A/N: I'm sorry, once again, for the delay. Real life got in the way [I know, I know, why do we need one of those?]. But I'm finally done with this chapter. It's kind of a filler chapter, but it's needed, so I am sorry if it drags on. I know some of you are waiting for another Callen/Kensi scene, and I swear, this chapter had a huge one in it at the end. However, I got carried away with the first scene, and then the second one happened and there was no space/time for the intended one. BUT I swear, the next chapter will have that, and most possibly more.
Anyways, enough of that. I hope you enjoy this chapter. Please R&R.
At his desk in the bullpen, Deeks would be lying if he didn't say he was glad to get out of the claustrophobic ops room for a little while. It had been a couple of hours since Callen and Sam had returned with their finding, though that was soon taken away to forensics. The only information that they had received from it so far was that the gun was a match to the one that had killed the LAPD officer, and that it had been scrubbed clean except for a very smudged print, something that was near unlikely to get them a match on who had held the gun before Sam. But any and every single thing was of importance, and it had been Hetty's order for the forensics to try and reform the print into something more usable and run it. The science behind it was over all their heads and the only thing they had understood was that it would take time to get it done.
So instead, they had focused on the crime scene photos and papers that the LAPD had sent them after sharing the information of the shooter. It was technically joint jurisdiction, but having experience at both departments, Deeks knew that there would be no waiting on this case. One side wanted to find a cop killer, while the other wanted to find the person who tried to kill their agent. With both sides having the same evidence and leads at that moment, there was no telling on who would get there first, or whether the other side would get a chance to speak with the person once the ones who found him were through with him.
That was if they ever found him, because at the rate it was going, they had nothing apart from the rifle. Although, if there was something that he had learnt in his time at NCIS, it was that they could get the possible from the impossible. Which, he supposed, was why everyone else was scattered around the place doing their own thing relating to the case.
Sam was going over the footage from where the shooter had hidden once again on the screen in their bullpen, trying to see if he could spot something that they hadn't, while Callen was off speaking to Hetty about something that Deeks had no idea about. He could also see Nate on the couch, reading a file and occasionally glancing up both generally and at Kensi, who sat at her desk, skimming through her past cases and undercover works to see if she could find anyone who stuck out as having a vendetta against her, or had a recent run-in with the law again. And he was still going through the evidence photos and papers. Yet, still no-one had found anything new to help them.
That was until Eric came bounding down the stairs, whistling loud for their attentions, and towards them with more enthusiasm than them all put together.
"I'm assuming you have something." Sam commented, moving out of the way to allow the tech access to the TV.
"I do." He confirmed, and both Deeks and Kensi stood up from their desks to near the screen. "It's not much, though."
"We'll take anything, right now." Kensi told him, sitting up on the side of the desk that she had just rounded.
"Ok, well, firstly, I ran the serial on the gun to see if I could find who owned it. Surprise number 1; it was unregistered." He said dryly as he turned to face them all, including Nate, who stood in at the threshold of the bullpen and the alcove, and Callen, who had arrived a second later.
Deeks watched subtly out of the corner of his eyes as their team leader went over to lean against the table next to where Kensi sat. It wasn't much, but from where he stood slightly off to their side, he was sure that Callen was invading her personal space just that bit more than would be considered professional. It was an obvious sign of what Eric had told him being true, and he had to wonder how he missed it earlier. Although, Deeks guessed, it wasn't something that anyone would pay attention to unless they knew it was there, and there was the fact that they were both naturals at hiding things that needed to be hidden.
Mentally shaking his head when he saw that Eric had brought something else up on the screen, he willed himself to think about the case once again rather than his friends' personal lives, which he had to admit to himself, was kind of creepy.
"What's surprise number 2?" Sam asked.
"I managed to get a hold of surveillance videos from around the area where you found the gun to try and find out where the shooter had come from, and had gone." Eric told him before loading up the clips that he had cut out as being the most important.
"Lemme guess. You found nothing?" Kensi asked with a smirk, to which the man in question replied with a cheeky smile.
