Kibbs shippers all seem to tackle this eventually, the "how did Gibbs know about the tattoo?" question. I think it's even a rule...
it's not a rose
"Any more tattoos?"
"Just the rose on Kate's butt."
"It's not a rose."
"He doesn't know. He's lying just like he did about the digitalis. Okay, tell them. Gibbs?"
Gibbs knew he was smirking slightly, but he couldn't manage to wipe the expression off his face. He wasn't sure what was most satisfying: Abby's amusement, Tony's shock, or Kate's indignation.
Actually, that was a lie. The other two's reactions were priceless, Tony's disbelief in particular, but getting a rise out of Kate...
He could feel her watching him still, even though she was supposed to be finishing her report. It had been a while since he'd had Caitlin Todd so completely confused and off balance, and he enjoyed it just a little more than he should.
He wasn't sure how long it was going to take for her to ask him outright exactly how he knew about her tattoo. He suspected she was trying to summon up the strength of will and sheer bloodymindedness not to ask, not to give him the satisfaction of seeing she was nettled. Trying to convince herself that he was bluffing. Getting frustrated because she suspected he was not.
And that was OK. Kate was at her best when she was slightly pissed, willing to push back, unwilling to let things slide, fighting and being that ballsy woman he'd been impressed by ever since she stormed back onto Air Force One, her hand on the gun at her hip, demanding to know who the hell they were.
Out of the corner of his eye he could see her glaring at him again, and the struggle to contain his smile was getting harder moment by moment.
Between agency policy, his own rules, and the simple fact that he was her boss, he wasn't about to make a move on her - much as he'd like to. And they were past the age when pulling a girl's pigtails to get her attention was acceptable.
(Kate in pigtails. Now there was an idea. Was there any way he could convince Abby to somehow engineer a reason...? No... That was almost as bad as DiNozzo's obsession with her in a Catholic schoolgirl uniform, and when he found himself thinking like DiNozzo, it was time to worry.)
He suspected she had no idea that needling her, as well as keeping her on her toes, was his not-actually-very-grownup version of tweaking a ponytail. The fact she still looked at him sometimes with the desperate need for his approval shining in her eyes was proof enough that she had no idea how much he already admired her.
Seeing the tattoo on her backside had most definitely been an accident - every time. He had enough of a self preservation instinct left in his old bones not to go looking for ways to torture himself, and seeing any part of Kate Todd naked without being free to do anything about it... That was definitely torture.
The first time, in the XO's quarters on the Foster, he'd managed to avert his eyes and get the hell out of there. The curve of her butt was branded into his brain, and the edge of a tattoo peeking out from under her panties was something even bourbon hadn't entirely managed to erase, but he'd done his best.
He was masochistically glad he hadn't been able to bite back his reaction to seeing the 'bikini' Tony had brought her back from Puerto Rico. The very idea of her sunbathing topless...
If she thought he was a pig, that was one more layer protecting him from ever having to wonder whether they could be more than colleagues.
The next time he'd caught a glimpse was the one he tried very hard not to think about, and the one that was most difficult to forget. He was grateful they had only been on the Philadelphia for a couple of nights. Quarters could be close on a destroyer, and even on a carrier space was always at a premium, but sharing tiny rooms on a sub that was running with no aircon... He'd been simultaneously intensely relieved and deeply disappointed when they'd arrived back in Norfolk.
The first night hadn't been so bad. It was the second that would pop up in memory now and then, refusing to leave him alone, and apparently unaffected and undiminished by alcohol consumption.
The emergency blow which had sent her tumbling into his arms, breathing hard and looking up at him with awe... If the COB hadn't burst through the door just at the right moment (or just at the wrong moment, depending how he looked at it), it would have been oh so easy to lean down and claim her mouth with a kiss. Pumped with adrenaline and with her scent invading his nose and her eyes wide with surprise, he'd almost done it anyway.
Their intimate if accidental embrace hadn't gone unnoticed. Scuttlebutt was one thing that never seemed to change, no matter what ship you sailed on. The gossips had overheard a couple things, guessed a few more, and the fact Gibbs'd stood up to Veitch and insisted Kate come on board with him had sealed the deal. It took only a couple of hours for slamming into a wall as the sub headed to the surface to become a steamy affair between a senior agent and his subordinate.
Kate didn't appear to have caught on to the gossip, or at least hadn't reacted to it. The day had ended with ice cream and a fevered panic to get rid of Drew's body before the deadly gas inside him leaked out. By the time they'd fallen into what passed for beds on board, they were too exhausted and too overheated to care about anything but sleep.
Sleep. That had been a long time coming, and then patchy and restless. Lying in a pool of his own sweat was not his idea of an enjoyable night. Sometime in the small hours he'd given up trying to shut his mind off and had lain with his eyes half closed, drifting in and out of a fitful dose.
He was pretty sure he hadn't even heard Kate get up to use the head. When she came back he'd just been waking up again.
She was muttering to herself about the heat, and he'd been about to open his mouth to make some silly joke or other when she grabbed the hem of the oversized shirt she'd been wearing in bed and peeled it off in one smooth motion. He'd caught one glorious eyeful of Caitlin Todd, naked as a jaybird from her hair to her heels, and had slammed his eyes shut before he saw any more.
It was enough. He hadn't slept a second more that night, and he'd been even grumpier than usual the next day. She'd even commented on it, and he'd really had to bite his tongue. Saying "Well I had a little trouble getting any rest after your striptease" would have been a bad idea, on so many levels, but it had become seriously tempting. He congratulated himself that when they made it back to DC, she was still blissfully unaware she'd accidentally given him an eyeful of her ass.
Gitmo had been the most recent incident. This time, he felt he could confidently blame DiNozzo, whose early morning iguana encounter had got them all out of bed in a hurry.
He'd considered adding "Do not bend over when you're only wearing a basketball jersey" to his list of rules that morning. He didn't know and didn't care exactly what she'd been doing, and he was grateful that she appeared to have something on underneath her shirt, but it had been a bit much when he hadn't even had his coffee yet.
It'd been another brief glimpse, but enough to confirm that her tat was a stylised butterfly superimposed over a half moon. That was... Intriguing. He was sure it must have some deep personal meaning to her, but there was no way he could ask. Which of course only made the damn thing that much more difficult to forget about.
It was simple enough to bark something about appropriate clothing, and she'd scurried back to her room, reappearing a short while later looking sheepish and definitely more suitably apparelled.
It was in Gitmo he'd felt his resolve beginning to weaken. She'd probably never thought about it, but the fact he'd informed her of his views on romance between agents while they were in Cuba... that was no coincidence. He wasn't arrogant enough to think it was likely she would ever go there anyway. She was young, beautiful, had no trouble, it seemed, finding men to date. Chances are she didn't consider it an issue... but he'd firmly stomped on the possibility. Which was a good thing, in the long run, even if occasionally it felt like a straightjacket.
A file slapped down on his desk, jolting him back to the present, and he looked up. Kate was glaring at him - a glare that promised some kind of unspecified but likely painful payback in the near future if he was any judge - but she didn't say a word.
"Thanks, Kate."
Her eyes narrowed at his mild tone, and then she turned on her heel and stalked out of the bullpen, not even pausing to acknowledge the 'good nights' from the others. Once she was safely in the lift, he allowed his grin to bloom. Yup, Kate Todd pissy and determined to prove herself was a force to be reckoned with. Just what they needed on this team.
And Gibbs... Well, Gibbs had an excellent memory.
A really, truly excellent memory.