Chapter Nine: I Have To Ruin That

When he opened the door into Alicia's room the next morning, Penny ran in and scrambled up onto the bed. Immediately, Penny forgot that Tony was in the room and began showering her mother with hugs and kisses, paying no attention to the tubes and machines around her. No, it was Tony that couldn't stop staring at them, just as he had yesterday, and it was because of this that he noticed that there were ones intruding through her skin today that hadn't been there yesterday. The thought didn't fill him with hope, rather, it made his skin crawl, but it didn't bother Penny, who was just happy to see her mother again.

It was a good few minutes before Penny finished her rambling that recounted the past twenty-four hours since she had seen her mother, and Tony sat down in the chair beside the bed, staying silent through the mother-daughter exchange. He'd spent most of the night jumping through a range of emotions after Ziva had left, and he'd finally ended up at a place called 'acceptance', which felt a lot like 'resignation'. He was starting to feel exactly like the petty office from yesterday's case - chased down until he was trapped and then held hostage in a situation that was miles too big for him to cope with. But his options were limited. He could either take Penny back to Riverdale, back to the grandparents who neglected her, or he could leave her to grow up in care with a family that wasn't her own. Of course, he didn't doubt that there was many families in the state that would be able to give Penny a childhood more cherished than he would, but he couldn't do that now. So, no matter what conflicting emotions were inside of him at that moment, he had to do this. This was his daughter, after all. He might not have been there to help name her, or to kiss the top of her head when she was still newborn, or to watch her take her first steps and say her first words, but she was still his child. He had to do this. How could he not?

"How are you feeling today?" he asked Alicia when Penny was curled up asleep beside her mother. Unfortunately they'd had an encounter with sugar the night before, so she had slept in late, and it didn't help that they had turned up at the hospice earlier that morning to see Alicia because Gibbs needed him in sooner than usual.

When she answered, Alicia's voice was weaker than usual and her eyes were darker as well. "Tired. Very tired," she admitted, before going back to watching her daughter. "Has she been behaving?"

"Good as gold," he confirmed.

"She's a good girl. She likes to make people happy...can't stand to see people sad." Alicia sighed, stroking her daughter's dark hair, shining soft as it had been washed again the night before. "I don't have a lot of money to leave behind but I've left it all in a trust fund for when she's older," she revealed. "You know, for college, a wedding...that sort of emergency fund. I don't want her to blow it all in spring break."

"Like we did?" he asked, with a smirk.

"Yeah. This money is for her big days."

He nodded. "Okay."

"The account details are in with my will. Everything you'll need to know and have is there too. Birth certificate...doctors record...everything with her name on it."

"Right," he nodded again.

She reached over the blanket and took his hand. "I really can't thank you enough, Tony."

"It's okay," he shrugged, trying not to show her how big a deal he was really making about this. "She's my kid too. I can't let someone else raise her."

"Not just for that," she shook her head. "I mean...taking her in is the best thing that I can ask for. But...having the chance to say goodbye to her...that's so much more. I might not have had the chance to if she'd stayed with my father."

"Alicia..." he started, but she cut him off.

"Make sure she knows how much I love her. She's so young, and I don't want to be sad about me forever, but..." she trailed off, starting to choke up on tears that her treatment prevented her from shedding.

Instead, he squeezed her hand reassuringly. "I won't let her forget you, Alicia. You're her mother. You'll always be her mother."

"Take care of her, Tony, please..."

"I will," he told her firmly.

She looked back at Penny sadly, stroking her cheek. "Every time I look at her I can't stop thinking that it might be the last time I see my baby," she admitted.

"Don't think like that," he told her.

"It's reality, Tony," she pointed out.

"We're coming by for lunch later, remember?" he told her, as if begging her to hold on for that.

"I know," she nodded gently.

They sat through small talk for another half an hour before Penny stirred. "Hi, Angel," Alicia smiled, stroking the side of her face with a single finger.

"Hi, mommy," she grumbled. "Is the sun out now?"

She smiled. "Yeah, honey, it's up now," she said.

"Have me and Daddy gotta go to work?" she asked.

"I'm afraid so, Penny," Tony answered. "Boss wants us in early and mommy's tired."

Penny curled tighter against Alicia for a moment and then forced herself into a sitting position, rubbing sleep from her eyes. She kissed her mother's cheek. "I love you, mommy."

"I love you, Penny. I love you forever and ever."

"Forever and ever," Penny repeated.

