Thanks for being patient with me folks! Getting these out as quickly as the muse will let me. Already a few pages into the next one, but will probably get caught up in some things this week so it will probably be a couple weeks out. However, yay for honeymoon! And I'm having a lot of fun planning the villain(s?) of this tale. I hope you enjoy!
Chapter 5
"I cannot find a single thing to connect our Marine and Piper," Greg said, sitting back and tossing his pen on the desk in frustration. "They have absolutely nothing in common."
"Other than being found dead on a river bank last night," Ned said with a scoff, equally as annoyed as Greg. They'd been looking for a connection for hours. They had put aside their attempts at deciphering Crow to see if they could be led to him by their victims instead of the data. They were getting nowhere.
"Davis was deployed in Iraq, Piper did analysis of communications from Iraq, but that's needle in a haystack kinda territory there. What communications would have something to do with what Davis was working on?" Greg asked, watching Ned's face as it twisted in thought.
"He was on a project at one point for building a clinic in Hawija. Someone planted some IEDs around the work site and he was injured, but by flying debris. Was able to get back to it after only a few days. The rest of his history there will need to be discussed with his CO when he's available tonight."
"Were you able to track down anyone who was deployed with him?" Greg asked. Ned nodded.
"Two guys that I've left voicemails for, neither in the DC area. We're playing the waiting game. What were you able to scrounge up about Piper?"
"Just that he has been specializing in this stuff for thirteen years, so if anyone was going to know what to look for, it was him. He was very detail oriented, obsessed with punctuation, and has written literally hundreds of briefings about potential threats. How many of those were useful and applied, we'll probably never know."
"Well, we know about the clinic. Let's see if we can find anything in here that mentions Hawija or a clinic specifically. We'll start there." Ned started scanning a report, and Greg sighed as he did the same.
After a couple reports each, Greg looked up and over at Ned. "When do you talk to their CO?"
"Not soon enough." He looked up at Greg and tossed another report on the desk. "Ten o'clock. I'm so tired. You wanna go make a food and coffee run? I'll buy if you fly."
"Yes, please!" Greg said, jumping up and stretching.
"Get me the largest, most caffeinated iced coffee possible with vanilla flavoring," Ned said, handing some money to him. "And no onions or peppers. Probably not a good idea with the coffee."
"Smart thinking," Greg said, raising an eyebrow and then turning to get his weapon and badge.
A couple of minutes later and Ned was all alone in the bullpen. McGee had taken Elly and Bishop to Piper's house. Ziva and Sommers weren't back yet, and he not so secretly suspected that Ziva had killed the prick and was late getting back because she was having a hard time hiding the body. The Director was coming in to join him in MTAC later, but for now the bullpen and everything around him was empty and quiet.
He scanned the area, then picked up his cell.
- -Pssst! I need a favor.
He waited for a long couple of minutes, and continued scanning reports for keywords he had in mind about the clinic and Hawija. He was so lost in his scanning now that it was peaceful that he was startled when the phone chimed with a text back.
- Does your fiancé know that you're talking to me?
Ned rolled his eyes.
- - No one does, but that's for sensitivity issues. This case is on another level. Though I wouldn't hesitate to tell Elly if he asked. I have nothing to hide.
- Okay… What's the favor?
- - What do you know about a group out of New York called 'atfal Alnabii?
- Hmmm. They're small potatoes. Really disorganized. They've killed a few people in the name of their cause, or at least they claim that it was them. They brand their victims or something. Why?
- - They killed a Marine and NSA agent last night.
- Well, that sucks.
- - Yeah. I can't find anything to connect the two men killed, but they were found together, tortured and shot point blank.
- Any details you can share?
- - I shouldn't even be sharing that, but the Marine just got home from Iraq and the analyst covered Middle Eastern communications.
-That's like saying the grass and weeds are both in the ground.
- - Exactly. That's why I was reaching out. If you hear anything, please give me a call or text. Was worth a try.
- Do we have to have your boss on the phone with us when I call you?
Ned sighed. He had thought he'd picked up on hostility earlier in their conversation, but wasn't sure. Apparently Andy was still bitter about being "cockblocked", as Bishop has put it.
- -Depends.
-On what?
- - On whether or not you're going to behave.
-Oh, I always behave. That's what you liked about me most.
Ned threw his head back and groaned. He rubbed the back of his neck, and he knew he was turning bright red. He was so glad that he was alone. The memories that flooded his mind were having a rather uplifting effect on him. Though it's not what he wanted now, it was very nice while he had it.
- - I've got someone else behaving for me now, and he plans to do so for the rest of his life.
There was a long moment of silence, and then Ned continued.
- - He and I have been through some shit together. Big shit. He means everything to me. I'm not going to do anything to jeopardize that.
There were a long few minutes of silence, and Ned figured he had finally pushed Andy away for good with that one. The point of contention between them in the past had never been whether or not they were good together. They were fantastic together. Sexually, personalities, and professionally they had everything they wanted in each other. The difference was that in college Ned wanted it to be permanent, and Andy didn't. Andy wanted to be a free agent, in every sense of the word. Ned wasn't willing to share him.
Their last summer together was strictly sexual, and though Ned enjoyed it, he was never really quite okay with it. Andy had changed. He'd gotten casual, kind of cocky, and stuck up around friends, but when they were alone he was the Andy that Ned had loved. He'd wanted more of that Andy, and believed that if he was in Andy's life permanently that he'd be the Andy he wanted him to be. So, he asked Andy to make things permanent and official. Andy said no, and they went their separate ways. It was just one more thing that had hurt Ned that summer.
