A/N: I think it's fairly safe to safe this is what we've been building up to. If you know what I mean.
I'm going to reiterate the rating at this point; I know it's been smutty (and fairly bluntly graphic) but I still want to do you the courtesy of mentioning that this is rated M and it does explicitly live up to that rating.
"Are you thinking of me when you fuck her?" -Alanis Morissette; 'You Oughta Know.' [Playlist]
Chapter Eight: Maryland
Diane leaned over the back of the living room couch and presented her—estranged?—husband with a brightly coloured, cartoonish Hallmark card, waving it a little obnoxiously in his face.
The action successfully distracted him from the baseball game he was watching and he looked up, narrowing his eyes. He took the card silently, confused for a moment, and glared at it. Diane then dangled a Sharpie pen in his face, which he ignored while he examined the frilly card. He recognized the children's storybook character Snow White and made the educated assumption that this card was not intended for him.
"What's this?" he asked, tilting his head back to look at her.
"Abigail's birthday card," Diane answered coolly. "Sign it, please," she directed, tapping his temple with the Sharpie. He snatched it from her to make her stop with the irritating tapping and dangling, and uncapped it, reading the generic message inside, and studying Diane's loopy, swirly handwriting.
He tilted his head, holding the cap in his mouth, and looked back at her.
"You want me to sign it 'Uncle Leroy'?" he asked, grinning a little. She rolled her eyes and shook her head.
"Right, like she'd even know what it means to have an 'Uncle'," Diane muttered, poking his shoulder shortly. "Just sign your name, her parents will tell her you're my husband."
Gibbs nodded and added his name neatly to the Disney birthday card. As an afterthought, he drew a smiley face and nonchalantly handed the card back. She approved his work and waltzed back towards the kitchen; Gibbs heard her shuffling for the envelope.
"How old is she now?" he asked.
"Seven," Diane answered, her voice muffled. "Well, six, she'll be seven on the twentieth," she corrected.
"Good age," Gibbs remarked without thinking it through.
"Is it?" Diane asked, snorting. "Amanda says all she does is talk back."
Gibbs smirked to himself and took a drink of his beer. He didn't say anything else, busy thinking about the trouble Kelly had caused them when she'd figured out talking back to Shannon would make her so mad she'd order Kelly to report to her father—and Gibbs would just let her off the hook.
Diane left the house, probably to mail the card, and when she came back in, he heard her messing around in the kitchen again.
"Hey," he said, raising his voice. "Come watch the game."
"I'm busy," she answered curtly.
"Doin' what, it's Saturday afternoon," he scoffed.
"I'm building a boat," she answered sarcastically.
He blinked, and looked towards the kitchen, raising an eyebrow. Gibbs laughed, even if he knew he was being subtly snapped at.
"Diane," he whined. "I'm being cordial," he snorted, repeating something she'd yelled at him a week or so ago.
"Well, how thoughtful of you," she retorted sarcastically. "I hate the Yankees," she added, making another excuse.
"Me too, why do you think I'm watchin'?" he answered. Diane came into the living room, her arms folded, and he gestured at the television with a wicked smirk on his face. "Yankees are getting creamed."
She looked at the score and sat down on the opposite side of the couch, crossing her legs primly and sitting stiffly without looking at him. He frowned and rolled his eyes, taking his feet off the coffee table and leaning forward on his knees. He took a swig of beer, watched the game until the next commercial, and then looked at her intently.
"If you're pissed at me, why'd you want me to sign Abigail's card?" he asked.
She bit her lip.
"Honestly?" she asked, looking away from the commercial after she spoke the word. "I don't need Rusty and Amanda to know how stupid I am."
He stared at her.
"You'd be stupid if I didn't sign the damn card?" he asked skeptically.
"I've spent enough time assuring them that this isn't an unhealthy marriage that it's become a point of pride to keep up that façade," she retorted snidely.
"You're being passive-aggressive," Gibbs growled.
"I'm honored that you noticed."
He grit his teeth and looked down at the beer he was holding. It was half-empty, and wasn't exactly ice cold anymore. He'd chosen to remain home this weekend; his team didn't have the weekend shift, and though he usually worked the weekend anyway, something had stopped him.
It was probably guilt, but he didn't question it that much.
He set his jaw and looked at her again, waiting until his piercing glare induced her to look back at him, unable to continue pretending he wasn't staring.
"Do you want me to keep noticing?" he asked dully. "Or you want to call a lawyer?"
Her eyes flickered, and he knew he'd called her bluff. He hadn't really meant to—and he felt distinctly underhanded for mentioning—technically threatening—a divorce. He had enough fights with Diane to know that she didn't want that; she considered it failure, and Diane did not like to fail.
"Are you asking me for a divorce?" she hissed.
"You want one?" he fired back.
She shook her head at him in disbelief.
"Would you even notice if I was gone, Leroy?" she asked quietly.
He looked at her hard, thinking about it.
"Yes," he answered seriously.
She looked surprised by his answer. He shrugged. There were a lot of reasons he would notice if Diane left. His house would be empty again. Her things would be gone. He'd have another alimony check to pay. His actions with Jenny would be a hell of a lot less illicit. Gibbs abandoned his beer to the coffee table and leaned back, stretching his arm over the couch.
She relaxed a little, and shifted—she leaned forward and took up his drink, set on finishing it for him. She sighed and rubbed her forehead.
"I might have to go to Seattle," she muttered tensely. "Rusty just keeps getting sicker."
"Did he get over the flu?"
"Yes, technically," she answered, leaning back. "His immune system is so compromised he'll never really get over it," she said. "He's got a lot of fluid in his lungs." Diane pushed her hair back. "It breaks my heart that Hannah is never really going to know her father."
"He could get better, Diane," Gibbs said.
"No," she answered curtly. "We're past that. We're a long way from AZT, Leroy," she said. "There's optimism, and then there's foolishness. We might get him for one more Christmas."
Gibbs squinted at her sympathetically. He hated that her brother had ended up with the short straw after all his hard work to quit the drugs and start a stable life and a good family. It couldn't be fixed, but it didn't hurt Diane any less. She'd spent so long hating Rusty for his choices and the way he abused heroin, but now he knew she just felt hopeless.
"Amanda invited us for Easter, but…" Diane trailed off, and snorted. She hadn't wanted to ask, and he wouldn't have even considered it. He would have used Shepard as an excuse—'I'm breaking in a Probie'. "I want to see him as much as I can."
"Then go to Seattle, Diane, you don't need permission," he told her.
She drank the rest of his beer and looked at him dully.
"You could come, Leroy," she said softly. "Cases slack off in the summer, you have plenty of leave time," she suggested.
"Your mother hates me," Gibbs pointed out.
"She doesn't hate you," Diane retorted dryly. "She hates how I act about you, and she can't hate me because she's my mother, so she directs it at you."
"Work," Gibbs grunted, making an excuse. And then, there it was, tumbling out of his mouth: "Shepard's too green to leave in the other guys' charge."
Diane didn't say anything. She put the empty beer bottle on the coffee table and then stretched out on the couch, laying her head on his thigh and turning towards the game, trying to ignore how much it bothered her that training Shepard seemed to be higher on his list of priorities than helping her deal with her brother's inevitable death. Gibbs slung his arm out over her body, his palm resting just on the curve of her hip, and relaxed a little, relieved to have kept things so civil.
The game returned, and she sat up a little, narrowing her eyes.
"Dammit, Leroy, I hate the Phillies, too, I don't care if the Yankees are getting creamed by them!"
"You hate any team that isn't the Mariners!" he accused.
"I'm from Seattle!" she retorted proudly. She swung her legs off the couch and glared at him, her bangs falling in her eyes. "This was a trap, you're trying to get on my good side—" she broke off with a small shriek as he pulled her back towards him and wrapped his arms around her tightly, squeezing her side.
She curled up, ticklish, and giggled, trying to escape from him by beating his chest half-heartedly. He buried his mouth in her neck and laughed impishly, refusing to let her escape, and she burst into laughter, tilting her head up for a kiss and scooting over to sprawl herself over his lap.
He let her pull his lips down to hers, her nails pricking his skin gently with a confident grip, and smirked triumphantly, having succeeded in keeping her on the couch with him and lightening the mood enough to take his mind of his exploits with Shepard and the sorry state of his and Diane's floundering relationship.
As it turned out, that June Saturday when the Yankees played the Phillies was probably the last good day their marriage ever saw.
"Has Peres confessed yet?" Stan Burley asked through a mouthful of Mexican take-out, looking interestedly at his colleagues.
Decker snorted.
"Naw, no confession, but his wife's pretty eager to chuck him under the bus," he answered, grinning from behind a stack of paperwork that pertained to the Red Yarn Case—the case that had begun with a dead body and some contaminated evidence and then ended with a rogue cop, some corrupt Marines, and a semi-innocent sleepover.
Burley snickered.
"Well, all the info we've got on him says he was a real dick—hey, what d'you think Gibbs' wife would do if he got arrested? You think she'd stick up for him?"
"Hmmm," Decker thought, leaning back. He placed his hands behind his head and puckered his lips with mock interest. "Who'd be dumb enough to arrest Gibbs?" he asked.
"Good point," mused Burley, pointing a plastic fork at Decker and then using it to scrape some refried beans out of his burrito. He looked up gleefully. "What if Shepard arrested him, and Diane had to come bail him out? What d'you think then?"
"I think we'd be directing a porno," Decker answered, smirking wickedly.
"So, Jenny would be in a skimpy little Bad Cop outfit and Gibbs would—"
"Man, who cares what Boss is wearing?"
"Right, yeah—and Diane would wear, like, what, a French Maid's outfit?"
"Nope, Naughty Nurse, she's a therapist—"
"You know, I personally think she'd wear your teeth as a victory necklace after she murdered you."
The sound of Shepard's voice surprised and terrified both men enough to send Burley's fork flying into the air and a few files sliding off of Decker's desk. Burley began choking on the food he'd had in his mouth and Decker hastily began trying to clean up his mess, his cheeks flushing. Smirking slightly at the hullabaloo she'd set in motion, Jenny continued coolly to her desk with her cup of iced coffee, tilting her head thoughtfully to herself.
"And then I'd of course hang your testicles above my fireplace to immortalize the pain we put you through for thinking such nasty boy thoughts."
"Where did you come from?" spluttered Burley, looking at her in disbelief. "I thought you—you were in Norfolk interrogating—talking to—"
"Brett Dorset?" she supplied, taking pity on his embarrassment. "I got a confession 'bout three hours ago; there wasn't much traffic on the drive back."
"Where's Gibbs?" Burley demanded.
"Hell if I know," she answered blithely. "He took off after we got back."
Decker glared at Jenny accusingly.
"He's obviously hiding around here somewhere teaching her how to mimic his silent eavesdropping approach," Decker said narrowly. He glanced around warily, stacking his files back and neatly patting them. "She's Simba and we're the poor little Zazus she's learned to pounce on."
"I do not understand what you just said," Jenny said seriously.
"Uh, The Lion King," Decker said, giving her a look as if it were obvious. "Haven't you seen it?"
"Last time I checked I wasn't five years old," she retorted.
Decker squawked, offended at her comment.
Burley jerked his thumb at their outraged colleague.
"He watches cartoons at the theatre by himself when we're not on duty," Burley revealed.
