Chapter 2
"Why should we believe you?" the detective demanded to the brunette woman sitting on the stairs outside of the house, a house that was surrounded by police cars, an ambulance, and lots of flashing lights.
Gibbs scowled when he heard that.
"You were the first on scene, supposedly. For all we know, you could have killed the guy, then called for help to cover that up," the detective continued.
Mac, for it was Mac, glared at the detective, a lanky guy in a dark blue overcoat that looked like it had seen better days. Beside him, wearing a patient, resigned look on her face, was a woman with her black hair pulled in a bun. "I've known the guy for eight months, you moron! He was my patient, and one I was very fond of! Why the hell would I kill him? Besides, he was two hundred pounds soaking wet, and it took two of us just to lift him high enough to get him into the damn tub! Which, by the way, wasn't due for another damn day! So no, I couldn't have lifted him high enough to get him that far down the damn stairs because I'm not that blarg-ass strong enough! And I'm not saying another blinking word until NCIS gets here!"
Gibbs grinned, watching. Mac had gotten a backbone over the years and it was fun to watch.
"Why would NCIS come here?" the detective demanded.
"Because Admiral Kent was a retired four-star admiral, that's why, and that means it's NCIS's case, not yours, because you are a four-star jackass!" Mac shot back.
Before the situation could escalate, Gibbs stepped in, holding up his badge.
"Special Agent Gibbs, NCIS. She's mine, and so is the admiral," he said, seeing the relief pour over Mac's face.
The first detective glared at him, but the second detective stepped forward. "Detective Campbell, DCPD. You were fast," she said, offering her hand.
"Word gets around fast," he said, shrugging. "What do we got?" he asked, sensing that Campbell was the more level-headed of the two.
"No sign of forced entry, nothing appears to be taken, just an old guy with a broken neck at the bottom of a flight of stairs. Could be an accident," she said.
"Except his nurse is saying otherwise," Gibbs said.
"She is. Says the admiral was physically incapable of climbing those stairs high enough to cause that kind of injury," Campbell said.
"And your partner?"
"Mmm, Shane is always quick to suspect the first person on scene until proven otherwise," Campbell admitted. "We've had a few naughty nurses, and he thought she might be another Daniela Poggiali in the making."
Gibbs grunted. "Well, I'm sure you can understand that this is now my case, and so is she," he said, putting his phone to his ear.
"I understand. Shane won't be happy about that, but I am; you get to deal with the political mess that comes with dealing with a high-ranking muckety muck," Campbell said. She walked back over to her partner and quietly spoke to him out of earshot of Gibbs.
"Yeah, boss?" McGee asked when he answered his phone.
"Gear up. Got a dead admiral," he said. He told McGee the address and McGee assured him the team was on the way. Then, after watching Shane and Campbell leave, he went over to Mac and sat down next to her. "Hey."
"Hey yourself. Thanks for coming so fast."
"Nice job on the detective," he said. "What do you know?"
"His name is Admiral Peter Kent, retired. I work for St. Michaels Home Care, a company that's contracted out by the Navy to provide home care for retired and injured Navy and Marine personnel. Admiral Kent was one of my patients, has been for at least eight months," Mac said, wiping her eyes. She took a shuddering breath. "I check on him pretty much every day, in the morning. Help him get dressed, get him his breakfast, make sure he's got lunch within reach, check his vitals, maybe go for a walk with him if he feels up to it, that sort of thing. Takes me a couple of hours, but I don't mind."
"You liked the guy," Gibbs guessed.
She nodded. "He was sweet, very much a gentleman, always had a story to tell, always fussing over me." Her eyes welled up with tears. "I came in this morning, the way I always do, and I saw him on the floor, at the bottom of the stairs, and I knew something was wrong."
"Did you touch him?"
She nodded. "No pulse. Cold to the touch, and his head was wrong. I've seen enough bodies to know what a neck should look like, and his neck was so wrong, and I knew there was no way in hell he could have fallen down those stairs," she sobbed.
Gibbs put his arm around her shoulders and held her as she cried.
When McGee pulled up to the address Gibbs had given them, in the MCRT van, he saw Gibbs sitting with a woman in a nurse's uniform, a nurse who looked like she'd been crying.
"Hey boss," he said, joining them. He couldn't shake the feeling that the nurse was familiar.
"He boss, what do we got?" Torres asked, joining them.
"Retired four-star admiral, found dead by his nurse," Gibbs said.
"Accident?" Bishop asked.
"He couldn't climb the stairs he was found at the bottom of," Gibbs said, jerking his head towards the open door.
"I'm on photos," Bishop said, holding up the camera and going inside.
"Think you can show us around, see if anything's missing?" Torres asked the nurse gently.
She nodded, wiping her eyes, and standing up. As she went inside with McGee, Gibbs spoke quietly to McGee. "Home care nurse, been with him for a long time. I want her under protective custody. Said he was acting funny when she spoke to him yesterday, and she may know something."
McGee nodded, trusting his boss's gut.
Inside, Torres followed the nurse around, having already introduced himself, and she called herself Mac. "How do you know Gibbs?" he asked.
"Met him a long time ago. I was a housekeeper at Bethesda when he was in ICU, back in two-oh-six, I think. Anyway, he encouraged me to ignore my male-dominated family and chase after my own dreams of nursing, and I did," Mac said, walking around the room carefully.
"And you stayed in touch," Torres guessed.
"Sort of. Ran into him a few years ago, helped him get some stuff on a suspect that was a patient of mine, and he said he owed me a favour," Mac admitted.
"And you called it in," Torres said.
"Yup." She shook her head. "As far as I can tell, nothing is missing, but if it's possible, check his computer," she said, pointing to the computer that was sitting in front of a chair, facing the fireplace. It was an odd spot for the computer, but Torres had seen stranger places.
"Was he working on something?" Torres asked.
Mac nodded. "Some tell-all book Admiral Kent said was going to make heads roll. He was obsessed with finishing it, said he was running out of time. I didn't know what he meant, at the time, but I do now, I think."
Torres nodded. "We'll look for it. How'd you get in?"
"I have a key. He gave it to me months ago," Mac admitted. "It was easier than him constantly trying to get to the door, when the fastest he could move was a shuffle with his walker. Bad knees."
"Okay. You said he couldn't climb the stairs. So where did he sleep?" Torres asked.
"A guest room down the hall. The evening nurse was supposed to help him get ready for bed and stuff, but sometimes he'd insist on staying up, so they would let him. He could be very stubborn about that," Mac said, leading Torres down the hall to a room with a bed, a bed that didn't look like it had been touched, neatly made as it still was.
It was a nice room, and tidy. On the bedside table was a framed photograph of a couple. The young man in the photo looked like a younger version of Admiral Kent, and Torres guessed that the woman beside him was his wife.
"What happened to his wife?" Torres asked.
"Megan? She died about a year before. Admiral Kent always spoke of her, missed her. Hope he's with her now," Mac said.
There was a knock on the door and Torres looked up; it was McGee, and he had a concerned look on his face. Torres joined him.
"What's up?"
"We may have a problem. The computer's hard drive has been completely wiped clean," McGee said. "And I mean completely."
Torres stared at him. "And the admiral was supposed to have some kind of tell-all book on that thing?" he asked.
"We could have a problem," McGee said.