The Lone Wolf and the Detective
Disclaimer: NCISLA characters belong to Shane Brennan. All original characters and this story are mine.
Chapter 3
Deeks and Kensi waited for Sam to turn up, and for Versey to appear. He fidgeted and Kensi shook her head and smiled.
"You know, I should put you and Milly in day care together. You could keep each other company with your fidgeting."
A smile hinted at the edge of his lips. "Then you wouldn't need to put her in day care. She'd be in Daddy Care. The best care in the world." His smile widened. "We can go on pretend car chases, shoot the bad guys and Milly can ninja attack them until they're unconscious."
Kensi's mouth dropped, horror spread across her face. "You wouldn't?"
He nodded. "Oh we would, and here would be the safest place in the world . And after the end of a hard day's work, we'll curl up in front of the T.V. watching cartoons, eating donuts and ice-cream, all smothered over our faces. And you would come home all achey and grumbly after missing us all day and join us."
He touched her heart and she leaned in to kiss him.
A knock on the window made them both jump.
"You're supposed to be on surveillance, not making a sibling for Milly." Sam glared at them, then his dimples deepened when he began to chuckle. He climbed into the back seat. "The look on your faces was priceless."
Both Deeks and Kensi blushed, they'd let their guard down for but a moment, and Sam had caught them out. "We've been watching, what took you so long?"
"Had to make sure G ate his soup."
"Hetty's made him soup?" Deeks raised his brow. "He's going to need something stronger than soup to get him back to his strength."
"I agree, but it's a start." Sam sat back in the chair. "So what were you about to do?"
Deeks cleared his throat and gave Kensi a sideway glance.
Kensi kept her focus on the Medical Centre. "Deeks was telling me a story to keep me entertained."
"You falling for that move again, Kens? Haven't you learned from the last time, when he got you pregnant with Milly?"
"I was telling her a story about Milly."
Sam shook his head. "Way to go, Deeks. Smooth move on the Mrs, anything to get her barefoot and pregnant again."
A wry smile crept across Deeks' face. "Two would be fun."
"Two is hard work," Sam reminded them. "Both of you are an only child, you have no idea what you'll be in for. One is a shock, two is bedlam."
"I can do bed-lam." Deeks winked over to Kensi, she snorted at his joke.
"You two are crazy. No wonder Hetty split you up. You're like newly weds, still on your honeymoon after how long?"
"Fourteen months and three days." Kensi looked at Deeks impressed.
"Precisely. You should be arguing by now."
"You know, Kens, no matter how many you have, you'll always have an extra child to take care of."
"Hang on a minute," Deeks interjected. The lawyer in him peered out through his scruffy facade. "I am not a kid, I am, if I might remind you, a lawyer and a damn good detective. You might be the extra child for Michelle, but I can take care of myself."
"Touché," Kensi responded. She was proud of him for standing up for himself against Sam.
Sam smiled at him. "Good, because I need you to be the tough lawyer and detective when we go to Romania. I need to make sure you'll be focused to have G's back."
"Of course you can count on me, Sam." His heart swelled for a brief moment, he knew Sam's methods were tough on the outside, but soft on the inside.
"I know, I just need to be sure that you will be focused over there. I can't risk losing either of you."
His admission caught Deeks by surprise. "You say what?"
Sam cleared his throat. "I can't risk losing you or G. You're my brothers, family stick together."
"Brothers," his smile widened. He liked the sound of that very much.
"I'll make sure Kensi will be safe, you focus on G."
"She's not coming with us," Deeks looked at the revision mirror and caught Sam's eyes. "I can't focus worrying about her. If we can't be partners, I need to know she's safe."
"You don't trust me to have your wife's back?" Sam was caught off guard, here was Deeks telling him he didn't trust him to protect Kensi.
"I do, it's the Comescus I don't trust. Not after what they did to Joelle, I can't deal with…"
Sam squeezed his shoulder from behind. "I get it. But Kensi is a tough girl, she can protect herself. Joelle had no agent training, she refused to hold a gun for her own protection."
"I've asked Granger if he will come instead. He agrees with me on this."
"Granger? The last time we faced the Comescus, he got shot in the shoulder."
"You were knocked out and almost blown up in an overturned vehicle," Deeks reminded him.
"But I wasn't. I came to in time to save G from being shot by Vasile."
"I know, which is why you're still coming. Callen needs you there."
"What do you mean, why I'm still coming?"
"You've got family who depend on you, Sam. Callen's right, we're all at risk due to our association with him. They won't hesitate to kill us, just to destroy Callen further."
