Thank you all so much for your reviews and alerts. I really do appreciate them all. Well most of them anyway. I don't mind constructive critisism. Just please try to keep yourself nice. Use your out of the house special manners. I Hope you enjoy this chapter :)

Chapter 34

Sarah looked up at Tim. Shit she thought. Why didn't I just tell someone on the little brats? They deserve to be in trouble. She hadn't made any of this mess. She decided to try and bully her way out. It didn't usually work well with Tim but she was in trouble already so.......In for a penny in for a pound, as they say.

"What's going on here Tim, is that your little girl has made a mistake. She was feeling neglected with Dyl getting all the attention and so she acted out. Any psychologist will tell you......." Tim put his hand up.

"Just stop Sarah. If Jess was feeling bad she should have told someone. There is no excuse for trashing somebody else's things, because you're angry and hurt. You should have come and got me or Abby when you found this mess."

"If you think...."

"Save it Sarah!" Tim said. "I wasn't planning on being too harsh, but if you want to keep it up I can easily change my mind." Sarah shut up. "Now you two. If you wanted to play dress up you should have asked and I'm sure Jess, that your Mommy would have found some stuff for you to dress up in. You don't go in to someone else's room and help your self. Do you?"

"No Daddy." Jess said.

"I'm sure you know better after last week too. Don't you Maddie?" he said.

Maddie nodded.

"Right. First we're going down to lunch before the food spoils......"

"Can I ask a question?" Maddie asked.

"Go ahead Maddie." Tim said. He held his breath, hoping that the question was not going to be what he thought. Of course it was.

"Where did all these dress ups come from?"

"Abby collects them." he answered, hoping that would be it. Of course it wasn't.

"What for?" she said.

"She likes to dress up." Tim said.

"Why?" Maddie asked.

"Yeh why Tim?" Sarah asked. Tim's look, told her that now would not be the best time to make things worse.

"She just does." Tim said. "Now what you three should be concerned about is how much trouble you're in. I came up to get you for lunch. So come on. As soon as lunch is over you're going to wash the dishes......."

"But we have a dish washer." Sarah said.

"Which we won't be using." Tim said.

"But there's heaps of people Tim." Sarah said.

"Would you rather go with the alternative?" Tim asked.

"Not really." Sarah said

Tim stood in the door way and held his arm out directing the girls to go through. As each one past he gave them a smack. Maddie glared at Tim and rubbed her bottom but she didn't dare say anything. Jess didn't say anything because she knew she'd done the wrong thing and she was lucky not to be getting a spanking. Sarah rolled her eyes and Tim grabbed her arm, holding her back.

"I'm just making a point here Sarah, to you AND the girls. They shouldn't have asked you to not tell and you know that you should have told. They need to see that they got you in trouble by putting you in that position. So just help the girls with the dishes and we'll leave it at that for you. They will be cleaning up this room without your help."

"Ok. Fine." She said.

"But Sarah, don't keep things from us. And lose the attitude. I'm still your legal guardian and it's my job to pull you up sometimes."

"I'm sorry Tim." She said.

"Thankyou. And Sarah? I do appreciate what a good help you are to us with the younger ones. We still think of you as ours, you know that right?"

Sarah smiled. "Yeh Tim I do. And I like helping out with the kids. I love them."

Tim kissed her forehead and they went downstairs together.

"Nice collection of outfits and accessories Tim." Sarah said when they got to the bottom step and then she darted off for the safety of a crowd.

They all sat down to lunch and surprisingly there were no real issues with food from Maddie. The only one who had a real issue with the food was Amber who ended up with a plate of crackers and a glass of club soda. Morning sickness that went all day was awful. Jimmy had trouble eating himself when he saw his Amber struggling to keep down a cracker.

"Are you sick?" Maddie asked.

"Um...yeh Maddie....just a little bit." Amber answered.

"Why? Do you have the flue?" she asked.

"No, I'm just not feeling very well."

"She's gonna have a baby." Jess said.

