This is the last chapter. Hopefully it's not too cheesy, but I wanted to give them a happy ending of sorts. Thanks so much to everyone who took the time to read this and write all those encouraging reviews! Hope you enjoy!

Note: If there are any inaccuracies in regard to locations of anything, I apologize, I wrote this from my memories of the last time I was in DC.

Disclaimer: Sadly, I don't own any rights to the #1 scripted drama on television. The only thing I own is a laptop.

Chapter 4

The black unmarked cars pull up to the National Mall, where, according to the trace, Harper Dearing has decided to make his last stand. They arrive as the sun has begun to set on the mid-May afternoon in the nation's capitol city. The proximity to the Capitol Building has caused fear of another terrorist attack, causing Homeland Security to get involved. With the amount of FBI and Homeland Security agents, plus two of NCIS's best agents, the likelihood of Dearing getting away this time are next to none.

"Keep your eyes peeled!" Fornell shouts. He barks out instructions to his agents and then goes to coordinate with Homeland Security.

"Do you really think he plans to make an attack on the Capitol, Tony?" Ziva asks as they get out of Fornell's car.

"Doubt it," Tony answers. "He's already made his point. He wants to punish the Navy for his son's death. He's not looking to take down the government, or at least there's nothing in his history that would suggest that."

"Then what is he doing here?" she asks, both to herself and Tony.

"Maybe he wants to make a scene?" he theorizes.

"But he's already done that," she points out. "He blew up half the Navy Yard."

"Well, then maybe Homeland Security's right. Maybe he's not finished," he postulates. Ziva contemplates this. It's a possibility that Harper Dearing is trying to get back at the government; NCIS is a government agency after all. But after her seven years as an investigator, her gut tells her that this isn't the reason Harper Dearing is here. Another thought crosses her mind.

"Or maybe he is," Ziva says. Tony's about to ask her what she means by that when a voice from their earpieces shouts,

"I've got visual on Dearing! He's by the Smithsonian, headed west towards the Washington Monument!"

Tony and Ziva look towards the spot, and can't miss the face they've been staring at on computer and TV screens for a month; Harper Dearing's. They draw their guns and take off towards him.

"Be careful!" Tony warns Ziva; if anything ever happened to her, she's the one thing he knows he can't live without.

"Same to you," she returns. By virtue of her youth and tip top physical shape, and the fact that she goes running every morning, Ziva reaches Dearing before Tony.

" Federal Agents! Freeze!" she shouts at him. Innocent bystanders see the badge and the gun and know that something's wrong; people start panicking. In such a public place, this could spell disaster. Ziva begins to realize that the location Dearing has picked may not have been chosen because of what he planned to do, but because of how he would be caught. He wanted people to see. He wanted it to be public and frightening. He wanted the whole city to know that he'd done this for Evan.

"Put your hands where we can see 'em!" Tony shouts as he catches up to her, placing himself behind Dearing while Ziva stands in front of him. He has nowhere to run. A sly grin creeps across the deranged man's face as he lifts his empty hands in the air.

"NCIS?" he says surprisedly when he notices their badges. "Awfully sorry about your headquarters. But transgressions must be avenged, you know."

"You killed innocent people," Ziva shouts. Dozens of federal agents have by now caught up with them and have formed a strategic position in a circle around Harper Dearing and the two NCIS agents who have apprehended him.

"I did this for Evan!" Dearing shouts. And those are his last words.

The only thing anyone hears is the whir of a bullet and the loud crack as it collides with Dearing's skull. Everyone looks around in shock as Dearing's dead body lies on the ground in a pool of blood. The kill shot had seemingly come from the sky, out of thin air.

Gibbs, Tony and Ziva think as they look each other in the eye. There's only one person in the world who could have made that shot. That man was a Marine sniper who always says that there's no such thing as an ex-Marine. That man is Leroy Jethro Gibbs.

When Tony and Ziva get back to the hospital, Gibbs and Abby are sitting next to McGee's bed. His eyes are open, and they focus on his two partners as they enter the room.

"McGee!" Ziva cries when she sees him and makes her way over to his bed faster than an eye can blink. Tony follows suit.

