Title: Once upon a Summertime

Disclaimer: I don't own the characters on NCIS, I'm just borrowing them for the story.

A/N: Review reply to Tivaxoxo: Since I couldn't answer your review I'll reply here to your question about Ziva's reaction when Gibbs touched her head in an earlier chapter at the beginning. There is not supposed to be abuse in her history so it wasn't about that. She does however come from a different world, in a way, than the others and is used to people being tough on her in some ways. So like you wrote, she just wasn't used to it.

CHAPTER 23

Fun and Games and Accidents

Tony's POV:

The next morning the four of us got up early, and I mean early, to take the dog out. We knew she'd be needing to go after a night cooped up in Ziva and Abby's room and we couldn't exactly let her do her thing on the floor in there. So we snuck her outside and out the door in the kitchen, through the gate and out on the street. We had no leash but it wasn't needed anyway because she wouldn't leave our side except to stop and sniff a bush once in a while as we walked up and down the street with her. Abby held my hand and had Philip tucked under her left arm as usual. She yawned big even though she was the only one of us who hadn't been up last night. Ziva had been quick to fill her in though about the events in our room during the night.

The dog looked happy to be outside again but she didn't try to run off or anything. She kept a watchful eye on each of us, almost like a sheepdog guarding and herding her flock, even though she wasn't a sheepdog.

"What kind of dog is she anyway?" Tim asked. He had first been a little cautious near the dog, not sure if he should trust that she wouldn't bite him. We told him she wouldn't though and finally after having her lick his hand for forty seconds straight while he tried to ignore her he gave in and said she must be a nice dog.

"I am not sure, "Ziva said. She picked up a rock and threw it into the bushes of Mrs. Tapps garden as we passed her house. "But she sure is beautiful."

I nodded.

"Yeah, she's nice but she sure is no Chihuahua. If we don't find a place to hide her soon…and I mean a place that's not the house we're all living in, then Gibbs is gonna find her."

I grabbed Ziva's arm and she spun around.

"What about Mrs. Tapps? She must have a place she's not using in her garden, like a shed or something, that we can hide her in. And she can't see so she probably won't notice. Not for a while anyway."

Ziva frowned and stared off at Mrs. Tapps yellow house with all the blue and white hydrangea bushes in the garden.

"No. We cannot do that to Mrs. Tapps. She is so nice to us and it would not be honest."

My shoulders sagged and my arms dropped to my sides.

"Oh yeah, you're right. We can't do that to her. We're just gonna have to come up with something else."

"What about asking her?" Abby's voice came from over by the fence. She had let go of my hand and was peering into the garden. "Maybe she'll say it's ok for the dog to live with her."

Ziva, Tim and I were all quiet and we studied each other's faces.

"Hmm, maybe," Ziva said.

We decided we would ask Mrs. Tapps during the day. It might be our only option if we didn't want Gibbs to find the dog first. We hid the dog in Ziva and Abby's room again and went back to sleep for another hour before heading downstairs to have breakfast.

In the kitchen chaos was in the air. Gibbs and Jenny were huddled over a calendar on the kitchen table and were pointing at today's date, talking in stressed tones of voices about something that was obviously supposed to be going on today. When they saw the four of us at the door they became quiet and Jenny smiled at us.

"Good morning. We didn't see you there."

"No wonder, you seem a little busy with something."

Jenny bent back down over the calendar and squinted a little.

"Yes, Tony, you could say that. What on earth is that little squiggle you've written there, Jethro?"

He looked at the page.

"It says Bring present."

Jenny cocked her head to the side and looked annoyed.

"Oh, that's just great. The trouble keeps heaping on us today. Well, I guess we're just going to have to go out and find one right after breakfast then. "

"Yup, I suppose so."

"Whose birthday is it?" Abby asked as she took a seat at the table.

"A very good friend of me and Jethro. Doctor Donald Mallard. We call him Ducky."

Gibbs took a sip of his coffee and smacked his lips with content.

"He is a forensic pathologist. Does anyone know what that is?"

We all thought hard on it. I had never heard the word before but I didn't want that showing so I did my best to make it look like it was at the tip of my tongue.

"I have heard it before, " Ziva said. "But I am not sure exactly what it means."

