My sincere apologies for the delay. Exams, trouble, you know the deal. Anyway, here's chapter 5 of my story about Kensi, the mystery of her dad and Callen right in the middle of it. Please read & review! Because of the absence of my beta-reader, this chapter is not beta-ed unfortunately. Be gentle.

Chapter Five: Hetty

Four men were waiting impatiently in the OSP room after they had seen Hetty and Kensi leaving. It had almost been ten minutes and they hadn't heard a thing yet. Each and every one of them wanted to go downstairs, to see what was going on, but Hetty had forbidden it. And so they had stayed put. As of natural, Sam became the first to be annoyed. He looked around the room to see that nothing had changed since the last ten minutes: Eric was still playing his new Call of Duty game on mute, Nate had picked a computer and had already started on his task to profile the ones involved. Sam turned his head to the right and found the last person unaccounted for. After Kensi had gone with Hetty, G had sat down on a chair and hadn't done a thing since. Sam had noticed a look between his best friend and their female partner before she had left, but had no idea what it had meant. At the moment he didn't care. The thing that worried him more was the unusual stare Callen had been expressing for the last ten minutes. Sam rolled his stool towards his partner and when Callen still didn't move, Sam touched his shoulder to get his attention. Slowly the touched one moved his head towards him.

"Hey man, what's up?" Sam noticed that it took Callen some force to put aside the thoughts he had been so occupied by for the last ten minutes. When he finally succeeded, he bowed his head.

"It's my fault." Sam had somehow expected this answer. He's always blaming himself. Maybe the G stands for Guilt.

"How? I don't get it." Callen let out a sigh.

"I should've never let her come with me."

"She probably said please. Nobody can resist Kensi saying please." Sam tried to cheer him up with a joke, but it only resulted in a very tiny little smile from Callen. At least it is something. The ex-Navy Seal put his arm around his partner.

"Come on man. Stop blaming yourself. You can't protect all of us all the time. Kensi is a big girl, she knows what she's doing." Sam now stared straight into the icy blue eyes of his best friend and didn't like what he saw. He was seriously blaming himself. Suddenly, his look turned towards determination and Callen slowly stood up.

"No. I don't think she does know what she's doing." With that, he left a defeated Sam behind and walked towards the exit doors, determined to protect Kensi. Not so much to protect her from Hetty, but mostly from herself.

When Callen arrived at the stairs, he already saw Kensi and Hetty talking and from the looks of it, it was a heated fight. Neither of them had noticed him yet and so he walked down the stairs as silent as possible. When he arrived at Hetty's desk, still neither had attention for him and they continued their argument. Upon scraping his throat, both women turned their heads towards him. Kensi's head had turned a slight shade of red while Hetty's glasses had made their way down her nose a little. Although the male detective could see the anger boiling inside of his boss, she stayed calm.

"I thought I told you to stay upstairs until I say otherwise." Callen put his hands in his trouser pockets.

"I know, but I have something important to say." Hetty folded her arms.

"What could be more important than this conversation?" Callen tried to make eye contact with Kensi but the woman was avoiding his direction. He let out a inaudible sigh.

"It's my fault. I told Kensi she could stay onto the investigation until I said so. You can't blame her. In my opinion, she can still stay onto it. We could use all the help we've got." Upon hearing that, Kensi's head switched towards him. He saw tears welling up in her eyes. He tried to smile but failed. He tried hard to keep his face from betraying the double feeling he had about this matter. Although he'd firmly admit Kensi is one of the greatest and talented young agents in the country, her state of mind he witnessed when they were at the crime scene made him doubt very hard about the capability of her staying focused during this personal case.

He heard a sound from Hetty's direction.

"Oh Mr. Callen…"

"It's the truth." Hopeful brown eyes stared towards the tiny little woman and it almost looked like the birthmark in Kensi's eye became more pronounced. After a long pause, Hetty spoke again.

"You are too involved, Ms. Blye. It's too dangerous for you. I can't keep you on the case, not officially and not personally." Kensi couldn't control her actions anymore and rose up, shoving the chair away loudly. Hetty called her name while the female agent had already turned her back towards both Hetty and Callen.

"IF… If I find out you're still working this case one way or the other, there will be serious consequences. And when I say serious, I mean bloody serious, Ms. Blye. Keep that in mind." Without turning around, Kensi stormed out of their sight. Callen and Hetty shared a look of understanding before the man ran after his colleague to save whatever there was still left of their female agent.

Callen had caught up with Kensi just outside the front door of their extraordinary office. He sprinted the last part and squeezed his hand around her shoulder, demanding her to stop. But she wasn't going to let go that easily. She forcefully tried to free herself from his grip, but he was still stronger.

