Title: I Need To Know
By: angstytimelord
Pairing: Greg Sanders/Ryan Wolfe
Fandom: CSI: Vegas/CSI: Miami
Rating: PG-13
Table: 7, 12_stories
Prompt: 4, Betrayal
Disclaimer: This is entirely a product of my own imagination, and I make no profit from it. I do not own the lovely Greg Sanders or Ryan Wolfe, unfortunately, just borrowing them for a while. Please do not sue.

***

Ryan smiled as he headed back to the office he shared with Greg; he'd been working in the trace lab for most of the night, processing the evidence they had brought in from the case they'd gotten at the beginning of their shift. It was past time for them to go home.

They were both tired, he was sure; Greg had been working in DNA, and that was a very exacting job. He just wanted to find his boyfriend, clock out, and get them both home so that they could fall into bed in each other's arms and sleep for a few hours.

He frowned when he reached the door of the office and peered inside; Greg wasn't there, which was odd. He should have been done with the DNA analysis by now. Oh well, Ryan thought, shrugging and turning to head in the direction of the DNA lab. He knew where to find his boyfriend.

It only took him a few seconds to get to the lab; he stood looking around for Greg, narrowing his eyes as his gaze swept the area around him. Ah, there he was. Standing in front of that new girl's desk, bending down to apparently ask her a question.

The girl rose as Greg bent down; she raised an arm to wrap it around his shoulders, pulling him down -- into a kiss that made Ryan's blood freeze in his veins. The moment that he watched that kiss seemed to last forever; it was frozen in time, never-ending.

Greg wasn't pulling away from the girl. Ryan couldn't see his face; his boyfriend's back was to him, so he couldn't tell if Greg was actually enjoying what was happening or not. But he could see that the other man wasn't trying to free himself.

It only took a moment for Greg to stand up straight and turn towards the window, but in that moment, Ryan felt that he had died a thousand deaths, all at one time. Greg had kissed that girl. No, she had kissed him. But he obviously hadn't tried to stop her.

Was this what Greg did in the lab when they were working in separate places and Ryan wasn't around to see his behavior? Was he trying to prove to the people they worked with that he was still as straight as they all thought he was? Or was this something more?

Could Greg be seeing that girl behind his back? There was no time for him to do so when they weren't working, because they were together all the time. Or he could just be stringing her along, telling her that he didn't have any time to date outside of work.

If that was so, then Greg didn't really mean to stay with him. He would keep making promises to women at work -- women who would be more than happy to be there for him when his current relationship broke up, as it seemed that Greg intended it to do.

When Greg turned around and their eyes met, Ryan could feel something within him twisting and breaking, something that he had thought was strong and enduring. The bond he'd felt with Greg had severed, dissipating into thin air as though it had never been.

He turned on his heel and strode back towards their office, not caring if Greg was following him or not. All he wanted to do was get out of there, get back to Greg's apartment and collect his things, and get out of Greg Sanders' life as quickly as he could.

It wouldn't be that easy, he knew. The bonds between them couldn't all be severed at once; he would still have to work with Greg before he could be transferred out of here and into another crime lab. That would take a while; it wasn't going to happen in one day.

He would still have to live next door to Greg, unless he managed to transfer out of this crime lab quickly. But that would be doable; they wouldn't have to see each other often if they didn't park their cars close together. They could avoid each other easily.

Maybe by the time he was out of here, his heart would have begun to heal. Maybe by the time Greg was a part of his past history, he wouldn't feel so betrayed, or so angry that he had let himself trust and fall in love, only to be let down.

He could hear Greg come into the office as he was bending over his desk, but he didn't look up. He didn't want to see Greg, didn't want this man in his car with him, didn't want to talk to him. He just wanted to get away, to nurse his shattered heart in solitude.

"Ryan, it's not how it looked. I didn't want her to kiss me," Greg murmured, closing the door behind him as he spoke. "I didn't know she was going to do that, I swear. And I've never had anything to do with her. I don't want her. She's after me, not vice versa."

