An hour later, Tim was still sitting in the living room. Sarah had gone upstairs to keep Kayla and Jared busy. Tim watched as his mother shut all the windows and closed the windows. "Mom, there's no one out there."
"You don't know that. I'll bet you didn't think anyone was out there ready to shoot you earlier either," Jackie said as she continued what she was doing.
Tim sighed. He thought about saying that even if there were someone out there, shutting and the windows and shades wouldn't keep bullets out, but the last thing he wanted was to scare his mother even more. Instead, he stood up and walked over to his mother. He took her lightly by the arm so she was facing him. "Mom, it's okay."
Jackie looked at her son for a moment and then pulled him into her arms. "I can't lose you."
"You won't," Tim promised.
Jackie took a deep breath and pulled away. She needed to get herself together. She'd had her moment of weakness, but now she needed to be strong for her son. "You're damn right I won't. You're gonna do everything your father and Gibbs tell you, Got it?"
Tim smiled. He never thought he'd say it, but preferred it when she was barking out orders. That meant she would be okay. "Yes, ma'am."
"Alright, I'm going to go make sure the kids are away from the windows until protection gets here," Jackie said before leaving the room.
Just then there was a knock at the door.
Tim felt a knot develop in the pit of his stomach. He knew that was Gibbs and that he would have to tell the man the truth. He knew Gibbs wasn't going to be happy. If nothing else, he was going to be annoyed at it being kept from him for so long. Tim just hoped that was all he'd be mad about.
Vance came from the kitchen at that moment. "I got it. I'm gonna talk to him outside for a minute."
Tim nodded and sat down on the couch. He propped his feet up on the table and leaned back in an attempt to relax.
Vance, meanwhile, opened the front door and stepped outside. Unsurprisingly, Gibbs was there. "Hey, Gibbs. Thanks for coming."
"What's going on, Leon? What happened to your policy?" Gibbs asked. The first and only other time he'd gone to the director's house, the man hadn't been happy. He'd told Gibbs that he didn't like mixing work with his family.
"It went out the window a couple of hours ago," Vance said. Actually, if you wanted to get technical, it went out the window the minute Tim joined NCIS. That was the moment his work and his family started mixing. Still, he tried to keep work and family as separated as possible, and it had worked until now. "Someone tried to kill my son tonight."
Gibbs was both surprised and infuriated by what Vance had just told him. He'd met Vance's little boy. He was no older than ten. If there was one thing he hated, it was people who went after kids. "Is he okay?"
"Yeah, he's fine. I know what you're thinking. It's not Jared," Vance said.
Gibbs frowned slightly. "You got another son I don't know about?"
"Yes, I do. I have four children, Gibbs. Though two of them can't technically be considered children. They're well over eighteen," Vance said.
"So your other son is the one that was attacked," Gibbs said. He'd recovered quickly from learning Vance had other children besides the two he'd met. After all, he didn't really know the director that well, so it wasn't too surprising to learn something new.
"Yeah. My two oldest kids had just had dinner. They were shot at coming out by a sniper," Vance said.
"And you're sure your boy was the target?" Gibbs asked.
"Positive. There was a laser on the gun and it was pointed right at him. The only reason he's alive is because someone he was with noticed. If not for that, he would've been killed," Vance said. It really got to him. In fact, the more time that passed, the more he realized just how close he came to losing his son. It was almost debilitating to think about. If he'd lost Tim tonight… He didn't even wanna think about what it would've done to him. He wasn't sure he could've survived it.
Gibbs could see that Vance was affected by the near loss of his son. The man was trying to hide it, and he was doing a relatively good job, but it was there. He couldn't completely hide it. "Any idea why someone would wanna hurt your son?"
"Well, I'm his father. That alone is enough to make him enemies," Vance said. He knew that there were plenty of people out there who would wanna hurt Tim simply because he was his son. That was why he wanted both him and Sarah close. His entire family could be in danger. "But there are other reasons this could've happened. He's an agent, Gibbs. My son works for NCIS."
Now that surprised Gibbs. He would've thought that if Vance had a son working for NCIS that everyone would know about it. "Your son works for you."
"He does. SecNav knows about it. He's alright with it as long as there's no nepotism detected. No one else at NCIS knows because he doesn't carry my name," Vance said. Tim and Sarah both carried their biological mother's name as a tribute to her. Tim had wanted that. He had been worried that by getting adopted, he was betraying his mother, so they'd all decided them him and Sarah would take her last name.
"Do I know him?" Gibbs couldn't help but wonder. If Vance's son really did work for NCIS, there was a good chance Gibbs did know him. It made him wonder who it was.
"You do. You'll probably be pretty shocked when you see him. Before that happens though, I want something understood," Vance said. He'd said the last part in his touch, ruthless director voice. "My son is no different than any other agent. He filled out an application, he went through the FLETC training, and he started off at the bottom. I didn't lift a finger help him."
"I get the point, Leon. Your son wasn't favored," Gibbs said.
"And I won't have him treated like he was. I won't have you or anyone else disrespecting him, but claiming he didn't earn what he has," Vance said firmly. He doubted Gibbs would think such a thing, especially since he was the one to hire Tim for his team, but he wanted it made clear anyway.
"Understood, Director," Gibbs said.
"Good. Come inside," Vance said before opening the door and leading the way inside.
Gibbs followed Vance inside the house. He stopped dead in his tracks as soon as he made it all the way inside. McGee was sitting on the couch looking mighty comfortable in Vance's house.