Tony turned his head as he got to his feet, looking at the window for a moment so that he didn't have to witness another emotional goodbye. He couldn't help but think about what Alicia had told him earlier...one day, one of these goodbyes would be their last...

"Do you remember the words to your songs?" Alicia asked her daughter.

Penny looked at her strangely. "But you sing the songs mommy," she told her.

"Do you remember them?" Penny nodded. "When you're sad, just sing those songs, okay? I want you to teach Daddy the words too."

Penny nodded again. "Okay. Bye, Mommy," she said, kissing her again.

Alicia gave her the strongest hug she could manage. "Goodbye, my darling."

Tony squeezed her hand one more time. "Bye, 'Lisha."

"I'm sorry, Tony," she whispered.

"Stop apologizing for the past," he told her for the millionth time in the past two days. "I'm going to take care of her. We'll see you later for lunch, okay?"

"Tony..."

"Okay?" he checked, more forceful this time.

She nodded, realising that Penny wasn't the only one who would need reassurance. "Okay."

--

It was a strange feeling of peace when Tony found himself alone in the bullpen later that morning. He passed the time by typing up his notes, guiltily pinning up the picture of the cat by Penny he had drawn on the day before as he did so. At the moment things were quiet so McGee and Ziva had taken Penny with them to the coffee shop on the corner. It only gave him around fifteen minutes of quiet, but it was a fifteen minutes he was thankful for, if only to clear his head. The elevator beeped, and he expected to hear the incessant chatter of Penny talking away to her new found family, but instead he didn't.

The occupant of the elevator entered the bullpen and stopped before Tony's desk, and Tony looked up at her. Instantly, he recognised the young woman and stood up. Alicia's nurse. "Laura."

"Special Agent DiNozzo," she said. "I'm sorry to disturb you at work, but Alicia asked me to come here."

"Is she okay?" he asked.

"Where's Penelope?" Laura asked, looking around them.

"She went to help my partner with the coffee run. Is this something important?" he asked her. "When Penny gets back we were going to come and have lunch with Alicia..."

"I need to speak to you urgently, sir," she cut him off. "Is there somewhere more private we can go?" she asked.

At this, he frowned, his heart pounding. "Of course, this way," he said, leading her towards one of the conference rooms. Luckily, the one closest to them at the bullpen wasn't being used, and he lead her into it. They sat down opposite one another. "What's happened?" he asked. "Is this something about Penny living with me?"

"No, it isn't about that," Laura said quietly.

"Then it's about Alicia," he realised.

"Yes," she nodded.

And then, he knew. He couldn't describe it, but he knew why Laura was there, away from work, away from Alicia in the middle of the day. He knew. He also knew that he wasn't ready. "Is she okay?" he asked, his voice cracking.

"I'm so sorry, sir," she began, and the bundle of butterflies that had been fluttering around in his stomach plummeted, "but I'm afraid Alicia passed away shortly after you left this morning."

"What?"

"I'm so sorry," she repeated.

"But...but she looked all right.." he argued immediately.

"She was very, very ill, sir."

"But she looked okay...she said that she felt okay...just tired..."

"She did look better, yes, but she had been deteriorating for a long time," Laura reminded him. "We were all surprised that she held on as long as she did."

Tony was silent for a moment as it started to sink in. Alicia was gone. The deadly illness had reached its point of no return long ago but now it had consumed her; rid her of her energy, her health, her life...her daughter. That morning really had been the last time she'd see Penny. It was why she spent longer saying goodbye that morning, talking about songs words and forever and ever. But yesterday...they'd laughed yesterday, they'd remembered old times. It didn't make sense that she was gone.

"She...she wasn't alone, was she?" he asked, as all the moisture left his mouth and he struggled to speak.

"No, I was with her," Laura told him. "She said to tell Penelope that she loved her, and to tell you goodbye, and that she thanked you."

He leaned forwards on the table top, putting his head in his heads. "I should have been with her..."

"She didn't want that. She'd asked enough of you already, she said, and she was happy."

"Happy?" he half-laughed. "She was dying-"

"She'd been holding on because she didn't know what was going to happen to her daughter, sir." She interrupted him lightly. "But when you came she was happy because she knew that Penelope would be taken care of and that she could let go. That's why she was looking better - she wasn't worried anymore. She knew that she was near the end and right after you left she told us that she knew it would be the last time she saw you."

"Why didn't she tell us?" he asked, still speaking into his hands. "I would have stayed. We could have been with her...did she suffer?"

"No, she went to sleep and didn't wake up," she told him. "I was holding her hand, she knew she wasn't alone."

