BABYSITTING CHAPTER 7

One or two chapters to go after this one, folks. Thanks for your fine reviews and encouragement. Much appreciated.

Slim looked without touching anything unnecessarily, but his partner left a trail of destruction in his wake as they searched for the evidence that could incriminate them. He hauled cushions from chairs, pushed the couch over and knocked framed photographs from the mantle. The pair systematically went through each room in the O'Connor house to no avail.

'Wonder where the kid is,' mused Slim as they stood in the doorways of what was obviously a child's bedroom.

'Probably with a relative,' snarled Shorty. 'Who cares! Come on. It'll be dawn soon. We've got business to take care of.'

The two men left the house under the cover of the remaining darkness and made their way back to their hideout.

…………………………….

Mick had barely made it into the water when he caught sight of the approaching headlights along the wharf. He drew himself as close to the side of the barge as he could and waited, shivering, for his captors to realize he had escaped. Eventually, a loud burst of swearing signaled the discovery and, soon after, beams of torchlight shot into the water. Mick tilted his head so that only his nose and forehead were above the water's surface. After some time, the pair had obviously called off their search, but they remained inside the barge. Unwilling to risk a swim to the wharf, all Mick could do was wait.

……………………………

'Don't worry about us,' Tony told Gibbs as he and Josh sat at the breakfast table. 'Josh is gonna teach me some of the games he's got on his laptop. We don't need McGee here looking over our shoulders and telling us how we'd get better resolution if we tweaked this and fiddled with that. Did I tell you, Josh, that McGee is also known as Elf Lord on line?'

'Just make sure you keep resting,' said Gibbs sternly, ignoring the look of incredulity on Josh's face. 'Josh, I'll be asking you for a full report when I get back with lunch.'

'Yes sir!' replied Josh, giving a mock salute.

'Hey!' protested Tony, pretending to be hurt. 'Whose side are you on?'

'Well, Gibbs IS the senior agent,' explained Josh, but the smile that split his face was so much better than the depressed look he had worn when he had woken that morning, that Tony let it go.

'I mean it, Dinozzo,' added Gibbs as he walked to the door and opened it 'You do anything to pop those stitches and you'll be looking for another job.' With that, he left. He had already arranged with Ziva and McGee to meet him at the O'Connor household. The local LEO's had supposedly looked the place over, but Gibbs wanted his own team on it.

'He's all charm,' muttered Tony.

'He doesn't really mean it,' said Josh as he fired up his laptop. 'My Dad says stuff like that all the time. It just means he's really worried. It's probably a marine thing.'

Tony considered the boy's words for a few moments. If what he said was true, then Gibbs must be worried about him 24/7.

'He wouldn't let you quit,' continued Josh, his voice confident. 'You're his best agent. He told me so.'

'He told you that?' asked Tony. 'He's sure got a funny way of showing it sometimes.'

'I told you. It's a marine thing,' said Josh. 'It's like my Dad says: if he didn't care about me, he wouldn't give a damn about what I did. He wouldn't bother wasting his breath telling me off about something.'

'So, you're telling me that the more pissed off Gibbs is with me and the more he threatens to have me excommunicated from NCIS, the more he cares,' said Tony, his tone dubious.

'Exactly,' said Josh.

Tony sat back and contemplated Josh's theory. He thought of his own childhood and his relationship with his own father who rarely had time to even acknowledge Tony's presence – let alone chew him out about something. Maybe the kid's theory had some weight.

Feeling Josh's gaze upon him, Tony looked at the boy and smiled.

'What's up?' he asked Josh.

'Wanna see some pictures?' he asked shyly. 'Of my dad?'

Tony tentatively reached out and ruffled the boy's hair, in much the same way as he'd seen Gibbs do to other kids.

'Sure,' he told him, strangely pleased with the bond they had formed. Josh clicked on an icon and a picture of a clean-cut man with sandy hair and blue eyes stared out at them from the screen.

'That's him,' said Josh, and there was no mistaking the admiration the boy had for his father. Tony could only guess at how that might feel.

'You've got the same nose,' Tony commented.

'I got my brown eyes and brown hair from my mum,' said Josh. He tapped a couple of keys and suddenly an attractive woman with kind eyes filled the screen.

'Wow,' said Tony, softly. 'She's beautiful.'

'Yeah,' agreed Josh. 'This picture was taken just before she got sick.'

