off toward the buffet set up.

"We shouldn't do that to her," Tina murmured. "My Sara gets riled up so easily. However, it's one of the things I love about her. She definitively does keep life most exceedingly interesting."

"Hey, Tina," Lolita asked, having begun to sip her tea. "This's really good. What's it going to do to me?"

"Nothing negative, I assure you. You shine brilliantly, Lolita, but you have a restless spirit. It will calm you and aid you in seeing things clearly. You'll be much better able to make decisions that benefit you and your son. Some of us tend to do that which harms us as well as those we love best. Your tea will help you not to do that any longer."

"Then I thank you for it. Cause I sure would like to stop making all the stupid mistakes I've made over the years and seem to still be making. They make life hard so hard and I'm sick and tired of livin' a hard life."

Tina started to respond but one of the twins started crying and she had to turn her son. Catherine peered over inside the carrier to offer advice as the twin continued to be fussy. Sara, upon hearing the baby's cry from clear across the restaurant, jetted back over to see what the problem was, while both Warrick and Gil leaned in to contribute to the tribal and extended family style of parenting that was becoming common to them.

With Lindsey and Juny engaged in an undercover discussion about the foibles of the adults over their breakfast, it left Lolita and Nick to their own singular devices.Lolita, resting her head in her hand, her elbow on the table, watched the others with a slightly sad expression on her face. Nick was watching as well and said with a forlorn note in his voice, "All my family's down in Texas and I don't have enough vacation time built up to go see 'em this Christmas. So everyone'll have somebody except me."

Lolita perked up a bit, a calculating light coming into her eyes. Somebody was alone for the holidays besides her and Lolita Avondale was a woman who preferred stimulating companionship no matter what the time of the year or what her mood, especially if it was male companionship. Smiling without looking over at Nick, she said, "That's not true. I don't have anybody either."

"You've got Juny."

"Junebug's my baby. He's got me. I don't have him." Turning her head toward Nick with her smile widening, she reached out to caress his upper lip. "Here's hopingyou won't mind me saying this, but you know what, Nicky? I am so glad you shaved that mustache off you had for awhile. I like you clean shaven much better. And I like your haircut better. Somehow, the combination of the old hair cut and the mustache gave you a sorta Beaver Cleaver look. You're much sexier now."

Nick gave her a dimpled grin. "Thanks. You weren't the only one who didn't like it. Nobody else seemed to."

"Hmmm, yesss..." Lolita let her fingers flick momentarily against Nick's lips before she gripped the lower one to pull him forward, murmuring, as she shifted her hold on him to grasp his chin as she laid a light but lingering kiss on him.

Sara, happening to glance up, saw it and her arm shot out toward Nick and Lolita as she demanded, "What's with the woman? Does she always have to go around trying to get her claws into every man she runs across? Warrick, has she always been like this?"

Warrick looked over and grinned. "Yeah, she has. The lady's a pimp."

"She's a what?!!!"

Laughing, Catherine explained to Sara, "He doesn't mean it the way you're thinking, Sara. It's street slang and means Lolita is a player."

"Yeah, that's what it means all right. She always has been a player and it looks like she always will be one."

Nick, upon being slowly released from the abrupt enthrallment presented to him by Lolita, was finally able to sit back and ask, his head still swirling from their kiss, "What was that for?"

Lolita just smiled and murmured, "Didn't you catch the invisible mistletoe?" Nick cocked his head at her, giving her a disbelieving look. She laughed softly and said, "All right then. Let's get real with this. This isn't the first time it's occurring to me how compatible you and I are and how we're both by ourselves. It'd be stupid if we didn't take advantage of that. So tell me, Nick Stokes, what're you doing for the holidays? I'm not talking about us having any great big love thing, but I do think it'd really be fun to go out with a good looking man like you on my arm." She leaned in close so he got a whiff of her sweet scents and got a good look at her delectable cleavage as she whispered. "Juny's going to be spending most his school vacation with Warrick. I'd have plenty of time to devote to just you, Nicky. And I'm a very entertaining person. I'd show you one helluva good time."

"I'll just bet you would," Nick said, gazing into those hypnotic gray eyes. Then, partially snapping back to reality, he grinned hugely as he said, "I think I would love to spend some of the holidays with you. Not all of 'em, mind you, just some of 'em."

"That sounds good to me, too. I'm only out to have some fun, not take over your life. But you know what else sounds good to me? Getting laid does. I really, really wanna get laid by a good, clean seeming man like you."

Nick sputtered surprised laughter as he said, drawing back from her, "You wanna what?"