"Tony, Ziva," McGee croaks out. "You're okay."

"You're the one we're all worried about, McInjured," Tony jokes, then corrects himself, "I mean, Tim." McGee smiles slightly.

"Dearing?" he asks.

"Dead," Gibbs answers. Everyone in the room looks at Gibbs; they know. Dearing was his from the start.

"Good," McGee whispers, before slowly drifting off to sleep.

"Gibbs," Ziva begins, "where-?"

"Roof of the Smithsonian Institution," Gibbs says as he gets up from his chair and heads out the door, "not that anyone needs to know." With that he leaves Tony, Ziva, Abby, and a sleeping McGee alone in the hospital room.

Tony walks over to Ziva and lays his arm around her shoulders, hugging her to him. The worst is over, and Dearing is dead. The only thing left to do is heal and rebuild.

"You think Gibbs forgives us for breaking Rule Number 12?" Tony asks her, still assuming that Abby already knows about them.

"Wait what?" Abby says, shocked. "Rule Number 12? Never date a…oh my god you guys! Really?"

"Gibbs didn't tell you?" Ziva asks, surprised.

"No. Why?"

"No reason," Tony replies. Abby smiles as she leaps up to hug them.

"I knew it! Ever since you got back from Somalia, I knew it! Well, maybe even before then I knew, of course after that whole thing with Ziva and Michael Rivkin and before that with Tony undercover-dating Jeanne Benoit I wasn't sure, and then again with EJ and Ray, but you two still acted so, you know-"

"Abby," Tony interrupts her.

"Yes?"

"Rambling."

"Oh, sorry." Just then McGee groans, the painkillers apparently worn off, and Abby runs to go find a nurse. As soon as she returns, Tony pulls Ziva towards the door.

"Come on. Let's go home."

Ziva walks into Tony's apartment as he closes the door behind them and looks around. It's been a while since she's been here. Not much has changed, except his DVD collection has certainly grown, and she's pretty sure he's gotten a new, bigger TV.

She suddenly realizes just how exhausted she is, both physically and emotionally. It's dark, and while she's hungry for dinner, she really just wants to lay down and sleep. Instead, she walks over to Tony's couch and sits down.

"You want me to order a pizza?" Tony asks as he locks his sidearm away in a safe placed on a shelf in his living room. Ziva shakes her head. She hasn't spoken a word since they left the hospital. Tony's concerned about her.

"Hey," he murmurs as he sits down next to her on the couch. "What's going on in that pretty little head? You okay?"

It's now that the tears start to fall again as she shakes her head "no", because she isn't okay. Tony wraps his arms around her and pulls her to him.

"It's going to be okay," Tony whispers, "he's dead. He's never coming back. We're going to be okay." But even as he says this, tears start to pool in his eyes, no matter how many times himself that DiNozzo men don't cry. Because he doesn't know that they're going to be okay. Every time he looks behind him at whatever horror he's been through, he thinks there isn't any other way the world can screw him over. And for every time he does this, he turns around to see some knew monster looming in his mist. He can't beat it. They can't beat it. These thoughts scare him, and he holds her tighter still.

"Are we, Tony?" Ziva asks weakly. "Are we going to be okay?"

"We, as in, you and me?" he asks, recalling the conversation they'd had less than a year ago when he'd asked her this same question and she'd said that she didn't mean that.

"Yes," she replies this time. "You and me." She looks up at him with tears in her eyes, desperate tears that cloud her beautiful face. He can't bear to see her like this. He knows this is her breaking point. All the fear she's felt over the past few years, all the walls she's put up because she's been hurt way too many times, like the ones he's put up because he's been hurt way too many times, everything's coming crashing down. The one thing she needs is stability; the one thing the both need is stability.

"Ziva, look at me," Tony says gently as he cups her face in his hand. "I can't promise you much. I can't promise you we won't be dead tomorrow, or in a week from now, or a month or a year. I can't promise you that nothing bad is ever going to happen to us again. I can't promise you that everything's going to go back to being the same as it was, because quite frankly, I'd be lying to you." He pauses and takes a deep breath. "But I can promise you this; as long as I'm alive, nothing's going to touch you that doesn't touch me too. Nobody's going to hurt you without having to deal with me. I can promise you that you're the one person in this world that I cannot live without. If I can promise you one thing, I can promise you stability. I'll be the same man at the end of the day as I was in the beginning. I won't take off and leave you waiting for a silly little phone call. I won't lie to you. And I know that's not much, but that's the best I can do. And I'm doing it for you."