'What did she die of?' Tony gently asked. Under different circumstances and with a different kid, he never would have asked such a personal question, but it seemed like Josh needed to talk. Hell, the kid seemed to have a more mature perspective than Tony did.

'She had a brain tumor,' Josh told him, passing his hand across the screen. 'My aunt had one too, but she survived because she had a scan and they caught it in time. That's one of the things my dad is real strict about with me. He wants me to have regular scans. He's a real pain in the butt about it, but it's okay. I know he's just scared that he'll lose me too.'

Tony stared at Josh for a moment, remembering a conversation he'd had in the hospital with an angry and pissed off Gibbs. At the time, Tony had decided that Gibbs was out of line and unreasonable. Perhaps there was another explanation. His epiphany, however, was interrupted by Josh.

'Hey, I'd almost forgotten about these ones,' the boy said, clicking on another icon.

Expecting to see another picture of the boy's family, Tony was puzzled to see a picture of two men: one very skinny and one shorter and stout. The skinny one was looking directly at the camera.

'These are from my Dad's camera,' Josh explained. 'He took them at work a couple of days ago and asked me to get them developed. He has no idea how to print off digital photo's. I transferred them from the memory card, and cleared the card, but I hadn't had time to print them yet.'

'Have you seen these guys before?' asked Tony. Josh shook his head.

Tony was about to ring Gibbs, just in case there was a link between the photographs and the disappearance of Mick O'Connell when the doorbell heralded the arrival of the nurse. If it had been the same killjoy nurse who had turned up the day before, there would be no stalling her. The phone call would have to wait. Besides, Gibbs would be back in a few hours at the most.

……………………………………………..

Just as it seemed to Mick that he was about to lose all feeling in his limbs due to the cold, Slim and Shorty left the barge in a small row boat and headed for the wharf. They were talking – or, rather, Shorty was talking at Slim – and Mick strained his ears to catch what was being said.

'Might have gone back to his house,' snarled Shorty. 'We'll go there and try to catch him springing the pictures. If he's not there, we'll have to shoot through, but that's the last resort. I'm not giving up this patch without a fight.'

Mick watched as the two men tied up the boat and walked to their car. Aware that it might be a trap, and concerned that the men might double back to get something they'd forgotten, Mick decided to count to five hundred. After that, he'd be on is way to the one person he knew would know what to do.

…………………………………………….

Gibbs was met by McGee and Ziva as he got out of the car at the O'Connor house. He also noticed a squad car and two uniformed officers talking to an elderly woman in a floral apron. Gibbs recognised the woman as Florence Danvers, a long time neighbour of the O'Connors'.

'Boss, the house was broken into last night,' explained McGee. 'The neighbour came to visit, let herself in and then came straight out when she realized something was wrong.'

Gibbs scowled and went to approach the two officers and Florence. By his time, a small crowd had gathered, curious about the presence of the police car, two other unfamiliar cars and the non-appearance of Mick or his son.

'Jethro!' exclaimed Florence, extending her hand in greeting. 'What on earth is going on? Where are Mick and Joshua?'

'Special Agent Gibbs, NCIS,' said Gibbs, producing his badge for the benefit of the two officers before shaking the woman's hand.

'Everything's fine,' he told her. 'I'm looking after Josh. Mick's gone off the radar for a while but we'll find him.'

'Oh my goodness!' exclaimed Florence. 'And now someone has broken into their home! How awful! I saw Joshua leaving with a policeman yesterday evening. The poor boy had nothing but his laptop. It made me wonder what was going on.'

'Everything's fine,' Gibbs told her. 'As soon as we know Mick is safe, we'll contact you. Now, my team and I are going to take a look inside.'

As Gibbs turned on his heel and entered the house with McGee and Ziva, the small crowd remained, apart from two men wearing hoods who had stood at the back of the crowd listening intently to every word that was being said.

'Hear that?' demanded Shorty as they quickly walked back to where they had left the car. 'The kid had a laptop.'

Slim looked at his partner, quizzically.

'You idiot!' snapped Shorty. 'The kid had a laptop. People store photo's on laptops. We get the kid. We get the laptop. We get the photo's.'

'But how will we find the kid?' asked Slim.

Shorty reached into his pocket and withdrew the wallet he had taken from Mick. With a flourish, he took out a card with a name and number printed on one side, and a handwritten, scribbled address on the other.

'Simple,' said Shorty. 'We go visit him at Uncle Jethro's.'