Rifiuto: Non Miriena

Ebony looked up as she slipped behind the bar to see Tim sitting at the counter. "You're here early. You usually don't come in for another couple hours or so. What's up?" He shrugged. "Tim? Hey!" He looked up, meeting her gaze.

"What?" She raised an eyebrow. "Sorry, Eb." A moment passed, before she leaned on the counter.

"What's goin' on?" He met her gaze. "Come on, Tim, I've known you since college. I know you. I know what bugs you and I know what you like. Something's goin' on. Spill." He sighed, pulling up an image on his phone and setting it in front of her. She studied it. "What is it? A box?"

"An Army footlocker from World War Two. I found it in my dad's closet today when my cousins and I were cleaning out the house. When I opened it up... there were Army caps and books and a gun holster and..."

"What are you gonna do with it?" She asked, handing him his phone back and straightening. She fixed a drink, setting it in front of him. He shrugged.

"I don't know. Keep it, I guess. It was my grandfather's."

"Paternal or-"

"Maternal." He whispered. "Mom's dad. Her side of the family was Army, my dad's was Navy. So I've got military branches on both sides." Ebony whistled.

"No wonder you didn't want to join the military." He chuckled.

"NCIS is as close as I get." He sipped his whiskey, propping an elbow on the counter. "NCIS has figured that my dad pretty much murdered my mom." An empty bottle dropped, shattering on the floor, and Ebony turned.

"What? How the hell did they come up with that conclusion?" Tim shrugged.

"Found DNA under Mom's fingernails. Matched it to Dad." He swallowed. "Personally, I think they contaminated the DNA. Or if not, they switched the tests."

"Tim." She shook her head. "These are your coworkers. Would they deliberately contaminate DNA or change tests?" He thought a moment.

"FBI does it all the time, which is why we end up with half their cases." She chuckled softly; over the years, Ebony had heard various stories about the ongoing war between the FBI and NCIS, and she, from the outside view, found it funny. Not that Tim would ever know. A moment passed, before she asked,

"So how are things with you and the Israeli chick?" He raised an eyebrow.

"Ziva?"

"You know any other Israeli chick?" He wrinkled his nose.

"It's going okay. It's still this whole... Friends With Benefits thing... I show up at her apartment, we have sex, I slip out in the morning and see her at work later in the day. Nothing more, nothing less."

"Did you ever think there might be more to it than just casual sex?" He raised an eyebrow.

"Such as?" He asked, sipping his drink. Ebony shrugged.

"I don't know. Love?" He sat up, coughing on his drink. She quickly took the glass from him and set it down, before moving around the counter and rubbing his back. "Breathe, Tim." When he was able to get a shaky breath in, he turned to her. "You okay?"

"Are you... insane?" She stared at him.

"About what?"

"I-"

"Here, Tim." Ebony nodded towards Lexi as she set a glass of water in front of him and returned to her work.

"About that last comment." She stared at him, expression blank.

"That you love her?" He sipped his water, taking deep breaths to calm his heart.

"I don't love Ziva. She's a friend, that's all." Ebony raised an eyebrow and then moved back behind the counter.

"If you say so. It just sounds a lot to me like you're in love with her." He glared at her, setting the cup down and throwing down a twenty as he got up.

"Ebony, you're my best friend, the mother of my goddaughter." He grabbed his phone, slipping it back into his pocket. "And I say this with all the love I can possibly muster, and know that I say this from the heart. Go to Hell."

She rolled her eyes and slipped the twenty into the pocket of her apron with a chuckle. "I love you too, Tim!" He turned back as he slipped out the door.

"Bite me!"


She couldn't get the pain in his eyes out of her head. Finding out that your mother's death was a murder investigation had to be hard, but to find out that your father had possibly killed your mother-

Ziva could only imagine the pain Tim was going through.

Her head snapped up as a knock sounded at the door, and after a moment, she got up, pulling the door open. He stood in front of her, holding what appeared to be a small chest of some sort in his arms. "What is this?"

"I'll show you." He replied, slipping into the room and setting the container on the floor in front of the fireplace. Ziva shut the door softly behind her, and then wandered over to him, picking up her glass of wine before she settled beside him. She took a sip before holding the glass out to him. He shook his head, and instead caught her lips in a loving kiss. When he finally pulled away, he returned his attention to the container, opening it up to reveal the various things stashed inside. "It was my grandfather's- on my mother's side." He clarified as she settled beside him. "This is all from World War Two."

"And... why did you bring it to my place?" She asked, cocking her head to the side. He met her gaze.

"Because of these." He pulled out the various books, handing one to her.

"Journey Through Japan: A History of Culture and Art?" She raised an eyebrow. He sighed.

"He was fascinated with Japan after the war ended. Was determined to go there someday and see the culture the Atomic bomb had destroyed. He was determined to make amends." She watched him sort through everything in the footlocker.

"Did he ever get there?" Tim shook his head, pulling out a couple photographs.

"No. He died in eighty-eight, when I was nine. In his will, he said that he left Mom a medallion but she never found it."

"A St. Christopher?" He met her gaze, thinking.

"Must be, yes. That must have been what she was talking about." She leaned close, studying the photographs.

"Who is he?" She asked, pointing to the second photograph- one of an injured young man in his Army uniform. Tim turned to her.

"My grandfather." Her eyes widened.

"That's-" He nodded.

"Yeah. He was injured near the end of the war. Lost an eye, a cheekbone and an ear. But even severely injured, he still fought. Still... survived."

"And who's that?" She pointed to the second photograph she held- a handsome young man in an Army uniform, smiling for the camera.

"My grandfather." Her gaze moved to him, shocked, before turning back to the two photographs.

"That's him?" He nodded. She leaned closer, studying the second photograph- the one taken before he'd shipped out. "He is very handsome." She glanced at him and then the photograph. "Like you." He chuckled, kissing her quickly. "So what are you thinking?"

"Sorry?" She watched him flip through the books.

"You are thinking something, Timothy. What are you thinking?" He didn't stop looking even as he spoke.

"I'm thinking... that I am in the company of a beautiful woman tonight."

"I meant about the books." He ignored her for a moment as he picked up a copy of Rebecca and began flipping pages.

"I don't know, just that... even if I don't find the medallion, at least I've have-" He stopped, as a page in the middle of the book fell back, revealing a thin strip of ribbon that fell back over the spine. Ziva turned her attention to what he was staring at.

"What is it?"

"I'm not... sure..." He shifted the book to look at the spine, and was surprised to see that the ribbon was stuffed within, between the binding of the pages and the spine of the book, creating a loop that sat above. Slowly, he tugged on the ribbon, only to meet resistance. "Zi, get me knife." She glanced at him as if he'd lost his mind.

"But Tim that has to be... at least a first edition of-" When it came to literature, Du Maurier was Ziva's favorite author, with Bronte a close second. During her days at university in Israel, she'd studied everything on Du Maurier, and knew a first edition when she saw one. And the fact that her partner was about to destroy such a beautiful, rare book-

"Zi, I need a knife, now." She climbed to her feet, rushing into the kitchen and then returning with one of her combat knives as he closed the footlocker. He took it, and turned the book over so that it lay with its pages open on the lid. She watched as Tim gently, almost reverently, slid the tip of the blade along the edge of the one of the spine edges. As the spine fell away, Tim felt his heart stop. Ziva leaned close to look over his shoulder.

"What is that?" He couldn't take his eyes off the trinket that lay within the spine. After a moment, he breathed,

"My mother's medallion."