Viva Mexico
Disclaimer: I don´t own any characters or anything!
Summary: Post-Hiatus. Gibbs moves to Mexico after resigning from duty. The team is ambushed and soon news are out that an old enemy is back. Will Gibbs come back to save them or does it need a little more to convince him that the team needs him?
2- Mexico
The following day Mike Franks got off the plane. He had not taken any baggage for his trip to Washington and could walk right out into the parking lot. He felt the warm wind playing with his hair and sighed. It was so much nicer here in Mexico -not as rainy as in DC and certainly not as cold. His eyes scanned the area and stopped on the features of a woman.
As he walked up, she smiled. "Welcome back, Mike. How was the trip?" Linda asked and tilted her head a bit. She had moved into his neighborhood about a year ago and they had become a good friend since then. She was half-italian and a very handsome young woman, but Franks never saw more in her than a friend.
"Damn good to be back. I didn´t remember Washington to be so cold." He said and followed her to the silver car that was parked a few rows away. "Ever been to DC?" He asked and wondered a bit why she had never told him much about her past. He knew that she had divorced after her husband had tried to kill her, but that was about it. She was now working as a teacher at the local school.
She nodded and got behind the steering wheel. "I lived there for a while -at least until my husband freaked out. Nice place, but pretty cold at times. And the kids at school are worse than around here." She replied and pulled out of the parking lot. "So, did you find what you were looking for?"
He nodded and watched some cars passing by. "Kind of, yes. When I was still working in Washington, I had a man on my team who was probably the most brilliant on the job I´ve ever seen." He began, careful not to tell her too much. He had figured that she was too young and too sensitive to know the full truth about his past. Inspite of her job as a PE coach, she seemed fragile, almost too delicate for such a story. "He resigned last night -that´s the call I got. They wanted me to persuade him to change his mind, but he would never do that. If you met him, you would think that he´s probably the most grumpy person on this planet, but he´s top on his job."
Linda just nodded and thought for a moment. "What kind of job are you talking about? It doesn´t sound like you were selling computers or something like that." She said and smiled a bit when she saw the slight panik creeping into his features. He had never told her about his former job, but she had figured it out on her own, only she didn´t want him to notice that she knew.
"I worked in criminal investigation. It´s not always as pretty as it looks on TV, so I thought I´d spare you with details. Didn´t mean to be rude, Lin." He replied and waited until she had pulled up in his driveway. "Care for some coffee? I´ll tell you more if you want to know." He offered and she accepted with a smile.
Half an hour later they sat outside on the porch of his house, watching the sun go down behind some mountains. "So, you´ve been with the police?" She asked after a moment, sipping at her cup.
Franks grinned and shook his head. "No, not the police. Ever heard of something called NCIS?" He asked, but got a headshake, indicating no. "It´s short for Naval Criminal Investigative Service. I was a teamleader. We were investigating crimes within the Navy or such that had to do something with the Navy. I had three agents in my team -the man I told you about was one of them. He was the best I´ve ever seen. He had an instinct to what was wrong or right that has always amazed me. After I left NCIS, he eventually became a teamleader himself. Jenny, who is the Director at NCIS now and a good friend of mine, told me that his team solved more cases than any other around -I guess he really had them trained well. To make a long story short, Jenny called me up last night to have me come to DC and talk to my old friend, but it wouldn´t have worked. I just watched him leaving and there was nothing I could have done to change that." He said and watched her closely.
"Sounds sad somehow. You didn´t talk to him then?" She asked and put the cup to her lips again, smelling the strong coffee that was in her cup.
He shook his head. "Call me a coward, but I didn´t dare to walk up to him. It´s been too long and besides that he wouldn´t change his mind if the president himself would try to convince him. He´s a headstrong bastard, but still a great agent. It´s sometimes like that, you know. I knew him before his wife and daughter died -he was different back then. Has changed a lot after it happened." Franks emptied his cup and looked at his neighbor. "More?"
She drowned the last sip and shook her head. "Thanks, but I´ve got to get going. I´ll see you around, Mike." She put the empty cup onto the small table and walked off the porch. Her house lay half a block up the road, which was a five minute walk from his place. A blue car passed her as she was walking towards her house and she turned around briefly when she noticed it pulling into Franks´ driveway. Without looking back, she accelerated her steps and closed the door behind her back. She didn´t want to see who was coming to visit Mike -she had heard more today than she had probably wanted to.