Title: Marcus Meets the Lab
Author: vampfire
Author's e-mail: semperfi_neversaydie@yahoo.com
Disclaimer: Don't own CSI or its characters. Not making money off this.
Pairing: Warrick/Grissom
Archive: Yes to Taking Chances. Elsewhere, let me know first.
Rating: PG
Spoilers: None
Summary: Gratuitous sequel to "Marcus" because the kid just wouldn't leave me alone.
Feedback: Please

***

A familiar voice brought Grissom's head up from the file he was reading as he walked down the hallway.

"He is? Well then I'd better not try his cell. That's why I wanted to ask you first. Is there somewhere I could wait for him to get back?"

Before the receptionist could answer, Grissom had gotten close enough to pipe in, with no small amount of concern, "Geraldine? Is there something wrong?"

"No, well, yes," she began, flustered to have run into him. "But I didn't want to bother you. I'll just-"

"Gil!"

A relieved smile swept Grissom's face as he met the excited rush of Marc towards his legs and used the boy's momentum to scoop him up into his arms. "Marc, are you okay?"

"I'm sick. I've been puking everywhere!"

Grissom frowned and held the boy securely against his side with one arm while he used the other hand to test his forehead. "Well, I don't think you have a fever. What's the last thing you've had to eat?"

"I didn't have anything after your spaghetti. And it was good so why would it make me sick?"

In his peripheral vision, Grissom realized that not only was Geraldine looking uncomfortable but Catherine had stopped nearby, curious, and from the look on her face she hadn't missed the boy's last words.

Geraldine stepped closer now. "I didn't feed him a thing. But ever since Warrick dropped him off, he's complained of not feeling well and he did vomit once, as he told you." She paused and went on, "I didn't mean to bother you or Warrick, Mr. Grissom. I know how to care for a sick child. But he was begging to see you both, and I thought if he could just see Warrick for a minute I could get him to calm down enough to sleep."

Grissom sighed and shifted the boy higher on his hip. Geraldine's discomfort with his relationship with Warrick was not something Grissom wanted to get into in the middle of the hallway. But he failed to understand why the woman couldn't realize that he'd been as much a part of Marc's life as Warrick had in the past few months. He endeavored to be polite to her, despite her prejudice.

"Well, Warrick's out in the field, but I'll take care of Marc. I appreciate you bringing him in."

She nodded, looking like she wanted to protest but knew she shouldn't. "Bye, Marcus. You try to get to sleep so you'll feel all better, okay?"

"Bye Geraldine!" He told her, looking perfectly happy to be left with Gil and not the least bit sleepy.

When she'd gone, Grissom found Catherine walking to them, a devious glint in her eyes at the sight of Grissom with a child. But her expression quickly went to concern for the cute tyke in Gil's arms.

Grissom returned his attention to Marc. "Kiddo, are you sure you didn't eat anything else?"

Marc nodded against his chest, where he was resting his head.

"Did you have the spaghetti too?" Catherine asked Grissom, showing that she had indeed caught Marc's comment.

Gris pursed his lips before admitting, "Yes. And so did Warrick, and he didn't say anything about feeling bad either."

"I'm all better now," Marc informed them. "I missed you. Can I see Warrick too?"

"He's not here right now. He's working somewhere else in the city."

"Oh. Well, can I see your spider?"

Oh, Catherine must be loving this. Grissom licked his top lip as he glanced up from Marc to look at her, fairly watching the pieces fall into place in her mind.

"Sure, Marc. Say goodbye to Cath; I'm sure she's got work to do."

"No, actually I'm stuck until Greg gets to my samples," Catherine told him with a certain amount of glee. She turned to Marc and said, "Can I come see the spider too?"

Marc grinned at her and Grissom knew he was sunk. So much for their secrets. No one knew they were dating, and as far as Grissom knew, Warrick had only mentioned to Nick that he was "watching" a young relative whose parent had recently passed away. With all the changes in their lives recently, he and Warrick had both agreed to keep the fact that they were living together and raising a child together a secret for as long as possible.

Grissom definitely hadn't thought it would get out this soon. Unable to shake Catherine, he led them back towards his office, pausing outside DNA for a second to call to Greg, "Sanders, any samples Catherine gave you go to the top of your pile."

