The club was dark and the crowd large and enthusiastic.

Couples, friends and strangers all pressed against each other, the air-conditioning system nowhere near powerful enough to cool a room filled with such a pulsating mass of people.

The drinks were flowing, creating a haze that rivaled the smoke machines.

The music was nearly deafening, making it almost impossible to think.

It was almost too much. Almost oppressive.

Tony felt like he had been released from a cage.

He had been so caught up in being what he needed to be on the outside that he hadn't been able to just be. He had been working so hard to put up the necessary fronts, to say the right words, smile the right smiles, that now, here in this anonymous crowd of self-absorbed partiers, he felt at peace for the first time in a long time.

Okay, maybe they're not all self-absorbed, Tony thought, catching Abby's worried eyes as they bobbed like buoys in a sea of humanity.

"Are you okay?" she asked, yelling to be heard.

He flashed her a smile, trying not to chafe at being bridled again. "Just fine, Abbs!"

He held his breath, waiting for her response—hoping it would be the one he wanted.

She bit her lip and shook her head. "But your shoulder's getting all bumped around," she shouted. "Let's go."

He grinned on the inside, toned it down on the outside. "You stay," he yelled back. "I'm going to chat up that pretty blonde at the bar."

Still she hesitated.

He wiggled his arm in the sling. "Don't worry. I'll make her promise to be gentle," he said with a waggling of eyebrows.

Abby rolled her eyes and gave in. "I can catch a ride home with—"

Tony gave her a stern look and cut her off. "I'll meet you at the front doors after the last set, Abby. Or Gibbs will kill me. Have fun!"

She nodded and turned back to face the musicians on stage, her grin getting impossibly wider when her friend slipped her name into the lyrics of the pounding death metal song they were playing. Tony slid through the crowd with practiced ease and headed straight for the blonde, who was swaying drunkenly on her feet.

He almost felt bad as he stepped neatly into her clumsy dance move and made a strangled cry of pain as her arm knocked into his immobilized one. Pretty blue eyes went wide as she took in the sling, but they went smoky as they traveled hazily up to his face.

"I am so sorry," she said, her words slurred.

"My fault," Tony said, giving the sling an unnecessary adjustment with a wince. "Let me buy you a drink and make it up to you?"

The woman grinned but it faded as her less-than-focused eyes landed on the full glass in her hand. She looked back up at him, somewhat sadly. "Oops."

Tony took a breath, keeping the smile pasted on his face as he plucked the drink out of her hand and downed the sickly sweet, fruity concoction. "Problem solved," he said, wishing the drink had been stronger. He was fairly certain he wanted to do this, but a little liquid courage never hurt anything. He glanced at his watch, wondering if he even had time to do what he wanted to do.

Wondering if he even really wanted to do it.

Wondering if when the moment actually came, if he could do it.

But then Brian Landry's lifeless eyes stared at him from inside his own head, begging him for help, pleading with him to make this right.

And Tony knew what he had to do.


Tony led the woman expertly through the questions, making it seem like he was hanging on her every word of mundane small talk when he was actually getting a name, phone number and place of employment. He also begged her to introduce him to her pretty gaggle of girlfriends, smiling his most charming at them and making sure he made eye contact with each in turn.

He knew at least two of them were sober enough to remember his face.

And then he excused himself and his new conquest, also known as Julia, almost rolling his eyes at the blatant jealousy as he made his ogling—and their little plans—perfectly clear. Julia followed him straight into the men's room with no reservations, and he felt a little less guilty about all this as they stepped into the last stall. He let her press him against the cool tiled wall and kiss him, let her smear plum-colored lipstick on his neck and collar as she attacked him hungrily, seemingly forgetting about his injured arm trapped between them. He kept his free hand carefully on her hip, but he grinned and could have kissed her when she slid her hands under his dark shirt and raked her nails down his back hard enough leave marks.

"Mmmmm," she murmured. "You like that? I know what else you'd like."

She swept her blonde hair back as she sank unabashed to her knees onto the hard floor, and the red-blooded young male in Tony almost let her do what she apparently wanted to do.

Almost.

But as she fumbled drunkenly with his belt buckle, he knew he couldn't take advantage of her.

He grinned—and not for the reason she thought.

He knew he couldn't take advantage of her in that way.

She had barely gotten the belt undone when Tony clamped a hand over his mouth and made a little gagging noise as he dropped to his knees, ironically mirroring her pose. He made use of her bolting to her feet and leaning on the wall to steady herself, and he stuck a finger down his throat and puked into the toilet.

He wasn't really surprised when Julia offered no comfort at first and simply crossed her arms over her chest. "That's a first," she said, affronted.

But Tony gave her his best pathetic, pained smile. "I'm sorry," he choked out. "I'm a federal agent and I got hurt on the job. I took these really strong painkillers..."

It worked.

Julia frowned and knelt beside him as he slumped over the toilet. "You poor thing. What can I do?"

"You don't have to—"

"Nonsense," she said, her eyes glowing. "Anything I can do to help a federal agent, I'll gladly do it."