When Andy caught up with him a couple of years later on social media, he'd changed his tune. He'd wanted Ned to come join him at the CIA, and be a real couple. He wanted them to go on joint assignments together and take on the world. Ned turned him down, gently. It wasn't that it didn't sound amazing, because it did. But he didn't trust that it would last. He knew that Andy couldn't do the forever thing, not to mention that if they were on assignments undercover they wouldn't be able to pose as a couple very often and would have a hard time with operations. But he agreed to be friends with him, at least professionally.
He felt a little bad about throwing permanence back in Andy's face, but he was crossing a line with the behaving comment, and he wanted to push him away quickly and efficiently. He sighed as he realized that he probably just burnt the bridge with one of his best contacts.
He knew he was going to have to tell Elly about the conversation, or he'd feel even guiltier. He was willing to feel guilty about hurting Andy, but he wasn't willing to feel guilty about anything to do with Elly, especially not hiding a conversation like this from him.
He was four more reports in when his phone chimed again. He was surprised to see that it was a long rant coming back at him from Andy.
-That's not fair, Ned. That's not fair at all. I offered you forever, and you said no. First you wanted it, then you didn't take it when I offered it up to you on a fucking silver platter! I tried to be with other people after college, and it was impossible because I always compared them to you, and they fell entirely too short. I'd had the real thing, and I'd lost it. I tried to make up for it, tried to offer everything I was, my entire world to you, and you wouldn't take it. You turned your nose up at it. And I've stayed as connected as possible to you this entire time, hoping, praying that one day you'd change your mind and be willing to give us another shot, a shot that I promised myself I wouldn't screw up if it was given. I wanted to tell you that when I saw you, and then your boss was there. It was going to be my last grand attempt. I was going to ask you to run away with me. To leave it all behind. Start over somewhere, a new life, a peaceful life where there's not so much death and destruction. I knew if anyone would understand that this is too much for me, it would be you, and you wouldn't judge me. I can't do it anymore, Ned! I can't keep watching people die around me. I can't keep killing people. I can't deal with this. I crave your gentle heart, and your beautiful mind, and your tender strength, and a life with you that I'll never have. I don't need you throwing it back in my face.
Ned sat there slack-jawed. He blinked a couple of times, but other than that and his erratically beating heart, he didn't move at all for a long few minutes. Finally, he closed his mouth and shook his head slowly.
"What the fuck?" he whispered.
*********WDYG?*********
Ziva and Sommers arrived at the marina and tracked down Davis' boat. It wasn't very big, but it was nice. They searched it and realized that he'd been on the boat pretty recently. There was trash in the can that was smelling up the small cabin. When Ziva looked closer, there were food remnants that she figured were about a week old.
Sommers was complaining about the stench and moving through the tiny cabin lifting up things to see if anything was hidden beneath. When Ziva pointed out what was causing the stench, she could see the lightbulb go off above his head that said that he was understanding something. He looked closer at the trash as well, wrinkling his nose.
"That's rancid," he said as he tried not to gag.
"Putrid," Ziva said, snapping on a glove to confiscate the remains as evidence. "I think it was egg salad."
"Was is the operative word here," Sommers said, grimacing as she pulled it from the black bag in the can and slipped it into a large evidence Ziploc. She sealed it and pulled a marker out of her pocket to label it. "Bunk looks like it was slept in recently. I bet if we searched the parking lot we'd find his car."
"Probably," Ziva said with a nod. "It looks like this could be where he was taken from. Somewhere here on the marina, or even directly off the boat. Why don't you go search for his car outside. I'll take a few prints and see you out there."
Sommers nodded and headed for the lot, glad to be free of the smell, and Ziva was glad to be free of Sommers. She could not understand how he was an agent. He didn't seem to have any ability to follow a chain of evidence. Something smells rotten in the boat. Well, let's see what the rotten smell is because it most likely was important evidence. He simply stopped at the smell. It didn't seem to trigger the next steps, the follow through. She was surprised that he thought about the car being nearby, though she'd already had the thought as soon as she saw the remains of the sandwich, and even considered it a possibility as they drove to the marina.
She took a few prints, and then made her way out of the boat. She found Sommers in the parking lot looking at a Mustang, walking cautiously around it. She joined him, looked at her notebook to see their victim's plate ID, then matched it with the car in front of them.
"Plate matches. We found it. I don't see anything unusual about it though."
"Yeah, it's pristine. Not a scratch on it. Interior is spectacular," he said, looking at her. "It's like everything else with this guy. It's just too good to be true."
"You think it's been detailed to hide evidence?" she asked.
"I don't know," he said with a shrug. "I just think that I'd like to find something to help wrap this up so we can have our weekend back."
Ziva sighed. "Let's have it towed back to the Navy Yard. We shall let Abby give it a look for anything we may not be able to see."
Sommers reached a gloved hand to open the door, but found it locked. "Figures," he said quietly.
Ziva pulled out her phone and handed the printing kit to Sommers. "See if you can get any prints off the door handles before we tow it, just in case. I will call for the tow truck." Sommers surprisingly didn't argue and took the kit. She stood far off and away from the car to make the call, watching Sommers work with precise care as he printed it. She wondered to herself whether or not it was the fact that he was printing, or the fact that it was such a nice car that had earned such gentle detail. She called Abby to warn her that the car was coming.
"You're stuck out there with the jerk?!" Abby exclaimed. "You have my sympathies."
"Yes," Ziva said with a sigh. "It's not my first choice in assignments, but I haven't killed him yet. I am trying really hard to focus on the positives. It is very, very hard. If he would simply shut up it wouldn't be so bad."
"After what he said in the meeting yesterday I wouldn't be surprised if he was mysteriously found floating in a cove somewhere."
"I have considered it, but knowing that Critten is going to put him in his place on Monday is getting me through. Every time he says something else that makes me want to strangle him, I think of him getting a swift blow to the head and a kick to the stomach. It makes me feel better."
Abby laughed, which made Ziva smile. "I plan on being there to watch it go down. He has no idea what's about to happen to him."
