Chapter eight
Gibbs started his day with his usual coffee and then decided to have breakfast at the diner again. He secretly hoped he would see Tony again and hoped the other man was there today too.
Of course, he was not. Jethro asked Elaine if she had seen him or if she knew if he would be back again. She looked at him knowingly but denied any knowledge about the whereabouts of Tony.
Just as Jethro wanted to leave, he saw a friend of his, Tobias Fornell, walking through the door. Fornell looked around, spotted him and walked up to him.
"Jethro, I just come from your house and when you weren't there, I thought I would find you here.", he greeted him.
Gibbs grunted and silently wondered, what the hell Tobias wanted from him on the one weekend that he was not on call.
Fornell joined him at the table and when Elaine asked him, if he wanted anything to eat or drink, he ordered a coffee and waffles. Jethro seeing that this would take a while, ordered a coffee as well. When the food came, Tobias put sugar in his coffee and then proceeded to put sirup on his waffles. All Jethro could do was shake his head. He truly wondered how anyone could eat or drink anything with that amount of sugar in it.
When Fornell was halfway through with his breakfast and hadn't told Gibbs what he wanted, Jethro was prepared for almost anything, from something about the job to complains about Diane. They didn't do it that much but occasionally they got together and bitched about her. Actually, it was more that Tobias complained that she was so difficult, and Jethro listened because he could relate, he had lived with the woman for two years after all. They hadn't gotten together in a while to do this, and Jethro wondered if that was what Fornell wanted from him today. On the other hand, he would have started to complain already. When he didn't want to wait anymore, he raised an eyebrow at Tobias and silently waited. That worked on almost everyone and almost every time.
And it worked this time too. Fornell sighed and then took one more sip of his coffee.
"I need your help", he said, "we had a case a few weeks back and well we had evidence we had to test, and we had to destroy some things to really check it out. Turns out our suspect was innocent and is now threatening to sue us if we can't undo the damage. I was hoping you could help with that?", Fornell said with a slightly desperate undertone, but Gibbs could hear how much it pained the other man to ask him for help. Their relationship was a strange one. They were friends but also rivals and neither one liked to ask the other one for a favor.
Gibbs cocked his head, "And you have no one at the Bureau who can help you, what the hell did you destroy, his golden watch?", he asked in disbelief.
"Ah, well, no, it's something bigger. It's his boat. Well, it's more of a yacht.", Fornell admitted.
"What the fuck, Tobias. Do you think just because I build boats in my basement that I can build and repair any kind of boat. You should go find someone else to do that!", Gibbs exclaimed and got ready to leave.
"No, Gibbs, wait. It's not his yacht that needs repairment, it's the cabinet in the yacht. The cabinet made out of wood; we had to take it apart because we thought there was a bullet embedded somewhere in there."
"And you have no one else to do that? Seriously?", Jethro wasn't convinced.
"Please don't make me say it, Jethro.", Fornell begged. When Gibbs didn't say anything, he sighed. "You are the best, okay. I thought you could help because you build stuff with wood in your free time, and you do an amazing job, and you will probably not mess it up and the guy then won't sue us. There I said it. Are you happy now?", Fornell asked.
Gibbs thought about it and in the end agreed because he honestly had nothing better to do and would have worked on the boat anyway. He didn't tell Fornell though but instead said, "You owe me for this, Tobias, big time!"
"Yes, I know, Jethro. I wouldn't have asked you if it wasn't important.", Fornell grumbled.
Gibbs chuckled and then told Fornell to eat up so they could go see what kind of damage the Bureau managed to do to the guy's cabinet.
When they arrived at the marina, they noticed that people were setting up cameras and lights everywhere and Jethro wondered what the hell was going on and where Fornell had brought him. By the looks of it was Fornell wondering the same thing.
"I don't know Jethro, looks like a photo shooting." Gibbs just nodded and waited for Tobias to show him where the yacht was.
Just their luck that there would be a photo shooting near the yacht. Jethro was not looking forward to that, he had had a few crime scenes at some of these and the people were generally loud and way too full of themselves. Gibbs groaned and debated with himself if he could still back out of this. He decided it wasn't worth the effort to argue with Tobias on it.
They went inside into the cabin and Jethro just stared at the mess that was greeting him. "What the fuck, Tobias? Did you have to take it completely apart, no wonder that guy is suing you. If you suspected there to be a bullet somewhere, couldn't you have thought about where it would most likely be instead of taking it completely apart?"
"I know, it wasn't me. The lab techs thought it necessary, and we didn't know it was that valuable to the guy. Besides we thought he was guilty.", Fornell argued. Jethro shook his head again, it seemed to him like he was doing that a lot today.
"Do you at least have a photo from its original state?", Gibbs asked, "Because if not, I'm not sure if I can help you."
"Yes, of course, we are not stupid, you know.", Fornell said slightly irritated.
"Yeah, yeah, just show it to me." Jethro took a look at the photo and realized this job might not be as difficult as it had appeared to be on the first look.