"Isn't it someone who sells bibles or something?" Tim asked as he tried to turn the page in the calendar to see what was on the other side.

Jenny gently moved his hand aside as she continued to go over each day in the calendar, as if to make sure there wasn't a second appointment she had missed somewhere.

"Honey, have a seat at the table and breakfast will be ready soon, ok?"

Tim and me and Ziva did as jenny said with sighs and dropped into our seats.

"No, not exactly, Tim." Gibbs answered his somewhat childish guess. "A forensic pathologist is someone who examines dead bodies and finds out the truth about how they died."

Jenny straightened to her full height at once.

"Jethro! There is no need to be that specific with the kids. They don't need to know everything, you know."

But we wanted to know everything. Maybe not Tim, he looked kind of worried. But Ziva and I insisted that we wanted to know what it was Doctor Mallard did. Abby nodded that it was ok for her too. She didn't want to be left out. So Gibbs told Jenny he would be gentle but truthful and continued. He told us that Ducky worked for NCIS. Just like Jenny and Gibbs. Only he wasn't a Special Agent, like them, he was a doctor. But not a doctor that made living people like us better. He was a doctor that told the Agents when the person who was dead actually died and maybe even how that person died. He had different ways of finding that out but Gibbs wouldn't tell us exactly how. Even though we did try to get him to tell more than he intended, but getting Gibbs to accidently say more than he wanted wasn't easy to do. He did tell us though that Ducky had to cut on the dead body to find out what they needed to know. Often his work helped lead the agents to a bad guy that they put in jail.

"So, today is Doctor Mallard's birthday?"

"That's right Abby." Jenny said as she put juice and scrambled eggs on the table. "And we had made a special note in our calendar so we wouldn't forget it. Only we forgot to look in it instead. So we just remembered that we are invited to his birthday dinner tonight at the Mallard residence."

A sudden bark brought Jenny to silence and Gibbs froze with his cup in mid air.

"I left the window open upstairs in our room," Ziva said and quickly got up from the table. "I am just going to go close it. It is hot outside and the heat will come into our room."

Gibbs and Jenny exchanged confused looks with each other and the rest of us dug into our scrambled eggs with little interest in absolutely anything else.

"What's the problem with the dinner then?" I asked. "Why don't you just go?"

Gibbs put his cup down and sat down at the table.

"The problem is we didn't plan well enough. We have all of you and we can't just leave you all by yourselves."

The words "all by yourselves" registered in my mind and I realized what Gibbs had just said. Like any nine and a half year old kid I knew it wasn't very often you got to be by yourselves, as a group of kids, in a house an entire evening. It was an excellent opportunity.

"Oh, well, we don't want to stand in your way of going to such an interesting dinner and all. You should go." I smiled my nicest most sincere smile hoping it would work. "We'll be here, spending a quiet evening in front of the fireplace with a good book. I'm a good reader you know," I said with a nod." I could entertain everyone until you got back."

Gibbs gave that crooked little grin he sometimes did when he thought something was really amusing but obviously didn't want to laugh.

"I don't think so, buddy," he said with a quick tussle of my hair. "We can't and we won't leave you here by yourselves. You're not old enough for that. Sorry," he added when I sighed disappointedly.

"And who would have lit the fire, Tony?" Tim asked as he reached for the juice.

"I would have," I told him, grumpily. "With your shirt…" I added under my breath but got a quick glare from Gibbs so I hurriedly returned to my scrambled eggs instead.

Then it happened. Had I known it would I would have clamped a hand over her mouth but of course there wasn't any way I could have known it would happen before it happened. Abby came up with a wish.

"We could come with you. To the party I mean. I wanna go."

I almost choked on my eggs and had to cough once and gulp down some juice.

Ziva came into the kitchen again and took her seat. She took a look at my probably much red and strained face.

"What is the matter with you?"

I just pointed at Abby who looked real pleased with her suggestion.

"I said we could come with Gibbs and Jenny to doctor Mallard's birthday dinner. I wanna meet him. He sounds nice."

Some of the color left Ziva's face too, but I guessed probably not for the same reason as me.

"What? No, that would not be a good idea at all…" she started. "I mean… who would look after the house while we're gone?"

