Part 5

Sara spent her next few days pacing her hotel room at the Adams House and waiting for the phone to ring.

She snatched her phone up off the bed when it did finally ring. But, it was not the person she was expecting on the other end. She didn't recognize the voice.

"Ms. Ellis."

"This is she."

"Ma'am, there's…." The young man was upset and having trouble telling her what she needed to know.

Suddenly the recognized the voice. "Is this Agent McGee?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"You can call me Sara, Agent McGee." She said, something in her told her that this was not good.

"We, we found your paintings, Ma'am." They are all in good shape. Everything is at NCIS in our evidence garage." Tim paused. "But…."

"What is it, Agent McGee?" Sara asked, sure she didn't want to hear the answer.

"We raided the warehouse. Four of the soldiers died, two are in critical condition." Tim paused. "Gibbs was hit in the leg. Tony was…."

Sara sucked in a breath of air as she waited for the horrible news.

"Tony was shot in the chest. He's…he's stable. But, he's unconscious."

"Where?" Sara asked as she started to prepare to leave.

"What?" Tim asked.

"Where's he located? Which hospital?" Sara asked as she slung her bag over her shoulder and headed out the door.

"Bethesda, Ms…Sara." Tim replied. "I don't know anything beyond that."

Sara hurried down the stairs and hailed a cab. She gave the driver her destination, and sit back in the seat. She searched her purse for tissues as she felt a wave of emotion hit her. She really liked Tony. His condition worried her. Gibbs condition didn't sound that bad. But, anytime you hear someone is shot in the chest, it causes concern.

Sara debated going ahead and calling Neal. But, she didn't know anything about Tony's condition. And, it would be agony for Neal to be worrying and not knowing.

Sara arrived at the hospital. She paid her fare and hurried in the doors. She found the waiting room for the O.R. She had been told that both Gibbs and Tony had required immediate surgery. She entered the room, spotted Tim and Elle and took the seat beside them.

Tim was unable to tell her much else, between answering calls and answering questions from the nurses about both Gibbs and DiNozzo. He had no time for a decent conversation with Sara. And Agent Bishop just sat. She seemed stunned.

Ellie had never been in the position of seeing two of her team members shot before. She was alternately blaming herself for not having done enough and crying when she looked down at her clothing and realizing, yet again, she was covered in Tony's blood. Bishop had tried to apply pressure to stop the bleeding. But, Tony had bled out a lot, in a very short time.

Gibbs was in and out of surgery in a few hours. He was soon in a wheelchair riding the halls looking for Tony's room. Tony survived surgery. But, he was weak, and he would need lots of recovery time. He was rolled into the ICU unit about 4 hours after his arrival to Bethesda.

"Agent Gibbs." Karen Walker, RN said, stopping Gibbs as he tried to enter the room.

"I am his legal…." Gibbs started.

Karen nodded. "Trust me…I know that. The whole hospital knows that!" She stated. "But, you need to give us time to get Agent DiNozzo settled."

Karen shook her head. She had been putting up with the irate agent for the past hour and a half, ever since he had managed to get his hands on a set of crutches then find himself a wheel chair. He had then propped his leg up and gone on the prowl, looking for Tony.

Karen had warned him he needed to stay in bed, to rest his leg. She had asked the doctor for an order to sedate the agent. But, it was not a medical necessity, so the doctor could not write it. The offer of some good coffee and allowing him to visit his agent ASAP seemed to appease the man. She hoped that nothing else would come up to keep Gibbs out of his agent's room.

"Agent Gibbs!" Sara said as she watched Gibbs wheel himself into the waiting room. Coffee cup tucked between his legs.

"Have you seen Tony yet?" Gibbs asked, looking irritated as usual.

"Shouldn't you be in bed?" Sara asked, surprised he was allowed to be up.

Gibbs shot her his famous glare in leu of an answer.

Sara looked at him for just a second. She got it now.

"I don't know anything. Tim's been on his phone or with the nurses. And Ellie…she's…."

Gibbs looked over to Bishop, sitting in the corner. She seemed to be crying. The lead agent's attitude changed completely. He rolled himself over to her.

"Bishop!" Gibbs said loudly, but not demanding.

Ellie looked up at him. There were tears in her eyes.

Gibbs then saw the dried blood on her shirt. "You okay?"

Ellie nodded and sniffed. "...it's Tony's."

The lead agent looked at her for a moment. "He's gonna be okay."

Bishop shook her head. "If I had…."

Gibbs took one of her hands in his. The action made her look up at him. "You did everything right."

Bishop shook her head as more tears flowed down her cheeks. "Tony would not be in there. You would not have gotten shot, if I had done everything right!" She insisted.

Gibbs looked up at Sara. She took it as her cue to come and sit with Bishop. Gibbs then filled his coffee cup from the pot in the waiting room and headed out of the room. Sara had no idea where.