"Yeah?" Ryan finally looked up, his dark eyes smoldering with anger. "Then why did you just stand there and let her do it? From what I could see, you were kissing her back. Didn't look like you were trying to get away from it at all. Looked like you were enjoying it."

"I wasn't!" Greg protested, moving towards Ryan with one hand outstretched. "I don't want her, Ryan, I swear I don't! I don't want anybody but you. But I couldn't tell her that I have a boyfriend. Too many people might put two and two together if they heard that."

"So I'm your dirty little secret, and you get to parade your heterosexuality around for everybody we work with," Ryan sneered, moving away from Greg's outstretched hand. "How nice. No thanks, Greg. I've had enough of being a secret. Find somebody else to hide from the world."

Greg's hand dropped to his side; Ryan could hear his soft gasp, the sound almost like a sob. He could see the look of pain that flashed across Greg's face before he looked down, raising both hands and burying his face in them, leaning against the door and sliding to the ground.

Ryan looked away, his heart twisting into knots. He wanted more than anything to go to Greg, to gather the sobbing young man into his arms, to tell him that he still loved him and that he hadn't meant what he had said. But the words stuck in his throat, refusing to be spoken.

He didn't know what he could say. He'd seen Greg kiss that girl, and even if he hadn't wanted it, the fact remained that he hadn't pushed her away or tried to make her stop. He'd simply stood there and let her kiss him, as though he wanted to advertise what was happening.

If it was that important to him for the people they worked with to believe he was straight, then Ryan wasn't going to play that game any more. They didn't have to make their relationship public, but he was tired of pretending to be something he wasn't.

Greg could pretend to be straight; he could keep his dirty little secrets swept under the rug. Ryan didn't want to do that any more. He wanted to let everyone he worked with know that he preferred men to women, even if it made them think less of him.

He had intended to do that without exposing his relationship with Greg -- but now, it didn't seem as though that would be a factor. There was no longer a relationship there; Greg had obviously decided that the truth about who he was would remain a secret, regardless of how Ryan felt.

Ryan didn't want to live like that any longer. He'd hidden his bisexuality from his colleagues in Miami, and had found it harder and harder over time to keep doing so. It was one of the reasons he'd left; he wanted to be in a place where he didn't have to hide.

He wasn't going to be with someone who went to such great lengths to hide the truth about themselves, especially when their way of hiding the truth was to do things like let a co-worker who they supposedly had no interest in be all over them. He wouldn't put up with that.

More than anything in the world, he wanted to pick Greg up from the floor, take the other man into his arms, and ask him what he'd been thinking. He wanted to repair the chasm that was widening between them with soft, gentle words; he wanted to fix what had been broken.

But he couldn't. All he could see in his mind's eye was that bitch kissing Greg -- and Greg simply letting her do it, as though it was perfectly natural. He couldn't be with someone who would do things like that, even if they hadn't been meant to go so far.

He crossed his arms over his chest, not looking down at the other man. The blinds on their office were down; Greg was leaning against the door, so he doubted that anyone would come in. Maybe this was the best place for them to have this out, as long as they didn't raise their voices.

"So what's your excuse?" Ryan asked, his voice cold and steady. He wasn't going to show any mercy, not when his heart felt as though it had shattered into a million tiny shards that were all trapped in his chest and slicing into the rest of him, cutting bits of his soul away little by little.

Greg looked up at him, tears streaming down his face, raising a hand to wipe ineffectually at them. "I didn't betray you, Ryan," he whispered, the words catching on a sob. "I didn't. Please believe me. I'm not going to make any excuses. I don't have to. It wasn't my fault."

Ryan simply stood there, listening, wanting with all of his heart to believe his boyfriend's words. "Then tell me what happened. I need to know," he managed to say before his throat closed and refused to let him speak further. All he could do now was wait, and hear what Greg had to say.

***

Next story in series - Rip in Heaven.