"No, he doesn't. Critten and I train together sometimes because he's studied some of the same martial arts that I have, and he doesn't make it easy on me to keep up. We have taught each other some things that I hope he decides to practice on Sommers. It will not happen at all though if we cannot get this case wrapped up."
"Does the marina have security footage we can tap into?" Abby asked, causing Ziva to turn her head up and look around.
"I believe they do," she said as she checked the light poles on the dock for cameras and seeing something that could be one.
"Is there an office there? Maybe someone could give you access to the footage. I can work on it while some of these tests are running."
"That would be fantastic. Thank you, Abby. I'll go check and call you back."
They disconnected and Ziva went to tell Sommers what she was going to do, instructing him to wait with the car for the tow truck. He simply nodded and continued printing around the edge of the door with meticulous detail. She shrugged mentally and headed for the boathouse, unable to figure out the man, and not sure she wanted to.
********WDYG?********
Elly drove Tim and Bishop to Piper's apartment. They talked about Piper the entire way. Bishop was a fountain of knowledge about Piper's quirks and personality traits that would help them in their search of the apartment. Apparently, the older man was disorganized in his personal life, and anal retentively organized in his professional life. Bishop admitted to being the opposite- a neat freak at home, and a scattered thinker, as she put it, at work. She said that she and Piper would compliment each other that way, but other times drive each other nuts.
Elly smiled as he thought of Ned's OCD and his own messiness.
"Sometimes, when we were up against something that was confusing us, and we were pulling an all-nighter, I'd sit on the floor with all of my files out around me like I was in your office, and I wouldn't be able to see him from behind his desk, and suddenly something would just come flying over the edge of the desk at me, and I'd reach up and catch it out of thin air like a trained circus act. And I'd toss a folder up on his desk, and he'd go, "Damn it Ellie!" because I would scatter his papers around. But then it would be just what he was looking for, and he's sigh in frustration because he knew I was right, and that he needed that exact folder at that exact moment."
"Sounds like you two were a professional yin and yang," Elly said with a smile in the rearview. She smiled back and nodded.
"He was a trusted mentor and friend. His wife left him because he spent so much time buried in work that he couldn't talk to her about, even though he wanted to more than anything. She didn't understand why he couldn't. He knew though that she would panic if she heard some of the things we were writing up. He always envied that about Jake and I. He told me to cherish that, that it was important. He loved his kids, but they were grown with families of their own now, and he didn't see them much. He said that he spent too much time on work instead of on his family, and that he'd earned his position in their lives." Bishop sighed, her voice gone sad as she stared out the window. "I wonder if they even care that he's gone."
Tim turned to look over his shoulder at her. "I'm sure they do. My dad was the same way. Worse even. We barely speak, but I know that if he passed, or when he passes, I'm going to hurt. He's my father. There's no getting around that."
Bishop gave him a sad smile. Elly focused on the road in front of him. He wasn't sure he was in a place right now to agree with Tim's sentiment, but he knew that it was what Bishop needed to hear, so he kept quiet.
They arrived at Piper's apartment and cautiously entered, watching for anything and everything that could be wrong or out of place. When they saw the state of things they realized what Bishop was saying. The space was definitely lived in. There was stuff everywhere, and nothing seemed to have a place. Bishop stood in the middle of the living room and looked around with a critical eye.
Elly looked at Tim with a raised eyebrow, and he nodded at him. Elly took the fingerprinting case and started looking around at things that should be dusted. He began with the doorknobs, trying to find a good print and not having much luck. He dusted the door's frame to see if anything was worthwhile there, and got a couple of solid prints, but when he overlaid them on the paper sheet and scanned them, they matched Piper's. Having his fingerprints available made the process somewhat quicker.
"It doesn't look like he was taken from here," Bishop said, coming from the bedroom. "He has this neon green suitcase on wheels that he takes on vacation with him. I know because I've dropped him off at the airport before on another trip. He loves it. Swears he's never seen another one like it, and that he has no trouble finding it in the airport."
"He really liked neon green," Tim said quietly to Elly, who scrunched up his face, then schooled himself for Bishop's sake.
"It was his favorite color," Bishop said with a sigh. "He liked how it was the complete opposite of what everyone thought of him as. He was such a quiet guy until you got to know him, with a surprisingly sharp wit that would catch you off guard, and so detailed oriented. Most of the time it was khakis and a button down or polo, and then there were random days where he's wear a floral print shirt and neon green gym shoes. He liked to keep people on their toes in his own way." She looked up at Tim and squinted her eyes in thought.
"He believed that no one was as they seemed, that everyone was portraying a mask that they wanted the world to see them as, but that inside everyone was a different person. His beach trips, randomly flamboyant clothing, and occasional music choices were his different person. His alternate persona."
Elly thought about how he and Ned were both very good at that. They both had professional personas that were so at odds with their personal personas. As he thought about it though, their team was such a family that they let that personal persona out much more than they probably should at work. It reminded him that he was Elijah right now, not Elly, and he felt both proud and restrained at the same time. He wasn't making jokes or comments about the condition of the apartment because he didn't want to come off as unprofessional as the liaison he was supposed to be at the moment. He was proud of being trusted with that role, though he wasn't sure he was doing a very good job of is. He could only try his best though, so he kept at it.
"You don't think…" McGee started, trying not to sound insensitive. "You don't think Piper was actually Crow, and that it got out of hand and The Children rebelled, do you?"
Elly froze as he looked back and forth between Bishop and McGee. That was a rather bold accusation, even if put in question form. He was curious to see how Bishop was going to react.
Bishop shook her head slightly. "That doesn't feel right," she said, chewing on her lip for a moment. "But I don't know if I'm impartial enough to judge right now. It just doesn't make any sense though."
