A/N: Thank you to everyone who has so kindly reviewed. I appreciate it! Here's a long, angsty one for you. There are mentions of suicide so if that bothers you, please don't read!
In the lobby of the upscale hotel, Gibbs and Ziva heard the gunshot and raced for the stairs.
Neither spoke as they pounded up the stairs and down the hallway. There was no sound coming from the room, and for a moment, neither could force their hand to open the door. Gibbs slid the keycard in and yanked it out. Ziva pushed open the door and prayed in every language she knew that they wouldn't find Tony dead in the room.
Gibbs' phone began to ring, and Tony set down the receiver. "Nice timing."
Gibbs and Ziva took in the body on the floor along with the knife sticking out of the chest. While Ziva felt for a pulse she knew wouldn't be there, Gibbs asked Tony, "Are you all right?"
"I can't hear out of my right ear, but other than that, I'm good." He laughed and Gibbs noted with concern the wildness in his eyes. "As good as I was this morning, anyway."
Gibbs crossed the room and put a hand on Tony's shoulder. He looked into his agent's eyes and saw a mixture of pain and sadness and something else he couldn't quite read.
"Hey," Gibbs said softly, "What did she say to you?"
Tony shuddered under Gibbs' hand. "It would be easier to tell you what she didn't tell me."
Gibbs wasn't sure what to do with that so he just stared, willing Tony to tell him whatever it was that had him so shaken. Surely it wasn't killing Watts. The woman was a cold-blooded killer, and Tony had taken lives before.
"I'm guessing since you're here, you found Bell's body?" Tony asked, his voice a bit stronger. He shook off Gibbs' hand and managed to stand, if a touch shakily.
Gibbs nodded, unconsciously sliding his hand under Tony's elbow. He was surprised when the agent shook him off again. He raised a questioning eyebrow at Tony, but didn't touch him.
"Don't, Gibbs," Tony said, his voice rough with emotion. He looked away from both Gibbs' and Ziva's confused stares. "I'm a complete waste of space. I had no idea what a monster she was until she flat-out confessed to Langworthy's murder. Even then, it took me a minute to process it since she turned on the tears and got me to have a drink with her. And you don't have to say it, drinking on painkillers is brilliant, I know."
Tony saw Gibbs' eyes dart to the empty glass beside the armchair, and Tony felt every bit as disgusted with himself as he knew his boss would be with him. He went on, "But she was talking about Pacci and all I could think about was Kate, dead on that goddamned rooftop."
Gibbs' blue eyes snapped back to his green ones at that statement, and suddenly Tony couldn't bear to look at him anymore. He hobbled crutchless past his boss, the fiery pain in his damaged knee bringing him completely sober. He laughed out loud. As if stabbing a woman in the chest and watching her gasp her last breaths hadn't already.
Ziva and Gibbs exchanged a look at the odd little laugh and knew Tony wasn't done. Tony stopped and stood over Watts' cooling body. He looked down at her with hatred. "She wouldn't stop talking. Her voice was completely different once she confessed. I've never heard anyone sound so dead, so completely emotionless." The scars on his wrist caught his eye, and he said quietly, "Not even Amie."
The room was silent for everyone except Tony—his ears were still ringing from the gun firing so close to his head.
"She told you everything then?" Ziva questioned softly, moving closer to her partner. She didn't touch him, just let him feel the warmth radiating from the nearness of her body.
The odd little laugh came again. "Yeah. Everything. You found Bell so you know about the end. She told me the beginning, the middle and the end. It was horrifying to just sit there and listen. I felt dirty just listening to her." He paused, shuddered again, and said, "I need to get out of here."
He walked, limping badly but moving quickly, to the door. He made it about halfway before Gibbs stepped between him and door, grabbing Tony by both arms. Tony moved to put his hands to his chest and push the older man off, but Gibbs gave him a hard shake.
"Hey," Gibbs said softly but firmly. "We'll get you out of here, but you're not walking on that leg. Okay?"
Ziva was suddenly beside him with the crutches and he took them without a word. She asked, "Do you want me to take you home?"
He was already hobbling toward the door. "I just want to be alone. And you have a body to deal with."
"How are you planning on getting home?" Gibbs asked.
Tony snorted. "Well I'm damned sure not getting a ride with a stranger. Ever again."
Gibbs' concern for his friend lifted just a fraction at that. He looked at Ziva and motioned to the body. "Can you handle this?"
She nodded and Gibbs thought he saw relief in her eyes. He followed his agent into the hall and glared at the curious guests who had gathered, daring them to ask questions. In the elevator, Tony felt Gibbs watching him as he leaned his head against the side wall.
