Note: I had a BLAST writing this chapter. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. Please leave a comment on your thoughts.
The Cabin
Gibbs comes walking up the little slope from the lake towards the cabin. He is heading towards the cabin when he hears a car coming. He gets unpleasantly surprised when he recognizes the car. It belongs to former FBI-agent Tobias Fornell. Fornell gets out of his car and walks aggressively towards Gibbs.
"Really, Gibbs? Here I thought I was your friend." Gibbs just looks utterly confused at Fornell, who seems really upset.
"what did I do?" Gibbs asks.
"what did you do?" Tobias yells out loud. "you go on a weekend trip with Phil and don't even think about inviting me? I thought you and I were friends."
Before Gibbs can say anything, another car pulls up, and Captain Phil Brookes comes out of it.
"Really, Gibbs. Here I thought you and I were friends, and then you invite Fornell to your cabin and not me?" Phil says and slams the car door before he notices Tobias Fornell standing right in front of Gibbs. Gibbs is not just looking really irritated at his two old friends.
"oh, I get it. So, you two planned for him to pretend he hadn't been here the whole time? Bishop told you I was coming. Didn't she?" Fornell asks while looking angry at first Gibbs and then Phil.
"what are you talking about?" Gibbs asks Fornell.
"oh, so you two pretend to be surprised when I show up. When you have been here the whole time?" Phil asks Fornell. Fornell looks angry at Phil, and Phil reciprocates the angry glare.
"Okay, stop both of you." Gibbs says and gets the two men to turn their attention to him. "no one has been here the whole time." Gibbs says irritated, and Fornell and Phil look surprised at each other.
"Agent Bishop called me a few days ago and asked me if I was with you up here. I figured it was probably him."
"yeah, the same for me, and I thought it was him that was here," Phil explains.
"Okay, so you figured, let's crash the party. The cabin is obviously big enough." Gibbs says loud with excaudate movements that clearly tell his two friends he doesn't really want their company. Fornell and Phil look a little ashamed down on the ground.
"well…" Phil says after a few moments. "you did tell me a few months ago that you sometimes felt a little lonely, so I thought you shouldn't be out here by yourself."
"I'm not," Gibbs says loud and irritated.
"so, you were here the whole time?" Phil and Fornell ask each other at the same time. It both amuses and irritates Gibbs. "you lied to me, Gibbs? How could you do that?" they both ask at the same time.
Gibbs is just staring at them with one of his famous poker face Gibbs-glares.
"I thought I only had 3 ex-wives." Gibbs says and receives a confused look from his two friends. "right now, you two sound like ex-wives too."
"you can't say I sound like Diane?" Fornell asks as he sounds very offended by the comparison to his ex-wife. Gibbs just shrugs at Fornells complaint.
"you can't say I sound like my ex-wife who cheated on me with a man who tried to kill me." Phil whines.
"you two are blaming me for taking the time to spend in my cabin as every single one of my ex-wives did."
"why can't we sit down and have a beer like last time?" Phil asks.
"Yeah, now that we are here." Fornell joins in with a friendly smile.
"Yeah, Gibbs. You told me a few months ago that you sometimes feel lonely. You shouldn't be alone." Fornell look questioned at Phil and then at Gibbs. He really didn't want Phil to tell anyone about that conversation. It was a brief moment where Gibbs opened up to his friend, who was in a stage of heartbreak, and Gibbs tried to cheer him up by open up a little bit about his own life. He never thought Phil would actually tell anyone about that.
"Holy Fourth of July weenie roast!" Fornell suddenly says, and Gibbs notices how both Fornell and Phil suddenly seem to have lost all interest in Gibbs admitting to Phil that he sometimes feels lonely. Gibbs turns around to see what has suddenly cut their attention.
It is Jack. She is coming up the hill and walking across the little opening in front of the cabin. She is heading straight into the cabin without ever looking at the three men.
It isn't just that she is walking by them – her blonde hair is shining and reflecting the sun as the light hits her hair just perfectly. She is wearing a pair of black sunglasses and a long white skirt and a bikini top and bare feet.
Once Jack has disappeared into the cabin, Gibbs turns back to look at his two friends. They are looking at him with stoned faces and wide eyes.