"What? And you don't? The last I looked, Deeks, Milly is ten months old. Aiden is almost a man, Kamran is ten years old. Michelle is a strong woman who can deal with the kids if anything happened to me."
"You're kids need you more, Sam. Milly is young enough for it not to affect her yet."
Kensi furrowed her brow, she hated Deeks talking like this. "Marty, you promised…"
"And I will keep my word as far as I can. I will go and have my partner's back, make sure he doesn't do anything stupid to get us killed. Sam and Granger will have our backs."
She saw his determination, he was not going to waver on this one.
"Kensi stays behind to make sure Milly still has a parent. I have to look at this mission from all angles." It took a brave man to accept the possibility of one's mortality, especially in their kind of work. Where they were going was going to be harder —- straight into the lion's den.
"Versey's coming to his car." Kensi brought them back to why they were there.
"Time I had a chat with him."
"I'll go." Sam moved to get out of the vehicle.
"No, best if I do this. He's my friend after all."
"Don't talk too long out in the open, you don't know who's watching," Sam reminded him.
"We'll take him to the boat shed."
"Kensi, you come with me." He focused his eyes on her until she capitulated.
"Okay." She gently squeezed Deeks hand and followed Sam to the Challenger.
"Hey, Versey." Deeks ran up to his old colleague.
"Deeks," he smiled over to him. "What are you doing here?"
"Do you have a free hour?"
Jeff Versey looked at his watch. "I'm due back to headquarters, let me ring through and let them know I'm going to be longer."
"I can't let you do that, Jeff."
Versey narrowed his eyes, Deeks. "What's going on?"
"Not here."
Versey nodded and followed him to his vehicle.
Deeks' visage darkened, he focused on the drive, turning at every point possible to ensure they weren't being followed before he drove to the Boat Shed.
"Now you're scaring me, Deeks, with all those detours to get to here. What is here anyway?" He looked at the square shaped building jutting out over the water.
"Safe house."
"Am I in danger?"
"Maybe." Deeks led Versey into the Boat Shed.
"Coffee?"
"Yeah, thanks."
He busied himself for a moment before joining him at the table. "Why were you at Cedar-Sinai today?"
"Visiting my partner."
"And back on September the second?"
"Are you following me, Deeks?"
He shook his head. "No. We're investigating something, we were going over old security footage in the Medical Centre, you popped up. Kensi and I saw you arrive earlier."
Jeff Versey took a sip of his coffee and sighed. "My partner, Jack Mannan, was shot on August 31. He almost died. He's been in a coma ever since. I go and sit with him for an hour everyday hoping he'll wake up." Guilt washed over Versey, "it should have been me. But Jack moved and got hit."
"I'm sorry. I don't know Jack, is he new?"
"Yeah, he's moved from Florida about five months ago. Nice guy, he didn't deserve this."
"No one does." Deeks pulled out his cell and handed it to him. "Do you recognise this man?"
"Yeah, he's Jack's cousin. He lives in San Diego, he came as soon as he heard about Jack. They were close growing up."
Deeks pondered for a moment. "Have you done a background check on this guy?"
"Michael? No. I believed him when he turned up. No one else in Jack's family is alive to visit, so I just accepted it."
"You sure?"
"Jack told me when we became partners that Michael was all he had left."
Deek nodded, he looked up at the security camera and stared at it for a moment. He hoped Eric and Nell were doing the search as they spoke. "What's Michael's last name?"
"Um…" Versey thought about it for a moment, "Coleman."
"Michael Coleman?"
"Yes." Versey studied Deeks for a moment. "What's going on?"
"Do you remember Callen and his girlfriend at our wedding?"
"The red head? I remember."
"They got married a few months back, expecting their first child. She was gunned down five weeks ago outside their house."
"Oh my goodness, is she okay?" Worry for her and her baby consumed him.
Deeks shook his head. "She died instantly."
Versey looked up at Deeks, fear replaced the worry.
"This Michael Coleman recognised Callen when they entered for their obstetrician appointment on September second. He was exiting the Medical Centre when they arrived, he did a double take of Callen and decided to follow them."
"You think Michael is responsible for Callen's wife's murder?"
"He's our only lead. You were spotted talking to him that day."
"You think I burned Callen for some enemy of his to kill his wife?" Horror spread across his face, "Deeks, you know me better than that."
"I do, which is why we're having this friendly chat alone right now."
Versey took in a deep breath to rein in his emotions. His hand shook on the table, he moved them underneath to calm his nerves.
