Author's Note:
Hi everybody! Thank you for reading Some Love Story, my traditional post-finale fic. Although this one won't go into the details of the events of "Deep Trouble", it is set in season six. As always, my penname, NavyStrong42099 is dedicated to my brother. Feedback is appreciated- even if it's criticism!
-C
Kensi Blye sat at her computer, scanning through photographs at the speed of light. She was alone in the Spanish mission that housed the Office of Special Projects on that Monday morning, but it was no wonder. The summer was just drawing a close and most people were either returning from vacations or leaving for them. Not even a phone disturbed the still air. She was positive that Sam and Callen would walk in, chattering about the newest island they had visited or checked one more place off the list of everywhere that a James Bond movie was filmed.
And maybe last summer she would have joined them. Not this one.
Looking back, Kensi almost wished that she had accepted Deeks's offer to go camping in Yosemite for a few days. Maybe they would have actually gotten the chance to talk about everything that had happened away from a working environment. She was still so confused about everything.
So ultimately that was the reason for not talking as much during their break. Things were left off in a bad place with Talia, and their prominent inability to communicate only made matters worse.
Looking back at old photos taken with Deeks sent a throbbing pain through Kensi's chest. Heartache. She was so damn tired of getting that all the time.
At last the sound of clicking boots echoed in the tunnel from the entrance. Perking up, the brunette peered from her seat to see who it was. Instead of finding a mop of blond hair, she spotted a much shorter figure with a bob of brown.
"Kens!" Nell greeted with a broad smile. "You're here a bit early for the first day back."
She shrugged. "I didn't really go anywhere to be back from."
The intelligence analyst pursed her lips. "Something you want to talk about?"
Kensi shot her a look.
"Right," she remarked with a knowing glance. After all, her friend knew how Kensi loved opening up about her feelings. Nell plopped down in Callen's chair while exhaling deeply. "Is this about Deeks or Afghanistan?"
Kensi slammed her laptop shut and said, "A little of both, I guess. Afghanistan is part of it, but it's mostly Deeks."
"You know, Kensi, it would help just to get away from work a little while and sort things out yourselves. The last thing you need is more pressure."
The brunette shot a glance over at Hetty's desk, contempt filling her mismatched eyes. "She's still not back from D.C., is she?"
"There's a lot of people to answer to," Nell remarked. "You know how slow things are vetted over in Afghanistan. And they need to track down those involved. Granger says it might be another week at most."
"Until she comes back?"
"Until we know," she corrected Kensi.
"Right," the brunette tapped her pen several times against her laptop. "So, how was your summer?"
Nell blushed, "Oh well, I guess since we've having a girl talk I should tell you. I-"
"What are you doing in my desk?" A voice broke the silence good-naturedly.
Both of the females jumped a little and found Callen leaning the archway expectantly. He was a little tanner than usual, and Kensi got the inkling that most of his free time was spent with Joelle.
"Just…having girl talk," Nell winked. She shouldered her bag and rose out of the chair. "I'll see you guys later."
"See ya, Nell," Callen chuckled, taking her place.
The petite woman trotted up the stairs and disappeared into ops. With Callen's arrival, more and more agents began flooding the operations center chatting excitedly. Glumly, Kensi began tearing through some old paperwork, trying to decide what could be recycled and what had to be kept. Callen constantly checking his phone and smiling was helping Kensi's mood either.
"How was your vacation?" Callen finally questioned, shoving his phone in his pocket.
"Hmm?" Kensi replied, not looking up from the report she was scanning.
"That bad huh?"
The brunette rolled her eyes and mumbled something about needing more coffee. She quickly avoided the situation by running towards the miniature kitchen in the back. Kensi nodded a greeting at another one of their techs and began the brewing process. Something caught her attention, and she turned to see Eric and Nell up on one of the balconies, standing awfully close to one another. It would have normally brought a smile to her face, but it just sent another stab of pain through her chest. So that's what Nell wanted to talk about.
God, why did she have to be so jealous of everyone?
There were countless women over the course of their partnership; most prominent were Monica and Talia. Both tall and brunette, with a little touch of the badass that Kensi took pride in. And now it was Nell and Eric- for being able to put work aside and put themselves first. How idiotic was that?
Now more annoyed than before, Kensi roughly reached for a cup and sent the stack flying across the stone floor. With a grumble, she bent down to pick them up, only to be faced with a pair of work boots.
