A lot happened in the last chapter so bear with me on the synopsis. Hopefully it's a good enough summary to job everyone's memory.

Synopsis of last chapter: Deeks was doing surveillance on Roberts when he was abducted from his car, leaving it abandoned outside a motel. He wakes up to Lucas Roberts who proceeds to make a call commanding his men to kidnap Alex. Alex and Callen are worrying about the missing Deeks from the cabin when two men burst inside. Alex manages to outsmart her attacker and fire Callen's gun at the second man, just in time to save Callen's life. As Alex falls into a panic-induced unconsciousness, Callen packs them into the attackers' vehicle and abandons the cabin.

Nell is unable to crack the code for the locked safe that was found in Deeks' apartment. Sam and Kensi can't find a link between Deeks' stored case files and the subpoena found in his mail. But the three manage to number the list of suspects down to one name, Solomon Armad, Deeks' former informant who Deeks later arrested. The details of the case are redacted.

Eric got a hit on Deeks' abandoned car and finds security cam footage capturing his abduction. Sam and Kensi are off to investigate the scene.

Alex's head was being split in half. The second she was conscious, all she could think of was the searing pain behind her eyes. Alex pried her eyes open, lids heavy and sore. Her pupils were met with blinding light. She scrunched up her face with a hiss, throwing her forearm over her eyes.

Alex's pain must've been louder than she realized because it wasn't long before a voice sliced through her thoughts.

"You can pull the screen down if the sun's bothering you."

"Marty," She mumbled.

"Not Marty," He responded.

Alex's eyes flashed open, disregarding the throbbing in her head the sunlight exacerbated. She glanced up front, eyes meeting with Callen's in the rear view mirror. Suddenly everything came back in a rush. The knock on the door, the oil, the knife, the gun.

Alex sat up, forcing herself upright and avoiding Callen's eyes. "Did I kill him?" She asked.

"Doesn't matter," He responded.

"So that's a yes then," She said.

"I didn't say yes, I said that it doesn't matter."

The vehicle stopped at a red light, and for the first time, Alex took in her surroundings. They were no longer on a dirt road in the forest. There was life on the streets, paved roads, buildings, palm trees in the street median.

"Are we back in the city?" Alex asked as the vehicle started moving again.

"We're in a city."

Alex sent him a sideways glance, squinting slightly when the throbbing returned in full force. "What does that mean?"

"We're in San Diego, not LA."

Her eyes bugged out, grabbing the passenger seat in front of her and scooting forward to look Callen in the face.

"What the hell are we doing in San Diego? Marty's waiting for us in LA. What-what if he's looking and he can't find us?"

"Alex," Callen began with a sigh. "Your brother can take care of himself. That's his job. Right now, my job is to take care of you."

"Yeah well, I-I killed a man this morning and now I'm in San Diego. So you're not doing your job very well!" Her voice wobbled and squeaked as tears began to prick at her eyes.

Callen didn't say anything, he just kept driving. It just made Alex more upset. Marty would know what to say. He always knew what to say. Marty would've never let this happen. What would he say? What would he think if he knew she had killed someone? He'd be horrified. He's be disgusted. He'd be sick to his stomach. All this time he refused to believe she had killed Laurel and Jackson, but little did he know she was more than capable of taking a life. She had fired the gun without hesitation. She just grabbed it, aimed, and fired. Not a thought of if that man would be okay, if she should aim for a leg or an arm. No, she had aimed right for his side and caught his neck. Even in her panicked haze, she was able to hear his agonized scream.

Before she could stop them, the tears were falling. She turned to the window and pulled up her hoodie. This was ridiculous. Marty was the one in trouble, that man was the one who died, Callen was the one who she just yelled at. And yet here she was, crying. It was selfish. But she couldn't quite get the tears to stop. So she just sat quietly, staring out the window, and letting the tears run down her face.

"NCIS agents Sam Hanna and Kensi Blye, we'd like to take a look before it's impounded," Sam flashed his badge at the officer as they approached the scene.

Nell and Eric were busy finding everything they could on Deeks' former informant, Solomon Armad. They finally felt like they were getting somewhere, like they were on the verge of something big. With something to go on, Kensi and Sam could finally start doing some real work. Like checking out Deeks' abandoned car.

There were a couple officers milling around, no doubt waiting for the agents who had just arrived.

The officer nodded. "Of course. I'm Officer Blake. I was told you guys would be heading over. Lemme know if you need anything. We'll get it towed as soon as you guys are done."

The agents nodded as he walked away.