"Our people are looking into it, but it looks like Jack was deliberately moved into LAPD to be your partner, to get to me and then to Callen. They just didn't expect to meet Callen at the Medical Centre, making their job that much easier."
"I don't understand," Versey furrowed his brow, suddenly he felt very cold and shivered.
"Either Jack was in on this, or he was moved because of his lack of family. Not certain which, but they couldn't get to any of us to find Callen, so they used you. They must know I'm LAPD."
"Who are they?"
"A Romanian crime family, the Comescus."
Versey shook his head, "never heard of them."
"You wouldn't, but the CIA, FBI, NCIS, NSA, Homeland, they all know them well."
"What do they have against Callen?"
"It goes back to just after World War Two. Callen's Grandfather killed some Comescus. So the family killed him, then Callen's mother when he was a kid. He's got no one left but the team. We're his family now. Then he met Joelle, had a piece of normal life for a few years, got married only a month before she was killed. She was ten weeks pregnant."
The news rocked Versey, "I'm so sorry, Callen, he must be…"
"He's on the edge of losing it big time. He wants revenge on anyone responsible. I do too."
Panic reflected in Versey's eyes. "You want to kill me?"
Deeks shook his head. "No. You were used. After I got shot, I had lots of training, learned the craft of making sure I wasn't followed or couldn't be targeted again. I was the weak link in the team, used to get to Kensi. Someone wanted to kidnap her to find someone."
"No one ever said why you were shot, after Callen and Sam visited and cleared me, I never knew…"
"No one was supposed to know. The work I do now is highly classified. The people I work with are ghosts, WE don't exist."
Versey nodded. "I get it. So you think this family found out you were LAPD, they found out how to get to you to find Callen?"
"Yes."
"I'm sorry, I had no idea."
"Thanks, Jeff. I know, but we need to put you into protective custody. If Michael and the Comescus find out we've found this out, your life could be in danger."
FBI agents appeared in the doorway. Deeks looked over to them. "He's ready to go."
"Just like that, I'm gone?"
"I'll let Bates know, Jeff. You'll have your job and a new partner when it's safe. I can't afford to lose you too."
Jeff looked at him, lost for words. He turned and followed the agents out the door. Not knowing what laid ahead of him.
Hetty's house
Marty Deeks pulled up outside Hetty's place, the one that hadn't been sold to the highest bidder a few years back. It had been the house where Callen lived from age fifteen.
"How is he?" He looked over to Sam and Kensi who chatted in the kitchen, making something to eat. His own stomach growled. "Any for me?"
"I'll make you something. We heard your chat with Versey, you did the right thing to send him away." Kensi looked at him with concern.
"I know, it's just hard when you're a cop and you find you've been taken for a ride like he has, then you have to leave your life behind and make a fresh start with a new identity."
"He'll be back before you know it, kicking your butt at basketball."
"No way. Kip and I will kick his butt at our next game."
She smiled. "That's the way."
"Hetty's making the arrangement for our trip. Callen's been talking to Nate, not sure how that's going."
"Is it okay if I see him?"
"Not yet. Wait until Nate's finished." Sam nibbled on a sandwich he'd made.
Deeks sighed and sat down, he wiped his hand over his face, he was shattered.
"You need to go home and get some rest, both of you," Sam observed them. "It's not easy with a baby at the best of times, but the hours we work, it's tough."
They nodded. "Call us if Nell or Eric find Michael Coleman."
"We will."
The Deeks' home
Deeks and Kensi revelled in the precious time they had with Milly that evening. She was bubbly and brought smiles to their faces, making the worries fade into the distance. They fell asleep as soon as they put Milly to bed.
A horrible noise filtered through the abyss, bringing Deeks and Kensi back to consciousness. His phone vibrated on the bedside table, he grabbed it and looked at the time. Five in the morning. "This better be good,"
"Deeks, you and Kensi need to get in here now. We've found Michael Coleman."
His eyes widened, he pressed Kensi's shoulder to nudge her awake. "Wake up, princess. We're needed in Ops."
She groaned and turned away from him, her head moved under her pillow.
He leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. "Wake up, sunshine."
"Go away, Marty."
"Nope, I'm not going anywhere until you get up. Eric called, they've found Michael Coleman."
Her eyes widened, she sat up too quickly for that time of the morning. "They have?" She looked at the clock. "At five? Do they ever sleep?"
"We need to drop Milly off at your Mom's on the way."
She nodded and dragged herself out of bed to get dressed.