Here's chapter 12! Thanks for the reviews! And I'd like to thank CelticCrossings, my beta, she always does a great job. :)


Gibbs, McGee and Ziva walked up to Murray's house, While they didn't have any evidence that he was going to hurt Caitie or Gibbs, Gibbs wanted to see if the man would come in to answer some questions.

Ziva knocked and the man answered the door a moment later. "Yes?"

"NCIS." The three of them flashed their badges.

"What can I do to help you?" Murray asked.

"We've got a few questions we'd like to ask you." Gibbs said, it was then that Murray recognized Gibbs.

"Hey, you're the guy who yelled at me earlier."

"Yeah, I get kinda pissed off when people take pictures of my kid without permission." Gibbs shrugged his shoulders. "Can we come in?"

"Sure." The man moved and let the three of them entered the man's home.

"What are your questions?" the man asked.

"Who hired you?" Gibbs got right to the point.

"I don't know, I got a call in May or June of 2008 and was asked to take the job. I was promised 156,000 a year paid in weekly increments if I took pictures of this one girl and her family members, at first it was just the girl and an older woman I'm guessing her grandmother and then she went to live with you. I had to take 15 pictures of her each week."

"Had?" Gibbs noticed the verbiage; Murray was speaking in past tense.

"After you left me earlier, I called the woman and told her what happened." Murray shrugged. "She told me that I didn't have to take pictures of that girl anymore, my last payday is this Saturday."

Gibbs nodded quietly. "Can we have the phone number you called?"

The man went to the front hall and grabbed something off the hall table. "You can have the whole phone," he offered, "when I got hired, she bought me the phone and told me to only call her from this phone. I don't need it if I won't be working for her anymore."

"What can you tell me about the woman who hired you?" Gibbs asked.

"I never met her; I only talked with her on the phone."

"Did she ever give you her name?"

"No."

"You never asked your boss's name?" McGee asked his tone disbelieving.

"She paid me three thousand a week to take 15 pictures of a kid; I could usually get all the pictures taken in an afternoon. Most of the money I got bought my silence." Murray said defensively.

"Anything else you can tell us about your boss? No detail is too small."

"She always took my calls." Murray explained. "Once I could tell I woke her up. Another time I called, I could hear something in the background some other language."

"Do you know what language?" Gibbs asked.

"Some guttural language, she was saying something as she answered the phone; she actually spoke to me in it."

"Do you remember what she said?" Gibbs asked.

His face screwing up in concentration Murray thought back, finally he spoke "Shalum" he drew the word out.

Next to him, Ziva gave a start "Did you mean Shalom?" she inquired, pronouncing the Hebrew greeting correctly.

"That sounds more like what she said." Murray told her; "it was over a year ago that she answered the phone like that, I don't really remember what it was to be honest."

"It's Hebrew." Ziva's spoke as Gibbs realized the same thing.

"I don't know if she was a native speaker of Hebrew but she didn't speak English with an accent." Murray said.

Hebrew is a second language. Gibbs thought. Since the bank account that's been paying him is a government one, it's a female government worker who has worked in or around the Middle East.

After a few more questions, the three of them left Murray's and started to go back to the Navy Yard, glancing at the clock though, he realized how late it was and decided to take McGee and Ziva home, promising to pick them up in the morning he started back to his house when he got a call from Caitie.

"Castle's bleeding!" She was hysterical, he couldn't make out much of what she was saying until "he's bleeding from his Butt!"

"What?" Gibbs asked.

"Castle is bleeding from his butt!" Caitie insisted. "He's on your bed and he won't get off! Should I call an ambulance? I wish I knew more about dogs. Abby knows more about dogs, I'll call her!" And with that she hung up

Pressing on the gas pedal, Gibbs made it home in record time. As he pulled up he could see that Abby's hearse was nowhere in sight. Throwing the door open he found Caitie at the bottom of the stairs, in tears.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"I can't get a hold of Abby and I think Castle's dying!" she sobbed. "There was a lot of blood coming from his butt when I saw him last!"

"Castle's still in my room?" Gibbs asked, sitting next to Caitie.

Caitie hiccupped "As far as I know."

"I'll go up and see what's wrong." Gibbs got up and went to his room, not knowing what he'd find.

Quietly turning the light on, he half expected to find the dog already dead but he did not expect to find Castle panting on his bed, suddenly he realized what was wrong.

"Cathlynn, go to the basement to get one of the boxes one of the deep ones, put towels and such on the bottom."

He could hear Caitie moving around and he went back to the bed. "We'll take good care of you." His voice was quiet as he spoke to the dog.

Caitie soon came in, box in hand, fighting back tears. "Is he gonna die?" she asked.

"Nope."

'What's wrong?"

"You'll see in a minute." He took the box from Caitie and set it in the darkest part of his room and then went over to the dog. "Come on Castle." He said quietly. Picking the dog up, he felt more then heard the dog growl. "Oh stop," he told the dog as he laid the dog into the box. Castle seemed to understand what the box was for and got comfortable, lying down again. The dog kept panting, looking up at Gibbs and Caitie expectantly, as if saying 'Well, what's next?'

"Cathlynn, go get some water and food for Castle, okay?"

"You mean that box isn't going to be his casket?" Caitie asked, managing to sniffle and hiccup simultaneously.

"Nope, go do what I asked and come back and grab a spot on the bed."

"He bled on it." Caitie pointed out as she left the room.

Gibbs got up and stripped the bed of all the sheets. Stuffing them into his laundry basket he was putting new sheets on it as Caitie came back in and put the food and water dish by the box.

"No need to put it in just put it beside the box and make sure Castle can see where they are." Gibbs told her.

"What's going to happen to Castle?" Caitie asked, helping put the sheets on.

Gibbs smiled and then motioned for Caitie to sit down. "You'll see, just watch." He said quietly.

Caitie sat down next to Gibbs and put her feet up on the bedstead. "What are we watching…." She trailed off for a moment. "Is that a bubble of blood coming from his butt?" She asked, freaking out again.

"Watch," Gibbs ordered, then smiled as Caitie realized what was happening.

"It's a puppy!" Caitie realized happily. Her phone rang and she picked up.

"Hey Abby, apparently Castle's giving birth, not dying." She quickly caught the forensic tech up on what was happening

"Better think of names" Gibbs told the teenager.

"Jenny if it's a girl." Caitie said instantly.

Gibbs smiled to himself as Castle bit the umbilical cord to cut it and then began to lick the puppy clean.

Caitie lay down on the bed, positioning herself so she could watch the birth of the next puppy and started giving Abby a minute by minute replay of what was happening. Gibbs got up, he'd seen several puppy births, this was nothing new to him and he figured Caitie would be sleeping in his room tonight. He may as well get comfortable on the couch.


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