DISCLAIMER: CSI and Cold Case are the property of Jerry Bruckheimer and CBS.
ARCHIVING: Only with the permission of the author.
SPOILERS: CSI 7.24

Blame it on the Coat
By mirage

Lilly opened her eyes lazily, a content smile gracing her lips. She was spent, really spent, like never before in her life. A sigh escaped her lips and she opened her eyes further, her gaze falling onto the object she owed all this to.

She felt the bed dip next to her as her lover moved closer. "I like your coat." Her lover purred, her breath hot against Lilly's ear.

Lilly's smile grew wider and she turned around to face Sara. "So you liked your birthday present?"

"Best birthday present ever." The brunette leaned in for a kiss just to prove how perfect the present had been.

Lilly hadn't been sure if her idea for a birthday present was really appreciated even though what followed after the 'presentation' was definitely on the 'liked' side of things. It had been frustrating to find a 'perfect present' for the first birthday they spent together. Whenever she asked the brunette what she wanted she only got the answer 'just one day with you away from crime'. Slightly pissed and with only one day to go she had decided to get her exactly what she had asked for.

"I didn't know you could be that…." Sara's voice trailed off as she made better use of her mouth by kissing Lilly's collarbone, causing the blonde to blush through her action and the memory of last night.

"I surprised myself as much as you." She confessed. She never had been the adventurous kind. She liked to be pulled along, but till now she never had been the initiator. Maybe that was part of being in a lesbian relationship, sometimes you had to start the action yourself. For her first try she had been quite successful.

"Oh, it definitely was a surprise. A very, very repeat worthy one," Sara said between kisses that trailed down Lilly's body.

Lilly laughed when Sara found a ticklish spot. "You'll have to wait for your next birthday, I'm not that kinky."

Sara looked up and pouted. "Then I will be a very frustrated woman, because from now on, whenever you wear that coat I will think about last night. There definitely is a fire under the ice and I have the wounds to prove it." She craned her neck, giving Lilly a perfect view of her pale skin now interrupted by angry red marks.

Lilly's fingers reached out to touch the hickeys. She had only been seventeen when she had given someone hickeys for the last time. "Then maybe I should never wear it again."

Sara's fingers clasped over hers, bringing their enclosed hands down to her chest. "Don't, it suits you perfectly," she answered, suddenly turning serious. "You wore it the first time I saw you."

Lilly furrowed her brows, thinking back to their first meeting. She shook her head. "You're wrong, I didn't wear it when we first met. We met in the garage, you were taking apart that green Chevrolet for the Gregory case." She never would forget that lean woman in her overall, the upper part wrapped around her waist, the tank top she wore leaving little to the imagination. Vera next to her had been spotting a fat grin as she called out Sara's name and the brunette turned around to greet them.

"I said the first time I saw you, not the first time you noticed me." Lilly had never known that there was a difference between these two, wondering how it was possible that she hadn't noticed Sara the first time she laid eyes on her.

"It was two months earlier, my third week in Philadelphia, I was still pondering if I made the right decision to leave Las Vegas and come here." Lilly's grip on the brunette's hand tightened. It had taken Sara months to open up enough to tell her about her last six months in Las Vegas. Her abduction, the hours spent trapped under a car, the merciless sun burning down on her. Her relationship with Gil Grissom hadn't been able to survive this. Lilly was angry at the weak man and at the same time grateful that he hadn't been able to be strong enough for her.

"I was on my way to the department when I saw you." Sara continued. "You were standing outside at the front door, talking to a young woman. She cried and you placed your hand on her shoulder, causing her to look at you. Whatever you said to her caused her to hug you and hold onto you. The next time I got a look at her face she seemed different, calm and peaceful."

Lilly remembered that day. "Abby Collins. She thought her mother had left her when she was 13 because she was tired of raising a daughter all by herself. She was a single-mother. We had found her remains two weeks earlier, buried close to her own home. That day I was finally able to tell Abby that her mother would have never left her of her free will." Their eyes met. There was no need to explain what it meant to her to be able to do that for others, to give them back their peace. With Sara there would never be a complaint about the pictures of her latest case adorning her nightstand and Sara never needed to explain the police scanner on her desk.

"You watched her as she left with her boyfriend. The wind blew open your coat, revealing its inlay. It was the first color I'd seen in a long time." Resting her head at Lilly's shoulder, the brunette avoided her lover's gaze and glanced at the object instead. "I like the colorful pink on you." Sara stopped, leaving much unsaid, but Lilly understood nevertheless.

It was this moment that the blonde realized that she might fall in love with the woman in her arms and to blame was her coat and its colorful pink inlay.

The End

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