Jenny gave a little laugh. She got up, put the calendar on the kitchen counter and grabbed a tea cup for herself.

"No coffee today, Jen?"

"No, I'm trying to cut back a little, Jethro." She sat back down again" I'll have tea today. Pass me the milk, please."

She poured some milk in her tea and put it beside her.

"And why would we need someone to keep an eye on the house for one evening, Ziva? We never have that. No one looked after it the other day when we were on a picnic, remember?"

I held my breath while I hoped they wouldn't say what I was afraid they would say.

"You know what, I think it's a great idea that Abby had. We should all go to Ducky's dinner. It'll give you the chance to meet him and we can keep our promise," Jenny said and sipped her tea.

Gibbs nodded.

"Sounds good."

I wanted to yell something that would make them change their minds, but being without ideas and taken off guard like I was I didn't yell. Instead I swallowed the huge pile of eggs that had assembled in my mouth and tried to smile. This was going to be a very long evening.

Ziva's POV

Later in the bathroom:

I burst through the door to the bathroom where I had seen Tony enter a few minutes ago. He spun around as I entered, with a green toothbrush in his mouth, wearing only his pajama bottoms. He looked angry and tried to tell me to get out, but had a difficult time getting the words out with foamy toothpaste in his mouth. Instead a gurgling sound escaped as he angrily pointed at the door.

Ignoring him I asked what I came to ask.

"Why did you not stop Abby? What are we going to do now?"

Tony spat in the sink and quickly rinsed his mouth.

"Me? What do you mean I should have stopped her? I'm no mind reader you know. I couldn't know what she was gonna say. And besides…"

I held up a hand. "All right, fine. You are right. I am sorry I accused you but I am really worried about tonight."

Tony gave me a puzzled frown and then turned and spat into the sink again.

"Why are you worried? I'm just annoyed. Birthday dinners are always extremely boring. I've been to a lot of them with my father and they're reeeaaly stuffy. You have to sit still the entire time and not move except your hands when you eat. I can't staaand those dinners and I almost always mess up somehow."

"Stop rambling about being bored. I mean, yeah, sure that sounds dead boring but we will survive, I am sure. What I am worried about is the dog. She cannot stay alone in the house all evening without anyone letting her out to go to the bathroom so to speak. There could be a number of accidents in here when we get back late tonight. And what if she starts chewing on things..."

Tony's made a small o with his mouth.

"You're right. That's a problem."

"Yeah, I would say so," I said. "But wait a minute," I grabbed his shoulders. "Gibbs said Ducky's house isn't that far away. It's only a couple of streets from here."

"So?"

"So then one of us has to get away once during the evening, make it back here and let her out for a quick walk in the garden or something and make sure everything is ok."

Tony's face lit up in a smile.

"Hey, that's not a bad plan." He turned sullen again, "But what if we can't find our way back."

I shrugged.

"We just have to be extra advertent tonight in the car when we drive over there."

"Maybe we'll walk if it's close."

"Even better. Then it will be easier for us to notice everything in our surroundings."

I grabbed a pink towel and tossed it to him before heading out the door again.

"We have to let Abby and Tim know about the plan. Move it, Tony, clean and dry yourself and meet us in our room. "

He muttered something about slowing down a little but did as I said and started splashing water on his face.

Abby's POV:

Five P.M

We had a plan. I liked the idea of having a plan. It made me feel sort of adventurous. And having a secret with Timmy, Tony and Ziva made me feel important. Because we had something important that we shared and wouldn't tell anyone else.

We all climbed into Gibbs and Jenny's rental car for the summer. Jenny had wanted to walk to Doctor Mallard's house but Gibbs hadn't gotten in the shower until just a little while before we were supposed to leave, so he made us late and we had to drive instead. Gibbs started the car and pulled out of the drive way. I had never known anyone who drove like Gibbs. Everything went by so fast outside. When my dad drove things went by much slower. I tried to pay attention to everything outside like we had all agreed. Even though I wasn't the one who was going to run back through the neighborhoods to check on the dog. We had agreed Tony would go. Because he was the fastest runner. Ziva had at first been a little mad and said that he wasn't faster than her at all. But after a while she calmed down and agreed that Tony should go. But she only agreed that he was a little faster than her, not much, only a little.