"I don't know, Ellie," Elly said gently. "He had a personal theory on people having two faces, he researched this material, and now he's gone. I don't think we can immediately rule out the idea."
Bishop nodded, looking Elly in the eye. "I know, I just… so much of what he's said to me in the past makes me think otherwise. He was just as aggravated with The Children as any other group we researched and wrote up. He wasn't particularly impressed or impassioned against them. There was no flag there. They were just another threat, and he treated them like one. He worked just as hard on our reports about them as any others. It just doesn't feel like that's it in my gut."
"Well, if there's one thing we have learned working with the Gibbs', it's to trust your gut. When we get back to the office, we'll work on finding any evidence that points towards him being Crow, and you play devil's advocate and find evidence against it."
She nodded at Tim. "That's fair."
The guys nodded, too. They searched through the apartment for anything else that looked out of place. They confiscated his desktop, but a quick look through it told Tim that he didn't do anything work related on it. There were a bunch of arcade games, and he used Internet Explorer, so Tim knew that he wasn't secretly tech savvy.
Elly found a number of thumb drives and dropped them into evidence bags. Bishop had taken the camera and had started taking pictures of everything. Elly could tell she didn't have much crime scene experience, but she made up for it in thoroughness. He knew that by time they were finished she'd have the entire apartment photographed for cataloging.
They left the apartment and dropped off what they had in the car, then began to canvass the area for anyone who would have seen anything the day they believed Piper went missing. There wasn't anyone who had been out at the time of morning they suspected Piper left his apartment for the airport. It was looking like a dead end, and they were about to get in their car when Bishop saw something and closed her door instead of getting in.
Elly looked from McGee to Bishop, and they followed her as she headed across the street. They tried to ask her what was going on, and she only responded with a shake of her head. She jogged to the corner, the guys following and then she stopped.
"Do you see the guy with the Hawaiian shirt?" she asked, looking almost a block down at a guy carrying a large backpack with a jacket hanging from it, and wearing a hideously patterned shirt of palm trees.
"Yeah," Tim said cautiously.
"I'm pretty sure I've seen that on Piper before. I think it was in a photo he showed me from his last trip."
Elly shrugged, then took off at a run for the guy, Bishop and Tim following close behind at a somewhat slower pace. When Elly caught up with him, he smiled at the guy, but it didn't do much to disarm him from the surprise of Elly jumping in front of him.
"Hey! Quick question for you," he said. "Where did you get your shirt?"
The guy looked around like he was going to bolt, and Elly rested a hand on his shoulder where he could easily grab his backpack strap if he needed to. "Whoa! Calm down. I'm not mad, just wondering."
Bishop and Tim caught up with him, and slowed to a stop, surrounding him.
"I, um, found it?" he said, looking between the three of them.
"Cool. Where?" Elly said.
"What's this about?" the guy asked. "I don't want any trouble."
"A friend of mine used to own a shirt just like that," Bishop said. "He was killed, and we think that shirt may have been left behind in his belongings from the place he was taken."
Elly raised an eyebrow at her and McGee, wondering if she should've been so honest, but the guy wasn't running. Instead he put his hands in his hair and backed up to sit on the steps of the nearest building.
"Oh, no. I knew it was too good to be true!" he said. "I'm in between places right now, and I don't have much, and I saw this suitcase. Ya know those ones with the wheels? I couldn't carry the whole thing, but I watched it for like half an hour, and no one was coming back for it, so I figured it was a gift from God or something, and I dragged it into the alley, and the clothes in it were just my size, ya know? So, I tucked as many of them into my bag as possible."
"Where was the bag when you found it?" Tim asked.
"I don't want no trouble man! I'll take you right to the spot. It's just around that corner down there."
"Okay, man. Why don't you show us?" Elly asked, reaching out a hand to help him up. The guy looked at Elly's hand, and then took it, hoisting himself up. He led them down the road and about two cars up from where they were parked. There was a small alleyway between the buildings, and the man explained about how that was where he unloaded the bag and showed them where it had been propped against a telephone pole right near it.
"What else was in the bag?" Ellie asked.
The guy looked distraught again, running his hands through his greasy hair. "I just, I just wanted some food and smokes, ya know? So, there was a pretty nice camera, and I took it down to Louie's."
Bishop sighed, then looked at the guys. Elly nodded, and then decided to venture into the alley to see if there was anything left of the belongings. He found the suitcase sitting next to a fire escape, and sure enough, it was that obnoxious neon green. He looked around for anything else that may have belonged to him, but there was nothing but some underwear left behind in the suitcase. He realized that he didn't have an evidence bag big enough for the suitcase, but carried it towards the small group anyway. As he moved into the sunlight he saw a small pocket along the inside seam of the ba, and slipped his hands down in it. He found Piper's NSA badge. He pulled it out and held it up to Bishop and McGee.
"Yeah, it was his. Looks like he was taken from right here on his stoop. They could've been hiding in the alley for him, jumped him, shoved him into a car or something, and gotten away in minutes."
Bishop reached out for the badge, and Elly gave it to her. She ran her fingers over it, and looked up at McGee, then back to Elly, then to the badge. "We don't take our badges with us on vacation. We're not like you agents. We really don't want anyone to know what we do when we travel. It's dangerous. And since we're not trained agents like you, we don't have any reason to get involved in things if something were to happen. We don't carry our badges with us outside of work. Why would he have his badge with him?"
"Maybe his double persona was working on a project you weren't privy to," McGee said.
"Hadley would've told me by now," she said, shaking her head. "He trusts me. He would've told me even if he wasn't supposed to."
"Maybe Hadley didn't know," Elly said with a shake of his head. "Maybe it was higher than Hadley, or something that he was doing off the books."
"He takes these trips multiple times a year, right?" Tim asked.
Bishop nodded.
"Well, maybe he was chasing a ghost," he said.
