A/N: I think it's time for another warning that this piece of fiction deals with very mature themes—some of which could be triggers for some readers. If you even think you might be bothered by this, please turn back now. Also, I'm not a doctor, not a psychiatrist, and this is not a self-help book. I'm simply tackling a tough subject (that I feel the show glossed over) in the ways that I imagine it could play out. All characters belong to their respective owners.
They lay side-by-side an hour later, both wide awake and staring at the ceiling.
Tony had started to lie on the floor after finishing up in the bathroom, but Ziva had shaken her head at him and motioned him to join her. He agreed, wordlessly and reluctantly, and had settled in as far from her small body as was possible.
But still they lay awake.
Finally, Ziva sat up, her voice somewhat rough when she said, "I guess I am not tired. I think I will go take a hot bath."
"Mmmmm. Good thinking," Tony said, deliberately murmuring the words and hoping she would think he was not having the same trouble sleeping as she was.
And then he found he wasn't. He tried not to think about what it meant that he drifted off to dream almost immediately after she left.
A nightmare complete with bathwater clouded not with bubbles but with blood jerked him awake and Tony stifled a gasp, glancing to his left to see if Ziva had returned. He found her side of the bed empty and fought a panic he wasn't sure stemmed from the nightmare or something else. He started to get up to search the house, but he stopped when he saw the light still sliding from under the bathroom door.
So he lay there for a long time, fighting the unsettled feeling that had started like a seed in his belly and grown until its offshoots were choking his throat. Long-buried memories peppered with images from the nightmare were floating near the surface, and Tony finally couldn't take it anymore.
He got up with a wince and a grudging thought that maybe Ziva was right about seeing a doctor. He stopped outside the door, fully expecting to hear her yell at him to go away.
But he was greeted with only silence.
"Ziva?"
There was not even a splash in answer.
He swallowed his nausea along with the memories that were still fresh from the nightmare and called her name again, knowing he sounded a bit strangled by the vines of worry wrapping tough tendrils around his throat.
"Ziva!" he barked, borrowing the tone from Gibbs as he lifted a hand to knock hard on the door.
He hadn't noticed it wasn't quite closed, and it swung inward, making Tony wonder if Ziva had left it open on purpose and why she would do that.
And then he stopped wondering anything.
Ziva stood in the middle of the room, stark naked and dripping wet—and blinking as if she had been awakened by his voice and had popped to her feet in surprise. Tony just stood in the doorway, stunned speechless.
And it was not by her beauty.
He had known she had a great body. He knew she ran and watched what she ate and did all of those things necessary to be able to strut around in a world-class body.
He had not known, however, that she had been taking a razor blade to that beautiful form.
Thin red lines stood out on her left thigh, and her hands came up quickly to cover them, leaving her more private parts on full display. Tony shook off his shock and grabbed a robe off the back of the door. He held it out to her, not wanting to scare her by draping it over her shoulders. But she didn't move to take it, and he covered her, realizing she was too ashamed to move her hands from the self-inflicted wounds.
Ziva's mouth was slightly open, but there were no words. Tony gently put an arm around her shoulders and led her back into the bedroom, feeling her shake as she sat woodenly on the side of the bed. He released her and started to move away, but her small hand landed on his arm, her dark eyes locking with his.
He could read only about half the emotions raging in those eyes, but he knew whatever she was about to say didn't need to be heard by Gibbs and McGee, who were back at their listening posts. He lifted a finger and pressed it to her lips, shaking his head slightly and pointing to the microphone.
He knew the other agents had night vision on them, but he didn't care. He wasn't really thinking about what Gibbs would think or what McGee would say. He wasn't really thinking about either of their careers, or their undercover op.
All he could think about were those little red lines—and the little white ones that told him far more than he wanted to know.
He leaned closer until he was speaking directly into her ear. He was so close he could smell the lavender shampoo on the wet tendrils brushing his cheek.
"Don't say a word yet."
He wasn't sure if the little twitch she gave was an answer or a shiver, but he figured he had to go with it. Knowing full well Gibbs would be pissed—and quite likely pull both of them from the assignment—he pulled her to her feet and pulled her gently back toward the bathroom, the only room in the house that wasn't covered with microphones or cameras.
Leading Ziva to sit down on the side of the tub, Tony moved to kneel in front of his partner. He took her trembling hands into his and whispered, trying not to plead, "Talk to me, Ziva."