He was surprised to find himself relieved that it was Gibbs who accompanied him and not Ziva. It was easy to fall back into their old routine at work and pretend they had never taken the relationship further. But to have her in his home would have been too much for his already quivering psyche. And trying to act normal for Gibbs is going to be a walk in the park?
As he made his slow way to the car, he couldn't help but think about how easy it had been to be so open with Watts. It made him physically sick to think that she had scripted a role for him and he had played the part with Oscar-worthy perfection. He suddenly envied the corpse up in that hotel room. It didn't have to think about Kate or Dev or Bell's gruesome death.
Shit. "I don't wanna go home, Boss," Tony said suddenly.
"I'm not leaving you alone tonight, Tony," Gibbs said, unnerving him with both the statement and the rare use of his first name.
Tony shook his head. "No, I mean, Scott Bell's parents need to know that we found him."
Gibbs glanced at the bruises peeking out from the neck of Tony's sweater and sighed. "No way, DiNozzo. The last thing you need is two hours in a car with that knee."
"They deserve more than a phone call," Tony said. He paused, then quietly said, "And they should hear it from me."
Gibbs was silent, and Tony thought he was going to agree. "Not tonight." He saw that Tony was about to protest and said, "They've been waiting for years. They can wait another day."
"Would you want to wait?" Tony said, immediately regretting it.
He started to apologize, but Gibbs just said, "It'll be past midnight by the time we get there. There won't be anything for them to do but sit up all night and suffer. I'll take you in the morning."
The unexpected kindness brought even less expected tears to Tony's eyes. He blinked them away quickly, even though he doubted Gibbs would notice in the darkened car.
"Ah, hell," Gibbs exclaimed suddenly as he pulled into the parking garage.
Tony just eyed him, trying to figure out what on Earth could make Gibbs look so … nervous?
Gibbs stopped the car and shoved his cell into Tony's hand. "Call Abby."
Tony grinned. He wondered if the scientist knew she was the only soul on the planet who could strike fear—okay maybe not fear, exactly—into the heart of Jethro Gibbs. He dialed, sighing as he had to switch ears to be able to hear the phone's ringing and not the residual ringing from the gunshot.
Abby picked up and started talking a mile a minute until Tony broke in with, "Abbs. It's me."
"Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god. Tony, are you hurt? I mean more hurt than before? Oh my god, oh my god, just please tell me you're okay!"
"I'm good, Abbs," he said. "But unfortunately, I can't walk and talk right now. I'll call you tomorrow."
"Okay," Abby said, sounding disappointed. "Promise?"
"I promise."
***
Tony understood when Gibbs demanded that he follow him up to his apartment. He understood when he followed him through the door and watched him collapse tiredly on his couch. Wouldn't it just be a bitch if I tripped and broke my damned neck after everything that's happened?
He drew the line at Gibbs' suggestion that they order a pizza and talk.
Tony looked at him as if he had just caught him cross-dressing. "What gives, Gibbs? You don't talk. You glare." He paused. "And oddly seem to get the message across while doing it."
Gibbs just looked vaguely amused. "Thought those painkillers didn't make you loopy?"
"They don't. But listening to emotionless recounts of two horrible, senseless murders and then killing said murderer? Yeah, that kinda does."
Gibbs just turned and walked down the hallway.
"Hey!" Tony called. As if he didn't feel bad enough, having Gibbs in his formerly Gibbs-free personal space was really creeping him out.
Gibbs returned with two bed pillows and slid them under Tony's injured leg with a gentleness Tony could never have imagined coming from his boss. Tony had to admit, though, that the elevation made his knee throb decidedly less ferociously. "Thanks, Boss."
Gibbs nodded and disappeared again. Tony heard him fiddling with his coffeemaker while calling for a pizza. He sighed, but deep down, he was pathetically glad to not be alone. Every time he closed his eyes, he was struck with a new vision that ran on a continuous loop of Kate, Devlin, Bell and crime scene photos of Langworthy's mess of a head. He was suddenly extremely grateful to have been spared the Bell scene. He didn't want to imagine the state in which years in an airtight freezer would have left the remains.
"You okay?" Gibbs asked from the kitchen doorway, a cup of coffee in his hands. "You look awfully pale all of a sudden."
"Just thinking," Tony said, still trying to get used to Gibbs in his apartment.
"Well stop," Gibbs said simply.
Tony looked at him and shook his head. "You can probably do that, can't you? Just flip a switch and stop thinking. That's a trick you need to teach me sometime, Boss."
Gibbs gave him a half-smile. "Your apartment isn't big enough to build a boat in."