"You heard me. I haven't since I've been back in Vegas. Had too much to do to get June settled in. Besides, there're not too many men here that I trust enough to fuck. Too many killer diseases and shit out there and I can't leave Junebug motherless. When I first came back, I thought I could get Warrick back. He is honestly the only one I've ever had sex with and felt totally safe. But he's thoroughly taken now, doesn't even seem to notice me anymore. He's too in love with Dr. Grissom. Besides with Sara, being the skinny, interfering bitch that she is, she's just waiting like a vulture for me to get too close to him so she can rip me a new asshole. I am really and truly not up for that."

"Yeah, you shouldn't be. Little as you are, Sara would have you down on the mat and counted out before the first round was over."

"Oh, I don't know about that. You've heard that old adage about the bigger they are, haven't you? I don't care how big and bad somebody thinks they are, there is always an equalizer somewhere available close by and I do have a talent for acquiring that equalizer so I can terminate a given situation in my favor. But we are not going to talk about Sara. I wanna talk about us. I really need to get laid, Nicholas. Like the girl said in the movie, me so horny. So whatdaya say? Think you would be willing to help me do something about that?"

"Um, well, uh, you've kinda... hit me with this a little... unexpectedly."

"Have I?" Lolita asked, her eyes widening. "Am I being too forward, a little too bold and brassy? Are you telling me you're not man enough to handle it?"

With his machismo rising to prevent his pride from enduring the assault that had been launched upon it, Nick shook his head, "No. That ain't it at all. I'm man enough to handle it. It's just, this's coming out of left field and you're... moving really quick."

"Oh? Then, am I too quick for you, Nick? Am I too much for you, maybe? I definitely wasn't for Warrick. He used to love it when I came right out and said what I wanted, in and out of bed. He likes honest, straightforward women. I'm sorry that you don't."

"Hey, that's not what I mean. I like honest, straightforward women, too. It's just that you, um, see it's..."

Lolita cupped her chin in her hand and fluttered her eyelashes at him. "Just stop tripping over your words and tell me what the trouble is. I really do not understand where your hesitation is coming from and I'm surprised by all of this uncertainty. I don't want to hurt you. Only make you feel good and keep both of us from being lonely this Christmas. I thought you down home Texas boys were supposed to be man enough to handle anything."

Increasingly frustrated, Nick snapped, "I am man enough to handle anything. Or I can handle most things anyway. At least, most of the time I can. I wish you'd stop looking at me like that. You're making me nervous."

Warrick had been watching them and grinned as he held his son Cat over a shoulder, gently patting his back. "She's got 'em," he murmured. "The fix is in."

Grissom glanced down the table and asked, "How do you know?"

"Don't forget I've seen her running cons before and know how she operates. She got him on the run. See how red he's got and how fast he's talking? Give Lola just five more minutes and he'll capitulate to anything she wants. She'll have Nick's head be so turned around, he'll start believing every notion that she puts inside it was his own idea when it'll be all hers. Then she'll start her flattering routine and puff him up with what a great idea he came up with."

"You sound like a man who knows this from experience," Gil said, revealing the mild jealousy he still had for anyone who might have ever had or might still have any sort of sexual or romantic connection to or interest in Warrick, particularly Lolita Avondale.

"Oh, I do. She's goddamned good at what she does. Once I caught her cheating. I actually caught her in the act. We'd never had what you call a clear cut exclusive relationship, so her fuckin' somebody else didn't much bother me. What bothered me was the kid I caught in bed with was just nineteen; a son of a friend who was sick and who'd been evicted from her house when she couldn't work. Her son was staying with me until she got out the hospital and could find someplace for them to live. Lola had no business touching him. He was just a kid and she's the kinda woman who can mess up a man's mind. Jason thought he was in love with her and, only for that reason, to keep her from messing his head more than she already had, she should've kept her hands to herself. But Lola started talking and pretty soon had me so confused that I ended up feeling like I was guilty of something. I started apologizing for not being there when she wanted me to be, was begging her not to leave me when I was already getting ready to tell her we weren't working. I forgot about that after she went into her con. Lola would've had me looped around her little finger again, but she messed up. I saw her beginning to smile like the cat that had just swallowed the canary. That's when I think I first started realizing there wasn't a chance in hell of us having been meant to be together forever, like we'd been believing we would be. I started drifting away, not physically but emotionally, and soon was trying to convince her we weren't gonna work out. It wasn't until I met you that I made the physical disconnection. So get that little green gleam outa your eye, Gil. You're the one I wanted then and you're the one I love now. You ain't got nuthin' to worry about, as far as Lola goes."

