A/N: Aaaaand I'm finally deciding to update again. Again, I'm so sorry that this is taking me so long! Buuuut the semester is almost over, then doing nothing but working over the summer! Yay money? Anyway, I'll be much less stressed in a few weeks time, and that will make me very, very happy.

Disclaimer: Still don't own nothing. That's a double negative which implies I own stuff. So yeah, I own NCIS. What now? Haha, I wish! Don't sue me, I actually don't own NCIS or anything of CBS's. Gia is mine though. Mwahahaha. OK, I'm going to upload this and stop typing out random nonsense. Enjoy! And review!

And with that, Tony turned and walked down the hall, and slammed his door shut, leaving a confused and hurt Ziva behind.

Tony moaned and glanced at his clocked again. The bright green numbers read 4:06, either much too late getting to sleep or way to early to wake up. He sighed and sat up. It had been about two hours since he left Ziva standing in his living room. Tony knew he had been harsh, but he couldn't bring himself to talk to her about his life before college.

It had always been an unspoken rule between the two of them to not ask too many questions about each other's pasts. Sure, Tony would ask about her past boyfriends (if she had any), but he always meant it jokingly. He knew not too much about Ziva's life before coming to America, just that the bastard that killed Kate was her half-brother and her sister was killed years ago. Her father was the Deputy Director of Mossad and he had no clue about her mother.

He sighed again and swung his legs off the side of the bed. He threw on sweatpants over his boxers and opened his bedroom door. As he entered the living room, he saw that Ziva was watching Beauty and the Beast, the only Disney movie owned, and the only reason he had it was because Ziva forced him to get it when they would watch movies together. If they were going to watch movies together, she had told him, she would at least get to pick out a movie once in a while. And even though he hated it, even though the songs made him cringe, seeing Ziva's face light up over the tale of a princess being rescued by true love always brought a smile to his face.

He leaned against the wall and watched her from behind. He knew that she sensed him; her crazy ninja skills allowed her to hear and sense things that no normal human being could, but she remained facing forward, pretending to watch the movie. She raised a steaming cup of something to her mouth, then balanced it on her knee as she paused the movie. She turned her neck around and looked at him. He stared back, not really knowing what to say. She put the remote down and patted the seat next to her.

At least she's not going to kill me, He thought to himself as he took his seat. She un-paused the movie, and they watched the last ten minutes together in silence. When the couple finally kissed and everyone lived happily ever after, she turned the T.V. off and put her mug down, and faced him.

"I am not that tired, Tony. You can go back to sleep for a while. I will wake you up when I go on my run."

"I'm not really tired, either," Tony muttered, staring at the blank screen. Ziva nodded and tucked her legs comfortably under her. They sat in silence for a few moments until she finally broke it.

"Tony, I want to apologize. I did not mean to pry before. You have your secrets just like every other person and I should respect you wanting to not talk about them."

Tony shook his head. "No, Ziva, you have nothing to apologize for. I'm sorry for snapping," He said, still not looking at her, though he could feel her eyes on him. "I know you read all about my past before, but… it's just complicated. I never knew what it felt like to be wanted, appreciated, even loved really, until I came to NCIS. Gia was that one exception, but it wasn't enough for me. Her being here again… it just reminds me of what I left, and it's just bringing a lot of bad memories back."

"Tony, you do not have to explain. I understand. I know what it is like to not want to return home and to what was once familiar."

Tony looked to his side and caught Ziva's eyes. She gave him a slight smile, and smiled back. Maybe one day he'd ask her what she meant, what she didn't want to return to, but for now, their unspoken agreement held strong.

~*~

Tony and Ziva had stayed up a while longer chatting idly about movies, ways to torture McGee, and other miscellaneous things, until he finally convinced her to get some sleep at around five instead of going on her run. While Tony was in the kitchen making coffee and searching for food to make breakfast with, he let his mind wander over Ziva again. Right this moment, she was sleeping in his bed after spending the night together. He chuckled to himself… this had always been a fantasy of his. Well, not necessarily in this situation, he thought. He wondered what spending the night with Ziva would entail, and if he would even be able to survive. Perhaps one day he'd find out.

He sat down and flipped through the channels; trying to find something amusing at 5:30 in the morning was not an easy task. He finally settled on the news and stared at the screen, though he didn't pay attention to it. He was day dreaming when Gia snuck up behind him and plopped herself down next to him.

"Hey, kiddo," He said to her. She smiled in return. "How'd you sleep?"

"Alright, I guess. Not the best sleep ever, but I wasn't expecting it. Ziva sleeping?"

"Yeah, just went to bed a half hour ago. We'll be leaving in an hour or so to go back to NCIS."

Gia nodded. "Tony, I'm really sorry that you have to do this. Honestly, I just feel horrible…" She looked down, ashamed. Tony enveloped her into a hug.

"Shut it, kiddo. You know none of this is your fault. And, even though these circumstances really suck, I'm really glad I got to see you again." Gia smiled, and returned the hug.

~*~

Once they had returned to NCIS, they found McGee sitting at his computer working. Gibbs was out getting himself coffee, and when he returned, he had two cups in his hand. The three team members cringed; Gibbs only came back with two cups of coffee when they had a long and stressful day ahead of them, but as he walked by, he handed one of them to Gia.

"It's peppermint, the only flavor they had."

Gia smiled widely and accepted the tea. "My favorite. Thanks, sir."

Gibbs smiled back, a very wide, fatherly smile, one which didn't grace his face often. "Call me Gibbs."

The team worked in silence for a few hours, with it only being broken by someone directing a question towards Gia about her parents, her past, or anything that might be related to the case. Suddenly, Gia's phone went off. Everyone looked at her, waiting to see who was calling her.

"It's just my alarm, it's ok." She told them. While looking at her phone, she swore silently under her breath. Tony looked at her questioningly. "Tomorrow night, Columbia is holding a dinner in my honor. I won a grant for my research and it's they're way of congratulating me." She looked up at the team. "It's too late to cancel… I'm the guest of honor! What should we do?"

"Columbia will understand. We'll call them and let them know you're unavailable for an undetermined amount of time," Tony said.

"Perhaps we could use this time to lure out our bad guys," Ziva suggested. "Have many agents around protecting her, and should anyone be there, we will be there to arrest them."

"Absolutely not!" Tony said, glaring at Ziva. "Gia will not be used as bait! That's just absurd!"

"Tony, no," Gia said. "I'll do it. I don't want to be hiding forever, and I can't do anything stuck here. Ziva's right."

"Gibbs, you can't allow this to happen!" Tony yelled, turning to his boss. "You can't put Gia in danger like that!"

Gibbs sat at his desk, glancing between Gia's eager expression and Tony's look of shock and pain. He sighed and nodded at Gia. "Are you sure you can handle this?"

Tony groaned and shook his head, while Gia took a big breath and nodded. "I can," she said. "I have to."

A/N Dos: So there should only be one more chapter, and perhaps an epilogue chapter too. It's almost over!!!

By the way, I am officially a Beta reader now. So if you're writing any stories and want a Beta, let me know! Trust me, I'm much better at giving time to Beta stories then writing my own. Most of the time it takes me so long is because I have evil writer's block.