CHAPTER FOUR

"Feeling better, Probie?" Tony asked smirking when McGee returned to work the following day.

"Yeah, why?" He asked suspicious of him.

"No reason." Tony lied waiting for Abby to get to work.

"Tomorrow is the last day and then you have to go back to school." Abby told Paige when they were getting ready to go to NCIS.

"I'm not going back there!" She yelled and then slammed her door.

"Paige. Get back here." Abby said back, not loud but in the tone that immediately got Paige to comply.

"Sorry for slamming the door, Mom." She said with her head down when she walked slowly out of the room.

"Okay. I know that you won't want to go back to that school. Dad is taking you to your new school tomorrow." Abby explained.

"Okay."

"Abs, Gibbs wants to know how long it's gonna be on those results." McGee said entering the lab when Tony told him to go. "Abs?" He asked when he did not see her and there was no music playing.

"Hi, I'm Paige." Came an unfamiliar voice as a little girl appeared in front of him. She was exactly how he pictured Abby to have looked like at that age, right down to the ebony tresses and green eyes, bright and curious.

"Hi. I'm Tim. I'm looking for Abby." He said not knowing how to react in that situation.

"Mom's in the ballistics lab." Paige said easily and then ran off to watch her mother through the glass window. When McGee was finally able to move again he followed and stood watching Abby too. The confidence she showed as she fired the weapon into the drum for testing was impressive.

"Did you say that you're Abby's daughter?" He asked.

"Yeah. Where were you yesterday?" Paige asked and then smiled up at him. The same he had seen a million times.

"I was sick." He admitted.

"McGee, didn't know you were here." Abby said walking out of the ballistics lab and pulling her goggles and earmuffs off. "Paige."

"Yeah." she answered then in ASL Abby told her to go and see her father upstairs while they talked.

"Thanks, Baby-girl." She said ruffling her daughter's hair as she passed. When she was out of the lab, Abby looked back at McGee.

"Abs?"

"I have a really long story for you." Abby said sitting down trying to convince him to do the same.

"I think so."

**flashback**

"So now he's threatening to take me to court and get custody of Paige." Abby explained sitting in Gibbs' house. He was holding the infant, and was so good at it.

"What did you do?" He asked looking lovingly at the dark haired baby who had her eyes open and appeared to be watching Gibbs.

"I dared him to." Abby said.

"What if he does?" Gibbs asked. He knew that Abby was mature for eighteen but wanted to make sure she was doing the right thing.

"Well his name isn't on Paige's birth certificate so it'll take a paternity test first. And he can't afford that. So I'm pretty cool for a while. Once I get my Master's Paige and I will be fine."

"So you're still studying?"

"Yeah. I stayed at college until I was humungous. Then I studied by correspondence. Luckily my parents bought me a laptop before they kicked me out." She laughed. He didn't even though it obviously wasn't a raw issue with her. He didn't laugh much these days anyway. Not since losing Kelly. Paige was what kept him from pulling the trigger when he was more than ready to. How she could get excited when he walked into the room, and smile at him with her eyes.

**end of flashback**

"Daddy."

"Princess Paige. What are you doing up here?" He asked. "Where's your mother?"

"Talking to some guy. I think his name was Tim." She said jumping up onto his desk. Only two people were allowed to get away with such liberties, and they were mother and daughter.

"I knew you should have gone DiNozzo." Gibbs said to Tony.

"I know. I would have loved to see the look on his face." He said laughing.

"Instead of McGee." He said glaring at the younger agent.

"Oh. Right."

"Aunt Kate." Paige squealed when Kate entered the squad-room. Kate was beaming from the adoration already from the little girl.

"Hi, Paige." She said dropping her bag in time to catch the full weight of the little girl with as much enthusiasm as Abby.

"Why didn't you take to me that quickly?" Tony asked offended. Kate remembered when Tony asked Abby that same question only a few days after she had started at NCIS.

**flashback**

"Kate and I have a theory." Abby said proudly.

"Why didn't you take to me that quickly?" Tony asked.

"You're like a piercing Tony. Takes a while for the throbbing to stop and the skin to grow back." Abby informed him putting her hand on his back to comfort him for the second that she walked passed him.

**end of flashback**

"Why didn't you tell me?" McGee asked after Abby explained.

"Don't feel bad. I didn't tell anyone." She smiled trying to not make him feel as betrayed.

"I know. But I thought that we were closer than most." He said shyly, as with every reference to their previous 'relationship'.

"We were but there was never going to be a long term relationship. There was no need."

"Wow... Okay." He scoffed, being reminded of the conversation they had when he wanted to become exclusive with her.