"What do you say, can you do it?", Fornell wanted to know, and Gibbs could detect the desperate tone from earlier.
"Yes, I can, I just need some things from home."
"How long will it take?", Fornell wanted to know as he followed Gibbs up the stairs.
"I might get it done this weekend, if not I really can't say. Why do you have a deadline, Tobias?", Jethro answered and smirked at his friend. He could see that Tobias wanted him to finish it as quickly as possible and wanted to see him sweat a bit.
"Oh, now you are just teasing me, right? You'll get it done this weekend, right, Gibbs? Right?"
"Yes, Tobias, I'll get it done this weekend, maybe even today!", Jethro decided to put him out of his misery.
"Oh, thank god, because I really like my job and the director threatened me with it if I don't fix this mess."
After a long pause with neither of them saying anything, Fornell asked if he could help, and Jethro decided why the hell not and told him to just follow his directions. He had decided to be a better friend after all, and the job would be finished faster with two people working on it.
They drove back to Gibbs' house and collected the items Gibbs thought they might need and then drove back to the marina.
When they arrived back there, the people where still setting up the cameras and lights. Just as there were about to go into the cabin again, Gibbs noticed a young man standing slightly off from the photoshooting-set and when he looked more closely, he realized that it was Tony. Gibbs stopped and stared and Fornell wondered what the hell had gotten into his friend.
As Gibbs watched he noticed another man going up to Tony and speaking to him. And even though he couldn't hear what was being said, he saw the looks the guy was giving Tony and he didn't like it. Tony was his, damn it. The second Jethro had that thought, he pushed it as far back as he could. What was wrong with him, he didn't even know the guy and it wasn't his place to feel this way, let alone think about Tony as his.
He turned away angry with himself for thinking and feeling this way about a stranger and rushed past Fornell to go inside.
Fornell wondered about his friend's strange behavior, but shrugged it off, he was used to Gibbs' mood swings after all and went after him. He would get it out of him, when Jethro was ready.
They worked in near silence with the occasionally order from Gibbs and when Fornell's stomach grumbled at lunch time it was clear that the mess that had been here before had indeed been a cabinet.
They went upstairs again to have something for lunch and Gibbs looked over to the other yacht. And immediately wished he hadn't. Tony stood there, wearing nothing but swimming trunks, the water dripping down his body. Jethro swallowed hard and couldn't stop the slight growl from escaping and willed his reaction to that sight down, it just wouldn't do for Fornell to figure out why he had been so moody earlier that day.
Fornell for his part, watched his friend watching the guys on the other yacht and had to stop a laugh when he heard the slight growl and noticed the way Gibbs was staring at the guy in the swimming trunks. Oh, his friends had it bad, he only wondered where Gibbs had met a model.
They came back from lunch and Jethro decided it was best not to look over there again. He went straight down and started to work on the cabinet again. He hadn't been able to really concentrate on his conversation with Fornell during lunch and he found it difficult even now. Fornell had asked him if he knew that guy on the yacht, but he hadn't answered, he wasn't ready yet. Normally the work with wood helped him calm his nerves but today it just wouldn't work.
He was very glad that they managed to finish the job today and the cabinet looked like it had before the FBI had destroyed it. When they went upstairs, he saw the contemplating look his friend was giving him and groaned and looked at his friend. He clearly knew something was up. Fornell laughed at him. "You have it bad, Jethro, where did you meet that pretty boy?"
'Oh, Fornell had figured it out. Great, but well, I might as well tell him now', Gibbs thought to himself.
"I didn't actually meet him, Tobias. Just saw him yesterday at the diner. He was out for a run in that rain and came in soaking wet."
"Oh, you've got it bad.", Tobias chuckled, "I've never seen you like this with any of your ex-wives, but yet here you are all possessive about a guy you haven't even talked to, really Jethro?"
"I know, believe me I know, but something about him, Tobias, I don't know, but something about him makes me think he is special.", Jethro told him and then groaned realizing how terrible that sounded.
Fornell laughed all the way back to Gibbs' house and then told him, that if it were meant to be they would meet again, and Gibbs could go from there!
Jethro silently agreed and when Fornell left after they had pizza for dinner he relaxed on the couch and proceeded to read a book. He realized he had actually enjoyed spending the day with his friend, even if he had been moody and not 100% there with his mind. Maybe he really should get out of his basement more often.
Secretly, he hoped this neighbor would start playing the piano again and that maybe it would help him sort out these confusing feelings he had for a stranger.
Sadly, his neighbor either wasn't home this evening or he didn't want to play today because Gibbs couldn't hear the piano.
He realized how much he had depended on the playing, how much it helped to calm him, even if it had been only two days. He really wanted to hear his neighbor playing again and then thought that he could maybe request a piece to be played if the man was up for that. With that idea Jethro got up from the sofa, wrote a short note and then left it taped to his neighbor's front door.
Satisfied with that he went inside again and then to bed, all the time thinking about how good Tony had looked with water droplets running down his body and why that got such a strong reaction from his body.