Yelina Salas

Character's background

The beautiful detective Yelina Salas first appears on CSI: Miami as a detective with the Miami-Dade Police Homicide Division. She has a close connection with Horatio Caine, the head of the Miami-Dade Crime Lab: she had married his late brother, Raymond Caine, with whom she has a son, Raymond Caine, Jr. (episode 117, "Simple Man"). Horatio loved her too much and he wants to protect her from the worst of her husband's misdeeds, and so conceals (among other things) the existence of Ray Sr.'s out-of-wedlock daughter (Madison Keaton--episode 208, "Big Brother"). He is forced to tell the truth, however, when Madison falls ill and requires a transplant from Ray Jr. Though she is initially hurt by the revelation, Yelina goes through with the operation, anyway (episode 316, "Nothing to Lose").

In the Season 2 premiere ("Blood Brothers"), after confronting him about his feelings, Horatio admits to Yelina how he had once thought they might be together had she not met his brother Raymond first. However, he will not act on his feelings as he still sees her as his brother's wife, which clearly disappoints her. She later becomes romantically involved with MDPD Internal Affairs Sergeant Rick Stetler, a personal nemesis of Horatio. When she shows up to work with a black eye in one episode, Horatio immediately suspects Stetler of physically abusing her. Then Horatio said him: " Touch her again and I will kill you" (episode 307, "Crime Wave").

Horatio loved Yelina even though he knew that her true love was his brother Raymond. And Horatio kept loving her even when she was dating Stetler. Horatio's love by her was platonic but very deep. When Yelina went to Rio with her husband and her son, Horatio was distress because he stayed hopeless to be with her (season 3 episode 24). Later, in season 4, he started a romantic relationship with Marisol Delko (Eric's sister), who looked like Yelina.

Rebecca Nevins, Marisol Delko, Rachel Turner (Horatio's women) invited him to dinner but Yelina never did. He always invited to her.

Departure

After a traumatic case in which Ray Jr. was kidnapped, Horatio tells Yelina that a vacation would do them all good. But, to her surprise, she is not going with Horatio, but with her husband (Ray Sr.), who had only recently been revealed to have been alive the entire time, having faked his death to go deep undercover for the DEA (episode 324, "10-7"). Horatio knew that Yelina truly loved her husband Raymond. Together, the family flies to Brazil without telling anyone where they were going. So secretive was their departure, in fact, that Salas's colleague Detective Frank Tripp does not even know if she's still alive and well ("Under Suspicion").

Return

Unfortunately, Ray Sr. soon gets back into trouble, this time involving the Mala Noche drug gang in Rio de Janeiro. Yelina grows increasingly worried about him, especially when he vanishes without a trace. Horatio and Eric Delko, who are in Rio in an unsanctioned pursuit of Mala Noche leader Antonio Riaz, discover to their horror that Riaz has beaten Ray Sr. to death and, furthermore, that Riaz is attempting to corrupt Ray Jr. into becoming a drug runner for him. Everything is successfully resolved, however, and Yelina and her son decide to try to start afresh in Miami (episode 501, "Rio").

Salas finds employment for herself as a private investigator, though Horatio is concerned about the dangers of her profession. Yelina calmly reminds him that she had, after all, been a cop and could take care of herself (episode 522, "Burned"). In fact, Horatio comes to her for help investigating a parolee who is a suspect in the murder of his parole officer. Yelina discovers the young man's birth certificate, which lists the father as John Walden. Horatio claims that he "knew him once," thus continuing his pattern throughout the series of over-protective deception towards her--"John Walden" was, in fact, Horatio's undercover alias sixteen years before in Pensacola. The young man turned out to be his long-lost son Kyle Harmon.