AN: Very grateful thanks to Angel of Clay for leading me through USA planning permit land. Bless you, gal!

Clampers may be a Brit. expression – at any rate it's a rude word over here.

Prime Real Estate

Chapter 9

Many phone calls took place that morning; some that the 'Gibbswiggs' team (Abby's word; everyone else winced,) were aware of and some they weren't.

Swinson called Flammand, ordered up two heavies to come and stop Hastings from taking off, and paced agitatedly, interrupted periodically by Hastings' foul mouthed grumbling, until they arrived.

"Just shut up, Arthur... if you'd done as you were told, you'd really be a free man now... but here I am, trying to protect you from yourself and you've not been out of jail twenty-four hours. You do realise you've already done something they could re-arrest you for? I'll tell you what, I'll just turn you loose and see how long it takes before they find you, shall I?" Hastings subsided again, for a while at least. Swinson was well aware, because he'd had a cop who owed him find out, that Neil Hastings hadn't made a complaint against his father, but the detestable old bully didn't need to know that. He turned away and busied himself with other things so that Hastings didn't see his smile. There wasn't much that made Swinson smile, but this was most enjoyable.

The lawyer also informed Flammand and Kenyon of what Da Silva already knew; with Ackerman gone, their work-load would increase, since they'd have to take his projects between them. Something else Da Silva knew – not to mention his part in Ackerman's death to anyone.

The lawyer grew more agitated when someone from the employment agency rang to tell him that the night watchman to whom he'd been giving occasional day work had been shot by the police yesterday evening, and was there a relative he should give the paycheck to? He waited until he got to work, and used one of an assortment of unregistered cell phones to call his tame police officer. No, not the police, he was told. NCIS – again! DiNozzo and McGee – again! He would have been more anxious still if the cop had known, and been able to tell him anything of the confession to Father Charlie, but he didn't.

(Not much later, the employment agency received a call from NCIS, yes, Maxwell Brock had been on their books, they'd be happy to help if someone came to see them. If she'd received that call first, the agency manager reflected, she might have mentioned it to the attorney, but she didn't think it necessary to call him back. He was just the man's lawyer.)

He'd no sooner ended that callthan another of his cells buzzed. He looked at it with distaste, but he really couldn't afford to ignore this person. "You are just the mouthpiece," he reminded himself and took a deep breath. Congressman Norman White had gone to considerable trouble behind the scenes to persuade the authorities in three counties that having larger capacity sewers, water mains and power lines was a good thing, not the bad thing that local people thought, especially those living close to the patch of heathland at Holt, a tiny community near Conklin. The hamlet had got its name because there had always been a badger population there; people had protested that this could mean the end of them, but who was bothered about a few badgers? Certainly not the authorities...

(While the services remained minimal the amount of building that could be done was almost zero; it wasn't a particularly beautiful area, it was rough and shaggy, but it was free, open space. The locals who loved it, children, horse riders, cyclists, dog walkers, and just plain walkers, watched the new mains going in with despair.)

Congressman White was civil, but insistent. The work was being done; he'd kept up his end of the deal; why did Swinson's boss insist on hiding behind his lawyer, and when was he going to get his $100,000? Swinson explained that all the money that had been made so far was being ploughed into the next phase of the scheme, (which wasn't completely untrue, but White didn't need to know about the several hundred thousand dollars he'd already salted away,) and since he was being patient, why couldn't the Congressman?

So far, in pockets all over DC, Maryland and Virginia, sufficiently far apart and small to stay under the radar of environmental groups or crusading journalists, there were plans for 2,000 houses, not including the 200 already built, or the 500 that were under construction. If the Congressman's help were needed again, then in the end there would be more money... He stressed that remaining unnoticed was the key to success, and managed to keep talking to him long enough for the man to forget he'd wanted to see the boss. When he put the phone down his hands were trembling slightly.

It was a phase, he told himself. There'd been times before when things hadn't gone smoothly, and he'd got a handle on them every time. This was no different. He squashed the whisper down that said NCIS... there wasn't NCIS before...

NCISNCISNCISNCIS

Chris Coppi called to let Tony know that the initial examination of Ackerman's body had suggested that the crash had killed him, and to ask who should do the autopsy. Ducky was happy for the Virginia coroner to do it, she was a woman he trusted, and it could be completed earlier.

Chris also confirmed that his tracking expert had found all the signs they might expect of one vehicle forcing another off the road.