"I feel like I'm in the Twilight Zone right now," Bishop said. "If he was, that may be what got him killed."
Their witness that wasn't a witness stood off to the side, trying not to listen in on the conversation. He interrupted them at this point though and asked if he could go.
"Let me get some information from you," Tim said, pulling the guy aside. While he got his limited contact information and took a picture of him, Elly pulled Bishop towards the car by the elbow.
"Are you okay?" he asked, chewing his bottom lip.
"Yeah, this just all seems to be getting more and more bizarre by the moment though. Let me lay this out real quick," She dropped her voice and leaned against the car. "My partner, who I trust with my life, is dead at the hands of The Children of the Prophet, along with a Marine he's supposedly never met. He was kidnapped before taking a trip to what was supposed to be a tropical beach resort, but may have been a cover for a secret op or something else work related that no one knows about, or at least have kept me in the dark about. And then there's the ultra-slim possibility that said partner is actually the leader of a terrorist group. Sound about right?"
"Sounds right to me. What we need to do next is get that camera back from the pawn shop before they sell it, if they haven't already."
"I don't get it. I know he's actually going to these islands. He comes back with pictures of him at the beach, of the ocean, of the palm trees… I know he's going. What could he possibly be doing there?"
"Maybe meeting with an informant?" Elly asked. "Or maybe he's got a secret lover, and the badge was just with him because he's paranoid. That's what we have to find out."
"Okay," Tim said, joining them. "Mr. Lucas is taken care of. Now the pawn shop."
Twenty minutes later they had easily confiscated the camera. Louie said that he was concerned about where it had come from, so he had kept it back for a week to wait to see if anyone reported it stolen. He was happy to get rid of it after finding out it belonged to a dead guy. He was incredibly superstitious.
They stood outside the shop, looking over Bishop's shoulders as she scrolled through the pictures on the memory card. There weren't many, just some photos of the beach and the resort he'd stayed in during his last trip.
"Maybe I'm looking too much into this, but maybe these pictures are supposed to mean something. Like coordinates, or clues, or a code." She flicked through the photos again and again. There were about a dozen of them. "I mean, why would he only keep these? I know he takes hundreds of pictures. I have to be tortured with them when he gets home."
"Can I see it a second?" Tim asked. She handed it to him and watched his face as he scrolled through the settings. He looked up at her with a raised eyebrow. "The photos are geotagged. There's coordinates attached to the photos."
"Seriously?" she asked, looking over his arm at the camera.
"Sweet!" Elly said with a grin. "We've got ourselves a puzzle!"
Tim showed Bishop how to access the geotag information, and she took the camera and started heading towards the car.
"I guess we're going," Elly said with a shrug and they followed her.
Once they got in the car and buckled in, Bishop pulled out her phone to call Hadley.
"Hey, Ellie. Tell me you got something."
"We have something, but I'm not sure what."
"Okay?"
"His suitcase had been left outside of the apartment the morning we suspected he'd gone missing. A homeless man found it, took the clothes, and pawned the camera. We have the camera back, and we have a theory, but I need to know something."
"What's that?" Hadley asked, a slight hesitance to his voice that Bishop was sure not many would catch unless they knew Hadley like she knew Hadley.
"Do you know if Mark was working on any side assignments?"
Another slight hesitation, and then Hadley answered. "I don't think so. I can check for you though. Why? What did you find?"
"Nothing conclusive. Circumstantial at best. I just have this feeling."
"Well, don't read too much into something that isn't there, but I'll be glad to check for you. What were you able to find in the apartment?"
"Nada. Everything was untouched. The only prints we pulled match Mark, and you know he's never really been a techy person."
"Yeah," Hadley said, sounding somewhat distracted. "Well I'll look into any other projects he may be working on, but you knew him better than I do these days. I don't really think he had any time for a side project."
Bishop was getting a new feeling in her guy, like she wasn't being told everything, and like she wouldn't be. It had her at a loss. She'd always trusted Hadley, and he'd told her things in the past that he had no business telling her when he needed a fresh set of outside eyes, so she thought he trusted her too. She wasn't feeling that at the moment. She caught Tim's eyes looking over her shoulder, and Elly's looking back at her in the mirror. She chewed her bottom lip a moment, and then gave Hadley as genuine at thank you as she could muster before disconnecting.
"Everything okay?" Tim asked.
"I don't know," Bishop said, tapping her phone on her palm. "Something feels… off. Like I'm not being told everything, or that Hadley needs to check with someone before he can tell me what he knows. Either someone was around him that prevented him from being completely honest with me, or he knows something he shouldn't."
"Okay," Elly said, looking back at her in his rearview, the car still sitting in park. "Are you saying he's acting suspicious enough that he may need to be added to the "People Who May Be Crow" list, or are you saying you halfway expect a call from him later giving you the real scoop?"
"Uh…" she thought for a moment, again biting her lip. "I'm going to go with number two, but let's treat number one the same way that we're treating the idea that Piper is Crow."
Elly nodded, his eyebrows raising. He turned the key over in the ignition and pulled off. He was impressed that she was able to be so objective, putting her feelings about these people aside enough to label them with at least some suspicion. He couldn't imagine thinking for a moment that anyone on his team was a possible secret terrorist, or double agent, or any kind of criminal. The loyalty that he felt to them was much too strong, and he would go to the ends of the Earth to prove their innocence. He knew things were different at the NSA, not usually being in the field like they were, but he'd expected a little more loyalty from Bishop than she was giving her team. It made everything all the more suspicious.
********WDYG?********
Tony loved the look in Jethro's eyes as he was pulled towards the bed in their suite. It was everything he imagined for his honeymoon. There was love, there was passion, there was that sultry dark sexuality that Jethro could ooze like no one he'd ever met. The spark was still alive, despite everything they'd been through so far, and he relished in it.
