Disclaimer: Criminal Minds and NCIS are owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.
Happily Ever After-Chapter 21
The weeks passed quickly for the Rossi family. There were no more major crises after the whole 'Jack incident' and life went back to normal for everyone. Dave was much mellower since he had gotten past his writer's block and because of his mellowness, he ungrounded his daughter after less than a week of being on restriction. This allowed Jack and Abby to have their first official date a week after they were caught making out. It was weird for everyone involved, because Dave usually terrified any kid that came to take his daughter out, but he found that he couldn't really intimidate his godson because he had known him since he was a baby. Instead of intimidating Jack, Dave found himself actually feeling relieved that Abby was going out with him. As JJ had pointed out to him, at least they knew Jack and they knew he would be good to Abby. It helped when he returned her to the cabin a full half-hour before her curfew. It only took a few weeks for all of the parents to get over the strangeness of their children dating.
As her final high school semester wound down, Abby found herself busier than ever. She had hoped that her last semester would be a 'blow-off' semester, where she could finally slack off, but the competition for valedictorian became intense and she had to step up her game by doing extra credit projects. She had also elected to take one final AP class and her workload and stress level increased because of it. It got to the point where Abby was almost too busy to worry about the college acceptance letters she was waiting for. Almost. Most of the time she was able to put it out of her mind, but the anxiety kept her up some nights and she couldn't wait to get an answer from the colleges, whether the answer was good or bad. It was the not knowing that was killing her.
Thankfully Jack understood the pressures she was under, as he was under many of the same ones. It was nice to have someone she could talk to who understood what she was going through instead of just telling her that everything would work out, like her parents often did. Jack frequently joined her in complaining about the amount of time it took for the colleges to send out the letters and he was as busy as she was with school work, so they could commiserate about that. While she was busy and stressed out, Abby found that she was happier than she had been in awhile, and she knew most of the happiness came from dating Jack.
Like the rest of her family, the month of February went by quickly for JJ as well. The cases seemed to drag on and once they wrapped one up, there were a dozen more waiting for the team's attention. Because of the large number of cases that seemed to come out of nowhere, Dave was frequently asked to consult on them and JJ was happy to be working with her husband more often. While he didn't accompany them to the various cities, just hearing his voice and his thought process was enough for JJ to stay in a good mood while the team was working the cases.
JJ had also made a conscious decision to spend more time with her daughter. A week after the 'Jack incident,' the two of them talked and JJ shared her fears about losing her place in Abby's life. Abby was surprised that her mother felt that way and she reassured her that it wasn't happening, but JJ was still worried. They finally decided to set Wednesday nights aside as mother/daughter night. On those nights, Abby came to the BAU from school and then she and JJ went out for dinner and then they went shopping or to a movie. It was fun for both of them and JJ felt like she was reconnecting with her daughter.
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Like the saying went, the first week of March came in like a lion. As Abby walked down a somewhat unfamiliar street, she tightened the collar of her jacket around her neck in an effort to block the wind. Both of her parents were out of town on a case, and while it was rare that her father was pulled into the field on a case, the team was frustrated and needed his help. They were in New York where an unsub was kidnapping members of the high society. After torturing them for four days, he killed them slowly and then dumped the bodies at various tourist sites throughout the city. The city officials were demanding results and the team had been there for a week before finally requesting Dave's help. He had flown out immediately and had been there for another week.
The only problem with Dave travelling with the team was there was no one for Abby to stay with. Nonna was in Italy with Rachelle, and Dave, JJ and Abby were going to meet them over there during Abby's spring break at the end of the month, but that meant that Abby couldn't stay with her. Garcia was in New York with the team, most of her aunts and uncles were traveling to various parts of the country and even Father Jimmy was at a convention in Tucson. When Abby suggested to her father that she was old enough to stay by herself, he laughed for about five minutes and then told her to start packing. While she did, he called one of his friends from NCIS.
Leroy Jethro Gibbs and Dave went back about fifteen years. During Dave's first stint in the FBI, before his retirement, he had worked on a joint case with NCIS and it had put him in contact with Gibbs. At first the two men despised each other, but when they went to apprehend their main suspect, an unknown accomplice was hiding in the shadows and he took a shot at Dave. Gibbs had seen the shooter just in the nick of time and had pushed Dave out of the way, saving his life. That had cemented the man as one of the few people Dave could trust with his life, and over the years they had become good friends. Since he could trust the man with his own life, he figured he could trust him with the life of his only child, so Abby had ended up staying with him.