Greg was too busy staring at the sight of his boss carrying a kid to ask why Catherine was being given priority, but agreed, and Grissom moved on. Catherine was chuckling at his attempt to get rid of her as soon as possible.

"Come on, Gil. This is too good an opportunity to pass up." She cast him a sideways glance and tried to fish, "You two sure seem to know each other pretty well..."

Grissom just shot her a look and she knew it wasn't going to be that easy to get an explanation out of him.

In his office, he let Marc get down from his arms and brought the spider cage down to rest on his desk.

"Wow," was all Marc said, reaching up timidly to touch the glass. Though the arachnid gave no response, Marc jerked his hand away quickly. Catherine chose to sit behind Gil's desk, looking for all the world like she had nothing better to do than observe her boss interacting with a child.

Grissom watched Marc in amusement. "Do you want me to take him out?"

Marc looked doubtful. "Next time," he decided, turning to hop up on the chair nearest him. As he sat, something weighing down his pocket caught Grissom's attention.

"Marc, what's in your pocket?"

The boy looked down and remembered. "Oh, that's the cards... Wanna play?"

"You took cards with you to Geraldine's? What is it, 'Go Fish'?" Grissom crouched down in front of the chair to be on eye-level with Marc.

"It's a new game. From Warrick." He pulled out a big pack of UNO cards. "We only played two times. He bet me that if he won I had to pick up all the toys you always trip over."

Marc was grinning at him and Grissom smiled back, telling him, "Let me give you some advice, kiddo. You shouldn't bet on cards with Warrick."

"Why's that?"

Grissom grinned. "Ask me again when you're older."

Marc laughed. "That's what Warrick told me to do when I asked him why you and he live together like my mom and dad used too, even though you're both boys."

Grissom felt his face burn and was glad his back was to Catherine and her undoubtedly stunned expression. The silence stretched as Marc took the cards out of their box and started turning them over into a new pile in his lap, looking at each one as he went.

Catherine's beeper went off and it took her a few moments to reach to shut it off. "Well, that was Greg," she told his back, superficially cheerful as she headed out of his office. "You have fun playing cards, Marc."

"Okay," he answered, contentedly, without looking up from his task.

When she was gone Grissom stayed frozen in place, telling himself that his professional world had not just ended, before letting out a deep breath and reaching out to the boy's bent head to run his hand over the short dark curls. "You are worth it, Marc," he murmured to the oblivious child. He stood and moved the spider's tank back to its spot on the shelf.

Nick came in not long after that. "Whoa," he said, "Hey there."

Marcus was too engrossed in the cards to greet him. Grissom was leaning against the front of his desk, watching the boy. "Yes, Nick?" he said, to return the man's attention to whatever had brought him here.

Nick delivered his and Sara's initial findings on the male DB, then returned his gaze to the boy with the cards. "Hey, is this the kid Warrick's been watching?" Nick asked after studying Marc for a moment.

"Warrick?" Marc asked, looking up at the sound of Warrick's name.

"He's not here right now, buddy," Nick told him, crossing over to the chair he was in. "I'm Nick. What's your name?"

"Marc," he told him, never shy. "Are you a CSI too? Do you know Warrick and Gil?"

Nick was smiling and glanced back at Grissom, who was watching the two of them together like he was waiting for a bomb to go off. "Yeah, I do."

"Do you have a gun?"

This threw Nick. "Uh, yes, but you know guns are only for grown-ups."

"I know. Guns are dangerous. Warrick has one, but Gil never has one. But that's okay 'cause Warrick would keep Gil safe if he ever needed to use a gun."

Nick just gave a short laugh, unsure what to make of this. Obviously Warrick had already answered some gun-related questions. And, well, the boy was in Grissom's office; he'd probably asked him about guns too.

"Nick, I thought you were going to wait for me before you talked to Grissom," Sara said lightly. Nick turned his head to see her in the doorway, attention focused on the kid.

"Sara, this is Marc," Grissom told her, in the attempt to appease her curiosity without actually telling her what a child was doing in Gil Grissom's office, legs swinging happily and an increasingly large pile of cards spread in a two foot radius around him. "He's not feeling well, so it might be best if you and Nick got back to the case."

