A/N: Ok, first WOW, all you reviewers ROCK!! I came home Sunday night thinking I would be lucky to have like two reviews, to find ten of them was so totally cool. All of you guys who reviewed, you know who you are, really you do rock, I have been running around the place telling everyone 'I have ten reviews' and have just been like I'm on a sugar high since I read all of your reviews. Second, I would have posted this sooner if I hadn't been soooo busy. I got to go see all these lights on my church's short bus (that is a fun short bus) and got a ton of inspiration from feeling all Christmassy. Hopefully the next chapter wont take so long (even though I haven't even started it). So don't stop, keep reviewing, and hey if you want to you can give me ideas cause I'll use them, I need them. Lots of love, nikki.

"Hello," he answered as he looked at me standing at his doorstep.

"Hi," I know I must look nervous and scared, I can hardly make my mouth say the things it needs to, "Are you Anthony DiNozzo?" I ask him, my voice shaking as I say his name.

"Yes, what can I help you with?" he says and I can tell he's a little nervous from my shaky voice.

"Um, my name is April Michelle DiNozzo, and well I'm your daughter." I say and I can see his face change from happy, not a care in the world to confusion and being just as nervous as I am.

"Ok," is all he says and don't know what to do next.

I don't know if I'm suppose to start crying and give him a hug and make it a picture perfect moment, or if I'm just suppose to stand here and wait for him to do something, or if I should just pinch myself now and wake up from this dream I must be having.

So I just be honest and tell him what's on my mind, "It's kind of cold out here, and it's snowing and stuff."

"Yeah, come on in," he says as he moves to the side of the door and lets me in.

I walk into the warmth of the small house slowly; taking in everything I see and hear.

"So," I hear him say as he closes the door and turns to me, "Where's your mom at?" he asks me.

I don't really want to tell him the truth, knowing he might just send me back home if he knows I ran away, "In-laws. Her, my step-dad, two step-brothers, and step-sister all went to New York for Christmas."

"Does she know where you are?"

"Yeah," that part was biggest lie I had ever told, she had no idea where I was and as long as I followed the schedule I had laid out she would never know where I had been.

"How'd you get down here then?" I guess he was trying to start a conversation, but was just as nervous as I was.

"Bus, and a cab." not being able to talk was an understatement, I could hardly move my mouth and stand, let alone do the two at the same time.

"So how old are you now, thirteen?"

I hated answering questions about my age, people always found it strange that my mother was little more than twice my age.

"Fourteen, but only since April 24," I tried to sound as young as I could, hoping that in some way in his eye's he could see me as his daughter.

"Yeah, I remember your birthday because your mother was insistent on naming you after the month you were born in," A small smile appeared on his face, "I remember asking her if you were born in February or March if she would actually name you that, her answer was 'I have a one out of twelve chance of getting the name I want, and I bet you twenty bucks I'll have her in April, if I have to have some kind of surgery done...'"

"My daughter will be born in April." I say with him as we both laugh at the story my mother had told me.

The smile that had once been small and just an after thought was now big and spread across half his face, I had definitely got my smile from him.

"The day you were born I lost twenty dollars off that bet." he looked down at me, the few minutes he had took to tell that story had brought us together, but those moments were over and we both found nothing to keep the same laughing and happy conversation to stay.

The silence was uncomfortable and I could tell he was very nervous as I stood there in front of him.

"How's your mother doing?" I heard him ask me, and the thought of just talking about my mother was just as bad as not talking at all.

"Good, married a doctor with a good job, had some "real" kids, and now she works as a third grade teacher." I hated to refer to my stepsiblings as her "real" children, but they are, the children she wanted, the ones she treats as her own flesh and blood.

"A doctor thought she was more of a computer geek type."

"Guess not, she married some guy she knew from high school, Kevin Powers." I saw a little jealousy flash through his face as I said Powers.

"She married Kevin Powers, the math teacher's son." the second I heard him say 'the math teacher's son' I knew just how "Grandma" had helped mom get a good teaching job.

We were both laughing again, I liked it when we were laughing, everything felt ok and there wasn't a strange silence between us. But as are laughter fades the strange silence comes back.

I finally take the time to look at him; he has thick, brown hair, and green eyes, both I had gotten from him. He looked strong, like he worked out a lot, he was tall, at least 6'2'', that had been passed down to me to, my mom was only 5'6" and I was 5'7" so I had guessed he would be tall.

I look around his house, most of its pretty open the living room off to my left, the kitchen extending off of the living room, and the dinning room connected to the kitchen diagonal to the living room. There was a hallway between the living room and kitchen leading to what looked like the bedrooms.

"Are you hungry?" I hear him ask as finish my look around him home.

"Not really, I ate at, well at two," I answered his question, I didn't want him to have to fix me something, but I was really hungry.

"I'll take that as a yes." he said as he walked into the kitchen. I didn't really know what to do next, so I just followed him into the kitchen, sitting on a stool by the counter.