"He found signs that the other driver had tried earlier, where the bank wasn't so steep, and there weren't so many trees, but Ackerman managed to stay on the road.; if he'd gone off there, he'd probably have survived with no more than a wrecked car and a scare. Too bad... the other guy tried again a few hundred yards down the road... sure got him that time. We'll take measurements and all the rest of it – I'll send our findings to Jinny. D'you want the Tahoe? It's got the other vehicle's paint on, mid-blue, non metallic..."

Tony called Jinny to update her, and Abby to let her know to expect a wreck, and sat, hunched over his aching ribs, fretting to himself.

Patch called to say they'd picked up a rental at Lexington and were on their way to his mother's house. That was good to hear, but it didn't ease the nagging unease in Tony's mind, so it must be something else. But what?

The owner of the organic dairy called to say he was on his way; Tony introduced himself, and apologised that Special Agent McGee wouldn't be able to meet him personally, being polite and charming down the phone while glaring at his friend's desk.

It really didn't help to be sitting here when even Tim had gone in the end; there was so much to do. It was important for Ziva and Roy to go in search of the lawyer; it was also important to see if the employment agency knew anything useful.

There were also the three remaining 'construction managers' to speak to, and they felt that it might be important to do that first. If a visit to the lawyer made him wary, it was logical to assume he'd talk to the shadowy boss, who'd warn all three heavies to close ranks and have their stories ready. Ziva and Roy took Kenyon, since Jinny's research had found that his area was closest to Swinson's offices in Arlington, Kath and Ollie took Flammand, which left Gibbs alone to see Da Silva. "Oh, no," the whole of Gibbswigg had chorused, and Tony had started to rise from his chair.

"No, ya don't, DiNozzo. I said desk."

"Boss, you can't go alone."

"DiNozzo," exasperated, "I can handle a heavy or two."

"I know, Boss. But the last guy I handled on this case wasn't a heavy, he was a street lawyer. You need a witness!"

"I'll go, Tony." The Senior Field Agent opened his mouth to protest, but Tim went on, "I haven't got a broken rib -"

"Two!"

"Whatever... and I have had more sleep than you. Gibbs'll -"

"Gibbs'll go by himself, McGee, just sit down, dammit." The exasperation level in the Marine's voice was rising, but the glance that passed between Tony and Tim suggested that it was because he knew he was losing the battle. They were right, and Gibbs knew it. "Ah... the hell... come on, then."

"Drive carefully, Boss, don't break Timmy, now." Gibbs had snorted, and everyone had left a grumpy DiNozzo behind to sulk.

A call he'd made to Oldenburg was returned. He'd asked how Arthur Hastings had left the prison, and was told he'd been driven away by his lawyer. He wasn't surprised. Back to Swinson again.

Jinny rang to say that the tapes from the Scranton motel were useless; cameras had whole areas they didn't cover, and weren't always switched on anyway. Tony wondered if Swinson had chosen that motel because he knew that was the case, and decided it was one of those questions that knowing the answer to made no difference; the lawyer could always turn round and say that of course he would take someone just out of prison to a place where he could feel he wasn't being watched. The point was, where the hell was Arthur now?

He sighed, which wasn't wise, as the sudden huff of breath hurt his ribs. That made him think of steel pipe and reebar, and his eyes flew wide open. It's got the other vehicle's paint on, mid-blue, non-metallic... He grabbed the phone and called the railway bridge site foreman at New York Avenue.

Yes, he was told, there was an old Ford parked just outside the entrance. Mid blue, with damage to the near-side wing. It had been there when he arrived. (Tony knew, he'd noticed it yesterday. You couldn't not notice damage like that – and if it hadn't moved, the odds were it was Brock's car. Tony knew it anyway.) The foreman added that he thought he'd seen it before, but he'd never taken much notice. A couple of clampers had been eyeing it hopefully, although the foreman didn't see that anyone would want to reclaim such an old shed. "Don't let them near it," Tony told him urgently. "I'll send a tow truck for it as soon as possible."

"Sure. Hey... does it belong to the guy who got shot -"

"Thanks," Tony said, and hung up pretending he hadn't heard.

So... they had Brock's car and Ackerman's, and when they arrived he'd go down and help Abby. He liked to keep the interior of his car nice, because you never knew who your passenger might be, but he really hoped that wasn't the case with those two. Maybe they'd find something useful. In the meantime, he had the earnest owner of an organic dairy to talk to.

While he was waiting for Mr. Gates to arrive, a young man from HR dropped a package off. "Adie sent it, it was handed in at the front door. He asked me to bring it up cuz Gibbs told him you were chained to your desk and not to let you out of the building. He says he's checked it for white powder."