Tony smiled at that, but Gibbs could see that the haunted look had not left his brilliant green eyes. Gibbs watched Tony unconsciously tracing the scars on his wrist, something he had noticed the young agent had taken to doing when he was troubled.
"Okay," Tony said, suddenly sounding half-panicked. "Since this is my place, can I make a rule? Sure I can. Good. You can stay, but you have to promise not to look at me like that. Okay? Now I know how that frog felt in biology class."
Gibbs held up his hands and went to sit in an overstuffed chair beside the black leather couch. The chair was perpendicular to the couch, situated near Tony's head, and Tony stared up at the ceiling and sighed. "Yeah, that's better," he said, the sarcasm evident. "Now you can see me, but I can't see you without breaking my neck. That's fantastic."
"You want me to move?" Gibbs asked, wondering why Tony was this upset. Gibbs thought back to the freezer. He saw the condition of Bell's body, the blood pooling in the bottom that wasn't all from torn fingernails as the young man clawed in futility. He guessed that Tony had heard about the beating in explicit detail and wondered what else they had talked about.
"No," Tony said finally, closing his eyes, absently rubbing his ear and willing the ringing to go away.
"The ringing will go away," Gibbs said, reading the gesture and speaking from experience. "Probably be gone by morning."
"I don't care," Tony said, his tongue playing over the stitches in his mouth. He found it odd that he kept forgetting about them, and he wondered if someone with a desk job, a normal, boring 9-to-5 would forget.
Tony's statement unnerved Gibbs, who found himself questioning his earlier "has issues, not suicidal" diagnosis of his agent.
But then Tony said, "She didn't shoot me. That's all that matters, I guess."
Gibbs ignored the last part of that. Or tried to. "You got any bourbon?"
Tony laughed tightly, realizing how his statements had sounded to his boss. "Kitchen, above the fridge."
Gibbs got up, but he looked down at Tony's pale face and pinched features. "Booze or painkillers?"
Tony looked up, confused. "Huh?"
Gibbs' tone was gentle and he held Tony's eyes when he said, "You're in pain, DiNozzo. Booze or painkillers? You can't have both. Not on my watch, anyway."
Knowing he'd have to take half the bottle of painkillers to get any sleep, he said, "Booze. There should be a bottle of Jameson up there." His tone was tinged with something Gibbs couldn't read when he added, "I save it for special occasions." He shook his head and closed his eyes.
Gibbs went to the kitchen and rooted around, surprised to find everything neat and orderly. There was not a dish in the sink, and Gibbs wondered why he'd expected any. Tony's home was as polished as any of his many masks. Gibbs carried the drinks back to the living room and handed the whiskey to his senior agent. Gibbs couldn't remember the last time they'd had a drink together.
They sat in silence, each man drinking and remembering, whether he wanted to or not. The doorbell rang, and Tony said, "There's cash on the hall table. What? I don't cook much."
Gibbs shook his head and went to the door. Delicious smells returned with him, and Tony realized how hungry he was. They ate in silence, and when they had finished, Gibbs said, "Well, at least I don't have to worry about your appetite."
Tony snorted. "I'm not bulimic, Gibbs. Food is never the enemy."
"Some people might be offended by that joke, DiNozzo," Gibbs said, finishing his drink and getting up to get a refill.
"Some people were offended by that mustache of yours," Tony called after him.
Tony quirked an eyebrow when Gibbs returned with the bottle of bourbon and a glass of water. He handed Tony the water and said, "Take the painkillers, kid. You're obviously not going to drink the booze. I forgot about those stitches in your busted lip. Bet that stung like hell."
Tony realized he had completed his ritual of taking a sip and, unable to pour the rest out, had abandoned the glass on the table. He dutifully complied with Gibbs' gentle order and hoped the little white pills would do their job quickly and ease the tearing pain in his knee. He had known since feeling the pipe connect in that alley that the injury was bad because it had that coming-apart feel that only serious injuries could produce.
"Nah. It's what I do. One sip and then I usually pour the rest down the sink," Tony said, then wondered why he'd said it. Maybe his tolerance was suffering from disuse.
"You'd never be like him," Gibbs said quietly, almost to himself.
But Tony heard him and felt the kind words like a blow to the chest. He wondered why it hurt so much to hear those words that were meant to offer comfort, and he realized it was because he didn't like letting anyone get so close to him. He had found that it didn't hurt so much when they were gone if you never let them in to begin with.
"I can't talk about my father tonight, Gibbs. Please," Tony said, the plea coming out more than a little strangled.
"We don't have to talk about anything," Gibbs said, sorry he'd dredged up another demon for DiNozzo to do battle with. The exhaustion was evident on his agent's face, and Gibbs wished he'd just down half a bottle and get some sleep. He knew he wouldn't, though. DiNozzo never took the easy way out when it mattered. "Unless you want to," he added.