"Look, I wasn't looking for a father for Paige. She's already got enough to understand. Introducing her to boyfriends would have been just too much." Abby explained. "And she's got a man she already adores as her father."

"Who's that?" He asked after hearing how bad Paige's biological father was, and that it couldn't be him.

"Um... Gibbs." She said hesitantly.

"What?"

"Yeah. That's another long story." Abby said and he didn't appear to be ready to leave.

"Paige-meister, didn't know you were still here." Tony said loudly when he returned to the squad-room.

"Paige." Gibbs said to get her attention. The look on her face said that she didn't like the nickname so her father told her what to do in ASL. She slowly approached Tony, motioned him to lean down just a few inches, before expertly smacking the back of his head like Gibbs had told her to.

"Hey!" He complained, and Paige started giggling. Gibbs had to laugh too.

"Agent McGee!" The mystery man said when he entered the squad-room.

"JT. How you doing?" McGee got up and asked his friend.

"Same old. You know me." JT said smiling broadly at McGee. "Listen Timmy. I need to see a co-worker of your's."

"Okay." The special agent was curious.

"Abby Sciuto, where would I find her?" He asked.

"I'll bring you to her." McGee offered getting up.

"I guess we could go tomorrow, so long as a case doesn't come in." Gibbs said to Abby.

"Yay." Paige cheered and hugged Gibbs. She loved school but never wanted to return to her old school again.

"Alright, now I have to get back to work so you stay here with Mom and we can go to lunch together." Gibbs said putting her down.

"Okay, Dad."

"Oh, isn't that sweet." Jason said as he and McGee entered the lab, just as Gibbs was leaving. In once swift movement Gibbs had his pushed against the nearest wall and his Sig in the man's face.

"Mommy, that's the man that took me." Paige said beginning to get upset.

"Boss, uh...?" McGee said before he was interrupted. Abby grabbed hold of Gibbs' hand and was trying to stop him from killing Jason. In public, with cameras.

"Mom." Paige started to cry for the first time since she was reunited with her parents, yet more hysterically than they had in some time.

"McGee! Get Paige out of here. Now!" She yelled and he instantly picked up the girl and took her out of the room.

"Abs." He tried when they got to the door.

"Go!" She yelled again as she tried to get Gibbs off of Jason.

"Abby, you should go too." Gibbs said coldly as he remained unmoved by Abby with his Sig ready to fire a bullet into the man's head.

"Gibbs don't. It's not worth it." She screamed to him still trying to pry his arm down.

"Abby, I mean it." He said and then looked at her in a way that made her let go and move away. "Get Tony, then stay with Ducky."

"But Gibbs..."

"Do it." And the scientist listened, not wanting to be part of that situation or in the way of the angry Special agent.

"Abby, what the hell is going on?" Tony asked when he ran into Abby as she was running out of the elevator and he was running in. He had his Sig in his hand too as did McGee who was next to him.

"Go to my lab. You have to stop Gibbs." She said hysterically, too shocked to cry.

"Stop him from what?" He asked getting into the elevator.

"Quickly." Abby said and then Paige ran to her still crying. "It's okay, Baby-girl. Dad's gonna be fine."

"I'm scared. He hurt me, Mom." She admitted.

"I asked you. I thought you said he didn't hurt you." Abby asked getting down to the girl's level and looking her straight in the eyes.

"I didn't want you to be mad. I was just happy to be back." Paige said trying not to make her mother angry. "And it was the other one, not him. He was the one that took me from school."

"I'm not mad, and I never could be at you. Just tell me what happened." Abby tried.

"Let Daddy get him." Was all she said wiping the tears from her cheeks.

"Go to Aunt Kate." Abby said then bolted to Tim's computer. She pulled up the lab camera onto the large screen.

"Abby, what's happening?" Kate asked when she helped the distraught girl onto her lap.

"Hold on." She said approaching the screen. She was still shaken by what her daughter was not telling her, but was trying to focus on the first crisis at hand. There was someone on the ground of her lab and she was trying to see that it was not any of the guys she adored, but she couldn't tell. "Paige, stay here!"

Abby ran to the elevator again leaving Kate confused.

"What happened?" Abby asked when she walked into the lab.

"He went after Gibbs. There was nothing else we could do." Tony said and when Abby looked at him, he seemed embarrassed.

"Well...? No-one's filling me in on what happened." Abby pointed out. She looked down at the man she had wanted to see dead since the moment he declared his hate for their daughter. But now, the way it had played out and what his death could do to any of the men that cared so much for her, was worrying.