"I…" she began, pulling her hands from his and tucking them tightly around herself. "There is really nothing to say. You saw everything."
He saw the shame in her eyes and knew it wasn't from being naked in front of her partner. He shivered at the thought of those cuts and he asked, "Is that all of it?"
"Is it not enough?" she asked, but her voice was blank.
He flinched. "I mean, have you been drinking? Doing other things to cope with what happened to you?"
Apparently, that was the wrong thing to say because he saw the anger rise in her eyes. "Just because you got wasted every night wallowing in your guilt over Jenny does not mean I would need to."
He sat back on his heels before sliding down the bathroom cabinets and sitting on the damp floor. He still couldn't drink Scotch without thinking about Jenny lying in a pool of her own blood, all alone as she faced down a death squad in that dusty diner, and the memory hurt because the guilt was still there. But he shrugged it off. This wasn't about his pain or his guilt.
"There are people who can help you, Ziva," he said, watching her bristle at the suggestion. He knew she would have had no problems shrugging off the agency shrinks. The woman was trained by Mossad; some geeky overachiever from Harvard didn't stand a chance.
"I need no shrink, as you call them," she said tightly. "I can take care of myself."
He hesitated, then decided it was better to say it and have her hit him than to agree with her on that admirable, sad, completely wrong statement. "That's not taking care of yourself, Ziva. That's hurting yourself in one way to alleviate a different kind of pain," he said, his voice soft. He looked at her and noticed thin stripes of blood had seeped through the white terrycloth robe. He moved his eyes back up to her face and took a breath, adding firmly, "You need help."
Her jaw went so tight he could practically hear her teeth grinding, but then she smiled softly, her hand suddenly at the belt of the robe.
"You can help me."
Before he even registered the words or the heat in her eyes, she was on the floor, kneeling between his knees with her mouth on his. The robe had fallen open and he could feel her warm, damp body moistening his t-shirt as she plundered his mouth with her tongue.
The pressure made his split lip hurt.
The desperation in her kiss made his heart hurt worse.
He realized his hands were pressed firmly to the floor on either side of where he sat to keep from reaching up and exploring the bare skin hovering over his body. He reached up and cupped her face in his hand, gently putting space between them.
He could feel her minty breath puffing out as she stared into his eyes.
"Ziva, please. You don't want this."
His voice seemed to break some kind of spell, and she pulled back, curling against the side of the tub, lavender-scented bathwater long forgotten. She pulled her knees up and the robe tightly around her. There was barely a foot between their bodies, but her expression was so closed she might well have been back in Israel.
"No," she said, averted eyes coming up to meet his. "You just do not want me."
"Ziva," he said, shaking his head slightly. He was glad Ziva had insisted on not wiring the bathroom—and then suddenly sick when he realized why. He shoved aside those thoughts. "I've always wanted you."
She blinked as if shocked by that. As if she didn't remember all of their flirting, their teasing. But then she smiled sadly. "So why did you never act on it? If you wanted me so badly."
He weighed his words, wondering how much of the truth he should give her—wondering if he even knew the truth himself. Considering he would give her just about anything to ease her suffering, he said, "Rule No. 12."
She just gave him a look. "And being with me would go against Gibbs' wishes," she said dully, the look in her eyes patronizing. "And we cannot have that, can we?"
Tony bit back everything he wanted to say to that: that Gibbs had his rules for a reason; that Gibbs was their supervisor, like it or not; that Gibbs had been there for him when he had really needed someone.
"You remember Paula Cassidy, right?"
She narrowed her eyes at him, as if she remembered everything about the woman—everything about Tony's easy familiarity with the pretty female agent. She nodded.
He looked away, making up his mind, and then said, "When she and I first met, there was a spark between us. A lot like there was between us. And Gibbs saw it." He paused, feeling his throat tighten as he recalled dancing with Paula in Cuba so long ago. He forcibly shoved away visions of what had been left of her body—a body he had touched, held, made love to—after that explosion. "And then he called me on it."
Ziva rolled her eyes as if to say she was less than surprised by that.
"Being Gibbs, he wasn't exactly nice about it, either. I was upset and angry at the time, but then Kate later told me that Gibbs told her that romance between agents never works out." Tony stopped, not even remotely surprised that Kate could still haunt him, still hurt him. He was never quite sure why, but talking about Kate to Ziva had always felt like some sort of betrayal, and he usually avoided it at all costs. "He was trying to protect me."