"It was based on Hamlet!" crowed Decker.
"Yeah, okay, then explain Pocahontas, Aladdin, Toy Story, and The Jungle Book," demanded Burley.
Decker slammed his fist on his desk defensively.
"You saw The Jungle Book with me!" he shouted.
"Only because my Mom read me the book!"
Jenny stared at them, slowly closing her lips over her straw and taking a drink of her coffee, fascinated by the utterly nonsensical exchange occurring in front of her. Gibbs chose that moment to appear in the bullpen, armed with a cup of coffee that bore a completely different logo than hers, and glare at the two agents. She pointed with her ring finger and spoke around the straw.
"Gibbs, who's your favorite?" she asked wryly.
He shot her a look and snorted, slamming a drawer shut and interrupting the fight going on between Decker and Burley. They both shut up, looking at Gibbs sheepishly.
"How did this start?" Gibbs asked, gesturing at the two of them, but looking at Jenny.
"Oh, you don't want to know," she said seriously, though she knew Burley was shooting her a pleading look, begging her not to inform Gibbs of the cop-nurse-criminal porno situation.
"Yeah, I don't," he decided, straightening up. "We've got the day to work on Peres' confession. Come on, close this damn case, or I'm makin' all of you watch The Fox and The Hound on constant loop."
"Is that threatening?" Jenny asked, starting to follow Gibbs.
"Jesus, Shepard, do you have feelings?" Decker asked. "Boss, that's such a sad threat—" he stopped whining when Gibbs' head-slapped him, and Jenny cocked an eyebrow, smirking. Gibbs went on ahead of them, and Decker was left nursing his head and glaring at Burley and Jenny.
"You don't think the doomed friendship of a cute fox and a cuddly dog, natural born enemies, is sad, Jenny?" asked Burley mockingly.
"Natural born enemies? A domesticated canine would hardly come into contact with a fox on any daily basis, and foxes aren't going to seek out a puppy unprovoked—I haven't seen the movie, though, what would I know?"
Decker just glared at her.
"Your childhood was a dark and terrible place."
Jenny shrugged, and closed her lips back over her straw.
She liked to remember her childhood as a few happy years when she'd spent the precious moments of her father's leave time watching M.A.S.H. with him.
Ducky looked up with a warm smile as the redhead entered his domain.
"Ah, Jennifer, it's a pleasure to see your neck is healing," he remarked right off the bat, approaching her with a twinkle in his eye. He craned his head to look at the rapidly fading bruises. "I assume your voice is back to normal?"
"If I could carry a tune, I'd be singing," she responded, smiling good-naturedly. She looked past him at the body laid out and open on his slabs. She tried to push the salacious memory autopsy held to the back of her mind and nodded at the body. "I guess I'm a little premature checking on our body," she apologized.
He looked regretful.
"I'm afraid I'm just starting on Agent Pacci's body," he said, shrugging his shoulders. "I should begin on Gibbs' late this afternoon, if I finish up this poor soldier in time," he added, gesturing at the cold corpse.
Jenny smiled and folded her arms.
"Well, I should stay a while and make it seem as if I attempted to force answers out of you," she sighed. "Gibbs would be livid if he thought I was easy on you," she added wryly.
Ducky beamed and happily returned to his unsavory work, although this time he had his back to Jenny, shielding the body from her view—he knew the messier parts of his coroner duties turned her stomach, no matter how much she'd insisted it was just the boys' teasing that had done her in the first time.
"Yes, of course, the determined need to succeed and succeed quickly that develops in those who are subjected to Jethro's rule," Ducky mused.
"Oh, I wouldn't do Gibbs the honor of crediting him with my drive," she answered lightly, laughing a little.
"He doesn't intimidate you, my dear?" Ducky asked slyly.
"Not so much anymore," Jenny answered smoothly. "I won't pretend he never did, though," she admitted. "He even made me cry once."
"Did he?" Ducky asked. "I have a difficult time believing that," he said, complimenting her ability to take Gibbs' personality in stride.
"Believe it. It was a week or so after I started, and he thought I was asking useless questions when we were bouncing around ideas on a case. He said—and I think I'm quoting—'If I wanted a pretty face to annoy me with stupidity, I'd hire my wife'. I went home and cried, I was so offended."
Ducky clicked his tongue.
"Your best bet at revenge would have been to call Jethro's wife and tell her what he'd said," Ducky chuckled wickedly. "Diane is a very intelligent woman. She no doubt would have made his life hell on your behalf."
Jenny obliged Ducky with a laugh, but she snorted silently to herself. She highly doubted Diane Gibbs would do anything on Jenny's behalf, even if she were in the dark about the attraction—and sometimes action—between her husband and his probie.
"You know," Ducky went on, talking aloud fondly, "you and Jethro have a lot in common. Work oriented, rather wary of personal conversations, incessantly focused on perfection," the medical examiner listed off personality traits. "You're more politically oriented than he, and you have a way with people, but essentially—the two of you are a remarkable team."
Jenny leaned against an autopsy slab, cocking an eyebrow at Ducky's back.
"I'm not sure I should take that as a compliment," she said neutrally.
"It was certainly meant as one," Ducky answered, looking at her over his shoulder. "I have never known him to take so quickly to a new agent."
"You're the only one who seems to think it has anything to do with my capabilities," she said dryly, crossing her arms.
Ducky let out a chuckle, clicking his tongue.
"Ah, yes, well—as he is married, I do like to give Jethro the benefit of the doubt."
Jenny laughed along with Ducky, though she wasn't sure it was that amusing of a thing. She fell silent, frowning slightly, trying not to think about her physical involvement with Gibbs—but doing so all the same in a highly logical, detached manner. She was so absorbed for the moment that Ducky's next question startled her into brutal, unintended honesty.
"What do you think of Gibbs, my dear?" he mused thoughtfully, genuinely interested in her opinion.
It was a question with that had so many answers she wasn't sure she could ever fully satisfy it, but she was so unprepared to be asked it that she simply parted her lips and let out the first thing that came to mind:
"He's sexy."
Director Morrow pointed at the big screen in MTAC, pinpointing a few key areas as he explained an intelligence tip to Gibbs. Gibbs raised his eyebrows, disbelief growing with every word the director said. When Morrow finally fell silent again, Gibbs glanced over at him, narrowing his eyes.
"Really?" he asked.
"I'm afraid so," answered Morrow dryly. "It's very lucrative."
"I can see that," Gibbs said, gesturing at the screen that lit up a map of the Marine base in Maryland. "But why'd our guys have to go get involved in somethin' stupid like that?"
"Money," Director Morrow sighed, standing up, "is an irrationally motivating thing," he said dryly, turning to face Gibbs. "The issue has gotten slightly out of hand, and the Maryland police force is facing roadblocks from the Navy, naturally," he explained.
Gibbs nodded. Of course the Navy would protect it's own, particularly if it thought there might be an embarrassing cover-up involved.
"Slightly out of hand?" Gibbs scoffed. He threw his hand out at the screen again, thinking about the information he'd just gotten. "Someone saw a hyena in the streets!"
"And we can't expect to convince Marylanders that they're simply seeing a big alley cat," Morrow muttered dismally. "That's why I'm sending in your team," he said, looking at Gibbs while he gestured for the techs to move on to some other work with the big screen.
"Why not earlier?" Gibbs asked.
"Honestly? I thought it was a conspiracy theory started by some radical environmentalist pacifist group in the area. We followed that lead for a while. However, now there's a petty officer dead from a nasty animal attack, and some very rich marines running around a city where there are rumors of some very exotic pets," Morrow related grimly. "Rings like this could spread to New York and cross the Canadian border, and that's the last thing this Navy or this government needs to be dealing with."
"What's the assignment?"
"Surveillance," Morrow answered promptly. "Probably for about a week in Maryland, maybe less if we get the job done, maybe more if we get nowhere," he said. "It's tricky—we've got an agent out there, but new Intel has forced me to think he's in on the business, and your team can't be detected."
"Not a problem," Gibbs said, standing up and shrugging. "They're pros."
Morrow nodded curtly.
"I'll have Charlene call you with a time for a full briefing," he said. "Until we get the details worked out, just warn your team not to make plans that can't be cancelled."
Gibbs nodded, taking Morrow's abrupt words as a dismissal.
"Gibbs," Morrow called, stopping him right before he left. The director arched a grey eyebrow a little. "Try not to let Shepard get banged up this time. She hardly has any time under her belt and she's got a concussion, strangulation, shock induced panic…" Morrow trailed off.
"Yeah, sir," Gibbs said gruffly, giving him a dubious look. "I'll try tellin' her to let the boys take this one."
Morrow snorted at the sarcasm in Gibbs' tone and turned back to the MTAC screen, grinning a little as he heard the metal door slam shut securely.
"Jenny," growled Decker, elbowing her as they stood in the elevator balancing containers of Chinese food for lunch. "What the hell is wrong with you?"
"Nothing."
"Seriously, Shepard."
"Noth.ing."
"You are never this introspective," Decker pointed out. "Cat's had your tongue all morning," he added. He waggled his eyebrows suddenly. "Is it your time of the month?"
She slowly turned her head and glared at him, and William Decker was suddenly reminded of that one Halloween he watched The Exorcist with his DEA buddies. His smile faded and he swallowed hard, backing away a little. He looked straight ahead at the elevator doors.
"I'm just sayin' you're acting funny," he muttered moodily.
Jenny didn't answer; truth be told, she could see no fathomable way in which she could explain herself without sounding like the most ridiculous woman in existence on planet earth. She was stewing in a state of utter embarrassment and disbelief as she repeatedly tried to figure out just why she'd stood in front of Ducky and dreamily told the ME that Gibbs was "sexy" like she was some lovesick, vocabulary deficient cheerleader.
She couldn't tell Decker that she'd told Ducky she thought Gibbs was sexy.
She couldn't even convince herself that horrifying moment had actually happened.
She had briefly entertained the idea of fleeing to the lab and telling Miller, but Miller wouldn't be interested and well—the idea of one more person at this office knowing that she was thinking something so annoying was repellant. She didn't have any girlfriends she could relay her mortification to; she had let most of her friendships fall by the wayside in the wake of her obsession with her father's "suicide".
No; Jenny had to bear this infuriating aftermath of her stupid simple sentence in solitary silence.
The elevator doors opened and they strolled out, bearing chopsticks and Chow Mein for nearly half the office—Jenny didn't even know whose dime this was on. She silently helped distribute food and then took her own container to her desk, still quiet. She propped her feet up, fixed her eyes on a threat memo that was on her desk, and pretended she was absorbed in it.
He's sexy.
Why did her inner voice find it necessary to incessantly torture her? She didn't need to hear herself say it over and over again; she was there when it happened. She had a first hand account. The question was why had she said it. No, that wasn't even a question; Gibbs was blatantly sexy in her opinion, it wasn't uncharacteristic for her to think such a thing.
It was distinctly troublesome that she had apparently gotten so lost in la-la land thinking about him that her professional filter had eviscerated itself and let her gobsmack Ducky with unnecessary insight into her Freudian subconscious.
Ducky was probably chuckling away right now, just thinking up ways to pour humiliation salt into her shame wound by comically relating the tale to Gibbs, thus ending any shred of respect he had for her as an agent.