It didn't take long to reach Ducky's house. Tony, Ziva, Tim and me kept looking out the windows the entire time in the car. Jenny looked back a couple of times with raised eyebrows at our leaning back and forth to get looks at everything that passed by. She even suggested Gibbs should slow down once because we all seemed a little car sick back there.

When we got out of the car we were standing in front of a big yellow house with a long front porch with white pillars and six steps leading up to it. The window shutters were green, just like the long hedge in front of the porch. Gibbs locked the car and we walked behind him and Jenny up onto the porch and waited behind them while they rang the door bell. We had to ring It twice before anyone opened. When the doors swung open it wasn't a man on the other side, but a little old woman in an old fashioned, grey lace dress with buttons that went all the way up to her chin.

The old woman smiled and clapped her hands together.

"Why isn't it, Leroy Jethro Gibbs," She said and looked pleased. "And…" she studied Jenny a moment. "I'm sorry, my dear, have we met?"

I leaned towards Ziva and whispered to her.

"She talks different."

"She has a British accent, Abby. She is from England."

"Oh."

Jenny cleared her throat.

"Mrs. Mallard, I'm Jenny. We met at your birthday about two months ago."

Mrs. Mallard cocked her head to the side and smiled again.

"Oh yes, now I remember. You are Leroy's fiancé, am I correct?"

"Yes, that's right, Mrs. Mallard," Gibbs said. "Your son close by?"

"Oh the birthday boy, yes of course. He is in the living room entertaining his guests by playing a beautiful piece from Chopin on the piano." She stepped aside and gestured for us to enter. That's when she noticed the four of us behind Gibbs and Jenny. "Oh, but who do we have here?"

Gibbs took Jenny's coat and then took off his own.

"These are our summer kids. They are staying with us for the summer. Ziva, Tony, Tim and Abby, say hello to Mrs. Mallard, Ducky's mother."

We all shook Mrs. Mallard's hand and told her our names and she was very happy to meet us. Just to make sure she wasn't also blind like Madame White, I waved my free hand in front of her face. That made her giggle and ask what on earth I was doing but I just giggled back. Tony took my hand after that and we all followed Gibbs and Jenny into a room that was called a lounge. The lounge seemed crowded with adults. There must have been at least twenty people in there. I saw them looking at us kids, probably wondering who we were and suddenly I felt shy. When we stopped I stared at the red carpet under my feet. I heard Gibbs and Jenny talking to a man who had that British accent Ziva had said Mrs. Mallard had. I didn't want to look up just yet because I was afraid to see all the people staring at me again so I just listened as they went on talking. Gibbs said happy Birthday, Duck, and it sounded like Jenny gave him a hug. Ziva, Tony and Tim said hello to him and before I realized it was my turn already. A pair of brown polished shoes blocked my view of the carpet and when I looked up I stood face to face with an older man with a bow tie and glasses. He had on a white shirt and a checkered jacket and he looked very kind.

"Hello there, little one. May I ask what your name might be?"

I swallowed once first but because of how nice he seemed I started feeling my nervousness disappearing. I also glanced around the room and I realized no one was really watching us anymore.

"It's…Abby."

"Oh, a short for Abigail I presume. Lovely name, quite lovely indeed." He extended his hand to me. "I'm Doctor Donald Mallard."

"Hello, Doctor Mallard," I said, doing my best to be polite.

He chuckled gently.

"Oh, please, it's Ducky to my friends."

I felt the last of my jittery feeling go away and I straightened my back and tried to throw both my pig tails over my shoulders. They were too short though and just fall back to their tips just touching my shoulders.

We all liked Ducky's home. It was very big and he let us play hide and seek anywhere we wanted in the house. Tony had told us all that it was going to be boring at the Birthday dinner and we would have to sit still the entire time but we were all glad he was wrong. Gibbs told us before we started playing to be careful and watch where we were going though, because Ducky and Mrs. Mallard had a lot of expensive things. I guess he was afraid we would break something. But we promised to be careful and then we played hide and seek in the house a really long time. Each time we played it took the person searching a long time to find everyone because he or she had to search through the top and bottom floor. One time Timmy scared Tony half to death when he jumped out from behind a corner. There were lots of little nooks in the Mallard house. That was what made it so perfect for hide and seek.