As Abby made her way to Gibbs' house, which was near a Metro stop, she thought about her stay with the solitary man. She had met him a bunch of times over the past couple of years, so it wasn't like he was a complete stranger, but she would have preferred staying at the cabin or at Nonna's. He worked long hours and when he was home, he tended to leave her alone unless she asked for his help or engaged him in conversation. On her third day there, he could tell she was stressed out about a test she was taking the next day, so he invited her into the basement to help him with his boat. She accepted his offer just to be polite, privately thinking she would hate it, but to her surprise the sanding of the wood helped her clear her mind and she found it relaxing. As a result, Abby began taking her books down there and she studied and talked to him while he worked on the boat. All in all, staying with Gibbs hadn't been as bad as she thought it would be.
As she pushed open the front door of Gibbs' house, her cell phone rang. She knew it was her father by his ringtone, which was the Sinatra song 'My Way.' She smiled as she answered it.
"Hey dad," she said as she shut the door behind her and inhaled deeply through her nose. She had thrown the fixings for beef stew into the slow cooker before leaving for school that morning and the house smelled wonderful.
"Hi honey, how's it going?" He asked as he watched JJ set up for her press conference.
"It's going good, I got a ninety-seven on my history test," she told him as she set her bag down and went into the living room. She was surprised to see Gibbs sitting on the couch. Not wanting to be one of those people who had their phone conversations wherever they happened to be, she backed out of the living room and went into the kitchen.
"That's great Pumpkin!" Her dad exclaimed and she could hear his smile over the phone line, "See, I told you you'd do well on the test."
"I guess you were right," she told him, stirring the contents of the slow cooker. "How's the case coming along?"
"That's why I'm calling; we finally caught the guy and we're wrapping it up in a few minutes with a press conference," he said and Abby could hear the exhaustion in his voice. She knew this had been a rough case for the team and she hoped they stayed in New York tonight so they could get some real sleep.
"When will you be home?" She asked.
"We have to finish some paperwork, so we probably won't be home until sometime tomorrow," he told her, as he watched his wife put the finishing touches on her press statement. She signaled that she was almost ready to begin, so he ended the conversation with their daughter. "Your mom's getting ready to talk to the press, so I have to go. Tell Gibbs that we'll see you both tomorrow, okay?"
"'Kay dad, love ya."
"I love you too Pumpkin," he said and then flipped his phone shut. He made his way over to the raised podium and stood between Hotch and the chief of police. The rest of the team was spread out along the makeshift stage.
Back in Washington, Abby flipped her phone shut and went to join Gibbs in the living room. "You're home early," she said, somewhat surprised. He tended to work almost as many hours as her mother did and she hadn't been expecting him home so early.
Gibbs was reading over a file and drinking his ever present coffee. "We have a tough case and I needed to get out of the office to clear my head," he explained. "How are your parents?"
"Good," she said as she sat down on the opposite end of the couch. "They finally wrapped their case up and they'll be home tomorrow, so this is my last night here. Wanna work on the boat later?"
He looked surprised, "It's Friday night, aren't you going out with that boyfriend of yours?" Abby had been at his place the previous weekend and Jack had picked her up there. While JJ and Dave hadn't been able to terrorize him, Gibbs had and he'd had doing it. He had intimidated the kid so badly that he was sure Jack hadn't even held Abby's hand during their date. Abby had made her displeasure known when she returned home later that night.
"No, he's going out with some friends from the track team tonight, we'll probably go out tomorrow night instead. Do you mind if I turn this on?" She asked, pointing at the TV.
"Go ahead," Gibbs said and then took a deep breath. "God Abby, it smells great in here! I'm gonna miss your cooking when you leave."
Flipping the channel to MSNBC, Abby said absently, "Well you'll just have to come over for dinner more often." She had hoped that one of the major news networks would carry her mom's press conference live, since it was such a high profile case, and she wasn't disappointed. She watched as her mother approached the podium and began speaking.
Gibbs set his file down and watched with Abby. "Your mother is good at her job."
"Yeah, she is. You can tell my dad doesn't like being on camera though," she said, referring to her dad's uncomfortable look. While JJ was front and center delivering her statement, Dave and the rest of the team were standing behind her on either side.
"We would like to thank the residents of New York for their vigilance and patience while we worked to solve this case" JJ said as she wrapped up the conference. "The streets of the city are safer tonight because of it."
With that, she gathered up her notes and it looked like she was about to step away from the lectern. In Washington, Abby picked up the remote control and was about to turn the TV off when she heard what sounded like the pop of a firecracker. Her attention swung back to the screen and she watched as a bright red stain began to bloom in the center of her mother's chest, before she fell to the ground. A split second later, before anyone had a chance to react, another pop sounded and a similar stain appeared on the left side of her father's chest and he too went down. Abby stared at the TV in horror for another few seconds before the entire screen went black.