CHAPTER ELEVEN
Around nine that night, Gibbs locked his car and headed up the path to his house. Leaping up the three steps to the porch, he put out his hand to the never-locked front door but found it barred fast against him. Good. DiNozzo was taking thing seriously.
An eye scrutinised him through the peephole. A few seconds later the door opened and Gibbs slid in.
"Hey, Boss". Tony's smile was strained. "Long day at the office? I'd have had your slippers ready but … Ow!"
The joking sounded forced. He was clearly impatient to know how things had developed during the day, but first things first.
"Sitrep, DiNozzo", Gibbs ordered, shedding his coat.
"Nothing, Boss, all quiet". Tony had spent the day alternating between boredom and frustration. With only the small TV in the basement for company, his viewing options had been severely limited. "You ever think of getting cable? No", noting Gibbs' reflexive frown, "guess not".
"Good", Gibbs said, ignoring the question. "Let's hope it stays that way". He went through to the back door. "Perimeter check, all the same. Take the bedrooms".
Like I haven't done that already five times today, Tony's expression said, last time thirty minutes ago, but he did as he was told.
Security confirmed, Gibbs turned his attention to the man beside him. Despite his casual banter, Tony looked drawn. He'd changed his shirt, but the sleeve of this one too was stained with blood. Gibbs gave himself a mental headslap. He should have thought to get Ducky to restitch Tony's arm before he'd sent him on his way this morning.
"Sit down", he said, doing so himself. The kitchen table was littered with a couple of pizza boxes and a takeout cup or two. "I see you've eaten. How long ago was that?"
"A while", Tony said. "You want some pizza? There's plenty left".
Gibbs flipped a cold slice up out of one of the boxes and jammed it into his mouth. He'd long ago stopped caring how things tasted, as long as they gave him fuel. He pushed the box towards Tony, who shook his head.
Not like him at all. Gibbs looked more closely. A sheen of sweat covered Tony's forehead; he looked a little warm.
"Let me look at your arm", Gibbs said, holding out his hand across the table.
"My arm's fine, Boss, nothing wrong with it, I changed the bandages a couple of times already".
"And yet it's still bleeding, DiNozzo. What does that tell you, d'you think? Give it here".
Tony hugged his arm protectively to his side, but when Gibbs jerked back his chair and stood, he thought better of it and held out the arm across the table.
Gibbs sat down again and unbuttoned Tony's cuff. He tried to push the sleeve back up the arm but it caught on the bandages. With a swift jerk of his hands he ripped it along the seam so that it hung in tatters around Tony's arm.
"Hey! Thanks, Boss, I didn't want that one anyway", Tony started, but a fit of shivering cut him short. Gibbs swore under his breath as he looked at the line of ripped stitches. The skin around them was an angry red.
"OK, DiNozzo, fix-it time. Looks like another house call for you", Gibbs said, and whipped out his phone. Speed-dialling Ducky, he outlined the situation.
Tony heard Ducky promise to be there as soon as he could. He stood up to put some coffee on but Gibbs waved him down again as he finished the call and cut the connection. While they waited, he ran through the day's events for Tony. They weren't much further forward.
An hour later, the arm was cleaned and restitched and Tony had been given a shot to stop the infection in its tracks. He'd made Ducky swear first that it wouldn't knock him out.
Ducky graciously accepted a bourbon from Gibbs, forbearing to remark on its inferiority to his beloved Scotch. He shuddered at the offer of old, cold pizza, though.
"I've called in a prescription, it'll be here soon. Make sure you follow the directions on the box, and don't stop before all the pills are gone", he ordered with a mock scowl at Tony. "I'll be back in the morning to check on your arm."
Diplomatically, Ducky didn't comment on Tony's presence in Gibbs' house, though the NCIS rumour mill must have gone into overdrive with Tony's suspension. He nodded in response to Gibbs' warning not to mention where Tony was. Then he drove off home.
"Bed for you", Gibbs said to Tony as they walked back into the kitchen. "I'll wait up for the drugstore guy".
"That's really not necessary, Boss, I can handle it myself".
"Do I look as though I care, DiNozzo? You need …"
Whatever it was he thought Tony needed was lost as the doorbell rang and a voice called "Drugstore".
Gibbs went through to the front door and checked through the peephole. A young man in a drugstore uniform stood outside, a delivery bag with Tony's meds slung around his neck.
The door was only just open when the boy's body jerked under the impact of a bullet. He pitched forward face down on to the porch and lay unmoving.
Gibbs slammed the door shut and threw himself sideways as it exploded in a shower of wood and glass.