"Aww, he's not feeling well? Hey, I've got some apple juice in my locker. Does he like that?"

Grissom almost told her 'no,' even though he knew that wasn't true, just to get his people out of his office and out of his personal life, but Marc had heard her.

"Apple juice is my favorite," he said, beaming a smile at Sara.

Marc started to jump up, remembered the cards, and carefully set about ninety percent of the ones in his lap onto the chair beside him before slipping out of the chair and going straight to Grissom.

"Gil..." he said, arms up expectantly. Grissom slipped his hands under the kid's arms and lifted him, settling him against his side. It wasn't until he met Sara and Nick's stunned expressions that he realized how natural and practiced that motion had been. Gees, did they expect him to be awkward around a child? Was his reputation that bad?

It struck him then, in a brief philosophical moment on his trip to the locker room to get the juice, that he was as comfortable with the five-year-old as he was with Warrick in his life. The thought made him smile and suddenly he longed to see Warrick.

Nick had left to start processing the evidence, leaving Grissom and Marc alone in the locker room with Sara.

"Thank you," Marc told her, accepting the juice after she twisted off the cap for him.

"I appreciate it Sara," Grissom added.

Sara's lips quirked at the picture of the two of them. "You're good with him."

She closed the locker and watched as Grissom cautioned Marc against losing his grip on the full bottle. "This is Warrick's relative, right?"

Grissom met her eyes, wondering where this was going.

"Warrick told me, just a few days ago while we worked that strangulation case together. I had said that I didn't think I'd ever seen him so happy. And he told me he was taking care of a cousin, that it was one of the best things that had ever happened to him."

Grissom felt his arms tighten almost involuntarily around Marc. He just nodded, unable to phrase an appropriate response to that from his perspective as Warrick's boss and not as his lover.

"Would you say the same?" Sara asked purposefully.

Grissom studied her a minute, wondering how she'd rationalized his obviously close relationship with Marc. He was about to say something vague, as a friend who'd met Marc and maybe seen him a time or two and not as a man who'd been one of his primary caretakers for the past few months.

"You don't have to answer, Gris," Sara told him, serious. "I finally get it."

She left them with a wistful smile. Grissom took a deep breath and shifted his attention back to Marc. "Are you tired yet?"

"Nope," he replied.

"How about playing cards?"

"Okay. What are we going to bet?"

"I'm going to have to talk to Warrick about children's card games," Grissom told him, holding the bottle of juice as Marc ran ahead of him back to his office.

They spent some time with the UNO cards, and Grissom finally began to see the signs that the late hour was catching up with Marc. "Why don't you take a nap while I go see how my people are doing?"

"Can I come with you, please?"

"Are you still feeling sick?"

"Nope, not when I'm with you. Let's go, Gil."

Grissom sighed at his inability to resist him and led Marc out of the office. They hadn't made it down the hall before Marc decided he was tired and asked to be carried.

Greg answered all of Grissom's questions without stopping his efforts to make faces at Marc, who just ate it up. Finally Greg ignored Grissom completely and addressed Marc. "Hey buddy, it looks like you found a friend."

Marc smiled at him but didn't understand. "What friend?"

Greg grinned at the kid. "The one you're getting a free ride around the lab on."

"Oh, this is Gil," Marc told him, matter-of-fact.

Greg found this hilarious, but quieted at a glare from his boss as Grissom left to go find Nick and Sara.

Sara was entirely professional, giving him an update and getting his input on their case. Nick gave Marc a wave and joined the conversation. Marc seemed to be drifting off as Grissom carried him across the hall to talk to Catherine, wondering how this was going to go.

He entered the lab she was working in, intent on asking her a specific question about her case. Catherine looked up from her work and immediately lifted a hand to motion him to silence.

"Gil," she said, putting down the evidence she was working on. "I know that I may have... made certain comments about your emotional handicaps in the past. But I have never thought you wouldn't be a good parent. You know all of my emergency plans for Lindsey involve you."

