a/n: i received an anonymous request to address Gibbs not wearing underwear.
this is set sometime in the nineties. since the most recent episode says its 1: Diane, 2: Rebecca, and 3: Stephanie, I'm not arguing that here, I'm going with it.
"He didn't wear underwear when we were married."
-Rebecca, Season 12 Episode "Check".
He didn't mind having his bones jumped the moment he walked in the door – hell, it was a damn sight better than being snapped at for working so late, or nagged at for something he didn't even know he did wrong.
He was starting to think this marriage might hold – though it was a telling indictment of his life choices, that he cautiously thought so two months after he married her, when he really should have had that mindset before he married her – or anyone – at all.
He at least didn't feel the need to sequester himself in the basement as often as possible – though he grudgingly reminded himself that there must have been a time when he didn't want to run and hide from Diane, either.
He pushed those thoughts away, and rolled over in bed, his eyes still closed. He pressed his face to the back of his wife's neck, breathing in slowly and running his hand over her hip, pushing the wrinkled sheets down her thighs.
She smelled like crisp apple shampoo, Acqua di Gio, and sweet, maybe-stale rum – in the back of his mind, he warily realized she was, if not drunk, not entirely sober; he'd noticed, once they moved in together, once they'd gotten married, that Rebecca drank – more than he'd noticed before.
She moved her head a little, tilting her neck up. She shifted onto her back and raised her arm up, crooking her finger and running it over his arm, tracing the contours of his muscles.
"I hope you're sufficiently distracted from the fact that I didn't cook dinner," she said in a husky voice.
He grinned against her neck, shaking his head a little.
"Have you ever been with a woman who doesn't cook for you, Jay?"
He smirked, and lifted his head.
"I can cook," he said smartly.
She moved her hand and flicked it under his chin, as if praising an eager child.
"Mmm, good thing," she murmured.
He bent to kiss her throat, his lips finding sensitive places around her collarbone, his hand sliding over her thighs again – light, suggestive; he was used to being pushed away or directed – Diane had been demanding in bed – but Rebecca didn't seem to care what he did with her. In the back of his mind, he thought that might be troubling – the drinking, the reckless disregard – but those thoughts, too, he pushed away.
She turned her head, watching his head move – his lips touching her shoulder, the crook of her elbow, her stomach, her ribs, her breasts, right up to her jaw, when he caught her staring at him with a mild sort of content curiosity, and he grunted, arching his eyebrow.
"Penny for your thoughts," he drawled.
She parted her lips, smiling.
"Since when do you care?" she asked lightly.
He tilted his head at her, silent.
She shifted, drew one of her legs up, and turned towards him, clasping his face in her hands. She ran her fingers over his lips, then down over his neck, splaying them out over the throbbing pulse in his throat, and then she turned her nose up a little, and a small crease appeared in her brow.
"Why don't you wear underwear?" she asked under her breath, her eyes catching his wryly.
He looked at her as if she'd genuinely caught him off guard – and she had. She had a tendency to do that, though – but her question reinforced his suspicions that she'd been drinking.
He didn't answer, and she leaned forward and nudged him with her nose insistently.
"It's been bothering me," she whispered coyly.
"That I don't wear it?" he grunted, skeptical.
She shook her head, licked her lips.
"The why."
He shrugged, still taken aback.
"Why don't some women?" he retorted.
Rebecca rolled her eyes a little, as if it were obvious.
"Tactic, for seduction," she murmured – sure, there were probably women who just scrapped the lingerie for the hell of it, but for the most part, Rebecca thought, if a woman wasn't wearing underwear, it was for a hot date.
Gibbs smirked at her.
"Same reason."
She laughed under her breath, a soft, skeptical laugh that was unique to her, that he loved hearing.
"You already got me," she murmured. "You go without it at work – don't you need to keep things in place, chasing after suspects?"
Gibbs ran his hand over her thigh – up and down, back and forth – again, and then shrugged.
"It's hot out," he said carelessly. "Keep forgettin' to do laundry," he added, tacking on another reason.
"I don't do laundry any more than I cook," Rebecca reminded him –as if he needed reminding that she was useless at all things domestic, as if he cared at all; he didn't marry women based on how well they could conform to a June Cleaver aesthetic.
He smirked at her again.
"You want me to start wearin' it?" he asked.
Rebecca lifted a hand off of his neck, and pillowed her head on it, her sandy-red hair tangling up in her fingers, and rippling over her shoulders. She shrugged, nonchalant.
"I don't care what you do," she mumbled flippantly.
That was the thing about Rebecca that sometimes made him wary – she genuinely seemed unconcerned with what he chose to do, as long as it wasn't bothering her; he was unused to that. Rebecca was fascinating – Rebecca, he thought, didn't care what he did, because she didn't want him to start noticing she was a drinker, or that she always seemed to be taking something – 'allergy' pills; 'vitamins', something.
He raked over her with his eyes, breathed in her apple-rum, Giorgio Armani scent again, and wondered if that was a recipe for disaster, two people in a marriage who wanted to be left alone about their demons, trying to make it work.
"I like it," she whispered suddenly, her lips moving against his.
She nipped his jaw, then his ear, her voice low and throaty.
She sat up, moved on top of him, and ran her fingers through his hair.
"I like looking at you," she murmured, her lips still near his ear, "knowing one flick of a zipper in a broom closet is all that's between me and your cock."
He didn't respond, he just let her talk to him; Rebecca was a talker – a dirty one; it was something he didn't participate in, but he never once felt the need to shut her up. Her lips pressed against his, and she pressed her self against his chest, her body warm, skin tingling.
"You always taste like whiskey," she whispered, her eyes heavy.
She kissed him again.
If he always tasted like alcohol, that's probably why she'd married him; why she said she loved him.
He knew why he drank, on the nights that he did.
He wondered why she did.
She didn't ask him; he didn't ask her.
i'm probably going to write more on Gibbs/Rebecca in the future, because the concept of a man with his severe emotional / guilt problems being married to an addict is intriguing to my muse,.
that said, with this i'm trying to play with / toy around with the developing characterization i have for them / their marriage in my head, that being that this might be the one time the dissolution of a marriage was not entirely Gibbs fault: sure, he's emotionally stunted, but i'm wanting my headcanon here to be more one where Gibbs is an enabler (craves being the 'savior' figure') and Rebecca is, as is vaguely implied, an unstable addict - and of course, she ends up cheating .. so we'll see where i end up on them. obviously that's just me, and there's so little on Rebecca people probably have their own opinions.
-alexandra
story #241