"But she's not married." Maddie said. "You've gotta be married to have a baby."

"They are gonna get married aren't you Amber? Aren't you Jimmy?" jess said.

"Yep, we sure are." Jimmy said squeezing Amber's hand.

"They're gonna be like Bridal Barbie and Bridal Ken." Jess said.

"That's pretty cool." Maddie said. "Do you like to dress up?"

Tim knew where this was going and he tried to head it off at the pass.

"Ok girls, time to clean up now. I think that everyone finished." Turning to the curious faces around the table, Tim tried to explain. The girls made a mess upstairs and they're going to do the dishes and give the dishwasher a well deserved rest. And then they're going to clean up our bedroom. Aren't you girls?"

They both nodded.

"What were you doing in Abby and Tim's bedroom Maddie?" her Mommy asked.

"Playing dress up." She said.

"Did you ask permission first?" Gibbs asked both girls.

Jess shook her head. Maddie looked away from Gibbs and towards her mother. "You don't understand. We didn't mean to make a big mess but we couldn't stop. We needed to try everything. It was way cool in there." Abby stood up and started to help hurry the girls along. She could see Tim was going to have a seizure with embarrassment in a minute. His face was bright red.

"OK Ladies. I don't know what you got up to but if Timmy says you're cleaning up, then you're cleaning up." She said clapping her hands. "Chop! Chop! Come on. Let's get going." Sarah got up and started stacking dishes.

Tony grinned. He would just wait a little bit for the perfect moment and then he would go up and see what all this was about. Judging by the panic stricken look on Tim's face, it was worth a look. Dress ups hey? He could just imagine.

Gibbs and Kim looked at each other. Not much to say really. Tim and Abby seemed to have it all under control. Besides, the full story would come out eventually. It always did in this house. In the kitchen, Abby pulled Tim off to the side. "What's this all about Tim?" she said.

"They were playing dressup." Tim said in an exaggerated whisper." 'DRESS UP!' Abby. With things from your closet. There's stuff all over the bedroom floor and when I caught them, Jess was wearing a cheerleader outfit and Maddie was dressed up like a Playboy Bunny." Abby giggled. "It's not funny Abs!" he said.

"It kind of is Timmy. You worry too much." Abby said, still having a giggle every time she thought about it.

"Today is Sunday." Tim said pointedly.

"The day of rest!" Abby said teasing him.

"That's not what I mean Abby. Tomorrow is Monday. School. Sister Mary Clarence. Show and Tell? I can just hear Jess telling the class how she dressed up in her mommy's 'special' dressup outfits. Then describing them. The cheerleader, the bunny, the nurse, the French maid.....Should I go on?"

"No. I get the picture." She said trying hard not to laugh. "How many of the .......accessories did they find?"

"Oh God! I didn't even think about that. We better go up and do a stocktake." Tim said. "Sarah do you mind supervising here?"

"No I don't mind." She said with a grin. "You two go and do..... whatever it is you have to do."

Abby and Tim went up to their bedroom. Abby was shocked at just how much mess the girls had made. They had obviously only tried on the outfits that had taken their fancy because there were lots of stuff that they had thrown on the floor that hadn't been taken off the hangers. Thank God. Abby started to gather these up when there was a sound in the doorway. "Well, well, well. What do we have here." Tony said. "Tim, I'm shocked! I have never seen this many ADULT dress up outfits outside of a sex shop."

"I am so sorry Abby, I tried to stop him but..........Oh ........you do have a lot of......clothes...........AND accessories." she said picking up a pair of furry handcuffs and dangling them in front of Tim. "Do you use these often?" Tim blushed bright red and Tony grinned.

"Actually, they're really flimsy. They just come apart as soon as you pull....."

"Abby!!!" Tim said as he snatched the handcuffs back off Ziva.

"Well I particularly like this nurse's outfit." Tony said holding it up. "Do you have to be sick Timmy to make her wear this? Does it make you feel all better?" Tony teased.