Ziva's eyes hardened, and Tony realized bringing up that fact probably wasn't the greatest idea when Ziva obviously was hurt that Gibbs had chosen him in Israel, that Gibbs hadn't been there to protect her.
But then she said, "And you think I need protecting?" She scoffed. "From you?"
He sighed. "Do you really think we would be good together, Ziva?"
That seemed to take her by surprise, but then she lifted a shoulder. "I had fun today."
"So did I," Tony said, trying not to shift uncomfortably on the hard floor—and trying not to think too hard about the lightning-quick shifts in her moods. "But I mean long-term. Day after day. I would drive you insane."
She didn't speak so he admitted softly, "I'd probably cheat on you. I'm terrible at commitment."
She still didn't say anything to that so he tried for humor. "And then you'd kill me if you ever found out. And then Gibbs would be down two agents, take his anger out on poor McGeek and kill him too. See? Not so good."
She cracked a smile, but it was nowhere near happy. "You do not have to do this, Tony. You can just tell me you do not want me. I am a big girl. I can handle it." She paused, closing her eyes as if to stop tears. She shrugged again. "I do not blame you. Who would want me? I am damaged."
"Don't," he said, surprising them both with his sharpness. "You are not damaged. What happened to you was unspeakable, Ziva, but it didn't change who you are."
She regarded him with those sad eyes again, and he suddenly wondered if that was true.
But he continued anyway. "You're still the strongest person I know. You're still someone who has been through all kinds of hell and still finds a way to smile." He gave her a smile of his own. "You're still my crazy ninja-chick."
She stared for so long that he wondered what he would do if she simply stopped talking altogether. But then she was moving, quickly enough to be true to her nickname, and he found her suddenly naked on his lap, the blood-flecked robe tossed aside and her lips pressed to his before he could even say a word.
Just as his brain registered what was happening—which was a split-second after another part of his body registered her soft weight—she pulled back, her eyes hopeful.
"So you do still want me," she said, and it was half-question, half-statement.
He was stunned and couldn't have answered even if he had wanted to. Unfortunately, his body answered for him, and she grinned, kissing him hard again as her hand slid down, slipping into his boxers and gripping him firmly in her damp hand. His whole body jerked at the contact and he cursed the little voice in his head that reminded him it had been a while since a beautiful woman he been straddling him. He realized his hands were still pressed to the floor and he willed them to stay there even as she sucked on his lip and stroked him with long, lazy movements of her obviously skilled hand.
Ziva, please, he thought. You really don't want this.
He was just trying to open his mouth enough to speak when she made a frightened little gasping noise and shoved herself off him. He sat there, breathing hard and watching her spit into the sink. He raised a hand to his mouth and realized her desperate kisses had reopened the wound in his lip and what she was now spitting into that sink was his blood. He realized she was sobbing silently and shaking with something that definitely was not desire, and all of the implications of her reaction to tasting his blood hit him like a freight train. His sorrow for her was like a physical ache in his chest, and he barely felt the muscles seizing up in his back as he stood, approaching her as he would a venomous snake.
"Ziva," he said softly, firmly, hoping to call her out of her waking nightmare.
He watched as she scooped water into her mouth and spit the pinkish liquid back into the sink. She splashed more water on her face, the droplets mixing with the tears until he couldn't distinguish the two, and then she picked up a towel to dry her face.
It wasn't working.
He stayed as silent as the tears streaming down her pale cheeks as he watched her, wondering what the hell he was going to do. Besides telling Gibbs she needed to be pulled from the assignment. She turned so quickly that he was ridiculously afraid she had heard his thoughts, but then she was in his arms, crying against his shoulder. It broke his heart to think that someone could be hurt so badly that she learned to sob without making a sound.
He put his arms around her, holding her tightly and wishing he could make it all go away. He wasn't in love with her, didn't want to marry her or watch their kids grow up.
But still he loved her.
Just as Kate had been like a little sister, Ziva was his family. He tried not to think about all of the reasons why he needed substitutes to fill that hole in his life. He revised his thoughts, though, as he fought his body's natural reaction to a very female form pressed against him. Ziva was more like an infuriatingly sexy cousin, flirting mercilessly but knowing nothing would ever come of it. At least Tony had thought they felt the same way—until her hands had been in his pants, offering him something that his body obviously thought he wanted.