He wanted to say something, but she pressed on quickly. "So, aside from being a little miffed that you didn't tell me about Marc before, I won't ask you about anything else you didn't tell me before, since you are clearly uncomfortable about it. Or else why would you bring Marc in here in the hope to avert my comments when he's clearly more than half asleep?"

Grissom frowned at her with his head slightly cocked, amazed at her continued attempts to analyze him. "I'm not trying to avoid your comments. He refused to be left alone."

"Oh." Catherine admitted defeat and changed gears, "Well, Greg matched the DNA we found on the victim to that of his ex-girlfriend..."

Marc fell asleep with his head cradled against Grissom's neck in the time it took Catherine to summarize her findings. As Grissom turned to leave, Catherine spoke up before he'd made it out the door.

"Gil, about Warrick... I'm jealous."

He turned around, surprised, to find her smiling at him teasingly. Unsure how to take that, Grissom gladly retreated to his office to settle Marc down to sleep.

Marc stirred as Grissom settled him into a chair.

"Where's Warrick?"

"Warrick should be back very soon. We'll all go home when he gets here, okay?"

"Okay. Gil, I had fun tonight." Marc wriggled into a comfortable position in the chair and Grissom took his jacket from where he'd thrown it over his desk chair and crouched down to tuck it around Marc.

"I had fun too, but most nights I have to be gone like Warrick is, doing work. There won't be anyone to watch you. Do you think you could be okay sleeping at Geraldine's?"

"I guess so."

"All right. Why don't you get to sleep while I wait for Warrick," Grissom told him, resting a comforting hand on Marc's shoulder.

The boy closed his eyes. "Night night, Gil. Love you."

"Love you too, kiddo," Grissom told him, tucking his jacket a little bit more around him. Grissom sat back on his heels a moment and finally stood up as he watched Marc fall asleep.

Warrick stepped in only a few moments after Marc's even breathing told Grissom he had drifted off. "Hey Gil," Warrick said, though he never called him that at work. "Nick told me Marc was here. Is he okay?"

"Geraldine brought him in because he was asking for us and complaining of his stomach hurting. But he's been fine ever since then. I think he might have just been missing you. He really latched onto you, more than anyone else in your family, including Geraldine, ever since his mother died."

Warrick walked further into the dark office. "Not any more than he's latched onto you."

Warrick reached out to run his hand down his lover's arm. "You've been wonderful to him. Don't think I don't appreciate that."

Gil's smile twisted into a smirk. "You may not thank me once you hear half the things Marc said in front of our coworkers today."

"That bad, huh?" Warrick closed the distance between them. "Then I guess there's no longer any reason I can't do this at work..."

Gil knew he should end the kiss. Ecklie's shift was starting, for goodness' sake. They couldn't afford anything to happen right now. But Warrick's lips on his had always had the effect of stopping his over-analysis of things, and this kiss was no different. Warrick moved on to his cheek, to the line of his jaw, and finally the soft spot where his neck and shoulder met, just inside his shirt collar. Grissom sucked in a breath and forced him gently away.

"I think we'd better get home now," he told him softly.

"Okay," Warrick said. "I'll get Marc and you can tell me which of our colleagues knows we're in a relationship."

Warrick scooped up Marc and turned towards the door before realizing Grissom hadn't moved an inch. "Don't tell me they all know!" he hissed, trying not to wake the boy in his arms.

"Well," Grissom admitted, following Warrick out the door and shutting it behind them. "By the time they get together and talk..."

"You're telling me one shift with Marc around did that much damage?"

"It could have been worse," Grissom told him honestly as they started down the hall. "He could have started talking about that one time he walked in on us while..."

"Thank God for small favors," Warrick agreed, infinitely glad at least that hadn't come up.

Warrick tossed a glance over his shoulder once he realized Grissom was no longer at his side. Grissom was stopped dead still in the middle of the hallway, looking shocked.

"You okay there, Gris?" Warrick asked, turning and shifting Marc in his arms. "You didn't catch this thing from Marc, did you? You're looking a little green."

Grissom met his gaze in panic and tried to speak calmly, "I think I just realized why Geraldine is so incredibly uncomfortable around me."

Warrick blanched. "You don't think he told her... Oh, man."

***