When Jethro pushed him back on the bed, then laid down next to him, Tony thought of their first night together. Jethro bent slowly to kiss him, looking deep into his eyes first, and that kiss felt just like the first one. It was slow, but the passion and depth to it was boundless. It was meaningful. This wasn't just the beginning of a vacation where they'd fuck like rabbits. It was their honeymoon- the time away given to express their love to one another after their wedding. Sure, it was delayed, but it only made the tender fire that coursed between them all the sweeter.
It wasn't until that kiss that Tony realized how much they needed this reconnection. They'd been so caught up in Amira, and work, and getting used to having their teams and Sierra around, that they'd started to become casual to one another. Sex was great, amazing even, but this was so much more. The way that Jethro's hand slid up Tony's stomach and then chest, even over his shirt, caused intense heat to run through him. This was the love of his life. This was the infallible Leroy Jethro Gibbs, bastard extraordinaire, best boss he'd ever had and one of the best agents NCIS had ever seen, and now he was his husband.
"How are you feeling, Mr. Gibbs?" Jethro said quietly with a smile, looking down into Tony's eyes. Tony's hand reached up to wrap around the back of Jethro's neck, squeezing softly and fingering the short silver hairs there.
"Like the world is mine," Tony whispered, then leaned up and took Jethro's lips in his again.
There was no rushing. The world stopped for them. This was their time, and no one could take it from them. Tony got lost in a sea of sensation.
Jethro felt the world expanding out in front of him as he landed next to Tony on the bed. Tony was his world, and he was overwhelmed by a sense of gratitude, pride, and bright love. This was his favorite place, next to the man who trusted him enough to be with him forever. He honed in on Tony's body, his entire being, and he felt like his entire world was laid out in front of him to explore and revel in. He looked into his eyes and saw forever, and then he kissed him.
The kiss sent light through his entire body, warming him from the inside out. That's what Tony felt like to him- light. Bright, enticing, like a smile for his soul, and warmth for his heart. He wanted to marry him all over again right then and there. He wanted to show him, tell him, make him understand just how much he meant to him, and how much he was dedicated to him.
He pulled back, content with doing so because he knew that he had the rest of his life to kiss Tony; the rest of his life to show Tony exactly how he felt. He smiled at the look in Tony's eyes, the reflection of his own feelings shining back at him. "How are you feeling, Mr. Gibbs?" he asked quietly, a smile on his lips that he could feel in his ears.
"Like the world is mine."
When Tony's lips came up to touch him, he could feel those words echo down his very spine. Tony was his, and he was Tony's. There was nothing in the world more perfect, more right.
Their tongues slid over one another. Their lips suckled each other's lips. Their hands made their way over one another's bodies, but never, not once did the individual actions distract them from the sensation that they were enmeshed in one another, vibrating at the same frequency, resonating at a level neither had ever found with anyone else. They moved like one person against each other, and Jethro was lost.
Tony's touches, his kisses, the feeling of his body against his as their clothes slowly but surely found their way to the floor… it all him drugged. He was higher than high. He felt more vulnerable than ever before, and yet at the same time he felt stronger than he had in his entire life. Nothing would keep him from showing Tony just what he meant to him that night, not even his own past and well-hidden insecurities.
There weren't any more words. Tony's hands traced the muscles of Jethro's back, shoulders, and arms as he grasped for his sanity. Jethro's mouth tried to find air as he devoured Tony's neck, his own hands coasting down Tony's back to his ass. They both pulled each other towards them with desperation, unable to get close enough, but knowing they were closer than humanly possible. Things were happening to them they couldn't explain. It was almost as if they could feel each other's thoughts, desires, emotions as they ground slowly against one another.
Time meant nothing. At some point, Jethro reached for the lube Tony had sat on the night stand for them while unpacking. Between the two of them, they lubed Tony's cock for stroking, and Jethro's cock to ease its way into Tony.
Once he breached Tony's entrance, they moaned into each other's mouths mid-kiss. Jethro pushed forward a little more, knowing that this wasn't Tony's preferred angle, but the one that would allow them to keep kissing, which they both knew without saying a thing was the priority right now. Tony gasped into Jethro's mouth, and Jethro inhaled his breath like it was his very soul. Jethro shivered, trying to hold himself in place for a moment to allow Tony to adjust, but at the same time was lost in the warmth surrounding him. He was diving into the ocean of his world, his Tony, and he was loving the feeling around him and within him.
Tony ached with a sweetness that brought him to life. Jethro was his, and the way he felt deep inside of him right now was the most perfect completeness he could ever ask for. It was the missing piece to his puzzle. This was his everything.
Tony's hands kept grasping at Jethro's back as his legs wrapped around his hips. Jethro's arms were along Tony's, holding him up on the bed, but his hands were around Tony's shoulders, pulling him closer to him with each slow thrust. Tony let soft moans and gasps escape now and then with the thrusting, but other than that there were no words spoken, the only other sound their bed and bodies.
The pace quickened, and Tony reached his right hand down to stroke himself between them, Jethro arching his back to allow Tony the room to do so. The kiss resumed and the passion filled the air around them as they fell into rhythm with each other until they climaxed in unison.
Jethro collapsed on top of Tony, who lowered his legs to wrap around Jethro's calves instead of his hips, their arms around each other as they savored their collective orgasm. Jethro nuzzled into Tony's neck, and Tony nuzzled the top of Jethro's head with his chin. Nothing was said as they fell asleep closer than they ever thought they could be.
********WDYG?********
Vance walked into the bullpen, his jacket over his arm and briefcase in hand. Ned and Greg both looked up from their reports, empty food wrappers next to them, and greeted him. He didn't look happy.
"This is not what I wanted to be doing with my Saturday night, gentlemen."
