Just a note I began writing this story before the Boston Marathon bombings. Once the events of that day transpired I felt it appropriate to hold off for at least a while before posting. I wanted to be sensitive to anyone affected by that day. It's only a mention but under the circumstances I felt it better to wait. I am working on the most recent update for The Secrets We Keep, in fact have a few chapters written but they are not where I want them to be at so this is what I'm giving you for now. Thanks everyone who follows me or any of my stories.
She wasn't ready for the sudden flash of insight that hit her. She was in love with him. She'd known for years that she wanted him, needed him, much like the air she breathed and the coffee he drank. But she'd always let that slide into the compartment marked fantasy. At night, on the weekends she would let those feelings wash over her, take them inside her much she like she wished she could take him. He felt it too; the occasional connection of blue and brown smoldering too hot for simple communication told her that. A glance from her desk to his could break even her concentration if the circumstances were right and they often were. She would feel the weight of that gaze in a crowded room, at a crime scene or even the rare moments when they were alone. A thousand words could be said when she finally allowed herself to look back at him. Yet on the surface he simply smiled. She asked herself often why she didn't just walk over to that desk on any of the nights they worked late settle herself on it and show him just how much he affected her.
Yet they both held back. Most days it was easy other days it meant she'd sit there fists clenched under her desk counting the minutes until she could go home and find a less than satisfying release at her own hand. Today had been especially difficult, he'd come to work in a suit. And damn if that didn't affect her. He hadn't failed to notice her reaction, he was a damn good investigator he wouldn't have missed the way she slid her eyes from the silver of his hair down to the shined shoes that were so not his normal clothing choice. A black suit, charcoal grey shirt and matching tie had never looked so good, and she'd seen many men try. As he'd passed her desk he hadn't bothered to hide the way he took in her shock, the need barely hidden in her eyes. Instead he'd stepped closer to her leaning in about to say something and then his phone rang. The blatant frustration at that familiar interruption had been shocking, not just because of how obvious it was but because she hadn't been the only one to see it.
Now heart pounding, pulse racing and a fine sweat breaking out on her neck and arms she wished he hadn't taken that call. Perhaps if they'd handed it off or if he'd let it go to voice mail, maybe just waited for it to ring one more time those few seconds might have made the difference. The difference being as they'd run through the various shipping containers he might not have walked into a hail of bullets.
Chasing subjects, sharing fire with them was nothing new in fact had become far more frequent as of late. Yet today hell seemed to be raining down on them. A terrorist cell intent on blowing up the port had made the day anything but ordinary. It had started out relatively routine, find the bomb, kill the guy guarding it, diffuse said bomb. Steady hands hadn't failed her in that task, Tony had killed the bad guy backed up by McGee, and Gibbs had watched her back as she'd let her mind work through the wires and detonators that she worked like a puzzle. Nothing about those moments had prepared any of them for the rest of the cell to pour out of the shadows like ants at a picnic. It was shocking how fast and how many there were. Normally her team could present an overwhelming offensive force even with just the four of them, but not this time. This time the sheer number had forced them to scatter into defensive positions. Tony and McGee had found shelter in between two large blue shipping containers. Tony as always had managed a quip about the containers becoming a habit of theirs but the humor had been brief as they'd rolled across the ground.
With a hand on his shoulder to relay her position she'd followed Gibbs into a virtual tunnel of metal boxes stacked high enough to nearly block the waning sun. She could hear them, their pursuer's boots on metal, instructions in Arabic that even someone who didn't speak the language could understand. "Find them….kill….hunt." They were the prey and this time the odds were not in their favor. Back-up was on the way. They'd managed a mayday of sorts as they'd seen the men pouring at them, but no one was wasting a free hand to hold a cell phone. She had a gun in each hand now seeing that McGee had been grazed across his leg. He was moving anyways, weaving through the metal structures as fast as his body would allow because no one wanted to be caught holding still. Their comm links allowed them to communicate but, it was broken words interspaced with harsh breathing, bullets bouncing off metal and a lot of swearing.
And now, the shocked cry of a woman calling out in protest. Belatedly she realized it was her making the sound and somehow she was smothering that sound, swallowing it down with the rising bile in her throat. Gibbs had stepped out from a crevice of steel and paint, like a damn gunslinger he walked down that metal alley way in a choreographed move intended to draw a little fire from the lone gunman above. Only to their obscene underestimation, that lone gunman had turned into far more than one. She wasn't counting though, not the men shooting just the bullets as they pierced the fine grey fabric of his shirt. She didn't know she was moving until she was standing, guns in hand next to him. Her own hail of hell and fury flew out at the enemy above them. 9mm ammunition and words equally lethal had them falling one by one bouncing off the sharp metal edges of the containers that had failed to protect them. Vaguely she was aware of something hot and burning piercing her body but it failed to stop her from pulling the trigger again and again until she knew only one bullet remained in each clip. She always counted bullets and there was Gibbs' gun lying on the ground next to him. He wasn't moving blood was rapidly seeping from underneath him, the woman in her screamed at her to check on him. She silenced that voice with every bit of training she possessed because just above the horizon of metal edges she could see movement and if it was the last thing she did she would kill the men that had him lying there gasping for breath.