Sara had no idea what to say to the young women. She put her arm around Ellie's shoulders and just started talking. She told Ellie about the first time she had met Tony. It had been at in the White Collar offices and by the end, she had put a smile on the young agent's face.

"He tells everybody that, Ellie. And I think it's true. Tony will make it through this. He does have nine lives. And, Agent Gibbs is just too stubborn to let anything get him down."

Ellie nodded. "Thank you. I am not really going to see better until I get to see Tony. But…."

Bishop was cut short as Abby entered room shuffling along on her platform boots. "Ellie! Ellie! How is…?" Then she stopped short. She had not met Sara.

Sara was not sure what to think of Abby. Abby was still wearing her lab coat and her hair was still in pony tails. She had on a spiked dog collar, a 'Hello Kitty' t-shirt and a black miniskirt.

Sara extended her hand. "Sara Ellis, insurance investigator, from New York City."

Abby looked at her. Of course, the red hair made her thing that she was connected to Gibbs in some way. But, she was pretty sure Gibbs wouldn't have girlfriends in New York.

Abby extended her hand also, and they shook. "Abby Scuito, Forensic Scientist for NCIS. Nice to meet you."

Sara smiled. "I'm a friend of Neal Caffrey. I'm in town to recover several priceless works of art."

Abby nodded. "I remember Sinatra. Beautiful blue eyes. And you came to the right place. Team Gibbs can solve anything."

Sara love her enthusiasm for the team.

The scientist continued to look around. Apparently, she and Gibbs had not ran into each other in the halls.

"What do you know?" Sara asked.

"Not much. I just heard…." Abby then noticed Ellie. She went over to the woman and sat down. "Ellie!" She said as she noticed the blood.

Ellie shook her head. "It's not mine."

Sara watched the two women comfort one another as Ellie told Abby what had happened, in brief summary. But, she didn't know what to make of the scene before her when Gibbs re-entered the room and Abby saw him. She ran to him. Well, what might be classified as running in the large clunky boots that he had on. It was really more of a fast shuffle. Abby tried to hug Gibbs. But, when she bent down the bag she had on her shoulder slid off and hit Gibb's injured knee. He let out something akin to a howl and grasped for his knee. Abby straightened up quickly and backed away. She stared wide eyed and it looked at if she was about to cry as she stared at Gibbs.

Gibbs groaned for a few moments longer, wishing he had not refused him pain meds. He leaned back in the chair as the pain subsided.

"Gibbs! Gibbs! I'm…I didn't mean…!"

Gibbs took her hand to calm her down. "I know. I know. What do you have in that bag?"

"Oh, yeah. I stopped by Tony's place and got a few things for when…" She paused. "Is he going to be okay, Gibbs?"

"He made it through surgery. They took the bullet out. And…."

"Tim just told me to get to the hospital to sit with Ellie. He didn't…." She shook her head as if to stop the flow of tears. She was not going to cry. She had been to the hospital too many times like this. She should be able to keep herself together. But. She couldn't. She could feel the cracks forming and the emotion leaking through.

"Abby!" Gibbs took her hand. "Tony is gong to be okay. This is Tony we're talking about here."

Abby nodded and wiped her eyes.

Gibbs looked around, then looked at his phone. "Where is McGee?" He knew the procedure the young agent would have to go through when shots are fired on the job. There were many hoops to jump through with body handling, paperwork, and justification to higher officials. He was not worried about McGee being able to handle it. It just seemed as if the process was taking forever. He had some questions for McGee also?

Gibb sighed and then rolled himself over to Ellie and Sara who were sitting in the corner. Abby joined them and sat down on the other side of Ellie.

Gibbs took Ellie's hand. "You're gonna go in with me as soon as…."

Ellie tried to remove her hand from his as she shook her head.

Gibbs opened his mouth to speak, but Abby beat him to it.

"Tony is not going to be upset with you."

"You don't know that." Elllie replied.

Abby smiled at that. "You don't know Tony."

The female agent shook her head again. "It's my fault." She looked at Abby for a moment, confused by her expression. "What does that mean?"

"Agent Gibbs." The nurse said as she stepped into the waiting room. "You can see him now." She said as he got closer. "Agent DiNozzo is in room 205. He is still unconscious. Limit your visit to 15 minutes. And, only two at a time." She paused. "And, you will go back to bed after this."

"We'll see." Gibbs said as Ellie joined him in the doorway.

The nurse just groaned and shook her head as she walked away.

"I get the feeling Gibbs leaves a lot of women feeling that way." Sara said after the watched the interaction play out.

"Yep, that's our silver-haired fox." Abby replied.

Sara liked the nickname. She smiled, then chuckled. "Does he know you call him that?"

Abby nodded. "He does. He didn't like it at first. Now he just thinks it's cute." She then linked her arm with Sara's. "We're next."

"This should be interesting." Sara muttered.

TBC