Jenny paused and stopped chewing her food, kicking herself in the ass mentally.
She was being entirely too overdramatic about this entire incident.
"Shepard," the gruff voice of Agent Sexy—GibbsGibbsGibbs—himself broke into her thoughts and she was so annoyed with herself and him for throwing her off her game that she fixed her eyes on him nastily and snapped:
"What?"
She swore her snippy, unprovoked rudeness induced a hush to fall over the bullpen.
Gibbs returned her glare narrowly, obviously not pleased to have been so disrespected without reason. He obviously took her uncivil response as an indication that he should be as caustic as humanly possible, so he dropped her Red Yarn Case report on her desk unceremoniously and smirked.
"Your report looks like it was written by a robot Prom Queen," he said coolly. "Where's your head, Shepard?"
"Robot Prom—what does that even mean?" she demanded, ignoring the snickers she was getting from Burley.
He reached over and flipped open the report, flicking the page.
"Swirly, distracting hand-writing—damn, you wrote it like it was an art history paper."
"How do you know what an art history paper is written like?" she demanded shrilly. She slammed her container of food down and stood up. "I'm not re-writing that."
He looked at her coldly, one-eyebrow going up frigidly.
"Not an option, Jen," he said curtly.
The use of the intimate nickname obliterated any chance there was of her remaining even minimally civil. She grit her teeth, sorting through a myriad of poisonous responses, but her eyes mistakenly fell on his wedding ring and that made her even angrier—and to her horror, she felt like bursting into tears.
She compressed her lips tightly. She held her hands up and made a motion as if she would shake him.
"You are the most infuriating bastard," she barked, shoving her chair back.
She swept the file off her desk and stormed out, probably more petulantly than was necessary, but well aware she could no longer stand to be in the same room with him until she figured out just what was going on with her feelings at the moment.
She left them a little bewildered as to what had just happened. Gibbs turned a glare on the only team members left.
"What did you two do to her?" he growled.
"Us?" Burley asked, pointing to himself. "What did you do to her?" he retorted seriously, his eyes wide. Gibbs looked at Decker for an explanation, and his usually helpful agent just shrugged a little cautiously. He muttered under his breath and turned his face to his food.
Gibbs looked at Shepard's vacated desk and frowned, unnerved. She wasn't one to act so intemperate without provocation. It was irksome.
"Gibbs, come on, she's been normal the whole time she's worked here, the psycho had to come out some time," Burley said lightly, grinning his old teasing grin. He sighed dramatically and clicked his tongue. "Women just can't hide the crazy."
But Gibbs didn't think it had anything to do with any fabled 'crazy' inherent in women.
He felt tense, and a sickening sense of guilt, almost, at the thought that maybe his advances weren't entirely welcome; he was suddenly haunted by the thought that when he'd kissed her in the showers—and then what had happened in the car—had just been actions she didn't think she could turn down—that she didn't really reciprocate the attraction he was beginning to find overwhelming.
She ended up assuring herself that Ducky was too much of a gentleman to gossip, but she stood in her kitchen restless and still fuming over those stupid few words. She held a mug of steaming tea to her lips and listened to Noemi finishing up cleaning something. Today had ended early; they were leaving tomorrow for an operation in Maryland, and the Director had sent them home to give them down time.
The bruises on her neck were all but gone—there was just one stubborn blackish-brown mark that refused to subside—and she was interested in this new assignment they had; it was a welcome change from the past few day's milling around the Navy Yard doing nothing.
Attempting to busy an illegal animal trading ring seemed like a fun thing to do. It would probably take her mind off the mixed thoughts she was having about her boss. Things had come a long way from her casually thinking he was physical attractive when she first began working at NCIS. She was walking thin ice now, and there was probably boiling water underneath.
She was restless, and she probably needed a drink. What was worse, she needed to get laid, and she had gotten it into her head lately that the only person who'd be able to adequately satisfy that need was Gibbs. A completely irrational thought, considering the wedding ring, yet not all that unrealistic, considering he'd been the first to indicate that he was okay with extramarital sexual activity.
Jenny was suddenly seriously unsure that she could spend any time in close quarters with Gibbs and not ignore her better judgment and seduce him. Appalled at the thought, and suddenly firmly of the mind that she was not going to be that woman who interfered in a marriage—she set down her mug, and ran up her stairs.
She changed out of her ratty sweats and into a pair of too-tight black jeans. She threw on a loose blouse, decided to forgo a bra, and rummaged around her closet for a pair of well-loved black pumps. On her way to the bathroom to tease her hair a little and pat on some lip stain, she swept her cordless phone off the bureau and dialed a number.
"Rick," she greeted coyly, as soon as the cop answered the call. She smirked in the mirror as she puckered her lips and ruffled her hair, checking her appearance. "What're you up to tonight?"
She smacked her lips quietly to seal in the colour and laughed when he teased her about ten o'clock being a little late for dinner.
"Not a problem," she said silkily. "I'm only interested in dessert. I'll meet you at your apartment when your shift is over?"
At least she'd have the need to get laid taken care of before she traipsed off to Maryland with Gibbs.
"Diane," Gibbs shouted up the stairs. "Diane!"
"You don't have to shout up the stairs, Leroy," her voice came snapping back, muffled by the distance between them.
He rolled his eyes and came up from the basement quickly, wiping his hands on a towel. He'd been staining some of the wood and he didn't want her to see his dirty hands and freak out over him touching something.
"Been waitin' for you to come home," he said, as she walked past him with her purse and brief case and dumped all of it unceremoniously onto the coffee table in the living room.
"Well, damn, looks like the anticipation didn't kill you," she snapped at him, disappearing without another word up the stairs towards the bedroom. He stared after her in mild disbelief at the acidity in her greeting, and then sprinted up the stairs after her.
She was changing clothes when he walked into the bedroom. She turned her back to him and was out of her work clothing and into jeans and a loose t-shirt before he could say anything; she began to sweep up the business casual clothes into her arms.
"Bad day at work?" he provoked sarcastically, following her when she brushed past him into the bathroom. She chucked her clothes into the laundry basket and hoisted it up onto her hip.
"It was lovely," she responded curtly. "You need anything washed?"
"No," he answered distractedly, blocking her exit. "What's your problem?" he asked, narrowing his eyes. "I haven't had time to piss you off."
She looked at him sharply.
"Leroy, there are certain days when I spend a lot of time thinking about the pros and cons of loving you, and you don't always come out on the positive side," she said icily. "This is one of those days."
She nudged his arm with the laundry basket and, a little taken aback, he moved to let her storm past him, out of the bedroom, and back down the stairs. He let her go for a minute before slowly following, opting to be cautious in a situation that could potentially become volatile. He meandered into the laundry room about five minutes after her and stood hesitantly near the basement stairs, looking at her warily.
"Diane, I'm goin' to Maryland for a case," he said bluntly. "Be gone about a week."
"Fine," she answered. "I'm going to Seattle for a few days," she responded firmly. "My flight's in two days."
"I'm leaving tomorrow," he said.
"Can I borrow your truck?" she asked. "I don't like to leave my BMW parked at Reagan," she said tightly.
"Yeah," he said. "You know where the keys are," he added.
She nodded, and he turned to retreat to the basement for his own safety when she stopped him, her hand resting on the washing machine thoughtfully. She turned her head and looked at him guardedly.
"Who's going to Maryland?" she asked neutrally.
"The team," he answered warily.
"All of you?"
He bristled, irritated.
"Decker and Burley, too, Diane," he snapped, unappreciative of the insinuation.
She turned away, shrugging her shoulders. She didn't care if it upset him, she was suspicious and she was tired of feeling bad about it. She had already asked him if he was having affair, and now she thought she'd done it prematurely. She couldn't ask again without coming off as paranoid.
"Leave me your contact information," she requested coolly.
Gibbs just nodded and quickly returned to the basement, the boat, and the bourbon before she had a chance to dig into him about anything else that popped into her passive-aggressive mind.
Jenny checked her watch swiftly as she rinsed her toothbrush, noting that she was making good time and there was really no need to rush. She had to meet Gibbs at NCIS at eight, and it was six-thirty now. She'd have just enough time to pack for Maryland, get to the Navy Yard, and get her head on straight for this operation.
She checked her reflection in the unfamiliar mirror to make sure there were no dark circles under her eyes; even though she'd gotten little sleep, her face didn't reflect that. She gently prodded a scandalous hickey on her neck with a slight frown, and then zipped up her toothbrush and toothpaste in the case she'd brought, flicked off the light, and quietly exited Rick Colter's bathroom.
She shoved her toiletry case back into her duffle bag and tucked her knotted hair behind her ears while she pulled out a pair of shorts and slipped them on over her panties, chewing slightly on her lower lip. She was looked around for her bra, and was just remembering that she hadn't worn one when Rick woke up with a start and stared at her in the dark.
He rubbed his face and fumbled for a lamp, blinking at her groggily.
He smiled lazily, and she was once again struck by how damn Hollywood his looks were.
"You don't have to go," he said, waving his arm welcomingly. "I won't kick you out."
She smirked and laughed a little, turning and drawing a wrinkled t-shirt out of her bag. She threw it on and then crawled onto his bed, crouching over his hips and chest like an animal, her hair falling over her shoulders and brushing his chest.
"No, I do have to go," she said, bending to kiss the corner of his mouth. "Work," she explained curtly, sitting back on his abdomen lightly and straddling him. "Case is taking us out of town."
"Sounds interesting," Rick said, reaching out with both hands to touch her waist and slide his hands up. She pushed his hands away and he smiled, placing them behind his head like a pillow. "Where are you Navy cops off to?"
She gave him a look that clearly told him she would not answer, and he shrugged good-naturedly.
"I was surprised you called me," he said.
"Why?" she asked, tilting her head and arching her brow. "Because you didn't call me?" she asked, reminding him that he'd said he would. Her light look told him she didn't care because she wasn't that interested, but he still looked a little sheepish.
"Uh, I didn't know if you'd want me to, after Havisham."
"You didn't have anything to do with her," Jenny answered, shrugging. She got off Rick and off his bed and found her sandals, slipping them on.
"Heller bruised up your throat pretty bad," Rick said darkly, reminding her that the strangling had been Rachel's fault.
Jenny gave him a wry look and touched the bit mark on her throat.
"Yeah? So did you," she said, standing up. She picked up her bag and then sat on the edge of his bed next to him. She bent forward and pressed against him, giving him a long, slightly enjoyable, appreciative kiss. "Thanks for the coffee," she said smugly, flicking her tongue along his lower lip.
He groaned in annoyance, probably at the idea of her leaving.
"Anytime, babe," he said, smacking her lightly on the ass as she got up. "I will give you a call this time," he added, laughing.
"Mmm, now that you've had a taste," she teased. She swung her bag over her shoulder, shrugging a little and pursed her lips. "This doesn't have to be anything other than it was," she said bluntly.
He raised his eyebrows and laid his head down, obviously still tired and content to let her go and fall back to sleep.
"Cool," he said lightly, and she grinned, giving him a wave that he didn't see as she left the room.
She tiptoed gingerly through his apartment and out the door, taking the stairs rather quickly out to her car. It hadn't been a bad night in bed at all—not, it had been a far cry from that—but the empty feeling she had in the hours after was unpleasant, she wasn't usually one to resort casual sex as a fix for her problems. She was experienced enough to know when she was essentially using someone as nothing more than a human vibrator, and she didn't much like the idea.
