"That went well," remarked Tony with forced irony, the outer offices of Andrews, Frere and Walker softly blurred around him, his one clear view of Gibbs' military-straight spine. At the comment, a striding Gibbs stopped and waited for him, wrapping his hand with unaccustomed tightness around Tony's upper arm once he reached his side.

"They want to play hardball," murmured Gibbs, "they came to the right place."

Tony tried to pull back a little out of the steel clamp of the grasp. "Gibbs," he hissed quietly, the injured tone finally netting the man's distracted attention, "you think you could quit playing the Incredible Hulk with my arm?"

Gibbs' fingers immediately released and Tony smiled, if only wanly, at the tender, apologetic massage of his bruised bicep.

"I told you—"began Tony, only to be shushed as Gretchen and her new attorney exited the office and headed toward the elevator they also waited on.

The grip returned to his arm, lighter now, the touch both soothing and supportive. Gretchen stopped a few feet away, hanging back, but the attorney – Price – was apparently of the how-to-influence-people school of thought and he pushed his way forward intimidatingly close to where they stood.

Gibbs, not shying from overt surveillance, looked his adversary up and down, doing his own probing for weakness.

"Mr. Gibbs," acknowledged Price.

"Special Agent," Gibbs corrected with cool precision.

"Special Agent," returned the lawyer, putting his own emphasis on the title, "there is no need to make this a pissing contest."

A smile, just visible from where Tony stood, quirked the corners of Gibbs' mouth. The kind of smile you only saw when Gibbs' was undercover. Tony had figured out, after just a couple of assignments, that this – this patently unGibbslike smile – was Gibbs' tell. The equivalent of the nervous stacking of poker chips when you had a good hand. It wasn't an unconvincing flash of teeth, nothing like the falsely ingratiating grin of the hospital administrator. It was a cheerful, sometimes seductive smile that managed to reach his eyes and seemed to have a convincing effect on whoever he directed it at. But it was -- if you knew the man well -- just ... wrong. As if a second personality had inhabited the body Gibbs.

"Do you see me pulling anything out, Mr. Price?"

The attorney smiled back, but it was a strained smile.

Gibbs, in case-mode, produced a certain strain in the NCIS hallways. Or, as Abby more colorfully put it – he made serious vibrations in the NCIS celestial aether. Gibbs, in pursuit of the family DiNozzo, was a cosmic force all his own.

And Tony had to deal with both a distracted superior and a distracted lover, there being no hiding from a cranky Gibbs when you had to drive home with him. Tony held onto the door handle as the sedan took a right-hand turn at breakneck speed, Gibbs taking out on the road what little he'd failed to take out on an increasingly Gibbs-shy staff. Tony swallowed back the bile that threatened, as his eyes and his dysfunctional balance system stopped reading from the same sensory page. He shut his eyes tight and clung to the handle, noticing the car had finally slowed only when they bumped to a fairly gentle stop.

"Sorry," murmured Gibbs.

Tony cautiously blinked his eyes back open and found they were sitting on the shoulder of one of DC's lesser known byways.

"I don't like to lose," he explained

"Ah," replied Tony offering his hand, "wouldn't have guessed that."

Gibbs' fingers were cold against his.

"You get used to it, well, after you've spent a lifetime with my father," shrugged Tony, rubbing a bit of warmth into the hand he held. "You know that old saying 'you'll never be as good as your father'? Don't know when I first heard it ... maybe at school, but when the girl you lose your virginity to says it ..." Tony shifted uncomfortably in the seat, "... I think it was probably then that I gave up trying to compete with him."

Gibbs frowned. "How old were you?"

"When I gave up? Twelve."

"You lost your virginity when you were twelve?"

"Yeah," Tony drawled the affirmation out guardedly, "when did you lose yours?"

"When I was seventeen."

"Guess I was just an early bloomer," quipped Tony.

But Gibbs studied the man beside him without a trace of humor. "How old was the girl?"

"Fourteen or fifteen."

Gibbs took a deep breath. "Do you think she was speaking from experience?"

Tony laughed. "Now there's a thought."

"I'm serious."

Tony turned a little more in his direction. "She said it like she was."

"You got a name?"

