The FINAL installment! I changed up the end at the last minute because I wanted some shocked gasps coming from readers (well, I tried, at least). Anyway, I forewarn; angst.
So excited for upcoming episode; we get to REALLY meet Mr. Miami! :)
-Livvy
Disclaimer: Guess who DOESN'T own this? Oh, yeah, you! With the pink shirt and the face! Me, the middle schooler!
The smell of dew clung to the air and cooled the skin that peeked out from the dip in her thin cargo pants. The blue NCIS cap she wore clung to her forehead, sweat trickled down her right temple. Humid strands of hair popped out from her messy ponytail, her hands shook. Tanned, lithe, fingers shook ever so slightly, the only berating sign that her nerves were shot.
Tony called in sick today.
In this discovery, she found nothing that resembled peace, even if just hours prior she lay awake in bed because she worried she wouldn't be able to face those green eyes.
Gibbs hadn't given a reason, either. McGee had been smart enough not to comment. But then, Tim had always been the smart one. Ziva felt sick to her stomach.
She leaned against the side of the van and took a deep breath, steadying herself of weakness. Her brown eyes darted towards the witness ready to be interviewed and she tried not to recall how Tony's fingertips had felt grazing her skin; much like the humid spring air did now.
Ray's eyes were soft that next night; soothing. It struck her that maybe he felt it was his obligation to fix her, as his hands bordered on possessive as they teased her breasts.
Passive aggressive was his style. Of course, she was sure CIA had made him just as screwed as she was.
There was a certain brand of sickness to the way she wouldn't look him in the eye. The brown eyes she tried to imagine were his green, and even those thoughts hurt.
As he drove for release, she internally begged for saving.
"Ziva," Ray whispered, spent, as he rolled away from her shivering body.
It's not as if she had the right to respond.
She can still recall shedding her clothes into the washing machine, moisture pooling thickly in her eyes. Smelling the lingering scent of him on her skin.
She made red welts on herself that night, in her shower. Scrubbing the skin to the point of pain. Scrubbing him away, when she so desperately wanted him.
With Ray, now, she lets out a whimper, and nothing else.
Her father always taught her to never scream when the snake bites you.
It's the one thing she's ever kept with her.
"Ziva," Ray says again, louder, cold hand reaching out to rub her shoulder lightly. She tries not to flinch. She turns away from him, and she can't recognize anything anymore. Herself. The man she calls a 'lover' when there is nothing of such involved besides mindless bodily functions.
"I understand," he says when she won't at him, and for a moment she is certainly taken aback. His phone rings in that short interval of silence, signaling his leave. It is at that moment that she realizes that maybe permanence is something she'll never possess until she is permanently six feet under.
Maybe, if she tried hard enough, she could forget the value even existed in the first place.
Ray left, that night. A firm kiss pressed against her cheek and a whisper of remorse upon his face. She mourns a bit; he was a good man. One she did not deserve.
It's the last time she'll ever see him.
A knock upon wood reverberated throughout his apartment. Tony doesn't move from his position on the couch, his eyes resting upon the half empty beer on the coffee table. Waiting, because he wishes her to go away, to leave him alone.
(A part of him, at least. The other part wants much different things...)
It eventually stops. Then starts again, not twenty seconds later.
His hands shove himself from the couch and he goes to stand by the door, his eyes dark.
"Tony."
His breath catches, because it's really her. She's at his apartment; the woman who basically made it clear she never wanted to see him again a few days prior.
She bangs on the wood again, and he just stares at the marred edges in the interior part of it. Places where he's kicked it unkindly.
"Tony," she says again, and he frowns, she wounds much more upset than he thought she would.
"Please let me in," she breathes.
"I can't."
She can hear him.
"Why not?" An indignant hiss.
He almost flinches. Almost. "Thought you said you wanted me to leave you alone."
The comment takes the air from her lungs.
"What, Ziva? Did Mr. Miami dump you and now you're looking for another good fuck?"
She slides down against the door, and he grits his teeth so hard it hurts. He shouldn't have said that, he knows. Uncalled for, immature. Proving to her he's everything she wouldn't want...
"Tony. I...am regretful, of my actions that night."
A bitter scoff makes it's way up the back of his threat, but he shuts his mouth before it can escape. He slides against the other side of the door, suddenly exhausted.
"You regret it?" he asks, and suddenly he wants to scream in pain and anger and frustration.
"Of course not," she says quickly. Unaware, not seeing the way a kind of light meets his eyes.
He sighs. "We messed up, didn't we, Ziva?"
"We have made no mess...yet."
The words hang heavy in the suddenly crisp silence.
He understands the meaning, she processes the words she's just said. His own nails dig into his thigh. "What are you saying, Ziva?"
"I am saying that I am very...scarred, Tony." It comes out like dirty words. She continued, eyes stinging.
"Tony, there are things that have happened in my past, people that have hurt me, that have taken a part of me...My father previously held the brunt of the blame. But he is not the only person that has betrayed my trust. I am dangerous and emotionally unavailable, and we both know that whatever I will offer you will be..."
"Stop!"
She sobs, through the wood. His head pounds, he wants to gag.
"Ziva, you are everything. You are beautiful, intelligent, compassionate, selfless..."
"We are dangerous Tony. Rule 12 is intact because-
"-because Jenny chose rubber-chicken dinners over Gibbs and he lost a piece of his heart."
He takes a deep breath.
"We could work, Ziva. I'm not promising you we'll get married and Gibbs will walk you down the aisle, but I'd rather know than have never tried."
He reaches a hand behind himself to unlock the door, and he hears her stand up. She opens it, and he can't help but smile a little weakly.
"We have to have rules, Tony," she comments seriously, brown eyes deep and unsure.
"How about we figure that our later?"
She gives a weak nod, (this is the weakest he's ever seen her before), and slides down next to him, resting her head on his shoulder hesitantly.
Silence encases the two of them.
There is no 'I love you'. That doesn't come until much, much later.
When she looks down upon his cold face, eyes stinging with tears. The casket is mahogany, wooden, and it reminds her of the wood of the door that night.
The gunshot, his painful shout and yelp, Abby's frantic cries, all ringing in her ears.
He took the bullet for her.
She sobs openly for the first time in her life, hand rested upon her swollen stomach, because at this point, everyone should know the baby was his.
And that she loved him, even if he didn't really know himself.