Hello my dears. I would like to thank those of you who have followed and favoured since my last update. I would also like to thank Petunia3116 andssl71 for the wonderful reviews.
So here is the next chapter, I hope you like it.
Disclaimer: I don't own NCIS: LA.
Sam pulled up outside Callen's house earlier than he usually would the next day, though this time it wasn't so he could catch his partner on the hop. No this time was because he had an invite he needed to offer to his neighbours. He still wasn't sure why Hetty wanted them at Aiden's barbeque, but he's was not to reason why, it was to do. With that in mind he made his way up the path to the door, taking note of the fact that the car was this time in the drive. He was glad about that. He didn't like the idea of this Marty guy leaving his young daughter alone. I mean the kid couldn't be more than ten. Of course he assumed she had a sitter with her or something when the guy went out surfing. Though if that was the case, why was it she who had called the police on him? Hmm, maybe he could get an answer to that question when he met the kid. With that in mind he knocked on the door and waited. And waited. He was just about to knock again when it was pulled open by a teenager rubbing sleep from her eyes.
Sarah had been happily sleeping when she was rudely awoken by someone at the door. she lay in bed for a minute wondering if she could really be bothered to get up, but she knew that if she didn't the curiosity at who it was would niggle at her, refusing to let her return to her peaceful slumber. Therefore she pulled herself from her bed and went to look out of her window to see who was at the door. To say she was shocked to see Callen's friend Sam on her doorstep would be an understatement. But despite this response she still made her way quickly to answer his knocking. She wanted to know what he was doing there. Therefore opening the door and trying really hard to supress a yawn she said, "umm, hi?"
"Hi. I'm Sam Hanna, friends with Callen next door." Sam explained to the teenage girl. He wondered who she was and why she was answering the door. Maybe she was the sitter? But if so why was she there when Marty's car was in the drive? And why was she half asleep? There was something not right about this.
"Ah-huh." Sarah responded eloquently. She really wasn't much of a morning person, unless it was to go surfing, and then only if the waves were really, really good.
"I was wondering if Marty was in?" Sam asked trying to look around the girl and get a view of the room behind her. Though he was also trying not to look like that was what he was doing, which wasn't that easy really.
"Dad's in the shower." Sarah replied waking up a bit more now and not being able to stop herself from smirking when she saw Sam's eye widen as he did a double take at her words. He looked so funny.
"Wait, Marty's your dad?" Sam asked completely forgetting everything else due to his shock that this teenage girl was surf dudes daughter. Surely Marty wasn't old enough to have a teenage daughter, right?
"Yep. So Sam Hanna, what can I do for you today?" Sarah asked really starting to enjoy herself now. She loved how people never believed her parents were really her parents. It entertained her no end.
"Right. Well I wanted to invite you and your dad to a barbeque I'm having for my son on Saturday." Sam responded getting back on track even as his mind re-evaluated all he had thought before. Looking at the girl in front of him he was say she was about the same age as Aiden, 15/16ish. Which meant either Marty had his daughter when he was still a kid himself, or he was a lot older than he looked. At least this explained why it was Sarah who had called the cops on him. She was more than old enough to do that.
"Okay. Why? Not that I mean any offence, but you don't actually know us. So yeah, why?" Sarah asked with a frown as she crossed her arms, wondering what this guy's game was. Because she knew you didn't just ask your friends new neighbours to a barbeque. There had to be a reason. She wondered briefly if Callen had asked him to invite them, but considering the conversation they had had the previous evening, she doubted it. It didn't seem like a move he would make.
"I thought it would be good to get to know the people in G's life." Sam responded, though he was still a bit thrown by discovering just how old Marty's daughter was. And as such he wasn't sure if his words had come out as a statement or a question.
"You know, you're almost as good at breaking and entering as you are at lying. What's the real reason, Sam Hanna?" Sarah asked narrowing her eyes at him. She also wanted to know why he called Callen G, but that was going to have to be a question for later.
"Hetty asked me to invite you." Sam responded with a sigh. There was no point lying, and he couldn't very well say it was G's idea. He just knew it would get back to his partner if he did that, and he doubted the other man would be too happy about it. So that really did only leave one choice, especially as he was sure that his boss would make sure she met this girl at the barbeque. Might as well prepare her now.
"Did she now? You know the more I hear about this Hetty, the more I want to meet her. We'll be glad to accept you invitation." Sarah replied with a smile. So she was going to meet the infamous Hetty, be able to put a face to the voice on the phone. Meet the woman who was the closest thing Callen had to a mom. Oh yes, that sounded like a great way to spend her Saturday in her mind.
"Great, be there by 1400. Here's the address." Sam responded, glad that he had managed to achieve what Hetty asked him to do, with minimal fuss. Not to mention he was sure that he would be able to gain all the information he wanted about Marty from his daughter. Oh yeah, this was going to work really well.
