Warnings: Same as usual.
A/N: Happy weekend everyone! Thank for you all your kind words throughout this whole story, keeps me motivated to keep on writing. I hope you enjoy this update! Please, let me know what you think. :)
Several weeks later, Leah woke up in Berlin, Germany.
Tony was sitting at the small table in their room, looking out over the city, a cup of coffee in front of him. She wasn't sure the last time he got a full night's sleep, probably Rome; they had been to Milan, Vienna, and Frankfurt since then, and now Berlin. They still didn't know who had hired the hitman back in Italy and even though there had not been another attempt on her life—Tony was still on edge.
Leah sighed and rolled out of bed. She went to the coffee pot to pour herself her own cup of coffee. They hadn't spoken about their heated kiss in Rome—and she didn't expect them too until they were back in Washington. However, fighting their attraction for one another was getting harder and harder the longer they were in Europe.
"'Morning," Tony mumbled when she sat down. "Sleep okay?"
"Fine," Leah said. "Did you?"
He didn't reply; she knew the answer—he hadn't slept. "Spoke to Tim," Tony said, changing the subject. "Mossad showed up at NCIS yesterday, apparently offering to help. Those diamonds that Reeves told us to follow—Mossad thinks they know when and where Bodnar is going to make the drop."
She sipped her coffee, clutching tightly to the mug. "Please tell me they think it's going to happen here in Berlin." I don't think I can take much more traveling between countries.
"Ziva set up a meeting with an old friend of hers that's been following Bodnar since Eli's death," Tony informed her.
"She isn't supposed to have any access to this case," Leah snapped, reminding him.
"Listen, we can't entirely trust Mossad," Tony replied, angrily. "We needed to make sure the contact was legit."
"If we compromise this case by involving her, there's a good chance charges against Bodnar won't stick," Leah argued.
"Hey, I didn't like involving her," Tony argued back, "but if we didn't—we could be living out here in Europe permenantly."
Leah diverted her eyes. "That wouldn't be such a bad thing," she mumbled.
Tony felt his heart slam against his ribcage. Fight it, he told himself. Fight it or this entire mission is going to become messy. "She set up a meeting with him, at lunch, some little café nearby. Maybe, since you'd like to live here, we can do a little sight-seeing to measure if it's up to par with your tastes."
She glanced up at him, tepidly. "I've been to Germany; my grandparents fled Germany in the thirties. My mother thought it was important that we learn the history; she brought us here when we were kids."
He breathed deeply, feeling a sickening twist to his stomach. "They were Jewish?"
"No," she said, shaking her head sadly. "They were considered enemies of the state because they spoke out against the Nazis. They would have stayed, but… my grandmother found out she was pregnant and my grandfather thought it best to flee. It was a good thing they did too, he found out after the war that their friends had all been arrested and sent to concentration camps where they were executed."
"So," he said, softly, "your family has always had some kind of hand in politics, dating back to the 1930s'. That's quite a legacy you have there Miss Dawson."
"I don't think my grandparents had much of a choice."
"No, but you did. Why chose the life of an NSA analyst?"
Leah gazed into her coffee mug, drowning images from her past in the hot liquid. "Long story, one that I'm not fond of telling; why did you chose to become a cop?"
Tony smiled, sadly. "I was on the fast track to a career in football—until I blew my knee out against Michigan. After that, I struggled in sports; my knee kept me down. One night, ended up saving this kid from a house fire—and then it hit me, what I had just done had mattered. Everything from there just…kind of…fell into place. I found something else, besides sports, that I was good at."
She put her mug down onto the table. "Tony, what if we don't catch Bodnar? We've been over here for almost a month."
He sighed, heavily. "We're going to get him."
"Is that what you told Ziva when you talked to her this morning?"
"What? How do you know about that?"
"You're not very quiet or subtle when you're speaking to her on the phone."
Tony clenched his jaw. "Yeah, well, she's a very direct person and needs to be spoken to directly."
Leah didn't doubt that. "What did she tell you about our contact?" she asked, changing the subject.
He set his own mug down. "She worked with him in the past; he's a friend and she trusts him."
She nodded. "Can we trust him?"
"It's Mossad."
"So… no?"
"Probably not. He's our best bet right now."
Leah sighed. Follow the diamonds. Follow the diamonds. So far, they hadn't found a single diamond. She wasn't even sure they existed. "In your little chat with your partner, did she mention diamonds?"
Tony glanced at her thoughtfully. "I'm pretty sure you told me not to involve her, so I didn't ask. I did have Tim look into it, and he found something rather interesting. Bodnar does have a substantial diamond fortune—but he was cut off from it once he was ousted from Mossad. We think someone else took the diamonds and they're the ones trying to get them to Bodnar."