"Au contraire. I got him on tape driving to and from the main road by the park." He informed her and played the short footage scenes that showed what they assumed was the same man who had shied away from the surveillance cameras at the private land driving an old, brown and beaten car. The video was taken by speed cameras, it seemed, if the quality of them and the focus on the car was anything to go by.
"So we got a name?" Deeks questioned, a bit eager, hoping that there were better views into the car, or better, of the shooter out of the car.
"No. Surprise number 2. He kept his face hidden and covered. Shades, hat and a scarf. Head straight but down." Eric answered, pulling up a small collection of photos. They were all, as Deeks had wished for, of the shooter out of the car. However, like Eric had said, none captured his face fully. "This is the best image I have of him."
"Any chance you recognise him, Kensi?" Callen asked. Although he looked serious, with his arms crossed and glancing briefly from the TV screen ahead to her, there was a teasing underline to his words that simply earned him a roll of the eyes from the agent next to him. "Thought not."
"He knew the place pretty well. Must have been planning it for a while." Nate spoke up in his usual fashion to add his thoughts.
"That's impossible, Nate. There was no way I would have gone to that park today, ever, except because Deeks took my car." Kensi reminded him, shaking her head as she did her best not to scream in frustration that they were going around in circles once again.
"Maybe he was thorough. Took every possibility into consideration and made a plan for it all." Callen suggested half-heartedly and was surprised when Nate considered it and replied.
"Would explain the extra effort into the disguise if he was exerting an obsessive behaviour over it." He said, earning a look of incredulity from the others that made him falter a bit. "That's what I think, at least."
"How did no-one see him carry a rifle from there to the other side of the road?" Deeks questioned sceptically as he eyed the current enlarged picture of the shooter in his disguise. He couldn't see the weapon from that, but they knew that he had brought it with him and left it there.
"Because..." Eric trailed off, already having come across an image that would explain the question, which he now brought up. "That's how."
"Guitar case. Clever." He reasoned with a sense of uncertainty, not sure whether it was indeed clever or just eerily OCD.
"What did you get on the car?" Callen asked to change the subject and back on track.
"Ran the licence. It was reported stolen an hour before and dumped less than an hour after. Taken from a side road with no cameras nearby and dumped in an alley way." Eric replied whilst clearing the screen of all the images and videos he had put up as he came to an end of what he had found. "And that's surprise number 3, in case you're wondering."
"So when you said you didn't have much, you were actually being serious?" Sam remarked, half indignantly, half mockingly.
"Yes." He simply answered with his typical look of innocence as Sam rolled his eyes and turn away from the screen to look at the others.
"Ok, so we have where he came from and where he went with the car. How about before and afterwards?" Kensi asked Eric, who merely shook his head.
"Nothing. I hate to say it, but he's good."
"A professional." Sam supplied, grudgingly.
"Or paranoid." Callen countered his partner as per usual.
"This is all well and good, but aren't we back at square one again?" Deeks asked them all, wondering if it was only him who had realised just how much progress they had really made. When he got no reply apart from a shrug from Eric and a solitary nod from his partner, he raised an eyebrow. Hoping for something a bit more optimistic, that had certainly not been the response he had predicted. "Ok, so now what?"
"Now, it's time we call it a night." Hetty announced from where she stood at the entrance of the bullpen. Deeks was sure that he wasn't the only who hadn't hear her approach, but being the closest, it had made him jump. The quiet laughter from behind him as he spun to face the little lady told him that his attempt at trying to regain his composure hadn't worked to erase his embarrassment. "There's nothing you can do now. It's late night and the forensics on the gun won't be back until morning, earliest. Tomorrow's going to be a busy day."
No-one spoke up to either argue or agree with her, and Deeks wondered if it was because they were all as conflicted as he was. They had been going over everything they had for hours now, and as Hetty had said, until the forensic results come in, there would be nothing more for them to do other than go over it all again. But the fact that going home for the night meant leaving the case open and untouched for a full 8 hours or so seemed like giving in for the time being, and he wasn't really up to doing that either. Not to mention, a lot could happen in 8 hours.
"Ok, then." He murmured as Hetty left without waiting for an answer. Turning back around again, he was a bit surprised to see that they were all now dispersed, with Nate and Eric actually gone, and preparing to leave. "Really? We head home?"
