Hey everyone, my deepest apologizes for the long wait. I've had some family issues come up and my head just hasn't been with writing but time is a healer and I think I got my groove back so…
Here we go! Chapter 26! Enjoy :-)
Let's not waste time with technicalities, you know the deal…
"What do you mean this isn't Ari?" snapped Gibbs.
"He's dead, Gibbs. It's been confirmed," replied Vance watching Gibbs pace back and forth in the Squad Room.
"Then who the hell is after Kate?"
"We traced the call to your phone back to NCIS," explained McGee.
"NCIS? Someone here is behind this?"
"It appears that way. Abby and McGee are downstairs running a search to see if they can isolate which line the call came from."
"You mean to tell me that whoever is behind this has been here the entire time?" Gibbs froze for a moment before slamming his hands down on his desk. "I want to know who this bastard is, Leon!"
"We are working on it, Gibbs."
"Not fast enough! Twenty-four hours, Leon! Twenty-four hours and this nut job plans to come after me and Kate! If he's working inside this building, there's no telling what he's planning!"
"I have increased security in and around the building. As the director of this agency I need for you to trust me in that I will keep you and Kate safe from whoever this is!"
"You're going to keep us safe? This psycho got in here under your watch, Leon!"
"We will find him, Agent Gibbs! I just need for you to cooperate with me."
"Cooperate, right?" Gibbs stormed off towards the elevator.
"Where are you going?" shouted Vance.
"I need coffee!" Gibbs disappeared into the elevator.
"Give him some time," said Constance. "His sight was so focused on Ari, having to change course is going to be difficult for him."
Vance pinched the bridge of his nose. "I know. Hell, I can't blame him, knowing that this bastard is here isn't an easy pill for me to swallow either." Vance slunk against Tony's desk.
"I'm going to call Tony and get him up to speed on things. If this is inside the agency, Williams needs to be under close watch to ensure she doesn't tip off her counterparts."
"Good idea, they should be landing soon. I have an SUV waiting for them at the airport. I was going to send over a team of agents to escort Williams back but I'm not sure if that's a good idea anymore. I need to keep this as contained as possible."
"I'll go over see her transport, Director."
"You don't mind?"
"Not at all. This is my daughter's well-being we are talking about."
Vance nodded.
Tony sighed as he hung up his cell phone.
Jane walked up to Tony. "What's up?"
"He's dead."
"Who's dead?"
"Ari. Just got off the phone with C.J., Vance confirmed it. Ari is in fact dead."
"What the fuck? If Ari is dead then who the hell called Williams?"
"Gibbs got another call from who he thought was Ari, the call came from NCIS!"
"NCIS? Other agents are involved this too?"
"Should have known she wasn't working alone."
"Well, I say we get to the bottom of this now!"
"Jane, no!"
Jane stomped over to where Kate and Williams where engaged in conversation. She pulled Skylar up by the collar slamming her against the wall of the plane. "Once a dirty cop, always a dirty cop huh?"
"Jane, what are you doing?" exclaimed Kate causing Ziva and Frost to come see what was going on.
"Ari is dead, this little piece of shit is working with someone inside NCIS to kill you!"
"I am not!" gritted Skylar.
"Who called you, Williams?"
"I don't know!"
"You don't know? Just like you didn't know about Doyle back in Boston? Protecting your fellow dirty ass agents just like you protected those dirty cops?"
"The only person I'm trying to protect is Kate!"
"Like hell, you are."
"What do I have to do to prove to you, I'm not involved in this?"
"Start talking!"
"I told you everything! I am not a terrorist! I am not a dirty cop and I'm not trying to kill Kate!"
The captain came over the intercom telling everyone to take their seats for landing.
"Rizzoli, back off!" said Tony, pulling the detective away from Williams.
"I'll be damn if I let her hurt Maura! You hear me? I will kill you my damn self before I let that happen! You're going to tell who you are dealing with, so help me!"
Tony nudged Jane towards her seat.
Kate stepped towards Williams. "I told you not to make a fool of me."
"I'm not, I swear!"
Stepping off the plane, the group was greeted by the sight of Constance leaning next to a sedan, a black SUV accompanying it.
"Wasn't expecting to see you here" smiled Tony, approaching the woman.
"Director Vance asked that I come oversee Williams' transportation back to NCIS."
"I think we have enough law enforcement on hand to handle transporting one suspect back to base, don't you think?"