"What did those poor cups ever do to you?" A familiar voice quipped.
Kensi shot straight back up just as rapidly as the plasticware had tumbled to the ground. "Deeks."
He ran a hand through his mop of blond hair and pointed towards the coffee machine. "Callen told me that you were making some."
"Yeah," Kensi nodded, shuffling her feet. Is this what they had come to? Making conversation about coffee? It was pathetic.
"So, um, how was your break?"
Sucky. Terrible. Three weeks of boredom.
"It was great. I got to spend some time with my mom."
"Good. That's good."
Kensi could see it in his eyes. He was feeling just as awkward as her. "Um, so I'll just," she bent down again and began picking up all the cups.
Deeks joined her not a moment later and said in a low voice, "We have to talk eventually, you know."
"Right," she admitted, putting her hands on her hips. "We'll just have to see if anything interrupts us this time."
The detective gave her a small smile, and suddenly Kensi felt a whole lot better. "Tonight?"
Kensi found herself returning the gesture weakly. This was Deeks. Things would be okay. "Tonight."
"Hey! You guys coming!?" Sam, who had entered while the partners were otherwise occupied, called. "Eric's got a case for us!"
Kensi and Deeks shared a look; the blond said, "Hopefully tonight."
"What do you have for us?" Kensi inquired as her and Deeks entered ops together. Granger was lurking in the shadows, a new favorite position of his since Hetty had been gone.
"Navy Ensign Erika Cardoza was reported missing by her friend aboard the U.S.S. Saratoga last night," Nell began. "It's currently docked in Los Angeles, and her and a couple of shipmates went out for a drink."
"Let me guess," Callen interrupted, "she left early because she didn't feel well and hasn't been seen since?"
"Precisely," Eric affirmed.
"Why they would go after Ensign Cardoza?" Sam asked. "She's young, the lowest officer rank, usually we see these kinds of things with older personnel."
"That's where her shipmates stopped cooperating," Nell explained. "Usually they would give it more time before involving us, but obviously they are under the impression that whoever took Erika Cardoza have more malicious intentions. So Eric and I did a little digging."
"We found that she graduated top of her class at Annapolis for naval engineering, which means that she would have access to designs of our aircraft carriers, subs, and more," Eric continued.
"The Navy wants Ensign Cardoza recovered as quickly as possible," Granger interrupted them. "They don't-"
"Found it!" Nell suddenly perked up. "There's a recording of the abduction off a security camera at a club called 8 Ball."
She pulled it up on screen. It was pretty crappy quality, but sure enough a darkened box truck pulled up beside Ensign Erika Cardoza and dragged her inside, kicking and screaming. Kensi's stomach twisted into an uncomfortable knot as they watched it happen.
"Kensi and Deeks go talk to the club owner and see if anybody saw something that night," Callen ordered. "Sam and I will speak to Ensign Cardoza's shipmates about her latest projects."
"What do you make of this?" Deeks asked, turning down another street to get to the club.
"I think somebody wants to get our latest naval technology using Ensign Cardoza. If she's developing some major projects for the Navy, then any terrorist would want to get their hands on it." Kensi answered.
"I wasn't talking about that."
She rubbed her eyes. "We need to focus on the case, Deeks. The last time we didn't wasn't good for either of us."
The blond averted his eyes. "Right. It's just, we also didn't get to talk about the important stuff last time."
Kensi checked her watch. "We only have so many hours left in the workday. We'll get to talk."
Deeks smiled at her knowingly and didn't say anything as he steered the SRX over to the side of the road. "Okay. Case first then. Until tonight."
Kensi and Deeks got out of the car and made their way over to the club entrance. A bouncer waved them it at a flash of their badges, and a wall of blaring music immediately bombarded them. Of course, at this time in the day, the only activity were the employees mopping up from last night's celebrations.
"Can I help you?" A man walked over to them. He donned a tailored silk suit with several rings glittering on his fingers. Classic. "My name is George Carlson, I'm the owner of the club."
"Special Agent Kensi Blye and Detective Marty Deeks, NCIS. We need to ask you a few questions," Kensi introduced them.
"I need to call my lawyer before I answer any questions," he turned away from them just as fast as he appeared.
"Please sir, you're not in any trouble. We just need to know if you saw this woman here last night," Deeks handed him a photograph of Ensign Ericka Cardoza.