Tony swatted at him with the package; it hurt his ribs and his hand, so it was a pretty feeble attempt. "Get out of here, Darren. And thanks. I think."

He rang down to Adie, his pal the security guard. "OK, turncoat... I thought you were my friend."

"I am... as long as Gibbs isn't threatening me."

"Ha. This package..."

"Dropped off by a lady who said she managed an employment agency. Says she won't be around the office cuz she's off for the rest of the day at a recruitment drive, but her number's in there if you need to ask her anything. It's everything she has on Maxwell Brock, except his last unpaid wages. She was going to give them to a cancer charity because she knew about his mother, but his lawyer said send them to him."

"Thanks, traitor."

Adie laughed. "Aah, DiNozzo... you'd just go out the back door anyway.." He disconnected, and Tony opened the package. He wasn't surprised somehow, that Swinson would take over the meagre pay of a dead man. He'd only seen him once, during Arthur Hastings' trial, outside the courtroom, but he hadn't liked what he'd read in him, and Tim had described him as a lizard. He trusted the Gemcity assessment.

What was revealed in the official employment record, and the notes jotted in the margins by Mrs. Shilton, was simple, and sad. The man had needed to support himself while in the USA, and had done his work as a bodyguard efficiently, and without violence, threat or attitude. He had taken two weeks off when his mother had died, and another two days at the time of her funeral. He'd then returned to work while he arranged for her will to be executed, and her house to be sold.

Tony only drew three interesting facts from it all. Until the day Ackerman died, Brock had been a grieving but balanced personality; although Swinson was dealing with the house sale, the returned exile didn't trust him to handle his mother's will, and again, Swinson was the one who had recruited him as a heavy for Ackerman.

Out of curiosity and a desire to leave no stone unturned, he rang the lawyer who'd made Angela Brock's will, who told him, willingly enough, that Angela's estate was to go to charity. Yes, her son had been with her when she'd made the will, and said he didn't need anything, he had a house and job in Kimberley to return to, and he'd encouraged his mother to do whatever would make her happiest. The only problem he'd encountered as executor, he said thoughtfully, was that someone was dragging their heels over the sale of the house.

I wonder who,Tony thought as he thanked him and disconnected. He pushed his chair away from his desk for a moment to stretch his long legs, and really hated Thorley Swinson. If Brock had never met him, he'd have returned to his second home having reconciled with his mother, and helped both her and himself to find peace.

As it was, his peace and his understanding of himself as a basically good man had both been wrecked, and he'd rushed headlong into hurting people, and finally committing suicide by cop. Yes, he thought grimly, that was what it had been, but it sure as hell didn't make the cop feel any better. He hoped that the man's soul could find the ease that the end of his life had been denied.

Mr. Roland Gates arrived, and Tony found he wasn't as bored as he'd expected to be from having spoken to him on the phone. It was actually quite interesting learning about the benefits of organic food, and listening to all the long, patient steps a dairy farmer had to go through before he could use that coveted word 'organic', or it would have been if he'd had more time. He listened politely; after all the man had taken the trouble to come to them, and while he was explaining why he simply couldn't have walked away from everything he'd worked so hard for, Tony remembered the malice that Tim had pointed out. This man had almost been another victim.

Somehow, he kept the acute disappointment off his face when Mr. Gates produced the recordings he'd promised, when he'd finally decided to bug his own office. "You'll hear" he said proudly, "It's the same man every time. He said his name was Ackerman, and he always brought either a lawyer, who was always really smooth and wouldn't let him actually threaten, or a guy he never bothered to introduce. A minder, I thought."

Ackerman was freaking dead, Tony thought in despair; they couldn't do a thing even if anything on the tape was truly a threat... Damn, damn, damn. "What did this minder look like?" he asked idly, fully expecting to hear Brock described.

"Oh... er, tall, beer-belly, sandy hair in a crew-cut, blue or grey eyes, forearms with blue and green tatoos. Mid thirties maybe... far too young to be carrying that much weight." He caught Tony's blink, and smiled, and the serious man disappeared. "I know," he said impishly. "I believe in healthy eating... can't help noticing those who don't!"

Tony smiled back, and got carefully out of his chair. "Mr. Gates," he said happily, I'd really like you to meet a friend of mine!" A break! It may be small, but it's a BREAK!

He left a mesmerised Roland Gates in Abby's care, looking at tatoos and facial construction programs, and hobbled back to his desk. He'd barely time to pop a couple of Tylenol, and ring Mrs. Shilton to be told no, no-one like tatoo-man on her books, before Gibbswiggs returned.

