Author's note:
Thank you for the reviews. I loved them…
Here's the next chapter… Enjoy!
And as always … reviews make me smile…. So keep them coming.
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The next morning in the bullpen Tony and McGee looked at each other, wondering where Ziva was.
"She's never this late." McGee comments.
"Yeah, the only time she's been this late was when she was on the run from the FBI." Tony remembered.
Just then the elevator dinged and out stepped Ziva. She looked pale, her eyes sunken and her step slower then usual. Her hair was draped across half her forehead and tied in a pony at the nape of her neck and she wore a long black jacket, buttoned up to her throat.
"Rough night, Zee-vah?" Tony chirped.
"No!" Ziva replied too quickly and in a tone that warned, don't ask again.
"Are you okay Ziva?" McGee asked as he came to stand in front of her desk.
"I'm fine, as right as grain."
"It's as right as rain, Ziva. Not grain." McGee corrected as Tony stared at her and tried to decide whether he liked her new hairstyle or not. He actually preferred it when her hair was left loose over her shoulders and he often imagined running his fingers through her silky strands. Of course, if he ever tried that, Ziva would most probably break his arm.
"Whatever! We better get back to work before Gibbs gets here." Ziva said as she turned her computer on and proceeded to ignore the two men standing in front of her.
Tony and McGee exchanged a look before moving back to their desks. Tony continued watching Ziva and he noted that she looked … exhausted. She also looked like she was in pain.
Ziva, what's going on with you?
Why won't you tell me?
Ziva felt like she hadn't slept in a year. Her head pounded in rhythm with her heart and her shoulder burned, making all and any movement of that arm impossible. She shuddered when she remembered what had happened the previous night.
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She'd come awake suddenly to intense pain. It had taken a good 10 minutes before she was able to sit up and access the seriousness of her injuries. She knew that she'd suffered a concussion but she didn't know how badly her shoulder had been hurt. She was also frozen and would have suffered from exposure had she lain on the ground any longer.
She knew that she should have called for help, but in her haste to escape her thoughts about Tony, she'd left home without her cell phone. When she finally stood up and the park around her stopped spinning, she'd walked slow and steady back to her apartment.
Once there she'd taken a shot of whiskey then headed to the bathroom to see the damage. The gash in her hairline oozed blood and the raw flesh around it was already turning purple. As she shrugged out of her clothes, she gasped at the amount of blood staining her sweater, and the wound was still bleeding. It wasn't a wide cut, but it was deep. She made short work of cleaning and dressing her wounds, before heading back into her bedroom and passing out from exhaustion.
This morning she had woken up stiff and bruised and she suspected that she was running a fever. Then she realized that she had overslept, so instead of cleaning and checking the wounds again, she simply dressed and tried her best to conceal them. She prayed that they wouldn't get a case, so that she could give herself a chance to heal.
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"Gear up!" Gibbs ordered as he rushed into the bullpen, heading for his desk.
Great! So much for not going out into the field today, Ziva mentally moaned.
"What we got, Boss?" Tony asked.
"A dead Marine in Shenandoah Park. McGee, you're with me. Tony, Ziva follow in the van and someone get Ducky." Gibbs ordered as he and McGee entered the elevator.
Tony looked at Ziva. Her eyes were closed, her brows drawn tightly together.
"Ziva, you okay?" Tony asked, for the first time genuine concern coming through in his voice.
Ziva snapped her eyes open and took a second to focus on him.
"Yes, let's go." She said as she grabbed her bag with her uninjured hand and followed him to the elevator.
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"So Zee-vah, who was he?" Tony asked as he drove the van.
"Who, he?" Ziva asked, her arching head making it impossible for her to follow Tony's line of questioning.
"The 'he' that kept you up all night." Tony smirked.
"What makes you think I was with someone last night?" Ziva asked an involuntary blush colouring her pale cheeks.
"Ah ha, see I was right. You were with someone."
Damn it! I have no reason to react like a jealous boyfriend! But why the hell do I feel like one?
"What did he do? Lead you on and then leave you at the 11th hour, pining for his touch." Tony laughed, fishing for more details and dreading them at the same time. He was terribly attracted to Ziva but there was no way he would ever admit that. For one thing she would never believe him and for another, Gibbs would kill him for breaking rule number 12.
Ziva glared at him as she remembered how her heated thoughts had distracted and frustrated her to such a degree that she had become the victim of a bloody two bit mugger. She, Ziva David, trained assassin, had almost been taken out and all because she was fixated on the gorgeous, sexy, irritating, annoying man sitting next to her.
The worst part of this whole scenario was that he was clueless. The Senior Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo couldn't see what was right in front of his nose!
"Tony, shut up and drive." Ziva growled frustration and pain getting to her.
Tony looked at her, taken aback by her growl.
Something's up with you and I'm going to find out what! He promised himself.
He covertly watched her during the rest of the drive and noticed that she kept pulling her hair over her forehead. He also noticed that she kept using her left hand when she was right handed. Her right hand lay limp in her lap. She still wore her jacket, buttoned up to her neck and her face was tense. Every time they hit an uneven patch of road, her left hand would wrap around her right elbow as if to brace it against further jarring.
Ziva what are you hiding? Tony wondered as they neared the park.
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The drive jarred Ziva's injuries badly so by the time they reached the park, Ziva excused herself and rushed to the ladies room and promptly threw up. Then she took 2 aspirins and made sure that her hair was in order and covered her head wound before she went back out to Tony.
Tony observed as she walked back from the ladies room. She was pale, except for the intense red at her cheeks and chin. She looked dazed and didn't hear him the first time he called out to her.
When she finally reached him, he asked her again, "You sick or something Ziva?"
"No!" Ziva insisted. "Where're Gibbs and McGee?"
"They're heading towards the scene. It's about 2 miles that way." Tony replied as he grabbed his bags and started walking in that direction.
Ziva looked at her bags with dismay. How am I going to carry these two bags on a 2 mile uphill hike?
She growled as she placed the strap of one bag over her left shoulder, while lifting the second bag in her left hand. Then she followed Tony. They walked in silence for half a mile, Tony slowing his pace discretely while allowing her to catch up to him. He observed as she struggled to hang onto her gear and it seemed like her right hand and arm were useless to help.
As Tony pondered this, Ziva walked past him. She knew that she was running a fever now as she felt sweat trickled down the valley between her breasts despite the November wind blowing in her face. Her vision swam and the landscape in front of her broke into many dimensions and then condensed back into one, numerous times. Her right shoulder was on fire and when she had checked earlier, she had found blood seeping through her bandages, staining her shirt.
I can't let them know what happened. If I tell them I was mugged, they will have a million questions:
What were you doing out at that time?
How did he get the drop on you?
Where were your weapons, your gun, knife?
Why didn't you fight back?
Why didn't you call us?
Why didn't you report it?
Why didn't you go to the ER?
Why?
Why?
Why?
Because I was fantasizing about Tony doing X-rated things to me and making me cry out in ecstasy and that's why I was distracted.
Now exhaustion joined her growing list of problems and the whole park started spinning madly around her. Her breathing became ragged and the heavy bags on her left shoulder started pulling her down over the mountain side.
"ZIVA!!!" Tony cried out in horror as he watched her tumble down the side of the mountain like a rag doll.
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