Chapter 4

The alarm clock sounded in the dark of the room, rousing Tony from his sleep deprived state, 4 hours was not a suitable amount of time for a Special Agent to sleep at night. Dragging himself out of bed and heading for the shower he remembered his conversation with Gibbs the night before. Well it could have been worse; he could have actually spoken those words out loud in front of Ziva. He was not looking forward to sitting behind his desk all day, the case was going nowhere and they had yet to get the green light on the stake out to gather evidence on the wife. They would need to simply wait until they were able to move forward until then he would work on the paper work that just seemed to continue to pile up on his desk, maybe he could bribe McGee into doing it for him, offer to be nice to him for a change or show him how to not be a computer geek. The water was not too hot and not too cold in the shower and Tony was able to enjoy the sensation and forget about his problems. Giving into his fate he stepped out of the shower and got ready, hoping to arrive at the office before anyone else including Gibbs. Tony arrived into the square that housed the team's desks and saw that the Boss was already in his chair holding onto a cup of coffee; of course he wasn't able to arrive before him it was as if he slept here when he wasn't working on his boat. "This way DiNozzo" said Gibbs as Tony sat down his rucksack next to his chair. "On your six Boss", the two of them made their way down to Abby's lab where she was spinning on a chair listening to her music at the highest level possible. "ABBY!". She abruptly stopped spinning and turned to face Gibbs while switching her music off via remote. "You don't have to shout Gibbs, this is my lab, its morning break and I don't have anything for you otherwise I would have known you were coming since that's your thing, you arrive when I just find out that I have something. Not that I need to have something for you to come here it's just that – ", Gibbs interrupted her before she could finish her rambling sentence, "I know you don't have anything Abs I want you and DiNozzo to try and find anything you can on Sanchez that could tie him to our dead marines wife". DiNozzo looked towards Gibbs in confusion, "Don't you think this is something that McGee would be better at, I mean he is the computer geek of us all", this earned Tony a slap to the head and he flinched, "But you know best Boss, on it!". As Gibbs walked out he heard Abby slap Tony on the arm, a gesture he believed could be due to the tension between DiNozzo and Ziva and one he hoped could knock some sense into him, he had more or less given the go ahead for the breaking of Rule 12.

Gibbs returned to his desk and was still there when Ziva exited the lift with McGee by her side. "I expected you to be mad that we did not return last night, what did you do when we did not come back McGee?" "I just went home, you know, to play some online video games as normal" Ziva narrowed her eyes at the back of McGee's head as he walked by her and sat down behind his desk. He was lying but she was unsure why he would feel the need to. Gibbs cleared his throat and Ziva realised he was right in front of her and no longer sitting in his chair. "Problem Ziva?" she sat her bag down on the floor and shook her head. "DiNozzo is in the lab with Abby working on finding anything that will tie Sanchez to our dead marine and his wife, I want you two to go see the wife again, see if you see anything suspicious in her behaviour". Ziva and McGee grabbed their gear and headed back towards the lift again to begin work, as they stepped in Ziva scrutinised McGee again for signs of unease, "So how long did you play the shooting game last night?..".

Tony was lying back in Abby's chair catching up on some sleep when she hit the on button on her stereo and he nearly jumped out of his skin. "ABBY! Can't you see I'm sleeping here" "Sorry Tony! I forget other people come down here I'm used to working on my own, it's my thing". He stretched his legs out in front on him and closed his eyes again, after a while he felt like someone was staring at him and since Abby was the only one in the room he kept them shut causing her to have to speak to get his attention. "Don't you feel it when someone stares at you Tony?" "Yes Abby but I chose to ignore the fact that you were". She pulled her lab chair over towards him and sat down. "So Tony, anything new in your life that you would like to share?" he opened his eyes to find her invading his personal space and slid his chair further back, "No, is there something that you think is new in my life, have you been looking over my computer history again? Because people Google all sorts of things it doesn't mean it's related to their life". "No I haven't Tony but keep in mind that I can find out anything about you I wish but that's not why I was asking, just wondering if you had maybe realised anything about yourself recently, say… a secret love you have been harbouring and not acknowledging?". Tony stared at her for a while, surely Gibbs had not discussed anything he had said with Abby, sure she was his favourite but the Boss knew how to keep a secret, she must be fishing for something and doesn't actually know anything. "Secret love?" he chuckled, "I don't have secret loves Abby you should know that but at this moment I have no interests in woman, well I have some interest in them of course I would but –". Abby sighed and rose from her chair and walked through the screen doors towards her lab "Forget I asked Tony, you'll come to me soon enough".

McGee and Ziva arrived at the wife's house earlier than expected; upon exiting the car they noticed that the light was on in the porch which was strange during the day but nothing to warrant suspicion. They knocked on the door and waited for an answer which never came. Ziva took the back door whilst McGee looked through the front window. The body of the marine's wife was sprawled on the floor with a pool of blood that had oozed from a gunshot wound to the back of the head. "Ziva I have a body in the front room, enter with caution". They headed into the house, Ziva made sure all the rooms were clear and McGee checked the pulse of the wife, dead. "McGee call this into the Boss, there's evidence here, look at this bullet case". 20 minutes later the whole team were in the front room with Tony taking pictures of the crime scene before they all returned to NCIS.

Ducky finished the autopsy and sent the bullet embedded in the wife's head up to Abby for analysis. The rest of the team focused on finding a motive behind the murder of one of their prime suspects in the marine murder case. Tony tapped his pen on his desk whilst trying to sort through the case notes they had accumulated so far. "So we have a marine who had just been granted a very large inheritance, which goes to the wife in event of his death, who is having an affair with a known drug dealer who is off the radar and now the wife is dead too.. It has to be our drug dealer, there is no-one else with a motive to kill her unless someone knew about the money and had access to it". McGee typed some information into his computer and then spun round in his chair to be face on with Tony, "The bank account that held the money has been cleared out within the last 4 hours, Ducky put time of death at 2 hours ago, and she must have emptied it before she died". Just then Ziva piped up and the two agents jerked their heads up not having heard her approach them. "Sanchez must have known she was emptying it and he killed her and then taken the money however we still have no idea where he is or if it even was his bullet that killed her". The 3 of them slumped into their chairs, annoyed that they didn't have a lead on where Sanchez was and nothing to do. Gibbs entered from the left and sat at his desk when the phone rang. "That was Abby, the bullet matches Sanchez's registered weapon and lucky enough the BOLO worked out and he's just been spotted entering the home of a known associate in the drug 'business' ". All of them jumped up and grabbed their gear with Tony grinning, "Looks like we got a lucky break for once". "Unlike the wife DiNozzo", "Yes Boss of course this is sad, being sad now Boss". Gibbs smirked at Tony and then looked at McGee, "Go down to the lab and help Abby with anything, she's trying to back trace Sanchez's movements since he's been off the grid, Tony Ziva you two head to where Sanchez is, do not approach him, stake out the place, remain unseen, this guys dangerous with a lot of help, I don't give you permission to be seen". Tony motioned to Ziva to walk in front of him, "Stake Out Time!" Ziva smiled at his remark, unsure about how this night was going to unfold, her and Tony in a small car for a long period of time.