A/N: Hi, lovely readers! I am just flabbergasted at the notice this little story has gotten, from the reviews to the followers…even some very nice mentions circulating on Tumblr after the last part (which totally shocked and humbled me).
I know many of you are using this as therapy for our collective Cote de Pression, so I apologize for the delay. My semester of seven courses started this week. Need I say more? :)
As always, enjoyenjoyenjoy. –Tatiana
- August, Pt. 1 -
It was late afternoon in Arlington, Virginia, and the all-in-one music store and piano studio smelled of oily polisher and pine dust, a combination wafting down from the piano repair center upstairs; it was also a recipe laden with memories for Tony. The last time he was in a similar establishment, he was no different than the children that sat outside the practice rooms now, waiting for their teacher to come out and their lesson to begin.
In fact, he was exactly like the young boy who was arguing with his mother, claiming he didn't want to "play the stupid piano anymore."
Tony had sidled up to the mom and son without realizing it and proceeded to shell out some unbidden advice. "You should really think about sticking with it."
"But it's boring," the kid replied, frowning.
"Look at it this way, girls dig musicians. Trust me." He hooked a thumb over his shoulder, indicating across the space to where his striking companion was perusing the rows of sheet music. The boy's brow furrowed. Maybe he was too young to properly appreciate the incentive.
But Tony was not. Personally, he was glad he'd quit early on—it facilitated making up for lost time now, and in more ways than one.
After eight years of skirting the inevitable with more finesse than a fortified hemline, they'd finally come to their senses two weeks earlier, and although the fruition of a romantic relationship with his former partner was long overdue, it was proving, as they say, worth the wait. He still couldn't get over what a relief it was to have someone to talk to about the things that matter, someone to come back to and to be there for, and who sought out the same from him. And he decided it was something he could definitely get used to.
The young pianists' choppy versions of nursery rhythms were nothing but distant echoes on the other side of the store. The distinctive Israeli was no longer in the sheet music aisle, so he searched for her until the strains of more sophisticated playing led him to a practice room tucked in the back.
As he suspected, inside the small room was Ziva, seated at the upright piano with her profile facing the full-length window in the door, which stood ajar. He smiled at the thought of her leaving it that way, expecting him to find her.
Not wishing to disappoint, Tony entered with a half-smile and a soft, "Hey."
At the sight of him, her rosy lips melted into a sideways crescent. "Where have you been?"
"Just looking around. Why," he asked, moving to stand over her, "you miss me?"
"Hmm," she hummed around the curve of his lips, pressed chastely to her mouth.
His thumb brushed over the apple of her cheek before he pulled away. Providing another, brighter smile to tide her over, he set to shutting the door and pulling up a chair for himself beside her bench. It wasn't lost on him that their student-teacher roles were reversed for the first time that summer. He resisted the temptation to retaliate for all those pinches, especially as he knew right where her alluring back dimples resided under the creamy cotton of her sundress…
By the time he was situated, she had returned to the keys, showing off à la a prima vista with the piece resting on the piano rack. Strung together, the chords sounded almost like—
"Is that the theme from Indiana Jones?"
Ziva looked impressed with his deduction. "It is a movie you like, yes? And those—" She pointed at the pile of music booklets atop the piano. A quick browse revealed them to be an array of the scores or main themes from films ranging from Field of Dreams to Rocky.
A big breath vacated his puffed cheeks as he took his seat again. "You're sure making it tough for me to quit."
The former assassin aimed to wink, but it came out as an endearing sort of blink. "Precisely."
He'd made the mistake of telling her that, in his opinion, the piano lessons had served their purpose. That didn't sit well with her relentless approach to challenges. Ever since, she'd made it her mission to retain his interest in the instrument through a variety of methods, including tapping into his movie addiction, apparently.
"Let's face it, Ziva. I'm not exactly a star pupil. I don't practice!" The acoustics in the small box picked up his laugh and amplified the ragged sound.
Impervious to his attempted deflection, the brunette slid over on the piano bench, her bare knees grazing the denim of his jeans, and reached out a hand. Her caress of his cheek and jaw line belied the potent timbre of her accented voice.
"As you say, I do know you, Tony. I know you do not always allow yourself to have what you really want."
His fingers wrapped around her hand, bringing it to his lips for a taste of the silky center of her cupped palm.
"I want you," he murmured against the sensitive spot.
"That—" Her fingernails ghosted the stubble near the corner of his mouth, effectively sending tingles shooting between his shoulder blades. "—you already have," she promised, catching his gaze and holding it fast in her own. "But that does not mean I will allow you to give up on this. Again."
Tony exhaled a quiet, almost disbelieving chuckle. "Yeah?"
She smiled slyly, confidence—in her ability to win him over, or maybe just in him—lending a radiant luster to her exotic features.
And it felt good, the warmth of her certainty on his skin.
Tony DiNozzo had woken up in his fair share of interesting places. On the floor of frat houses. The back of surveillance vans. The prison cell of a Somali terrorist camp. Nothing was quite so astonishing to him, however, as awakening beside her.
It wasn't Ziva's first sleepover. Over the past month, they could practically be considered living together for the number of hours a day (and night) she spent at his apartment. Yet it was the first time he'd known, even in his sleep, that the familiar topography of her cheekbone and the elegant curve of her eyelid would greet him. That her body would be warm and malleable and tangled up in his own. In essence, that he would wake up to his best friend, the woman who, without knowing it, had owned a slice of his heart—he had to admit—for years.