"Let go of me." She again tried to wrestle her shoulder away but learned Callen wasn't going to loosen his grip. She changed over to plan B. Kensi grabbed his arm with her other hand. Callen wasn't expecting this and without too much force, his arm ended up behind his back. Soon he got a hold of himself again and with ease he turned himself out of the awkward situation. Since he didn't want her to overpower him again, he embraced her with both of his arms, forcing her close to him.

"Let go of me, G!" He felt her fists hitting his chest multiple times and although it did hurt him, he set his teeth to not show her how he felt. She is already hurt enough. Quickly though, she stopped trying to free herself from his grip and she calmed down. She straightened up and he let go of her while keep standing in front of her.

"Take it easy, Kenz. Running away never helped anyone." She didn't dare to look him straight in the eye yet so she moved her head sideways.

"I know." When she still didn't look at him, Callen felt the figurative distance between them grow bigger.

"And I know how much you want in on this case. But if Hetty says so.."

"I know."

"We will do our very best to catch whoever murdered Fortell." He saw Kensi's face relax a bit more after hearing those words.

" And will there be any information related to your father or his death, we will find it. You know that too."

"I know." Kensi let out a sigh. The male agent's brow furrowed.

"Than what's the matter?" A long pause followed. Kensi's head stayed low and Callen saw her biting her lip. She doubted if she would tell him her secret, thinking through the possibilities of finding out the truth about her father's death and losing her job. But she couldn't let go. She couldn't let go of her only hope. She felt Callen's hand touch her shoulder again when he spoke up.

"You know you can talk to me, Kenz. You know you can trust me. I'll always be there for you." Upon hearing these words, a shiver cursed through her body. Only hours ago, Nate had said the exact same thing. She slowly looked up and saw the honesty that radiated out of the clear ocean eyes in front of her. Again she felt tears welling up but she managed to keep them from falling down. Very, very slowly but determined her hand moved towards her pocket. She grabbed Callen's hand from her shoulder and she shoved the plastic evidence bag inside of it without unlocking their eyes.

The moment he felt the bag inside his hand, everything just fell into place. That's why she wanted to stay on this case so badly. That's why she was so jumpy at the scene. She was holding back evidence. But she had given it to him eventually.

"Thank you." He finally looked down at the bag in his hand. It was a piece of paper, smeared with blood. An address was written on it.

"You found this at the crime scene." Kensi only nodded.

"Where?"

"The bushes. Looked like he was holding it in his hand." Callen searched for Kensi's eyes again. He needed to know.

"Why? Why keep it?" Kensi started to ramble.

"I don't know. It was stupid. IS stupid. Completely stupid. But I couldn't just let it go. The moment I saw the paper, I knew it had something to do with my father. I just knew it. But I don't have any evidence for that. It's just my gut telling me I should keep it and find out the truth myself before wasting it again." She didn't know if she made any sense, but was relieved to see the understanding in her colleague's eyes. He slowly nodded.

"I know the feeling."

"Always trust your guts, right?" Callen tried to smile but failed for the second time today.

"Right."

"So..?"

"So what?"

"What are you going to do with it?"

"It's evidence. I'll put it together with the other evidence we find. We'll find out what's hidden there, Kenz. We will." Kensi's face became shocked and she snitched the paper out of Callen's hand again before he could react.

"NO! You can't do that." Callen put his hands up in defeat.

"I have to! It's evidence. I can't withhold it, you know that!" Kensi grabbed his shirt to empower her next statement.

"Wait for it.. just for today. Just for tonight. You can put it together with the rest first thing tomorrow morning. Just give me one night." Now it was Callen's turn to look shocked.

"What? Are you kidding me?" When he found it Kensi was indeed telling the truth, he became angry.

"You can't do that. They'll find out. Hetty'll find out. And she'll fire you. And not just fire you! You will endanger the case all together. All the other evidence will be pronounced compromised and the murderer will go free. IF we find him at all without knowing what you found at that address." Although Kensi knew the true meaning behind his words, she could only think about that one clue she needed to find out what happened to her father. And why. She was so close, she couldn't let go.

"I don't care." With those words she started to walk away. Callen made a quick sprint and stood in front of her again within seconds.

"You are CRAZY! We can't lose you! You can't lose yourself like that!" Still, his words didn't have the outcome he had hoped for. Tears were now slowly making their way down her face.

"I need to, G. I need to. I can't help it. If I don't do this, I will never forgive myself. You hear me? NEVER." Again she walked past by him and walked away. When Callen looked at her, slowly walking the small aisle, the shivers cursed through his body. He knew exactly how the picture looked like.

Someone on his way to his death penalty.

He couldn't let that happen. If there was somebody who deserved all of the goodness in life, it was the woman in front of him, now digging her own grave with every step she took.

He couldn't.

Before she was about to turn the corner, she felt another hand touching her back. This time the hand didn't use force, but it had an enormous effect. It felt like she became paralyzed. She slowly turned around, her tired face now again staring straight into the most beautiful eyes she had ever seen.

"I'll go."