"Ok guys. You've had your fun." Tim said.

"As have you Probie, it would seem." Tony said. "Alright. Let's go down stairs and play a little one on one. Have you got another cheerleader outfit? The girls could get dressed up and chee......Ouch."

"Leave them alone Tony." Gibbs said as he slapped the back of his head. "Geez. They sure did do a job in here. I'll send them up if you like. They've finished with the dishes."

"Thanks Gibbs." Abby said. He smirked.
"Nice Playboy outfit Abs." she giggled. Tim scowled.

"Why don't you two go and put out dessert." Tim said.

"Good idea." Ziva said. As soon as they left, Tim started gathering up some things that he didn't want the kids to see. He didn't feel like explaining their uses right now. He had no sooner finished putting them away when the girls came slowly in to the room.

"Ok girls. Pick up all these clothes and put them back on the hangers and then lay them on the bed. Then I'll hang them up in the closet. I don't want you climbing on the ladder. You could fall." Abby said. "You KNOW Jess, that this was really naughty. You're lucky your not going to get a spanking." Tim went back downstairs to put on coffee and left Abby to it. It actually didn't take that long to get it all cleaned up when they had someone to organise them.

When they were finished, Abby sent Maddie back downstairs to Kim, so that she could talk to Jess. "Why did you come in here Jess. You know that what you did was wrong. Don't you?"

"Yes." She said sadly.

"Then why did you do it. Did Maddie give you a hard time?"

"It was her idea, but I wanted to come. I was mad. Everyone loves Dyl more, just because he broke his stupid arm. "It's not fair."

"Oh I see. Well, I'm sorry that you feel that way but it's not true. Everyone loves you. Life is like that Jess. Sometimes Dyl will get a little more attention that you and sometimes you will get a little more attention than him. But that doesn't mean that we don't love you just the same. We're family Jess. We'll always love each other. Like when Amber gets married, everyone's going to be looking at her but that doesn't mean that I will love Ziva any less. It will just be Amber's turn to get the attention. Do you understand?"

"I guess."

"You wanna know something really silly?" Abby said. Jess nodded.

"While you were up here getting yourself in trouble because you thought no one was paying you any attention, Ducky was downstairs waiting for you and Maddie to come down because he had a gift for the two of you."

"Serious?"

"Yep."

"Can I go and see him now?" she asked.

"Yep."

Jess went to run off and then came back and hugged Abby. "I'm sorry I got into your stuff Mommy." She said.

"You're forgiven." Abby said.

"Mommy?" Jess asked. "Did you have all that stuff from when you were a little girl?"

"Why would you think that?" Abby asked.

"Because they're kind of small." She said seriously. "If you wore those skirts people would be able to see your underwear."

"You know what Jess? We better hurry downstairs or Uncle Tony's going to eat all of Auntie Ziva's cake." She said. Jess faked a shocked look and they both went downstairs to get their dessert.

After dessert, Ducky called the girls over to him. "I have a little gift for you." He said producing two presents wrapped in pink paper. The girls were both very excited.

"Thank you Ducky." Jess said, kissing him on the cheek. Maddie did the same.

"You're very welcome young ladies." He said. The girls tore open their packages and soon each found a bead threading jewellery making kit inside.

"Thank you Ducky!" Maddie said first this time, throwing her arms around his neck. It was Jess's turn to follow her lead. Gibbs came over to inspect the gifts.

"Wow! These are great. Why don't we take them in to the kitchen. We can sit at the table and make bracelets."

Tony,Tim and Jimmy all exchanged glances. Each were wondering if they had fallen into an alternative universe. After a while though, curiosity got the better of them and they all went to see what Gibbs and the girls were making. Soon they found that the bead threading got them in and before long they were all sporting brightly coloured bracelets that they had made themselves. To look at them no one would ever have imagined that the four men sitting at the table making jewellery with two little girls were highly trained federal agents and a medical examiner in the making. But the truth was, there was no other way any of them would rather spend a Sunday.

TBC