"Given the circumstances, the more, the better. Where is Caitlin?"
Kate walked up. "I'm right here."
Constance clasped her hand over her mouth at the sight of Kate's bruised eye. "My dear child." She grabbed hold of Kate's chin, examining her face. "Tell me you left him looking worse than you do?"
"I think the needle sticking out his chest did that."
Constance slapped Tony in the back of the head.
"What was that for?" asked Tony.
"You were supposed to look after her! You think that hurt want until Gibbs gets ahold of you!"
"Speaking of Gibbs, where is he?"
"Back at NCIS probably riding Abby and McGee about getting information on that phone call."
"Find anything new?"
"Nothing yet. They are working on pinpointing exactly where the call came from within the building."
"I can't believe our own are involved in this."
"Me either, but having Williams in custody might help draw out the rest."
Ziva came walking up with Williams, still in cuffs.
"Well if it isn't the little traitor now," smirked Constance.
"I'm innocent," retorted Skylar.
"It's funny, you keep saying that and yet no one believes you!" spat Jane.
"Put her in the SUV, Ziva. You and Rizzoli can drive her back to NCIS. Gibbs can't wait to talk to her. Tony, you and Kate can ride with me." Constance noticed Frost standing in the back. "Detective Frost?"
"Mrs. Isles," nodded Frost. "Or should I be calling you something else now?"
Constance looked at Kate.
"He knows," replied Kate.
"I'm hoping your presence means you are here to help not hurt?"
"That's the plan," replied Frost.
"Very well," Constance tossed the keys to Tony. "You drive, I can't stand D.C. traffic."
The group loaded into their cars. Tony drove the sedan with Kate in the passenger's seat, Constance behind her and Frost on the other side while Ziva manned the SUV, Skylar handcuffed in back and Jane in the passenger's seat.
Back at NCIS, Gibbs walked impatiently around Abby's lab, watching her plasma screen closely as she worked at her computer.
"What's taking so long?" snapped Gibbs, throwing his hands in the air in frustration.
"Trying it access the NCIS call records is not an easy task, Gibbs! You have to give me some time," replied Abby.
"We don't have time, Abbs!"
"Gibbs, I'm really going to need for you to chill out! I can't work with you down my back like this!" Abby typed away at her computer. "Okay, I got something!"
Gibbs rushed over to stand next to Abby, looking at the screen. "What do you got?"
"I've been running a search of the calls going out of NCIS, seeing if I can find what phone it came from," Abby pointed at the screen filled with numerous phone numbers. "These are all of NCIS' outgoing calls. The highlighted ones are the ones to your phone." Abby typed some more pulling up a shorter list. "These are numbers that those calls to you came from." Abby clicked the mouse bringing up a list of names to go with the number.
Gibbs studied the screen. "Those are mostly McGee, Ziva, Tony, Ducky and you."
"All the other calls to your phone for the NCIS don't line up with the time of the call."
"You said the call came from NCIS!"
"McGee and I traced it, it came from within NCIS."
"Then why isn't it showing up?"
McGee rushed in the lab, huffing and puffing. "We've been hacked!"
"What?" questioned Abby.
"I wanted to double check and make sure I didn't do something wrong on the trace. I tried some different configurations to find the caller location and that's when I found it. Someone has tapped into the NCIS modem and has been running an alternate phone line remotely using a NCIS number. The call you got didn't come from NCIS, just an NCIS line."
"Which line?" asked Gibbs.
"Whoever did this is good, they routed the line so that you couldn't trace it back to any particular line but I'm smarter!" McGee took over Abby's computer bringing up a new screen. "Instead of tracing where the signal was coming from, I traced where it was going to, seeing if maybe it would give us some clues and I found this."
"It's an outgoing call list," said Abby in awe.
"I'm assuming he's using some type of burn phone to run the signal through."
"Looks like he only uses the phone to call me, there are no other outgoing calls," said Gibbs.
"Yeah, but there are a hell of a lot of incoming calls. All from the same number," said Abby.
"I can try and see if I can pull any information on the phone," said McGee.
"I got a better idea," said Gibbs taking out his phone.
Ziva laid on the SUV horn, for what felt like an eternity as she, Jane and Skylar sat unmoved on the D.C. street. "Why are we not moving?"
"Man, this traffic is ridiculous," said Skylar, innocently for the back seat.
"What? You in a hurry to get to your jail cell," replied Jane, looking at Skylar through the visor mirror.
