Summary: Ziva gets jealous when Tony flirts with a new NCIS agent, and Tony decides to rectify things.
Disclaimer: Okay so, Di wants me to disclaim NCIS in as many languages as I can (creys!); here goes - NCIS is not mine (English). NCIS bu shi wo de (Mandarin). NCIS mmn si wa eh (M'sian Hokkien...don't ask). NCIS mmn hai ngor geh (Cantonese - that's all written as "NCIS不是我的", btw). NCIS bukan kepunyaan saya (Malay). NCIS no es mío (Spanish, and I'm not even sure I got it right)...okay, I'm out! That wasn't a lot of languages :( but it must be pretty clear that I don't own NCIS by now, so LEAVE ME ALONE TPTB!
Spoilers: General NCIS; slight 7x04 "Good Cop, Bad Cop".
Warnings: Fluff overload, and possible OOC-ness, haha. I tried my best to stay in character but this is a new style, so...
This fic contains no Ray or EJ, but takes place after GC, BC, obviously. Also, sorry for the long disclaimer...whoops.
Enjoy and please review?
-Soph
Description
He doesn't have to look away from the new agent he's flirting with to know that Ziva's staring at him; he can feel the intensity of her dark eyes somewhere on the right shoulder of his suit. He finishes up his conversation and smirks at Ziva as the other woman walks away, her ass swaying. His eyes flick to the aforementioned body part before returning to the scowling, dark-skinned brunette before him.
"Something wrong, Zee-vah?" He raises his eyebrows and refuses to wipe off his smirk even as her scowl deepens. It's not because he's sure that she's jealous; given that she's the enigma she is, he can never really be sure. It's simply that accusing her of jealousy would be fun, and he would never miss the opportunity to bait her into threatening him with office supplies. While it's vaguely intimidating, there's something uniquely Ziva about it that makes him love it all the more.
"She's attractive." Ziva's voice is like honey laced with just a hint of arsenic. One wrong word and he knows he'll be coughing up paperclips in the hospital.
He shrugs. "Nice ass." He makes the point of leering over Ziva's head at the other side of the office, as if he can see the topic of conversation from his unfortunately low vantage point.
"Oh really?"
His eyes snap back to Ziva's and his smirk widens. "You jealous?"
"Will you stop discussing other women's backsides if I say that I am?" she asks matter-of-factly, her chin tilting up in a challenge.
He blinks, because that isn't how the game is played. The world suddenly recedes into her, him, and the bullpen, as he leans forward with increasing interest and a dry mouth. "Are you?"
It's her turn to shrug. "No. But I am willing to say it if you will stop talking about women as if they are objects."
Something cold settles in the pit of his stomach; something that feels astoundingly like disappointment. His ego, though, has been stung by something with more bitterness. "I don't talk about women like they're objects."
"Of course you do, Tony. That's your thing." She gives him a nod for emphasis before going back to work.
He settles back in his chair, nursing his ego and feeling rather blue.
Ziva doesn't know; doesn't know that he started out looking at her as a lethal woman in a beautiful body and ended up seeing her as a beautiful woman with a perfect heart. He realizes that his bitterness doesn't stem from her somewhat truthful and very injurious statement so much as the fact that she might think he sees her as nothing more than a pretty face. Because he doesn't; he can't, and he doesn't want to.
And he desperately needs her to know that.
He sits up again, propping his elbows atop his desk and drilling holes into the side of her head with his gaze. He waits until she glares at him in pure annoyance before speaking. "Yeah, okay. I do speak of women as objects a lot of the time." Honestly is the best policy – or so he's heard.
Her annoyance changes to shock so quickly that the effect is almost comical. Her face freezes in a picture of pure amazement, and he has to resist telling her to close her slightly opened mouth lest the flies get in. "You're admitting it?" Her voice comes out breathless.
"I am an honest man." He fakes indignation.
"Yes, when it comes to bragging about yourself."
He can't help the genuinely indignant pout, but the little wise man who lives in a very tiny corner of his mind stops him from responding to the insult. "You haven't heard the second part of my admission," he argues instead.
"Which would be?"
"I speak of some women as more than objects."
She snorts, and he can't really blame her because it didn't sound very right to him either. "How lucky of them."
"You know what I mean. I don't exactly go around describing you or Abby as hot chicks, Ziva."
"I was not aware that you described us at all."
"Well, ya know, my neighbours wanna know what's going on in my life sometimes."
"And you talk about us?" If he'd thought she had been amazed before, it's nothing compared to how wide her eyes are now.