"She doesn't look familiar," Carlson said. "And I would know. We give fifty percent off to serving military."
"Her name is Ensign Cardoza, and she was kidnapped outside of your club last night. Do you remember seeing anything or hearing about anything?" Kensi prompted.
Carlson shrugged. "You'd have more luck talking to the bouncer working last night. He's probably out back having a smoke."
"Thank you."
Carlson showed them through the interior of the club and out into the docking bay where goods came in and out. He stopped following them and shut the door after the partners when he received a call on his phone.
Kensi took a brief look around. "No bouncer out here."
"Do you think he could have been posing as one?"
"Not likely. If this was staged, the kidnappers wouldn't have been able to predict if she would even walk that route at all. No, Cardoza was followed and then the opportunity was taken."
She was interrupted by a call on her cell from Callen.
"Hey Kens. We spoke to some of her crewmates. Apparently they were planning on going to 8 Ball last night instead of the other bar. It's not a coincidence. Also, Eric just called. It seems that the club recently hired two new employees named Trevor Harris and Greg Santhers. Sending you pictures now. Just keep an eye out."
"Okay, thanks Callen. Call us if you find anything else."
Kensi hung up and opened up the picture message of their two suspects. One was dark skinned and quite burly while the other was paler and less stocky. She help her phone so Deeks could see.
"Two new employees and Cardoza's outing was originally planned for this club. Looks like your theory was right after all."
"Let's go see what Carlson has to say about all of this," Deeks suggested.
"You go on, I'm going to call Nell and see if she has anything more on these guys."
Kensi was left alone as she dialed for her friend.
"Hey, what's up?"
"Can you pull any information on the two guys you and Eric found, Trevor Harris and Greg Santhers? We need to know what their connection is to Ensign Cardoza." Kensi began pacing back and forth in the back lot.
"Already ahead of you. Harris and Santhers were hired about a week ago…"
Kensi stopped paying attention to Nell when she noticed a white van concealed by a dumpster across the lot. Glancing to make sure she was alone, the brunette jogged across the asphalt towards it.
"…indicates they were only guns for hire. Now, Eric and I-"
"Nell, what was the license plate for the white van found on the recording?" Kensi interrupted her.
"There was none. The only distinguishing factor was a-"
"Broken taillight?" Kensi guessed, running a hand over said object.
"Yeah. Eric's been running it through Kaleidoscope, but no hits yet."
She turned to a vehicle next to the van that looked like an old police car completely painted over black. "What about a car with the license plate Romeo, Nine, Two, Six, Quebec, Kilo, Papa?"
"Doesn't sound familiar. I can review the tapes again. What, did you find something?"
Kensi opened her mouth to speak when she felt something cold jab into her side and remove her own gun from her waist band.
"Hang up the phone," a cool voice rasped in her ear.
Kensi did as she was asked, and cut off Nell from further communication.
"Drop it."
The phone clattered to the pavement and was promptly crushed by the man's foot. Looking into the rearview mirror of the truck, Kensi recognized Trevor Harris from the photograph Callen sent her.
"Turn around, slowly."
Again, she complied. The man had backed up a few feet to give her room, which of course didn't work in Kensi's favor.
"Who are you?"
Kensi didn't answer as a familiar mop of blond hair poked from behind the dumpster. Deeks emerged stealthily onto the scene with his gun poised. Her eyes flicked towards him, a mistake on her part. Harris just retook the last few steps me made and forced the gun to Kensi's temple.
"Drop your weapon, now!" Deeks ordered.
"I think not," Harris rebuked.
Another man, his accomplice Greg Santhers, came at Deeks's right from between the cars and the gun aimed at his torso.
Realizing he was out of options, Deeks lowered his Beretta and set it gently on the ground. Santhers fished some car keys out of his pocket and opened the trunk to the car that vaguely resembled a police car.
"Phone too. And smash it." Once Deeks had done that, Kensi's assailant spoke.
"Climb in or we shoot her," Harris ordered.
Deeks walked slowly over towards the vehicle and set one foot in. When Harris gestured him to continue, the blond shook his head. "Not without knowing she's not going to be harmed.
Frustrated and out of patience, Harris pushed Kensi into the trunk, carrying Deeks with her. The top was slammed shut on them before either could curse.