Chapter 1
Saturday morning
Navy Yard, Washington, D.C.
NCIS Headquarters
It was a Sunday morning, and Tim McGee would have rather stayed in bed.
"There goes my day off," he muttered, walking out of the elevator with a coffee in one hand and a bag of donuts in the other.
Something was going on: he got a mysterious text from Tony DiNozzo at 5 a.m., telling him to be at the Navy Yard ASAP. A series of texts and a phone call convinced McGee that Tony was on the level, although DiNozzo said he could only discuss it in person, and that it had to be at NCIS.
And, he could not, under any circumstances, call Gibbs.
Going by the very excited and slightly concerned tone in Tony's voice, McGee decided something hinky was up.
Tony wasn't much of a conspiracy theorist - aside from his rant about advanced technology leading to something like SkyNet from the Terminator movies - so whatever had him eager to talk had to be important in his mind.
To McGee's surprise, Ellie Bishop - the NSA agent now working with the team - had beat him to the squadroom. She sat, Indian-style, on the desk that previously belonged to Kate Todd and Ziva David, working on her laptop and munching on a donut.
"Morning, Tim," she said; McGee waved and grunted to her, then threw his bag behind his desk before walking back to her with the bag of donuts.
"I forgot; you guys don't do greetings," she said, eyes on her laptop's screen.
"We do donuts," Tim replied. "And showing up at work an hour early when the senior agent has something he can't talk about on the phone...looks like you got a text yourself."
"Yeah," Bishop said, reaching for a chocolate donut. "You know what's going on? Tony wouldn't say a thing. Sounded really excited with a hint of concern, at the same time."
"You too?" McGee replied, drinking from his coffee cup and eating a donut.
"And me three."
McGee and Bishop looked up to see Abby Sciuto, wearing her white lab coat and looking very, very tired.
"Tony said this was big and that I should be here, now," Abby said, looking half-asleep. "He sounded scared, and excited. And swore he'd bring me a Caf!-Pow."
McGee held the bag of donuts for Abby, who took the bag for herself. "Haven't even eaten breakfast," she half-muttered, reaching for the first donut she could find.
"And why not tell Gibbs?" Abby asked. "...he's not in trouble, is he? Tony said he wasn't. But I'm not sure that's what he really meant-"
"Abby, I asked him the same thing," McGee said. "Tony swears Gibbs isn't in trouble of any kind."
"But he did say for us to be here, and now," Bishop countered. "You don't think this has anything to do with Diane and Fornell - or their daughter?"
"The guy who kidnapped Emily's in jail and staying there for a long, long time," McGee replied, before pulling out his iPhone. "I'm going to text Tony again. Ask him where on earth he is-"
McGee didn't need to text DiNozzo. A moment later, the elevator dinged, and the senior agent walked off, with four coffees and a box in one hand, a Caf!-Pow in the other, and wearing a very stuffed backpack.
"Ladies and McGentleman, thank you for showing up," announced Tony, smiling and appearing to all three as if he was about to make the announcement of the century.
"Tony. You better have a damn good reason to wake us all up so early - and you better have an explanation as to why we're not supposed to tell Gibbs," McGee told him.
"And if Gibbs is in trouble," Bishop followed.
"And you better tell us if he's in trouble," Abby said, snatching the Caf!-Pow 64-ounce cup from Tony's hand.
"Relax, everyone," Tony said. "Grab yourself a bagel and some coffee. There's a good reason why Gibbs isn't in on this and a better reason why we're meeting here and not my apartment."
"It's 6:30 in the morning, Tony," McGee complained. "Gibbs I understand. You hate getting up this early as much as we do-"
"I understand, McGrumpy, believe it or not," Tony replied. "There's a rhyme and reason as to this clandestine meeting-"
"Then spit it out," Abby said, leaning on the front of Bishop's desk. "Gibbs is gonna show up soon."
"I know," Tony answered. "This stays between us."
"What stays between us?" Bishop interjected. "And what's in your backpack? That thing is stuffed-"
"Yeah, probably full of paper," McGee said, picking up the backpack Tony had dropped onto the carpet. "Doesn't feel like there are any bricks or weapons in here."
"Gimme that," Tony shot back, snatching the backpack from McGee. "Tim...Ellie...Abby...what is in this backpack is the result of two days and seven hours of secret, undercover work by yours truly."
"What kind of undercover work?" McGee retorted. "And have you even gotten any sleep?"
"Been up since the night before, McNosy-"
"You didn't sleep?" Bishop asked. "That's not good for your health-"
"Darn right it isn't," Abby interrupted. "You're not losing sleep over-"
"No, Abs, I'm not losing sleep over our favorite Israeli Ninja," Tony retorted, before pulling out a flash drive. "Tim. Put this into your computer, put it up on the monitor. We're wasting time."
"What is this?" McGee asked; Tony gave him a glare.
"We're wasting time, Tim," Tony said. "This is not something you want the Great White to walk in on. Nor that other guy."
"What other guy?" Bishop asked, as McGee shrugged and put the flash drive into the USB port on his PC.
"Click the picture thingie, McJay-Peg" Tony said.
"'Picture thingie'? That what you call the .jpeg file on here?"
"Yeah. Jay-Peg. And hurry."
Tim clicked the .jpeg file - the only file on the flash drive - and his eyes went wide.
"McGee? What is it?" Abby said, concerned over Tim's reaction.
McGee sent the .jpeg file to the main monitor.
"Tony," Abby said. "That's...are those Gibbs's ex-wives?"
It was the same graphic Bishop saw the other day with Tony and McGee, after the team learned that Tobias Fornell and ex-wife #1 - Diane Gibbs Fornell Sterling - were back together. It was Tony and McGee's way of filling Bishop in on the backstory behind Gibbs' three ex-wives.
Only then, the space for ex-wife #2 was blank; Tony said he knew nothing about her.
Now? It was filled. With the image of an attractive, military-esque redhead.
"She," Tony said, pointing to the mugshot of the woman between Diane and ex-wife #3, Stephanie Flynn, "is the subject of the morning. The Holy Grail of NCISdom."
McGee, Abby and Bishop walked up to the monitor and stared at the photo.
"Holy Grail?" McGee finally said. "Tony. Who is this lady?"
"And is this a joke?" Abby interjected.
"I promise you, this is no joke," Tony said. "I promise you, she is real. She was the second ex-wife of Leroy Jethro Gibbs. The woman we have, heretofore, known nothing about until now."
Tony stood there grinning like the Cheshire Cat.
"Well, who is she," Bishop asked, curious and without a hint of annoyance - unlike McGee and Abby, both of whom were becoming more annoyed by the moment.
"She," Tony said, triumphantly, "is Shana M. O'Hara."
"Who?" Abby asked.
"Shana M. O'Hara. And, as you will soon discover, via these handy reports and notes in my overstuffed backpack, the former Shana M. O'Hara Gibbs has quite the history."
Bishop rushed back to her laptop, and frantically began pulling up records; while Tony prepared whatever presentation he planned for his audience, Abby and McGee noted the look on Bishop's face, and looked over her shoulder.
"I'm telling you, you can't make any of this up," Tony said with glee. "What you heard about Diane, and Stephanie, the alimony, the nine-iron, is nothing - NOTHING, I say - compared to what Ms. O'Hara Gibbs has-"
"Tony. This is classified. She's classified," Bishop abruptly said.
"No. She's ex-wife numero dos," Tony said, not following the NSA agent's lead. "Not classified."
"Yes, classified," Bishop replied, pulling up a redacted file on her laptop. "She's classified. Her existence is classified. You, me, us, we're not supposed to know about her."