The sun was already up and emitting a low, warm light over the world as she drove back to her townhouse and braced herself for this upcoming Maryland stakeout.
"Just because we're on a stakeout doesn't mean you have to dress like a—ow," Burley broke off, nursing his shoulder after her sprang away from the punch Shepard delivered to it.
"I'm not sure I wanted to hear what you were going to say," she said in a sickly sweet voice.
"Jenny," drawled Decker playfully, handing her a cup of coffee. "No hitting the weaker kids."
"I was at the gym," Jenny lied blithely, uninterested in getting into her personal life with the boys. She shrugged, perfectly comfortable and confident in her shorts, old sandals, and faded t-shirt. Decker, however, was sly and more perceptive than she'd counted on. He whistled wolfishly and poked her neck, right where she knew the hickey was.
"Does the gym have a name?"
Jenny put her index finger to her chin and pretended to think about it.
"Oh, if only I could remember—it was something like 'mind your own business' or 'shut the hell up'…" she mused, smirking just a little.
"Or 'handsome metro cop'," Burley piped up. She glanced at him and he looked hesitant, obviously trying to join in on the banter without taking it in the wrong direction. She just smirked a little more to give him the green light. Ah, hell—if they knew she was sleeping with Colter, at least they'd stop betting on her sleeping with Gibbs.
She took a long sip of her coffee and smiled appreciatively.
"Thanks, Will, you know how I like it," she said gratefully.
He shrugged.
"Gibbs picked it up," he said, showing her his own cup. "Weird, right?"
Jenny puckered her lips thoughtfully and pressed them against her coffee mug. That made sense; she wasn't sure Decker would know how she drank her coffee, but Gibbs certainly did.
Gibbs came into the bullpen with a military issue backpack on his shoulder, holding a bundle of files in his hands. He waved it at them brusquely, managing to hold keys and a coffee cup in the other hand.
"Got the final Intel, c'mon," he said gruffly, not bothering to greet her.
"Gibbs, you know we're dragging Shepard out of bed with her metro boy toy," Burley drawled.
Gibbs paused in his determined tracks and turned, looking her up and down a little sarcastically. His eyes fell on her neck and then snapped quickly to her eyes and this time there was no doubt about it. He was jealous. So she quirked a brazen eyebrow and lowered the coffee cup from her mouth.
"That's too bad," Gibbs said curtly, obviously pleased to screw with any of his team's non-work related plans. "Hate to interrupt your fun," he said sarcastically.
"Ah, that's alright," she answered breezily, holding her own. "I'm sure I can manage by myself for the few lonely nights I'm stuck in Maryland," she added suggestively, flexing her hand a little.
Decker let out a bark of laughter. Gibbs looked at her hand, shrugged, and smirked, turning to storm off towards the elevator.
"Not unless you want an audience," he announced boldly, holding up the files. "Two agents to a room, Shepard," he called over his shoulder. "Pick which one of us you want."
Burley let out a laugh that was clearly meant to pity her; clearly, co-ed teams weren't yet in the hotel budget for NCIS.
The redhead fixed a glare on every single one of her male team members and actually prayed that Gibbs would just arbitrarily assign her to a room—because she'd rather claw her eyes out than deal with the teasing that would come out of choosing any of them.
Gibbs had Jenny drive one of the cars to Baltimore; she could drive stick and Decker couldn't, so she took a car with him and Burley rode with Gibbs. She assumed that meant Gibbs would put her with Deck when they got to their hotel, and she was correct—something she was grateful for. Common sense told her she could never allow herself to room with Gibbs—they'd be in bed together in seconds, and not in a professional way. On that note, with her current state of mind, she didn't think she could gracefully handle rooming with Stan.
They were relatively comfortable, acceptably spacious connecting rooms, with king-sized beds, desks, simply bureaus, and bathrooms in each. Gibbs gave them all an hour of downtime settling in before they were going to debrief and go over their roles.
Jenny threw her things on the right side of the bed and wandered into the bathroom to brush her hair. It was sticky and hot outside; the weather had been cruel to her red locks and she was determined to fix it. Decker wandered around awkward, exploring the drawers in the hotel room. He sat down on the bed and flicked through the complimentary bible left on the bedside table. In the mirror, she saw him glance at her things.
"Do you snore?" she asked.
"Wha-?" he asked, distracted.
"Do you snore?" she repeated, flipping her hair over her face, bunching it up, and tying it into a bun messily. She pulled at the skin under her eyes, frowning, and then turned off the light, walking into the room and dropping down heavily in an armchair.
"I dunno," he answered, shrugging. "I'm asleep."
"Has anyone ever told you that you snore?" she asked.
He thought about it a minute, and then shook his head.
She sighed in relief.
"Good, snoring makes me crazy," she stood up and walked to the bed, throwing her stuff uncaringly onto the floor. She lay down thoughtfully and stretched her arm out. "We can share the bed," she said matter-of-factly.
"I can sleep in the chair, Jenny," he said seriously.
"Really, Will, it doesn't matter."
"I dunno, I don't want to make you uncomfortable," he muttered seriously.
Jenny laughed lightly and turned toward him, propping her head up on her palm and looking at him with raised eyebrows.
"Man, you don't know uncomfortable until you've been stranded in someone's barn after a Sigma Kappa Halloween party and end up having to share the hayloft with three piglets, your best friend, and the drunk guy she's hooking up with."
Decker burst out laughing.
"Damn, I shoulda gone to college in—" he broke off, glancing at her to fill him in.
"Georgia," she reminded him.
He just whistled and shook his head, swinging his leg on the bed and smacking his knee with the bible. She lunged towards him, snatching the book from him, and placing it squarely in the middle of the bed.
"Here, we'll sleep with this between us, just so you know who's watchin' in case you try any funny business."
Decker snorted and made the sign of the cross, lifting an eyebrow.
"So, about this Sigma Kappa barn party…"
She snickered, and was about to start filling him in on some of the tamer details when Gibbs barged into the room, followed by a wary looking Burley, and thrust a handful of files and earpieces down on the bed at Jenny and Decker's feet. He shot them an annoyed look, and Burley looked desperately jealous of Decker's good luck in not having to room with the taciturn ex-Marine.
"What party?" Burley asked, taking up the armchair Jenny had been in.
"Shepard slept in a barn," Decker enlightened everyone.
"Really?" asked Burley with interest.
"Big red one," Jenny answered matter-of-factly.
"Roll in the hay?" Burley snorted.
"Not me," Jenny said primly. "But my poor friend Meg, if I hadn't been there to watch, she'd never have been able to remember the next morning."
Burley grinned and shook his head.
"You done?" Gibbs asked, glaring at Jenny. She shrugged and fell silent, indicating he could go on with dictating how their lives were going to work for most of this boring, stuffy surveillance operation. Gibbs picked up a file and opened it, throwing down a blueprint of a building for them to look at.
"We're gonna be stationed in some older government housing building," he said gruffly, "The place is being renovated, and Morrow wrangled us clearance to use it from Baltimore authorities…"
The first few rounds of surveillance did not go well. In an effort to remove temptation from her midst, Jenny had agreed to team up with Burley—an arrangement Gibbs had already assigned, though he'd done the courtesy of asking her if it were okay. She was confident she could handle it.
That is, until the end of a six-hour shift cooped up with him in which soy sauce had ended up in her hair.
Now she stood glaring at him lethally from beside the bed in the hotel room, her hair washed and soaking wet as it hung, clean, down over her shoulders, and Burley was pointing at her, desperately trying to defend himself to Gibbs.
"C'mon, this isn't fair! I assumed she knew that stakeouts meant pranks, it isn't my fault she came unprepared!"
"Soy sauce in her hair, Stan?" Decker asked skeptically.
Burley held up his hands defensively.
"I didn't know she had a thing about snakes, she fell into that table on her own."
Then, Stan made the worse mistake he possibly could have made: he laughed.
Jenny strode across the room aggressively enough to make him squeak in surprise and hunch forward, not so subtly protecting his groin.
"Oh no, Stan, I won't attack when you're expecting it, never when you're expecting it," she threatened in a terrifying tone.
"Gibbs," Burley squawked.
"Ah, you gotta be able to take what you give, Steve," Gibbs said, strolling forward and taking Jenny's arm. He gently pulled her away from Stan, and she whirled to him, folding her arms tensely.
"Don't pair me with him," she said frankly. "I quit babysitting when I was sixteen."
"When was that, Probie, three years ago?" Burley asked a little nastily.
Gibbs rubbed his forehead. Jenny pointed at Decker.
"I'll work with him," she said shortly.
"No," Gibbs retorted curtly. "You and Deck know the tech stuff, that's why you're not together," he reminded her. She thrust her hands out and shoved her palms into his chest recklessly.
"Then I'll work with you," she snapped. "I don't give a damn if it makes you uncomfortable."
His gaze turned steely, and she was aware that she had overstepped and made the moment more awkward than was necessary. Decker cleared his throat and stood up, rubbing the back of his head subconsciously.
"Look, Boss, I'm fine with workin' with Stan, we've done it before," he said, trailing off a little when Gibbs didn't even look at him.
"Shepard," Gibbs said calmly, his voice a little tense. He jerked his head towards the door. "Hallway."
She grit her teeth and turned sharply on her heel, storming out of the hotel room. He followed her, and she heard the door slam—and whirled on him unsticking her jaw stiffly and narrowing her eyes.
"No elevator for you to trap us in here," she said snarkily.
"Calm down," he said.
She frowned and put her hands on her hips.
"You know Stan and I clash, and you stuck me with him anyway, Gibbs!"
"You and Decker know the tech stuff; we need a techie in each pair," he retorted, reiterating his previous words. She nodded tensely, sensing that he was being overtly cautious with her. She shivered, her wet hair making her a little chilly, and blew strands out of her eyes, refusing to back down.
"Look, you had me drive separately, you tried to stick me with Stan, I get it, it's obviously tempting for you to work with me," she saw the scoff begin behind his mouth and glared at him. "I'm not being arrogant. It's a fact," she snapped. "We'll be fine, we'll just keep our eyes on the job. I'm a professional," she asserted firmly.
He nodded, but she still felt something was off.
"What?" she hissed, exasperated. She smacked her hand against her thigh, giving him a frustrated look. "Can you handle it?"
He reached up and rubbed a hand over his jaw and looked like he was trying to force words to form into a coherent sentence, and then he answered her, gruffly:
"The way you were actin' the other day," he started roughly. "When you called me a bastard—"
"Jesus, did I hurt your feelings?"
He laughed sarcastically, gritting his teeth. He lowered his voice.
"Am I—are you," he stopped and stared at her like she was an alien for a moment, and then he glanced at the door separating them from the other two. "The thing in the car, was it harassment?"
She stared at him in speechless confusion for a moment and then sighed, her shoulders slumping.
"Christ."
That wasn't much of an answer by even his standards, and he just looked at her bluntly, waiting for her to answer him or accuse him. She pushed her hair back, gripping it tightly, and looked at him, her eyes meeting his as she stared past her pale wrist.
"Jethro, do you really think I'm the type of woman to let you get away with something like that? You think I'd just take it if I felt it was sexual abuse?"
