Disclaimer: I do not own NCIS its characters, places, etc… I just want to write fiction containing them… that is all. ;)

Rated T (…for now)

Drama & Romance

Set after Hiatus Part 2 & Gibbs' return (only just settled on where this fiction is set…)

L.J Gibbs & Abby. S

A/N:This may be the finale of Second Chances.

But I'm not entirely sure, tell me if you think I should continue or end it with this bang I've planned and written purely for you, yes you. You wonderful NCIS loving person reading this. :)

Chapter Seven of Second Chances

He didn't see or hear from her since.

It was his own damn fault for not being able to cope with emotional situations. It was his own damn fault for promising to give her a baby, walking out and not even talking to her after sleeping with her. So, obviously it all just boiled down to awkward silences if they talked about her and her disappearing act, multiple coffees, no Caf-POWs day in and day out work for days which turned into weeks on end.

Why the frickin' hell did he agree to her? He should have said he can't do it, he should have politely declined, hugged her and banished the whole thing away to the furthest recesses of his psyche.

But obviously he didn't do that. He couldn't and wouldn't do that to her.

Marine, father and friend to the core.

Even if it did mean screwing her.

He was en route to her lab to check up on her, armed with a Caf-POW and perhaps even an apology for her. If DiNozzo knew of the predicament he was in he'd attach a Ground-hog Day movie reference. But he didn't know. No-one knew about himself and Abby apart from him and her.

So his feet took him to her lab, though her music was off, the lights were dim and her computers were silent. After a quick deduction if was quite obvious she wasn't there. She hadn't been there all day...maybe all week? Perhaps she's ill? Perhaps she'd done all of her work and gone home? But that's not her. This isn't her. This isn't her at all.

As the scent of burning rubber and petrol becomes overwhelming, the damp, dark smell of past or coming rain ceases it from being too much. At least it is gas that is invading his nostrils rather than her heady, seductive perfume. His eyes, glued to the windscreen and the road ahead. The idiotic squeal of the wipers stabbing into the emptiness his brain contained. Seeing that making sure she hasn't done anything rash was priority, emptying his mind was an absolute must. Hence the reason why he was trying not to replay the night in his mind. It was also why he wasn't replaying the night from hell in reality.

At her apartment door once again, Gibbs rapped on the forest green painted door. The gold plated knocker and numbers catching a mutated, distorted refection of him. Above the gold, a small eye-hole was placed; he only hoped to God she wasn't watching him through it.

Gibbs then heard the brute sounds of the metallic chink of the chain being taken off, the click of the lock being undone then the creak of the door.

It opened a fraction, the once unknown orangey glow within crawling across the floor to pull him in. Abby wasn't there to meet him only the silent warmth was there.

After pushing open the door briefly he was met with the cowering sight of her on the sofa, the trails of midnight black hair hiding her from him.

Her eyes pierced his soul, her eyes bloodshot, the sockets red and puffy. She had been crying. Her wet, tear-clung lashes told him that she'd only stopped recently. Abby looked at him, her eyes speaking volumes just like they always have.

"It didn't work." Her voice was soft, breathy, an octave short of being a whisper. "I'm not pregnant." Abby choked on her words, feeling each one stick in her throat and leave behind a puncture wound. "Hold me?" She whimpered.

"You don't need to ask, Ab." He sat next to her, pulling her into him so they were chest to chest and heart to heart. All pent-up worry and anger had melted away from him only to be superseded by a surplus of comfort, concern and most possibly love for her.

Gibbs held her to him, not breaking contact for the however long amount of time she needed his love for. Gibbs didn't move away from her because she needed him, he didn't want to let her go, didn't need to let her go; not even when she cried into his neck. So he kept his hands on her, kept his arms around her. Kept her warm with his touch, with his words of comfort and security. "I got ya, let it all out." He kissed her on the temple. "Let it all out, Abbs. It's good to cry."

"I've been doing this for days. It's not done me any good yet..." She sniffled.

Gibbs gave the briefest of exasperated sighs, dropping his hands to her waist he looked sideways at her.

She was chewing her lips, her breathing heavily laboured as she filled her lungs and emptied them through her nose.

"It bought me here didn't it?" He tried.

Abby refused to answer.

"We've only tried once." He forced her to look at him as he pressed his hands to her cold cheeks, wiping away the tears stored in the dark rims beneath with his thumbs. "Don't give up." Her pinkish eyes narrowed as she gave a gut-twisting frown. "We'll just try again."

"Yeah?" Her lower lip trembled and fell away from it's partner as her eyes shimmered with growing fresh tears.

"Yeah." Gibbs threw a lopsided smile in tandem with a nod, ensured that this time won't be as graceless as the last even though he felt the light inside him die.

Gibbs then skimmed her open lips with a single digit, feeling her breath and chapped skin. Immediately afterwards he replaced his finger with his lips.

A/N: Well oh deary me...it looks like Miss DCIPHOENIX has decided to end it on a cliff-hanger...again! P:

Hope you enjoyed reading this big-ass-long-planned-hair-clawing-nail-bitingly hard, frustrating, small and angst-y chapter – please tell me your thoughts in your review now, you lovely fan-fiction-reading peoples! :) Back College now, so updates/sequel will take a while to write/publish new stuff.

spoiler But the sun will shine again, readers. Remember that. ;)

DCIPHOENIX

xxx