CHAPTER 9

A/N Big thanks for all the reviews and the alerts, they make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside

Gibbs took the files and fresh coffee down to the basement where he spent the next few hours thinking and more importantly remembering.

Pushing Thompson to the back of his mind for the moment, he focused on each of the 15 murdered victims.

He remembered each and every case, but he couldn't, no matter how hard he tried, remember the people who had become this killers victims. Their roles in the original cases had been minimal to say the least, most of them just names in a long list of people interviewed because of their connection, however tenuous to a victim or a crime scene. He was no closer to understanding why they had been targeted now.

Unable to avoid it any longer, he turned his attention to the Thompson file, he didn't open it; he didn't have to read it again to remember every agonising detail. This was one case that still had the power to keep him awake at night.

He hadn't lied to Tony but he hadn't been entirely honest either.

He had known from day 1 on that case that Philip was just as guilty as his brother. He knew it, Franks knew it, the brothers knew that they knew. But they couldn't prove it and Gary refused to give him up.

It was true that he had never come face to face with Philip before the day he shot him but he did have his name and a 14 year old photo etched into his mind.

It didn't make sense, why had the killer set up Thompson like that, what was his intention? How did the killer know? Gibbs gut was screaming at him, this was relevant but he couldn't for the life of him work out why.

He thought through everything as logically as he could. The timing of each murder, the lack of evidence, the constant pressure on him and his team, the link to his old files and he came up with one sobering theory.

This was an inside job