"Hetty's right. There's nothing else we can do now." Callen replied with a small shrug that he assumed meant to reassure him, but the tight look on his face said more about his reluctance to leave everything be than anything else.
"May as well catch up on the sleep before the case actually starts." Sam added, sighing more out of tiredness and agitation than annoyance. Accepting the two statements at facts, he knew that the only way to get this case closed would be to start back on it tomorrow, and so he copied the others and began to grab his things to leave too.
"Deeks, my keys?" Kensi asked, or rather demanded, politely as she approached his desk. He had to think about it for a minute before remembering that he had placed it in his desk drawer to keep it safe in fear of her wrath had he lost it.
"I think you'll find your car to be in perfect condition. I even filled the tank up for you." He informed her while dropping the keys in her outstretched hand
"Thanks." She replied, the shock clear in both her tone and face.
"Hold on. Didn't you go home in that car earlier?" Sam asked her as she turned back to go to her desk and grab her things.
"And...?" Kensi prompted nonchalantly, shouldering her bag and leaning against the table to hear the rest of his point. The answer, however, came from the man next to her, much to her irritation.
"Sam's right. Bet you took the usual route too." Callen said in a way that almost seemed chiding if it weren't for the challenging look on his face.
"Yeah, but no-one followed us." She replied reluctantly, knowing exactly where the conversation was going. "Right, Deeks?"
"Um... No?" He answered a bit uncertainly. Although he knew for sure that no-one had followed them, he wasn't quite sure which answer would get him the less grief. In the end, he went with agreeing with neither, not fancying getting caught in the middle of his partner or the other two. Somehow, they were both evenly scary. "It's two against one, Kensi. Sorry."
The only thing that she could do to rebuke was to throw him a dirty look before her attention was claimed elsewhere, which he reckoned was really lucky for him. He had annoyed, teased and pissed off Kensi before, but he had never gone against her, at least not to the others on their team. They mostly worked as what they were; partners. Though some things, Deeks supposed, just had to take priority over backing his partner, and he was sure that keeping her alive was one of those things.
"I'll bring the car." Callen told her, snatching her keys out of her hand before she could do anything about that, or about Deeks' words. "You can take mine."
He threw his car keys onto the desk next to her, but Kensi didn't make a move to get it. Instead, she looked around, starting with Deeks and meeting each of their eyes with a narrowed look of repressed exasperation. Finally, realising that she wasn't going to get out of this, she pushed away from where she stood and started to make her away out.
"You forgot the keys." Callen pointed out, watching in slight amusement as she simply carried on.
"I'm getting another one." She informed him.
"What's wrong with mine?"
"Where do I start?" Kensi snapped back with a huff, leaving the area known as 'theirs' without a final goodbye.
"Take the other route, yeah?" He called after her, and he could almost hear her roll her eyes from the other side of the room.
"Yes, I know. I'm not a rookie." She called back before finally disappearing out of their sight.
Deeks silently watched as the other two men looked at each other, neither one saying anything, at least nothing that he could hear. But by the way that Sam nodded, albeit so minutely that he wondered if he had actually seen it, made him entertain the thought that maybe the two of them had a secret way of communicating without words. Perhaps that's what happened after being partners for 3 years.
Barely a couple of minutes had passed since Kensi had left when Sam followed. There was something going on, Deeks could tell, and it had no doubt to do with the junior agent. It had seemed odd that they had let her go off on her own, but he should have guessed that there was a backup plan to it. In actuality, it made more sense, knowing how much Kensi would argue having anyone of them escorting her, having experienced it earlier.
"See you in the morning, Deeks." Callen's words snapped him out of his thoughts as he passed by his desk, where he was still slowly getting his things together.
"See ya." He replied measly, standing behind his desk until he was the only one left. It might have been good to get out of the ops room, but being alone downstairs in the huge and somehow silent hacienda late at night was scary enough for him to get a move on and simply pick up anything he needed before heading out.
...
It was only when she was over halfway home that she was certain that she wasn't making things up. Looking out for things out of the ordinary came as second nature for her, especially when they were either undercover or in the middle of a high risk case. Considering that she was shot at that afternoon, Kensi assumed that the latter applied right then. And as she peered into her rear-view mirror, she was sure that she wasn't getting paranoid. The car she spied was most definitely tailing her.