In her ear she heard the sound of Tony saying something, but her mind wouldn't make sense of it. She was focused on the groaning's of men speaking a language rapidly becoming foreign to her and the gasping breath of the man in black. From the movies Tony had made her watch with him she knew that man in black always died killed by the man in a white hat. In those movies the man in black was the bad guy. But the man at her feet was good more good than a woman like her deserved. She strengthened her stance, lowered herself just enough to grasp the weapon from his limp hand and watched as that shadow on the steel skyline moved stealthily in her direction. Before she rose to her full height she let her fingers graze his palm. Silently she prayed for a response, a curling of his fingers, a twitch of movement. Again she had to fight back a scream as there was no response just the rattle of air in his chest, so focused on that sound was she that she almost missed the scrape of a boot dragging across the metal she was surrounded by. Her head snapped up a warrior's focus fixed on that ominous sound, her heart stayed there on the ground next to him willing him to show some sign of life.
Her mind recognized the sound of sirens far off in the distance too far, as the dragging sound grew louder and the bobbing shadow grew closer. She was exposed, easy to see yet her enemy moved slowly, she registered he was either injured or the numbers of his team had diminished enough that he wanted to be sure of his target before he began firing again. She could have hidden, retreated to the side of any of the metal boxes surrounding her but that would have meant leaving Gibbs alone unguarded and her breath actually stopped in her chest at that thought.
Behind her a distance away she could hear more sound, footsteps approaching slowly caution in every fall of sole against asphalt. This sound she recognized even above the roar of rage in her mind. Tony with McGee shortly behind was approaching. Their voices in her ear confirmed it. But she remained still a human shield for the man on the ground, if they wanted him they would have to go through her. Shoulders rose up into her line of sight, suddenly everything went quiet all she saw was a white shirt, dark hair and the eyes of her enemy. With the barest hint of pressure the hammer fell on the weapon in her hand, a perfect headshot that should have been satisfying but the look in his eyes right before he died had her spinning to her left. A second of confusion as her left hand momentarily wouldn't respond to her command and then she was firing the last bullet from that gun and emptying the rest from the clip in Gibbs'. The resounding finality of the empty click on the Sig Sauer in her hand had her throwing her body over his, pulling the knife from her hip instinctively. Logically she knew it would be nothing against another hail of bullets, she steeled her body for the next hit. It never came, instead Tony's voice shouting orders into his phone, words she almost understood but with the focus on the man underneath her became less than clear.
Finally she registered the words "All clear." Only then did she allow herself to truly asses his condition. The grey shirt held the stain of blood but as she shook her head to clear her gaze she saw it was not nearly as much as she might have expected. She'd counted no less than six bullets impacting his body, it hadn't been till the very last one that he'd hit the ground. For some reason that made her smile. She was forced to wipe water from her face, it wasn't raining so she couldn't understand it but for now she ignored it in favor of ripping open his shirt. Buttons went flying bouncing off the black ground, earlier in the day she'd envisioned nearly the same sight only her tearing had been fueled by passion. In this moment gone was the need to know what he looked like lying naked beneath her instead she was cataloging his wounds, a shoulder shot that looked like it had missed anything vital, a graze on the side of his neck so far nothing mortal. Black Kevlar had her breath rushing out in a whoosh of sound and the sprinkle of moisture. Again she wondered where the water came from but as her hands ran over the muscles of his chest and across the firm strength of his belly she watched his eyes snap open. Locked on hers she saw the reality of what had happened sink in. He tried to sit up, restrained by Tony's strong hand; her own still gripping the fabric of his shirt began to shake. She didn't know if it was relief, the ebb of adrenaline or the blood running over her fingers but what she did know was fear when she saw it. Those azure eyes fixed so clearly on her showed fear, shaking her head her eyes trailed from his to the area around them. Men were again pouring in around them, only this time she recognized many of the faces, friendlies. Her mind categorized them as no threat. But when she looked back at him he was again watching her with fear, forcing his body up to a sitting position. Ziva tried to stand, failed for some reason she couldn't understand, instead she watched his hand reach for her. He called her name his voice hiding nothing that he felt for her, that made her stop look at him, look at Tony and then McGee. They all shared the same look of fear. Through the stubborn nature of her training she forced her legs to bring the rest of her upright. If they were afraid, if Gibbs was afraid then there was still a threat. She brought up the knife still clutched in her hand glanced at it when she saw the blood staining the blade, she hadn't remembered using it. Slowly using all her focus because her mind just wouldn't allow her any clarity she followed the trail of blood up her arm and saw a wound nearly matching the one on Gibbs' opposite shoulder. She turned back ready to smile to make a joke about being a matched set, when a red hot poker of pain lanced through her midsection. Glancing down she saw the stain spreading across her own middle, she hadn't been wearing a vest. Another glance told her the steady throb in her thigh wasn't a charley-horse from all the running they'd been doing.
Her gaze flew shocked, disbelieving finding his. Tony and McGee we're holding him back with a great deal of difficulty. Tony was bleeding from somewhere but it was just a hazy acknowledgement of a stain on his body somewhere. Again she found Gibbs' gaze locked onto the blues eyes that haunted her at night just as the pain hit. Like a freight train and the whip that had once been used on her she felt a lash of fire lance through her. To her left a paramedic approached but he wasn't fast enough to stop her from hitting her knees. Gibbs was forcing himself across the distance between them, calling her name but before he could reach her the inky blackness she hadn't known she was fighting claimed her.