A/N: This was written for Round 4 of the NCIS Last Fiction Writer Standing contest over on LiveJournal; the prompt was deceit. This is an extended version of the one I submitted to LJ (I had to cut back due to word limitations :^), the original, however, received the Mod's Choice for that round which made me smile a great big goofy smile. Much love and keep the peace, Kit.
DISCLAIMER: Nope.
The basis of any conventional relationship is honesty. But they've never been conventional, or even remotely so.
And their entire relationship is founded on a lie.
...
"Having phone sex?" And it's the first thing she ever says to him, her voice innocent though the question and its implications are definitely not. She's beautiful and exotic and, somewhere inside him, he's interested in this stranger with the dark hair and dark eyes and blue headscarf that is wholly out of place.
He looks up at her, standing before his desk, watching him curiously, and he hears himself replying smoothly, "No. Charades." And it's the first lie he ever says to her during their first conversation of many.
...
They have sex in a ritzy hotel paid for on the government's dime while under the assumed names of the late Jean Paul and Sophie Rainier. To the federal-funded voyeurs watching on the big screen, they play their parts flawlessly, a perfect performance, harmonically orchestrated.
Outside the twist of sheets, they keep up their normal banter and the sexual tension resides over the hotel like a heavy cloth and they're simply Tony and Ziva, under cover.
And no one is the wiser.
...
Officer Bashan is the first to see through the ruse. She berates herself for her naivety because of course her father is spying on her. And leave it to the one man thousands of miles away to see what an entire investigative agency had missed (or conveniently ignored) unfolding beneath their very noses for the better half of a summer.
"That depends, did you, or did you not, sleep with him?"
"Who?"
"Anthony DiNozzo, your new team leader."
Her indignation at the blatant infringement of her privacy neither confirms nor denies the accusation.
It is a lie by omission.
...
He sits across from her as they perch in the rafters of some anonymous barn, a large bomb nestled between them. She studies the device and he studies her, keeping his eyes diverted from the foreign threats painted on the walls surrounding them, distracting himself from thoughts of imminent death by staring down her sweater.
Either he's guilty of underestimating her efficiency with a knife and improvised explosives, or his dumb luck has intervened again, but he survives the ordeal entirely intact. She asks why he even followed her to certain death and he tells her doesn't know –he's deceiving himself at this point.
He also indirectly informs her that she may not be worth dying over and that couldn't be further from the truth. Years later and he'll remember those words as he lays in bed, mourning the loss of another woman he loves.
...
"You ever lie to someone you love, Ziva?"
He lies to them all for nearly a year and, of course, a girl is involved.
"Yes." Yes.
She's beautiful and funny and smart and everything he never knew he was looking for. Unfortunately, this relationship, too, is founded on false pretenses and it was only a matter of time before it fell apart anyway. He knows it won't end well because his life is like that and how else is it supposed to play out? There are no such things as happy endings and, while the good doctor deserves her fairytale dream, he won't ever be given his. Because he knew it wouldn't end well.
"They ever forgive you?"
He loves her and unfortunately she loves him and when it ends and his charade is called, it is messy and lethal and crushing. She leaves with a broken heart and he stays with a new understanding of "in too deep".
He lied to her and Gibbs and McGee just as much as he lied to Jeanne. And it kills him a little bit because it takes time to mend the splintered trust his team had in him.
The periodontal disease is the most merciful of his punishment.
"They never found out."
...
She discovered as she grew up, that if she lied to herself, she'd eventually believe anything; that Ari was innocent, that her father was honest, that she was a good person. Self-deception, though, is tricky business and she is inherently flawed. So when he asks, "Didn't you tell me the heart wants what it wants?" She replies, "No. Actually I didn't."
And maybe, if she keeps telling him that, she'll convince herself too.
...
"Do you ever think about soulmates?"
...
He promises to destroy the photos and then swears to her that he did. In his defense, though, he never believed she'd find out, that she'd see the evidence taped on his prison cell wall.
She's irritated with him and rightly so.
And it would be much, much worse if she knew that he'd let the crew believe that she was the girl back home, waiting for him.
...
Fast forward to an elevator ride and angry pacing and bruised skin. Treason swarms around everything and it's all a mole hunt, a goose chase, a sham. He's suffocating and there's no one to trust because it turns out that the war game, wasn't a game after all. And if he can't trust Gibbs, who can he trust?
He vents at her, growls and roars, and she stands there, placating, understanding, just as betrayed as he. They're in this mess together, at least, and they're not alone.
Ironically, in a time when nothing is at it seems, he's finally honest with her:
"I'm tired of pretending."
...
She lies to him about Michael and Michael lies to her. It's some sick, twisted cycle of obscured half-truths and falsehoods and deception and it's all so very tiring.
She says she doesn't think she can trust him and at the time she believes it, but hindsight is twenty-twenty, and when she finds herself completely compromised and confronting death, she'll realize that she could trust him after all. Too bad it's too late. No take backs, says a little voice inside her head. You chose this path.
She told him once that she'd never be taken prisoner.
...
It's absolutely utter veracity when he sits across from her bound, dirty, and bruised, confessing that though he tried, he couldn't live without her. And, in hindsight, it's complete cliché that the only way he could ever be brutally honest with her (and himself) is under the influence of truth serum.
She's been betrayed and beaten and thoroughly abandoned and he knows she doesn't believe him when he tells her that they've come all this way for her. In her headspace, the idea is unfathomable because no one has ever loved her that much; to risk their lives for hers.
It's a moment of truth for once, consequences be damned.
...
The first time he asks her if she's okay, she'd just tensed up because shouting voices and gunfire conjure up tragic memories of hopelessness, brokenness, and sand. Her moment of weakness is over as soon as it dares claim her, but the tremor that runs through her does not go unnoticed by his ever watchful gaze. He's been waiting for her to show the cracks in her armor and when she finally does, she denies it.
Her voice is clipped, carefully measured, as she asserts, "I am fine." But her eyes don't meet his.
...
It takes a while to build back their shattered dynamic, but when they do recover that wayward trust, it's stronger than before. Perhaps it's the experiences they've shared that have fortified their bond, perhaps it's nothing at all.
In the quiet of a Parisian hotel suite, they re-familiarize themselves with the other. Reassurances are whispered and soft laughter permeates the still air and their banter is gentle and easy and as close to normal as they've ever been. They won't cross that ever blurry line as they stumble along together in a foreign country unpolluted with unpalatable memories, but limbs will be innocently entwined come dawn's early light.
She lies to Nora and he lies to McGee and they lie to themselves when they vow to leave Paris in Paris.
...
He promises her he'll be there, that he wouldn't miss it for the world, that she should reserve a front row seat for him, and where can he buy tickets in advance. The past few months and he'd been preparing himself for her loss again because if the government deemed her unfit to stay, she'd have to leave again and all the strings in the world couldn't keep her tied here. He's adamant that he doesn't want her to stay, constantly voicing his displeasure at the thought of her becoming permanent in this country, in his life. Call him crazy, but he's under the impression that if he tells himself something often enough, then he'll convince himself into believing it. He doesn't want her to stay and therefore it won't hurt when she has to leave.
The final verdict arrives and she's permitted to stay and he's absolutely elated. She wonders if he'll come to her ceremony and he hates himself for making her think he wouldn't want to. Because of course he does.
He promises her he'll be there and then he isn't. He's failed her like all the men in her life have failed her and he feels dirtydirtydirty with the thought.
...
Their entire relationship is founded on a lie.
A/N2: =^.".^=