"What are we even looking for?" Kensi sighed.

"Anything that we can use to find them," Sam responded.

Kensi slipped into the backseat as Sam sifted through the glove compartment up front. The seat was clean. Too clean. Even for Deeks.

Kensi shook her head. "Deeks is neat, but not like this. He practically lives in his car sometimes. He always has a go-bag, food, anything..."

"The guys who grabbed him could've doubled back, cleaned everything out," Sam suggested.

Kensi shook her head. "They wouldn't chance it. Besides, Eric would've picked it up on traffic cams."

"I really feel like we're missing something important here." Sam sighed. "All that's in here is his car registration. No back up ID, no weapons, nothing. Deeks wouldn't come out here to do surveillance without some sort of backup identity."

"What if whoever he was surveilling already knew who he was?"

"Nah, Callen wouldn't let that happen. He wouldn't let Deeks come out here without backup to do surveillance on someone that could ID him."

He slammed the glovebox shut and a hallow thump echoed from inside. He met Kensi's questioning eyes in the rear view mirror.

"I thought you said it was just car registration," Kensi said, leaning forward.

"That's all I saw." Sam opened the box again, shuffling through. "There's nothing here."

Sam took the papers out, resting them on the car seat as he felt around the box. His fingers pressed down on the back of the compartment, feeling as the faux wall gave way. "It's got a fake back. You got a knife?"

Kensi nodded, pulling a knife from her waistband and handing it over.

Sam flicked it open, placing the blade at the bottom of the fake wall and pulling it out. A cellphone tumbled out.

"That's Deeks' phone." Kensi gasped.

"Smart boy." Sam grabbed it and handed it to Kensi, replacing the wall and compartment contents. "Deeks hid it for a reason. There must be something valuable on that thing. Keep it until we can get it to Eric and Nell."

Kensi nodded in agreement. Deeks was giving them something. A part of her warmed at the idea that Deeks may have left this for them to find. She felt a shiver run up her back when she thought of what that meant. Deeks didn't ask for help when it came to things like this, that's what got them into this problem to begin with. The fact that he'd leave something as crucial as his phone behind for them to find meant he was in serious trouble. Serious enough that he knew he'd need their help.

"You try the GPS?" She asked, forcing herself not to think too much about the possibilities.

Sam clicked the screen in the center on, watching as a log in screen appeared. "It's password protected."

"I got it," Kensi responded, sliding out of the backseat. "You should check the trunk just in case."

Sam popped the trunk before sliding out of the driver's seat so Kensi could take his place.

She quickly typed in Deeks' password, the date he graduated law school.

Location history

"Here we go," She mumbled to herself. "Where have you been, Deeks?"

0 locations to view

"What?" Kensi said to herself. She tried again.

Refresh

0 locations to view

"How is this even possible?"

Before she could question it further, the car shook as the trunk slammed shut. Kensi sent a questioning glance at Sam through the rear view mirror as he stood stock still, hand resting atop the trunk. It was several moments before he moved, and when he did, Kensi could clearly see the nausea on his face. He walked towards Officer Blake, exchanging a few words before he handed Sam a ring of keys. Sam came back, got into the passenger seat and closed the door lightly.

"What was that about?" Kensi asked.

"We're taking the car back to OPS," He responded.

"I thought LAPD was gonna impound it."

"Not anymore. They're releasing it into our custody until we close the case. Let's go, Kens."

"Sam, we can't just drive away like this. We don't know if there's anything wrong with this vehicle. It hasn't even been processed, not to mention my car is still here."

"Kensi! We'll send someone for your car, but right now we need to go." He stared directly into her eyes, but she made no move to start the ignition.

"What was in the trunk, Sam?" She asked quietly.

"Kensi, let's go."

"No, not until you tell me what's going on."

Sam sighed. "There's a body back there, Kensi. White male wrapped in a garbage bag, looks like he was stabbed. It can't be more than a day old."

"How...?" Kensi could hardly believe what she was hearing. How was Sam so calm? There was a dead body sitting in the trunk of the car...the trunk of Deeks' car.

"I don't know." He shook his head. "But we need to go before LAPD finds out. The second they see that body, Deeks is gonna be the prime suspect in a murder investigation. There's no telling how LAPD'll bring him in."

"Deeks wouldn't do this...not without a reason. He-he wouldn't kill a man and stuff the body in his trunk. Someone's setting him up. The same person who cleaned out the car and wiped the GPS history." Kensi could feel herself heating up. This was insane. If they didn't think so before, this was confirmation. Someone was after Deeks. And whoever it was knew NCIS was looking for him too.