Gil smiled. "I think you know me too well. I thought I had that green gleam well hidden. But I thank you for the reassurance. I'm afraid it won't be an easy matter for me to rid myself of the green gleam. I do have justification for it. It is very apparent Lolita still has a touch of a... thing for you. She's much too beautiful and sexy for me not to feel a tad insecure, with her being around us as much as she has been."

"You don't seem to be bothered by Tina. I was married to her, ya know. And she's beautiful, too."

"But she also has a beautiful personality and doesn't have the same interest in you that Lolita has. Lolita's nothing like Tina. With her, I can see it's just friendship and being June's parents that you and she have between you. But with Lolita, if she thought she had any hope of taking you from me, she'd do it in a heartbeat."

"But you're not really worried about that, are you? You know there's no chance in hell of that ever happening, right? You know how much I love you and can't even imagine life without you, don't you?"

"Yes. I'm aware of all that. That's why I'm thinking we should, perhaps, do something to keep her from getting her claws into Nick. If I was really worried about her taking you from me, letting her turn to another man would be desirable. But in this case, that man happens to be Nick. I'm not sure he's worldly enough to withstand being steamrolled by her."

"Nah, I wouldn't worry. I've been around Nick long enough to know he'll be okay. Besides, Lola's got that look on her. I've seen it before. She's only out for a one night stand that might last a few weeks max cause she'll have his nose opened up. They'll go out a few times, screw around a little and that'll be it."

"But he might fall in love with her. A woman like Lolita makes that easy for a man and Nick's prone to falling for the wrong women."

"Man, now you're starting to sound like Sara. It's not any of our business, Gil. They're both adults. He'll be fine."

Catherine, coming over to them, heard the Warrick's tail end comment and asked, "What're you two talking about?"

"Lola and Nick. Gil's worried she's gonna hurt him."

"On no she won't. He won't let her. Nick's stronger than we give him credit for being. He's not a little boy, has never been really weak and he's getting stronger each and every day. We've got to let him take care of himself. Even if she does hurt him, Nick will survive that. We just have to be around to help him pick up the pieces, if it comes down to that, and I don't think it will. From what it seems like to me, our little Lola is just hot to trot at the moment. After she gets that outa her system, I betcha she won't give Nick the time of day. He's too easy going and traditional for her to want to be with him long term. Being as sweet as he is, I also betcha what he does in bed won't do it for her. It'll just be what he's familiar with. Betcha it'd be the missionary position all the way."

"You'd be wrong about that," Warrick said with an insider's chuckle, mildly distracted as he shifted the positioning of his son from his shoulder to his arms. "When it comes to sex, Nick's not as traditional as you might think. The boy likes to get a little freaky every once in awhile." Upon noticing dead silence coming from Gil and Catherine, he looked up at them, sensing he might have given away too much information, and said as innocently as possible, "What? What're yall looking at me like that for? I haven't done anything wrong."

"Why are you getting so defensive?" Catherine asked sweetly but with sharpness in her eyes. "And how do you know whether Nick gets freaky or not?"

"Yes, how would you? You didn't, by chance, do more with Nick than simply share space during those occasions when you and I were having difficulties or he was going through bad times and you were living with him, did you?" Gil asked. "You didn't share a bed too, did you?"

For the longest time, Warrick just gazed back at them, measuring their suspicions, wondering if he could tell the truth and weather their reactions. Then he decided he didn't want to deal with any of this. "Look," he said, "We're guys. We talked. Now, excuse me. I think the baby's diaper needs to be changed."

Catherine and Grissom watched him shoulder one of the baby bags and head for the restaurant's restroom, that easy rolling stride just as long, that body just as lean as before Warrick had become monogamous, the father of twins and been told he was father of another son. Then Catherine said, "Well. Does that or does that not prove guilt? Or do we need further evidence to come to an ultimate conclusion?"

"It's immaterial whether he did it or not. It was before he and I made a firm commitment to each other and it was my reluctance to commit which kept that so long in coming. I hold myself responsible for the length of time he waited for us to become one and can't blame him for anything he did before that time."

"Then you'd better tell him that. He's got to awfully anxious about what you're thinking about now."

"I will," Gil promised. "But it amuses me to keep him a bit off balance."