He opened his refrigerator, "Well, I have...um...cheese...um..." he kneeled down and started to dig through the take-out boxes filling the inside of the refrigerator. I hear him mumble, "What is that", and I'm slowly losing my appetite. He stands back up and opens the freezer door, "Here we go, pizza, everybody loves pizza." he said as he held up a frozen pizza box.

"Pizza! I love pizza," I say as he shows me the box, and after the outburst I want to suck all my words back up and make it sound more behaved.

"Either they don't feed you or you really like pizza," he says as he puts it on a cookie sheet and puts it the oven.

"Well," I try to sound behaved this time, "Mom is on this whole eat healthy with no meat thing, so I haven't eaten meat or pizza in about three months."

"Healthy eating, sounds like Kate." When he says that I get really curious about who Kate is.

"Who's Kate?"

"Oh, I work with her. She's really into healthy food and eating good."

"So, what do you do for a living?" I ask him; curious to know if he's with one of the agencies the cab driver had talked about.

"NCIS, its Naval..." I stopped him in the middle of his sentence.

"...Criminal Investigative Service," I could tell it was different for someone to know what NCIS stood for.

"How'd you know that?" he asked me as he pulled up a stool on the other side of the counter.

"Cab driver told me, he said a lot of FBI, CIA and stuff live down in this area, when he mentioned NCIS I asked him what it stood for." I answered.

"Smart cab driver, most people don't have any idea what NCIS is or what we do."

"Navy cops that investigate murders." I say, remembering what the cab driver had said.

"More cab info?"

"Yeah, so do you just go around finding dead bodies and finding who killed them?"

"Close enough, but we just do Navy personnel murders."

"So Kate goes and helps you find murders?"

"Yep, her and Gibbs, my boss, and McGee, the newbie. Then we have Abby in the lab running finger prints and blood samples, and then Ducky does autopsy."

I tried to remember all their names, Kate, Gibbs, McGee, Abby, and Ducky. "Are you working on any cases right now?"

"No, if we were Gibbs would make us work all night until we found the murder."

"Tough boss?"

"Ha, he's worse than tough, try hard as a rock."

As he finished his sentence, the buzzer for the oven started to ring. He stood up and took the pizza from the oven, setting it down on the counter in front of me. He cut the pizza and took out some plates and drinks.

"Looks good," I say as he sets the plates on the counter.

"Hope it is, I haven't eaten since lunch either." he says as he cuts the pizza into eight slices.

I take a large slice and put it on my plate, smelling the hot meat and cheese "It sure does smells good."

"It does." he says as he also takes a large slice of the pizza.

I take a bite of the pizza; despite the hot that burned my tongue it tasted better than anything I had ever had. "It tastes just as good as it smells."

Talking was at a minimal as we ate, I was hungry and could tell he was to. The only things that really came up in are light conversation was if I was good in school or if I was into any sports. As we did occasionally talk it was a nice feeling, not pressured or uncomfortable, just questions asked back and forth to get to know each other better.

As we finished off the last of the pizza I couldn't help but yawn. The time had gone by fast, when we had started talking it was only around ten, but now it was after twelve and I was getting more and more sleepy as it grew later and later.

"You look sleepy, I guess we should get to bed soon." he said as he saw me yawn again.

"Really," I yawned again, "I'm not that sleep at all," yeah that was a lie, but I really didn't want the nice feeling I had around him to disappear.

"Yeah, you don't look at all tired." he said sarcastically. "Now really, you need to get some sleep. I have work for two more days till I get off for Christmas, and I'm going to have to take you with me."

"You can leave me here by myself," I say as I hop off of the stool and walk over to the door to get my bag.

"Yeah, I could leave you here, but I don't know what I'd come home to. I really don't know what you would do if I wasn't here to stop you from burning down the house, I can hear it now 'Were really sorry Mr. DiNozzo, but your house was burned down today.'"

"Guess I'll get to meet all the people you work with then?" I ask, the slightest hint of mischief in my voice.

"No jokes, unless it's Kate. No freaking anyone out, unless it's McGee. And don't touch Gibbs' coffee."

"So," I say as I follow him to the guest bedroom, "Lots of jokes, freak people out, and spill Gibbs' coffee."

"Right." he says as he opens the door to the room and flips the light on.

"Nice room," I say as I walk in and set my bag down on the floor.

"Your grandmother did it, she has this thing about decorating my house."

"Really, it's really nice." I say, sitting down on the bed and bouncing on it a few times.

"I guess I'll see you in the morning then." he says from the door.

"Yeah, I guess so," I say as I take my pajamas out of my bag.

"Well, good night."

"Good night," I say as he leaves the room and shuts the door.

It only takes me a minute to change, and before long I'm in the bed realizing how tired I am.

I lay there for a minute, just thinking about the day. It had been long, but one of the best of my life. For the first time in my life I had felt at home.

For the first time I wasn't a mistake, I was a daughter, I was his daughter.

For the first time in my entire life I was loved.

A/N: Please review, pretty pretty please!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!