"What do you expect me to talk about? It's not exactly like I've a lot of stuff to share."
"You could talk about your latest conquest." She tilts her head suggestively at the cubicle wall behind her.
He makes a face. "Nah. Not as interesting as you two."
Her face softens the tiniest bit, and he swears he wouldn't have seen it if he hadn't devoted a lot of time to studying every single one of her expressions. "So how do you describe us?"
He props his feet up onto his desk and rests his head against the back of his chair, watching her. It's one of his favourite hobbies, particularly because it tends to get on her nerves. A small part of him wonders why that's so; ex-Mossad-operative that she is, she must certainly be used to having an audience. The larger part, though, just really likes the way her brows furrow together.
He takes a dramatic pause before answering her question. "I describe Abby as this Goth-y chick. Good with computers, good with science. A little bit on the weird side. Has funky dog collars. Um. She and Timmy, good team. Talks a lot but has a heart of gold."
Ziva smiles in a way that tells him he hasn't described their favourite scientist wrongly. "That's nice of you to say of Abby."
"Well, she's sweet. Hard not to say nice things about her."
The hesitation before Ziva's reply is so long that he starts counting the seconds in his head. "What do you say about me?"
He takes another dramatic pause. "Scary chick with many knives and even more guns. Likes to read, has curly brownish-black hair – if you don't straighten it. Steals my food."
She blinks. "That's all?"
"I want to tell them about Mossad, but I'm not sure I'm allowed."
"Oh." Her smile droops a bit as she turns back to her computer. "Okay."
He gets the sudden impression that she'll actually find out whether he's allowed to tell others that she's ex-Mossad just so he can have more things to say about her, so he slips out of his chair and saunters over to stand behind her. "There's actually more."
She twists her neck to look up at him, and there's just something her close proximity (or rather, his close proximity to her) that makes him want to lean down and kiss her senseless. "Are they as flattering as the things you've already said?" Is it his imagination, or is there an odd inflection in her voice?
He rubs the back of his neck, feeling a bit guilty for the trick he pulled. "Maybe more flattering."
"In what way?"
"In the good way."
For a moment she looks as if she wants to say something, but apparently decides against it as she continues to blink up at him with those mesmerizing eyes of hers.
"Ahhh, okay." He gives himself a mental headslap for caving in to the guilt. "I told them there's this chick…goes undercover with me. Well, went undercover with me. Really good with knives and guns and undercover work. You know, got the whole package and everything. Brains and beauty and guts – I mean Gibbs is pretty brainy and gutsy, but he doesn't have the looks. Not for me, anyway. The rest aren't even in the same league. And she bakes cookies for me on weekends – I mean c'mon, everyone knows that the way to a man's heart is through his stomach. And there's the once-in-a-lifetime movie quotes; those are pretty awesome too."
The smile on her face is nothing short of amusement, but the decided softness in her eyes makes his heart skip a beat or two. She always has a way of making his heart go haywire. "You really tell them that?"
"That's the gist of it." He puts on his best now-I've-bared-my-soul-please-don't-shoot-me-down expression.
She chuckles and does a tiny shake of her head, but before he can ask her what that means she raises a hand to cup his cheek, and slides a thumb along his cheekbone. The fact that she lets it linger for a moment longer than necessary – in his estimation, at any rate – pretty much sends any thoughts flying out of his mind; all he wants now is to kiss her.
Insanity drives him to do just that – turn his head the bare minimum number of degrees so that it's his lips against her skin, and for someone whose eyes were as big as saucers just a few minutes prior, she shows a remarkable lack of reaction now. She does still her hand, though, and considering that his lips are pressed against it, he's doesn't complain.
Of course, she withdraws her hand almost immediately, but his heart is already doing jumping jacks. Ah, women. Or maybe just this woman.
"Okay," she continues in so business-like a tone that he wonders if he's just fantasized the kiss – until her next sentence. "Then I will admit that I…was a little jealous."
His smirk makes an against-his-will reappearance. "Were you?"
She cocks an eyebrow at him. "Mostly I was just mourning your taste in women. Agent Cyrill clearly does not know how to bake."
"Ah." He wrinkles his nose in faux regret. "Too bad. Lucky there's you."
The softness flashes through her eyes again. "Indeed," she replies as her lips turn upwards into a brilliant smile.
A/N: There's something I've been meaning to ask...do you guys prefer if I reply to reviews, or not? I'm only asking 'cause I don't want to spam your inboxes and end up with you annoyed with me...
Thanks for reading, and please review! I love spam in the form of reviews :D
-Soph