The anticipation of seeing her was how he came to be awake before her that morning. It beat a ringing cell phone for an alarm clock, beckoning him to gruesome crime scenes at obscene hours prior to sunrise. But that hadn't happened in months.
Truth be told, their state of unemployment probably should have unsettled him more. They still hadn't heard directly from Gibbs and per Abby's intel, Vance was running out of excuses to give SecNav to delay the search for their replacements. Instead, with the future of their jobs on hold, something new had slipped in and taken priority in his life.
And she was currently wrapped in his arms, exhaling feathery hot breath against his chest. For the first time ever, he had real food in his kitchen cabinets and refrigerator; there was a regular-sized bed in his bedroom; and he had a remarkable woman to share it all with by his side. If only he'd known sooner that the only thing he needed to grow up was the proper motivation...
She'd started to forgo her usual pre-dawn risings, indicating to Tony that she had acclimated to their new reality, too. Or maybe she was just that sated. Once touching was added to their repertoire, he'd had a terrible time keeping his hands off of her, even to let them sleep.
Power of suggestion working its magic, Tony found his fingers drawn to the bare stretch of her skin peeking out from beneath the drape of covers. The probing digits moved on the accord of a summers' worth of training to play the faint indentations of her ribcage as substitute piano keys. Each gentle tap of his fingertips was accompanied by a hum, slivered out between his pursed lips, producing the sound her skin could not emit for the corresponding notes.
As if to defy his thoughts, Ziva chose that moment to exhale a little moan and stir under his wispy ministrations.
"F major does not include a D#, Tony," she mumbled, her voice husky with grogginess.
His grin was involuntary. With his chest as her pillow, he felt her eyelashes flutter open as the weight of slumber eased from her limbs, lightening a load he would always be more than happy to bear.
"Are you saying I made a mistake, Miss David?"
Lifting her head, Ziva stacked her hands under her chin, peering up at him with half-lidded eyes. The vestiges of sleep softened her features to a hazy glow, and he knew he'd never grow tired of seeing her so content, especially if he was the one to rouse it to the surface.
"It has been known to happen," she countered before stifling a yawn into the back of her hand.
"I just don't think it's possible." Tony used his free hand to trace her jaw line, relishing the press of her cool cheek into his palm. "See, I have this excellent piano teacher..."
Her lips spread in a graceful smile, hazelnut eyes muted yet sparkling, a combination that elicited an excruciating ache of longing somewhere deep in his chest—and the only remedy was her.
No. He hadn't made a mistake at all.
Their friends found out during the next weekly dinner, held for the first time at an eatery near the Navy Yard, rather than one of their apartments, but it wasn't a conscious disclosure by the new couple.
Tony, for one, blamed the weather. The dog days of summer had brought with them a heat revival and the return of Ziva's wavy mane, the way he actually preferred it: sexy and untamed. Within the easy flow of companionship that enveloped their table, he reached out an unthinking hand and brushed a stray curl off of her forehead.
Personal boundaries had never been particularly observed by the partners, and yet there must have been a visible shift, in how the gesture failed to startle her, or the private smiles they exchanged afterwards, perhaps, that gave them away.
The resulting reactions varied from a mingling of amazement and jubilance (Abby) to an expression that bordered on unsurprised (McGee). They might also have inadvertently educated the dozen or so past colleagues and acquaintances that were dining at the restaurant, thereby doing their part to fuel the NCIS rumor mill from afar. Tony couldn't say he cared who knew about them, honestly.
"I think it's great," Abby announced, her pigtails bouncing. "I'm so happy for you two!"
McGee nodded sincerely. "Me, too."
"I mean," the forensic scientist continued, "just because you're out of your jobs, and Gibbs is who-knows-where, and Parsons is still out to ruin all of your lives, doesn't mean you should stop living." A good-natured pump of her arm across her body served as an exclamation point on the unusual statement of approval.
Tony raised his eyebrows. "Thanks—I think—for that, Abs."
"No problem. But, you do know what this means, right?"
"What is that?" Ziva asked, curiosity coloring her tone.
Abby and McGee glanced at each other and then back at the pair, but it was the computer genius who inclined toward them over the table.
"What are you going to do when we go back?" Their former teammate issued the question as if it was the most obvious of considerations.
"Rule #12," Abby chimed in ruefully, her optimism paling. "Gibbs definitely isn't going to be as happy for you guys as us."
"That's a good point," Tony allowed, the words slithering out despite his stiff jaw. "I'm sure we'll figure something out. Right, Ziva?"
When no audible reply came, he turned his head to search out her confirmation, uncovering hardness settled in the thin depression of her lips; beneath the cool glaze over her eyes, he saw her thoughts whirl in dizzying circles. Perhaps it hadn't been as obvious a consideration to her.
Then, subtly, her face angled away from him, tilting down in the same manner as it had on that night in his apartment after her father died. That she couldn't meet his gaze now worried him in the same measure as it had then, maybe more because shutting him out now carried greater consequences. And not for her alone.
In the shadow of the table, out of public view, he reached for her hand where it rested in her lap. His fingers instinctively intertwined with hers, but the grip she returned was weak, almost slack. The pressure of his hand increased, holding on tightly for them both.