"Huh. I don't know if I'd do that if I was you.." Catherine inhaled deeply as she watched Warrick disappear into the restroom and said, thoughtfully and distantly, as if she was recalling a very pleasurable past event, "He's a helluva man, Gil. I wouldn't play head games with him. There are too many people out here who would be more than willing to take him off your hands. Warrick looks as good naked as he does in his clothes." Then Catherine's eyes got wider and round and she clapped a hand over her mouth as she realized what she'd just said.

Spinning on her heel, she tried to walk away, hoping Grissom hadn't noticed her slip of the tongue. But he had and caught her arm before she could get away, saying to her, "What did you say?"

Whirling back to face him, she told him, spreading out her hands, palm up. "It was nothing, Gil. I didn't say anything."

"When have you seen him naked?"

"Gil, let it go."

"No. And don't lie to me. Even if I can't tell if what you say is a lie, you know, if you do lie, it will nudge at your conscience until you'll have to come tell me the truth. So just tell me now and get it over with."

Putting an imperious finger in his face, she told him. "It's nothing you need to know about. What we had going on was long before you and he even started dancing circles around each other while you made up your mind if you were going to get together or not. It's no more relevant than what you and I had before Warrick came on the scene and you got him hired on as a CSI so you could keep him near you. So be fair. Don't ask questions about me and him until and unless you're ready for him to ask questions about you and me. Are you ready for that?"

He dropped her arm. "No," he said.

"Well then, there ya go."

When Warrick came back with his freshly diapered son, just as he was about to sit down, Sara reached up for the baby from where she sat and he gave Cat to her.

Noting that Nick and Lolita's seats were empty, he asked, "Where'd they take off to?"

Tina murmured. "Lolita said she needed to do some shopping and asked Nick to take her. She said for you to take June home with you and she'd pick him up later on today." She exchanged a knowing look with her ex-husband but neither expressed what they were thinking, although both knew it was the same thing. Tina only said, "I suppose she had gifts to buy for June and doesn't want him with her while she buys them."

"Yeah," Warrick drawled, shaking his head, "That must be it." He glanced over the table at Gil as he felt the end of a foot trying to ease its way up his pant's leg. He gazed at his lover, this widely renowned and respected forensic scientist who was playing undercover footsies with him after just recently reproving him when he had done that same thing. Warrick grinned slowly, his green eyes beginning to smolder. "Guess you're not mad, huh?"

"No, baby," Gil said softly. "I'm not mad. Whatever was between you and Catherine or you and Nick, it's all ancient history. We're going to leave the past where it lays and look to our future. I've no great need to hear about your romantic past just as you don't need to hear about mine."

The wording caused Warrick to lift an eyebrow. "I don't?"

"No. You don't."

The conversation had to end at that uneasy point when Juny ran over, hit his father on the arm and demanded, "Dad, you've gotta come spot me while I'm playing a video game with Lindsey. She keeps killing me and I need your help." As Warrick stood up, Juny peered up at him then impulsively and lovingly reached about him to give him a tight hug as he said, head buried against Warrick's stomach, "You know what? I love getting to call you Dad."

Warrick took his eyes off Gil to look gravely down at his son. Then he tousled his head, said in a voice gone mildly hoarse. "Sweetheart, I love you hear you calling me that, too." After that, he went to help his son beat Lindsey at the game they were playing.

Sitting next to Gil while idly picking at her food, Catherine was eying Warrick as she said, "He's really getting into this fatherhood thing, isn't he?"

"Shouldn't he be?"

"Oh, sure, I guess so. But... suppose Juny's not his son? Suppose Lolita just told him that so she could get back into his life, knowing he never would've let her any other way?"

"Catherine, have you looked at that child's eyes and face or noticed how he's built? Or listened to how he walks and talks? Other than having a lighter complexion and more of a reddish tinge to his brown hair, he's exactly like Warrick."

Catherine shrugged. "I know. I've looked. He does look like Warrick and sort of acts like you'd think Warrick did as a child. I'm just a little uneasy at how Lolita's wormed her way back into his life. The woman has the heart of a con artist. That's how she's made her living for years. When they were together, she was teaching Warrick how to con. I'm just wondering if she's really changed her ways. Surely her son wanting to know about his father wouldn't be enough to get her to do that, would it?"

"Don't be so judgmental, Catherine. Change is possible for everyone."

"Well, we're going through too many changes too fast. She's only been back in Vegas two months, but she's already a thorn in Sara's side and has just crooked her finger at Nick to start him following wherever she leads.Plus, she's got all of us on edge as to what her true intentions are toward Warrick."

"I'm not on edge about that. I explicitly and implicitly trust Warrick and he says he has no interest in her anymore."