Ziva looks up at Tony as he promises her all these things, all these things that aren't much, but in reality is everything she's ever wanted. Tony's promising her something permanent, the one thing that can't be taken away; his heart. It's everything she's ever dreamed of. But there's that part of her that keeps telling herself that she can't take it, that there's a reason she can't have this happiness.

"Tony, I, I…can't," she says helplessly. He looks at her confusedly.

"You can't what?" he asks.

"I…I don't deserve any of that."

"Ziva, what are you talking about?"

"I don't deserve any of those things, Tony!" she shouts. "I've done some terrible things, Tony. I've killed people." Tony looks at her sadly.

"It's part of the job, Ziva. I've shot my fair share of bad guys too. And with Mossad, you were doing your job, following orders…"

"No, Tony. You don't understand."

"Then make me."

Suddenly, she's afraid, even more afraid than she's been all day. What if he hates her? What if he thinks she's a monster? What if he decides he doesn't love her after all? But she loves him, and she has to tell him now.

"I…I killed Ari," she says feebly. Tony shakes his head, sure that this is a misunderstanding, that today's trauma has just brought up old memories she's kept suppressed.

"No, Ziva. Gibbs shot Ari." She shakes her head.

"Gibbs…filled out a false report…" she continues, trying to convince him. "I killed Ari. I killed my own brother," she whispers, her voice breaking. And finally Tony understands.

"Oh Ziva," he whispers, hugging her to his chest. She buries her face in his dress shirt as she sobs and mumbles weak, meaningless apologies, and he rubs her back comfortingly. He repeats her name over and over again. "You did what you had to do." She nods against his chest. "I can't possibly blame you for that. You saved Gibbs' life. What you did seven years ago…that's the past. You have to move on. You can't keep blaming yourself for all those things from the past. I've done it, and…you can't. Trust me, you can't."

Ziva sniffles.

"Then, you don't hate me? You don't think I'm a monster?" she asks softly.

Tony sputters.

"Why would you ever think that I would? Ziva, I told you that I love you. I meant it. That's never going to change, do you understand me?"

"Yes, Tony," she answers, a small smile creeping across her lips. "I love you too. And I mean it."

Tony smiles lovingly down at Ziva as he leans his face down to her's and kisses her tenderly. Ziva wraps her arms around his neck and kisses him back.

Gibbs turns around at the sound of two sets of footsteps making their way down his basement stairs. Unsurprisingly, Tony and Ziva stand in his basement, hands intertwined, their eyes pleading with him.

"What do you two want?" he sighs.

"Your blessing," Ziva replies shyly.

"And what makes you think you need it?"

"Rule Number 12, boss," Tony answers. "We know we're breaking your rules."

"Damn right you are."

"But that's not going to stop us from being together," Tony continues.

"Never thought it would, DiNozzo." All three of them stand in silence.

"So what's the verdict?" Ziva asks, for once getting the expression right. Gibbs takes a deep breath.

"Rule 51: Sometimes, you're wrong." Tony and Ziva look at each other, then at Gibbs.

"Does this mean…?" Ziva asks hesitantly.

"Go on," Gibbs says, "get out of my basement. Go have dinner, or see a movie, or whatever it is you kids do these days." Tony and Ziva's eyes light up.

"Thanks boss," Tony says gratefully, before he and Ziva turn and make their way up the stairs, knowing that they have the blessing of the man who has always been like a father to them.

It starts to rain as they reach Tony's car (he'd gone back for it after grabbing his other set of car keys from his apartment). Tony goes to open the passenger door for Ziva, but she stops him.

"What?" he asks as she moves closer to him.

"Nothing," she replies as she wraps her arms around his waist and kisses him.

Tony smiles into the kiss as he pulls her close to him. And so they stay, kissing, in the rain, knowing that no matter happens from now on, they will have each other.

Fin.