She should have guessed that she wouldn't have been able to make it all the way home without being followed. The fact that she recognised the car, though, was what bugged her the most. If he had wanted to remain inconspicuous, then he could have tried a bit harder at staying hidden.
Letting out a deep breath, Kensi reached for her phone and pressed the speed dial number 3 before putting it on speaker and throwing it back onto the passenger's seat. It rang for about 5 rings, and just when she thought he wouldn't pick up, he did.
"You know, Sam, for someone who's been doing this for a few years, you really can't tail." She told him dryly, not letting him even say a word until she was done.
"I dunno what you're talking about. I'm heading home." He replied matter-of-factly, though she could clearly hear the smile in the words. She was certain that if they weren't having this conversation over the phone, she wouldn't be able to keep back the urge to hit something at the sight of it. That, and the fact that the risk of perhaps breaking something in the car she currently drove was way too high. She did not fancy facing Hetty first thing in the morning and having to explain what had happened.
"You live in the other direction!" She exclaimed instead.
"You're confused, Kensi." Sam teased good-naturedly, and the familiarity of it easily cut down her at her anger. "This is another route, remember?"
"Speaking of, how did you know I was going this way?" She asked him, genuinely confused as to how he would know how to follow her when she was making journey that she rarely ever took. Of course, even since Dom had been kidnapped, they all alternated their routes frequently, but this was one of the longest and the most avoided by herself.
"I didn't."He insisted and Kensi guessed that he got Eric to track her cell GPS. It made sense, and she had to admit that it was something that she would do too. Yet, his denial of it ticked her off once again, but all that she could do was glare at the car via her rear-view mirror.
"I can look out for myself, thank you very much." She told him tightly, and if it were anyone besides those on the team, they would have dropped the subject at the sound of her voice. The tension in it was probably high enough to be sent through the phone and onto the other side. But it didn't seem to affect him.
"Never said you couldn't." Sam brushed off passively.
"And if someone was to shoot me now, then you being about 4 cars back isn't going to stop them." Kensi scoffed. She might have been pointing out the obvious but it was the truth and backed her argument.
"Good thing I'm not here to stop them, then." He countered easily, chuckling. Shaking her head to her herself in both reluctant amusement and vexation, she reached across where her cell laid and unceremoniously hung up. A smirk graced her features when she heard Sam beep his horn not a second later, although he didn't try to call her back.
The rest of the drive to her place went smoothly and quietly, apart from the radio that she had turned on and managed to tune only a few minutes before she turned onto the street where her apartment building was located. Sam's car was still an eyesore in her rear-view mirror, though he was no longer trying to hide behind 4 cars.
Parking in her usual space, Kensi exited her car and locked it behind her before heading over to where the familiar silver vehicle had pulled up by the curb side not too far away. The passenger's side window was already rolled down for her as she reached the car and leant her arms against it to talk to the driver. Her initial annoyance at the situation had worn away with time and the fact that no matter what she did or said, it wouldn't change anything, anyway. And considering the long day that she had had, mixed with the fact that it was pretty late, Kensi couldn't be bothered to put any energy into any emotions that she knew would just be a waste.
"I thought you were on your way home?" She asked him casually.
"I am." Sam replied as he turned to look at her, the streetlights giving them the visibility to see each other.
"Really?" Kensi said dryly. " Didn't know my place was on your route."
"It can be. You know how I like to mix it up sometimes." A smile accompanied his words, one filled with charm and teasing that made her smile back.
"Of course." She agreed mock-seriousness, showing how much she really did believe him. He merely raised an eyebrow at her words but she ignored it and asked the question she had originally came to ask. "How long are you going to wait?"
"Until you stop talking to me." He answered nonchalantly and she laughed at his words.
"Liar." She rebuked, but let the topic be as she pushed away from the car and took a step back. "Goodnight, Sam."
"Night, Kens." Sam replied likewise, to which she nodded and turned away to make her way to her place, telling herself that she didn't care anymore whether he did indeed stay or leave.
...
