-1
Gibbs walked into the interogation room and roughly dropped her rucksack on the desk. He stood in front of Ziva and she looked up him expectantly. "Are you a member of this team, Officer David?" She flinched slightly.
"Yes"
"Really? You didn't act that way today." He turned away from her staring into the two way mirror. "Today you did everything you could to make life difficult for us, your team; today you broke the law by obstructing our investigation." His voice was hard but steady as she stared at her hands folded neatly in front of her.
"I know."
"Why?" He still had his back to her as he spoke. "If you don't trust us then you should not remain a member of my team."
"I do trust you."
"You didn't trust us enough to speak to us today did you?" Ziva suddenly clenched her hands into fists and slammed them both don onto the table, causing Gibbs to spin round to face her again..
"I TRUSTED YOU TO DO THE RIGHT THING!" she sighed deeply after her outburst, relaxing her hands again.
"What?"
"I trusted you to do the right thing, I knew that if you thought Akim had done it then you would arrest him for it." her voice was barely audible, a mere whisper.
"If you knew he hadn't done it, we would have taken your judgement into consideration."
"I know, but at the time, I thought he had killed her"
"You were going to help him escape even though you thought he had slit that woman's throat as she slept?" Gibbs' voice was full of disbelief but she just shrugged.
"Yes." For the first time since he entered the room she looked up and met his eyes. "I would have." Gibbs was silent for a moment, turning over her reaction in his mind.
"Why?" he asked simply. She pursed her lips tightly and lowered her eyes to the desk.
"Because, because I thought I was partly to blame." she ran her hands through her hair sighed. "We had a fight, a really, really big fight last night."
"Uh-huh"
"And so he went to stay with her, normally he stays with me, sees her during the day, because I work and she does not you know?" She looked up at Gibbs, her eyes pleading with him to try and understand. "So last night he went to her, really angry because of me and this morning she is dead I do not know, I was not thinking straight because of our fight I just, did not know what to do." Gibbs sighed,
"What could you to have POSSIBLY fought about that would upset you that much? Enough to lie to you team and jeopardise your whole future?" there was a strained silence between them, "Ziva!" he banged his fist on the table causing her to jump slightly.
"Ari, we fought about Ari." her voice was barely audible as Gibbs stepped back from the desk, about to say something but before he could voice it Ziva continued, "You see, Akim was Ari's best friend when we were children. He lived around the corner and he played at our house all the time, our fathers were good friends, they worked together. Even when Ari left with his mother they stayed in touch, like pen friends, " she paused and smiled, "They were very sweet and when Ari came to spend his holidays with us Akim would come round every day. He did not have brothers or sisters of his own so he liked to spend time with us, even when Ari was not at home. He became like another sibling, one of us. All through school and university they stayed in close touch, with each other and me but then when Ari became more and more involved in the work my father had him do it became more difficult for them to talk. So you see Akim only knows our old Ari, the one we grew up with. He does not know what he became." Gibbs stared at her as she finished,
"ok, but that still doesn't explain . . ."
"The argument, yes I know, I'm coming to that." She snapped suddenly at Gibbs who raised his eyebrow in surprise but said nothing, "Akim has always found it hard to accept that I work here, with you, because he thinks you killed Ari. He says he does not know how I can bare to look at you all day because of what you did, what you took from us and he says this all the time, all the time. So last night we were talking about him and he started up again pressurising me to leave NCIS and. . . And I do not know why but I just, told him it was me. That I killed Ari." Gibbs sank down into the chair,
"Oh" Ziva glanced up at him, her eyes were glistening slightly as she carried on her story, her voice now wavering,
"He was SO angry with me. I have never, ever seen him like that before. I don't know why I told him, maybe I thought I could make I'm understand. But he could not see why I did it." she stopped, breathing deeply with her eyes shut, trying desperately to hold herself together. "And then he, he just left. He left me and for the first time I was not sure that he would come back to me, he was so angry. When he phoned me the next day I thought he was going to apologise, but he was so, uh freaked out about this, he did not make much sense so I went to him. I suppose I thought that if I helped him then maybe he would, well, forgive me. I had to do it Gibbs, you see? I , I, I . . ." she paused to breathe in again, "I NEED him, he is pretty much all I have left now. I know that I was wrong to do this but I just, I could not turn my back on another brother Gibbs, you cannot expect me to do it again." Her voice was thin, dangerously close to breaking as she finished speaking and she brought her hands up to cover her eyes. Gibbs sighed deeply,
"Ok, ok" he stood up and moved round to her side and leant on the desk, "Ziva" she ignored him so repeated her name but again she made no movement so he reached his hand under her skin and pushed her face up until her eyes met his. "Don't ever, ever do this again you understand me?"
"Don't do what? Break the law?"
"No, lie to us, hide things from us. We are your team and . . ."
"I know, I know and I'm sorry but this morning, I just . . . Did not know . .." she tried to shake her head loose from his grip but he held it tight.
"Stop apologising, you know the rule." a fleeting smile darted across her face, "You must trust us to help you. You don't always have to go it alone." she snorted quietly.
"Hmmm like you Gibbs, I'm sure you would always ask for our help yes?"
"Ziva, we both know what you've done for me." His voice was firm, signalling the end of the conversation. He smiled at her and stood up, moving his hand to her shoulder and squeezed it gently. He took a step before turning as an after thought placed a light kiss on her head, her dark curls tickling him lightly. Her shoulders relaxed as she let out a long, long sigh as he walked out of the room.