A sudden, sharp pain made him jerk as the muscles spasmed in his back. The shifting of his body had a part of him suddenly pressed hard against a much softer part of her.
Ziva drew back, shoving out of his arms with an animal cry of rage. Before Tony could even start to apologize, he saw the flash of the razor blade in her hand. He held his hands up, palms outward in a classic position of surrender, but he didn't know if it would do any good. Her eyes were flashing with a rage so intense he knew she wasn't seeing him.
His heart broke all over again for what she had gone through—what he couldn't even begin to imagine trying to endure. That heart was also crammed somewhere up in his throat as he realized she was just as likely to cut herself accidentally in an attack as she was to slice him. He thought briefly about bolting, knowing he was closer to the door.
But those bleeding wounds on her thigh made him stay.
He suddenly wished they had stayed in the bedroom. Gibbs and McGee would no doubt have stormed the place by now. And that made Tony glad they hadn't. Ziva was in enough pain without having to deal with her co-workers witnessing her breakdown.
"Ziva, please," he said. "It's me. It's Tony, and I'm not going to hurt you. Can you hear me?"
His soft words were like flipping a switch, and her eyes suddenly focused on him and he knew she was back to seeing reality instead of her worst nightmares come back to life. She seemed to realize she had the blade in her hand, and she set it aside, plucking the robe from the floor and covering herself. She did it all without a hint of shame and he knew she had found her game face again.
He wished she hadn't.
"You are going to tell Gibbs to pull me from this op, yes?" she said, her voice dull.
He ran a hand through his hair and let out the breath he had been holding. "I have to," he said, hoping it wouldn't send her into another rage.
She simply nodded.
He waited, but she did not speak.
"Ziva? You're okay with that?" he asked, trying not to sound too hopeful.
"You need someone here to watch your back," she said, lifting a shoulder. "And now you cannot trust me to do that."
"I trust you with my life, Ziva," he said immediately. "I wouldn't be here in the first place if I didn't."
She laughed without humor. "But that was before you knew how crazy I am."
"You're not crazy, Ziva. You went through hell in Africa, but I don't think you're crazy."
She eyed him, shaking her head with disgust. "You keep saying that. And you know what? You do not know what happened out there. You do not know about them interrogating me, blasting my religion, hitting me." She stopped and looked him dead in the eyes. "You do not know about them holding me down and raping me. So many times, so many different men that after a while I started keeping track of them and giving them names so it would not feel like such a … such a fucking violation."
He tried to keep his face impassive, but he knew the sympathetic pain was showing in his eyes. He cursed himself, for all the clichéd reasons of hating his maleness, but also because he had never felt so helpless in all his life, had never felt so completely inept.
She continued, "So now you will tell Gibbs all of that, and I will lose my job."
He gaped at her, feeling a hint of anger that she would think he would repeat something so painful, so horrible. "I would never tell him what you told me."
She lifted a disinterested shoulder. "But you will tell him that I cannot do my job."
"Ziva. I have to. It's for your own safety. Yeah, we sat around and watched movies all day, but our real work is catching a killer. Since the nights are the hardest for you, I don't think this is a good idea."
She didn't speak, and he could tell she wanted to leave the small confines of the bathroom, the air thick not with steam from her bath but with the tension between the two agents.
"I don't have a choice," he said, feeling more miserable than he had in a long time.
Her eyes flicked up to his. "Sure you do. You are simply choosing to rat me out." She held up a hand to stop his response and her eyes were suddenly angry. "So go ahead. Do it. And then I will have no job. McGee and Abby and Gibbs will want nothing to do with me because I am damaged goods. And I have no family because they betrayed me. And I cannot go home because I renounced my country thinking it was for the best. So tell Gibbs, Tony. And then I will get a job as a secretary or something. And it will be fine until one day when my boss grabs my ass and I will be lost in the memories of those pigs with their dirty hands on me. And my Mossad training will kick in and I will likely kill the man. And then I will probably kill myself, because really? What will I have to live for?"
He was reeling, trying to take in that bleak premonition and find ways to refute it.
She scoffed at him. "I really did not think I would have to explain to you, of all people, that my job is my life, Tony. But go ahead and take it from me," she said, shrugging. "It will be you who has to live with the consequences."
She smiled darkly.
"Not me."