"Not what we want to be doing either, sir," Ned said calmly.
"Staff Sergeant Melbourne coming online soon?"
"About forty-five minutes," he answered with a nod.
"Good. Where's the rest of the team?"
Ned felt his MTAC persona taking over naturally again. "Ziva and Sommers are backtracking the Marine's last known whereabouts in Norfolk. They believe he was taken from a marina there where he stores his boat. McGee, Elly and the NSA analyst, Bishop, are on their way back from deceased analyst Mark Piper's apartment. They have some theories that McGee and Elly want to discuss with you."
"Am I going to like these theories?"
"Not one bit, sir," Ned answered with a shake of his head.
Vance sighed. "Great. Send them up when they get here."
"Will do," Ned said, watching the older man turn to leave. He looked over at Greg who looked back worried, and then looked back down at his paperwork.
He tried to concentrate on the report in front of him, but he couldn't stop thinking about Andy's text. He hadn't replied. It hurt. He felt guilty, and ashamed, and angry. How dare Andy try to interfere in his life now, after all these years? How dare he try to suddenly change everything he'd worked so hard for? And what did he mean that he offered himself up on a silver platter? Ned had his own life. He didn't need Andy's.
And then there was what Andy said about needing to get out. That he wanted to take Ned and run. That he didn't want to kill anymore. That he'd be the only one who would understand. It was a knife to the gut.
He was confused, but more than anything, he just wanted to show Elly the messages. He wanted to confess the conversation to him, and he wasn't quite sure why. He knew that he should wait until after the meeting in MTAC, once Elly had the opportunity to get some space to handle it. He figured he'd be angry. Angry at Andy for sure, but somehow, he was worried he would be angry at him as well. He opened his phone and reread the texts again, making sure there was nothing incriminating in them against him. He didn't see anything specifically, but he felt like there was a trap door there somewhere.
An energy burst came with the arrival of their entire missing team. The elevator opened and everyone unloaded in one fell swoop, all chattering about what they did and didn't find.
Ned got to his feet involuntarily, desperate to put his arms around Elly and hold him close. He felt sick suddenly. Something was churning in his gut. His eyes locked on Elly, and that churning turned into a hurricane. He started second guessing whether or not he should tell Elly about the texts. He was worried about his reaction. He didn't want to do anything that would make Elly not trust him, or heaven forbid, leave him.
Elly came into their side of the bullpen, slipping his messenger bag over his shoulder and next to his desk as he went to move behind it. "Hello good sirs!" he said, that springy energy lightening up the tension in the Ned's stomach. "Is our fearless leader in?"
"Waiting for you upstairs," Greg said.
Ned stood there staring at Elly, unable to speak. Bishop came around to sit behind Tony's desk, then noticed Ned's expression.
"You okay?" she asked. Ned didn't move.
Elly turned to look at him. "Ned?" he asked. "Everything okay?"
Ned shook it off and nodded. "Yeah. Just… missed you."
Elly cocked an eyebrow at him. "Likewise," he said, feeling unsure about the expression Ned was wearing. It had an ominous feeling to it, and he noticed Ned was pale. He knew there was something that wasn't being said, but he'd have to get it out of his fiancé after his meeting with Vance. Tim was waving him over to join him as he headed for the staircase.
"I'll be back soon," he said. "Ellie? You wanna fill them in on everything from today?"
"Sure!" she said, sarcastic enthusiasm dripping from her voice, then turned to Ned and Greg. Ned sat down, and they got to work.
Elly meanwhile was heading for the stairs, that uneasy feeling growing more and more in his stomach that something was wrong. He was worried that Ned had found out something he shouldn't have about the case, and maybe even Bishop or Piper. That pale expression wasn't infusing him with any confidence.
They headed into Vance's office and closed the door. Their director was sitting at the conference table and called them over to join him.
"Gentlemen," he greeted. "Come have a seat. I hear you've got some theories to run by me."
Elly looked at Tim who nodded at him to go ahead as they sat down together on opposite sides of the table with Vance sitting at the head.
"We found very little in Piper's apartment. We don't think he was taken from inside of the unit, but outside at the curb. A homeless man had taken the clothing and camera from the suitcase left behind at what we're considering the scene of abduction. That's where things get… weird."
"Weird how, Agent Critten?" Vance sat back, folding his hands with his elbows on the armrests of his chair as he scrutinized Elly.
"We discovered that he was taking his NSA credentials with him, and Bishop immediately saw that as a red flag. According to her, analysts don't take their creds with them on vacations like this because of the danger of someone finding out they're government agents. Since they don't typically make arrests there's no reason to bring them." Vance nodded noncommittally and Elly continued. "The homeless guy hocked the camera at a local pawnshop, and we were able to recover it. The memory card was still in it, and there were twelve photos on it. Only twelve. Bishop says that Piper would take hundreds on his vacations, and he takes two or three vacations a year, usually to the Caribbean. When we looked at the photo details we found out that they're geotagged."
"So why these twelve photos?" Vance asked rhetorically.
"Exactly. We think that they're some kind of… clue. Like these twelve photos are significant somehow. Bishop ran the lats and longs while we were driving back, and they're from different trips. Different islands. Something's not adding up. We think he was working something on the side that he didn't tell anyone about, or at least not Bishop."
"We think he may be trying to track Crow, or someone like him, and the trips are just cover stories. Someone he's tracking is going to these places, and he's following them there," McGee interjected.
"Which would make sense," Elly said, spreading his hands out in front of him. "Because who can afford trips like these on an analyst's salary, even one as seasoned as him? And Bishop told us that Piper had a personal belief that everyone had two sides to them, and spoke of this belief often. We think his other side may have been playing the role of a spy."
Vance sighed. "Have you been able to confirm with Agent Hadley whether or not Piper was working an angle on the books?"