"I don't know what kind of woman you are, Jenny," he said unexpectedly. He looked uncomfortable and exasperated. She let go of her hair and let her hand fall to her side, shrugging.
"I'm not the type to keep my mouth shut if I feel threatened," she said dully. "That's what you've been pissing yourself about?" she asked crudely. She rolled her eyes upwards and her cheeks flushed. She bit her lip, and blurted out: "Because it's not like I reciprocated voluntarily with a," she gave him a vulgar sign-language motion and mouthed the word hand-job, "in autopsy."
He put his hand over hers to make her stop and cleared his throat, raising an eyebrow in a kind of warning. She pulled her hand back and propped her fist on her hip again, cooling down a little. He seemed to relax slightly; obviously relieved to hear she wasn't harboring some wounded, hollow fear of his advances.
"Will you get over yourself if I tell you I wanted it?" she asked, her eyes meeting his confidently. It wasn't a come on, and it wasn't a challenge or a lie—it was just raw honestly; the truth. She had wanted it, and he had wanted it to, though he probably was not ready or willing to admit it.
He surprised her, though, by nodding curtly and then, cocking an eyebrow.
"Might make it harder to work with you," he said dryly, but her own brows went up in a bit or surprise because she detected the slight joke in his tone. She pursed her lips and, in an act that was more instinct than insinuation, flicked her eyes downwards just below his belt and back up to his mouth.
She leaned against the door to her room, turning the handle as she prepared to re-enter and fend off the curious looks of Burley and Decker. Meeting his blue eyes, she said:
"You just keep your gun to yourself and your binoculars on the streets and nobody'll break any promises to God."
"Lions and tigers and bears—"
"—oh, my."
Jenny lifted an eyebrow from behind her binoculars, amused to find Gibbs chiming in to her inane little Wizard of Oz reference. She snickered lightly and shook her head a little, narrowing her eyes again. She was stretched out on her stomach in the cramped quarters they were hold up in, her ankles crossed over each other on the floor behind her.
She frowned uncomfortably as sweat trickled down her neck, making her shiver in annoyance. When she piled her hair on top of her head, it cooled her neck but made her scalp unbearably hot and itchy; when she took her hair down, it tortured her neck—it was impossible for her to win.
She sighed and shifted, sitting up and stretching, rolling her neck from side to side. Gibbs reached out to take the binoculars from her and handed her the headset they were using to listen in to the bugged warehouse. She set them down, letting her hair down briefly and shaking her hands through it roughly, trying to cool off.
"Lions, tigers, and bears are the least of the worries those twerps had," Jenny muttered seriously. She clicked her tongue and reached over Gibbs' knees for a water bottle, pouring some of the (depressingly) lukewarm liquid into her hands and throwing it on her face and hair. She took a long drink of the water and then gestured with an open palm at the warehouse. "Those flying monkeys were twisted pieces of work—what if they have flying monkeys in there?"
She threw the bottle aside and snorted, not sure if Gibbs was paying attention to her. She shook her head and then picked up the headset casually, pursing her lips in a no-nonsense manner.
"If they've got flying monkeys, you're on your own, Gibbs, I didn't sign up for that shit."
She settled the headset over her ears and turned to look at him. He was peering at her over the binoculars, staring at her neutrally in a way she couldn't quite interpret. She looked at him for a moment, waiting for him to say something, and then turned back around, leaning back on her palms and tuning into the—well, the nothing that was happening in her ears.
"What are these Marines doing smuggling hyenas and baboons and whatnot, anyway?" she asked loudly.
"Money," Gibbs grunted.
"Yeah, got that," she retorted. "I just mean, why don't they get a little more theme oriented? Bring in some whales and giant squids and box jellyfish oh my."
She snickered at herself.
"Who needs a pet hyena?" she continued, pursing her lips skeptically. "Maybe a cute little red panda I can understand, but hyenas? Ick," she shivered.
"Jenny."
"Yes?"
"Stop talking."
She lifted an eyebrow and glanced slowly over her shoulder at him. He stared straight ahead with the binoculars and she turned her nose up, pretending to be offended. The silence had begun to get as stifling as the heat and she was just trying to save her own sanity.
"If you'd prefer to just look at me, then," she teased loftily, turning back to glare out the window.
She frowned slightly; there was a lull in activity—truth be told, there wasn't much activity at all—and nothing was being said; she adjusted her headset so it was only covering one ear and reached for the water bottle again, unscrewing the cap. She took a drink, spared some more to flick over her face and chest, and re-closed it.
Then she swept her hair back up, baring her neck, and giving him a clear view of the hickey still taunting him from just below her ear. He lowered the binocs and glared a little, narrowing his eyes at the annoying spot. He toyed with the idea of asking her if that pretty boy cop was responsible for it, and wondered what it would be like to taste that spot on her neck himself.
Jenny checked her watch and then rubbed her forehead. She allowed herself a small yawn; the muggy heat was making her groggy and lethargic; she needed the conversation to keep her awake.
"When do Decker and Burley relieve us?" she asked.
"Four," he answered, and she looked at her watch again. Damn if it wasn't only one o'clock right now, and this was boring as hell—worse than the first day had been, almost.
Almost.
There wasn't much that was worse than spending hours upon hours cramped up with Stan Burley.
"Gibbs."
He grunted to indicate he was listening.
"How did you survive heat like this in the desert?" she asked, eager for advice.
He didn't say anything for a moment, and when she shifted to look at him, she noticed he was looking at her intently, a little suspiciously.
"You sure I served in the desert, Shepard?" he asked.
"You're right, you're obviously old enough for 'Nam," she retorted, rolling her eyes. "Only place the US was combatively involved was the Middle East," she said logically. "Unless you were in the Balkans?"
He narrowed his eyes at her sharply, and then shook his head slowly, peering back through the binoculars.
"Panama and Kuwait," he said curtly.
"Desert Storm?"
He nodded, and she noticed his knee twitch slightly. Curiously, she leaned over a little—and without thinking, simply on instinct, she touched his leg just at the knee hesitantly.
"Were you injured?"
He ignored her for so long she thought he wasn't going to answer, and then he just said:
"It was war," in a blunt, sort of mysterious tone, and she figured he didn't want to talk about it. She splayed her hand over his knee, burning the heat of her palm into his jeans and then branding the weight of her hand into his skin.
"Guess you weren't thinking much about the heat," she muttered, pushing a few strands of red hair off her damp forehead.
She didn't know why she did it, but the next thing she knew she had replaced her hand with her head and was stretched out tiredly with her cheek on his legs. She swallowed and rubbed at her neck. He leaned forward and flicked the hickey on her skin gently and she squeaked, smacking his fingers.
"Get up, it's too hot for that," he said gruffly, poking the hickey until she sat up and shoved his legs. She delivered a swift kick to his shins, reaching up to touch her neck gingerly.
Her head swam briefly with the words—it's too hot—uttered so many times in the elevator when NCIS' air conditioning had been broken. Heat was a terrible atmosphere for them to be caught in.
"Wear less clothing tomorrow," she shot at him, popping an eyebrow pertly.
He laughed curtly and lowered the binoculars again, nodding at her t-shirt and jeans.
"You first."
She was impressed, and unfortunately a little provoked and turned on, by his semi-flirty—oh, fine, downright seductive—banter. Well, if he was going to ignore the rules and casually ignore the wedding ring factor, she was going to cautiously play along. She would consider the stain on her conscious and the undesirable state of her morals another day.
Jenny was in the hotel's en suite bathroom, carefully dabbing off her make-up, when she heard Decker trudge back in. It was around eleven, just when his and Burley's shift was ending, and he sounded tired. She heard the door connecting their rooms open, and Gibbs said something in a gruff tone, probably warning them that they needed to meet for debriefing before bed.
Their stakeout hours were odd; because they were trying to not only bust the trading ring but also discover if the NCIS agent already involved was rogue, there were times when none of them were at the scene. When Decker and Burley had taken over their shift at four o'clock, Jenny had separated herself from Gibbs as much as possible.
Currently she was in a state of semi-undress, clad in a pair of demure panties and a short, light robe post-shower. She had forgotten to remove her make-up beforehand, and was in the process of cleaning up the unattractive black smudges.
"Jenny?"
"Bathroom," she answered, nudging the door a little with her hip to close it more. "How was your shift?" she asked.
Decker grumbled something unintelligible, and then his voice got louder as he answered:
"We watched one of the sleazy zoo-keeper guys bang a hooker in the alley—" he started to push open the door as he spoke and she immediately reacted, letting out a shriek of surprise and objection and jamming her knee and elbow against it, preventing him from getting an eyeful of her panties and basically exposed chest.
"What? What?" Decker was demanding, panicking. "Hey, you okay? Shepard?"
She was so startled by his sudden attempt to open the door that she could barely form an answer; she just shouted:
"What the hell are you doing, William?" at the top of her lungs.
"Jesus Christ, you sound like my mother!" he yelled back, still in that panicky, neurotic tone. "Cool it, I just have to pee!"
She heard doors slamming and groaned, silently lifting her eyes to the ceiling—the unmistakable sounds of Burley and Gibbs storming in from the other room, probably with some macho, ridiculous intent of coming to her rescue.
"You can't just waltz in and pee, Deck," she yelled furiously.
"Why not?" he sounded legitimately bewildered.
She gave an indignant, exasperated cry of disbelief.
"I'm half-naked!" she protested shrilly. "I'm a woman! I'm not one of your boys!"
She dropped her make-up removing wipe in the sink and quickly pulled her robe closed, tying it securely around her waist and cursorily making sure it covered her appropriately before she flung open the door and glared at him. She took a moment to let the scene sink in: Decker; half-petrified with confusion, hunching away from her, Gibbs; standing silently and obviously tensely near the bed, and Burley; looking slightly amused and appropriately wary, his gun hanging loosely from his index finger.
And then of course, her, standing in the bathroom in a little cotton robe that was probably clinging to her in all the right places and glaring at them like she'd just caught them rifling through her purse.
Decker saved her the trouble of finding something witty to say by turning tomato red and beginning to splutter.
"I didn't think—I wasn't even, I mean I'm so used to you, and stakeouts with the guys," he flailed around grammatically, trying to explain himself. She couldn't help but feel pity for him; this was Decker she was dealing with, he had probably honestly meant no harm.
Still, she had the right to get a barb or two in.
She threw her arm out, gesturing between the three of them vaguely.
"I don't understand why you men are so eager to whip it out around each other!" she said, one eyebrow going up. "Hate to break it to you, they all look the same to us! Sure, some are a little bigger, but really, they all do the same damn thing!"
She realized she was talking into stunned silence, and when she quit speaking, Burley twitched in a weird, uncomfortable way and reached up to rub his jaw, looking pained.
"Boss, make her stop," he hissed at Gibbs, looking genuinely appalled.
Burley's desperate plea snapped Gibbs out of whatever annoyed, stoic stupor he was stuck in and he fixed a glare on Decker. Decker winced and straightened up, holding his hands up defensively.
"Gibbs, I swear, I wasn't tryin' any funny business," he said, a pained expression on his face. He reached up and scratched the nape of his neck nervously, turning to Jenny with a pleading look. "Come on, give me a break, Jenny, it just means I was treating you as equal as one of them, yeah?"
