Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS but it's my birthday real soon…Maybe? Please?
Authors note: This is the sequel to "On his knees" It's written mainly in Gibbs' point of view. Hope you enjoy and that it answers some of your questions from the first fic!
He'd done the unthinkable, he'd hurt her, he'd hurt the one woman he could see himself happy with.
He'd spent so long dreaming about her, needing her, making sure she'd never know how much.
He'd tried to keep his distance, but one too many lingering gazes and he was right back to where he had been with every red head since Shannon. He had hurt her, and in a way he was still punishing himself. That was not right, it wasn't fair, not to her.
She'd said she was in love with him. How could she love him? She was too good to love him. She for her part was pure, vibrant and innocent against the black smudges on his troubled psyche. But it didn't change anything, he couldn't be with her.
She was sitting on the park bench a cardboard cup set beside her. He'd tried to push the thought of what he was doing from his mind. His mind fled to a memory of her watching him sing the marine anthem on the birthday of the Marine Corps. Her lips twitching into an appreciative smile, her eyes warm, encouraging, mesmerising.
His tongue fumbled with the words of the old excuses, the ones he told himself late at night while working on his boat in the dark and she was all he could think about.
Too old,
Too haggard,
Too set in his ways.
Too given to his work,
He'd done this too many times,
He couldn't make this work,
He was a bastard,
He was her boss.
The more he tried to get her to accept his reasons the more he himself found fault in his own excuses.
He was old but she didn't seem to care. He was world weary but she seemed okay with that and around her he felt better, he loved his work but she knew him, she wouldn't be offended by a forgotten six month anniversary after a straight 32 hour case.
She would love him regardless of how he acted, after all she'd fallen in love with the bastard, he would have to play Clark Kent with her. Where by he would be charming quiet and distant at home and super hero crime fighter at work. She would love him anyway he was.
And while he was trying to talk her out of a relationship, he talked himself into one. And all of a sudden he was kneeling in front of the woman he'd tried so desperately not to love but did, and he was offering her all that he was, all that he could give, knowing that she wouldn't refuse.
He couldn't see her tears, he never could. He never wanted to.
I hope this lived up to expectations!