NCISNCISNCISNCIS

"The man is a snake," Ziva said.

"Yeah, I called him that too... McGee said lizard."

"Either will do," Ziva agreed. "He knows that this boss of his is up to all sorts of skull-diggery, but he revealed nothing. He refused to say who the boss was, he cited lawyer-client confidentiality; he was regretful about Brock and Ackerman, and marvelled at both dying within such a short time of each other, but he could 'throw no light on it'. He acknowledged that he is the go-between the boss and the construction workers, the boss prefers it that way. He denied utterly that any threats had ever been made, and said he would never allow such a thing, because his client was an honest businessman. Hah!"

Roy Fordham nodded. "He's a smooth one all right. You want to hear what he said when we asked him about Hastings?"

"Oh, yeah." It was Gibbs who spoke, but everyone was aware of Tony hunching forward in his chair.

"'Hastings is not a pleasant man.'" Roy steepled his fingers, and did a credible impersonation of Swinson for those who knew him. "'I felt for a long time that I had let this colour my way of handling the trial. I could have done a better job; it is not my place to pass judgement. Hastings may indeed go back to jail after the retrial, but it will not be for so long, and I will have belatedly ensured him justice. I owed it to my profession.' When we asked him where Hastings is now, he had no idea. He said he paid for him to spend two nights at the motel in Scranton, and left him there. We checked again with the motel, and they confirmed that Hastings is long gone."

Tim sat carefully down on the edge of Ziva's desk. "We pooled information on the way back," he told Tony. "All three 'construction managers' have got their story off pat in spite of our efforts. They've never met the boss; he communicates through email or Swinson. We spoke to one of the brickies at the site where we found DaSilva, he said he was a useless boss, and the foreman really runs the site."

"We found much the same," Kath said. So did Ziva and Roy."

"Altogether a really frustrating morning," Ziva said, having made two fruitless visits to most people's one.

"Only thing we did feel," Gibbs said, "was DaSilva is nervous, out of his depth. When the time comes, he'll be easiest to lean on, but he can't ell us what he doesn't know. So, DiNozzo, what've you been doing?"

Tony couldn't resist pushing his chair back again. He raised his arms – carefully – and linked his hands behind his head as he rattled off his morning's efforts.

Tim groaned. "We should all have stayed here," he said plaintively, and got a (very light) Gibbs-slap for his pains. The same security man who'd escorted Mr. Gates up reappeared. "Here, Tony, the warrant you asked for."

"Warrant?" Kath asked dubiously.

Now Gibbs groaned. "Ack... For Brock's place. Shoulda thought of it last night, but I had all these hospital cases to deal with." He went to pick the document up from Tony's desk, but the SFA snatched it away. The two looked at each other for a long moment. "DiNozzo, you're not coming with me."

"Well, you could take Ziva, but she's already had a fun morning. McGee could do with a rest – although he's not going to get one cuz his Mr. Gates is down in Abby's lab... we could take Kath..." He watched Ziva wickedly out of the corner of his eye as he spoke.

The lady snorted. "Shut him up, Gibbs... get him out of here before he goes stir crazy. Take one of mine as well. Like... Roy. You've been there before. This time you'll get into the place."

Tony, clutching the warrant, was already half way to the elevator.

NCISNCISNCISNCIS

Angela Brock's house was one of eight arranged round a square of neatly mown grass, with a path in from the access road on the far side of the square. All the houses were owned by elderly people, who kept fresh paint and colourful gardens, and a good few of whom watched curiously as the three men with guns and badges approached. They said nothing, however, not even when Gibbs produced his lock-pick.

They weren't expecting to find dishes in the sink or the television switched on, or the general mess of a person who couldn't care less about the place, and they drew their guns, methodically clearing the ground floor. Roy began to move upstairs, Gibbs towards the cellar, Tony towards the back door. A few moments later a yell from the SFA had the other two men hurtling up, or down the stairs, and out into the rear garden. Tony was leaning against a tree about a hundred yards away, gasping for breath; sprinting that distance hadn't been a good idea...

Roy ran on past, as Gibbs checked his SFA out."He came out of... the garden shed, Boss, and made a... run for it..."

Gibbs put an arm under Tony's to steady him. "D'ya recognise him?"

Roy came loping back, shaking his head, no-one, as Tony said "Oh, yeah... It was Arthur Hastings."

AN: Well, we knew who it was, but they didn't, so it's a cliffie for them.