She rolled her eyes, relaxing, and shooting him a good-natured, small smile.
"Well, shit, Deck, I guess if you put it that way you can bust in on any woman naked," she drawled, half-teasing, half-sarcastic.
Gibbs looked at them both like he was fed up and then just cleared his throat. Burley twirled his gun around like a western cowboy, blew on the mouth of it, and then strolled to the desk and laid it down. Jenny nodded at it, coming out of the bathroom and leaning against the door.
"What were you gonna do with that, Stan?" she asked.
"Fire prematurely," Decker answered immediately, snickering at his own joke.
"You're a riot, asshole," Burley fired back, darting across the room to punch Decker semi-playfully in the shoulder. Decker just snorted, and Jenny pursed her lips, shaking her head. She had always had the feeling that the boys hid their true, teenager-at-heart nature around her.
It was almost pleasant to see it come out here.
She pushed her hair out of her eyes and looked up, meeting Gibbs' eyes by accident. His features were difficult to read, which she had come to understand meant he was either working through how he wanted to feel about a situation, or he had already decided and was hiding the result. Burley and Decker were still messing with each other, so she lifted her chin and raised her voice over the din.
"When's our next round?" she asked.
"Shepard, you wanna take the victor?" Burley asked, his voice muffled. Decker now had him in a headlock.
"Sure," she answered, without hesitation. "I'd decimate you in hand-to-hand combat," she added smugly, continuing with her conversation with Gibbs. "This the night we start round the clock?"
Gibbs shook his head curtly.
"After the shipment. You and I are back on surveillance at six am," he said. "Intel says they've got a shipment coming in sometime tomorrow."
She was about to say something else when Decker ended up flat on his back at her feet, and stared up at her with a frown, winded.
"Take 'im down," he said dramatically, and Jenny turned to look at Burley, who looked quite pleased with himself for dropping Decker to the ground. Decker, considerably more muscular than Burley, seemed rather impressed by the turn of events.
Jenny smirked, already confident enough in her strategy to know she was going to 'win'.
She stepped past Decker, reached out feebly to grab Burley's arm and, when he yanked her around and threw his arm around her neck—as she knew he would—she cried out in a beautiful imitation of actual pain and forced tears to spring to her eyes.
And, just as she had anticipated, Burley released her in a fit of worry, Decker leapt off the floor, and Gibbs barked at Stan to get away from her—and there she stood, untouched, upright, triumphant, because the bunch of old-fashioned chauvinists were afraid they'd hurt her.
"That's cheating," Burley growled.
He looked around in outrage, demanding support from his colleagues.
It was Gibbs who shot him down.
"No," he said gruffly, something like approval flashing in his immovable blue eyes. "That's strategy."
Jenny let a small smile fold over her lips and made a small bowing motion, raising her eyes to look at Gibbs through her lashes. He looked back for a moment, his brow cocked slightly, and then his eyes receded into his usual moody glare again, and he pointed at her callously.
"Oh-six-hundred, sharp," he reminded her bluntly. "Get some damn sleep, Jenny, I'm not doin' your part tomorrow," he added, though she didn't think he was annoyed. He had kicked her off him once, claiming it was too hot, but when she actually had fallen asleep with her head on his thigh, she had awoken in the same place—she got the distinct impression he didn't object to the proximity.
But she just nodded, compressing her lips, and Gibbs disappeared into his and Stan's room, flinging the door closed.
Decker rubbed his shoulder and gave Jenny a surprised look.
"He let you get away with sleeping?" he asked incredulously.
"Decker, he lets her get away with whatever the hell she wants," Burley said, rolling his eyes.
She didn't answer, she just inclined her head a little smugly.
"And with that, gentlemen, I'm going to put a bra on," she said smoothly, retreating into the bathroom again—where she was glad she'd already taken her change of clothes—and shutting the door securely this time.
She was sure she wasn't meant to hear it, but Burley didn't seem to understand that hotel doors weren't soundproof and he was a loud talker.
"I don't get how you sleep next to her without suffering," Burley said to Decker, his voice muffled but understandable all the same.
"She's not a blonde," Decker answered seriously.
And she wasn't even offended; she just laughed, and she hoped they heard her, and knew she was listening. Decker was fine with sleeping in a bed with her because she wasn't blonde, and he wasn't attracted to her—well, that, she understood; she was fine with sleeping in a bed with him because he wasn't Gibbs, and she wasn't allowed to sleep with Gibbs.
Burley was wincing and whining and stretching cramped muscles when Jenny arrived at their stakeout quarters. He eyed her hands full of coffee with longing and nodded his head towards the door.
"Decker just got done briefing Gibbs," he told her. "The shipment didn't happen on our watch, so it'll probably happen on yours. We'll be back to take over for you guys at midnight."
Jenny bit back a yawn and just nodded, slipping past Stan and entering the room. Decker had already left, and she handed Gibbs his cup of coffee silently and stood, looking out the window. It was still hot as hell, and the room didn't smell great—it just felt sweaty and dirty in the cramped quarters.
She looked down, and noted that Gibbs had still shown up in jeans and a polo, apparently refusing to dress for the weather. She had kept her end of the bargain, though—short denim shorts, and a flimsy, simple V-neck was all she wore, with not much underneath to keep her decent.
"No nasty animals rear their ugly heads, huh?" she asked, sipping her coffee moodily.
"Nope," he answered, thrusting a pair of binoculars up at her. "Work," he said gruffly.
"Yeah, yeah," she retorted, trying to balance her coffee in one palm while she maneuvered the binocs. She quickly realized she'd spill, and leaned down, handing her Styrofoam cup to Gibbs.
He turned his head and leaned back slightly, greeted with a view down her shirt that she hadn't meant to give, but didn't exactly cover up right away. It didn't matter, because he didn't look away. He slowly took her cup for her.
"Don't contaminate any evidence, now," she admonished lightly, cocking an eyebrow.
She adjusted the binocs around her neck quickly and swept her cup back into her hands, smirking a little.
"They're not worth compromising a case," she added, once again prodding him to have a little fun.
"Don't sell yourself short," he retorted appreciatively, surprising her with his heady banter. She pursed her lips to show her approval, and straightened up, lifting the binoculars with one hand.
"Careful, Jethro," she teased suggestively. "We're professionals."
But as the day went on, the line between professional and unprofessional became impossible to walk. It got darker, their coffee got emptier, and though the sun went down, the room only got muggier and more uncomfortable—Jenny knew her shirt was clinging to her, a little damp from sweat, and she was conscious of her (poorly chosen) black bra showing through.
She had already removed her sneakers and ankle socks, letting her feet cool, and he had his polo thrown in a corner, and was sitting stoically in a thin white undershirt with the sleeves rolled up. When he adjusted the binocs or moved to pick something up, the muscles in his biceps flexed and enticed her.
She titled her head back, smirking again, now simply playing with her empty coffee cup. She had the headset only half set on her ears; the shipment had still not shown up, and chatter was almost non-existent. She laughed out loud, and Gibbs gave her a wicked look over the binoculars.
"I've never seen a group of boys stumble over their asses so fast to beat it," she continued, snickering through the relation of one of her stories from undergraduate school. "Beat it, ah, out of the courtyard," she amended, though her raised eyebrows told a different story.
"You win the contest?" Gibbs prompted smoothly.
She lowered her eyes demurely, and then popped them back up, looking at him through her lashes; she chose not to answer, and instead just looked at him in the horrid, dim lighting of the quarters. She glanced at her watch; thirty minutes until their time was up.
She shook her head good-naturedly and pushed loose strands of hair off of her forehead.
They were having a good time, a time that precariously bordered on inappropriate, heavily sexual banter, and genuine laughter and relationship building. He let the binoculars fall around his neck and leaned back, looking at her intently.
"Why'd you leave?" he asked. "Georgia."
"Emory," she corrected, squinting a little, just to clarify. "I went to Emory."
"You've got a bulldog stuffed animal in your house," he pointed out.
She snapped and pointed at him wryly.
"I knew you'd gone snooping," she accused lightly. She shook her head, licking her lips a little. "I dated a 'Dawgs linebacker," Jenny explained. "But Georgetown's mascot is also a bulldog."
"Yeah," he nodded. "Didn't ask about Georgetown."
She gave him a saucy look, arching an eyebrow.
"Nosy," she remarked in a low voice. She frowned a little, moving her head back and forth, considering. But why stop now—so much had come out of her mouth in these past few hours that she'd normally refuse to reveal; Gibbs was irresistible.
She leaned forward, curving her shoulders in, and pulling her feet up a little; she began to playfully attempt to balance her empty cup on her ankles and shrugged a little uncaringly.
"Nothing traumatic, nothing interesting," she said coolly. "I went to Emory on a partial scholarship, and it got me a better scholarship to Georgetown, which is where I'd wanted to go anyway. Came back home for law school."
"Why go to the south in the first place?"
She smirked.
"Cowboys," she answered silkily. She glanced at him and grinned, shaking her head. "I had to sow some wild oats."
He laughed in disbelief and picked up the binoculars again.
"Why'd you leave Georgetown?" he went on. "Not fancy enough?"
Jenny fumbled her coffee cup and it sprung away from her, bouncing across the floor to his leg. She lunged forward onto her hands and knees and crawled forward, winced as the hardwood floors bore into her knees.
"Why'd you leave the service?" she retorted boldly, her eyes finding his as she reached for her cup.
Her foot tangled in a wire and she tripped, her knee sliding and rubbing in a painful burn as she tumbled forward into Gibbs. She rose up on her shins, wincing, and pressed one hand down on his thigh, regaining her balance.
He didn't answer her, but he lowered the binoculars again, his hands coming off of them, and looked at her, blue eyes blazing almost painfully into hers. She bit her lip on instinct, though it seemed to ignite him. Gibbs reached out and pressed his hand against her thigh, his fingers tugging at the edge of her denim, brushing over her sweaty, warm skin, and she interpreted it as an invitation; she threw that leg over his lap and straddled him, her breath hitching in her throat.
His hands rested on her thighs, just above her knees, as if frozen in wonder that she was sitting in his lap. It was a cinematic moment, she looking at him with slightly parted, stained lips and wisps of humid red hair framing her face, and him looking back at her as if he'd just made some sort of crucial move he couldn't take back.
She reached up and pushed the headset roughly off of her, swallowing. Her hands shook as she reached for his neck, and she shifted, pushing herself up a little, pressing her torso against his, and then she was kissing him again—like she had in the showers, and like she had in the elevator. Like those kisses, it wasn't tentative, it was consuming; she was desperate to taste as much of him as she could, and she almost couldn't breathe for the force of the lust that ignited her lips and limbs, and he proved himself to be just as wanton and desperately doomed as she was.
His hands moved up her thighs, applying pressure, dipping into her waistband and fingering the metal, brand name clasp on the wasteful excuse for denim. He seemed to change his mind, and slipped his hand between her legs, between them, and the pressure he exerted—rubbing her inseam into her groin—made her shake and pull her lips away, her eyes closed, and she tilted her head back, managing to swallow down a moan.
She squeezed her legs against his thighs, her nails pricking gently into his neck, and he pulled her towards him firmly, holding her onto his lap, his lips brushing her neck and exploring, tongue tracing her pulse and finding her ear and jaw. She bit her lip, grinding her hips against him, and she had that feeling of dizziness again, like she was spinning out of control.