Deeks came out of the shower to find Sarah shutting the door with a contemplative look on her face.
"What's up?" He asked wondering what was wrong. He had thought he'd heard someone knocking on the door earlier, but hadn't gotten out of the shower to investigate.
"We just got invited to a barbeque this Saturday afternoon." Sarah replied, deciding against mentioning who it was that had done the inviting. She knew if she did she would have to explain about calling the police, and Hetty. And she wasn't sure she was ready to have that conversation with her dad. She did not think it would go well. She wanted more answers to the questions in her head before she started answering his.
"Cool." Deeks nodded with a smile. He was glad that Sarah was making friends in the neighbourhood. Because it had to be someone she knew who had invited them, I mean he didn't actually know that many people at all. Only Callen really.
"Yeah. I'm going back to bed. Have fun at work." Sarah replied with a wave of her hand before she disappeared back into her room, ready to return to her slumber. But as she lay down the questions in her mind refused to let her return to oblivion, instead they circled around and appeared in her dreams, allowing her overactive imagination to take control.
Deeks was sat at his desk going over some of his actual work when his phone rang.
"Marty Deeks." He said down the line though he was still reading through the file in front of him.
"Mr Deeks. This is Henrietta Lange." Came the reply in a voice which begged for his full attention. He didn't know who she was but he still put down the file as he spoke.
"What can I do for you Ms Lange?" Deeks asked causing Hetty's eyebrows to raise. She had thought her name would cause him alarm, or at least some sort of recognition after her conversation with his daughter and Callen's conversation with Sarah the previous evening. But she got nothing of the sort. It seemed martin Deeks had never heard her name before. How very intriguing. But now was not the time for that.
"It's miss, and please call me Hetty. I believed you wished to see the un-redacted files concerning the Deveron case, as well as the intelligence we had that caused the undercover operation." Hetty responded. She had organised everything that he wished for, and while she knew she could arrange for him to see the files through Miss Abbott from the DA's office, she'd wanted a chance to meet Martin Deeks in person.
"I did, I do." Deeks said sitting up straight at her words. He hadn't expected to hear back about his request for at least another couple of days, if not next week. That he had someone on the phone about it now showed him just how important this case was for NCIS.
"Then I suggest we meet." Hetty replied simply.
"When and where?" Deeks answered, ready to go now if she wanted him to. He had so many questions about that case, and he was hoping the answers to them were in the un-redacted files.
Hetty responded by giving him the address of the boatshed, and arranging to meet him later that day. She would call Miss Abbott and get her to join them as well, and if she gave her a time which was slightly later than the one she gave Mr Deeks, was that really an issue?
Deeks arrived at the address Hetty had given him and had to do a double take. Was this really the place? It looked like a boathouse, though he guessed that was probably the idea. Hiding in plain sight and all that. He was meeting the head of a secretive federal agency after all. Damn Sarah would love this, it would send her imagination wild. Hmm, on second thoughts probably a good thing she didn't know about this. God knows how she would react. Opening the door he found himself in a corridor. As such he called out as he made his way towards what he hoped was the main room. "Hello? Anyone home?"
"In here, Mr Deeks." Came a disembodied voice, which he soon found had a person attached to it. A very small woman who was studying him extremely closely. That look made him feel a familiarity with lab rats. He could suddenly understand how they felt to be observed. It was spooky.
"Miss Lange." He said holding out his hand to her, hoping to get her to stop her staring.
"Please, Mr Deeks. Call me Hetty." Hetty replied shaking his hand and waving him towards the table in the centre of the room which had the files he requested sitting on the top.
"I'm Marty. So these the files?" he asked making a beeline for them. Wanting to get started on figuring out how they were going to win the unwinnable case.
"They are, and while the information has not been redacted, the names of the agents involved are still missing. Instead they have been labelled agents A and B." Hetty replied sitting down opposite him so that she could answer any questions he had, as well as observe how he worked. You could find out a lot about a man by watching him work.
"Men In Black eat your heart out, right?" Deeks chuckled back, though he was already opening the top file. There were no more black lines unlike the files he had read before. And as he started reading he couldn't help his eyes widened and his mind starting moving. Those black lines had been hiding some serious secrets.
Hetty sat there and watched as different emotions crossed his face as he muttered the occasional words to himself and referred back to different pages and files to gain a complete picture. She wondered if and when he would figure out that the agent he was reading about was his new neighbour. Wondered when he would figure out exactly what it was Mr Callen did for a living. It would certainly be interesting when the realisation hit. And watching him she realised it would not take much for it to do so. Martin Deeks was obviously a highly intelligent man. Good, he would need to be to keep up with her agent after all.