"Of my first conquest? Of course I've got a name – "

But Tony didn't get to finish, as he had to grip the handle again as the car started up with a roar and made a stomach-jolting u-turn.

"This couldn't have waited until morning?" Tony sighed plaintively and leaned back against the desk chair he was, once again, occupying. One hand absently patted Rufus' head, receiving a halfhearted lick in return, as if Rufus, too, was ready to be off duty for the day.

Abby reported in with an enthusiastic, "I'm here, bossman," practically as she bounded from the elevator. McGee, who she had in a hand-to-hand tow, looked a little ... disheveled, which could have explained the bounce in her step. Anyway, the duo got a real grin from Tony, which was more than Gibbs had been able to muster out of him in the past few days.

"What's up?"

Even though he'd expected alacrity, Gibbs blinked in the face of the energetic arrival. "I need to find someone."

"'Kay," replied Abby, craning her neck at the notes on his desk. "Who?"

"Patricia Chaney, born sometime around 1970. In the early 80s her family lived in Bridgeport, Connecticut, probably sent her to private school, though we're not sure which one."

"What'd she do?"

"Stole DiNozzo's cherry," replied Gibbs with the seriousness only he could muster.

"You're kidding."

"Nope."

Abby's nose wrinkled. "We find people for that? I mean, if so, I better tell Hank Kenneda that he's in a world of trouble." She turned to a blushing McGee. "What about you, McGee? Who do you need to warn?"

If possible, McGee blushed even redder.

"Oh, come on," she prodded. "We're all family here. Even Gibbs had to lose his virginity to somebody."

Not unsympathetic to his youngest agent's worsening distress, Gibbs handed over the paper with what few particulars he had about Patricia Chaney. "Get to it, Abs."

"Oh ... yeah," Abby studied the note for a second. "Right. I'll get right on it." She looked back up at the still blushing McGee, "You coming McGee? I'll let you help."

With a little sigh, McGee followed.

When they were safely in the elevator, Tony laced his hands together behind his neck. "So, who do you think stole McGee's cherry?"

"Abby," said Gibbs simply.

Tony sat up straighter. "You are kidding me, right?"

"Nope."

"Patricia Chaney, now Arnwine, born July 17, 1970." Abby clicked the remote and popped up a picture of a blonde teenager with a big, black hair bow and an oversized jeweled crucifix choker, "definitely going through her Madonna 'Desperately Seeking Susan' phase at the time. In the year of our Lord 1985, actually, she was attending a public school in Bridgeport – hence the trendy dress in the school pic -- and living on the corner of Maple and Elm Streets. You have to love the whole Main Street theme. While our Anthony was living at the equally Our Town corners of Elm and Oak about two blocks away." Her fingers made little scissoring motions across the desk. "Walking distance."

She observed Gibbs. "So you gonna tell me why we're deconstructing the early years of Tony's sex life?"

"We're not."

"We're ... not," she echoed in a definite explain-yourself tone.

"We're deconstructing his father's sex life."

"Oh." Abby frowned. "Tony and his dad boffed the same Madonna wannabe?"

Gibbs shrugged.

"Eww. And we're dragging up Tony's painful past because ..."

One of Gibbs' hands fretted with the straw on her oversized soda cup. "Because we couldn't come up with anything else and, if we don't find something to use as a weapon, all Tony's father has to do is take the custody battle to court. No judge in the land is going to give Sam to a chronically ill man in a same-sex relationship -- even if he is the father -- when a paragon of business virtue is there to step in and give the kid everything money can buy."

"Look familiar?"

Gibbs tossed the photo copy across Tony's desk.

"Trish," Tony identified with a glance. "How come I got older and she hasn't changed a bit?" He tossed the photo back toward where Gibbs stood.

"We've got to do this, Tony."

Tony shook his head. "Won't work."

"It'll work."

"You think my father hasn't already paid her off?" challenged Tony.

"Maybe," Gibbs conceded, "but it's the only card we have."

Tony scrubbed one-handed at his already tired eyes. "Gibbs, she surely won't appreciate having her life disrupted."

Gibbs took the photo back into his hand. "I know. That's what I'm counting on."

(tbc)

Many thanks to C for reading bits and pieces. All remaining mistakes are solely my fault. Appreciate the feedback on the last chapter!