Her hands slipped from his neck to the binoculars and she hissed as her fingers were slammed together by the impact of hitting the heavy equipment. She didn't want to stop, but the pain numbed her lust—barely, just barely—and she knew they couldn't finish this here, even as she knew that there was no going back, really, and they were going to finish this.
She got loose of him and stood up on shaky legs; his hand snaked around her knee and he leaned against her as if begging her to push him away and give him a reason to stop; she just shudder when his open mouth pressed against her leg and she reached for his shirt, forcing him to stand up with the weak brunt of her strength.
Her hands fumbled for his wrists and she pushed him, adeptly avoiding cords and other hazards, up against the wall by the door, her body fitting against his perfectly as she slammed into him, and that drew a visible, pained response from him; he reached around her and pressed her hips against him.
She checked the time on his watch and then reached between them and unbuckled and unzipped him, and shoved his pants and boxers down his legs—with more aggression and more resolve than she had used in autopsy, and more need.
His hands ran up her sides, bunching her shirt in his fists, knuckles eagerly kneading her ribs and her climbing higher until his hand was cupped over her breast and roughly trying to find its way inside the fragile material of the stupid bra she was wearing.
A moan escaped her lips and she pressed her body against his again, her lips dragging against his shirt as she melted a little into his touch, and then she remembered, this wasn't the grand finale, she was stalling, until they could get back to her hotel room, and she fought with his hands, yanking them out of her shirt an away from her breasts, and tightly she intertwined their fingers—
-and dropped to her knees, pushing his hands flat into the wall next to his thighs.
She squeezed his hands and pulled hers free, splaying them against his abdomen, smirking a little when his muscles clenched tightly, and she trailed her hand down in a teasing, unfair way, until she had lazily stroked him from base to tip and before he could choke out her name in appreciation, she had her mouth on him.
And then, he did moan.
He slid his hands into her hair, his fingers working, frustrated, at the bun she'd tied it up in—she was only slightly annoyed when he broke the elastic tie and her red locks came tumbling down around her, because it felt good to have his fingers stroking her scalp, brushing her neck, and pulling her hair, coaxing her to move her head just right and yet giving her enough freedom for comfort.
The floor was murder for her knees, but she didn't care; it didn't matter to her that they were on the job, they were supposed to be keeping a weather eye on this surveillance work, she was too desperate to touch him and to be touched, after so many weeks and months of fighting it, of slip-ups, and of trying to be good.
"Jenny," he ground out hoarsely, and she heard the subtle warning in his tone. She heard his head knock back against the wall and flicked her eyes up, parting her lips, sliding her hand lower on his thigh and then smacking his skin lightly.
He pushed her head down insistently, a groan escaping his lips, and she handled it relatively well, forcing her palm into his thigh only as a subtle warning of her own. He was pulling her hair so tightly.
"Jen," he said huskily, his hand sliding a little, touching her neck, and cheek, and then shoulder; he started to push her away, his stomach clenching in a telltale sign, and then he changed tune and shouted "NO" so loudly, and so forcefully, jerking his knee and pulling her hair roughly at the same time, that he startled her into having no choice but to swallow.
She blinked; her breath lost, and leaned forward on her hands and knees, unable to figure out what had happened. Then she heard a concerned shout—Burley's voice—and while she was licking her lips and trying to clear her head, she tasted blood in her mouth. The next thing she heard was a zipper, Gibbs swearing, and the door opened, and Gibbs was crouching in front of her, his hand on the back of her head.
"Jesus Christ," Decker swore. "What happened?"
"Busted her lip with that door," Gibbs said roughly, and the lie was so ridiculous and so perfectly executed that she laughed, and sat back on her heels, pushing her hair back. Gibbs hand moved to her neck and he cupped her face, looking at her, the lust and heat of sex still burning in his blue eyes.
She swallowed, wincing a little, and reached up to touch her lip—which she knew he had busted when he'd pulled her head out of view and accidentally hit her with his knee. She licked her bottom lip and laughed huskily, shaking her head to get her hair out of her face.
"Damn, Jenny, are you okay?" Burley asked, kneeling next to her. He tried to look at her face but Gibbs head-slapped him aggressively, and Burley drew back, squealing. "I swear, Decker didn't even bust the door open that hard," he muttered incredulously.
Jenny nodded, composing herself. She covered her mouth and laughed, muffled, detesting the taste of coppery blood in her mouth.
"I shouldn't have been sitting there," she said thickly, waving away their concern.
Gibbs hand slipped off her neck, and she heard Decker gathering some things.
"Here," Gibbs gruffly handed her his polo to hold to her lip, and she did so gratefully, a little intoxicated by the smell of him that emanated from the shirt and the taste of him that still flooded her mouth.
She stood up without help, and scowled when she saw the blood on her white tennis shoes.
Decker and Stan looked at her warily, and she realized that was happening a lot this trip—the two of them were caught off guard. Suddenly, when she met Decker's eyes and he immediately looked away, she wondered if Deck even bought Gibbs' bullshit story. Gibbs turned a glare on the two of them, and she was almost surprised by the intensity of it.
"You two are on until morning," he barked callously. "If the shipment comes on, you're done, we regroup tomorrow," he added. They nodded, indicating they understood, and Gibbs looked over checking on Jenny. She just held up his shirt as if to wave him on, and then buried a smile in it.
"Jenny, I'm sorry," Decker said sincerely, rubbing his jaw sheepishly.
"It's fine, it's just a flesh wound," she said clearly, grinning a little. Burley laughed, privy to the reference, and Decker still looked uncertain and uncomfortable. Gibbs groused something about getting her lip patched up and pushed the door open, holding it for her.
He pulled the door of the apartment shut and she leaned against the wall, relaxing, trying to catch her breath. They both understood the necessity of silence in this moment, and she pressed her hand to her mouth tenderly, closing her eyes for a moment. Then she slipped her hand down her chest and over her stomach, righting her clothing, and buttoning her shorts with a graceful, shaky finger.
She opened her eyes and he was looking at her with something akin to raw need.
He beckoned to her, and turned away, hiding his eyes, and she reached out grasped the back of his jeans, holding his polo in a bunch in her hands, and following him down the treacherous, rickety stairs that would lead them on a safe route out of the complex, and back to the hotel.
Back to the hotel, and thus probably to hell.
In the middle of the night, with the door shut tightly and the world blocked out, Gibbs threw his bloodstained polo into his room as Jenny made for the bathroom she shared with Decker. He followed her, prowling almost protectively, and was quick to snatch tissues from a box and run them under cold water for her.
He held the damp mass up to her lip gently and pressed, though the bleeding had stopped, and now there was only swelling. She smiled in a wry, flushed way, her green eyes glinting, and leaned against the doorframe, letting him stroke her lip clean with guilty hands. When she'd had enough, she swatted him away, and then she was smirking at him provocatively, part of her lip trapped in her teeth seductively.
She crossed her leg at the ankle, one shoulder of her top drooping lazily, and tilted her chin up so she could meet his eyes better.
"Professional," she admonished sarcastically, her voice throaty.
His eyes flickered dramatically, and she couldn't quite read his expression; he reached out to touch her lip gingerly with his thumb, and then his fingers traced a delicate trail over the barely-there faded bruise on her neck and the hickey Officer Colter had left near it. She saw a flash of jealous, a spark of longing, and for a split second, she thought if he stopped touching her she might die—
-and then she realized how utterly absurd that was, and she wanted to escape from him, to stop.
Right now, they still had a chance to stop.
His wedding ring struck cold against her skin, sliding against her collarbone as he touched her gently, moving closer. It was as if he were exploring her, asking her—it was that same moment again, the one where they were each waiting, breathless, begging the other to make the move.
She wanted it so badly. She wanted him to make the move, so she stood still, waiting, refusing to look away from his intoxicating, cobalt eyes. She didn't give a damn about the woman that wedding ring represented, not now. Her stomach stirred and fluttered and she wanted him, and it wasn't just lust—though it had been at first—there was something emotional there, too.
But she didn't think about that.
She cocked an eyebrow, and he reached out with his other hand, touching her hip, his fingers pressing in and gripping as if he would pull her flush against him. She reached out, her lips parted in earnest, and her lithe palm snaked behind his shoulder and she popped him in the back of the head, delivered a head-slap that made his eyes darken passionately and melt into a sort of indignant, challenging glare.
She gasped quietly, in a mocking little way, and bit her bottom lip again.
"Am I not allowed to do that?" she asked in faux consternation. She lowered her voice, lowering her lashes attractively. "And here I thought it was a sign of affection."
Something remarkably similar to a growl ripped out of his throat, low and enticing, something that made her stomach and her spine ache with the need to be touched again. His hand held her a little more tightly at her hip and her breath caught, almost as if she were trying to say something, but couldn't speak.
The tension was palpable.
"Gibbs," she said, her voice edgy, almost a moan.
His lips hit hers, and then his body did, and she was pressed so tightly against him and the wall that she didn't know where his body began; knees against knees, thighs against thighs, chest against chest, and hands—roaming, stroking, clutching, almost as fierce as their mouths.
She thought her knees would buckle, and she thrust her arm up, grabbing tightly to the doorframe behind her, her nails digging into the paintjob. He was unbuttoning her shorts again, slipping his hand over the taut skin of her back and abdomen, slowly inching her pants down until they landed around her ankles and she shivered, biting her lip.
His hand ran over the unimpressive light pink cotton panties that covered her and he abandoned them to her ankles, too, his hands moving immediately to tangle her shirt up in her arms and then over her head, exposing her in front of him—white, blushed skin, parted bruised lips, aching eyes, one black, taunting bra strap slinking off her shoulder.
She pulled his hips against hers, unbuckling and unzipping again, and her hand roamed over his muscles, finding its way to his heartbeat; he ran his own hands up the backs of her thighs and picked her up, pressing possessive, resolved kisses to her neck, his teeth catching her bra and pushing it out of his way. She grasped his hair and his neck, lowering her mouth to his, moaning his name and everything she'd been holding back into the hot, demanding kiss that he returned to her.
He pinned her against the wall, and the doorframe was unforgiving and ruthless against her spine; she couldn't feel the pain, she could only feel his rough hand slipping between them; she gasped, whimpered, when the wedding band touched her again, and she broke the kiss, her lips resting in anticipation at the corner of his mouth.
"Jen," the word escaped his lips in a haze of desire and he was holding back, holding back when she needed him most. He was waiting for her consent; this was the point of no return and they both damn well knew it.
She nodded her head, pressing her lips to his urgently; he gripped her hips tightly and thrust into her. It was one exquisite movement that elicited a sharp cry of exultation from her lips; she dug a heel into his back, tilted her head back against the wall, and struggled to breathe. Her heart raced and she tightened her hold on his shoulders, her fingers brushing his hair and his neck.
Gibbs was only still for a moment. His lips fell against her shoulder, his eyes closed as if he were saying a doomed prayer, and his fingertips dug into her, passionately, possessively, and unforgivably. The wedding ring wasn't cold anymore; it was slick with sweat, warm metal against her skin, a tarnished symbol of a tarnished promise.