He hadn't known. He hadn't even said a proper goodbye because he'd been adamant that he'd see her at lunchtime. Now, even. He and Penny should be on their way to see her now. Even then, at the end of everything, he'd assumed there would always be one more chance. Always one more day, one more visit...one more goodbye. "I should have stayed..." he whispered, fighting back tears. He mustered all his strength, and looked up at Laura. "Thank you, Laura. Thank you for being there for Alicia and for coming to tell me yourself. Thank you for...for respecting her final wishes."

She nodded. "I only apologize that the news wasn't good," she whispered, seeming on the verge of tears herself.

They both stood up, Tony wiping away furiously at his face to remove and trace of tears that may have escaped when he wasn't paying attention. He saw Laura out, but waited in the doorway for a moment. He stood there in shock, long enough for the others to return from their coffee run. Penny skipped forward ahead of them only slightly, swinging Ziva's hand in a way that made the Mossad officer seem strangely more feminine than she'd usually let others see her and carefully holding a small Styrofoam cup containing her new favourite hot chocolate. She looked up and saw him, waving brightly to him as her pigtails swung with the movement. That look on her face was unmistakable, even after three days he knew it. She was excited about seeing her mother...her mother who...who had just died.

He returned her wave slightly, but couldn't bring himself to even begin matching her eager smile. He just stood and watched as she helped McGee load each coffee onto the respective desk. Ziva, on the other hand, paid more attention to his lack of smile, and approached him. When she made it to the doorway, she noticed that he was still watching Penny, and was taking shaky breaths.

"Tony?" she asked.

He took a deep breath, trying to control himself, but failed. "It's happened," he choked out.

She frowned. "What has happened?"

"She's gone, Ziva," he told her, biting his lip as tears welled again. Saying it himself made it much more real, but he fought the tears back, refusing to let them fall when someone had suffered a stronger loss than he had with Alicia's passing. He rubbed at his forehead, leaning fully against the doorway.

Ziva placed her hand on his arm. "I am so sorry, Tony."

"I have to tell her," he realised, as both of them looked over to Penny, who was laughing away at something McGee was showing her in a video on a computer. "She's happy...and I have to ruin that."

Ziva was silent for a moment, and then she stepped back. "Stay here, I will be back."

He was too confused to disobey, and he remained in the doorway, watching as Penny continued to laugh as she fixated on the screen. Part of him wanted to know what was so funny, especially seeing as McGee never had anything on his computer that was humorous to anyone other than himself and Abby, but he didn't want to make his presence known. If he did, he'd have to tell her...he'd have to tell her about Alicia and that would be...he didn't know how he was going to do it. He wanted to release everything, to scream to high heaven and wait for the feeling to end, but he couldn't. He hadn't realised until now how unbalanced he felt, how he'd spent so much time since Alicia's 'betrayal' on the verge of hysterics, always wanting to let it out, but now he knew that if he started he'd be unable to stop.

But when he was about to lose control again, Ziva was back, her comforting hand on his arm again, the same comforting hand he'd held two nights ago when he needed reassurance. "I have spoken to the Director," she told him. "She said that her office is available to you if you would like some privacy with Penny."

He looked at her, dragging his helpless gaze away from the little girl in question. "Thank you," he stuttered.

The hand that was on his arm rubbed up and down for a moment, before stopping again. "I am here if you need me," she told him in a whisper, and he could tell that the words held more meaning today than they did two nights ago when she had left him after Penny's bedtime. She might not have been overly confident when helping him with a child, but she understood loss and how it could break ones heart no matter what the circumstances.

The moment ended, and Tony took a deep breath. He approached McGee's desk, and Penny jumped round to him, tugging at his pocket and pointing to his desk. "I got your drink, Daddy!" she said. "It's coffee, but Ziva said you don't like coffee but it had to have coffee so it's just a hot chocolate with a little tiny bit of coffee in it. Ziva let me try a bit, it's really nice," she rambled.

"Thank you, Penny," he murmured.

She instantly picked up on his usual mood that had suddenly disappeared. "Daddy-"

He held out his hand to her, waiting for him to take it. "Come on, Penny. I need to talk to you about something."

She just stared at his hand. "Where we goin'?" she asked.

"We're going to Auntie Jenny's office upstairs," he told her, lifting her onto his hip when she didn't take his hand.

She looked confused, especially when they walked past his desk. Pointing back down to the desk, she leaned over his shoulder. "Daddy, you left your chocolate coffee!"