"what?" Gibbs asks when none of them are saying anything or even moving or blinking their eyes. They seem like they have just seen a ghost – and not a Diane-ghost.
"shut the…" Phil says completely cut by surprise and unable to finish his sentence.
"who the hell was she?" Fornell pitches in.
"I guess that dating pp I gave you really worked."
"Dating app?" Fornell exclaims loud and looks utterly confused at Gibbs before he burst into loud laughter.
"no, I didn't use the damn dating app that got you kidnapped, Phil."
"in my defense…" Phil starts when Fornell bursts in. "kidnapped. This just keeps getting better and better." Even Gibbs can't help but smile at Fornell's uncontrolled laugh. Once Fornell has finally stopped laughing, he looks towards the cabin and then to Gibbs.
"who is she?" Fornell only receives a raised eyebrow from Fornell.
"she looks familiar," Phil says, bewildered.
"what? she is your ex-wife?" Fornell asks Phil and slaps him playfully on the shoulder as Fornell starts laughing again, and it makes Gibbs laugh too while Phil is just looking confused at Fornell.
"My ex-wife was a brunet," Phil says, and it just makes Fornell and Gibbs laugh even harder.
"Okay, but really. Who is she? Your ex-wife number 4?" Fornell asks once he stops laughing.
"no." Gibbs just says. "it is Jack." Gibbs says irritated. Fornell and Phil are back to looking like they have just seen a ghost.
"guys. Hey?" Gibbs says, trying to snap them out of their condition of shock.
"as in NCIS Special Agent Jacquelin Sloane?" Fornell asks.
"yes. Jack is staying here for the weekend."
"I can see that," Phil says, shocked.
"how long has that been going on?" Fornell asks.
"what?" Gibbs asks.
"you two?" Fornell asks.
"you lied to me." Phill says accusingly and looks back at Jack and then to Gibbs. "when I was at my lowest point when Stacy broke up with me."
"cut it, Phil. You sound like my ex-wife now. I didn't lie to you." Gibbs says clearly, very irritated. He looks over at the cabin, where Jack disappeared. Just minutes ago, he was down at the lake. Relaxing with Jack in the sun, until his two unexpected guests showed up.
"You told me a few months ago that you were feeling lonely," Phill says, and it snaps Gibbs back to focus on his to friends blaming him.
"well, clearly not that lonely." Fornell jokes.
"it is not the way you two think."
"right," Fornell says with a knowing look.
Then the door to the cabin is opened, and Jack once again appears. She is now wearing one of Gibbs's old shirts over her bikini top. The shirt is tied up in a knot, so her belly is visible. She is now also wearing a pair of flipflops. She walks by the three men towards her car.
"Going somewhere, Jack?" Gibbs calls after here. She just looks back at him with a smile and then holds up her car keys that are dangling in between two of her fingers.
"oh, you don't need to leave because of us," Phil says, all dumbstruck and embarrassed and starts walking towards his car. He is just about to tumble over his own feet.
"Yeah. No. we were already about to leave anyway." Fornell adds in follows Phil back to their cars. They quickly get into their cars and drives off. Jack comes back to Gibbs with a bottle of bourbon in her hand.
"they left in a hurry," Jack says, pretending to be surprised. Gibbs places an arm around her lower back.
"Yeah, they did," Gibbs says, unable to hide his satisfied smile, with his two friends leaving and him being alone with Jack again.
"I hope I didn't spook them away."
"Nope." He places a kiss on her temple.
"you didn't offer them to stay?" she asks.
"Nope." He looks down at her. He can't help but look at how attractive she looks in the slightly transparent shite skirt. Just enough to get a hint of her bikini bottom she is wearing under it.
"you want to go back to the lake?" he asks and forces his eye to look up at her face.
"Nah. It got lonely down there."
"I didn't expect them to show up." Gibbs has an apologetic smile on his face.
"hey, they are your friends. If you wanted them to stay, why didn't you just tell them?
"I didn't." he objects a little too quickly, and it makes Jack chuckle, and Gibbs looks away from her with a slight blush on his face. She places a hand on his cheek to get him to look at her. He looks up and into her soft brown eyes. The sun is hitting her face just perfectly, and her hair is slightly moving in the light breeze, and she is looking just perfect in the summer sun. He leans down and kisses her.
"how about we go inside?" Jack suggests once they break the kiss. "we can go back down to the lake later."
