"Where the hell is Tony?" McGee grumbled, infuriated by the Senior Field Agent's no-show.
"I don't know," Ziva said, glancing warily at Gibbs who, by now, was boiling with rage. "But if he doesn't get here soon Gibbs is going to slap the ceiling."
"I think you mean hit the roof," McGee said. "But yes, you're right. Gibbs is going to go mental and you and I will be the ones in the firing line. God, why does Tony always do this? If he's going to act like a child the least he could do is take the consequences."
On the other side of the bullpen Gibbs violently slammed his desk drawer shut. "McGEE!" he roared.
"Yes boss?" McGee stammered, hoping that Gibbs hadn't overheard his comment.
"Have you tried contacting DiNozzo?"
"Yes, boss. I've tried calling both his cell phone and his landline. He answered neither."
McGee winced even as he said the words. Never be unreachable was one of Gibbs' most important rules and Tony had broken it. He was really going to be in for it when Gibbs inevitably got hold of him.
'Too damn bad,' he thought, squashing what little sympathy he had managed to muster for the absent agent. Tony brought this on himself.
McGee had always liked Tony well enough but he hated the way the man acted like a child and always got away with it. It annoyed McGee how Tony acted like an oversexed frat boy, bragging about his many conquests, using juvenile nicknames and playing childish pranks. McGee had never been able to understand why Tony was Senior Field Agent. He thought that Gibbs should give the job to someone smarter and more capable. Someone like..…him. Perhaps this would be the final nail in the older man's professional coffin, he thought wistfully.
"Well go to his apartment and get him!" Gibbs snapped. "Tell him that if you aren't both at your desks in an hour he's out of a job."
"Yes, boss," McGee said, grabbing his weapon and car keys, before scurrying off to the lifts.
Ziva watched McGee leave with an expression of undisguised glee on her face. She was so pleased that Tony, the bumbling clown, would finally be facing some consequences for his actions. Gibbs, on the other hand, watched McGee leave worriedly. Despite his gruff demeanour he felt as though acid was gnawing away at his gut. Tony was never the most punctual person but he had never been this late before, at least not without sending word. He also knew better than to be unreachable. Something was definitely wrong in this situation.
Sure enough his gut was proven right when, 45 minutes later, McGee hurried back into the bullpen with a small amount of concern for Tony on his face. "Well?" Gibbs snapped. "What did you find? Was he there?"
McGee shook his head. "Boss, he doesn't even live there anymore. I spoke to the woman who lives in his apartment now. She said she moved in two months ago. One of the neighbours said that Tony moved out almost a month before that!"
"Pull up his personnel file," Gibbs ordered, trying to figure out why Tony wouldn't let on that he'd moved. "See if he's updated his contact details."
"He has," McGee said a moment later, rattling off the address of a house in the same neighbourhood as Ducky.
"Grab your gear," Gibbs ordered, standing up. "We'll all go."
The area where Tony lived was about twenty minutes away but Gibbs made the drive in fifteen. They pulled the car up in front of a house that was about as different from any place they'd thought Tony would live as it was possible to be. The house seemed more like a family home than the bachelor pad they'd all thought that Tony would have. "Well, I'll be dammed," Gibbs said. "Maybe DiNozzo's finally growing up."
He gained access to the house by picking the lock and McGee managed to disable the alarm before it went off. They took a look around the house, again surprised by its style. Tony still had his state of the art entertainment system and massive DVD collection but other than that it seemed like he was trying to create a totally different living environment from his last one.
There was no sign of a struggle and Gibbs was interested to note that Tony seemed to be preparing to do some decorating in one of the bedrooms upstairs. In the master bedroom they found the bed unmade and a pair of sleep pants abandoned on the floor. Tony's cell phone was on the bedside table. It was obvious that the Senior Field Agent that dressed and gone out in a great hurry.
As he and Ziva secured the house again so they could go back to the office, Gibbs handed the cell phone to McGee. "We need to know where he went in such a hurry. Can you find out who called him last?"
McGee scrolled through Tony's call list. "A Katrina Hessing, boss. She called at about 1am this morning."
"Has he mentioned anything about this woman to either of you?"
"No, boss," McGee said.
Ziva snorted disgustedly. Why would she ever pay attention to the names of any of the slags Tony spent the night with before discarding like a used piece of trash? "Probably his latest tart," she said dismissively."
Gibbs frowned, not at all pleased with the comment. He'd noticed that Tony was taking a lot of shit from both McGee and Ziva lately but hadn't done anything about it, hoping that the two younger agents would realise on their own that his second was an excellent agent. If anything, though the abuse Tony was taking had only gotten worse. Gibbs knew that he was going to have to step in but he decided that this wasn't the moment to do it. Finding Tony was more important than issuing reprimands, no matter how well deserved, right now.
By the time they got to the office it was after 10am. That meant Tony had been missing for around nine hours now so Gibbs deemed it prudent to inform Vance. Tony wasn't the director's favourite agent but even he was concerned. Vance told Gibbs to keep him informed.
Neither McGee nor Ziva were happy about having to expend so much effort looking for Tony, both feeling as though he had probably gotten drunk last night and was now sleeping off his hangover in some poor, unsuspecting woman's bed. Nevertheless they both knew better than to flout an already annoyed Gibbs' orders so, after informing Abby that Tony may be missing, they got down to business.
As she seemed to be the last known person to have spoken to Tony, they ran a background check on Katrina Hessing. They learned that she was a 27 year old waitress who lived in the city. Just like Tony she didn't answer either of her phones and when McGee and Ziva went to check out her home she didn't answer the door. Obviously, unlike with Tony's place, they couldn't pick the lock and go in but they assumed that she wasn't home. They stopped by the bar where she worked only to be informed that she had resigned a few months ago, apparently planning to move to Seattle.
They reported this to Gibbs who by now was really worried. DiNozzo had obviously been keeping secrets from him and Gibbs hated it when his second did that. The Senior Field Agent was a trouble magnet and Gibbs needed to know all the facts in order to rescue him.
"What have you gotten into this time, DiNozzo?" he mumbled. "You better be okay or I'll head slap you into the next century!"
Back to Tony and the babies in the next chapter. I'd hoped to have them in this one as well but I felt the rest of the team needed to be shown. Gibbs is worried but McGee and Ziva have a long way to go before Tony will accept any support from them. Please review. I am also taking suggestions for baby names. Please give me your ideas when you review.