"Of course he does. He wouldn't say anything else, especially not to you. But I can't believe you aren't concerned about him being around the only woman who was able to tie him down longer than anybody else. They were together for three years. Even you can't say he's been with you that long."

"Not yet, I can't. But give us a few more months and I will be."

Catherine sighed and shook her head. "Gilbert Grissom, you are the most stubborn man. You haven't heard a word I'm trying to say, have you? It's like I'm talking to a brick wall when I try to communicate with you sometimes. I just want to..." Catherine broke off as she straightened up to stare over Gil's shoulder. Then said, her voice taking on an entirely different sound, "Gil, I think the handsomest man I've ever seen just walked into the place. I do believe he must be looking for me and I don't want to keep him waiting. I'll be right back."

But before she could rise, the long haired, redheaded, intensely blue eyed man whose rangy good looks had attracted Catherine's eye turned to come toward them. Pausing next to the table where Tina and Sara were sitting with the babies, he said, nodding his head in greeting to the women, "I'm really sorry to bother you while you're at breakfast, but one of the waitresses told me Lolita Avondale would be over here and it's very important that I find her. I'm Loki Avondale, her brother."

After giving him an up and down glance, Sara said, "She left a few minutes ago to do a little Christmas shopping."

"Oh. Then is Warrick Brown here?"

Catherine put in, "Warrick's here. He's over there playing a game with his son."

"No I'm not. I'm right here." Warrick, standing behind Catherine's seat, was holding out his hand to the man. Laughing at each other, evidently very glad to see each other, they engaged in one of the complicated handshakes common to urban men of color as Warrick said, "What's up, Loki. You back in town to see Lola?"

"Yeah, I am. And what I've got to tell you and her is real important." But before he said what that was, Loki grinned at Juny, picked the boy up under his arms then laid a kiss on his forehead, saying to him, "How you been doin', little man? I've missed you."

Laughing, Juny hugged him and said, "I missed you too, Uncle Loki. Mama's gonna be really happy to see you."

"I'm gonna be really happy to see her too." After setting Juny back on his feet, "From the impatient look on that young lady's face over, she must be waiting to finish up a game with you. Why don't you go do that while I talk grown up stuff with Warrick for a minute?"

"You're not going anywhere, are you? You'll still be here when I'm done, won't you?"

"Yeah, little man, I'll still be here. Now get." Once Juny had run off, Loki turned to Warrick and said, "Man, we've got problems. Is there someplace where we can go talk about this?"

"Yeah. Right here. There's nothing you can say that they can't hear."

"All right then, whatever you say. Remember Jason Thatcher, Paul Richardson and Diane Thatcher's son?"

"Sure I do. When he was a kid, he stayed with me years ago while Diane was in the hospital and Paul was in prison."

"Well, blood tells, man. He's not a good dude to know anymore. Jason's a bigger drug dealer up in New York than Paul ever was here in Las Vegas or after he hit New York. And Jason never got Lola out his system. After you and her split up, she went to stay awhile in New York with Paul and Diane. She and Jason picked up where they left off and have been together, on and off, for years. She lived with him for almost a year this last time before she came back out here. He wants her back and I don't mean that in a good way. He's madder than hell at her, for some reason. He's put something of a hit out on my sister, Rick. Word is, he's ordered her to be brought back to him alive. Word is, he wants to take her out himself and put out a kill order on anybody who did anything to her before he's got her back in New York. All he wants is somebody to bring her to him."

Warrick closed his eyes and heaved a sigh. "Awww, shit. What's Lola done this time?"

"I really don't know. None of Thatcher's people are talking. But you need to know about this more'n you do that. I know my sister. I know she came out here and told you that Juny's your son. And he may be. I really think he is. He looks too much like you not to be. But Thatcher thinks different. She told him that Juny was his son and he wants him back. He really loves the boy and the fact that Lola ran off with him might be why he's after her. Like I said, I don't know for sure. What I do know for sure is Thatcher's said to be willing and able to pay out the ass to get them both back to New York, Lola to kill and Junebug to keep. I've got to help her, Rick. Don't know what I can do, but I've gotta do whatever it takes to make my sister and my nephew safe from him."

Tina stood up and came to stand next to Warrick. "And we will do that with you. They have become one in our family now. They belong to us. We must assist you in making her safe, mustn't we, Warrick?" She turned to look gravely up into Warrick's face. "We have to help her. Just like you helped me with the problems I had when we first met."

Warrick sighed for a second time, looking his tall ex-wife in the eye. "Yeah, I guess that's what we'll have to do."