Gibbs and Jenny talked and talked and talked and talked to people in the lounge. Every time I passed by the room I saw them talking to someone. It was strange they didn't get bored talking so much. One time I actually thought Gibbs looked a little bored when he was talking to this fancy woman. So I went over to him and asked him if he wanted to play hide and seek with us instead. He grinned and asked the woman to excuse him for one second and then bent down. He must have seen I was worried about him. He smiled and told me he would like to play with me and if there wasn't so many people he needed to talk to then he would have played with us instead. He explained that when you're an adult you sometimes have to be polite and right now he needed to finish talking to Ms. O'Hara. I looked up at the woman's face and she looked down at me. She didn't smile or say hello or anything. Instead she looked really annoyed. I guessed it was because I had interrupted them. She had a lot of make up on. Red, lipstick, some dark stuff on her eye lids and black eye lashes. Her dark red hair made me think of autumn and her stare almost made me feel cold. I gulped but when I felt Gibbs kiss my cheek I looked at him and smiled at him. I didn't look back at Ms. O'Hara. Then I ran off to continue our game. I thought Gibbs could probably take care of himself.

Ziva's POV

Playing hide and seek in Ducky's house was a lot of fun. We agreed Tim won because Tony looked for over half an hour for him. When he had found the rest of us we even joined in the search and it still took another fifteen minutes before we found him. He had hidden himself under a woman's skirt in the lounge. She had of course given him permission and even told him to hide under there when she had seen him looking for a place to hide. Both Jen and Gibbs looked a little embarrassed when Tim finally crawled out from under there with a "Haha,here I am Tony!". Gibbs and Jenny obviously had no idea he had been there the entire time. The entire room burst into laughter though but after that Gibbs announced that he thought it was time for us to play, as he called it, "a more composed game." Just when we were discussing something we could play Mrs. Mallard announced that it was time to eat dinner. We all groaned a little at that but quieted our groans when we got a look from Jenny.

The table had been set and was a long table for all twenty five of the guests. There were twenty five with us kids. The table looked very fancy with expensive wine glasses for the adults, plates, white napkins and a lot of forks and knives to eat with. We got regular glasses but ours' were nice too.

When Mrs. Mallard had heard Gibbs and Jenny were bringing four kids to the dinner party she had ordered some food that she thought we would like better than the fish-stuff the adults were eating. She was right. We all really liked the meatballs with spaghetti and the soda to drink. People gave toasts to Ducky who sat and listened with a small blush on his cheeks. Jenny gave one toast but was interrupted when Abby yanked her sleeve and said she needed to go to the bathroom. Jenny got ready to take her when Gibbs got up and went with her instead. With Gibbs out of his seat I could not help but notice the woman who was sitting next to him. She had red hair and a red dress and red earrings and pretty much seemed to have gone with the theme red on everything this evening. I heard Jenny call her Ms. O'Hara once when asking her to pass the water. With Gibbs out of the way she stared at us with penetrating eyes. It was like she wanted to tell us we were not really supposed to be there. I just stared back at her until she finally turned her gaze away. When I turned back I saw Tony grinning.

"What?" I asked and took a bite of one of my meatballs.

"Nothing. Just that you don't seem afraid of her is all." He shoveled some spaghetti into his mouth.

"No, of course not. Why would I be?"

Tony took a moment to swallow.

"Because anyone who isn't an adult can see that that woman doesn't like kids. And that she's a mean person."

I shrugged. "Yes, that is obvious." I looked at the woman smile and talk friendly with Jenny about this and that. It was easy to see that she had a very smooth tongue around adults. "Well, who cares about her anyway. We have more important things to talk about." I leaned as far as I could across the table and lowered my voice. "It is time for us to play a game outside in the garden."

Tim gave me a puzzled frown. "Outside? Why outside?"

Tony sighed and shook his head at Tim's question. "Because, Timmy, I feel like running off some energy. And I think someone needs to pee."

"I don't have to pee. And Gibbs is already helping Abby." Tim put the last of his dinner in his mouth and chewed.