He nods and places his hand on her lower back while she leans closer into him as they walk back towards the cabin.
Once they get into the cabin, Gibbs starts to chuckle.
"What is so funny?" Jack asks while she starts finding two glasses for the liquor.
"they are not going to let me hear the end of this for months now."
"the end of what?" Jack asks.
"really,"? he asks with a raised eyebrow. "inviting you to my cabin and you walking around like that."
"What is wrong with the way I look?" she asks and pretends to be concerned as she looks down at herself.
"absolutely nothing. But they are going to think all kinds of things about it now." He wraps his arms around her and kisses her.
"is that a bad thing?"
"no," he says with so much sincere love in his eyes as he is looking into her eyes. He lets go of her, and she starts finding 2 glasses for the liquor she just brought in from her car.
"you should have seen their faces when you came up from the lake," Gibbs says with an amused smile on his face, and he can't stop himself from laughing just by the memory. Jack looks over at Gibbs. He seems so relaxed and happy as he is leaning against the wall of the cabin. His shirt is unbuttoned, and just hanging loose over his white marine-body fitt-shirt. He is just observing her while she is roaming around the cabin for something.
"I heard you from down there. It sounded like a serious agent-needs-assistance-alert."
"oh, it was. If you had waited much longer, we would need to call Palmer to come and pick up two bodies. And this time, I wouldn't have shot Fornell in the ass."
That last comment leaves Jack looking at Gibbs with a mix of shock, bewildered and amused.
"you shot him in the ass?"
"it was a long time ago and doing an undercover-op, but yes."
"and yet you are still friends? You two really have a friendship to be admired." Jack says, amused, and when she finally finds what she was looking for.
"did they recognize me when I walked up from the lake?" Jack asks as she sits down on the floor and pours a glass of bourbon for each of them. Jack looks up at him as an invitation to sit down and enjoy the liquor with her. Gibbs happily accepts the silent invitation with a smile.
"not at first. I told them it was you when they started making ex-wife jokes."
Jack takes a sip of her liquor, and it doesn't go unnoticed how she licks the alcohol of her lips afterward before she puts the glass back down. "does it bother you?" Jack asks when she notices how he is staring at her with a dreamy look.
"what?" he asks, still looking at her lips.
"ex-wife jokes?" Jack says, amused when the word seems to snap him back to reality.
"no," he says and takes a sip of his own liquor and looks away when he notices how she is looking amused at him.
"is that my shirt you are wearing?" he asks after a few moments. Jack nods and takes another sip of her alcohol. She is looking into his eyes over her glass with a slight mischief smile in her eyes.
"do you mind?" she asks and places the glass down on the floor next to her. Her legs are bent slightly under her as she leans to the opposing side. She is leaning to her side and resting her wait on her hand. The leaning to the side makes the tied up oversized shirt reveal her bikini-top more, and she knows it is driving Gibbs crazy. She can see how he is forcing himself to not look at it.
"no. It looks better on you than it ever did on me." Gibbs says with a smile, and it makes her blush and looks away from him. "but you weren't wearing it when you came up from the lake." He points out, and it makes her look up to meet his eyes.
"oh, you noticed that." She says sarcastically with a big smile.
"Hard not to." He takes a sip of his alcohol, but he never breaks eye contact with her sparkling brown eyes.
"you forgot your shirt down at the lake. So, I didn't put it on because I didn't want to get your shirt wet, and my bra was wet."
"you are wearing it now." He looks over at her with a soft smile.
"I can just take it off if you want it back." she starts to untie the knot that is tying the shirt together on the front. Gibbs places his glass on the floor and reaches over and stops her from untying the shirt.
"I didn't say I wanted it back." his voice is so soft and almost whispering. Jack lets go of the now untied shirt and place her hand on the back of his head and pulls him closer to her and kisses him passionately. He leans over her, and they lay down on the floor while continuing the kiss.
Note: I hope you liked this. I LOVE Fornell-Gibbs-chemistry. They are freaking hilarious and doing the time Diane came along. It was just funny, which is why I brought in a quote from Diane (the fourth of July comment is actually Diane's line originally.) the moment I wrote Fornell and Phil in one of the previous chapters this storyline came into my head. I just thought I needed to write this chapter.