Skylar didn't reply, she simply shifted in her seat.
"There must be an accident ahead."
"Must be. Do you see Tony anywhere?" asked Ziva.
"I think they are a few cars ahead of us."
The sound of vibrating filled the air.
"Someone's phone is going off," said Jane.
Ziva looked at her phone. "It's not mine."
"Mine either," Jane looked at Skylar.
"You took my phone, remember?" replied Skylar.
Jane leaned over into the backseat, pulling Skylar's bag over the seat. Placing her ear to the bag, she heard the sound of vibrating coming from the bag. She looked at Skylar. "Why is your bag vibrating?" Jane reached into the side of the bag pulling out a cell phone. "You have another phone."
"I can explain it's…" Skylar started before Jane held up her hand silencing her.
Jane answered the phone. "Hello?"
"Rizzoli?" came Gibbs' voice on the other line.
"Gibbs?"
"Rizzoli, why are you answering this number?"
"This is Williams's phone."
"Gibbs? How did he get that number?" asked Skylar.
"I got this number off of a list of calls made from this bastard's phone."
Jane looked back at Skylar.
"It's a work phone, I swear! He gave it to me so he could keep track of me," said Skylar.
"He who?" Jane looked down at the display of the phone.
A few cars ahead, a police officer approached Tony's car, tapping on the window.
Tony rolled down the window. "Yes, officer?"
"Where you head to sir"
"The Naval Yard."
"Got a pretty bad accident ahead. We are closing down the road."
"This is the main entrance."
"I'm sorry, sir."
Tony flashed his badge. "We're federal officers. We work at NCIS. We are transporting a suspect, we need to get through."
"I'm sorry, sir. We are directing all traffic to a side street if you wouldn't mind following the detour another officer will point you where to go."
"Alright," replied Tony, rolling up the window following the detour.
Driving along the side road, Tony, Kate, Constance and Frost found themselves alone.
"That's strange," said Kate. "Seems that no other cars are taking this route."
"That is strange," said Frost looking at their surroundings. "Maybe we are the only people heading to NCIS?"
Kate looked up to see a car racing towards Tony's side of the car. "Tony, look out!" shouted Kate as a car came barreling towards the driver's side of the car from an intersecting street sending the car into a spin.
The sound of screeching tires and breaking glass filled the sedan, the world outside of them spinning none stop until the impact with a light post stopped them.
The car was silent.
Tony was the first to open his eyes. "Kate," was all he said as he ignore whatever pain he may or may not have been feeling. "Kate! Kate answer me!" Tony reached over lightly, shaking the blonde. Slouched over in her seat, Kate's eyes slow fluttered open and Tony breathes a sigh of relief. "You okay?"
"Yeah," replied Kate, shifting in her seat. "I think so."
Grunting from the backseat alerted Tony as Frost and Constance began to move.
"We're fine back here, DiNozzo. Thanks for asking," grunted Frost, brushing away broken glass.
"I'm not," winced Constance.
Tony looked back to see that Constance's right side was wedged between the seat and the part of door that had been pushed in due to the SUV sliding into the light pole.
"Hold on, I'll help you." Kate was about to undue her seatbelt when the sound of a gun cocking of a gun beside her ear made her freeze.
"Don't move!" said the man, his voice heavy with an accent. "Agent Todd, I presume. You are a very hard woman to get ahold of!" The man opened Kate's door. "Get out the car!"
Kate looked at Tony, who simply nodded for her to comply. Kate got out the car and the man forcefully pushed her against the door.
Tony went to reach for his gun.
The man pointed the gun pointed straight at Kate's chest. "You pull out that gun, I put a bullet straight through her heart."
"Please don't hurt me," pleaded Kate.
"Oh, I am not the one you need to worry about!"
"No, I am!"
Kate looked up to see Jane standing with her gun pointed at the man.
"Game's over, asshole! Put the gun down or I will leave all sorts of brain matter all over this street for Maura to analyze later."
The man dropped his gun, with a smile on his face. "The game is not over, it has only just begun."
"Oh but it is!" Jane pushed the man to the ground.
"I will not talk! I will not talk until our mission is complete!"
"You don't need to talk," Jane looking up at Kate and then into the distance where Skylar stood next to the SUV, uncuffed. "We already got all the information we need."
What do you think? Reviews and comments are welcomed and an update is coming soon (be prepared for a whole lot of "Tate"ness) ;-)