"Not you, dummy," Tony hissed between clenched teeth. "The dog,"he whispered.

Tim stopped chewing and nodded with big eyes that he understood what we were talking about now.

As soon as Abby got back with Gibbs we asked if we could go outside and play in Ducky's garden. He said we could if we had all finished our food. Quickly I swallowed the last of my spaghetti to show Gibbs and then we all got to leave. Tony took off towards the doorway and as I turned to follow I accidently ran into Ms. O'Hara. The bump made her take a step to the side and tip the wine glass she was holding. Red wine splashed all over her dress and I froze in front of her. I looked around and saw that the rest of the room was busy in conversation and had not noticed what had happened. I was not sure if that was a good or bad thing though because when she raised her chin I saw murder in her dark brown eyes. She fixed her cold stare on me and looked like she was about to speak when I felt a hand touch my shoulder gently. I looked up and Gibbs stood behind me looking at Ms. O'Hara.

"What happened?" He raised an eye brow like he was waiting for an answer. "Ziva?"

"I…I, I bumped into her. Wine was splashed."

"Oh," he said. "Ms. O'Hara, are you all right?"

She took a breath as if to keep herself from exploding in front of Gibbs. "Yes, yes of course, Agent Gibbs. I'm all right. It was just a bit of wine."

Feeling more confident now that Gibbs stood behind me I offered her a smile. "It is good that your dress is so red, Ms. O'Hara, so that the wine did not really change its color."

"Ziva," Gibbs said in a sterner tone. "It was an accident but it's not a joke. Apologize." He said.

I lowered my head some. "I am sorry, Ma'am."

"I'll go get you something to dry your dress with, Ms. O'Hara." Gibbs put a hand on the top of my head as he walked away.

As Gibbs walked off Tim came over to me. "Are you coming, Ziva?" he asked. "We're waiting for you."

Ms. O'Hara discreetly pushed Tim aside and bent down so we were face to face. That cold stare was still there and she looked like she might have sharp fangs hidden in her mouth. And she seemed to want to use them.

"I don't care if it was an accident or not, you little slouch. You caused this to happen and if you ever do anything like it again, I'll…"she was interrupted by another push, this time to her lower back. Tony had come running our way.

Ms. O'Hara staggered forward and I took a step aside so I would not collide with her again.

"What the he…" she spun around and saw Tony standing there.

"Really sorry about that. I came running to get Ziva and when you took that step back I wasn't prepared for it and ran into you."

Things were getting a little louder now and people were beginning to notice that something was going on down by our end of the table. Now however, Jenny put down her napkin and got to her feet.

"What's going on?" she asked mostly directing her question at Tony who looked the most guilty at the moment. My remorse had turned into anger at Ms. O'Hara threatening me and I did not really care who bumped into her anymore. I was only sorry Tony had not been carrying a plate with food that could have gotten stuck to her butt.

"This child here," Ms O'Hara pointed at Tony, "ran straight into me from behind. And I'm sure it was no accident this time." She had a hard time hiding her wild anger from showing now.

"Tony, is that true?" Jenny asked with a frown. "Did you collide with Ms O'Hara on purpose?"

Tony held up his hands and shook his head. "No, of course not. I was just coming to get Ziva who was talking to Ms O'Hara . Ms. O'Hara took a step back when I was passing behind her and..."

Ms. O'Hara's face became red with frustration. "That's a lie! I took no step back! You really should look after these kids more," she said to Jenny. "If they were mine…"

"God forbid," I muttered under my breath but loud enough for the others to hear. Suddenly I felt Tony clamp a hand over my mouth and pull me back a little. Jenny turned to us both with a slightly confused and a bit suspicious look on her face.

"I don't know what's going on, but right now I want the two of you- and you" she pointed a finger at Tim, "to go outside and play for a while. That way we can avoid any more problems."

"Yes, Ma'am," said Tony and let go of me. We both ran for the front door as fast as we could with Tim following. I knew I had let my temper control me there for a minute and we were lucky we did not get into trouble. But Tony was right. Ms. O'Hara was mean.

To be continued

A/N: So chapter 23 is now read. Please send me a review with your thoughts after reading it. I hope you're all having a great beginning of the summer.