I bet you will, Tony thought. He said, tentatively, as if he might be asking too much, "Find my friend I'm here with?"

Her eyes narrowed, but he said quickly, "She's my coworker. Didn't have anyone else to come with so I felt bad for her." He flicked a glance at Julia's short, black pleated skirt and the spiky bracelets around her wrists and then at his own plain black attire. "I'm not really into this, but she seemed so excited…"

Julia lapped that up—and listened while Tony gave a vague general description of Abby that was utterly useless considering it matched half the women in the club tonight. He added an apology that he had forgotten what she was wearing, even though he knew the neon green top like the back of his hand because he had picked it out for Abby's birthday last year and she wore it often.

"Please find her?" Tony asked, looking as pitiful as a starved puppy. "I just want to go home."

He watched her wide-eyed nod, and then her back as she wobbled to her feet and all but staggered out on her mission. Tony just hoped she would "find" several Abbys before her friends found her.

He rose, slid the unnecessary sling from his arm, pocketed it, and went to the sink, washing his hands and rinsing his mouth as quickly as possible. He did not look at himself in the mirror, for several reasons—the number one reason being his guilt over Ducky's and Gibbs' concern for his "injury." A glance at his watch told him this little charade had cost him precious moments, but he knew it had been necessary. He had to protect himself.

He only wished young Brian Landry had learned to do the same.


Tony walked down the bar-lined street and lost himself in the milling people outside the most crowded club. He felt anonymous—and therefore safe—as he thought about his cell, slipped discreetly into Abby's coffin-shaped purse, the GPS inside dutifully broadcasting its location. He ignored the cabs until he spotted one old enough to most likely not have a camera waiting inside. He confirmed that as he leaned in, ostensibly to speak with the driver about his destination, a strip-mall with another bar located inside.

He was glad Landry's neighborhood backed up to the shopping center: One fare among a hundred from one bar to the next would blend in; a bar to a specific residence might not.

Especially if police came asking about that specific residence later on.

Tony did not speak during the ride, nor did he tip too little or too much.

It was the Goldilocks method of blending in: Everything had to be juuuust right—just perfectly, boringly ordinary.

Forgettable.

Tony made his way through the dark neighborhood, breathing in the crisp fall air with a smile of anticipation. He could do this. He would do this. He had to do this.

Abby was right. This night was going to be unforgettable.

At least for Kenneth Landry.


Tony stood outside the Landry house, smiling in amusement at the low stone wall obviously not designed to keep intruders out.

Intruders like him.

Last chance to back out, DiNozzo, he thought, even as he was breaching the wall surrounding the manicured back lawn. There was no swingset here, no bicycles or skateboards, Tony noticed, not even a tire hanging from the huge tree near the property line.

Bet McGeek could ID that tree, he thought, the probie's face popping into his head as he entered the security code given to him by his partner the day before.

"This ain't base housing at Quantico…"

"I was just wondering if you locked up…"

"I doubt the poor guy needs to add a break-in to his troubles…"

Tony entered the house, knowing full well that Landry could have heard him and could be waiting—either with a gun, knife or his Marine Corps training that made the prior options all but afterthoughts.

He didn't care.

Brian's dead eyes, the bruises on his otherwise smooth young skin, all those war movies that spoke to the boy's longing to know his father—those things did nothing but steel Tony's nerve. And break his damned heart. He hadn't lied to Gibbs about his own childhood. Tony knew exactly how it felt to be hurt by the one person who was supposed to love and protect him. He knew the pain of that ultimate betrayal—and he knew the feelings of worthlessness and despair that came with it.

But he had made it through.

Brian hadn't.

So Tony moved through the big house like an extension of the shadows cast by the moonlight streaming through the windows. He made no sound as he slipped silently toward the den, the sliver of light under the door drawing him mothlike to that warm glow. He paused, knowing Landry could be waiting for him. But he also could smell the faint tang of scotch in the air.

He imagined Landry drowning the sorrow of losing his only child—and he heard Gibbs' wholly confusing anguish from the night before—and he turned suddenly to leave, shame making his cheeks burn hot as the July sun.

And as he turned, he came face to face with a photo of Brian hanging on the wall. Tony thought about the place of honor Landry's dead wife's photo held on the mantel in the flowery living room, and rage began a slow burn through his belly as he stared at the boy's smiling face, relegated to a back hall. Tony stepped closer to the picture, studying the boy's clear blue eyes and easily finding the hopelessness in them that countless teachers and so-called friends had missed on a daily basis.

But he didn't blame them.

None of those people had seen the boy's stripped-bare body, lying in a pool of his own blood, the bright red swirling in with the multi-colored bruises like a sick rainbow of human suffering.

Tony, of all people, knew just how easy it was to hide the bruises—and to hide the pain.

So he didn't blame the people who had missed those bruises, overlooked that pain.

Tony blamed the man who had put those bruises there, the man who had caused that pain.

He made up his mind, and with a nod at the boy in the photo, he turned back to the door of the den.

"What the fuck are you doing in my house?"

Tony looked into Landry's wide, furious eyes.

He smiled.