"Is that why the meeting was set up with Mossad?" she asked.
"Yes, they're the ones that are going to know where those diamonds are and who has them," he answered.
"Well if they knew that, why haven't they caught him yet?"
"Beats me."
She watched as he stood up and smiled at her. "You seem awfully confident," Leah pointed out.
He grinned and shrugged. "I have a very good feeling about today."
Tim looked up from his computer and around the empty bullpen. Vance had assigned some mundane task to Ziva to keep her out of their case and Gibbs—well, he wasn't sure where Gibbs had gone. More coffee maybe?
In the three weeks that Tony and Leah had been gone, Tim had spent more time alone, with Gibbs, then he could ever remember. The pair would stay here late at night after Ziva had gone home to try and find information for Tony and Leah in Europe. So far, Leah's contacts were giving them bread crumbs but not the whole loaf of bread and it was beginning to feel like the team was running around in circles in Europe.
Tony had been the one to suggest working with Mossad when Tim had told him that Mossad had shown up at NCIS offering to help, as long as they helped them solve the murder of one of their own on American soil. He hated the idea but they would know the guy best and Tim got the impression that Tony was a little uncomfortable about being in Europe alone with Leah. Delilah was spot on, apparently.
"McGee," Gibbs said, starting him as he returned to the bullpen. "Can you give me any information on that dead Mossad officer?"
"Do you think he's linked to our case?" Tim asked, pulling up the information that the new director of Mossad had brought them.
"I think Elbaz isn't telling me the truth," Gibbs replied. "I want to make sure that Tony and Leah are safe. We've already had one assassination attempt on her, let's not have anymore."
Tim swallowed the lump in his throat. They still had not been able to determine who had hired the hitman to take out Leah. There was no ties to Bodnar between the two men, there were no ties to anyone with the hitman. "Tony reported that there hasn't been any more trouble."
Gibbs glared slightly at the junior agent. "That doesn't mean there won't be another attempt. Tony knows that, he's just letting you know it's been quiet, not that he thinks the threat is over."
"Why would Bodnar want Leah dead?"
"Hitman says he didn't; Bodnar thinks she's the only one that can clear him."
"So," Tim said, thoughtfully, "maybe that means that the person who really killed Eli David wants her dead."
"What was she working on before being assigned to this case?" Gibbs questioned.
"I don't know, NSA is being stingy; claim it's highly classified."
"Well, what can your girlfriend over at the DOD tell us?"
Tim looked surprised. How did Gibbs know about that? It's Gibbs, Probie, he heard Tony's voice in his head, he knows everything. "Um… they've worked together before in the past. She wouldn't tell me on what."
Gibbs cracked a grin, grabbed his coffee and started to walk away. "Well," he said, "perhaps you should use your powers of persuasion on her." In a flash he was gone from the bullpen, leaving a bewildered Tim behind.
Sitting at street side café, Leah felt Tony's hand gently graze her knee and she felt a chill run up her spine in the middle of a warm day. They were waiting for the contact from Mossad and trying to look as nonchalant as possible.
Leah wasn't sure how she felt about Tony's idea of sitting here, acting like a couple on a romantic getaway, but she figured he was the federal agent—he had been on more undercover missions than she had, and if an associate for Bodnar was around, they wanted to maintain some form of cover.
Tony leaned in now, brushing his lips across her temple. "Try to relax," he whispered in her ear. "Or you're going to give us away."
"I am relaxed," Leah argued, turning her head slightly only find his mouth dangerously close to hers. Well, I'm not relaxed anymore.
"Sure about that?" Tony asked, grinning, before he kissed her.
It was like everything in her brain faded away. She completely forgot what they were doing here, other than the fact that he was kissing her and she was rather enjoying it—and returning it. Briefly she thought about how inappropriate ethis probably was, how unprofessional… and you don't care… then, a male cleared his throat and they broke apart.
Standing near their table was a young, handsome, middle eastern man, smiling. "Sorry. Am I… interrupting? Ziva did not tell me that you two were… involved."
Tony smirked at the new comer. "We're not involved. Just trying to maintain a cover."
"Well, then your cover was pretty damn convincing," the Mossad officer said.
"Are you going to join us?" Leah asked, suddenly, wanting to change the subject.
He cocked an eyebrow. "Wouldn't that be ruining your cover?"
She faked a smile, stood up and gave him a tight hug. "No."
Tony bristled, slightly with jealousy, but took her lead; he stood up and shook the Mossad officer's hand with a smile. Outwardly, they look liked old friends meeting. "Have a seat. Maybe you can start with an introduction."
"My name is Adam Eschel," the man said, "and I am going to help you find Ilan Bodnar and bring him to justice."
