Author's Note: This chapter, in which Gibbs "gets over himself" is for deidi. Thanks for reading and for reviewing!

All the best,

Vivian

Chapter Seven: Disingenuous

"Boss? Are you wearing lipstick?"

Gibbs, seated at his desk, groaned inwardly. Leave it to Tony to be dense as a post until it came to noticing details that had anything to do with the traces of a woman. Resisting his first urge to scrub madly at his face with his hand, Gibbs didn't even turn around.

"That's certainly a new way of getting out of doing work, Tony," remarked Ziva with amusement in her voice. "Accusing Gibbs of being a cross dresser. Creative, but risky."

"Well, you know me," grinned Tony, puffing his chest out and leaning back to place his hands behind his head. "I like to walk on the wild side."

Gibbs turned around to fix Tony with the kind of impassive, unimpressed glare that he hoped would distract Tony entirely from the lipstick smudges across the lower part of his mouth. It worked. Immediately becoming more interested in the papers lying on his own desk, Tony quickly and obediently returned to the task at hand.

It was several more minutes before Gibbs became aware that there were still eyes on the back of his head. Expecting to see Tony preparing to make another crack, he spun around, only to find McGee gawking at him with partially open mouth from a couple of desks away. Gibbs raised an eyebrow at him, but it was several moments before McGee found the words to say what it was that was obviously on his mind.

"That's…Abby's lipstick," he finally said, more and more wide-eyed the better he could see Gibbs' face. "That's the lipstick Abby was wearing this morning."

It would have been a wonderful opportunity for Tony, or even for Ziva, though Gibbs, to have gotten on McGee's case for spending too much time staring at Abby, or for having an unmanly interest in lipstick brands. Unluckily, neither of the two field agents made a sound. Instead, all three of the members of his team continued to stare at Gibbs with varying degrees of disbelief, horror, and scintillated interest on their faces, until he was forced to break the silence.

"Yeah," he said, sounding more nonchalant than he'd thought he could under the circumstances, "Abby got…a little excited this morning. Seems she's been having some computer trouble today, and I was unfortunate enough to walk in while she was rejoicing in having finally successfully outsmarted the virus that was preventing her from focusing. Next time, I'm going to send McGee."

ZIva laughed, and lost interest. Tony, looking only slightly disappointed, muttered "Probie would just love that," and returned reluctantly to his work. McGee, on the other hand, steadily met Gibbs' eyes, his expression passing from shock into something just short of betrayal. He probably knew that Abby had not been having any computer trouble.

He knew that he ought to feel guilty. After it all, it was, and had been for some time, common knowledge that McGee had feelings for Abby far exceeding those involved in the normal, friendly co-worker relationship. It was so obvious that Gibbs strongly suspected that McGee had given up any hope of trying to hide those feelings, and perhaps he did so to make everyone else aware that the Abby game was ultimately his to win. Gibbs had always kept the knowledge of McGee's preference at the very back of his mind, assuming that both McGee and Abby were capable of keeping themselves under control enough not to let it get in the way of their working relationship. About McGee, at least, he seemed to have been right.

Why was it, then, that he didn't feel guilty? Then again, what, if anything, did he have to feel guilty about? He hadn't invited it, hadn't asked for Abby to suddenly develop feelings for him and to decide it was time to act upon them. Then again, it hadn't been sudden at all. Both Gibbs and Abby had known for some time that Abby nearly worshipped Gibbs, and it had been flattering, even fun to think of himself as being a hero in her eyes. The only thing he was really ashamed of was letting the seduction of her feelings for him make him feel all the more powerful, something, he told himself, that a man of his age and experience should have been able to ward off or at least ignore. For a moment, he was prepared to believe that it was conceit on his part; simple, if not particularly admirable.

Upon honest reflection, however, Gibbs knew that it hadn't just been conceit. He hadn't just been flattered, he'd been deeply moved, regularly buoyed up by the idea that Abby Sciuto was helplessly attracted to him. It wasn't a question of flattery, or of being delighted that a woman found him interesting. It was Abby, and Abby alone whose attentions had made him feel like a stronger person. Sincere feeling of that kind was more dangerous than any unwanted arrogance could ever have been, and he found himself unable to be relieved by the idea that he was more of a man than he'd given himself credit for only a moment ago.

It wasn't that he had ever thought of her as a woman. He hadn't allowed himself any liberties of the kind. Only in the back of his mind, in the uncontrollable subconscious, something about Abby had always made him feel wonderful. Coming down to her lab had been the high point of his day for longer than he could clearly remember, and he allowed himself only rare visits in order to make the experience all the more refreshing and rejuvenating.

The more he thought about it, the more Gibbs realized how much he wanted to return to the lab at this moment. The relief that he felt every time he walked in to see her hunched over her computer, lost in brow-wrinkling, frustrated contemplation, was just what he needed at this moment to clear his head. Gibbs couldn't feel guilty, because he was just on the cusp of beginning to understand that he didn't have a choice as to whether or not he did or did not work well alongside Abby from this point on. He couldn't work without her, couldn't even do his job without her presence in his sphere.

"Forgive me for allowing myself a personal question, but…Jethro, is that lipstick on your mouth?"

Ducky had come up behind Gibbs during Gibbs' moment of revelation, and now the Doctor was peering down through his glasses with a more and more disapproving look on his face. Ah, thought Gibbs, reaching across his desk for a tissue. Lost in pleasurable realizations, he'd forgotten to wipe the makeup off.