She moaned, murmured a demand for satisfaction, and he complied, his mouth finding hers again. She held onto him, struggling to find release from the intense, unbelievable pleasure that this was. He broke the kiss, gritting his teeth, and she felt the inebriating clench of his abdomen as he thrust home, his body fitting against hers, and she curled her body towards him and threw her head back, biting her lip in almost-there frustration.
He was a little too quick for her—he groaned, she felt him mutter her name against her throat, swear against her lips, and she was wincing as he pulled back, his breath ragged, holding her a little more gently.
"Oh," she gasped, parting her lips as she whimpered slightly, still on the edge, still waiting. "Oh, that isn't fair," she moaned, her green eyes flashing in a playful tease.
He let her stand, she did so shakily, and his hand ran between them; he slipped a finger inside her and she grit her teeth, almost losing it—almost. She bit her lip tightly though and put her hands on his hips, looking up into his eyes, her feet flat on the ground, her body still pressed tight against his. She opened her mouth and then sucked in her breath, her toes curling a little, arching towards him.
"Bed," she gasped, pulling his head to hers, kissing him in a slow, lingering way, her lips brushing his as she spoke again, tried to make him wait until he could get her in bed, until she could wrap herself around him, get his mouth between her legs—
"Bed, let's—take me to bed," she said huskily.
"Yeah," he answered gruffly, the growl still deep in his voice, and he stepped back, leaving her cold, and aching, hurting to be finished off.
She swept up the clothing that had been shed and led him into his and Burley's room, where she slammed the door, and pulled him on top of her on the unmade bed and her green eyes met his and there was so much conflict and rawness and intangible understanding and need—and then it was gone, and he was kissing her hard again, and she was tangled up in him, and they had crossed an irrevocable line into a murky world of adultery.
Stan Burley was busy trying to balance a couple boxes of pizza and a six-pack, and rolled his eyes in annoyance; he kicked the door in front of him roughly, waited a few moments, and then shuffled over to Decker's door and banged his foot against that one. Decker answered after a few moments, looking uncomfortable, and Burley walked in.
"Hey, man, couldn't reach my key," he muttered, carrying the food over to the desk and gesturing blindly at Gibbs' door. "Boss must be asleep."
He popped open a pizza box and rubbed his hands together excitedly.
"Morrow said to take about a twelve hour break, then he'll give us orders. He still wants to talk to Gibbs," Burley stopped talking, turning, and holding a piece of pizza curiously. He cocked his head and frowned, looking around.
"Where's Shepard?" he asked, taking a bite of pizza.
Decker, who had stretched back out on the bed with a newspaper in his lap, didn't answer—he still had that awkward, uncomfortable look on his face. He pressed his lips together, cleared his throat, and pointed vaguely at the door that connected the two rooms.
Burley stopped chewing, his brows going up. In the silence that resulted from Decker's wordless answer and Stan's lack of rambling, the reason for Decker's discomfort became clear. Burley flushed a little, looking at Decker as if he was asking his colleague to confirm what was going on.
"Jesus, you think we should tell them how thin the walls are?" he asked sarcastically, gesturing at the door the same way Decker had.
Decker shrugged and looked at his newspaper.
"It's none of our business," he said tightly.
"It's a little unprofessional," Burley grumbled loudly and indignantly, sitting down in the desk chair and abandoning his pizza. "I couldn't get ahold of him to brief him on the shipment," Burley went on sourly. "You're tellin' me this is why? We're supposed to sit her and listen to him fuck Shepard all night?"
"Christ, Stan, give it a rest," Decker snapped, glaring at him. "We're off the clock for twelve hours, they're adults just—just shut-up. It's not our business," he repeated edgily.
Burley glared momentarily at Decker, then looked at the closed door and kicked his foot a little petulantly.
"I guess I just sleep in here, then?" he asked rudely.
"Stan, you're sleepin' with Miller," Decker pointed out sharply. "You don't get to be up in arms because of this."
"I'm not married, Deck!" Burley snapped, pointing to his chest earnestly.
"And you've suddenly got some grand moral compass?" snorted Decker, glaring at his colleague again.
"I dunno, Decker, it just doesn't seem right," Burley snapped sarcastically, scowling.
His brows knit together and he leaned back, one hand rubbing his knee subconsciously.
Decker cleared his throat, still uncomfortable, and just went back to his newspaper, shrugging his shoulders again.
"You've been degrading her about sleeping with Gibbs since she started, and now that she's in bed with him, you don't think it's funny," he said shortly. "Don't be a jerk, Stan."
"What do you want me to do?" he snapped.
"Turn a blind eye."
Burley looked at Decker distastefully, and then reached for a coke from the six-pack and popped it open aggressively, taking a long, thoughtful swig. He winced a little, and then lunged for a remote, turning on the hotel room's TV and popping the volume up a little, just to tune out the muffled noise of his boss screwing the probie.
She woke up with a start, her eyes flying open heavily and uncomfortably, and she was disoriented—the room was arranged differently, and Decker was lying way too close for comfort. She was on the verge of elbowing him sharply in the ribs when her groggy mind was flooded with reality and she remembered she was in bed with Gibbs.
Naked, entangled, and sinfully, in bed with Gibbs.
Her head spun a little and she felt dizzy. She turned, searching for a clock, and the dim, cheap digital hotel clock told her it was close to four in the morning. She twisted, rolled onto her side, her back to Gibbs, and then she pushed the covers off of her and got out of bed. She spared a glance for her boss, a glance that assured her he was still dead asleep, sprawled on his stomach, and she swiped her panties off the floor, slipping them on.
She picked up her shirt on the way to the bathroom and slipped that on, too, and she waited until the door was shut to turn the light on and meet her own eyes in the smudged, dirty hotel mirror.
Her make-up was blurry, smudged, and framing her eyes in a faded, elderly-raccoon-ish way. Her hair was a decided mess; knotted, flat, in need of a wash. Her eyes were bright, probably left over from the endorphins. Her shirt was wrinkled. Her neck, still bruised the strangulation marks from days ago gone, Rick's hickey hidden by Gibbs' possessive mouth.
She bit her lip, swallowed hard, and turned on the faucet, bringing her hand to her mouth and covering it lightly, her fingers splaying out over her chin and cheeks. She flicked her eyes downward and closed them lightly; her lashes brushed her skin and her shoulders slumped, and she stood very still and, in the moment, hated herself.
The lighting in the bathroom was horrible.
She didn't look good.
She didn't feel good.
She felt like the other woman, though that particular feeling probably stemmed from the obvious, inarguable fact that she was the other woman.
She closed her eyes more tightly, but the only thing she could see reflected to her mind's eye was the simple gold band nestled snugly on his ring finger as he ran his hand over her body; she could feel it catch in her hair and pull a little when he tangled his fingers there, and she could almost taste it; her mouth tasted like metal—as if she were going to be sick.
She fought the feeling down, though, and instead opened her eyes and forced herself to meet her own reflection, and she parted her lips, taking in a deep breath. Her eyes burned painfully and she fluttered her eyelashes, reaching out to cup a handful of cold water and splash it on her face.
She didn't want to see tears on her face; it wasn't her right to cry. She didn't really deserve to cry.
She had spent so much time thinking about sleeping with Gibbs, fantasizing about it, playing their dangerous, seductive games, that she hadn't taken a moment to consider what it would feel like afterwards, when she remembered that he was married to a woman she didn't even know—whose feelings she…
…didn't care about. Jenny wasn't going to kid herself; she didn't care about Diane Gibbs. She didn't even know Diane Gibbs. It might be that realization in itself that made her the sickest and the sorriest; she felt guilty, but only because she knew this was going to be a mess, and she wasn't going to come out of it the clean one.
Jenny splashed her face again, biting her lip, and crying silently, letting it out of her system in a frustrated, annoyed way. She shivered, cold, and her body ached to crawl back into bed with him and fall asleep.
She shouldn't go back to bed.
If she slept with him—if she went back into that room, and fell asleep next to him, that would seal the deal; that would make this an affair, rather than just a one-night stand to relieve sexual tension. She couldn't afford to have an affair with her boss. It would be sticky, offensively unprofessional.
She took a deep breath and let it out, her eyes drying a little. She splashed her face and wiped it off, scrutinizing her eyes to ensure that they weren't red. She hated herself for crying over this, for shedding tears over a decision that was hers and a weakness that was her fault and no one else's.
She turned off the faucet, opened the door, and turned off the light.
She went back to bed, and slipped in, fixing the sheets and comforter, and Gibbs shifted, lifting his head and rubbing his jaw, his eyes fixated on her lazily. He didn't say anything, just watched her curl up next to him on her side, and he laid his head back down, eyes closed, and thrust his hand out lazily to rest over her thigh.
She turned onto her back and let his hand slide, resting sleepily between her legs, and she licked her lips, closing her eyes lightly, almost blissfully. She'd gotten it out, she'd thought about it, it was done; back in bed with him, it felt good again.
The phone rang, and it startled her; confused her. There was no explanation for the phone to be ringing at four in the morning.
She reached over and answered it, clearing her throat sleepily.
"Shepard," she said gruffly, her eyes still closed.
There was silence for a moment.
"Can I speak with Agent Gibbs?" Diane asked curtly. Her voice was edgy, icy.
Jenny flinched, and opened her eyes. She cleared her throat again, momentarily disoriented, but it worked to her advantage she sounded like she'd just been woken out of a deep sleep. She shook her head.
"He's in the other room," she muttered smoothly. "Other extension," she clarified.
"I'm sorry to have woken you," Diane said, her voice a little warmer. She sounded like she'd taken a deep breath, too. "So that's four-nine-?"
"Eight," Jenny told her hoarsely.
"Eight," Diane repeated. "Thank you, Agent Shepard."
Jenny nodded; Diane hung up the phone—and Jenny followed suit, smacking it down loudly. She reached over and gripped Gibbs' shoulder, shaking him a little. He grunted at her, exhausted, probably in need of a good night's sleep. She turned her head and met his eyes in the darkness.
"Your wife."
"What?"
"She called. Go in Decker's room," Jenny said neutrally. "You need to answer the phone before either of them does."
Gibbs got up without asking her anything else and threw on his jeans—and he was so collected about it, that she almost wondered if he'd done this before.
Decker shielded his eyes when the phone rang and woke him up; damn Burley had fallen asleep upright with the TV on, and the glow seemed brighter than the flames of hell to his sensitive eyes. He sat up, frowning, and reached blindly for the phone, kicking Stan and chucking the remote at him.
When he picked up the corded phone, he was surprised to find it taken roughly from his hand.
Burley swore, giving Decker a look that could murder and fumbling with the remote.
"Gibbs."
Decker blinked to adjust his eyes and saw Gibbs holding the phone, turning his back to them as he spoke into it in his usual hollow, mechanical way.
"What the hell is going on?" Burley asked groggily, flicking off the television and flopping down unhappily.
"Diane, it's four in the morning," Gibbs growled, and Decker turned away, lying on his back, keeping his mouth shut and sticking to his it's none of our business guns.
References: NCIS Season 3 Episode "Kill Ari, Part 2" ("That second night...), Several Disney movies, The Wizard of Oz, Monty Python and the Holy Grail.
Thank you all so much for your feedback thus far. Keep it coming; I love hearing what you think & you're all so sweet and encouraging!
-Alexandra