Both men shook their heads. "We let Bishop ask Hadley since they have the kind of relationship that he'd tell her even if he shouldn't. He got all squirrelly. She feels like the NSA is holding something back from her, and in turn, us."
"Looks like it might be time for me to have a talk with their director," Vance said.
The guys nodded. Elly chewed his lip a moment, considering what he wanted to say.
"What are you thinking, Agent Critten?"
Elly looked at Vance, his face scrunching a moment in concern. "It's just that I'm getting the feeling that Bishop doesn't trust her agency. After that phone call, she doesn't trust Hadley. We approached her with the idea that Piper might even be Crow, and she stated that she doesn't think it's him, but she encouraged us to at least look into it. That's her partner, and her former supervisor, and she doesn't feel the need to defend them."
"Do you think she's somehow in on this?" Vance asked, not sure where Elly was going with this line of thought.
"No!" he said vehemently, and even McGee shook his head no. "That's just it. She's definitely not. But something about the way she's acting, it's almost as if she isn't surprised that Crow is a member of the NSA team. Like she's been suspicious of this all along."
"Have you confronted her about it?" Vance asked.
"No," Elly said, shaking his head. "I'm playing the politics of it. We've all befriended her rather quickly, and we've earned her trust I think, which is more than her own teammates have earned. I think her gut will help lead us in the right direction. I don't want to do anything that will force her hand until she's ready to show it, and I definitely don't want to do anything to have Hadley recall her back to the NSA."
"I completely agree," McGee said. "She's critical to the investigation, and I feel like while here she's free to explore the possibility that it's one of the people closest to her. If they recall her, not only will we lose the inside intel, but she'll be kept away from the case and run in circles, wasting critical time, and they can pull her off of the case completely. Whatever your conversation with their director looks like, I believe it's best that we don't do anything that could cause them to pull her."
"I'll keep that in mind," Vance said. "At the same time, we need to push this case hard. We have a terrorist in the NSA. Bishop may be our ace in the hole to beating the NSA at finding this bastard, and they've obviously underestimated her if they've let her come work with us. I'm sure NSA Director Spots is running their people in circles trying to find out who it is.
"What I want to know is why they let Bishop out of their sights. If it were one of you that were killed, the Gibbses wouldn't let any of you out of their sights unless they thought it was unsafe for you to be here, or unless they thought you were involved and wanted to follow where you led. Which do you think it was?"
"Safety," McGee said.
"I think it's not only her safety, but possibly that Hadley thought that she had a better chance of finding out what she needed to if the NSA wasn't breathing down her neck. She's naturally investigative. Analysts don't usually do this kind of investigating."
"I could easily see that," McGee said, nodding slowly in agreement. "There's nothing that would've stopped her from investigating this, and if Hadley knows her that well, he would know that she'd be better off with us."
"Okay," Vance said, a grim expression on his face. "I'll tread lightly while talking to their director. What do we know about our Marine?"
Tim took over the conversation, and Elly was relieved. "He was abducted from Cobb's marina in Norfolk. His boat is stored there, and it appears he was on it at the time, or was at least spending time there. His car was found in the lot without a scratch on it. Ziva and Sommers didn't find much of interest in the apartment, and neighbors said he is the local superhero. They both mentioned to me that everything they were told fell under the "too good to be true" heading. He's too perfect. They couldn't find a speck of dirt on him."
"Keep looking."
"We are, sir."
"Good. Go ahead and get back at it. I'll make the call, and then I'm due in MTAC with Agent Dorneget to talk to Davis' CO. I'd like you there as well."
Tim nodded, and the two agents got up and made their way towards the exit. Once they got there Elly stopped, then motioned to Tim that he'd be with him in a moment. He turned back to Vance as the door closed.
"Excuse me, Director," he said, moving back into Vance's line of sight.
"Yes, Agent Critten?"
"I'm just a little confused about my directive here. McGee said you wanted me to act as a liaison with the NSA, but I'm not sure in what capacity. I'm obviously not supposed to be talking to their director, and I am enjoying working with Bishop. I'm exchanging communication with Agent Hadley, but I don't really know… well I don't know what I'm doing, sir."
Vance gave Elly a sideways grin. "Sounds like you're doing just fine," he said. "Your role in this is to work with the agents and make them feel like they can trust our organization to partner with them, not against them. You're there to be friendly, share information, and obtain information. You're not there to be the hard hitter. Leave that to me. Just keep me in the loop on what you're communicating, and make the NSA feel like we're working together. And if something doesn't feel right, let me know. Agent McGee is there to guide the team. He's never had to do it like this before. He needs to focus on the case. You're there to focus on the interagency relationship."
Elly nodded. "Okay, that helps a lot. I can do that. I'll be in touch."
"I expect so."
Elly smiled, and then left Vance to make his call. He headed down the stairs running his orders through his head. Vance's explanation of what he was supposed to be doing put him at ease. He'd already been doing that, and he knew better where the lines were drawn. He appreciated that.
He looked over the railing at the team working busily at their desks. When he looked at his own desk he smiled. There was a Mountain Dew and something that looked like a pack of Starbursts sitting next to his keyboard. He felt a swell of love in his chest for his man and sent a prayer of thanks out to the universe for finding him. He remembered the expression Ned was wearing before he went upstairs, and his stomach flipped. He headed for the breakroom and pulled out his phone to text him.
-Hey, are you okay?
He leaned against the counter, waiting for the response.
- -Yeah, I think so. I need to talk to you privately for a few minutes when I get back from MTAC.
-Okay, baby. Whatever you need. Go kick ass upstairs, and I'll be waiting for you when you're done.
- -Thanks :) I love you.
- I love you, too.
Elly slid the phone in his pocket and looked out the window into the darkness. He had a feeling his world was about to be turned on its head, and he had no idea why, but he didn't like it.