Tony didn't respond, and he jumped a little when Gibbs' phone rang. It was almost midnight.
"Yeah, Gibbs."
Tony listened to Gibbs listening to someone on the phone.
"That's good to hear, Abbs. Thanks for letting me know."
Tony heard the phone click shut.
"McGee's … " Gibbs paused, realizing Tony had no idea what had happened to McGee earlier. He wished he hadn't said anything because he knew it would make Tony feel guilty. Only Tony could save someone's life and then feel bad about the circumstances. "McGee passed out on the way home. Abby took him to the hospital, but the doctors promised her he'll be fine with some rest."
"I shouldn't have tackled him," Tony said wearily. He was so tired, but every time he shut his eyes, he saw the horrorfest of bodies.
"We'd be worrying about the bullet in his head instead of the bump on his head if you hadn't," Gibbs said. He paused. "And you know that."
"Mmmm, well, guilt and I are old friends. It's not easy to say goodbye."
"You have nothing to feel guilty about," Gibbs said, tossing back the remains of his drink and pouring another.
"I killed someone tonight," Tony said, matter-of-factly. "Some might think that's reason enough to feel guilty."
"DiNozzo!" Gibbs barked, unable to help himself. "She killed a damned fine Marine and a young man with a bright future. You killed her before she put a bullet in you. Are you saying you feel guilty about that?"
Tony wished like hell he could see his boss's face. "Of course not. I'd kill her again if given the chance. That's the problem, really. I don't feel anything. I ended someone's life and I don't feel a stitch of remorse… nothing."
"DiNozzo—"
"I don't ever want to be like her. She told me how she murdered two innocent people and there was nothing in her voice. Nothing at all. She could have been reading a grocery list if she hadn't been talking about maliciously beating a man half to death and leaving him for dead. So I need to feel something over her death. I killed her, and that's not really cause for celebration, even if she deserved it. Hell, she deserved worse. I remember wishing she had suffered more at the end for all the pain she caused. What kind of person does that make me?"
"One interested in justice," Gibbs said without hesitation.
Tony forced himself upright, ignoring the flickers of pain that lit up across his battered body. He looked Gibbs in the eye. "Does it still bother you to take a life?"
Gibbs lifted a shoulder. "It depends on the situation."
"That's a bullshit answer, Boss."
"Why's that?" Gibbs asked, holding Tony's intense gaze.
"Because you don't kill innocent people, and according to what you've told me, if it's justified then you shouldn't feel guilty."
"You asked if it still bothered me," Gibbs said slowly. "Being bothered isn't the same as feeling guilty. But I'm not going to lose sleep over every scumbag I've had to take out."
Tony thought about that for a long moment. "I guess I'm just fucked up, then," he said and struggled to his feet. "Bathroom," he said when Gibbs started to rise.
Gibbs watched Tony hobble down the hall and sighed. He had the distinct feeling he'd said something wrong, but he couldn't figure out what it was. He looked at the bottle in front of him and hoped Tony had an extra bedroom. Or not. The couch looked more comfortable than the space under his boat.
A few minutes later, Gibbs realized Tony had been gone too long. He was on his feet in an instant, and he practically ran down the hall and banged on the bathroom door.
It opened, revealing Tony dressed in shorts and a T-shirt. "Yeah?"
Gibbs actually looked embarrassed. "Sorry, I … "
"Just thought I had gone to off myself?" Tony finished, raising an eyebrow.
"Tony, I … "
"Can't complete a sentence?" Tony finished again, wondering if his boss was drunk and then wondering what the hell he would do with a drunk Gibbs.
Gibbs looked down. On their way to meeting the floor, his eyes flicked over the massive bruise wrapped around Tony's knee. The bruising was as dark as thunderheads, and the joint itself was so swollen Gibbs couldn't even make out the shape of his kneecap. "Aw hell, DiNozzo."
Tony didn't look down. Once was enough for one night. Instead, he said, "You just said 'sorry' to me."
Gibbs looked up from the damaged joint and said, "Guess I did."
"That's the spare bedroom," Tony said, pointing to a door behind his boss. "Make yourself at home."
Gibbs just nodded and turned toward the door.
"Gibbs."
He turned back and saw DiNozzo had pain in his eyes that had nothing to do with the bruises on his body.
"I would never," Tony said. "I'd never do that. Not after Amie. She had time to regret it." He paused, leaning heavily against the doorframe. "So did my mother. Anyway, I just wanted you to know that I would … I'd never do that."
"I know, Tony," Gibbs said, turning again. "I know you wouldn't."