"I know, Kensi. That's why we need to go. We don't have time to play character witness to the LAPD. We need to find Deeks, safe and alive. Which means we need to get out of here."

Kensi nodded, feeling her heart pick up pace. This was bigger than they thought, bigger than them. Bigger than high school drama, bigger than family relationships, and secret sisters.

She started the car, fixing her eyes on the road ahead.

Kensi came to a stop in the parking garage across from OPS. They parked in the very top floor, which was usually vacant. Both she and Sam agreed it was best to take keep this close to the vest for now. What they were doing was a crime. They were concealing a murder. Hiding a body...to protect Deeks.

Kensi sighed at the thought. "What do we do now? We just stole an abandoned car with a dead body in it."

"We have to ID the body, but we'll need Eric and Nell," Sam said.

"And then they'll be complicit if we get caught." Kensi nodded in understanding.

"We won't get caught."

"They still deserve a choice in this. If they don't wanna get involved, then we'll handle it ourselves," Kensi said. "But I'm getting really tired of keeping secrets from each other."

With that, Kensi pushed herself out of the car and slammed the door. It was too much. It was too difficult. Too difficult to hide her anger and hurt at Deeks' actions while trying to make sure he was safe. It was too difficult to pretend she was fine with all of this. She knew Deeks would do the same for her, she was sure of it. But it wasn't fair. It just wasn't. It wasn't fair that Deeks had dropped this bomb of a secret before packing up and taking off before he could explain. Now she was here with broken trust, just praying that they could repair it when he returned. It wasn't fair.

And it made her feel selfish. Because she wasn't the only one who pulled a short stick. There was a teenage girl out there who deserved to be getting ice cream, going to movies, playing video games...instead she was on the run from a murderer.

"Kens," Sam pulled her from her thoughts. "I know your emotions are complicated right now, mine are too. But we have to push them aside and do what's best for our partners and for that girl. We gotta give them a chance to explain."

Kensi nodded. "You're right, let's get to OPS."

The two agents walked into the building, minds completely focused on a new mission. Sam grabbed Kensi's elbow, stopping her.

"Copy room, 10 minutes. Get Eric and Nell."

Kensi nodded, splitting off towards the stairs as Sam went to the bullpen.

He sat in his chair, leaning back with a heavy sigh. It felt like the first time he was able to breathe in days. Ever since he and Callen stepped foot into that high school, he knew something was wrong. There was just a feeling. And like always, his gut was right.

He glanced over at Callen's desk. It almost made him want to laugh, the thought of Callen trying to corral a teenage girl.

Teenage girl.

Alex was a teenage girl.

There was one thing a teenage girl always had with her. Maybe Deeks and Callen had made her toss it, but there was a chance. A small one, but still a chance that it could give them something.

Just as the thought hit him, he saw Eric, Nell, and Kensi descending the stairs. Kensi sent him a glance as they entered the copy room. He waited a few minutes before following suit. This was shaping out to be a long day.

"What do you mean they escaped?" Roberts hissed.

Deeks' breath stopped at the words. They escaped. Who was they? It had to be Alex and Callen. Deeks prayed that it was true. That Alex and Callen had gotten away. That Roberts' men hadn't been able to get to them. He prayed that they were unharmed, that they would disappear, that they'd never be found again. If Alex was safe, he could finally deal with Roberts the way he wanted to. He needed to know she was safe before he made a move.

"So help me if you get back here and that girl isn't with you, I'll skin you alive." Robert spoke so calmly it was unnerving.

He ended the call and stared off into space for a moment before turning to Deeks. His chest heaved up and down rapidly, his eyes raged with fire. He said nothing before storming out of the room with a slam of the door.

Deeks smiled for the first time in what felt like days. They escaped. And if Deeks knew Callen at all, Roberts wasn't gonna get a second chance to capture them.

They were safe. Roberts couldn't get to Alex. Which meant that Deeks was finally free. He had one mission, and he would accomplish it.

He heard Roberts' booming voice yelling at his men outside. If Deeks' estimates were correct, there were at least 7 men in the building.

And only one of them was coming out alive.

Thanks to everyone for sticking with this story. I know I don't post a lot, but my life is just insane. I'm already working on the next chapter, so hopefully I'll get it out before I go back to school in January.

I know this chapter want the best, but it's been a while and I'm a little out of practice so bear with me.

Reviews feed my soul, and I'm hungry